Was this crowd level accurate?

[2019TripIdeas]

Hi-
We're currently planning a trip to WDW (my 4th trip, but first one with kids). We did Disneyland this past Spring (March) and I did not do the best job planning. One of the biggest things involved in that was that I left feeling like I had misjudged the crowd level.

On the sites I looked at beforehand, the days we were there were listed as likely to be a "7" I believe on the Disneyland side and a 6/7 on the California Adventure side. As far as California Adventure went, that seemed about right. We waited in lines of about 25-30 minutes (we had our very young kids with us, so we weren't going on the big name rides anyway, those would've been longer- maybe 40-50 minutes). While the walkways were crowded at times, you could always move around comfortably. Some type of Food/Wine Festival was going on in part of the park, but otherwise, moving around was not an issue.

Meanwhile, over at Disneyland, minus the first hour of the day, we felt like we couldn't move at all. Lines exceeded 90-120 minutes on the app, we spent long periods of time just stopped in standing traffic (on the little bridge by Tiki Room, in front of the castle, and throughout main street). We had a great first hour or so, found we could only do one more attraction because the park got too busy after 10 a.m. We'd then go back to hotel, rest, and try again at night.... even trying again at night, one of the nights we didn't get on anything else because we couldn't get through main street when we arrived. (There were people trying to get parade spots, but this wasn't around the time of the parade).

We also noticed several times that the cast members were opening up those back walkways behind Main Street (and we used them, thankfully!). That made me question if the crowds were actually higher than a "7". While we LOVED the experience of the rides and being there, my husband and I both agreed we're NOT crowd people to that degree (and 4 attractions in a LONG day didn't seem worth the $).

Do you think this sounds like a crowd level of 7? As we plan WDW we're trying to plan for as much of the "low season" as we can, but if I'm unrealistic and that's just the way Disney is all around, I'd want to know that too. If this is a real 7, I'm terrified to think of a 9/10! Thanks!

 

[sherilaine]

You will find that most people will tell you any crowd predictor website is not able to predict crowds at Disneyland - maybe they work for WDW but not for Disneyland and not since Carsland opened.

 

[Niltiac]

The general feeling around here is that the crowd calendars are not at all reliable when it comes to DLR, so it's quite likely that that was not a real "7". I don't know whether they're reliable for WDW.

That said, Disneyland will often feel extra crowded because the walkways just aren't designed for the crowds that come these days. DCA was built later and took potential crowds into consideration, so even if Disneyland and DCA are equally crowded, Disneyland will feel more crowded when you're walking around. Lines at 90-120 minutes is not unusual at all for Space Mountain or Indy. If you were seeing those wait times across all rides then I agree with you that that's extremely busy. But if that was the high end, that's normal. I also think it's fairly normal for them to open the back walkways on a fairly busy day around parade time. Not being able to get through main street at all when it wasn't even close to a parade time seems strange. It's definitely normal for there to be crowds, people milling around and people sitting and saving spots for the parade, but I've never been unable to navigate up the street at all.

 

[DLRExpert]

Always expect it to be busy and if it isn't then that is a plus.
If you are trying to avoid the crowds the most important thing to do when visiting the park is to be there before opening. You can probably get quite a few things done within the first two hours of the park opening if you plan it out correctly.

For example, by 9am Fantasyland is busy so avoid this area after that. However, if the park opens at 9am then you can do a few attractions in those first 30 minutes if you plan it correctly.

By 1030am Adventureland, New Orleans Square (not counting Haunted Mansion), and Frontierland start to get busy.

By 11am Critter Country and Haunted Mansion start to get busy.

Also, never use Stand-By queue if an attraction has FP. The trick is to try and ride the Non-FP rides while you wait to use or retrieve your next FP.

My other recommendation is to avoid the Extra Magic Hour park if you don't have access to it. Personally, I avoid the Disneyland EMH no matter what. Disney California Adventure is easy to experience if you do or don't have access to EMH.

 

[smartlabelprint]

4 rides?! Were you using fast pass or maxpass?

 

[2019TripIdeas]

So we were pretty clueless and only used FastPass for Radiator Springs, and for the Buzz Lightyear ride over in Tomorrowland. I totally underplanned and couldn't seem to figure out where the FastPass kiosks were (or which rides had it and which didn't- total rookie move, I know). Several times I thought a ride had fastpass but the crowds were so big we couldn't figure out where.

We did do Fantasyland first (one morning we had the early entry, and that one went WAY better- I want to say we did 6 things in the first hour alone! But then we found it packed and had to get out of there by 10 a.m.-ish when waits got so long. We went to California Adventure for a few rides and shows (no issue there!), back to the room to nap, and tried to return around 5:30. That was the day where we couldn't get up Main Street later (I think we were stopped by Great Moments with Lincoln, on the side of the town square area?). It was just a mass of people, no one moving, some people on ground for parade spots, a lot of people trying to exit the park, etc. We ended up going over to the downtown disney area to try to wait it out, but when things didn't look better judging by wait times on the app around 7 p.m, we left. I think the parades were supposed to be 8/10 p.m. that day?

I think we were before Maxpass rolled out, unfortunately (would've happily paid that upcharge!). The day we only got to 4 rides at Disneyland was a Saturday, so I did assume it would for sure be more crowded.

Thank you for all feedback so far!

 

[VandVsmama]

If you only made it onto 4 attractions all day, then you're doing Disneyland wrong.

BUT....I have some good news for you...you came to the right place for advice! I agree w/ @DLRExpert 's advice. I'd also like to add a few general hints & suggestions based on stuff I've learned from everyone here....and these are things that our family has put into practice, done ourselves, and found that it works really well for us.

1. Don't trust the crowd predictor calendars online. They're usually off. If you go in March, just plan on it being busy. DL walkways are more narrow than they are in DCA & WDW, so it will always feel more crowded at DL compared to WDW.
2. Download the Disneyland smart phone app to your phone.
3. Use the app to look up when FP return times are for rides you want to go on.
4. If you can afford Max Pass, buy it and use it. If it's not in the travel budget, use a FP runner to get FPs while everyone else goes on another ride or does something else.
5. BE AT THE TURN STILES WITH PARK TICKETS IN HAND 30 MIN BEFORE REG. PARK OPENING!
6. If you have Magic Morning with your tickets, use it. It'll be on Tues, Thurs, or Sat. If you can swing it, use your Magic Morning on 1 of your 1st days at the parks (when you're the most well rested and not tired).
7. Even on a busy Spring Break day, you should be able to get in 10 rides before lunch time if you plan it well. I'll give you an example in a subsequent post.
8. Have everybody pick THE #1 thing they want to do on the trip. Do that on your first day and have the attitude that everything else will be icing on the cake.
9. Go read www.disneylanddaily.com. They have some examples on their website of how to ride several different attractions on a busy park day.

 

[VandVsmama]

Ok, so our family is going to be at DL on Fri 3/23 and Saturday 3/24 next month so we can go to the Food & Wine festival with my sister. SO EXCITED! Only doing 2 days this trip, but I'll take what I can get. This is my sister's first time back at DL in over 20 years and she hates theme parks, so I subscribed to RideMax (www.ridemax.com) and put in a test list of attractions (up to 13) for Saturday 3/17 (they don't have 3/24 loaded into their online app yet).

I've used RideMax many times before and have found it to be spot on accurate with wait times. We didn't use RideMax on our last trip this past May because I know the drill and how to do things now. But for this trip with my sister, since she's impatient, I'm using Ride Max again. Here's how it played out:

We'll be staying at the DLH, so we'll get EMH entry that day from 7-8 am. Assuming we're at the gate 20-30 min ahead of time, during that 7-8 am hour, we're going on the following in this order (this was RideMax's recommendation):

• Matterhorn
• Dumbo
• Alice
• Mad Tea Party
• Mr Toad
• Pinnochio

It also recommended to do Peter Pan first, but we're skipping Peter Pan this time.

Then the rest of the day goes like this:

• 8:05 am - get Star Tours FP using Max Pass
• 8:05 am - go on Autopia. 12 min wait
• 8:34 am - King Arthur's Carousel. 5 min wait, 3 min ride time
• 8:42 am - Snow White. 8 min wait
• 8:59 am - Roger Rabbit's Car Toon Spin. 5 min wait
• 9:08 am - get IJ FP using Ride Max
• 9:09 am - Mickey's House. 8 min wait
• 9:31 am - BTMRR. 14 min wait
• 9:53 am - go on Star Tours using FP. 8 min wait
• 10:17 am - go on IJ using FP. 9 min wait
• 10:31 am - FREE TIME
• 6:58 pm - Jungle Cruise. 14 min wait
• 7:21 pm - Pirates. 19 min wait.
• 8:00 pm - HM. 9 min wait

 

[2019TripIdeas]

Lines at 90-120 minutes is not unusual at all for Space Mountain or Indy. If you were seeing those wait times across all rides then I agree with you that that's extremely busy. But if that was the high end, that's normal. I also think it's fairly normal for them to open the back walkways on a fairly busy day around parade time. Not being able to get through main street at all when it wasn't even close to a parade time seems strange. It's definitely normal for there to be crowds, people milling around and people sitting and saving spots for the parade, but I've never been unable to navigate up the street at all.

Yes for sure on Space Mountain and Indiana Jones- my husband kept an eye on that as he had wanted to go (but it wasn't worth 150-200 minutes on that). I know we saw 90+ on Splash Mountain and I think Pirates too and even 60+ on rides that I would've falsely assumed would be lower waits- Jungle Cruise, Small World, Haunted Mansion.
Also, thanks for the heads up on pathways. Now that I think of the specific spots where we got "stuck", it makes sense that the crowd would bottleneck there.

 

[VandVsmama]

I also put in a sample list of rides for DCA for Fri 3/16. This is what Ride Max came up with based on what I entered. We don't like GotG, so that's not included here.

• During EMH: RSR, Toy Story, and if time, Mater's & Luigi's.
• 8:05 am - get RSR FP using Max Pass
• 8:05 am - Monsters, Inc. 2 min wait
• 8:18 am - Mater's. 13 min wait.
• 8:36 am - Luigi's. 11 min wait
• 8:51 am - get Soarin' FP.
• 8:52 am - go on RSR using FP. 16 min wait
• 9:26 am - GRR. 5 min wait
• 9:36 am - get Toy Story FP.
• 9:39 am - go on Soarin' using FP.
• 10:04 am - Little Mermaid. 9 min wait
• 10:22 am - Golden Zephyr. 6 min wait
• 10:36 am - go on Toy Story using FP. 11 min wait.
• DONE AT DCA!

Then we have an early lunch at the food booths @ DCA and go over to DL.

• 11:30 am - get Roger Rabbit FP using Max Pass
• 11:30 am - Buzz lightyear. 23 min wait. I think 23 min is long to wait for this, so we'd probably skip it and have a more leisurely lunch.
• 12:09 pm - go on Roger Rabbit using FP. 5 min wait. You could enter DL and take the train to Fantasyland station and then go to Toon Town from there.
• 12:18 pm - get BTMRR FP
• 12:20 pm - It's a small world. 21 min wait.
• 1:03 pm - go on BTMRR using FP
• 1:16 pm - Pirates. 20 min wait.
• 1:53 pm - Jungle Cruise. 22 min wait.
• 2:23 pm - get IJ FP.
• 2:23 pm - FREE TIME.
• 7:44 pm - go on IJ using FP
• 8:02 pm - go to your assigned area for 9:00 pm performance of Fantasmic! In our case, we're doing a dining package for dinner for this.
• 9:30 pm - HM. 4 min wait. But I don't think this will be feasible since right after Fantasmic, there will be fireworks usually at 9:30 pm so I doubt we'll be able to make our way to HM right away.

 

[2019TripIdeas]

VandVsmamma,
Thank you so much for all of that. I can totally see where we did it wrong. In terms of doing it "right", we were at the gate 45 minutes early each day (which put us maybe 1/4th of the way across the esplanade between the parks) and we did have the app open a lot. The one thing I didn't love about the smartphone app, was that because I was constantly checking times (Hoping that something would go under 45 minutes or so), I felt like I wasn't engaging with my kiddos (who, ultimately, we were there for). But that's probably a whole other post

It's really helpful to read through how you'd move through the park to maximize time- I also found us doing a TON of back and forth (or attempting it) and that didn't go well at all. I just didn't know the layout of the park well, so falsely hadn't thought of how long it would take to trek between the toontown rollercoaster and Pirates, for example.

We had kind of set our threshold as maybe a max of 45-ish minutes for a wait, since we had a baby and a toddler. We waited that out or a similar timeline on Pirates (worth it!), Pooh, Haunted Mansion, Small World. In an ideal world, we're hoping to do WDW at a time when waits won't even be that long (if such a thing exists, ha!)

Thank you again for your reply!

 

[VandVsmama]

During that "FREE TIME," you can do whatever you want. Options include....

• go see a show. Frozen at DCA, for example, especially if we are tired. Mickey & the Magical Map. Jedi Training Academy in Tomorrowland.
• spend some time in the Animation building in DCA. go to Animation Academy a couple of times. Go to Turtle Talk.
• go to Tom Sawyer's Island.
• by 1-2 pm, we have left the parks and go back to our hotel to lay down and rest. If the weather is good, the kids swim.
• go shopping
• go on Winnie the Pooh
• go to a couple of character meet & greets
• go on Little Mermaid again
• ride the train the whole way around the park
• ride the monorail loop
• see if we can go enjoy my favorite pirate band in New Orleans Square
• go to Coke Corner to see Alice & the Mad Hatter play musical chairs with kids (ask at Coke Corner earlier in the day for the actual time).
• If a parade is available that day at DL and let's say it starts at 4:30 pm, we'd want to be at our favorite spot in Fantasyland sitting down to see it by 4:00 pm. It's right near the Alice in Wonderland bathrooms (our favorite spot, that is). 1 person stays there saving your spot while the other adult takes the 2 kids (we have 2 kids) on It's a Small World....or to the bathroom...or to get a snack to enjoy while you wait for the parade.

 

[Lesley Wake]

Hi-
We're currently planning a trip to WDW (my 4th trip, but first one with kids). We did Disneyland this past Spring (March) and I did not do the best job planning. One of the biggest things involved in that was that I left feeling like I had misjudged the crowd level.

On the sites I looked at beforehand, the days we were there were listed as likely to be a "7" I believe on the Disneyland side and a 6/7 on the California Adventure side. As far as California Adventure went, that seemed about right. We waited in lines of about 25-30 minutes (we had our very young kids with us, so we weren't going on the big name rides anyway, those would've been longer- maybe 40-50 minutes). While the walkways were crowded at times, you could always move around comfortably. Some type of Food/Wine Festival was going on in part of the park, but otherwise, moving around was not an issue.

Meanwhile, over at Disneyland, minus the first hour of the day, we felt like we couldn't move at all. Lines exceeded 90-120 minutes on the app, we spent long periods of time just stopped in standing traffic (on the little bridge by Tiki Room, in front of the castle, and throughout main street). We had a great first hour or so, found we could only do one more attraction because the park got too busy after 10 a.m. We'd then go back to hotel, rest, and try again at night.... even trying again at night, one of the nights we didn't get on anything else because we couldn't get through main street when we arrived. (There were people trying to get parade spots, but this wasn't around the time of the parade).

We also noticed several times that the cast members were opening up those back walkways behind Main Street (and we used them, thankfully!). That made me question if the crowds were actually higher than a "7". While we LOVED the experience of the rides and being there, my husband and I both agreed we're NOT crowd people to that degree (and 4 attractions in a LONG day didn't seem worth the $).

Do you think this sounds like a crowd level of 7? As we plan WDW we're trying to plan for as much of the "low season" as we can, but if I'm unrealistic and that's just the way Disney is all around, I'd want to know that too. If this is a real 7, I'm terrified to think of a 9/10! Thanks!

Last spring was also extremely crowded in general. The SoCal ticket deal was a great deal ($150 for 3 days that could be used over several months). It was the farewell season of Electric Light Parade, which was very well promoted. And lots of rainy days meant that crowds were low those days but then much higher on sunny days, as locals would just wait until a non-rainy day to go to the parks (didn't you know that most SoCal residents are allergic to rain and will melt...). This spring, I believe the number of people has gone down too at DL, but with all the construction walls and refurbs, it still feels extremely crowded.

For WDW, you really can't plan for a low season anymore either. The problem is everyone else seems to think that season will also be low, so will end up coming. It has also been seen that Disney will cut back on staffing levels during their "low season", so even if there may not be as many total guests in the parks, it still feels like it. My best advice is to plan as if it will be busy-arrive early, hit rides at rope drop, plan FPs strategically, maybe take a mid-day break, then come back and stay late.

 

[VandVsmama]

VandVsmamma,
Thank you so much for all of that. I can totally see where we did it wrong. In terms of doing it "right", we were at the gate 45 minutes early each day (which put us maybe 1/4th of the way across the esplanade between the parks) and we did have the app open a lot. The one thing I didn't love about the smartphone app, was that because I was constantly checking times (Hoping that something would go under 45 minutes or so), I felt like I wasn't engaging with my kiddos (who, ultimately, we were there for). But that's probably a whole other post

It's really helpful to read through how you'd move through the park to maximize time- I also found us doing a TON of back and forth (or attempting it) and that didn't go well at all. I just didn't know the layout of the park well, so falsely hadn't thought of how long it would take to trek between the toontown rollercoaster and Pirates, for example.

We had kind of set our threshold as maybe a max of 45-ish minutes for a wait, since we had a baby and a toddler. We waited that out or a similar timeline on Pirates (worth it!), Pooh, Haunted Mansion, Small World. In an ideal world, we're hoping to do WDW at a time when waits won't even be that long (if such a thing exists, ha!)

Thank you again for your reply!

My family's max is 25 min to wait for a ride. We'd wait 30 min for Peter Pan. But every other ride, my max is 20 min. My DH gets Theme Park Fatigue pretty quickly and when that happens, he's cranky and no fun to be around. So we all have a much better time by doing it this way.

We have never felt rushed like we have to "walk with purpose" quickly from 1 attraction to another. The Ride Max software figures out the order in which you should do stuff based on a huge database of historical ride wait times that they have. Similar to Touring Plans, you plug in when you'll get there and what time you'll leave and you enter up to 12 or 13 attractions you want to do, and it spits out your itinerary.

Of course, you don't HAVE to do it that way. We've gone to DL without using Ride Max and we've had as equally amazing of a time.

The basic idea is to:
1. get there early
2. go on slow loaders within the first hour or 2. This would be rides like Alice, Dumbo, Casey Jr circus train, etc. Autopia you'd want to go on within the 1st 2 hours of park opening. Don't want to wait an hour for Space Mountain yet you also want to go on Fantasyland rides? You purchase Max Pass and right after you enter the gates, you get a FP for Space Mtn while you are walking to Fantasyland. Or get the FP on your phone while you're in line to get on Mr Toad's Wild Ride.
3. When your FP return time begins, get the FP for the next ride. So let's say at 8:15 am, you get a FP for Space Mtn. It has you return at 9:00 am to ride it. At 9:00 am, you get a FP for...I don't know...Star Tours. Star Tours return time is maybe 10:30 am. Go on Space Mtn, then go on Autopia and Buzz. Then a bathroom break or another ride or 2 or 3. Then at 10:30 am, get a FP for Indiana Jones....

Let's say the return window for IJ begins at 12:00 pm. So at 10:30 after you've got your IJ FP, you go on Pirates, HM, Jungle Cruise, maybe the Tiki Room and Winnie the Pooh. At 12:00 pm, use the FP to get on IJ. Then have lunch.

While in line to use your IJ FP, you use Max Pass to get your next FP. Let's say it's for BTMRR with a return window now of 2:30-3:30 pm. After lunch, go to Tom Sawyer's Island. Then go on the river boat or the sailing ship.

etc., etc.

 

[HydroGuy]

Hi-
We're currently planning a trip to WDW (my 4th trip, but first one with kids). We did Disneyland this past Spring (March) and I did not do the best job planning. One of the biggest things involved in that was that I left feeling like I had misjudged the crowd level.

On the sites I looked at beforehand, the days we were there were listed as likely to be a "7" I believe on the Disneyland side and a 6/7 on the California Adventure side.

I did not read all the posts in this thread but this may help:

Why I Am Skeptical of the Touring Plans Website DLR Crowd Calendar: https://www.disboards.com/threads/w...ing-plans-website-dlr-crowd-calendar.3196851/

 

[katyringo]

So much good info here.

My recommendation is Go read all of Casey from Disneyland daily’s tips. She knows the parks so so well and her maxpass tips are spot on.

We went during capacity days last time and still rode everything in our 3 days. It can be done!

 

[smartlabelprint]

Ok, so our family is going to be at DL on Fri 3/23 and Saturday 3/24 next month so we can go to the Food & Wine festival with my sister. SO EXCITED! Only doing 2 days this trip, but I'll take what I can get. This is my sister's first time back at DL in over 20 years and she hates theme parks, so I subscribed to RideMax (www.ridemax.com) and put in a test list of attractions (up to 13) for Saturday 3/17 (they don't have 3/24 loaded into their online app yet).

I've used RideMax many times before and have found it to be spot on accurate with wait times. We didn't use RideMax on our last trip this past May because I know the drill and how to do things now. But for this trip with my sister, since she's impatient, I'm using Ride Max again. Here's how it played out:

We'll be staying at the DLH, so we'll get EMH entry that day from 7-8 am. Assuming we're at the gate 20-30 min ahead of time, during that 7-8 am hour, we're going on the following in this order (this was RideMax's recommendation):

• Matterhorn
• Dumbo
• Alice
• Mad Tea Party
• Mr Toad
• Pinnochio

It also recommended to do Peter Pan first, but we're skipping Peter Pan this time.

Then the rest of the day goes like this:

• 8:05 am - get Star Tours FP using Max Pass
• 8:05 am - go on Autopia. 12 min wait
• 8:34 am - King Arthur's Carousel. 5 min wait, 3 min ride time
• 8:42 am - Snow White. 8 min wait
• 8:59 am - Roger Rabbit's Car Toon Spin. 5 min wait
• 9:08 am - get IJ FP using Ride Max
• 9:09 am - Mickey's House. 8 min wait
• 9:31 am - BTMRR. 14 min wait
• 9:53 am - go on Star Tours using FP. 8 min wait
• 10:17 am - go on IJ using FP. 9 min wait
• 10:31 am - FREE TIME
• 6:58 pm - Jungle Cruise. 14 min wait
• 7:21 pm - Pirates. 19 min wait.
• 8:00 pm - HM. 9 min wait

Will dumbo be running again then?

 

[VandVsmama]

Some really handy blog posts on the www.disneylanddaily.com website:

How to start your day at DCA --> https://disneylanddaily.com/how-to-start-your-day-at-california-adventure/
What to do when Disneyland is super crowded --> https://disneylanddaily.com/what-to-do-when-disneyland-is-super-crowded/

 

[VandVsmama]

Will dumbo be running again then?

Nope. So we won't be going on Dumbo!

 

[smartlabelprint]

Nope. So we won't be going on Dumbo!

We’re sad. I never thought kids noticed. 2/3. This am kiddo said I was dreaming about Disneyland. I rode dumbo. Umm... First off they don’t know we’re going. 2nd we can’t ride it!