October trip plans

[live4christp1]

So excited! This will be our first full week back at WDW since 2015. We have been down for short weekend trips here and there and visited Disneyland in 2016 and Aulani in 2017.

This trip we will have APs. We will arrive Sunday around noon. Check in (staying off property) and pick up our groceries for the week. We have a dinner at Kona Cafe at 5:05 PM. I'm hoping we can get there about 330 and take a ride on the monorail to spend a few minutes looking around GF and Contemporary.

If all goes well with dinner and we are out at a decent time I'd like to hit one of the parks for the night time show. Kind of hoping DHS extands their hours and adds a second showing of Fantasmic. Then DHS would be our first choice. Otherwise it will be MK or Epcot.

What would you choose?

We will have a couple of friends with us on base tickets so not really planning to park hop on this trip.

 

[nkereina]

MK would be the easiest coming from Kona, but is it a MNSSHP night? I believe MNSSHP is every Sunday in October except for 10/7. If your date happens to be 10/7, I would still avoid MK because during this time of year, evenings at MK are very crowded on non-party nights.

Will you have a car? If not, Epcot would also be easy to get to since you can easily walk from Poly to TTC to pick up the Epcot monorail. But otherwise, DHS or Epcot would be fine choices. Flip of a coin. If either has evening EMH, I would avoid that one.

 

[live4christp1]

It is 10/7. Right now DHS shows 8 PM close and Fantasmic at 8. I know when we have visited in October in the past, that has often changed. Crossing fingers. We drive down so we will have a vehicle. (Most of the week at MK has MNSSHP/most nights in one week I think I have seen).

MK would be the easiest coming from Kona, but is it a MNSSHP night? I believe MNSSHP is every Sunday in October except for 10/7. If your date happens to be 10/7, I would still avoid MK because during this time of year, evenings at MK are very crowded on non-party nights.

Will you have a car? If not, Epcot would also be easy to get to since you can easily walk from Poly to TTC to pick up the Epcot monorail. But otherwise, DHS or Epcot would be fine choices. Flip of a coin. If either has evening EMH, I would avoid that one.

 

[sharonabe]

It is 10/7. Right now DHS shows 8 PM close and Fantasmic at 8. I know when we have visited in October in the past, that has often changed. Crossing fingers. We drive down so we will have a vehicle. (Most of the week at MK has MNSSHP/most nights in one week I think I have seen).

IMO, that would be the BEST night to do MK for HEA. You won't have time for anything else really, so there's nothing competing with it. You should have plenty of time to get there and stake out a spot. It would be a much more leisurely way to see it and then you won't have to do MK during the day on a non-party day. The difference in crowd levels during the day is drastically different. You can plan all your MK touring for days there IS a party and still see HEA without much hassle.

 

[Grammy4Lizzy]

If it is a party night, do they have HEA?

 

[jwolfpack]

10/7 isn't a party night - that is our arrival day too, and we are doing the HEA fireworks dessert party that night! For us, there's nothing like watching those fireworks over the castle to get our trip started on a magical note. There are several MNSSHP's that week, so it will be one of the only nights you can catch HEA.

 

[gharter]

With all the MNSSHP each week, it becomes much more difficult to see HEA. And it is worth seeing. All of the party nights makes MK busier on the nights they don't have a party, so be prepared for that. However, Sunday night is not as bad as a Friday or Saturday.

 

[Farro]

If it is a party night, do they have HEA?

No they don't, but they have a Halloween version of fireworks! It's fantastic!

 

[DisneyWishes14]

My vote would be for MK simply for convenience. You will waste valuable park time by driving to another park from Poly. With Kona at 5:05 pm, you could get a good 2 1/2 hours in at MK including HEA!

 

[nkereina]

IMO, that would be the BEST night to do MK for HEA. You won't have time for anything else really, so there's nothing competing with it. You should have plenty of time to get there and stake out a spot. It would be a much more leisurely way to see it and then you won't have to do MK during the day on a non-party day. The difference in crowd levels during the day is drastically different. You can plan all your MK touring for days there IS a party and still see HEA without much hassle.

This is a good point. With 10/7 NOT being a party day, MK will be packed so you will not want to tour MK on a non-party day. We are going in late October and booked a HEA dessert party on a non-party night and will hop to MK just for that. We then will do our MK touring days on party days for "lighter" crowds.

 

[live4christp1]

Yes I think logistically MK is probably the best plan. As long as our check in goes smoothly we could just park at the ticket and transportation center (Free with AP) and avoid the resort parking fee (if that applies for dining/not sure). Browse the GF and Contemporary via monorail and end up at Poly for our ADR. Then hit MK.

Thanks for the great tips everyone!