We go to WDW on Sept 20. By coincidence a friend of mine is at HS right now - today - with his young family. This is what he just posted on Facebook.
“ Disney world is not worth it whatsoever. Minimum wait is 60 minutes and most things are 2+ hours. We paid $25 for parking to sit and do nothing this entire day. I am so angry right now. This entire trip is wasted.”
Any comments or thoughts? It is a Sunday (our visit days are M-F). I thought the crowds are 1 of 10. Are the lines really that bad? The Lines app is showing about 30 to 60 minutes (w most about 40 min)
Gotta agree. There’s a number of things that are sub 20 minute waits, but no one wants to ride them. And on weekends, even finding sub 20 is tough.
Labor Day Saturday I was there and I basically wrote off the parks(I had an MK park res) until the end of the day. When I did go in, I wasn’t able to ride anything without a stupid long wait.
Hs is even worse. There’s only a few things to draw crowds in different directions. It’s why I wouldn’t really feel comfortable advising anyone to go to Disney right now.
additionally, I was to be there for another few days but my trip was cut short, but I had already cancelled/switched all my HS reservations for other parks. It’s so busy, and I didn’t feel like doing nothing but waiting in super long lines all day
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I’ve heard not of one complaint about visiting MK or HS Monday through Friday. I would definitely target HS for Tue, Wed, Thursday. Weekends best for Epcot or AK.
But, I can imagine that was a bit of a rude awakening.
Also, if these conditions are at 20% capacity, I’d hate to see it at 40%
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Hs has been repeatedly reported at capacity everyday. I’m not sure how you haven’t heard anyone complaining about the waits, as there have been plenty.
MK is a better during the week, but not Friday. On Friday it gets fairly busy. HM, POC, and space mountain waits will stretch to 40+ minutes. Splash mountain and btmrr even longer.
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MMRR averaged a 64 minute wait 9/8 to 9/10. The other top 5 headliners (including ROTR) averaged 25 to 45 minute wait over those same three days. Doesn’t sound terrible to me. But being use to FP+, yeah it’s not great.
ETA: This weekend’s waits are only a tiny bit higher than the week days. Clearly the friend of the OP is greatly exaggerating.
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You did a trip report, right? (I seem to recall people referencing one but I’m not on here as much weeks I’m working) I’m about 6 weeks out from my trip and I’ve been checking wait times on the app and freaking out at each mention of “increasing capacity”. We’ve got a day planned at each park Tues-Fri, but can’t quite figure out what to do with our bonus day on Sunday.
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I personally reserve Sundays for AK. You could consider doing one park twice during the weekdays.
Maybe scheduling HS twice, in case the ROTR BG is not successful on day one.
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Agree with this. I was there today. Had we not gone directly to MMRR then to TSM we would not have been on any rides.
Think TP needs to re-evaluate crowd levels at HS.
I did, indeed. It was cut short, but it was fun while it lasted.
As far as what to do for a bonus day, The only advice I can give is to maybe keep it flexible? While the parks are busy on the weekend, there still seems to be the ability to change parks at the last minute. So maybe get what you’d feel you’d want for a default, and if something grabs ya through the week or something goes wrong, switch it up?
The only thing is I did not see wait times more than 55mins except MMRR was at 90 at one point during the day. ROTR had some down time this morning.
I am curious as to suggestions as well. We will have 5 park days over Columbus Day weekend…Thursday before to Thursday after. We will do Epcot that first Thursday because we need a late start. We were going to take Saturday and Sunday completely off from the parks. But I can’t figure out which parks to do which days. Which one for Columbus Day itself? Which on on a Friday? Aaahhhhh!!!
I have HS reserved for this Tuesday and Thursday, and next Monday as a back-up. I hope that I will be able to report lower crowds.
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Pre-covid (Jan/Feb) HS wait times were substantially higher, even on week days than what they are now. Again, it’s just not what we are use to because there are currently no FP+. For the previous many years, our fast passes would save us literally hours waiting in line.
TP’s crowd level predictions (based on wait times) seem to be fairly accurate, when comparing pre-covid to current conditions. The predicted wait times were always based on stand by lines. It’s just now, liners have no advantage over the next guy because of no FP+, especially when we could book far in advance and utilize FP+ drops.
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This image probably won’t help, as the two popular parks have the lowest predicted wait times for Monday. I don’t know what to tell you.
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We just left EC on a Sunday. We toured world showcase only today. Didn’t ride Malestrom aka Frozen but heard a CM say 60 min wait as we walked by. Walked on to friendship boats. I know who cares. Saw a line cue up briefly at mouse gears. For relaxing and snacking it was pretty tame for a Sunday I thought.
And gorgeous day! Overcast and breezy
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Sounds like a perfect day!
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Everything I am reading says that on busy days you should do MK or HS because their AP slots are full. I don’t understand how having a slot full makes that the better park to be at. It just doesn’t make sense to me…I guess I’d rather go to AK and wait in 6 lines because there are 6 rides and know that when I do MK I won’t have any long lines. I am just missing the logic behind the parks that have the AP slots full having the lowest CL. My brain hurts from trying to figure it out, actually. 
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I’m with you on this! I think that busy days should be EC or AK days. JMHO. HS is always going to be busy but busier on weekends so, I’d go there M-R. That’s based on what I’ve read and a bit of experience as a new local.
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We just went to HS the day after Labor Day (Tues), and while waits did hover higher than I would have wanted, it wasn’t a wasted day. While Disney will post waits of 60+ min, we Liners know better. Most we waited (outside of the breakdown for ROTR) was 35 min or so.
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HS might feel more crowded on weekends because locals can come and be there all day. On weekdays, while park pass availability might be full up, a larger percentage of those who come have much more limited windows if when they can be there. This will make actual crowds at any given time during the day much more variable.
HS is also particularly bad because every ride they have has reduced capacity… sometimes significantly so. This is different from the Omimover type rides at other parks which have almost no reduction in capacity. So lower crowds mean much shorter lines for many things. At HS, reduced capacity means reduced park capacity isn’t enough to compensate for reduced ride capacity. At least not by much.
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