Extended Evening hours at Parks ??

[deany]

A couple of questions:

- how many hours are they extended? What about AK? In early Oct, it will be pretty dark.

- do the extended hours just make the parks busier than usual?

- do most people avoid these parks or go to them because of the extra hours?

I am curious because we are probably not getting the park hopper option. We do have 2 days each of parkhopping from previous tickets.

 

[deany]

bump

 

[NJOYURLIFE]

We like the extra 3 hours and have not noticed a real big difference. Of course we go in sort of off season like May and the end of August. We are not early morning people, so staying at the parks later works for us. We have never closed a park down, but I know that sometimes the extra 3 hours will keep Magic Kingdom open to 3 am.

How it works is that whichever park has the extended hours that day will remain open 3 hours past the regular closing time. So Animal Kingdom may have a 4:00 closing, so with the 3 hours it will stay open until 7.

Hope this helps.

 

[Sammy]

We were at Disney 2/27 through 3/7 and here's what we experienced for EMH nights (copied from one of my earlier posts):

Evening EMH at AK: really nice, not crowded at all. Got to ride the safari in the cooler late afternoon hours (5:00 pm or so), and saw many more animals than I've ever seen previously. The park is really pretty lit up at night too. Of course, you can't see any animals once it gets dark, so you are limited at that point unless you want to hang out in DinoLand (which we do not)!

Evening EMH at EPCOT: NEVER AGAIN!!!! I truly think it was more crowded that MK on a Saturday during the Holidays!! It was insane! The thing about EPCOT is that there is lots to do in the World Showcase even without an EMH bracelet, so the crowds never dispersed until after 10:00-11:00! Crazy.

Evening EMH at MK: Also crowded in the evening until Wishes at 9:00; once the fireworks were over and people realized they couldn't get onto any rides without a bracelet, the park cleared pretty fast. We had the best time at this EMH! We usually travel in the off-season, so MK is closed by 7:00 or 8:00. What fun to be riding tea cups or Dumbo at midnight!! We would definitely brave the early crowds to do this EMH again....but this is the only one.

As far as what hours the parks are open for EMH, it depends on the regular closing times. EMH is 3 hours past whatever that time is, so if AK usually closes at 5:00 pm, it is open until 8:00 for EMH.

Hope this helps!
Sammy

 

[rayjess]

We had same experience with EMH at Magic Kingdom in February. Very packed until fireworks were over. But still had to wait in lines for certain rides.
MGM also cleared out after Fantasmic. Not a whole lot of rides are open there for EMH. But, lines were mostly non-existent at the rides that were open.