***Official November 2016 Thread***

[Becky Mouse]

Hi! Can you tell me how the crowds were last year on Black Friday? Ok so, I know it's going to be crowded..but still manageable? At Epcot specifically?

I am staying at CR 12/3-12/7 post cruise. But now am 99.9% sure that I'm going to add a night (at a different resort) on 11/25, pre cruise, so we can have a full day at Epcot before leaving to Port Canaveral.

Touring Plans currently predicts Epcot will be at a 9/10 that day, and also on Saturday.

On Sunday, crowds should drop down to a 5/10. Most people who traveled over Thanksgiving are checking out on Sunday--it's the busiest travel day of the year! Monday's crowd at Epcot drops to its lowest: 1/10.

 

[Kimberly9701]

Touring Plans currently predicts Epcot will be at a 9/10 that day, and also on Saturday.

On Sunday, crowds should drop down to a 5/10. Most people who traveled over Thanksgiving are checking out on Sunday--it's the busiest travel day of the year! Monday's crowd at Epcot drops to its lowest: 1/10.

Unfortunately our dates are set in stone. We will be on the Fantasy from 11/26-12-3.

 

[BrightOwl1]

We're going to at Disney 11/15-11/22 and I am living in fear of the park during that early part of Thanksgiving week. I've seen the crowd calendars but I don't know what those 7 and 8 out of 10 numbers look like on the ground; could anyone describe what those crowds and wait times are like?

 

[heywagners]

We're going to at Disney 11/15-11/22 and I am living in fear of the park during that early part of Thanksgiving week. I've seen the crowd calendars but I don't know what those 7 and 8 out of 10 numbers look like on the ground; could anyone describe what those crowds and wait times are like?

Plan ahead and use fast pass + wisely. Take mid afternoon breaks and take advantage of rope drop. It will be busy - there will we wait times of an hour in some places, but you'll still be at Disney! If you have young kids, bring them a small bag of stuff to do in line. We bring a small notepad and pencil for them to draw, small toys to play with ("squinkies" and Matchbox cars). You'll be fine.

 

[ariane37]

Hi! Can you tell me how the crowds were last year on Black Friday? Ok so, I know it's going to be crowded..but still manageable? At Epcot specifically?

I am staying at CR 12/3-12/7 post cruise. But now am 99.9% sure that I'm going to add a night (at a different resort) on 11/25, pre cruise, so we can have a full day at Epcot before leaving to Port Canaveral.

We went to MK from open (8am) until about 2; crowds were great until about 12:30-1 when they picked up. Walking around was fine but ride times jumped too high for us; too high for us is over 30 minutes lol but the headliners were closing in on 60. Prior to and right after our 10:05 CRT ADR we could still ride some of our favorite headliners with 20-30 minute waits.
We went over to Epcot around 2:30 and were there until 7/8ish. We spent the entire time in WS watching performers and the holiday storytellers, so I can't speak to ride/attraction wait times. WS was crowded as it was on Black Friday in 2012 when we were there; BUT, it was not unpleasant to walk around and we could easily see every performer/storyteller we watched. Sorry I can't give any more info!

 

[ariane37]

We're going to at Disney 11/15-11/22 and I am living in fear of the park during that early part of Thanksgiving week. I've seen the crowd calendars but I don't know what those 7 and 8 out of 10 numbers look like on the ground; could anyone describe what those crowds and wait times are like?

Last year we were there the Fri. before Thanksgiving until the Sat. after. You're leaving the Tues. before; we had absolutely NO problems with crowds the Sat./Sun. before Thanksgiving at AK and then Epcot & MK respectively. Wait times did get a little higher than we're used to at MK - but as I mentioned in a post above we won't do any wait over 30 minutes and for some rides over 20, so when I say they got higher than we're used to I'm saying they were maybe in the 30-45 min range. You could get additional FP's for a number of attractions in MK, just not some of the headliners. By Monday we saw a slight increase but as a pp said, if you plan on RD your last couple days and don't use your FP real early, you should be ok.
I will say the one time we DID feel the crowds on many days was if we tried eating QS lunch during normal lunch times Silly us! Some of those lines were longer than ride lines! But again this was like the Mon. before Thanksgiving and onwards.

 

[Kimberly9701]

We went to MK from open (8am) until about 2; crowds were great until about 12:30-1 when they picked up. Walking around was fine but ride times jumped too high for us; too high for us is over 30 minutes lol but the headliners were closing in on 60. Prior to and right after our 10:05 CRT ADR we could still ride some of our favorite headliners with 20-30 minute waits.
We went over to Epcot around 2:30 and were there until 7/8ish. We spent the entire time in WS watching performers and the holiday storytellers, so I can't speak to ride/attraction wait times. WS was crowded as it was on Black Friday in 2012 when we were there; BUT, it was not unpleasant to walk around and we could easily see every performer/storyteller we watched. Sorry I can't give any more info!

Thanks! My main 2 concerns were- Holidays around the World and the Candlelight Processional (planning on doing a dining package). So I'm happy to read that you were still able to see the story tellers!

 

[Becky Mouse]

We're going to at Disney 11/15-11/22 and I am living in fear of the park during that early part of Thanksgiving week. I've seen the crowd calendars but I don't know what those 7 and 8 out of 10 numbers look like on the ground; could anyone describe what those crowds and wait times are like?

I pulled up predicted wait times at Haunted Mansion on 11/29 when predicted crowd levels at Magic Kingdom is a 2, and then I pulled up predicted wait times at Haunted Mansion on 11/23 when predicted crowd levels at Magic Kingdom is a 9. Here's a comparison of wait times at the rides:

On a crowd level 2, the wait time never reaches 15 minutes: http://i.imgur.com/VRnkKL3.jpg

On crowd level 9, the wait time is about half an hour for a good chunk of the day: http://i.imgur.com/YdRY0aH.jpg

 

[1437disney]

I pulled up predicted wait times at Haunted Mansion on 11/29 when predicted crowd levels at Magic Kingdom is a 2, and then I pulled up predicted wait times at Haunted Mansion on 11/23 when predicted crowd levels at Magic Kingdom is a 9. Here's a comparison of wait times at the rides:

On a crowd level 2, the wait time never reaches 15 minutes: http://i.imgur.com/VRnkKL3.jpg

On crowd level 9, the wait time is about half an hour for a good chunk of the day: http://i.imgur.com/YdRY0aH.jpg

May I ask how you are getting this information? It would be useful, Hoping I can get it. Thanks!!

 

[Tammil]

My family is joining the November crowd. We are currently booked at CBR for 11/26-12/03 with free dining. My plan is for us to fly in on 11/25 and book a room only res for that night. The flights look like they may be cheaper that day (still waiting for SW to release prices/flight times). It will have been 5 years since our last trip to Disney so I'm very excited. I would have loved to stay at POR again but I had to take the free dining!

 

[Becky Mouse]

May I ask how you are getting this information? It would be useful, Hoping I can get it. Thanks!!

Touring Plans gives the current month's crowd calendar for free, but you need to subscribe to see the extended crowd calendar. I think their wait time predictions are free to everyone (or maybe just for the current month?). https://touringplans.com/magic-kingdom/wait-times

Here's the link to the crowd calendar:
https://touringplans.com/walt-disney-world/crowd-calendar

 

[1437disney]

Touring Plans gives the current month's crowd calendar for free, but you need to subscribe to see the extended crowd calendar. I think their wait time predictions are free to everyone (or maybe just for the current month?). https://touringplans.com/magic-kingdom/wait-times

Here's the link to the crowd calendar:
https://touringplans.com/walt-disney-world/crowd-calendar

 

[Funfire240]

Thanks! I keep moving around my park days because i cant decide. I could even do 11/29. Youre right, im sure they wont be too busy. We were originally going to go 11/15 (my birthday) but changed because of FD. I love Christmas Did you do Minnies holiday dine last year?

I'll jump in - we did the Minnie's dine on the first night it was offered last year. I really liked it. I wasn't sure because I had read some bad reviews about dinner food there but we had no problems with it. Character interaction was wonderful and we all enjoyed the dinner. The desserts were awesome! Santa Goofy at the door was a riot (DH was not in a good mood by that time - long store - so Goofy kept trying to get him to smile - it was hilarious!) All of the characters' Christmas outfits were really neat to see.

 

[heywagners]

I'll jump in - we did the Minnie's dine on the first night it was offered last year. I really liked it. I wasn't sure because I had read some bad reviews about dinner food there but we had no problems with it. Character interaction was wonderful and we all enjoyed the dinner. The desserts were awesome! Santa Goofy at the door was a riot (DH was not in a good mood by that time - long store - so Goofy kept trying to get him to smile - it was hilarious!) All of the characters' Christmas outfits were really neat to see.

This is the one I really hope to get!!!

 

[cmsesq]

We're going 11/12 - 11/22 ( 12/13 at Royal Pacific for US, 11/14 room only at ASMu, and 11/15-11/22 at ASMu). There are a lot of us going then and I'm getting more and more nervous about the crowds, ha.



That's a steal! We're looking at $400ish pp round trip. What airline did you use?

Sorry post so delayed but we booked delta through Expedia.

 

[Becky Mouse]

This is the one I really hope to get!!!

Me too! I'm reserving our BOG PPO breakfast first, then I'll reserve our Minnie's Holiday Dine (two different days). I'm going to try to get the Fantasmic! package, but I've heard the dinner times are very weird for the package. I hope we don't get stuck with too early of a time. I've been working on our itinerary, and I think we're going to try to catch Belle in France at 2:50pm on our Epcot morning before taking the boat over to HS... so I don't want a dinner before 4:30 if I can help it!

 

[xipotec]

Ok here's what we decided given the limited info......

Comments welcome...

11/14-11/20

11/14 drop off luggage at Poly
HS
Lunch Sci Fi
Star Wars fire works??
Dinner California Grill during Wishes?!

11/15
Ohanas breakfast
Epcot
San Angel dinner

11/16
Cindy's breakfast
Luggage to GF
Tony's dinner
Wishes?

11/17
GF grill breakfast
AK
Narcoossee's dinner time?

11/18
GF grill breakfast
MK
BOG lunch
Peco's dinner

11/19
GF grill breakfast
Epcot
Teppen edo dinner

11/20 checkout

 

[BurTam]

Looks like we're joining the November 2016 thread! We just booked November 13th - 20th at POFQ to celebrate mine and my daughters birthdays. It will be my hubby, myself, my 7 year old daughter and my 9 year old daughter (turning 10). This is the first time we're going for an entire week so needless to say, we're extremely excited.

 

[ariane37]

I'll jump in - we did the Minnie's dine on the first night it was offered last year. I really liked it. I wasn't sure because I had read some bad reviews about dinner food there but we had no problems with it. Character interaction was wonderful and we all enjoyed the dinner. The desserts were awesome! Santa Goofy at the door was a riot (DH was not in a good mood by that time - long store - so Goofy kept trying to get him to smile - it was hilarious!) All of the characters' Christmas outfits were really neat to see.

This is good to hear. H&V in general gets a lot of negative reviews. We ate lunch there about 5 years ago - it wasn't anything great but not terrible. My kids are older and so we have no desire to eat there but I'd LOVE to get pictures with the characters in their Christmas outfits! Just don't want to hear everyone complain to me about the food lol. Might have to add this to my already to big list of ADR's I want........

 

[ariane37]

Thanks! My main 2 concerns were- Holidays around the World and the Candlelight Processional (planning on doing a dining package). So I'm happy to read that you were still able to see the story tellers!

In case you have some free time (sure, how many of us have free time? Well, free time after we're done on the Dis lol) I'm currently finishing up my TR from our trip last Nov. and I have pictures of the storytellers we visited. You can just skip the whole thing until you get to that part and just read about them! I hope you get to see a lot of them, they're great. My boys 10 & 14 never give me crap about standing around watching them instead of riding rides

We did the CP twice in 2012, saw Geena Davis and then Neil Patrick Harris. The show itself is beautiful and moving. Then add NPH and it was phenomenal!