Crowds in late August ....

[Easto]

Arrival - August 26
Departure - September 2

The crowd calendars show crowds to be in the 3 - 5 range for our trip with the 5 being the weekend.

I've tried to use the crowd calendars to plan which day to do each park, but unfortunately MK is recommended on both arrival and departure days. MK with a 5 and 3 year old girls is a must (with multiple visits).

We can't figure out a strategy to hit 6 park days using the crowd calendars.

Considering it's low season what if we said screw the crowd calendar and did our own thing.

Will this make a big difference this time of year?

 

[ErinsMommy]

We were there last year around those dates and didn't follow a crowd calendar and saw/did everything we wanted

 

[Lucius Best]

I count 9 days, but you're only planning 6 park days? That means you are not going to parks on arrival/departure days, and then you'll have a resort/pool/water park day somewhere in there? With 6 days, you could do 3 days at MK, and one day at each of the other three parks. Note that you could add a 7th day to your tickets for only about $10 per person.

Weekdays that week are a 3, weekends are a 5. So it's conceivable that a recommended day on a weekend would be busier than a non-recommended day during the week. If you can get to the park when it opens, you can get so much done the first hour or two, regardless of the predicted crowd level, so it wouldn't make much of a difference. If you want to minimize crowds, avoid the weekends. You could do something like this:

Wed Aug 26 arrive, pool
Thu Aug 27 AK
Fri Aug 28 MK
Sat Aug 29 Epcot
Sun Aug 30 pool day/water park
Mon Aug 31 MK
Tue Sep 1 HS
Wed Sep 2 MK
Thu Sep 3 depart

 

[lauradis]

Epcot on the weekends is more crowded
Magic Kingdom after 11am on Mondays and Saturdays is normally the most crowded.


http://www.easywdw.com/category/calendar/08-august-2015-crowd-calendar/

Easy is the best one to explain why.

The first park in green is projected to be the lowest crowd day park.

 

[ML_LovesDisney]

Arrival - August 26
Departure - September 3

The crowd calendars show crowds to be in the 3 - 5 range for our trip with the 5 being the weekend.

I've tried to use the crowd calendars to plan which day to do each park, but unfortunately MK is recommended on both arrival and departure days. MK with a 5 and 3 year old girls is a must (with multiple visits).

We can't figure out a strategy to hit 6 park days using the crowd calendars.

Considering it's low season what if we said screw the crowd calendar and did our own thing.

Will this make a big difference this time of year?

We went the last week of August once, and it was not crowded at all. We walked on a lot of things at MK in the mornings. I stress "in the mornings", I don't know what it got like by afternoon since we tried to hit all of our must-do rides in the morning then went back to resort to swim.

 

[DizDaD7]

Id just wing it..It's definetly lower time than Jersey week, which is highly manageable so 3's will be a breeze....( Pun intended) Also 5's on the weekend will be fine I'm guessin....

 

[Easto]

Sorry. I had a typo. We leave to come home on the 2nd, not the 3rd.

Our tickets are 6 park days + one of typhoon lagoon, blizzard beach, or Disney quest.

 

[Easto]

Last time I went to Disney was during March break. I played the crowd calendar when choosing parks, but during March break it was a zoo.

Is it same to assume that even a Non-Recommend park in late august is not even close to being as busy as a Recommended park during March break?

 

[Lucius Best]

Is it same to assume that even a Non-Recommend park in late august is not even close to being as busy as a Recommended park during March break?

It depends. On a crowd level 5 weekend in August, a non-recommended park might be a 6-7? But a weekday in March crowd level 7, a recommended park might be a 6.

But that's a worst case comparison: the busiest non-recommended day in late-August to the quietest recommended day in mid-March. In your case, weekdays should be pretty light. Weekends and EMH days will be busier. If you plan accordingly, you can avoid the worst crowds.

 

[Ava]

Are you staying on-site and do you have park hoppers? If so, you could take advantage of morning EMH at MK one day. Crowd calendars never recommend the parks with EMH, but if you are able to take advantage of the early morning hours and then hop to another (recommended) park for the afternoon, it can work out well.

 

[Easto]

We are staying at the Poly and don't have park hopper

 

[GillianP1301]

We always go the week leading up to Labour Day, which is normally late August, but this year is the week after you are going, and the crowds are very manageable. I believe the crowds start to go down a a bit 2 weeks before Labour Day, so you should be good. With 3 - 5 on the crowd calendars, I wouldn't stress out that much on which park on what day.