Anyone know why it's so busy right now?

[goofy4prez]

I myself no longer use Touring Plans or any other crowd calendar to plan when I'm going to Disney or what parks I'm going to go to or avoid on any particular day. I have found it to be busy all the time regardless of which park it is as with what day, week or month as well. It's changed so much over the past few years. Now I will go to WDW when I want to go and visit which park I want that is convenient to me.

 

[NancyK]

We just got back from 10 days at Disney. Agree with a lot of what has been said. The parks were busier than any other January we've been. We managed to see almost everything with fastpass and Disney After Hours. In 40 trips, I've never noticed any real problems with the bathrooms until this year. Garbage overflowing and empty paper towel dispensers were a common problem.

 

[PDXmouse]

We were in MK around 10:00 am and left around 9 pm. There were definite crowds but we worked the FP system and felt pretty good about our day. We did:
Swiss Family Tree
Flying Carpets
Lunch at Pecos Bills
BTMRR
Pirates
Did a little shopping
Got a dole whip to share
Jungle Cruise
Hall of Presidents
Haunted Mansion
Got a root beer float to share
Carousel of Progress
Space Mountain
Space Ranger Spin
Snack at Casey’s Corner
Shopped a little
Pooh/Tigger meet and greet
Rested while waiting for Fireworks Dessert Party
Dessert Party
Viewed OUAT and HEA

 

[Animal]

The Brazilian Real has firmed up a bit. In January 2016, it took 4.09 Real to get a $. Now it only takes 3.15 Real to get a $. I also suspect a lot of Brazilians delayed their trip a year or two because of the Rio Olympics.

 

[zebrastreyepz]

We have never considered January/February but Festival of the Arts will have us there next year.

 

[PavlovPluto]

We were there from 1/21 through yesterday. My husband came down with the flu during out first night and never made it to the parks. I think half of Brazil was there. There were the large groups as well as many families. My daughter and I got caught up in one group as we were walking, and it was no small feat to extricate ourselves. We didn't see too much grossness in the bathrooms that people have mentioned, but I did notice the trash can in the Frozen ride line was overflowing with trash on the floor all around it. It kind of took away from the ambiance. On Friday, we did FP+ FOP, the posted stand by wait at the time was 210, Everest was at 70. We've had much better luck in the past on Jersey week and also early December, but I hear those have gotten more crowded as well.

 

[katallo]

We have been here for 5 days and it's crowded. We went to Disney Springs today and crowds resembled Easter. And tons of people appear sick with coughing. So far, we have heard 3 people say they had chills. I wish the fever and chills folks would stay in the room for awhile.

 

[Animal]

We were there from 1/21 through yesterday. My husband came down with the flu during out first night and never made it to the parks. I think half of Brazil was there. There were the large groups as well as many families. My daughter and I got caught up in one group as we were walking, and it was no small feat to extricate ourselves. We didn't see too much grossness in the bathrooms that people have mentioned, but I did notice the trash can in the Frozen ride line was overflowing with trash on the floor all around it. It kind of took away from the ambiance. On Friday, we did FP+ FOP, the posted stand by wait at the time was 210, Everest was at 70. We've had much better luck in the past on Jersey week and also early December, but I hear those have gotten more crowded as well.

Almost sounds like your husband got the better end of the bargain! I kid. Sorry this happened to your family. My nightmare is getting sick during a Disney vacation!

 

[Donna3271]

WE were there earlier this month for the Marathon (Jan 3-9), and honestly it was our 8th Marathon weekend, and I have NEVER seen it that crowded! The lines were impossible. We basically just did what we had fast passes for and walked around.

I was there over Easter a few years ago, and honestly, this felt more crowded.

 

[hllb]

Sitting at Skipper’s Canteen now. It’s definitely more crowded than I’m used to, but I don’t think it’s going to be too high today. 5 at MK was predicted. I’m thinking it might be a 6. We didn’t do headliners multiple times - I never could find another space mountain FP. But, we only cut maybe 2 things off our plan and if we weren’t doing a dessert party we wouldn’t need to

 

[Nuclear Monkey]

Pro-bowl.

 

[emilyrachael]

We were there this past week and it was more crowded than we expected. We did hit a few low crowd days, but generally, lines were longer and there were more people everywhere. We noticed a lot of South American tour groups, snow birds, and big family groups. I do wish Disney would have planned for the crowds a little better and extended hours or at least ran both sides of queues more.

 

[hllb]

I didn’t see any large tour groups at MK today. If they were here, we randomly avoided them.

 

[PavlovPluto]

Almost sounds like your husband got the better end of the bargain! I kid. Sorry this happened to your family. My nightmare is getting sick during a Disney vacation!

I'm just thankful at this point that my daughter or I didn't catch it before we had to travel home!

 

[Action City]

Pro-bowl.

Pro bowl has zero to negligible impact on crowds.

 

[katherine52478]

We got here yesterday and went straight to Epcot (World Showcase). Packed pathways and super long lines at all food booths and counter service locations. The bathroom lines weren’t too bad but there were some areas that needed to be cleaned up. We were last here in November 2016 and this was equal to the Friday night we spent at Food and Wine.

This afternoon/evening, we went to MK. It was a pretty soggy night so it didn’t seem too crowded and the standbys weren’t terrible (15 min for PoTC, 25 min for BTRR). We just did our 3 FP and the People Mover and left but it was pretty easy to navigate around. There were some Brazilian families but we didn’t see any tour groups either day.

So far, a great start to our trip!

 

[fiasco32]

Pro bowl has zero to negligible impact on crowds.

How does one know this? This is only the second year it’s been in Orlando.

Randy Moss had an entourage at MK on Friday evening.

 

[hllb]

Numbers are out. MK was a 5 as predicted. The other parks were 1 level higher than expected, I believe.

 

[rpb718]

Pro bowl has zero to negligible impact on crowds.

May or may not be true. I wouldn't go by a sample size of 1 year to offer anything definitive. While is seems that the crowd levels may not be affected, the increase in the number of VIP tours being conducted may have an effect. Prior to the Pro Bowl on TV, there was a spot where a couple players were taped maybe 1 or 2 days before Sunday riding 7DMT in MK and EE in AK and possibly something else I can't remember what. I'm sure they didn't wait in line to get on those rides - and setting it up to take video of them riding didn't help wait times.

As an aside - one of the players riding 7DMT cars was tall and did NOT look comfortable sitting on that ride.

 

[WillowRain]

I'm just thankful at this point that my daughter or I didn't catch it before we had to travel home!

Right? My kids caught a little cough bug, oldest had a mild fever for a day so nothing major. She stayed in that day, then came out the next day which was the freezing cold Thursday. Still amazes me that we all didn't get the flu. My kids are handsy, and my son, well he LICKED a pole on the monorail. Kids are so great!