Summer touring plan. EMH or not? easywdw vs touring plans

[DisFam95]

Just booked!!.

We're going in August (usually do more off season). Do you prefer to do the EMH - get in / get out and take a break after lunch or do you avoid the EMH park? I've heard both strategies. The kids are pretty good at being early risers.

I'm still confused over touring plans vs easywdw advice of Sun Aug 9 one says MK is best park the other say worst park to visit - that could be a huge difference. They match up on all other days so why complete opposite views on that one day.

Trying to get my game plan down and start make dining plans!! Can' t wait!! Let the stress planning begin!

 

[Lovetherodent]

Do the EMH. Hop to another park, head back to the resort after lunch and return the parks around 5. if an evening EMH is in the plan, take an afternoon nap and go back the park a little later, maybe after the daily thunderstorm.

 

[Dan Murphy]

I prefer not to use emh parks, I do prefer the low crowd parks for easier park touring.

Josh's reasons not to visit Magic Kingdom that day....

Magic Kingdom is not recommended with the extended hours and both nighttime spectaculars. The morning Extra Magic Hour at Disney World’s least popular theme park will help pull away a few thousand people, but won’t do much to ease Magic Kingdom crowds. With more and more people arriving on Saturday instead of Sunday, today will be popular with those that have arrived for a traditional weeklong vacation and want to visit the world’s most popular theme park first thing. This coming Tuesday and Wednesday will be significantly less busy. You can still make today work by arriving no later than 8:20an and touring efficiently in the morning. Take advantage of FastPass+ in the late morning and early afternoon and you’re in great shape. Take a break from 1pm to 6pm or so and return in the evening for dinner, some late night attractions, the Electrical Parade and Wishes.

 

[meggiemouse]

I use easywdw. I like how he explains his park recommendations.

 

[SeanTomorrow]

I use TouringPlans. I like how they predict something tangible (wait times) and report on their own accuracy.

 

[sharonabe]

In the summer, using the morning EMH means a tiny bit cooler temps for your morning touring. The same could be said for the late EMH. It will be HOT and HUMID in August, so we always try to be at the parks during the coolest part of the day. EMH, Park hoppers, and an afternoon break would be my choice.

 

[MrInfinity]

Do what works for you! The crowd calendars are just a good guess and as you've found, they sometimes suggest completely opposite things. I found on the first day of the trip I have planned, Easy recommends the AK and MK, while TP says those are the worst for that day. Go figure.

Simple advice. If you are one that likes getting up early, and would actually go for the EMH time, then go use EMH to its fullest. You can get far more done in this hour than in several hours later on, on any day. But, you need to power it in, and know what you want to do in that hour in order to make it happen. If there is some probability that you will not be there to use EMH, or you might stop at the bakery, or take pictures, or listen to the bands, then just plan to not, and pick other days. For example. I know that we travel with kids. We will not stay out till midnight. So I don't plan to go to parks where there is late EMH. Sort of. Because by parks having late EMH, many guests will stay past the close of 9. So really, it's easier to get out of an EMH park at 9pm than it is to get out of a park closing at 9pm, at 9pm. So it's all... what works for you.

 

[Mikie]

What's your second choice park for the day? I get nervous when those two sites gave such opposite recommendations. Feels like if you get it wrong, you're really in for it! I like to go to MK on my first day and if at least one site says its a good choice, I'll chance it. If your schedule is flexible and another day the sites are more in agreement I'd pick a different MK day. As far as whether to use EMH, I say as long as you can itilize every minute, go ahead and go there. If you won't quite get there at open (or won't stay the duration of late EMH) then avoid the park entirely.

 

[rtbreneman]

I always Use EMH because we get there early and we get park hopper tix. If/when things get crowded, move on. but that first hour is great to get some things done without the crowds.

 

[siskaren]

It always puzzles me when people express confusion over why easyWDW recommends (or doesn't recommend) a particular park on a particular day. Aren't they reading Josh's explanation?

 

[MainMom]

We are going in July and only doing one early EMH at MK. MK is always our first full park day and that day happens to be EMH. I follow the easywdw calendar for all of the other days.

 

[Brian Noble]

It always puzzles me when people express confusion over why easyWDW recommends (or doesn't recommend) a particular park on a particular day. Aren't they reading Josh's explanation?

Because the recommendation isn't what they want to hear. You used to see this all the time back in the TGM days, and sometimes even with TP.

That said, there's more than one way to skin a WDW vacation. Avoiding EMHs makes crowd management more predictable, but I've been to a few even so.

 

[Kristina4109]

For our June trip, we picked a park that had EMH the day before. We found this worked really well. The only park we hit that felt crowded was the MK, and from what I'm hearing, that's pretty much standard nowadays.

 

[DisFam95]

It always puzzles me when people express confusion over why easyWDW recommends (or doesn't recommend) a particular park on a particular day. Aren't they reading Josh's explanation?

For me it's because if I'm not mistaken that TP has been doing this for way longer than Josh and I've been using their advice for many years. I've read Josh's explanation and it makes sense. It's just bothersome to have extreme opposite opinions from the best "experts".

 

[jharaldson]

It always puzzles me when people express confusion over why easyWDW recommends (or doesn't recommend) a particular park on a particular day. Aren't they reading Josh's explanation?

I find a lot of the detail in those notes to just be large chunks of copy/paste. An example of where I trust touring plans more is my upcoming trip in May. On Monday, May 11 we are going to HS. Josh says to avoid it because of EMH. Touring plans says it is going to be a 2 and when I look at the same day a year ago it was a predicted a 2 and ended up being a 1. Because of historical comps I am trusting touring plans over Josh. Also, with Star Wars weekends that week it makes sense to me that a lot of people will skip HS until that.

 

[siskaren]

I find a lot of the detail in those notes to just be large chunks of copy/paste. An example of where I trust touring plans more is my upcoming trip in May. On Monday, May 11 we are going to HS. Josh says to avoid it because of EMH. Touring plans says it is going to be a 2 and when I look at the same day a year ago it was a predicted a 2 and ended up being a 1. Because of historical comps I am trusting touring plans over Josh. Also, with Star Wars weekends that week it makes sense to me that a lot of people will skip HS until that.

Why wouldn't he copy/paste when his reasoning for avoiding EMH or MK on a Monday for instance is always the same? And I'm curious why TP feels that a day in May would only be a 2 or a 1. Numbers that low suggests that you're going to see the lowest crowds of the year, and I always thought that September and January were the lowest crowds. Also, not everyone is into Star Wars (I know, shocking ), and would therefore want to avoid HS on the weekend.