Avoiding Extra Magic Hours!

[karly05]

I consult the crowd calendars at Easy WDW and his recommended days avoid EMHs so...

I would be game to hit an am EMH then hop away if convenient. But I am not a night owl and don't even try pm EMHs.

 

[>Ash<]

I avoid Early Morning Hours just because kids are up and it will be busy with all the families and young ones, late nights at MK you see alot of parents dissapearing around midnight if your lucky yo get a 3aM magic hour night at MK stay to the bitter end you get to do alot of ride walk ons haha

 

[disneydad1000]

We used to religiously attend every single morning EMH. Went off-season so crowds were not a big issue, always had and used park hoppers, grabbed tons of fastpasses, wanted to maximize time in the parks. Over the years, we started avoiding morning EMH. We found parks (especially HS) sometimes more busy at 8am on EMH morning than at 9am on regular day. Last trip was first trip with FP+, we have come full circle: no park hoppers, and planned park days specifically to avoid EMH.

We do the same exact thing as you, we use to be commando, not anymore, actually spend a couple days at our resort just hanging out, we take the kids swimming, take walks around the resort. If some one asked me a couple years ago if you enjoy your time at your resort, I would of said "what resort?, we just sleep and shower there" now we make it part of our vacation. We also go every August so we don't need to be commando anymore.

 

[jerseygirl82]

My plan for November, for the first time ever, is to avoid AM EMH. I'm hoping others will flock to these parks, lessening the crowds wherever we are. My party of 10 will also appreciate being able to "sleep in"

 

[beck00]

We are also avoiding EMH for our November trip, but still have park hoppers. I go back and forth feeling like the hoppers may have been a waste or unnecessary. We have several days that we plan to move to another park...mostly party days that we don't have tix for, so we'll catch Fantasmic! or Illuminations. Our last trip we did not get the hoppers and did not miss them at all, but this trip is with a larger group at a busy time. I'm pretending hoppers will make this trip easier to pull off!

 

[5kidsmommy]

We love EMH and have never had a real big issue with crowds, but we do tend to go during low crowd times anyhow so maybe that's why.

 

[DisneyFive]

Add us to the non EMH crowd (if we can avoid it). We once got to HS at 9am for rope drop only to find out that it was an EMH morning. Totally our fault, and normally we would have known, but we moved our schedule around during the trip and didn't realize it. This was back in the days of paper FP's, and by the time we got to TSMM the return window was super late in the day already. It's amazing what one hour could do back then for FP availability for the super popular rides like TSMM.

Would still prefer the old system though (sorry, OT)

Having said that, I can't wait for our last full day this trip. We now always end at MK and it's a EMH night. Regular hours are until 11pm, plus two more for a 1am close! Praying for great weather that night. Should be an awesome night!

Dan

 

[Babe the Blue Ox]

We like to hop later in the evening into a park that had morning EMH. We find that the early arrivers get tired out and leave early, leaving that park pretty quiet at night. You can get a lot done after the crowd dies down.

 

[Mikie]

My name is Michelle, and I'm an EMH avoider.

Pick a reason:
- people in my travel party who already think Rope Drop is insanely early
- people in my travel party who can't keep going every day all the way to park close, much less extra hours
- going in fall when the pleasant weather means we don't take mid-day breaks and 9-7 or 8 or 9 is plenty already
- using crowd calendars to pick park days, which invariably means picking non-EMH parks
- no Hoppers, so no ability to bail out if the park gets too crazy for our tastes

 

[lustergirl]

EMH Night at MK

 

[revdon64]

Our favorite thing about avoiding EMH, especially AM EMH, is that we get an extra bit of sleep. It's a nice selling point for Disney, but the truth is that EMH parks tend to be the most crowded parks whether people actually take advantage of EMHs or not. We get just as much if not more done with lighter crowds in less time.

 

[revdon64]

I totally agree. And yes, having PH is the key here. We never go without 'em, but I understand many folks do not do hoppers.

However, folks who go to WDW once every couple or more years and are staying onsite feel that EMH is a benefit that they paid for, and I'd be hard-pressed to argue against it.

That's funny, because we go every two years-ish and we feel like EMH is a benefit in knowing which park to avoid at the peak times of day! LOL

 

[MrInfinity]

If you are not staying at a WDW Resort, you cannot attend AM EMH.
And, if you cannot attend AM EMH, you should avoid going to the AM EMH park on that day.
By the time you can enter, that park will already be busy.

Yep, for that reason, I think EMH days are *good* and the sites that recommend otherwise are missing the boat. Look at that reasoning right there...
"If you are not staying at a WDW Resort, you cannot attend AM EMH".

Bam. If you are offsite, there is absolutely no reason to pick the one EMH day to go to the parks. You will not get any good rope drop time because the resort guests will be there already in lines. Thus, offsiters absolutely should avoid this day... and the corollary to that, is onsiters should absolutely do them. Because there will be fewer offsiters going here. What's the bigger effect... the few onsiters who get up at 7am to get in line so early on vacation, or the thousands upon thousands of offsiters who are aware if they go the day before or the day after they can have a better rope drop.

To be staying onsite and not utilize this is throwing away the best hour you will have all trip. To go the following day, you'll not only miss out on the bonus hour, but have a rope drop that is compounded by all the offsiters who are going this day because they avoided the EMH day. So your rope drop on the day before or after will be that much worse.

So "avoid EMH" is bad advice in my opinion. Unless you're talking to an offsiter, in which case it's sound.

 

[Cuchman]

Per Josh's recommendations at easywdw, we always avoid them and the effect is profound on crowd levels. If we were park hopper people, we might leave the park after EMH, but we don't hop.
It has made a huge difference in crowd levels for our end of August trips.

 

[mickeyfanachey1999]

We love evening extra magic hours. We will probably be at MK until 2am tomorrow. We have never and likely will never see a morning extra magic hour so I can't comment on those.

 

[disneyfanlincoln]

I love both AM EMHs and PM EMHs but I stay on site and have hopper option. My favourite thing is PM EMH at MK, the crowd level thin out and you can achieve multiple rides on some attractions. MK at night is magical bit MK with fewer crowds at night is even better. EMH is the reason we stay on site however if we stay offsite we would avoid EMH parks......

 

[Babe the Blue Ox]

To be staying onsite and not utilize this is throwing away the best hour you will have all trip. To go the following day, you'll not only miss out on the bonus hour, but have a rope drop that is compounded by all the offsiters who are going this day because they avoided the EMH day. So your rope drop on the day before or after will be that much worse.

So "avoid EMH" is bad advice in my opinion. Unless you're talking to an offsiter, in which case it's sound.

Some would say that the best hour of the day is the last.