Park hours in April? Special event?

[sharona]

Found the park hours for our dates 4/23-4/27 and wondering why the closing times are so early that weekend? 6 pm seems early for a Saturday night. Is there something going on that weekend?

 

[macraven]

Grad bash will be held on april 24 and 25 besides 3 more dates.

 

[EvilQueenLiz]

http://gradtours.com/index.php?page=universal-grad-bash-senior-class-trip

 

[macraven]

the special events for gradadventure and grad bash are on the UO site.

it also has info on booking at cbay for those special events.

 

[sharona]

Hmmm, we'll be at WDW on 4/24 for the day/night so not an issue there but I guess 4/25 will have to be an early night for us. How much of an impact on the regular park days will these events have? Will the days of the grad nights be particularly crowded due to kids and families attending the event that night? We're staying at RPR, not CB thankfully.

 

[macraven]

from what i have read, a chaperone must be with the kids in the parks.
could be 10 kids for one chaperone.
the younger groups usually are good kids, just a tad lively with excietment but will have a sensible adult with them.

the older group of teens graduating could be a bit busy if it is like it was when i was a teen in hs.

i don't know if all of them will be in the parks the entire time or maybe go to the parks once they are closed for a private event

i'll try to read some threads of last year by using the search to see how this will be set up.

 

[hpriamson]

Hmmm, we'll be at WDW on 4/24 for the day/night so not an issue there but I guess 4/25 will have to be an early night for us. How much of an impact on the regular park days will these events have? Will the days of the grad nights be particularly crowded due to kids and families attending the event that night? We're staying at RPR, not CB thankfully.

Grad bash isn't kids and families. It's high school seniors and their chaperones.

We went to the parks the day of a grad bash night in 2013. Didn't notice any big or rowdy crowds of teens in the park during the day - if I remember correctly, it was actually pretty quiet. The grad bash is 7 or 8 PM until 2 AM, so I guess they don't want to tire themselves out in the park during the day ahead of time.

 

[sharona]

Good to know, thanks. Have actually run into this before at WDW. I guess we tend to vacation around the same time every year! Back in 2010 we were at MK on our arrival day and it was scheduled to close at 5 or 6 pm. They were informing people as they boarded the ferry and monorail to get over there that the park was closing early for a special event. At that point we had already committed to a schedule and we were ok with an early night our first night. It turned out fine as it was really empty because many people didn't want to "waste" a park ticket on a park that was closing early. Maybe it will be similarly quiet at the US/IOA parks that day. That would be nice. Even though we have EP it would be really great to have less crowded HP areas and since we have APs there is no wasting a ticket day.

 

[hpriamson]

I meant quiet more in the sense of normal, not noticeably less crowded than the other days we were there. They do open at 8 instead of 9 on grad bash days too.

 

[kathi29]

When my DD went to Gradventure (8th graders) they were only there for the event. It was school sponsored, so they left the school a few hours ahead of time and had to be picked up again in the middle of the night. They only have a ticket for the event and school is still in session, so I wouldn't expect packs of teenagers to be in the parks during the day.