@mascardofamily That’s a pretty serious generalization & accusation. Can you give us some specific examples?
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There’s a lot of drugs and drinking that’s done at the event – on par with what you’d find at any type of rock concert event, but more than what was around for Grad Nite events back in the day. There’s also people who go for the experience of having sex on rides. In my view, that’s just what happen when people decide to get wild and crazy, so you kick out the offenders as you catch them. The one that still gives me chills is the year that a group of party goers tossed Mickey into the Castle moat. That costume is so heavy that it is very lucky the gal in the costume didn’t drown. 
ETA: From a gal I knew who worked at the Emporium, she said that it was also the event with the highest amount of “five finger discounts” on merchandise… I have no idea if it is the highest, but IMO, for a Christian event, there should be zero merchandise walking out without a receipt, ya know?
@mascardofamily Have you seen this yourself or is this just hearsay? I’ve been to dozens of Christian concerts & festivals and never witnessed this type of behavior. Sounds like your friend may just have a problem with Christianity. Can you imagine if she said the same thing about homosexuals & gay days?
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I haven’t been to Night of Joy personally, but my experience is from being in the park with NoJ attendees on the afternoon before the event started back in 2001. While waiting in line for Pirates of the Caribbean, the church group ahead of me reeked so strongly of marijuana (which I am allergic to), that I had to leave the line. On my way out of the park, I stopped by the restrooms over near what is now the Tomorrowland Noodle Station, and there were a couple of people wearing church t-shirts who were still clothed, but had hands underneath each other’s clothing and were making out pretty intensely in a corner of the restaurant area. When I pointed it out to a CM, I was told “Yeah, just wait a couple hours and the real freaks come out, but we can’t do anything about it.”
Here’s another person’s review who was there a few years later, although he didn’t see the drugs and sex issues…just the bad behavior of the kids.
http://jimhillmedia.com/columnists1/b/jeff_lange/archive/2005/09/14/1519.aspx
I think DIsney could solve the problems with this event with two simple steps:
- Higher chaperone-to-child ratio
- Be more aggressive about taking people behaving badly to a holding area until the event is over.
When I attended Grad Nite back in the day, we had to dress up (including guys had to wear ties), we were highly chaperoned, and we knew that if we were caught doing anything out of line, we’d be taken to a holding area until the event was over…and then have to deal with the school when we got back. My hope is that after NoJ got kicked out of the Magic Kingdom for a while, that now people realize that it is a privilege to go to an event like this, and behave better. I’ll be around it all in a month and change, so I’ll let you know what I see this time 'round, if you’re interested.
We did CG on July 3 a few weeks ago on the first night of our trip and it was absolutely AMAZING! We saw 4th of July tribute to USA fireworks and this set the tone for our whole trip!! PS - it was myself, DW and DSs 5&7… 
I impressed my wife with this one even with our beautiful boys there for our “date”!
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To me, date night means either a chance to dress up or a chance to be relatively alone. NOJ doesn’t fill that for me. CG fits the dress up, but not the privacy (I think it’s a little loud too).
Are you staying somewhere you could just order room service instead?
Laurel, we could as long as we want to eat in our very relaxing Cars suite with DDs 9 & 6, DS3, and DMIL. 
. Probably not the best idea.
I guess to clarify date night doesn’t have to be very fancy for us. Just a chance to relax with one another and finish a sentence without being interrupted by a child.
It looks like we are leaning towards CG. Our plan is to hit RD at MK the next day but that’s not pressing as we have several days planned there so if we stay our later than expected it’ll be fine.
Thanks for the input!
Wait! I thought we got to pick ours dates, not the restaurant …grrrrrrrr… (Putting away my note to Colin Firth).
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We are doing a date night this trip too. I’m thinking just MK or Epcot for a few hours of strolling hand in hand without a kid trying to climb our arms.
I know that this was not one of your options listed, but an Epcot Wind Down after watching illuminations would be a lot of fun.
This was not on your list…but… for date night I would eat dinner at Jiko at the AKL and then stroll the fabulous grounds looking at the animals, sitting by the fire and having an adult beverage.