EMH worth it?

[BigThunder78]

My wife and I are planning our first trip to DW. We are staying at POFQ. We are debating if EMH is worth attemting. Seems like the park that has early will be packed all day with the hotel guests and then off property guests. In your experience does EMH pack the park?

 

[hiroMYhero]

to DISboards!

“Thread Tools” immediately above your post allows you to Edit your Thread Title. Not sure about Editing the Poll but changing the title to EMH is best.

 

[Alesia]

It's not a yes or no question. A good rule of thumb is that you should avoid the park with EMH if you don't have park hoppers, but there are a lot of factors that could come into play.

 

[EdmondD]

Eating
Mickey
Ear ice cream

is totally worth it's

 

[BigThunder78]

to DISboards!

“Thread Tools” immediately above your post allows you to Edit your Thread Title. Not sure about Editing the Poll but changing the title to EMH is best.

Thanks....this is my first post. Couldn't figure out how to change it once I realized my mistake.

 

[BigThunder78]

Our general plan right now is to skip EMH. We are not doing the park hopper right now. Our thought was that we didn't want to miss park time by bouncing between parks. The plan is to go to MK on Thursday, HS on Friday and AK Saturday.

 

[gap2368]

I like evening EMH you get 2 hours but I have an AP so I can park hop.

 

[GeorgiaHoo]

If you don't have park hoppers then maybe not, but you can get a whole lot done during morning EMH and the next hour or so that makes it worthwhile.

 

[Haley R]

Our general plan right now is to skip EMH. We are not doing the park hopper right now. Our thought was that we didn't want to miss park time by bouncing between parks. The plan is to go to MK on Thursday, HS on Friday and HS on Saturday.

Is there a reason you are doing HS for two whole days? Personally, HS is a half day park for us. MAYBE a full day, but we would most likely need a break or would be bored there all day.

 

[PrincessBelle39]

I think it depends on when you are there. We went last July and we found ourselves swimming and resting throughout the day when it was extra hot and making the most of the parks late in the day into the night and using EMH when it the temperature was a little more pleasant.

 

[Upatnoon]

EMH is free, so sure.

Should you visit a park with EMH? I avoid them if I am staying offsite as they attract more Disney guests.

Where many Disney guests fail is they head to a morning EMH park too late, then face crowds all day.

Or they go to an evening EMH park too early, then are too tired to stay until the end when crowds thin.

 

[JessicaW1234]

We always do the morning EMH and it is so worth it. We are able to ride more in those first 2 hours than the rest of the entire day. Yesterday we went to HS EMH & rode SD, As2, TSM (twice in a row) Star Tours & ToT.

 

[slpeters]

We did our first trip this last November. We did an EMH every day. We thought they were all worth it, AM more so than PM. On days where we did an AM EMH it was always the best part of that day.

 

[goodeats]

This trip we generally planned to skip them, but yesterday we made the 7am EMH for HS and were able to ride TSM, SDD, RNRC, and TOTx2 before 9am plus sat and had some coffee at some point. It would have been even better if we were more effecient, but I was pleased. The benefit was we got TSL out of the way and that’s where most of the horde at reg opening was heading. It’s difficult to wake up so early but next trip we’ll get PH and do EMH in one park and then evening FP in another!

ETA - the real benefit yesterday was that it was so much cooler when we were there. At least in the summer this is huge!

 

[swanwed6206]

If you do it right EMH is great. As many posters have said, if you are doing morning hours then get there on time to take advantage. If you are doing evening then don’t get to the park too early because it will be crowded. We love the late night MK hours and tend to be able to ride the rides with barely any lines. The only challenge for us is staying up that late! If you are coming for the first time then I would probably skip the EMH days and concentrate on getting fast passes to organize your day.

 

[PrincessWithABlaster]

The easyWDW website is a really great, data driven site to check out. The owner there, Josh used to do a very popular crowd calendar but stopped because it ibecame too hard to make it reliable. He does a number of posts on crowd trends. A couple months ago he looked at some of the conventional wisdom about busy times to go based on analysing wait data most of this year. EMH is not the scourge lots of people think it is.

https://www.disboards.com/threads/best-days-for-mk-backed-up-by-data.3690973/#post-59416756

So yes, I would definitely go and not worry too much if you don't have hoppers. If you can get up early enough for it, it's a great time to tour. We have also enjoyed the Epcot evening EMH the last two years. For us it's just great to hit a couple more rides instead of standing in line for buses/monorail with the mass of humanity leaving after Illuminations.

 

[BigThunder78]

Is there a reason you are doing HS for two whole days? Personally, HS is a half day park for us. MAYBE a full day, but we would most likely need a break or would be bored there all day.

That was a mistype...we are going to AK on Saturday.

 

[BigThunder78]

Thanks for all the info. We decided to add park hoppers. It sounds like they are worth it. Alos, it gives us the opportunity so spend some time at Epcot.

 

[LiveToTravelNicely]

Since you added Park Hoppers, I would suggest this strategy for AM-EMH days:
If you can actually be to the AM-EMH Park 30-45 minutes before that EMH time starts, then definitely do this, and then hop to another park when it starts getting too crowded. A lot of resort guests *think* they can manage to be up and at the park by AM-EMH time, but in reality, end up showing up an hour or two after regular opening. So the theory is that AM-EMH days end up being crowded, but not until an hour or two after regular opening. If for some reason you get delayed and cannot make the AM-EMH time, just head straight to your originally planned "hop park" and skip the AM-EMH park.

 

[igrsod]

We always do EMH with or without park hoppers. We get so much done during those few hours, that we don't feel bad doing things that don't require long lines during the busy part of the day, such as eating sit down meals, watching shows and parades, going to less popular rides, people watching, shopping, or going back to the hotel for a nap or swim.