New Year at Disney, worth it?

[Grumpy McScrooge]

Currently pricing disney for a week covering the new year. Read reports it becomes very busy, anybody experienced it? Does it differ greatly from other holiday seasons, highs and lows.

Would be going with my wife and 3 girls(9, 6 & 3) and also my sister and brother-in-law.

 

[nugov2]

I would consider turning down a free trip during this time of year. I mean I guess if you know what you are getting into. Most likely you will be getting on limited rides, but my family is more about rides than the atmosphere of being in the park. Just from looking at pictures of the crowds this year in combination with only 3 FP, I would not be williing to shell out the premium price for how we like to vacation. I try to avoid large crowds at all costs though(you'll never see our family at free or discounted days at museums/parks ) We went in June and it was great.

 

[Elise79]

Personally, I would subject children to New Year at WDW. Xmas and NY are the busiest time of year at the parks.

The parks get very very busy - TT had a 300 minute wait on NYE, plenty more were over 2 hours. There were a handful across property that had waits under 45 minutes.

MK was closed most of NYE to some guests too.

As an adult I would like to go but I would do Epcot and plan on a lot of people watching

 

[wayneg]

Been taking our Son on Xmas/New Year trips since he was aged 6, spent 5 New Year's eve's over there, every one of them in Epcot.
As said mega busy, busiest time of the year without question, parks get to capacity and close, we get to Epcot for opening and stay until the first fireworks at around 8pm? after celebrating New Year in UK at 7pm(Midnight at home) Rides areonly really done with fast pass, eg standby lines, Soarin over 4 hours (heard it reached 6 hours mid afternoon) Test Track over 2 hours. See pics I took below. Even lining up for a basic burger was 30+ mins.
Every time I have been I say never again, lines are silly, crowds everywhere but its the most magical time to be there. I can easily see why people don't want to go but we wouldn't hesitate going for a 6th New Year if dates/holidays worked for us.

 

[Disneynutinlondon]

We were in WDW Xmas/New Year 2006/7. We actually spent NYE in EPCOT. The boys at that time were 8, 10 and my step son was 15. We went to EPCOT just after lunch and wandered round and did the rides etc. We found a spot at the top of the steps on the bridge between UK and France before the 1st showing of Illuminations and then after when people started to move off we staked out a really good spot at the bottom of the steps right by the railings.

We'd taken with us blankets, windcheaters, hats and gloves and had dressed in layers and boy did we need it all as that wind whistled off the water !!! I had also packed tubes of the glow in the dark sticks which helped keep the boys from getting bored and we were also able to share them with the other people waiting around us.

This is DS8 with his glow wear !

I have to say the atmosphere was fantastic the entire time but as the time ticked on our "space" was gradually squished and there were time where I had to "politely" point out to other guests that they were actually sitting on one of my sons !!!

For the next 4 hours we took it in turns to wander around world showcase and watch all the entertainment that was going on. If memory serves me right there were a multitude of bands, magicians and other circus style entertainment.

The parks are certainly a lot busier than at any other time of the year (we've been Easter and summer as well) but the decorations are beautiful so as long as you go well prepared I would say "go for it" we had a fantastic time and we have wonderful memories.

 

[Tinkerbell1989]

We have just come back back from our third xmas trip. It is an amazing time to visit; you just have to accept that it will be busy.
Compared to my own previous xmas experience, I found it was much busier this year than both 2006 & 2010. As we were offsite guests, we didnt have access to FP+, and over this busy period, we noticed the queues were longer than 'normal'.
The weather is unpredictable... we went from 31° to 8° and everywhere in between in 2 weeks!

Xmas day we spent in the villa, and then played mini golf - it was lovely and relaxed. 30th dec we did typhoon lagoon (reasonably quiet) and then mk (very busy, but certainly managable). NYE we speng all day in epcot which had the queues everyone is talking about - yes soarin and test track reached 300mins at one point (but i believe part of that is disney directing the crowds with queue times...a story for another day!), it was extremely busy still. The fireworks were worth it though!

Like i said, i have just come back (suffering severe jetlag lol), but i will be doing a highs/lows and a tr in due time. If anyone wants anything more specific, feel free in pm me :-D

Sorry for the essay - well done if you got this far ;-)

Steffi xx