Crowd levels in september

[Porturican]

Hi there!

I am wondering if you guys/gals can help me get an idea of what you think the crowd level will be like at Disney World this September. I have never been to WDW so this will be our 1st trip. We will be there from 9/19-9/25 with the free dining and staying at ASMu. We tried to extend our trip 1 day but they said all the value resorts were booked. I thought Sept was a slower time?

Do you think with the free dining the crowds will be as bad as Holiday season or summer/spring break? Or its just that the value resorts offer the best rate so they just filled up quickly?

Maybe some of you have done the free dining times in the past and can share that expierence and maybe if you think this year is even crazier.

Thank you all for your words of wisdom!

 

[Callas]

I have seen fee dinning be crowded and given that some recently released dicounts do not include the week of the 20th, I would hazard to guess this week will be more crowed.

Also free dining tends to bring more people to eat but they may not ride as much. Maybe they are all eating or on the way to eat or resting from eating or even getting ready to go eat. The times I have gone for free dining did have packed streets but the ride waits where less then 20 minutes most of the time bacause they where all eating.

Anyways, I have one week left that I refuse to name that I like to go to avoid crowds. I will never tell. No I will not. Not in a million years.... well maybe after I die I will tell, but not before then.

Callas

 

[Captain_Oblivious]

My family and I did free dining in mid-Sept. 2006 and loved it. We didn't experience much by way of crowds at all. I remember getting to Thunder Mountain first thing in the morning and the CM telling me to just pick whatever car I wanted to ride in.

That being said, the general experience seems to be that crowds are somewhat higher with free dining than they had been in the past, but still not near what they are in peak times. I would guess you'll still want a fastpass for the popular rides, but shouldn't have too much trouble anywhere else.

Hope that helps!