Has rainy weather ever ruined your Disney trip?

[Savsmommy]

We're going to Disney this weekend and the weather is gonna be scattered showers all weekend. Just wondering if rainy weather has ever ruined your trip? Any suggestions to make the most of the trip even if it does rain??? It will be me, my husband and my 3 1/2 year old daughter.

Thanks!!!!

 

[ahutton]

As long as it is not cold/blowing rain I've never let it stop me. I suggest wearing some kind of waterproof sandal, a raincoat (buy or bring one before you go so you don't have to have the yellow poncho unless you want one) and go have a great time. EPCOT is fun, but requires a lot of moving around outside to get around so it is not my favorite rainy park. MK is great, you can get around quite a bit without having to be outside, MGM is somewhere in the middle. I've never done AK in the rain, so don't know how it is there. If it gets too cold or wet we will just relax in the room or do a hotel activity.

 

[Pammy_from_WI]

In 1999 we had a very soggy, hot and humid 17 day trip. The first part was so hot and humid we were praying for rain, well we got it!!! The second half of our trip it felt like it was raining non-stop. Most days was fine, just put on the waterproof sandles and ponchos and away we went. But on some days it was a cold, and windy rain and we froze out butts off, ended up getting sick for a last few days in WDW.

However I will say the parks we dead when it rained!!! At MGM almost everything was a walk-on. The only thing we missed was Fantasmic!! At IOA/USF the parks we so dead it felt like we were the only ones there. I have video of our car being the only one in the lot and this was at about 10am.

That was a odd weather trip tho, right between two hurricanes. We had a blast though and would do it again in a heart beat!!!

Now for some suggestions, get watershoes or waterproof sandles, they dry super fast and you won't get the blisters you would from wet socks and sneaks. Pack light jackets if the temps call for cool weather, with rain. For the stroller get an adult sized poncho and put it over the top it will keep your daughter dry unless you are heading into the rain, worked great for our little one last year. Take large ziplocks for cameras and such so they don't get wet if it's raining. And just go with the flow!!! FL weather can change in a sec, you just have to remember you're on vacation and have a blast even if it does rain!!! Most rides are inside and the queues are mostly covered, so it gives you a chance to get out of the rain.

I do tend to hope for rain when in WDW, sounds weird, but it does keep some people out of the parks or sitting in restaurants, so that keeps the lines down, typically and that means more fun for us!

Have a great trip!!

Pammy

 

[mommystieg]

We always go in June during part of the summer rainy season and it has never ruined our visit. Even though on our very first day of our very first trip we left everything in our stroller(including our ponchos and umbrella)and went into the Mexico pavilion for lunch. We came out to a downpour!! The basket on the bottom of the stroller had 2 inches of water in it!! We immediately purchased a poncho to cover the stroller, went back to the room and dried everything and returned to the park. We learned 2 very important things:

1) No matter how sunny it is, always cover the stroller before parking it
2) Never leave your raingear in the stroller

Just be prepared--the rain typically doesn't last very long. I would not recommend visiting AK on a very rainy day. Although the animals are more active we found that this park seems to have some drainage issues during heavier rains. We tried to duck into to see FOTLK but it was cancelled due to a nearby lightening strike

 

[prplcrzy]

We have been there many times in the rain and we have just as much fun. The parks are less crowded in the rain so it works out.

One suggestion would be to make sure everyone has a second pair of shoes/sneakers. We do this every trip just in case. There's nothing worse than having to wear wet shoes!

Have a good trip, we head down next Friday!

Nancy

 

[jdads2]

I love the parks when its rainy...less crowded.

Here's a related story. My brother and I go on a fishing/golfing trip with his church group every year(used to anyway) and on the 5th or 6th year we were riding home together after an especially warm 4 day trip. We head to the 1000 Island region of NY in late May or early June, not shorts weather ussually but deffinately no snow gear either. Anyway, I was commenting how lucky we were that it was in the 70's the whole long weekend and how lucky we were that we get great weather for every trip. Hearing that he turns the radio down and asks if I'm crazy because this was the first year that it hadn't rained for 75% of the trip....hmmm

I guess the important thing was that we were having fun together and not letting the weather dictate our enjoyment.

Get ponchos and have a blast!

 

[CamColt]

It didnt ruin our whole trip but it did mess up our plans. Last summer we went in expecting the typical midday showers but had much more. 1 night we did the FDP and after dinner it started pouring, thundering & lightning...so no Fantasmic for us. That was a bummer. The following day, the last day of our trip, we moved to the Poly. We had planned to spend the afternoon enjoying the pool/beach however the storms moved in again and they closed the pool for the few hours we had planned to be there. It then poured again during FITS. Tinkerbell didnt fly but we still got to see the Fireworks. Unfortuantely watching them in a downpour wasnt very fun.
We worked around the rest of the rain, but there was nothing we could do for that stuff.

 

[stacy6552]

Listen to mommysteig! We learned the hard way. cover the stroller. if you forget and come out to find your stroller soaked, removed the pad and use diapers to soak up the extra water.

Before every trip I go to Target and by a bunch of those dollar ponchos in a matching color that is not yellow. we toss them out as we ruin them or put them back into ziplock snadwhich bags. I return the unused ones after we get home.

 

[Jynohn]

The rain ruined our plans only one day during our 1997 honeymoon. It was on Halloween, and we had decided to spend the day at Universal and bought tickets for their Halloween Horror Nights later that evening.

Well early on in the day, it started to rain, but by mid-afternoon, the word downpour could not even describe it. We bore it out as best we could, but finally we were just too drenched to enjoy ourselves anymore and decided to call it a day. We have a funny video of us leaving the parks amid a sea of the yellow poncho people, and as we were approaching the car a siren started going off warning us that they were evacuating the park due to the threat of a hurricane.

We spent the rest of the day back at the hotel and would have been ok with it, but we were very disappointed about missing the Halloween activities. We thought for sure it would be cancelled because it was still raining so heavily, but we found out the next morning that it went on as planned. Just goes to show you that they don't let weather stop them there if they can help it!

 

[trayletha]

Nope - just grab your rain gear and have a ball!!

Our first trip (last year in Oct) we arrived on a drizzly evening, well we deceided to go ahead and go to MK anyways. It was great ...... we road the train into Toon Town and walk right into see Mickey Mouse with no wait!! It was a great start to our trip. and one of our best memories!

 

[Disneyolic]

Jynohn Wow...we were there during that time too! The real bummer was the rain was so bad on our last day that we ended up leaving MK early and just hanging out in our hotel room. It just never stopped.

We went to Universal Studios on one of the rainy days. That wasn't bad at all considering that just about everything is indoors, except the walking. I was limping around a bit because I slipped and fell on the moving walkways from the garage. Be careful of those when it's wet out! My brother's then girlfriend was trying to talk us into going to the Halloween Horror Nights but we didn't end up doing it. Just went out to dinner and that night was horrible for rain.

This time we bought rain ponchos from a dollar store (bright orange) to bring along with us this time. Don't want to look like everyone else, especially with little ones.

 

[The Disney Bunch]

Dh & I went to WDW for our honeymoon in 1994 during Tropical Storm Gordon - the weather was awful! But we had a good time anyway - we just put our ponhos on and ran from attraction to attraction - a number of rides were not open because of rain and wind but there are so many things that take place in buildings that it wasn't bad - Good lucK!

 

[miche61]

Oh my! The last day of our trip last year, it rained! We had gone to WDW with my in-laws. We finally split up that last day. It started to rain. It was the first time we were alone as a family of five (DH, DD8, DD6, DS5) for the trip. We put on our WDW rain gear, and had the time of our lives! We got to ride on Barnstormer at least 5 times without getting off, because everyone had left because of the rain. It is my fondest memory of that trip.

 

[dijid]

Originally posted by mommystieg

Just be prepared--the rain typically doesn't last very long. I would not recommend visiting AK on a very rainy day. Although the animals are more active we found that this park seems to have some drainage issues during heavier rains.

I wish I had read your warning about AK before we went! It POURED on Sunday afternoon and when it seemed to let up a little bit, we went to the trails thinking that the animals would be very active when it stopped. Only it never stopped. And it amazingly just kept getting harder and harder. After maybe 1/2 hour at the outpost, we decided to go for it and try to finish the trail. It hit 5pm when we were at the gorillas and we got kicked out - and were told this was the last bit of cover available. We were not pleased about this. It had now been raining for over an hour I believe. The rest of the trail was horribly flooded, as were other parts of the park. We were forced to go through water 4-6" deep. Our stroller didn't push as easy the next couple days.

Moral of the story - avoid AK on rainy days. And don't believe that myth of the rain never lasting long!