"Official" 2018 Disney After Hours (DAH) Thread (Now Closed, see New 2019 Thread)

[Lsdolphin]

We will be attending 8/30

 

[garanorymom]

Waited as long as we could. Heading over. Weather is not looking good.

 

[wmoon]

Here now. Weather not been great. Been in since about 7.15. Used 3 fastpasses for space, splash and 7d and watched happily ever after.
Currently waiting for philharmagic as a family favourite.
Only seen maybe another 6 people with lanyards.

 

[Haley R]

Dh and I can’t stop thinking about attending dah 7/21. We have two options for plane tickets if we do decide to go. I’d love to hear other opinions: frontier nonstop but land in Orlando at 10:46 pm. Our other option is united on the way there for 5+ hours with 1 stop but lands at a decent time in Orlando. Dh wants to do the second choice while I would rather do the nonstop and get there at 10:46 at night. We would get there on Thursday 7/19.

 

[mcurrence]

Dh and I can’t stop thinking about attending dah 7/21. We have two options for plane tickets if we do decide to go. I’d love to hear other opinions: frontier nonstop but land in Orlando at 10:46 pm. Our other option is united on the way there for 5+ hours with 1 stop but lands at a decent time in Orlando. Dh wants to do the second choice while I would rather do the nonstop and get there at 10:46 at night. We would get there on Thursday 7/19.

If there isn’t a big price difference I vote for the nonstop -after all that travel and layover you might be too tired or unmotivated to do anything anyway??

 

[trishadono]

The AP and DVC discount is $30 off the ticket price. $89 vs $119 pre-tax. Those are in-advance prices, day of is $124. I’m not 100% certain but I don’t think AP/DVC discounted tickets are available day of.

Yep I looked today and not available, rats!

Thanks for info .

1 more day then when back I have pix of Cr .

We skipped with rain FYI.

 

[123SA]

Looks like a third night without a sellout I guess. Really surprising to me compared to the winter events.

I'm surprised too. I wonder if this event attracts more locals than travelers? If I were local, I could see that attending in the winter would be preferable. Not as hot, not as rainy, and I would assume less crowded.

 

[GADisneyDad14]

I'm surprised too. I wonder if this event attracts more locals than travelers? If I were local, I could see that attending in the winter would be preferable. Not as hot, not as rainy, and I would assume less crowded.

I guess the later hours may play a role as well. Take people like us - kids are 8 and 3. Winter DAH hours of 8-11 or 9-12 work a lot better if we want to bring the older child. 10-1 is sort of a different setup. Although there’s probably just as many folks with tweens/teenagers who can make the summer later hours work, so who knows!

 

[Haley R]

If there isn’t a big price difference I vote for the nonstop -after all that travel and layover you might be too tired or unmotivated to do anything anyway??

I wanna say the difference in price is like $20 or so. I'll have to check with DH to be sure. I would much rather show up at night, but he's convinced that we will be wasting the day by doing that. I see his point of view, but I'm not amused by the idea of changing planes and having a layover. Flights could get delayed with either option.

 

[frangi]

Went tonight 7/7/18 and walked onto everything only thing was 7dmt was done for a bit still rode it three times no wait.

 

[Ashley Marie]

7/7 DAH - really great night. We did not experience eerily empty walkways or anything like that, but every single ride was a walk-on for us. There seemed to be a decent amount of people attending, but maybe our path just worked in our favor as far as (non-existent) wait times went. The only waiting we experienced was a line to get drinks from a cart, and that only took a few minutes.

I should make a note that we did most things at a fairly leisurely pace.

We left the Poly after having a few apps and drinks in the club level lounge. It was raining lightly, and we had a private boat ride to MK — only two passengers aboard! We entered the park at about 6:25. I’m not sure what time they officially began letting DAH ticket holders in — it may have been earlier.

We had no Fastpasses (I had to cancel the ones I’d booked because I got that dreaded email saying one of my other day’s FP would disappear if I didn’t). It turned out totally fine. They really weren’t needed. We focused on hitting attractions with longer run times and typically short waits before the event started, beginning with Carousel of Progress. When we got out of the show, it was pouring. That storm didn’t really let up for the next couple hours, which meant Mine Train, Thunder Mountain and Splash Mountain seemed to be down for that entire period of time. It luckily cleared up by the time DAH began.

We were able to do COP, Peoplemover, Philharmagic and Haunted Mansion, plus have an unplanned bite to eat (got a bit hungry for actual food and didn’t want to just rely on DAH’s free treats), watch Happily Ever After and make it onto Jungle Cruise before DAH’s start at 10pm. By the time we got off JC, it was the actual event time.

For those wondering if the After Hours lanyard will get you in through the FP lines before 10pm: probably not. We actually only attempted that once, at Haunted Mansion, and the CM said no and that “I know a lot of misinformation has been getting around.”

Our full night’s itinerary:

Carousel of Progress (before DAH)
Peoplemover (before DAH)
Philharmagic (before DAH)
Haunted Mansion (before DAH)
Quick dinner at Pecos Bills (before DAH)
Happily Ever After from side of castle (before DAH)
Jungle Cruise (boarded before DAH, off after 10pm)
Pirates
Thunder Mountain
Splash Mountain
Drinks from snack cart
It’s a Small World
Peter Pan
Ice cream from snack cart
Mine Train was down, so Winnie the Pooh
Mine Train back up, so we did that
Buzz x 2
Space Mountain x 6 (there is a shortcut to re-ride)
Buzz one more time before it hit 1am

No wait for the bus back to Poly. It was a surprisingly full bus (shared with GF), but no one had to stand.

We will be at Monday night’s DAH. I’ll report back!

 

[pmurph]

Hi! You can add me for 7/14 (thanks!)
We won't make it to MK until about 9:00 or so because we have dining at Disney Springs. But...

This event seems tailor-made for my situation (And we got the DVC discount)! This is a last minute trip for us, and a really short one. We have limited park time, and in fact DAH will be it for us! It is also my son's 13th birthday, so what a treat this will be!

Crossing our fingers for nice weather, and limited ticket sales ; ) !

 

[wmoon]

Excellent night last night.

We arrived about 7.20. We would have been earlier but we thought ds having a decent nap beforehand would actually work out better for us and it did.

The weather when we arrived was horrendous, we headed straight for space which had a 105 minute line and were a bit disappointed to see the fast pass line all the way out in the pouring rain. It didn’t take too long though with fp.

We then headed round to splash which had a 30 minute line and was very quick with fp.

Next round to 7d again quick with fp.

We grabbed a pretzel and a churro and got a great spot for Happily Ever After with about 1 minute to go.

We were going to do HM but went for philharmagic instead as we had missed it last year and we all love it. When we came out it was 10.10.

7D was down so we did the following all with no wait at all.
Winnie the Pooh
Teacups
Buzz - twice
Jungle cruise- a boat to ourselves
Flying carpets
Pirates - a boat to ourselves
Thunder - twice
7d - only wait if the night, it posted 10 minutes but was more like 20 as they were having problems with it. If we’d known I wouldn’t have bothered waiting as we’d done it earlier. By the time we got off it was saying 25 minutes and the line was well out the door.
Peter Pan
Dumbo
Buzz light year - 4 times without getting off.

So 16 rides during dah with 3 go booked with dah ticket, fireworks and 1 other ride.

We wandered about and had spells where you hardly saw another person. We had popcorn, sodas and an ice cream treat.

All cast members we encountered were cheery and happy.

We left around 1.30, there was a bus arrived for pop/ art of animation as we arrived at the bus stop and we wandered through art of animation taking photos and got to bed at 2.20am.

An amazing night and well worth the cost.

 

[Alii711]

Excellent night last night.

We arrived about 7.20. We would have been earlier but we thought ds having a decent nap beforehand would actually work out better for us and it did.

The weather when we arrived was horrendous, we headed straight for space which had a 105 minute line and were a bit disappointed to see the fast pass line all the way out in the pouring rain. It didn’t take too long though with fp.

We then headed round to splash which had a 30 minute line and was very quick with fp.

Next round to 7d again quick with fp.

We grabbed a pretzel and a churro and got a great spot for Happily Ever After with about 1 minute to go.

We were going to do HM but went for philharmagic instead as we had missed it last year and we all love it. When we came out it was 10.10.

7D was down so we did the following all with no wait at all.
Winnie the Pooh
Teacups
Buzz - twice
Jungle cruise- a boat to ourselves
Flying carpets
Pirates - a boat to ourselves
Thunder - twice
7d - only wait if the night, it posted 10 minutes but was more like 20 as they were having problems with it. If we’d known I wouldn’t have bothered waiting as we’d done it earlier. By the time we got off it was saying 25 minutes and the line was well out the door.
Peter Pan
Dumbo
Buzz light year - 4 times without getting off.

So 16 rides during dah with 3 go booked with dah ticket, fireworks and 1 other ride.

We wandered about and had spells where you hardly saw another person. We had popcorn, sodas and an ice cream treat.

All cast members we encountered were cheery and happy.

We left around 1.30, there was a bus arrived for pop/ art of animation as we arrived at the bus stop and we wandered through art of animation taking photos and got to bed at 2.20am.

An amazing night and well worth the cost.

Quick question. Did you just use you DAH ticket to get in or did you visit a park earlier that day? It seems like you didn’t have any issues with your fast passes. Right now we have DAH booked with fast passes but there was a post earlier saying that a cm stated that if you used fast passes without a regular park ticket it would use one of your park tickets on your account. It sounded like bs but I just wanted to be sure. Thanks!

 

[wmoon]

Quick question. Did you just use you DAH ticket to get in or did you visit a park earlier that day? It seems like you didn’t have any issues with your fast passes. Right now we have DAH booked with fast passes but there was a post earlier saying that a cm stated that if you used fast passes without a regular park ticket it would use one of your park tickets on your account. It sounded like bs but I just wanted to be sure. Thanks!

Just DAH tickets. The only other tickets we have on file are uk ones which won’t activate until we check into our resort next year.

 

[PatMcDuck]

We had a great time on 6/30. I also did one of the After Hours events in January. Worth the price, especially with the DVC discount. 6/30 was dry, and to have super low crowds and cooler temps was fantastic. We walked on everything and rode several 2X, staying on them because there were no lines. We had a GREAT fun Jungle Cruise ride, one of the surprise highlights. We did not even take the free food or drinks, just some free water. One perk for us, was almost no kids. It made it a nice change for us, lol. Some older kids, including a few idiots (scooping up water in Pirates with their water bottles, dumping it etc, sigh), but mostly a nice calm night. All guests and cast members seemed happy.

 

[AMusicLifeForMe]

Here is my review from the Disney After Hours Event from last night (July 7th):

The event didn’t start until 10 p.m, but I found myself entering the Magic Kingdom at around 8:45 p.m. The check-in process was very simple. I had put my ticket on My Disney Experience. So, I just scanned my MagicBand at the tap locations, and I was good to go. Got my lanyard and my pamphlet.

I would go on the PeopleMover, see Happily Ever After, and go on It’s A Small World before the event happened. My goal was to get the “longer attractions” done by the start of the event or at the very end.

Here is how the event ended up for me once it started:

1st hour:

1. Pirates of the Caribbean
2. Magic Carpets of Aladdin
3. Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters
4. Astro Orbiter
5. Space Mountain
6. Teacups

2nd hour:

7. Dumbo
8.Barnstormer x2 (did not get off)
9. Little Mermaid
10. Winnie the Pooh
11. Carousel

(7 Dwarfs Mine Train had been closed during the event up until this point. As I got off the Carousel, I noticed the lights turn off on 7DMT meaning that it had just opened. So, I quickly rushed over and I was probably within the first 20 people to get in line.)

12. Seven Dwarfs Mine Train x2 (Did get off and got back in line)
13. Peter Pan (Did get off and got back in line)

3rd hour:

14. Haunted Mansion
15. Big Thunder Railroad
16. Splash Mountain (running more logs than they needed to which had some backups before some of the drops)
17. Jungle Cruise

I would go on a total of 17 attractions with 3 attractions going on more than once. That makes a total of 20 rides in 3 hours for me.

I was hoping to get on Big Thunder one more time after Splash Mountain, but due to the extra length because of the amount of logs, I did not get to do that.

Attractions I did not go on: Tomorrowland Speedway, Enchanted Tiki Room, Country Bear Jamboree, Mickey’s Philharmagic, Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse, and any character meet & greets. I did PeopleMover and It’s A Small World before the event, so I am not including them on this list.

I did stop about 4 times to get water/sodas/ice cream. I never waited in the popcorn lines.

I thought the crowds were much better this time around than when I did this event back in March.

After the event was over, I got to Main Street at about 1:10 a.m. due to the length of the Jungle Cruise. At about 1:20, I started making my way down Main Street at a slow pace. When I got to the end of Main Street at about 1:30, the majority of the people were gone which allowed to get some amazing pictures of an empty Main Street. I would stay around Town Square for about 15 minutes just taking it all in before making my way out of the Magic Kingdom. Cast Members never said anything about leaving, but I’m sure they were getting ready to. There were only about 15 of us still in the park that I could tell.

I would get to the bus stop and a bus for my resort pulled up at about 2 a.m. Got back to my resort room at 2:25 a.m.

Overall, a very successful and an amazing night at Disney After Hours!

 

[Haley R]

All of these good reports are really making me want to go 7/21. I think Dh and I are gonna be crazy and just go. We just need to decide which plane tickets to get.

 

[Luvscrappin]

We attended 7/7. Even though the weather started out just awful it eventually stopped raining and we has a great time!
We rode Space Mtn, Buzz, Pooh, Peter Pan. Small World, Carousel (DD was the only rider on the carousel!) We also did Jungle Cruise, BTMRR, 7DMT, Philarmagic and closed down Dumbo ..my family was the only ones on the ride. We stopped to take lots of photos in the park. We all had ice cream, drinks and popcorn. I would definitely do this again! The cast members were all very polite!

 

[bvolek86]

My wife and I will be attending DAH on Saturday July 14th. I've been following this thread for the last few weeks since the summer DAH events started. I CAN NOT WAIT! The idea of being almost alone on Main Street USA is giving me chills!

I hope everyone going tonight has a good time.