Just Back - November 8 - 11

[100AcreWood]

We just returned from a long weekend trip to celebrate dd's 13th birthday. I knew going into the trip it would be crowded but this was by far the most crowded I have ever experienced at Disney. We have been going for 20 years with trips in February, June, September, October and December.

1. We had a great trip but after seeing these crowds, I can't imagine what Christmas week must be like. There were no 4th Fastpasses to be had (except useless ones). We enjoyed seeing the decorations but there were not as "over the top" as I remembered from our December trip 14 years ago.
2. Overall the people were so nice. One elderly couple stopped to give our kids Disney pins. They said they enjoyed seeing the looks on kids' faces. We also enjoyed meeting people while waiting in line.
3. Our kids love pin trading and they had a great time trading during this trip!
4. Galaxy's Edge was awesome! Smuggler's Run was well worth the wait. I can't ride Star Tours because of motion sickness but I had no trouble as the "Engineer" on this ride.

 

[mjkacmom]

Half of NJ was there!

 

[mrsap]

Half of NJ was there!

Exactly why I avoid that week!!! Why go to Disney when I can stay home and see the same people?!

OP happy you had fun despite the crowds!

 

[tbia]

I believe that the Jersey week, combined with Veteran's Day falling on a Monday created a perfect storm.

 

[Christine]

We just returned from a long weekend trip to celebrate dd's 13th birthday. I knew going into the trip it would be crowded but this was by far the most crowded I have ever experienced at Disney. We have been going for 20 years with trips in February, June, September, October and December.

1. We had a great trip but after seeing these crowds, I can't imagine what Christmas week must be like. There were no 4th Fastpasses to be had (except useless ones). We enjoyed seeing the decorations but there were not as "over the top" as I remembered from our December trip 14 years ago.
2. Overall the people were so nice. One elderly couple stopped to give our kids Disney pins. They said they enjoyed seeing the looks on kids' faces. We also enjoyed meeting people while waiting in line.
3. Our kids love pin trading and they had a great time trading during this trip!
4. Galaxy's Edge was awesome! Smuggler's Run was well worth the wait. I can't ride Star Tours because of motion sickness but I had no trouble as the "Engineer" on this ride.

OP, I'm with you on the crowds. I usually do the summer but went from 2-9 November. I posted a few days ago about my RD experience with FoP on the 8th. Then saw later posted times of 235 minutes!! Earlier in the week, though, it wasn't so bad but there were a lot of "marathon" people running around at the first part of the week.

I agree with you on the new Star Wars ride. I'm prone to motion sickness and I was fine as the Engineer. Admittedly I glanced away from the screen often so I could push my buttons! The standby for that ride wasn't really that bad (we didn't line up until about noon) and I think we waited about 35 minutes (posted time was 60 minutes).

 

[WinnieAndMinnie17]

Just got back from 11/4-11/10 and I didn't have one complain about crowds. We RD slinky and was like the 30th person online on 11/5, Smugglers was around a 45min wait and that was the longest we waited all day. Rode RNR and TOT about 3x each with FP+s. Was very successful all trip with gaining FPs. Went to MK on 11/6 and rode every ride and met every princess by 5:30. Didn't even RD that day either. We got about 14-15 FP+s this day! Epcot was pretty crowded but thats also because of the Food and Wine crowds. My only complaint would be the Christmas party was such a bust for us, the rain killed the entire night. No shows went on and the second parade was cancelled. Also the fireworks were impossible to see any projections on the castle due to smoke and rain. Overall, I didn't mind the crowds although my patience is very good.

 

[gharter]

We hit Jersey week once and outside of Spring Break or Christmas, it was the most crowded I've seen.
As others do, we avoid that week.

Glad you had a fun trip.

 

[JJ2017]

Glad you had fun! We were there as well but it’s the only time we have ever gone since we are from NJ and take advantage of the break. Super crowded!!!! How do you find out what the actual crowd level came in at?

 

[vfalkner]

We were there the same time (Nov 8-11) and didn't think the crowds were that bad but we've been during this time before and during Thanksgiving and maybe it was the parks we were in. We did see wait time super inflated waits a couple times. We rode SDD first thing on Nov 10 and they said it would be 80 minutes but was really only 45 minutes and rode RNRC that night and lined up to a 95 minute wait and then had announcements that the wait time would be even longer and we got on after 60 minutes. I almost left the line since we thought we were going to miss dinner and Jingle Bell Jingle BAM but ended up getting both. During the middle of the day we were told the Smuggler's Run ride would be 125 minutes and it was only 60 - which was great because it gave us more time to explore Galaxy's Edge than we thought we would have. I got very bounced around on Smuggler's Run as the engineer but had poor drivers - my two teenagers (LOL). They claim they were told the left/right and up/down instructions backwards but all I know is we crashed the ship! We saw Chewbacca later in the night and he was very disappointed we crashed the Falcon! The rain at the Christmas Party was a bummer but we made the best of it and saw the early parade and only waited 30 minuted for 7DMT. We arrived at the top of the hill just as the fireworks started which was really cool. Our worst wait time of the weekend was almost 2 hours to meet the 7 dwarves but they were so cute it made it worthwhile.

Sad to be home...

 

[DopeyDame]

Just got back too! Agree with the crowds - super crowded, although we had some good luck getting 4th fastpasses with a little bit of "grab and modify" action. We had a really amazing time, though. The cast members seemed to be at the top of their game this time, compared to our last few trips.

 

[Imamom2]

We just got back - Beach Club 11/6 thru 11/11 (yes, I'm a Jersey teacher). The rain at the Christmas party was a drag but we still had a lot of fun and rode everything. We had great luck with the 4th fastpass, loved Galaxy's Edge and Oga's Cantina, and enjoyed Food & Wine every day. The Skyliner was amazing and the cast members were lovely. DH played golf on Saturday and really liked the Magnolia course. Crowds weren't too bad except for Epcot on the weekend and that was still manageable. We got FP for everything we wanted and got on line for Smuggler's Run at 8:50. The line was maybe 25 minutes. We saw GE at night and during the day and it's so impressive. Slinky Dog was really fun, too. Toy Story Land was probably the most crowded area of any park. The decorations at BC and GF were beautiful! Main Street and HS at night are stunning. Jingle Ball Jingle Bam at HS is so cool and the projections off ToT are amazing. The weather was great so coming home to a storm was the worst!!

 

[heidijanesmith]

Thanks for the review.

I was looking at the wait times on the App and could not figure out why it was so busy for Nov. I did not know it's Jersey Week!

 

[chicagodisneyguy]

We were there the same time and thought crowds were better than I expected. We had a BOG pre-park opening reservation and they opened 7DMT 15 minutes early. We were able to ride that twice before the masses came through. We also had amazing luck getting same day fastpasses, We snagged two FOP and two SDD same day. We were only a party of two so maybe that helped.

 

[DavidNYC]

We were there as well same days (from Jersey . . . ) and while the parks themselves only felt and looked a little more crowded than usual (we've been there the same weekend last 5 years) I noticed that 4th FP were much harder to come by (with the exception of Epcot one night when it was only 2 of us and we got Soarin twice and TT once during a 2-hour period) and the waits were really . . . weird. Tower of Terror we couldn't find a single 4th FP for despite standby only been 20-30 minutes for much of the day. Actually - didn't see a single Tier 1 DHS pop up after 11am despite having seen them in testing often over the last month. Posted standby times fluctuated more than I've ever seen rather than staying in a relatively consistent smaller range. Just an odd dynamic overall compared to past years.

 

[mousestruck]

We ventured to WDW during Jersey Week for 12 years. We always had a fabulous time, finding the crowds very manageable and the weather perfect. However, we did notice that the week became increasingly crowded year after year. Our last Jersey Week visit was 2017. We had a wonderful time but the crowds were worse than ever. On our last night, which was the Saturday of Veteran's Day weekend, we literally couldn't move in MK and then had trouble getting on a monorail to return to our resort. Since then we've gone during the summer (including week of July 4th) and have found the crowds to be much lighter. All that being said.... we always loved visiting during Jersey Week!

 

[JJ2017]

We were there as well same days (from Jersey . . . ) and while the parks themselves only felt and looked a little more crowded than usual (we've been there the same weekend last 5 years) I noticed that 4th FP were much harder to come by (with the exception of Epcot one night when it was only 2 of us and we got Soarin twice and TT once during a 2-hour period) and the waits were really . . . weird. Tower of Terror we couldn't find a single 4th FP for despite standby only been 20-30 minutes for much of the day. Actually - didn't see a single Tier 1 DHS pop up after 11am despite having seen them in testing often over the last month. Posted standby times fluctuated more than I've ever seen rather than staying in a relatively consistent smaller range. Just an odd dynamic overall compared to past years.

Agree with the HS assessment. I actually checked in with Guest Services to inquire if something was wrong b/c it felt strange to not have anything pop up. We did standby for ToT and it was only a 20 minute wait in the evening.

 

[JJ2017]

We ventured to WDW during Jersey Week for 12 years. We always had a fabulous time, finding the crowds very manageable and the weather perfect. However, we did notice that the week became increasingly crowded year after year. Our last Jersey Week visit was 2017. We had a wonderful time but the crowds were worse than ever. On our last night, which was the Saturday of Veteran's Day weekend, we literally couldn't move in MK and then had trouble getting on a monorail to return to our resort. Since then we've gone during the summer (including week of July 4th) and have found the crowds to be much lighter. All that being said.... we always loved visiting during Jersey Week!

Ha - we were there at MK on the day you referenced in 2017. We had an HEA dessert party booked and the walk from the dessert area to the garden (led by a screaming CM) was the most anxiety producing event I have ever lived through!