Morning strategy in August

[megmatthbeck]

Good Morning!
Our family is visiting the third week in August. Our plan is always to go at rope drop, tour for a few hours, then head back in the afternoon to swim and rest (we're staying at VWL). In the evening, we'll probably park hop to a different park.

I was wondering if would it be better to hit the parks with extra magic morning hours or to choose the park that had evening extra magic hours hoping it will be less busy?

We've never been in August before and are trying to plan to do as much as possible while it's a bit cooler and the lightest crowds.

 

[anjalee6]

We have been in August many times. We like going to rope drop or EMH I'm the AM. We typically go back to the resort in the middle of the day for a break.

We try to avoid the parks with EMH at night To us, we have found they are crowed until later in the evening, but that has just been our experience.

 

[pjpoppins]

I posted a similar question and was told to hit morning EMH (get there before it opens) then head out late morning or so and then do a park without evening EMH at night. I think I'm gonna stick to that plan (meal plan so doing ADR's). If you do evening EMH I would recommend going later on, after the nighttime entertainment if you're up for it. We are going the same week and have never been during a "busy" time. Most online touring plans/guides always advise against an EMH park. But I think if you get there before opening you can get so much done in the first hour. If you're not going to get there until 15 minutes left of EMH then I would say pick another park.

 

[supergoofy]

Going the last week in August and am reading a lot on easywdw about park touring.

In our past trips to the Land as this is our first World trip in a decade we always did EMH as we could get more done in an hour then we could in several hours later in the day.

 

[jeneric997]

We've been many times, but DD is going to high school next year, so we might try to go in August as well. It might be totally insane, but we discussed using FP+ in the last hours at the park and staying for EMH. Less sun, sleep in. It would mean only going to each park once, but we could hit a regular opening if we didn't get to things we wanted to do.

The only park I remember not having a positive experience for evening EMH was DHS, it was crowded the whole time.

Any thoughts/suggestions would be appreciated!

 

[Megs114]

My DH and I have done the 3rd week in August the last two years. Here are my suggestions:

1.) Get to the park for rope drop or EMH. We would be able to ride most of the rides we wanted to go on, leave around 11 or 12, do some swimming, maybe take a nap, grab some food at the hotel or go for our reservations at the park we are going to at night, head to the other park or the park we went to that morning (preferably one that didn't have EMH. More on that later).

2.) I don't really recommend evening EMH EXCEPT if it's at Epcot. We tried doing both MK and HS over the past two trips. We found that they were still extremely busy up until closing and there wasn't much to get on. Epcot was still busy but you can still check out all of the World Showcase. When we did it, everyone was in Future World so it was nice and quiet at World Showcase.

3.) Definitely take the break in the middle of the day. It's Florida in August and it is HOT. However, it's also my ideal time to go. It's less crowded than the rest of the summer (a lot of Florida schools are getting ready to go back to school or are already back in school), which means shorter wait times. There still will be wait times, especially on the water rides. So make sure you FP+ Kali River Rapids and Splash Mountain. But back onto the break in the middle of the day! After a few hours in that heat, you'll be sweaty, tired, and hot. You will have a fine layer of sweat over your entire body and puddles of sweat in other areas lol. Take the break to cool down and de-crankify.

4.) I recommend getting the park hoppers so you aren't confined to one park a day. If you go to EMH in the morning, chances are everyone will be. However, the guests who didn't get the park hopper will be there all day and night which makes for a very crowded park. DH and I used to only do one park a day and then once we got the park hopper, we'll never go back.

5.) We were picked to test the FP+ this past August. At the time, there wasn't a tiered system for any of the parks but I do have some tips with making your reservations. Make your reservations for the 2nd park you go back to at night. We made the mistake of making the reservations for the morning park so we were out of luck when we got to the park at night. Also, spread them out for where you think you will be throughout the day. We did a lot of back and forth because we wanted to make sure we got everything done.

I hope this helps! Sorry for going off on tangents! Lol

 

[NDDisneydad]

My DH and I have done the 3rd week in August the last two years. Here are my suggestions:

1.) Get to the park for rope drop or EMH. We would be able to ride most of the rides we wanted to go on, leave around 11 or 12, do some swimming, maybe take a nap, grab some food at the hotel or go for our reservations at the park we are going to at night, head to the other park or the park we went to that morning (preferably one that didn't have EMH. More on that later).

2.) I don't really recommend evening EMH EXCEPT if it's at Epcot. We tried doing both MK and HS over the past two trips. We found that they were still extremely busy up until closing and there wasn't much to get on. Epcot was still busy but you can still check out all of the World Showcase. When we did it, everyone was in Future World so it was nice and quiet at World Showcase.

3.) Definitely take the break in the middle of the day. It's Florida in August and it is HOT. However, it's also my ideal time to go. It's less crowded than the rest of the summer (a lot of Florida schools are getting ready to go back to school or are already back in school), which means shorter wait times. There still will be wait times, especially on the water rides. So make sure you FP+ Kali River Rapids and Splash Mountain. But back onto the break in the middle of the day! After a few hours in that heat, you'll be sweaty, tired, and hot. You will have a fine layer of sweat over your entire body and puddles of sweat in other areas lol. Take the break to cool down and de-crankify.

4.) I recommend getting the park hoppers so you aren't confined to one park a day. If you go to EMH in the morning, chances are everyone will be. However, the guests who didn't get the park hopper will be there all day and night which makes for a very crowded park. DH and I used to only do one park a day and then once we got the park hopper, we'll never go back.

5.) We were picked to test the FP+ this past August. At the time, there wasn't a tiered system for any of the parks but I do have some tips with making your reservations. Make your reservations for the 2nd park you go back to at night. We made the mistake of making the reservations for the morning park so we were out of luck when we got to the park at night. Also, spread them out for where you think you will be throughout the day. We did a lot of back and forth because we wanted to make sure we got everything done.

I hope this helps! Sorry for going off on tangents! Lol

Thanks for the tips. We are planning an August 2014 trip and this info helps!

 

[Karbase8]

DO NOT SKIP EMH IN MK.....It's virtually empty the third week in August and they usually hold it on a Friday and Sunday. We have went the last 3 years and it was a breeze getting on rides and it's cooler out. I don't know how the changes will affect it this year, but in the past it's been very easy touring and good weather. August is moderate crowds, make use of RD, FP plus it's blazing in the afternoons so you as you have said going back to the hotel or doing air conditioning breaks really helps?

 

[mommyrosa2]

We have a few August trips under our belt and for the most part I agree with others who say to hit the parks with AM EMH...you really can ride quite a bit during that time. We too then get out of the parks by noon, and also relax poolside at our resort for the afternoon. As far as PM EMH are concerned, we do take advantage but tend to go back much later at night, ie: if MK EMH were 10p-1:00a, we don't show up until 10:30p-11:00p, by then we find the crowds to be much better. I should also note that my girls are older so we can do that, not sure this would be feasible with younger kids though. HTH...have a great trip!

 

[megmatthbeck]

You've all been very reassuring! Thanks for the advise!

 

[wisblue]

IMHO, the summer morning EMH/break/evening approach is a perfect example of where FP+ can easily be better than paper FP. In the morning you can do a lot of things without FP before you leave the hot and crowded park for your break. Then you can use your 3 FP+ reservations in the evening.

For those of us who like to take a break from the parks in the middle of the day (regardless of the time of year), paper FP was not very useful because FPs with return times in the middle of the day were useless to us, and we wouldn't be around in the middle of the day to pull FPs with return times that we could use in the evening, especially if we planned to park hop.

In the morning, going right on a ride with a posted wait time of 20 minutes or less always made more sense to us than getting a FP to come back later, especially because we rarely care to do anything multiple times in one day. We also have found that those posted wait times of 15- 20 minutes are usually overstated in the first few hours after opening.

When we park hop, which we usually do, the availability of FPs for the second park would be extremely limited when we arrived. Now, if we plan to go to DHS in the evening, we can line up FPs for TSMM, TOT, and Star Tours in advance, making those evenings that much more enjoyable. Or at EPCOT, we can choose Soarin, Spaceship Earth, and Mission Space. At MK, we can pick any 3 of our many favorites.

The bottom line is that, with FP+ we can easily do more of our favorite attractions with the same amount of time in the parks than we did with paper FP. I realize that the same may not be true for people who intend to spend 12-16 consecutive hours in a park. But, we usually don't have the desire, not to mention the stamina, to do that. Those midday breaks make our whole experience more enjoyable.

 

[carrie1626]

Good Morning!
Our family is visiting the third week in August. Our plan is always to go at rope drop, tour for a few hours, then head back in the afternoon to swim and rest (we're staying at VWL). In the evening, we'll probably park hop to a different park.

I was wondering if would it be better to hit the parks with extra magic morning hours or to choose the park that had evening extra magic hours hoping it will be less busy?

We've never been in August before and are trying to plan to do as much as possible while it's a bit cooler and the lightest crowds.

I'm a past AUG visitor.
This (BOLD) is the better choice!

With FP+ you can make do a lot at RD without having to use FP+ for early times. You can take that afternoon break ( highly recommended in AUG) and then do the FP+ attractions later at whatever park you want to go back to.

I found in AUG when the parks are open later, that I didn't want hopper passes because I'd return to the same park in the evening.