April 20th or April 27th Disneyland Trip?

[NathanF]

Anyone care to guess on how much worse the 3rd week of April will be compared to the 4th week, in terms of Disneyland crowds? We're thinking about rescheduling our trip to the 20th to stay later in the park (10pm vs 8pm) since we love being there at night.

We expect the crowds would be worse, but we're not sure how much, and whether or not the benefits of staying later would be worth the hassle of crowds (andthe $150 in air ticket change fees.) Thoughts?

Thanks.

 

[avalon451]

Ummmmmm.... kind of guessing here, that's the Monday one week after Easter, right? The week before and the week after Easter are one of the highest crowd times of the year, but you'll just miss that. I just looked at the schedule, and they're not doing nightly fireworks; just on Friday and Saturday of that week.

It looks to me from the hours like they expect it to be medium crowds that week. It would be lighter the following week, which is nice, but if you use FP, take a midday break, and tour with a plan, the midday crowds won't bother you anyway.

Any kids? How old? I'm wondering how well they'd hold out, anyway. Just gathering information here...

 

[mechurchlady]

The closer to the holiday the more crowded it will be. I would go the 20th.

 

[NathanF]

Ummmmmm.... kind of guessing here, that's the Monday one week after Easter, right? The week before and the week after Easter are one of the highest crowd times of the year, but you'll just miss that. I just looked at the schedule, and they're not doing nightly fireworks; just on Friday and Saturday of that week.

It looks to me from the hours like they expect it to be medium crowds that week. It would be lighter the following week, which is nice, but if you use FP, take a midday break, and tour with a plan, the midday crowds won't bother you anyway.

Any kids? How old? I'm wondering how well they'd hold out, anyway. Just gathering information here...

No kids, just the two of us. We went last year from April 30th (a Wednesday) to May 4th (a Sunday.) The crowds were very nice on that Wednesday decent on Thursday, but heavy on Friday and Saturday. We still didn't use FP though, since the crowds weren't that bad, and we always did a midday break.

We really do hate crowds though, and I generally won't wait in line for more than 15-20 min. That being said, I do recall being very saddened on our last trip when the park closed at 8pm on the Wednesday and Thursday that we were there. (This time, we won't have any weekend closing times of 12pm to make up for that, so it's even more of an issue. Roaming around at night is quite fun!) I suspect we may be willing to trade less people for longer hours, as long as it's not going to a huge increase in crowds.

Am I at least correct in assuming that the weekdays of the 21st-24th should be a fair bit better than the weekend of May 2nd, 3rd, and 4th which we did experience last year?

The closer to the holiday the more crowded it will be. I would go the 20th.

That being the case, wouldn't the 20th be more crowded then? Or did you just mean that you personally would prefer slightly more crowds to an 8pm closing time?

Thanks for both of your comments!

 

[Krissy Marissy]

That week has longer hours because they are still expecting spring break/easter break crowds. If you dont like crowds I am not sure what to tell you because it sounds like spring break crowds have been heavy so far. It is fun there at night though. The choice is yours of course however I would gladly take lower crowds over nighttime strolls.

 

[DisneyMomma81]

We started our trip last April on the 20th (DS's 8th B-day) we stayed through either Wed. or Thurs. evening, crowds were very managable that week. Check this calendar for hours from last April ~ http://www.laughingplace.com/Guide-Cal-DLR2-200804.asp

I'm sure either week would be fine but the 2nd week you mention would probably be better, I bet last year was even better because Easter was in March last year, so most if not all Spring Breaks were over by mid-late April.

 

[NathanF]

Well, we decided to change it. Those nighttime strolls better be worth it. ;-)