Booked Easter...have Questions

[reesecup]

I'm a little upset in one sense but excited in the other. We cancelled our ressie for the end of Oct. at BWV (congrats if any of you were waitlisted and it came through) and we changed to going at Easter time and the kids spring break.
We have a boardwalk view from Easter Sunday until Thursday. We think we may come in on Sat. and just get a cheaper room like one of the all stars and then switch over. Then, we hope to catch a night or two at HHI on the way back home.

I know this has been asked many a times but how bad is it during this time?
We hope we can manage the crowds with early entry and such. And we know the shows like Hoop de doo will be on the top of our list and then we plan on hanging around the resort and chillin out by the pool. We won't know how to act on this b/k all the other times we've gone have been during Christmas and only hit a couple of nice, warm days.

Hope someone can help. Also, will anyone else be there at this time???

 

[DMKEDM]

We do most of our Disney trips in the dead of winter (November, December, January) and while we hit an occasional day where it's too cold for the pools, it's not common. Mostly pool weather is in place, at least from late morning til mid-to-late afternoon...certainly in March/April (can't remember the date of Easter this year) you should have plenty of weather warm enough for pool and water park days.

We've also been over Thanksgiving for several years in a row now, and we also went in mid-June this year--both crowded times at the parks. Certainly we noticed the crowds, but they were no big deal. If you hit the major attractions you really want to ride during the first hour or two of the morning--get a fast pass for one and ride the other in the first half hour or so after the park opens, you should be fine. You'll hit lines, of course...but we never waited more than 30 minutes and we rode all the major attractions (and lots of minor ones) we wanted to go on...

Super key, of course, is planning for the new major attractions--Mt Everest at Animal Kingdom (a GREAT ride!), Soarin' at Epcot come to mind...but if you do the early in the morning and fast pass planning you should be just fine...

Another note: my teenaged S is a big devotee of getting to the park 30 minutes before it opens, particularly on magic early hours days...I'm not...I'd rather spend my waiting time at the rides, looking at the interesting visuals, than at the gates waiting to get in! Either way you wait...obviously, that's personal choice and S and I would make different choices (we usually compromise and do it his way one day, my way the next)...

Good luck and have a great time!

 

[dianeschlicht]

This is an EXTREMELY busy time at WDW, so plan on even the EMH being incredibly packed. If you haven't already done so, you might want to get those Hoop dee Doo tickets ASAP as well.

 

[drusba]

Weather: generally ideal. 80's, sunny, pleasant in evening, storms usually happen late at night when you are sleeping.

Crowds: extreme. One way to think of it: imagine you have entered MK at noon and are in the courtyard at the base of Main Street and you look down the street towards the castle. You don't see the street. You don't see the sidewalks. All you see is bobbing heads packed next to each other moving en masse.

Advisories: go early to park if you want to do some things quickly. Take advantage of early entry but be aware they sometimes suspend that during Easter week and just open the parks early to everyone. Fast passes for anything popular will usually run out by noon for the entire day and night. Stand-by lines for popular rides get to over 2 hours and some to 3 during busiest time of day (usually about 10 to 3:30). Thus, rely on fastpass. Lines for popular rides sometimes get smaller (to 30 minutes) during parade or at MGM during first Fantasmic. They usually have two Fantasmics most nights; first one requires lining up at least an hour or more early to get in; second one you can walk in and find seat just before it starts. For daily MK parade be aware that people actually start grabbing ideal spots beginning about 2 hours before the parade. By 10:30 everything can have long lines (even the Treehouse goes to over an hour) but things can lighten up for a number of attractions after 4 and before 8 at MK (huge crowd comes back after 8) and after 3 at MGM or Epcot; that does not include the real popular things like mountains, test track, Soarin, RnR, Tower, Peter Pan, Pooh. AK can sometimes have lighter lines toward closing. All parks except MK are not too bad on Easter Sunday. Masses troop to MK on that day under belief something special there happens that day that you cannot see on others -- false belief, absolutely nothing goes on at MK on that Sunday that you cannot see other days of the week. You must have ressies for dinner. True story: on the Thursday before Easter we were at Crystal Palace with our ressie at 5:30. A family came up without a ressie and asked for the "next available reserve time"; the CM stared at the computer for a long time and then answered "Tuesday at 8:45."

 

[reesecup]

Well....you guys just helped change my mind once again! Now, I am either going to rent out this ressie or cancel and we are going in Jan!!! I just am not very patient and can't handle crowds although I would LOVE to see the Easter parade and such.

 

[drusba]

I see you have been "during Christmas" and if you mean Christmas week, those crowds are comparable to Easter. (After having been during Easter and Christmas we went one year in the last two weeks of June figuring we could deal with those huge summer crowds; that June crowd, though large, felt like off-season in comparison to Christmas or Easter.) As to the "Easter Parade," be aware there is none. The official one that was on TV (and taped long before Easter) ended back in the 90's; they had one that usually ran daily during Easter time at the regular daily parade time which was basically the floats redone to match Easter; they then stopped that and just added a couple Easter looking floats to the regular parade; and they have now stopped that so all you are likely to get is the usual daily parade. There are some decorations (but nothing elaborate) and some of the nations in Epcot dress it up more; there is also an Easter egg hunt at most of the resorts on Sunday and some have some kids craft sessions and meets with the bunny (and Mrs. Bunny). Some of the restaurants have a brunch on Sunday. Other than that, Easter time is treated the same as any spring break week and Disney does not do anything like it does at Christmas.

 

[mmmcq]

Go at Easter and you'll have fun. We've gone Easter vacation several times and it's our favorite time of the year in terms of the weather - warm but not too humid and cooler at night. We've seen larger crowds in the summer months.

We just go early to one park for a few hours, then go back to the room for a swim and nap. Then we go back to a park at dinner (most often that's Epcot) and stay thru Illuminations.

Many years there were extended hours in one park each night over the Easter holiday week (E nights?). I'm not sure if the schedule in April 2006 included something similar. They may have been eliminated completely - but check out the 2007 schedule to be sure if it's available already.

On those nights we'd go back to MGK and stay till 12 or 12:30. It was so much fun we did it with a 6 mo old and her two olders sisters. The baby slept thru most of the night in a front carry pack. We just took it easy the next day. Crazy....but those are the nights my girls remember. Riding Buzz Light Year 50 times because there was no line at midnight!

We had to cancel this past Easter for a college hunting trip on the West Coast (my girls are getting too old!). We miss WDW so much that we just booked a last minute trip for Thanksgiving. I know the crowds will be awful, but I can't wait to see the Christmas decorations. It's the one time of the year we haven't been to WDW.

So don't stress....just plan your April vacation days well and you'll be fine. Really!