Opinions on evening EMH...

[mhingher]

DH & I have been to WDW once before with EMH. We went in March when crowds were pretty low, and we were able to walk right on rides for EMH in the evening. We're leaving 5/13 for a week in WDW and I'm working on our itinerary. Normally I would plan on visiting a non evening EMH park in the morning, and then head to the evening EMH park around dinner time and stay late. Should I keep with this plan, or do the opposite? I recall come DISers mentioning that their strategy is to avoid the EMH park... any advice/suggestions??

TIA!

--Melissa

 

[dixipixi]

When we were at WDW last June, we thought the evening EMH was a complete disaster! We tried two different parks and had the same experience at both. We were pretty bummed about it because we have teens and for the first time we slept in some mornings hoping to utilize the later evening hours.

We think the problem is that Disney has no way of removing day guests from the park. A lot of people stay and really crowd the parks. Both times we went it was completely jammed...there was barely room to move.

You would stand in long lines and be held up time and time again while the CMs tried to explain to people that they could not ride without a wristband. Some of these exchanges got quite heated and the remaining guests in line were often berated by the turned away guests as they were leaving the queue.

Now, even with that experience, we have planned for a couple of evening EMH's this June as well. But our plan is now different. These are just "extra" time in the parks. We already have another full day scheduled for these parks so we won't be missing anything if we leave. If things are nearly as bad as they were last June...that's exactly what we'll do...just leave.

I'm seriously hoping they've found some way of dealing with this problem.

 

[DaniDownUnder]

Bumpity bumpity bump bump bump!!

 

[mhingher]

Bump!!!

 

[Dis-Wiz]

First of all, sure the parks may be crowed but, the lines are not long, at least from my experiances.

From my experiances, my sister and I LOVED it!! We went out almost every night for when the MK closed late. Since we were right on the monorail, it was easy getting back and forth during the late hours. We were able to ride BTMR four times in a row without waiting in line, and could have kept going on, but I started getting kind of quesy. We were able to get right onto rides that were normally had an hour-long wait. We went on Splash Moutain and when we came back to the boarding area, the CMs told us we could just stay in the logs and go for another ride because there was NO line! However, there was still a huge line for Peter Pan's Flight. Can you believe it!?! People forcing their little children onto rides at 1-2 in the morning!(I'm talking stroller mania!) We passed many strollers during the night with children deep in sleep and their parents trying to take advantage of the no-wait lines. We felt so bad for those children!

So anyway, we enjoyed the EMH and took full advantage of them. During the days that there were no EMH that we didn't care to go to, such as EPCOT, we just relaxed and built our energy back up for the next long day. The EMH are great, you just have to make sure you add in relax time into your day so that you don't become fully exhausted by the time your vacation is over.

btw, I noticed your ticker says 7 days left!!!! LUCKY!! Doing the one-week-left happy dance are you? I am doing my 73-days-left dance. Not much of a dance, but it keeps me going

 

[LadyDulcinea1]

DM and I did a few EMH in August, and we enjoyed being able to walk around the parks at night, especially Epcot, it defiinitely gave us more time to get everything done, and enabled us to make use of our first day there, since didn't get to the park until after lunch.

However, the parks are definitely VERY crowded, but I don't remember the lines for rides being any longer. My suggestion is, if possible, to still get to the parks as early as possible, this way you make the most of your day and still have some time before the parks get crazy busy.

 

[brutus]

I think the EMH-evening at the MK is great, but what about the EMH-evening at EPCOT or one of the other parks?

We have never done that. Is it worth the crowds? Anyone have any experiences?

 

[Swimnoid]

We plan for EMHs too. Last June we thought they were crowded as well but in December, the week before Christmas, they were fine. They start out crowded and then get reasonable. The later they are the better too. We were at MK on Christmas Day until 3 am and it was really fun after 1 am. Unfortunately it was bittersweet as we went back to the resort, packed the car and left. But we are going again in 11 days and can't wait to takd advantage of EMH again.

 

[Disney Crazy Debbie]

We have never done EMH before either so this year will be our first. Even though we will be there during the free dining promotion it will be after school starts so the EMH in August is Sunday night, when all good little children should be back in bed getting ready for school! When we went in August in 2004 lines were relatively light and I was sorry that I didn't take advantage of the EMH. Now I have to struggle with free dining!

 

[Dizneydaz]

We almost always do the evening EMH. We think they're great! We don't get up early enough (or should I say my DD6 doesn't) to do the a.m. -also hard to do with 3 hr. time dif. We've never experienced long lines but we don't go during high season either. You're planning on doing the same thing we do. We do one park in the a.m., take a break, and then do the p.m. EMH park. Works for us!

Oh, and Epcot p.m. EMH. Loved that too! Park open until midnight. Hardly anyone there. Soarin', Mission, and TT. Great rides, small waits (at least for us). The only disappointment with EMH has been at AK. The Safari ride wasn't open later so there wasn't much to do. Unless the add the Safari, we'll probably skip that from now on.

 

[scheddj]

We loved the early and late EMH's and plan to use them again. Not sure why the guide books have such a low opinion of them. The early mornings are the best for the big ticket rides like SM, ToT, TT, etc. The evenings are great for the other rides. In the evenings we walked onto Star Tours, Kali, Spaceship Earth, etc.

 

[GarrettJD]

We tried on Evening EMH at Disney-MGM Studios last June, and it was a disaster. Huge lines for everything. We'll be avoiding all EMHs this July.

I think it works out kind of like this:

Higher seasons = Higer resort occupancy = more crowded EMH
Slower seasons = lower resort occupancy = less crowded EMH (plus the parks close earlier so EMH gives you more time in the parks)