Easter week, is this normal for crowd levels?

[princesslover]

We are planning on being there April 15-23. Right now, TP has every day at a 6, except for Easter which is a 7. I am not complaining but I thought this week was typically one of the more crowded weeks. 6 seems slightly above average. Is this slower rhan normal, or typical?

It is also my kids' school break, but it imay not be for a lot of people. I was just surprised.

 

[mousehockey37]

We are planning on being there April 15-23. Right now, TP has every day at a 6, except for Easter which is a 7. I am not complaining but I thought this week was typically one of the more crowded weeks. 6 seems slightly above average. Is this slower rhan normal, or typical?

It is also my kids' school break, but it imay not be for a lot of people. I was just surprised.

The numbers are relative. The people will be there.

 

[Accident]

I would rank the most crowded weeks in order from worst to best:

1. week between xmas and nye.
2. easter week (weekend being the worse as some schools are off the week before and others the week after so it's 2 weeks of large).
3. week leading up to and including thanksgiving.
4. anything that just opened or closed (locals love new things to do and seeing old favorites go away).
5. all other holidays with a day or more off from school/work are similar to a summer crowd with the weekend itself being like peak summer. the week that requires less time off from work will be worse (friday-sunday holiday, week before. saturday-monday holiday, week after is worse).
6. summer
7. the fall
8. the spring
9. winter (but after the nye and marathon crowds have left so near mid jan+ but don't froget about #5).

Now the difference from 9 to 1 is only 2-3 steps on a crowd calendar, you can count on 1 hand the days where the crowds are under a 6. its always crowded and #9 is a crowd of 6, #1 is a crowd of 10.

 

[bashuck]

We are planning on being there April 15-23. Right now, TP has every day at a 6, except for Easter which is a 7. I am not complaining but I thought this week was typically one of the more crowded weeks. 6 seems slightly above average. Is this slower rhan normal, or typical?

It is also my kids' school break, but it imay not be for a lot of people. I was just surprised.

With Easter being so late this year I think school districts have a larger variation of which week the kids are out so the Easter break crowd has been spread out more than normal.

 

[Tattylou]

@mousehockey37 has it right. Go prepared bc the crowds will likely be there. We went Easter 2014... if that was a 6 then I'd hate to see a 10. It was wall to wall in the MK, esp fantasy land, by noon everyday. We still had fun and came prepared for crowds. That being said, my kid's spring break is Easter this year too and we opted to do a vaca down in St Pete beach instead of Disney bc of the Easter crowd factor. A lot of New England has break that week after Easter this year even though it is late. That was same scenario the year we went at Easter too. Saw lots of Red Sox fans like ourselves while there.

 

[anniemae]

I would not focus on the calendars. I think this year will be very crowded with Pandora opening and almost impossible to predict. Everyone has a different idea of what a "6" is but people get so caught up in the numbers. I would not focus on a 5 vs. a 6 vs. an 8 -it's all just guess and estimates. Prepare for crowds and be happy if it is not crowded. I think it is getting harder and harder to predict crowds.

 

[princesslover]

Thanks everyone. I realize it will be crowded, no doubt about that, but was expecting it to be "red" level. I am curious if there is a reason for the 6 prediction, and why it is not more 8 or 9. I think a couple of parks do have a 9 for a day (luckily not days we are in that particular park) but the rest are below 7 with a 6 overall for each day.

 

[princesslover]

I would not focus on the calendars. I think this year will be very crowded with Pandora opening and almost impossible to predict. Everyone has a different idea of what a "6" is but people get so caught up in the numbers. I would not focus on a 5 vs. a 6 vs. an 8 -it's all just guess and estimates. Prepare for crowds and be happy if it is not crowded. I think it is getting harder and harder to predict crowds.

I agree. I don't live and die by the crowd calendars but just curious.

 

[Tattylou]

I would not focus on the calendars. I think this year will be very crowded with Pandora opening and almost impossible to predict. Everyone has a different idea of what a "6" is but people get so caught up in the numbers. I would not focus on a 5 vs. a 6 vs. an 8 -it's all just guess and estimates. Prepare for crowds and be happy if it is not crowded. I think it is getting harder and harder to predict crowds.

Agree completely....

Seems like it's always crowded even at the "low" crowd times. It's like is it pretty crowded or super crowded or wall to wall crowded....I think those are the new levels. I was there for 3 and 4 crowd level days in Dec and it was still more crowded than any trip I can remember from my trips in the 90s.....I miss those good old days.

Either way, Easter week I would plan for rope drop each morning and maximize fast pass usage.

Even though we decided to do a different vaca this April, now I'm now kind of sad we aren't going to Disney even with the crowds.

 

[mousehockey37]

Also, if the weather is supposed to be nice, you'll get a massive influx of locals/day-trippers as well. From the resort side, you can kinda predict some things from past years, but a BIG factor is the weather. People who live within up to 4 hours away (that's a guess) I would call day-trippers. So yeah, you could easily see crowds higher or lower than what any calendar says.

Something else to consider is that a decent portion of schools across the country this year haven't had a super bad winter. So, the schools aren't having to make up snow days and whatnot, so the kids have "longer" breaks since they don't have to use the built in days to make up for snow days.

 

[kniquy]

Not only is it easter week but it is also the dark side marathon weekend - so that will start bringing in people on thursday. I myself will be there for a convention which is at the swan and dolphin, that shouldn't worsen the crowds because they have us in meetings from morning till night. I myself will be cutting out early to hit the parks a few days.

NE does have there April vacation at this time, so that might draw some people down there. I'm preparing for pretty crowded parks. We have our FP for the rides we want and we shall see what we can hit otherwise.

Just another note -Air fair is pretty high just because it is easter week so that may actually deter people from going down for that week.

I would think the holiday and race weekend would keep the locals and day tripper away, simply because they can go down pretty much at any time and avoid the worst of the crowds.

We will have to wait and see.

 

[princesslover]

Not only is it easter week but it is also the dark side marathon weekend - so that will start bringing in people on thursday. I myself will be there for a convention which is at the swan and dolphin, that shouldn't worsen the crowds because they have us in meetings from morning till night. I myself will be cutting out early to hit the parks a few days.

NE does have there April vacation at this time, so that might draw some people down there. I'm preparing for pretty crowded parks. We have our FP for the rides we want and we shall see what we can hit otherwise.

Just another note -Air fair is pretty high just because it is easter week so that may actually deter people from going down for that week.

I would think the holiday and race weekend would keep the locals and day tripper away, simply because they can go down pretty much at any time and avoid the worst of the crowds.

We will have to wait and see.

The airfare is outrageous! We considered actually driving from Maine. Interesting theory about the holiday combined with the marathon keeping locals away. That is the sort of thing I was wondering about. Not that I expect it will be slow, but I wonder if there are factors that were considered in his predictions. I assume there is some logic used. I guess we will see. I am prepared either way.