Planning Strategy, Crowd Calendar or Magic Hours?

[Panthers65]

Hey everyone, I'm in the midst of planning a trip for my family in October and I wanted to get some opinions on planning things out. I've got the days and schedule of most the things we want to do (parades, fireworks, ect...) and I'm shuffling them around trying to figure out the best day for each.

A lot of the planning guides I've read have referenced both the Crowd Calendars and the Extra Magic Hours to help plan what days to hit when. My question is which one should carry the most weight. It seems like every day a park has EMH, It's also anticipated to be a heavy crowd day. I understand Disney does this to help with the crowded days, but how effective is it?

When planning your day out, do your place more importance on being able to get to the parks first or stay late, or do you look more at the crowd calendars?

 

[kiramay]

People go for the EMH and that causes a larger crowd. Evening EMHs tend to be more crowded than morning ones. Some people like the extra time, some people avoid it. We plan to avoid the parks with EMHs.

 

[skywaywaver]

Hey everyone, I'm in the midst of planning a trip for my family in October and I wanted to get some opinions on planning things out. I've got the days and schedule of most the things we want to do (parades, fireworks, ect...) and I'm shuffling them around trying to figure out the best day for each.

A lot of the planning guides I've read have referenced both the Crowd Calendars and the Extra Magic Hours to help plan what days to hit when. My question is which one should carry the most weight. It seems like every day a park has EMH, It's also anticipated to be a heavy crowd day. I understand Disney does this to help with the crowded days, but how effective is it?

When planning your day out, do your place more importance on being able to get to the parks first or stay late, or do you look more at the crowd calendars?

I've never been a crowd calendar fan. I always subscribed to the "avoid the park(s) that had EMH the day before" tactic. This time, I planned that way again and found that 5 out of 7 days worked with easywdw's crowd calendar. The last two days...not so much. Those are our 2nd and 3rd MK days so I'm okay with that. I'm happy avoiding the crowds on HS and AK as those are usually only 1 day parks for us.

(PS: I'm not answering the poll because I am not sure which is "better" but wanted to state what I use)

 

[Panthers65]

I've never been a crowd calendar fan. I always subscribed to the "avoid the park(s) that had EMH the day before" tactic. This time, I planned that way again and found that 5 out of 7 days worked with easywdw's crowd calendar. The last two days...not so much. Those are our 2nd and 3rd MK days so I'm okay with that. I'm happy avoiding the crowds on HS and AK as those are usually only 1 day parks for us.

(PS: I'm not answering the poll because I am not sure which is "better" but wanted to state what I use)

No problem at all, and thanks for the feedback. Can you tell me the reasoning behind avoiding the parks that had the EMH's the day before? I can understand the idea of avoiding them the day of, but not the day after.

 

[Panthers65]

Anyone else?

 

[Wood Nymph]

Our strategy is to buy a park hopper, hit parks early, leave when crowded, go back later and:

- Avoid MK on Saturday and Sunday and any day with an EMH

- Take advantage of the evening EMH at Epcot - Future World - the crowd tends to be in the World Showcase, leaving Future World less crowded

- Don't go to a park that has an early morning hour unless you can get there right at the beginning of it. That first hour can be great.

- if a park has an evening EMH, especially one that usually closes early, like HS, go to that park the next day

- either skip AK or just go for the morning

 

[Day-Day]

Some of this depends on whether you will have park hopping capability.

Also, I'm a little confused because the sites I visit that provide crowd calendars will provide park recommendations which take EMH into account. Crowds and EMH are closely related.

Are you asking 1) if some folks choose a park because it has EMH and 2) if some folks choose a park based on the crowd calendar predictions or recommendations?

 

[Panthers65]

Some of this depends on whether you will have park hopping capability.

Also, I'm a little confused because the sites I visit that provide crowd calendars will provide park recommendations which take EMH into account. Crowds and EMH are closely related.

Are you asking 1) if some folks choose a park because it has EMH and 2) if some folks choose a park based on the crowd calendar predictions or recommendations?

Yes we have park hopper.

I think we've answers my question.

I had read to take advantage of the EMH, but general consensus on this board is to avoid those parks with EMH and rely on the crowd calendars.

 

[Dan Murphy]

I stick to the low crowd, non-emh parks. I do not like to be in the high crowd park.

 

[wdwfan22]

I love easywdw's crowd calendar. He explains the rationale for picking each park for every day. It really makes sense when you read it.

He also says that if you want to go to parks with EMH's thats fine, just go early for morning one's, then hop when it gets crowded, or hop to the one with late EMH late in the evening before they start. He also says that the earlier the evening EMHs are, the more crowded they are. 1-3 am EMHs are GREAT. Love them. 9-11 at HS? not so much. The later, the less people.

 

[Day-Day]

Yes we have park hopper.

I think we've answers my question.

I had read to take advantage of the EMH, but general consensus on this board is to avoid those parks with EMH and rely on the crowd calendars.

I think the crowd calendar's may recommend or show the MK as a good day on any day with a night-time event like Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party; even EMH morning days. We visited the MK several times during a day when there was a special event that night and the crowds were very low until around 4:30 or so when the night-time event guests started coming in. We hopped to EPCOT at that point. We visited MK another evening to catch the parade and fireworks; really made use of park hopping.

I'm interested to know what the day at MK is like when there is an EMH that morning along with a night-time event that night. We haven't had the chance to try this.

 

[maryj11]

We usually try to stay away from the parks with EMH except we did go to Epcot on this past Memorial day with evening EMH . We didnt arrive until after 3:00 and it was actually pretty nice and stayed until right before EMH was over. On another trip we went to HS and AK during EMH and I will not do that again it was crowded all day. We have never been to EMH at MK so I'm not sure about that.
I would avoid the park with EMH unless you have park hoppers where you can take advantage of the EMH but go to another park if crowds get to be to much.