MF, PW & crowds

[LilGMom]

Good morning everyone!!!

Starting to plan our end of the year trip and the week we currently have picked (12/6 - 12/11) is the same as Pop Warner and ends with MF. We've gone during PW before and since we don't stay at the same resorts we never really had an issue with them. But I don't think we've ever been there at the same time as MF so I'm not sure how much of an impact that has on daytime crowds. I'd like to keep the dates but convince DH that we should leave Saturday afternoon (12/12) instead of leaving on Friday so that we could participate in the Mega MM - not sure if he'll go for that and points for Friday night are awful.

So my question is if you weren't going to MF would you pick the first week of December instead if you were wanting lower crowds? We went the first week this year and while it was more crowded than we've experienced in past years it was manageable. Open to all trains of thought. TIA

 

[chirurgeon]

Mousefest truly does not effect crowd levels. There are probably no more that 2,000 people attending Mousefest. Given the number of people who will be at Disney World over that weekend, I doubt it is a 1% increase in people. The only time it might effect an individual ride is if there is a meet centered around that ride. And then it is just that time. If it is your goal to avoid Mousefesters, you can look at the schedule on the Mousefest site and you can do different parks than are on the schedule for that day. However, Mousefest is a great event. I am going back this year. I am hooked on Mousefest.

Kim

 

[LilGMom]

Mousefest truly does not effect crowd levels. There are probably no more that 2,000 people attending Mousefest. Given the number of people who will be at Disney World over that weekend, I doubt it is a 1% increase in people. The only time it might effect an individual ride is if there is a meet centered around that ride. And then it is just that time. If it is your goal to avoid Mousefesters, you can look at the schedule on the Mousefest site and you can do different parks than are on the schedule for that day. However, Mousefest is a great event. I am going back this year. I am hooked on Mousefest.

Kim

Thanks. For some reason I had a mental image of 5k+ people all converging on one park or spot. It is definately not my goal to avoid MFers, in fact I'd like to convince DH to stay another day so that we could partake in part of it. But if he nixes that idea I just wanted to be informed on the possible crowd impact.

 

[UrsulasShadow]

The largest meets I attended were the MegaMouseMeet and the TSM meet. Neither affected park attendance. All the rest of the meets only affected one pretty small area of the park at a time...one attraction, one restaurant...and usually had around 30, 50, maybe 100 people at a time. (we're not counting the DATW meet...there were about a dozen of us, more or less). If I hadn't been in the midst of Mousefest, I doubt I would have noticed us.

Pop Warner very rarely affects park attendance. Days are spent in their competitions. You might see groups of kids at night, and you will probably see large groups of kids on the AllStar buses, especially at night. I've seen groups of cheerleaders in the parks occasionally, but I've never been disturbed by them.

Like has been noted on the podcast and elsewhere on the boards, though, the word is out, that early December is a fantastic time to go. I expect it will not remain a "value" season for very long...I found it quite busy at times. Osborne Lights was a mob scene when we were there, but we really didn't plan our viewing time very well.