What is grad night and how busy?

[momof2disprincesses]

I would like to treat my best friend to a long Disney weekend for her birthday on Fri. May 5. However, I see on the park hours that it is a grad night. What is this and how busy will the parks be?

I assumed early May would be a perfect time to go to the parks ... am I wrong

 

[Bob P]

Don't worry, Grad Night is a hard-ticket event that takes place after the MK closes. The only thing you would notice is that the MK will close early those nights.

If you do a search on this board you will find many other threads on the topic. Meanwhile, here are more details:

http://allearsnet.com/tp/mk/grad.htm

 

[disneyfan67]

I would like to treat my best friend to a long Disney weekend for her birthday on Fri. May 5. However, I see on the park hours that it is a grad night. What is this and how busy will the parks be?

I assumed early May would be a perfect time to go to the parks ... am I wrong

I went last year on 4/27 to 5/3 to celebrate my birthday and I didn't realize that it was Grad night and was kind of disapointed. It taught me to check everything out thoroughly before I booked another trip. I was only able to enjoy one (non grad) late night at MK. The traffic around MK is thick when Grad night is in full swing and I think the kids who go to grad night are so lucky to be able to stay at MK until 4am. I wish I could have done that when I graduated high school.

The MK closes at 7pm sharp and it opens 2hrs later for Grads only and stays open until 4am. I remember getting stuck on the monorail when we were going to Chef Mickeys from the Poly. The monorail stops at MK when grad night is going on but doesn't open the doors and it was held there for over 20 minutes and we're almost late for our ADR's. I remember talking to a couple at O'Hana's who had a tower room with a MK view at CR and said they were hearing loud music until late in the morning.

I don't remember it affecting my stay at the Poly (crowd wise), but it might at other resorts, I'm sure other members can add more info. The only park that's affected by grad night is MK and you can always go to Epcot to see Illuminations at night if you want to see a cool fireworks display at night. I hope this helps.