Disney World at Thanksgiving

[Dismom820]

Has anyone gone during the Thanksgiving holiday? We are very excited to see the famous Christmas transformation, this is something we've always wanted to see in person! But, I have heard that Thanksgiving is one of the most busy times of the year! Have i gotten myself in a pickle? I will have a 2 year old going with me, she's usually a easy going kid and loved her Disney experience last year, but it wasn't a high volume time when we went. I just need some tips or a heads up! hahah

 

[GC&S]

We went this past year for the first time at Thanksgiving. We got there the sunday before and stayed until the Monday after. It got more crowded as the week went on but it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. We are rope drop people but we also closed down the parks a couple of nights. The decorations were amazing and we really liked all the holiday traditions that were highlighted at Epcot. We did the Christmas party. We went to Animal Kingdom on Thanksgiving day and it was not too bad. We ate at DTD for thanksgiving.

I don't know if we would go again during that time as the weather was so different. It was the only time we took a backpack into the parks. We would start out in shorts but by evening were in jeans, sweatshirts, hats and gloves. Normally when we go in the fall it's warm all the time.

 

[Dismom820]

We went this past year for the first time at Thanksgiving. We got there the sunday before and stayed until the Monday after. It got more crowded as the week went on but it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. We are rope drop people but we also closed down the parks a couple of nights. The decorations were amazing and we really liked all the holiday traditions that were highlighted at Epcot. We did the Christmas party. We went to Animal Kingdom on Thanksgiving day and it was not too bad. We ate at DTD for thanksgiving.

I don't know if we would go again during that time as the weather was so different. It was the only time we took a backpack into the parks. We would start out in shorts but by evening were in jeans, sweatshirts, hats and gloves. Normally when we go in the fall it's warm all the time.

oh goodness, we are doing a short trip, since my little one is still young. we have planned to go down on wednesday, magic kingdom on thanksgiving, animal kingdom on friday and back to magic kingdom on saturday then leave sunday. i'm assuming all the days we do the parks it will be super crowded then? I've heard nothing but amazing things about the christmas decor! we are rope drop people as well, so I'm hoping to knock out as many rides as possible first thing in the morning. i didn't even think about the weather though. it will be cold enough for gloves at night? i think after this trip, our next ones will be planned during the months of february or march. so hopefully we won't have this issue again, but we wanted to experience the christmas decor at least once! hahah

 

[sharadoc]

Magic Kingdom is the crazy busy park on Thanksgiving Day. The weather last year was really wacky and not typical. We got there on the 18th and it was normal, then turned into August hot, huge thunderstorms, then freezing at night for a couple days.

 

[GC&S]

oh goodness, we are doing a short trip, since my little one is still young. we have planned to go down on wednesday, magic kingdom on thanksgiving, animal kingdom on friday and back to magic kingdom on saturday then leave sunday. i'm assuming all the days we do the parks it will be super crowded then? I've heard nothing but amazing things about the christmas decor! we are rope drop people as well, so I'm hoping to knock out as many rides as possible first thing in the morning. i didn't even think about the weather though. it will be cold enough for gloves at night? i think after this trip, our next ones will be planned during the months of february or march. so hopefully we won't have this issue again, but we wanted to experience the christmas decor at least once! hahah

I would stay away from MK on Thanksgiving. We had friends that were there at rope drop and said it was crazy even at that time. That's why we went to AK. I think Friday will be busy everywhere. We went to DTD Friday morning and it was insane. But I think if you manage your FP and expect waits, you should do fine.

The weather was unseasonably cold when we went. The wind was awful at night, so yes, we wore our gloves and hats. But we are from Ohio so it really didn't bother us (except I really want warm when I go to Florida) It also rained a couple days (like they shut down rides and made everyone go into One Man's Dream at HS) due to tornado warnings.

But seeing the Osborne lights was incredible and we met Santa Goofy at HS.

 

[mjkacmom]

Why not go after Thankgiving? I have kids in college, high school, and middle school, so we can only travel during peak times. Enjoy your ability to travel without crowds.

 

[Dismom820]

Magic Kingdom is the crazy busy park on Thanksgiving Day. The weather last year was really wacky and not typical. We got there on the 18th and it was normal, then turned into August hot, huge thunderstorms, then freezing at night for a couple days.

wow, thats going to be interesting packing clothes lol

 

[Dismom820]

I would stay away from MK on Thanksgiving. We had friends that were there at rope drop and said it was crazy even at that time. That's why we went to AK. I think Friday will be busy everywhere. We went to DTD Friday morning and it was insane. But I think if you manage your FP and expect waits, you should do fine.

The weather was unseasonably cold when we went. The wind was awful at night, so yes, we wore our gloves and hats. But we are from Ohio so it really didn't bother us (except I really want warm when I go to Florida) It also rained a couple days (like they shut down rides and made everyone go into One Man's Dream at HS) due to tornado warnings.

But seeing the Osborne lights was incredible and we met Santa Goofy at HS.

we have reservations for mickeys backyard bbq on thanksgiving, so we decided to open magic kingdom and leave around 3ish. we won't ever spend a whole day at a park while we're down there. we will have a 2 year old so we don't want to overdo it with her. we understand it will be busy and we are very patient with everything disney hahah we definitely plan to utilize our fast passes so hopefully that will save us any headaches hahah last year when we went, it was for labor day and it was miserably hot, so I'm sure we won't complain about the cold and we know all about florida's rainstorms! hahaha we are excited about the christmas lights and is really the only reason we decided to go at this time!

 

[mondragon]

One of the craziest times of the year to go. Went 2 years ago and I think the day after thanksgiving they were at max capacity. It was miserable.

 

[Dismom820]

Why not go after Thankgiving? I have kids in college, high school, and middle school, so we can only travel during peak times. Enjoy your ability to travel without crowds.

we've always wanted to see the christmas lights in person and the famous "transformation" from thanksgiving to christmas. so we thought we'd try it out this year and my mother is going with me and its the only time of year she'll have more than just a few days off for work. next time though, we plan on going in february or march…which i heard is the ideal off peak season! hahaha but like i said, we wanted the thanksgiving experience this time. we may never try it again after this time though!

 

[Dismom820]

One of the craziest times of the year to go. Went 2 years ago and I think the day after thanksgiving they were at max capacity. It was miserable.

oh man, this is making me nervous hahah i know just being in disney is going to be great and we're looking forward to seeing the christmas lights, but I'm so nervous about the crowds. next time we plan to go during february or march but this year, the only time we could work it out was at thanksgiving.

 

[itchin2go]

We went Thanksgiving week of last year. I researched crowd calendars and picked our parks based on those. We are rope droppers, also, FWIW. We had a great trip. We honestly didn't notice the crowds being worse than any other time of year, but again .... best parks and rope drop. I think those things are key.

Had we gone to the most crowded parks each day at the most crowded times, we would likely have had a different experience.

http://www.easywdw.com/category/calendar/11-november-2015-crowd-calendar/

I'm not sure what you mean by "transformation". We didn't see anything like this. Christmas decorations were already up except for the tree at MK. Other than Osborne Lights at DHS (which were mind-blowing), I was pretty underwhelmed by the decorations. They were nice, but just not the WOW I had created in my mind. We did enjoy the gingerbread display at the Contemporary and some of the chocolate displays at the BC/YC. The tree at AKL was pretty. But again, just nice. I guess I had blown this up in my mind to be a bigger deal that it was. A case of expectations getting in the way.

FWIW - we took it easy on Thanksgiving day, slept in, late breakfast at Boma, and dinner at Hollywood Brown Derby that night - Osborne Lights after. It was a festive way to celebrate the day, and DHS was a "best park" and not gridlocked.

I wouldn't hesitate to go back that week. Other than rain, we loved the weather.

 

[itchin2go]

We went this past year for the first time at Thanksgiving. We got there the sunday before and stayed until the Monday after. It got more crowded as the week went on but it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. We are rope drop people but we also closed down the parks a couple of nights. The decorations were amazing and we really liked all the holiday traditions that were highlighted at Epcot. We did the Christmas party. We went to Animal Kingdom on Thanksgiving day and it was not too bad. We ate at DTD for thanksgiving.

I don't know if we would go again during that time as the weather was so different. It was the only time we took a backpack into the parks. We would start out in shorts but by evening were in jeans, sweatshirts, hats and gloves. Normally when we go in the fall it's warm all the time.

This is funny. We kept waiting for it to get cold, but it never did. Perception is a weird thing! Now, there was one day where it rained incessantly ... That was no fun, but we thought it was warm all week.

 

[Dismom820]

We went Thanksgiving week of last year. I researched crowd calendars and picked our parks based on those. We are rope droppers, also, FWIW. We had a great trip. We honestly didn't notice the crowds being worse than any other time of year, but again .... best parks and rope drop. I think those things are key.

Had we gone to the most crowded parks each day at the most crowded times, we would likely have had a different experience.

http://www.easywdw.com/category/calendar/11-november-2015-crowd-calendar/

I'm not sure what you mean by "transformation". We didn't see anything like this. Christmas decorations were already up except for the tree at MK. Other than Osborne Lights at DHS (which were mind-blowing), I was pretty underwhelmed by the decorations. They were nice, but just not the WOW I had created in my mind. We did enjoy the gingerbread display at the Contemporary and some of the chocolate displays at the BC/YC. The tree at AKL was pretty. But again, just nice. I guess I had blown this up in my mind to be a bigger deal that it was. A case of expectations getting in the way.

FWIW - we took it easy on Thanksgiving day, slept in, late breakfast at Boma, and dinner at Hollywood Brown Derby that night - Osborne Lights after. It was a festive way to celebrate the day, and DHS was a "best park" and not gridlocked.

I wouldn't hesitate to go back that week. Other than rain, we loved the weather.

we plan to visit magic kingdom on thanksgiving. we won't even visit DHS since my little one won't be able to do much there. our two parks of choice this trip is magic kingdom and animal kingdom. there is plenty for her to do at these parks.
we had always heard that the night of thanksgiving, crews come in and transform the parks to christmas so when you come back the next day, its all christmas-y. maybe they don't do that anymore and start adding christmas in early. last year when we went, it was the end of august and they had already started putting up pumpkins for the fall. so maybe they do things a bit differently now.

 

[itchin2go]

we plan to visit magic kingdom on thanksgiving. we won't even visit DHS since my little one won't be able to do much there. our two parks of choice this trip is magic kingdom and animal kingdom. there is plenty for her to do at these parks.
we had always heard that the night of thanksgiving, crews come in and transform the parks to christmas so when you come back the next day, its all christmas-y. maybe they don't do that anymore and start adding christmas in early. last year when we went, it was the end of august and they had already started putting up pumpkins for the fall. so maybe they do things a bit differently now.

Didn't notice anything like this. There were decorations up all week. We went Saturday to Friday of Thanksgiving week. There were trees and decorations up at Epcot and the resorts. There were wreaths on Main Street at MK. The castle was lit up with Christmas lights at night - very pretty. I can't speak to AK, as we didn't visit that park on our last trip. As I said, the tree at AKL was lovely if you have to time to visit that resort.

You will likely love the decorations. I think I just built it up in my head to be something that it wasn't.

Based on that crowd calendar I linked to, I would swap your MK and AK days - AK on Thursday, MK on Friday. It is lucky that you've selected those parks to visit, as they are the top picks for Thursday and Friday, just swapped. It will likely make a huge difference in crowds and how much you will be able to get done. The key, especially at busy times, is to zig when others are zagging, so to speak.

 

[staceyrhood]

we plan to visit magic kingdom on thanksgiving. we won't even visit DHS since my little one won't be able to do much there. our two parks of choice this trip is magic kingdom and animal kingdom. there is plenty for her to do at these parks.
we had always heard that the night of thanksgiving, crews come in and transform the parks to christmas so when you come back the next day, its all christmas-y. maybe they don't do that anymore and start adding christmas in early. last year when we went, it was the end of august and they had already started putting up pumpkins for the fall. so maybe they do things a bit differently now.

The "transformation" of MK from Fall decorations to Christmas takes place the night after the last Not So Scary Party which is usually Nov. 1 0r 2...it will be all Christmas my mid week,

 

[Dismom820]

Didn't notice anything like this. There were decorations up all week. We went Saturday to Friday of Thanksgiving week. There were trees and decorations up at Epcot and the resorts. There were wreaths on Main Street at MK. The castle was lit up with Christmas lights at night - very pretty. I can't speak to AK, as we didn't visit that park on our last trip. As I said, the tree at AKL was lovely if you have to time to visit that resort.

You will likely love the decorations. I think I just built it up in my head to be something that it wasn't.

Based on that crowd calendar I linked to, I would swap your MK and AK days - AK on Thursday, MK on Friday. It is lucky that you've selected those parks to visit, as they are the top picks for Thursday and Friday, just swapped. It will likely make a huge difference in crowds and how much you will be able to get done. The key, especially at busy times, is to zig when others are zagging, so to speak.

thank you for the tip and the crowd calendar! I'm sure we'll enjoy the decor, we love christmas time. we will more than likely switch the days around according to the calendar. maybe the whole transformation thing was a myth ahahah either way, we'll enjoy it!
last time we went was labor day, the crowds seemed low, we were able to ride 10 rides before 1pm…so i doubt we/ll get lucky this time around but we'll definitely work on our "zig"! hahaha

 

[Dismom820]

The "transformation" of MK from Fall decorations to Christmas takes place the night after the last Not So Scary Party which is usually Nov. 1 0r 2...it will be all Christmas my mid week,

maybe i was told something different all this time hahahah I'm sure that either way, we'll enjoy the decor, we love christmas and we love disney so I'm sure either way it'll be a blast!

 

[itchin2go]

The "transformation" of MK from Fall decorations to Christmas takes place the night after the last Not So Scary Party which is usually Nov. 1 0r 2...it will be all Christmas my mid week,

Ah - that makes sense - didn't know that!

thank you for the tip and the crowd calendar! I'm sure we'll enjoy the decor, we love christmas time. we will more than likely switch the days around according to the calendar. maybe the whole transformation thing was a myth ahahah either way, we'll enjoy it!
last time we went was labor day, the crowds seemed low, we were able to ride 10 rides before 1pm…so i doubt we/ll get lucky this time around but we'll definitely work on our "zig"! hahaha

You're going to have a great trip!

 

[sharadoc]

This is funny. We kept waiting for it to get cold, but it never did. Perception is a weird thing! Now, there was one day where it rained incessantly ... That was no fun, but we thought it was warm all week.

The night before Thanksgiving it was around 40 degrees. People had no coats and flip flops, we had 2 sweatshirts and thermal underwear, gloves and knit hats and we were cold. When did you get there?