Just back.....10/4 - 10/11 AWESOME trip, but crowds getting HEAVY!!!!....

[cindyfan]

We just returned last night and the crowds this year were extremely heavy compared to previous years at this time....which is what everyone was thinking might happen

It wasn't bad the first few days....but then all heck broke loose.

Here's a run down:

Sat 10/4....Arrived at 3pm then headed to MGM, not bad, but still no FP for TOT, Fantasmic still a few seats at show time. Even had time to run to MK for one ride on Space Mtn after Fantasmic.
Sun.....AK managable in AM. Safari 15 min wait by 9:30. walked on to everything else.
Sun.... also did MNSSHP. We went last year so we planned a bit better. Avoided the first parade! Great seats for the second. Space Mtn still had 30 min wait though. Really MISSED BTMRR!!!
Monday....Epcot in afternoon and evening. Wait was 10 min for M:S. Test Track 45 min, used FP. Ok seats for Illuminations.
Tues......MK all day....not bad at all. 5 - 15 min for most rides. still had to get FP for Jungle Cruise though. Posted time was 15 min, but it was running about 30 -40 min. Got great seats for parade around 35 min before. But by parade time....it was only 2-3 people deep watching.

Wed.....MGM in AM. Did TOT using FP. RnRC up to 30 min wait by 9:30. Were able to go twice using FP both times. But it broke down right after we rode the 2nd time. Not sure how long it was down. Back to Epcot for evening. Crowds were HUGE!!!!!!!!! With MK closed at 6 and the rain the night before, and everyone knowing Epcot closed at 3 on Thurs......it was NUTS!!!
But I'm wondering if people were still afraid of M:S!! the first time we rode it....10 min wait, then when we got back on (posted time was 20, it ended up 35, they made an announcement stating a few technical difficulties).

By Wed we could see a SIGNIFICANT INCREASE in the crowds!!!!

Thurs....back to Epcot just to ride M:S again and TT. FP for TT ran out by 10:45 (park was closing at 3). Wasn't too bad. Out of there by 11:30. MK was absolutely STUPID on Thursday night!!!!!! I've never been to the park when it has been that bad!!!! Not even when we went in July one year! Wait for Small World was 45 min!!! We only stayed to watch the fireworks. It was as if once you were in the park you could not escape!!!

Friday at AK was just a bad. We tried to do EE, that was just ridiculous!! Only thing open was the safari and Tough to be Bug. Wait for the safari was up to 30 min by 8:25. We will never do EE for AK again. Can't understand why those were the only 2 things open!!!!!

Sat.....MK early before our afternoon flight home. By 10am...it was getting NUTS!!!! Space Mtn and a good portion of Tomorrow land all broke down due to a power outage aroung 10:30. Not sure how long it took to fix. By time we left at 11:30am.....you could not walk down Main Street for all the people!!! It was going to be UGLY that day!!

So we were glad we went early in the week. Not sure what the crowds will be like going forward. But they sure didn't plan the park hours very well!! They should have left MGM open late every night especially with all that was going on at Epcot and MK!!

We had an AWESOME time and can't wait to return next June!!

 

[Armadillo4]

Thanks for getting online so quickly after your trip! Your observations are much appreciated. I'll be going next weekend and hoping the Columbus Day weekend crowds and Press Event people will be gone. But of course everyone's assuming the FTP is a big reason for the increased attendance as well.

Thanks again! Glad you had a good trip overall!

-Carlos

 

[HugsForEeyore]

Thanks for posting your observations! I just got back, being at WDW from Oct 2 to Oct 8, leaving mid-day Wednesday. I planned my whole trip assuming around Wednesday (Oct 8) or Thursday (Oct 9) the crowds would significently increase due to Columbus Day, and that seems to be the case! I am very glad I came and left before the heavy crowds - the crowds for my trip weren't bad at all!

<img src="http://home.att.net/~disneysue/hugsmall3.gif">

 

[pigelet]

Do you think it was because of Columus Day? Is that when the south has their fall break? We went over Columus day 3 years ago and it was insane. FTP has been going since Sept. and I read crowds were not big then. We leave the end of this week. Will just have to go VERY early every da and FP a lot

 

[Minniespal]

Glad you had such a great time ~ Thanks for posting your observations.

 

[Jewelz]

I'm getting nervous now. We went two years ago, yes right after 9/11, oct 30 - nov 6 and it was great, if I remember right the lines weren't that long that is why we picked this time of year again. Gosh I hope it dies down after Col. Day.

 

[manchurianbrownbear]

Great information. Much appreciated. Keep those quick reports coming!

 

[manchurianbrownbear]

Great information. Much appreciated. Keep those quick reports coming!

 

[ppiew]

We were there too and I agree - the crowds were like Easter Sunday! Place was PACKED!!!! The huge media event on Thursday coupled with the Columbus Day weekend had every hotel filled and every park jammed! Saturday nite they had two fireworks displays at the MK. "Fantasy in the Sky Halloween fireworks" about 10PM and the new one "Magical Dreams" at 7:30PM Supposed to also have had Spectromagic at 9PM but it was cancelled due to the huge downpour. Friday nite was MNSSHP which was also jammed with people. Couldn't believe the crowds for October! Guess I had better buy some stock!!!

 

[SuzanneSLO]

We are also just back and these posts confirmed what a difference the park you are in makes! We were at Epcot on Sat 10/11 for opening and then back again for Illuminations. Opening was very managable, I did both TT and MS within the first half hour.

I have never seen Illuminations so empty (we have been before in March and mid-May). There was a downpour at 8 pm that delayed it for about 10 minutes and meant that no one sat on the ground to watch. Still, we have a great viewing location that we got to about 9 pm. Even before the rain, the wait at the Fish & Chips place was only about 5 people long.

Also, we went to BB during the day on Sat and it was much less packed than when we had been on Mon 10/6. We almost didn't go because I was afraid it would be too busy and it was almost too busy on our prior visit.

Went to AK on Sun 10/12 and it was more crowded then on Tues 10/7, but we also arrived later (9:45 instead of 9) and had breakfast with Donald. So my 2YO neice only got to ride the flying dino's 3 times instead of 11!

We had a great trip!

-- Suzanne

 

[ghost1000]

We were there oct 4-12. The first few days weren't bad and then it ramped up - Thursday was insane at the MK but with fastpass and careful planning we didn't have too many waits (we had done all the "important" stuff on Monday). Longest wait we had was about 20 minutes for Small World but a little later it was up to 40+ (I have a pic of a posted 40 minute wait).

Friday at Epcot wasn't too bad for us (but we weren't there long) and the MNSSHP on Friday night we found a bit busy but it was much better than during the day.

Anyone else heading soon just plan on crowds and think fastpass and you should do fine. Oh and be sure to see Philharmagic again and again and again!

 

[laurie31]

I believe the crowds were due to Columbus Day. We were also there Oct 4-12 (working on that trip report now!) and felt crowds were light until Friday, and Saturday was ungodly! We did Epcot Saturday, thinking it was the park best able to handle large crowds, but it was hard to even walk around there! By 10:30, the *single rider* wait for Mission Space was 45 minutes. The fastpass return time changed from 12:50 to 1:10 while I was in line to get the FP! FP return for Test Track was 4pm. We had to skip it We we eating dinner duing the rain, so weren't affected by it, although it delayed Illuminations - I don't know by how long as we were headed to MK to catch Spectro. (We saw Illuminations earlier in the week). I was thinking we'd made a mistake not doing Spectro on Thursday but now I see we didn't. We saw the FITS fireworks at 10, and while we were disappointed it wasn't Wishes, it was cool to see Tinkerbell fly. My kids were impressed Then vast hoardes of people left the park and we got awesome seats at the hub for Spectro.

We had a different experinece from the OP at AK on Friday though. We also did early entry. We got in the park by 8:15. We went straight to the safari, although we did stop to look at the little creatures the CMs had in those little boxes. (They had spiders, scorpions, etc, for kids to look at). Posted wait time was 20 minutes, but it was more like 10. After the safari, we went on to Pangani trail, then out to Rafiki's planet watch. The kids had a blast doing the Discovery station activities and we got lots of autographs. We were told the Discovery stations didn't open until 9, but the one in Pangani was open at 8:50 and the kids were thrilled. We didn't even notice things were not open. I presume the OP wanted to ride Dinosaur...I don't know what else wasn't open. Maybe the shows? Or the other stuff in DinoLand? Obviously we had different agendas We wanted to see animals, meet characters, and watch Festival of the Lion King - which was awesome, btw Our only disappointment was saving Kali for the afternoon when it was hot. Everyone else had the same plan. When we went to ride, the stand-by line was 45 minutes and the FPs were gone. However, after the parade it was a walk-on and we rode twice. We would have done it again (the girls LOVED it), but we had PS in Epcot for dinner at 7pm. We did manage to dry off a bit before we got there Speaking of which, it was at Alfredo's and it was a 45 min. wait for those without PS! We waited 5-10 mins. I was so glad we'd made the PS! (this was where DH wanted to eat for our anniversary but we couldn't have waited that long to eat with the kids).

Saturday crowds were by far the worst, and hopefully after today things will be a bit better.

Laurie

 

[Straitlover]

I must ahve lucked out. I thought the crowds were very manageable w/ the exception of Thursday night (10/9).

I did AK Sun 10/5. Only FP we did was for Primeval Whirl (wait was like 25 min). that night at Epcot waits for M:S and TT were around 30 min or so (we went just for Illuminations and to look a little at the countries, got there around 7:30).

Mon was back to my sis's for my nephew's funeral.

Tuesday was Epcot. Spent the frist couple of hours w/ the Wayne Brady show. They were handing out free tickets out front that also got you into Epcot for free! Couldn't FP with that, though, so we went back up front later and had our PHP's scanned. We used the single rider line for TT twice. Sign said 25 min wait first time and 15 min wait second time, but I doubt it was more than 5 minutes each time! We did FP HISTA but didn't need to. We also FP'd M:S, but the wait was only around 20 minutes I think near lunchtime. Went over to MGM for Fantasmic, but it was cancelled due to am impending rain/thunderstorm (lots o' lightning! but the bad part only lasted a few minutes, really).

Wed was Universal (big ol' waste of time except for Extreme Ghostbusters, Beetlejuice's Review and MIB). It was very busy, but most waits were minimal except for ET (35-40 min). We did MIB as singles; otherwise it would have been a long wait. Wish we had just went back to Epcot and/or MK to see all the stuff I missed.

Thurs was MGM. We saw most of the remaining original Brady Bunch cast members there filing something (all but Jan, Bobby & Alice). Boy, Florence Henderson sure is short!!! All the girls are. It was kinda crowded, but not as much as Universal was. ToT ended up w/ a long wait, but that was becasue only one side was running. The only thing we FP'd was ToT and two go-rounds on the RnRC. I liked this place much, much better than Universal! Thursday night at MK was nuts, though! The security guard checking my bags said the crowd was around 65,000 people, and I believe it! Only things we did were PoC, Spectro and Wishes. Actually, when we got there, we hopped on the train because the 8 PM Spectro was rounding the circle at the front of Main St. When we got off the train at Frontierland and came out at Splash Mountain, the parade was just coming by there, so we saw most of it twice!

Friday at MK while we were there was great! Small crowds, but I was not feeling well. We FP'd Pooh and saw Philharmagic and went on Snow White waiting for our FP time. Then we FP'd Peter Pan and went to Hall of Presidents waiting for that time. I was feeling worse, so we went to Pecos Bills to try and eat something. Couldn't so we went back to PP, then headed over to Tomorrowland. Wait for Buzz was 25 min, but I knew I wasn't going to last that long, so we went on the TTA and then I had to leave (2:30 PM). So the lines were very good for the most part while I was there. However, I had to miss a lot of stuff.

Temps were around 88 each day w/ close to 100% humidity - yuck! It gets pretty darn humid here in NC, but this was awful! I will never go back except in Nov-April ever again!!!

I had one of the best cheeseburgers I have ever had at the Electric Umbrella - YUM !!!

 

[cindyfan]

I guess some things are relative to what people are used to
At EE for AK on Friday.....the only things open were the safari and ITTBAB. We even asked a couple CM's about it and they told us those are the only things open for EE. They suggested we can see characters....but we have never had trouble seeing characters on non-EE days, so for us.....the EE was a waste. When we went to AK on Sun 10/5 we entered at 9am, grabbed FP for the safari, did Dino-land, then grabbed FP for Kali, did the safari, Tarzan, Lion King shows and the trails, etc...everything and never had to wait. But when we did EE, it was either wait for the safari or wait for the other things to open. We could have slept another hour.

I thought the humidity was great compared to what we have experienced during other months like June, and other years during Oct. This year the weather seemed almost perfect, except for the storm on Tuesday evening.


I think the crowds were so heavy for all the reasons listed......
Columbus Day
FTP
MNSSHP having 3 parties in a span of 8 days.
The media events for M:S and Philharmagic!!!
Then to add to the mess.......the park hours (with the exception of Thursday) were very typical of Oct weeks when there weren't events going on!
It was....IMHO.....some poor planning on WDW part for Wed through Sunday!
It was just too crowded to not extend the hours for MGM and MK!!!

This was our 4th time at WDW during the Columbus Day weekend and it was by far the MOST CROWDED we have ever seen it in Oct....and Thursday was the MOST CROWDED we have EVER seen it at MK.

 

[simba2]

We were there 10/5-12. I agree about the weather -- it was HOT. The humidity was awful. We wore tank tops the entire week. Fri. night we went to MNSSHP and bought the commenorative t-shirt. We tried to wear it, but after 2 hours gave up and took it off and put it in the bag. The shirts were soaking wet it was so hot out. The heat/humidity really took a lot out of us.

Crowds early in the week were great. As everyone else has said, Thurs. night was unreal at the MK. I've never seen so many people there. Once Wishes was over there was a mad dash for the exit. We made the mistake of trying to get from the bridge into Tomorrowland to Splash Mt. We should have gone "the back way" but I thought it might be more direct to cut through by the castle and go through Adventureland. BIG MISTAKE. We got caught up in the crowds. It was a zoo. We did make it to Splash eventually.

Fri. we went over to MGM in the a.m. TOT had a 110 minute wait for standbys and no FP's. Yikes. I like it, but not enough to stand 2 hrs. in line.

Sat. night was busy at the MK but I think the rain sent many fleeing from the park. Also once they cancelled Spectromagic we noticed many leaving. By the end of the night the crowds weren't bad.

Does anyone know why there were fireworks over the castle on Mon. and Tues. nights -- when the park had closed early? Were they "testing" Wishes? We stayed at the Poly and heard what sounded like fireworks at 10:00. We knew the MK was closed and thought it couldn't be fireworks. But we looked out the slider and sure enough it was. The next night, same thing. When we saw Wishes at the debute on Thurs. night we knew that what we had seen earlier in the week had been Wishes.

 

[jazyjewel]

Had about the same experience as everyone else. 10/4 was a nightmare. We went to the MK then and the crowds were horrendous, left early and went to the mall, then back in the evening. Monday through Wednesday were good though. Got to do everything we wanted with only about a 15-20 minute wait for everything.
Thursday was our 10 year anniversary and I had ps for Garden Grill at 2:10. That was awesome!! I was afraid our server had spoiled the rehitchin surprise cause he asked us what kind of desert we wanted with the rehitchin. Luckily hubby didn't catch that. He was totally surprised!!! Pluto was the best man, Chip was there and Mickey was watching from 2 tables away.
We left there and went the the MK and the crowds were getting really bad.
Friday we went to Animal Kingdom, then off to the mall for a halloween costume. The halloween party was awesome. Hubby and my brother loaded us up on candy, they kept going back again and again to the trick or treat spots.tons of people there in fantasyland, but the rest of the park was great. We had about 4 boats behind us and in front of us empty in Pirates. That's lots of fun when there is noone else around.

Saturday was horrendous with the crowds. We went to epcot to do MS again and strolled around the world, the went off to MK. Were gonna stay there and get some pics of the fireworks, but the crowds were way to heavy, so we just waved bye to the castle and went back to the hotel. We did get interviewed by one of the reporters though Don't know which channel it was for tho, but we were taste testing the freeze dried strawberries for them
I did have one of the CM's tell me that on the previous saturday, they had rented all of the strollers out, and they have 30,000 strollers available to rent. So, that is alot of people!!!!

All in all, we had a great time!!!My fav ride was Mission Space, and fav attraction was Philharmagic. Can't wait to go back again in December!!!!!

 

[txSleepingBeauty]

Simba, they probably were testing the fireworks. We went on the Keys to Kingdom Tour (which was fantastic and totally worth the money) and our guide Lauren was telling us how they have to test the fireworks late at night to make sure they're "show ready." She also told us that it was a good thing they did test the new wishes show because some of the timings were off!!

 

[Kay1]

Well, this coming weekend should be quite a zoo if crowds in general are larger. It's not only the Food & Wine kickoff, but the weekend three-and-a-half-day weekend for our Florida teachers. We're going anyway since our kids are out of school ( like everyone else, I guess.) I try really hard to avoid this particular weekend but my son's been doing so well in school, I'll have to bite the bullet and try to be patient.

 

[mecook]

We were at almost the same park every single day! We didn't make it back to AK after Sunday morning, 10/5. I was planning on finishing up with Tarzan and the parade on Friday, but we ran out of time. I met you at the meet and I think I can remember which one you are in my group photo. Tell me what you had on that night. Was it a sleeveless blue top with Pooh on it? We had walk-ons at almost everything we did all week. I pulled FPs for Jungle Cruise on Tuesday, Pooh on Tuesday, Mermaid in MGM on Wed., and Test Track on Thursday. We arrived most days before 9:15 and had no problems. We had a 9:05 PS for CRT on Tuesday, but got seated at 8:30, and were leaving there at 9:05 so we did Dumbo right then, followed by Teacups, Pooh, and Philharmagic before entering Adventureland, Liberty Square, and Frontierland for the remainder of the day until 5:00. After getting home, I read that they closed MK at 11:30 due to 125,000 inside, but we didn't "feel" it in those lands. The worst thing was Spectro and Wishes on Thursday. Awful crowd!!!
We left early Saturday so we didn't get into the long-weekend madness. Melanie

 

[simba2]

Mecook -- what day did you read they closed MK at 11:30 due to 125,000 people? Did you say Tues.? Wow, we thought the crowds were good early in the week. Guess I'm glad we were at Epcot on Tues.!