Disneyland on a Sunday night in late september

[MDH]

Hi, hoping for some information from regulars to Disneyland. My families trip is Sept 25th to Oct 2nd.
We are trying to maximize our Disney time and need to work around a couple of things (LEGOLAND on Thursday Sept 29th, and SeaWorld on Friday Sept 30th) We want to get in one Halloween party. We land on the 25th at LAX at 1 PM. I'm estimating that we should arrive to our hotel which is right at the gates around 4 PM, and from what I've read this is a reasonable estimate. Now I'm looking at two options. One is to go to park right away. It appears that on Sunday's the park is open till midnight, that would give us a considerable amount of time at the park. Then on Monday, we wake up a little later, stroll through downtown Disney, then using the Halloween tickets we enter the park at 3 PM and stay till end of party. We would then visit the parks on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Saturday as well. This would be 5 days in the parks using a 4 day pass and a Halloween pass. The other option is to do nothing other than dtd once we land on Sunday and go to park early Monday using a park day, and then also staying for Halloween party that night. This gives us 4 days (although one would be quite long) in the parks only. I'm looking for advice as to how busy that Sunday night will be? Is it super busy from say 4-8 and then slow down? Is it super busy on Sundays usually right till close? I understand crowds aren't a science, just looking for some useful advice from those who have seen it before. Thanks for the help!

 

[SMD]

Sunday still tends to be the hang out day for APs from about 2-3 hours after opening until after the nighttime shows. I think that doing 2 late nights where you enter the park at 3pm or later, followed by your first morning in the parks on day 3 might be a little exhausting by the end. I would consider a full day in the parks on Monday and doing the Wednesday party. It ends at 11pm, so not a terribly awful turn around for a early morning SD departure. Are you commuting to SD, or getting a hotel there for 1-2 nights? I just did the drive home from SD on Sunday and it took 3 hours to get to the DL area and then only 40 minutes to get home, just north of LAX from there. 40 minutes to LAX is rare. 3 hours from Mission Valley to OC was painful. I can't imagine potentially doing that on back to back days. Also, the Saturday is Gay Days. The Friday party will sell out and DL will be quite crowded. If you could move your SD trip to Friday & Saturday instead of Thursday and Friday it may be better.

 

[Angrose]

Last year, Touring Plans listed Sunday, 9/27/15, as a 4/10 for crowds but what they really saw was 5/10 for both parks. I'd say that's pretty good! I'd go for it!

 

[lorijohnhill]

I was at DLR that same time period last year and thought it was great! The crowds did not seem terribly heavy. I would go with 5 park days, but then, I always say the more Disney the better! Have a great trip!

 

[clb79]

We decided to do Sun-Thurs last week (7/17-7/21/16) even though we knew we would only be there for 1/2 day (afternoon/evening) instead of a full day (Mon-Fri) with our 5 day passes. The goal was to see Paint the Night and the Fireworks anything beyond that was a bonus and just let our kids take it all in (its been 6 years since our last visit, 2 of them have never been). We arrived at the resort around 3:45pm and by the time we parked, went through bag check, got our tickets printed and photos attached at the turnstiles we happened to walk right into the start of the Soundsational Parade (4:30pm). It was by far the lowest crowds we saw all of the trip, we did everything except Fantasyland, Indy & Hyperspace Mountain before the park closed @ midnight including watching Paint the Night and Fireworks from the IASW viewing area.

Park hours might be reduced in September (unless Halloween Time keeps weekends longer) and some of the APs won't be blocked, but we were told by several locals that even when the other passes aren't blocked Sunday Evenings are generally a less busy time in the parks, especially the later in the day it gets.

We were skeptical about "wasting" one day with only a half day, but for us it ended up being one of the best decision we could have made. We got so much accomplished Sunday night that we didn't ever feel pressured about not getting everything in the rest of our time there.