I just discovered After Hours

I can’t believe I never knew about After Hours! I have so many questions!

  1. How long have they been around?
  2. I see they are available for MK, AK and HS. Has anyone ever tried to get tickets three separate days for all three parks in one week? Is that even possible?
  3. Also, it seems that at this time, there has been no announcement as to whether or not Star Wars Galaxy’s Edge will be included in After Hours once it’s open, is that correct?
  4. If you are already in the park that day with a regular ticket, how do you activate the After Hours tickets once the park closes?
    This has made my day! Now I have to save up more money for our 2020 trip for me and my husband! :smiley:
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At this time, there are no After Hours events scheduled beyond April 13. After that, we don’t know if they will return. I would guess they will return late fall through spring, although I highly doubt SWGE will be included. We shall see!

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I am going to Orlando for business this week. I managed to get DAH at MK and HS, but couldn’t stay long enough to get AK.

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I went to AK and MK last month. The MK event was one of the best “extra” events I have even been to. I enjoyed AK too- just not as much!

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I haven’t told my Dear Family that I am doing Disney while down there. LOL.
We have a family trip planned this summer.

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I feel like if I could only choose one, it would probably be MK. It just seems so magical to be there mostly empty!

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I’ve done all 3 in a long weekend, and it was awesome. We did AK first on our arrival day, then MK the next night. We took one night off and then did HS on our last night.

We are AP holders so we were in AK before the event started. We went to the ticket counter across from Flame Tree at around 7pm and got our wristbands for the events. For the other 2 parks we had been in the parks earlier those days but left for a bit. When we returned it was after 7 and we got our bands on the way in.

I loved these events and I will do them again in a heartbeat. I was a little disappointed by the food cart in HS…there seemed to be only one, and it was in the walkway to TSL, but not close to TSL. It wasn’t really close to anything, really. The carts at the other 2 events were more frequent. All the carts and CM’s were liberal with the treats and drinks once the event officially started.

I expected to really prefer the MK event since there were so many rides available, but I the HS one was my favorite and the MK was my least favorite. I think Fantasyland was a little weird and creepy at night. There’s not enough lighting, and having so few people gave it a totally different/not great feel. (I’ve done the EMM at MK, and loved it!! During the day, with no people around, Fantasyland is great!) The AK one was awesome because Pandora is so pretty at night, and even Asia has a great feel to it with the lanterns and lights overhead. Plus, riding EE after dark is a totally different experience. HS was fantastic because TSL is so fun at night, and it’s close enough together to not feel weird when there are less people there. Also, riding SDD over and over again rates really high for me.

Doing these events really changed my touring strategy, though. After the AK DAH on our first night we really felt like we had riddin/seen everything we wanted to at that park, and we ended up bailing on our AK day and dropping our FPP. We changed plans and did an improptu day at Epcot. With that in mind, when we did MK and HS before the DAH, I tried to focus on the shows and attractions that would not be open during DAH. This worked pretty well for us, and made our daylight hours in the parks way less stressful. We were actually wanting to do the less-popular things when everyone was running around to the headliners, which made our daytime waits pretty minimal.

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We’re not telling the kids that we’re going to Disney next week while they’re at their grandparents…just told them we’re going to Florida :slight_smile:
We did MK DAH 2 years ago, it was awesome, although I agree that lighting was insufficient.

We’re doing AK DAH next week - so excited!!!

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Thank you for the detailed reply! I agree, the After Hours seems like it would definitely help with making sure we get to see everything and being less stressed in the daytime. It will be my husband’s first trip, so I want to pack in as much as possible without overwhelming him!

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We really enjoyed DAH at HS in January of this year. Weather was great, rode SDD over and over with maybe a 5 minute wait each time and several rides had zero wait. The free snacks carts/stands were plentiful but sometimes hard to figure out if it was one of the open stands selling at regular cost or giving out the free stuff. We wouldn’t hesitate to do it again!

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We have booked MK DAH on our upcoming trip and now I am considering adding AK DAH as well. I am not crazy about the extra cost when we already have one booked, but the crowd levels keep increasing. I am leaning towards adding AK so as to reduce the crowd related stress during the day. We can focus on shows, shops, and the rides typically not included (love KS) knowing we’ll be able to hit the more popular rides after hours. What do you all think?

I honestly don’t know if I would have been happy with AK if I wasn’t one of those crazy EE fans. The highlight of my night was 6x in EE. The lowest part of the night was the 53 minute (I think that was the exact time) for one FoP ride.

I do like EE, but 53 minutes for FoP? I expected there to be a wait because it is so popular, but almost an hour? I’m going to have to think about this more.

Anyone else have experience at AK DAH?

I have read stories of people being able to stay on a banshee and ride back to back. We had an issue with the startso they took us out and made us do the whole loop again including preshows. It was just a disappointing way to end a night.

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Backside of Magic did a report on DAH at AK recently and also reported 1 hr waits for FoP during the event. I think they said there were times when it was just 15 minutes but that required some planning and wasn’t the default.

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Good to know! EE is a bit over my roller coaster limit, so without quick access to FoP, I think AK wouldn’t be a great choice for me. I’ll probably try for just MK… maybe add HS depending on how SWGE turns out.

I listened to that report. What they did not mention was that when you checked in they asked you to not go to Pandora until after 9 (30 minutes into the 3 hour event. We did EE 6x, Dinosaur 2x, and Triceratop Spin before we even went there about 9:40. In that last hour and 50 minutes we did Navi and FoP 2x. 12 attractions is good, but that 50 plus wait was the end of my night. There were also three snack carts (only two with ice cream) and one was not where it was listed on the flyer.

We have decided to forego the after hours event at AK. Too much money for DD14 to hang around waiting while we do things she won’t enjoy. I’m not sure how much DS16 will want to do either. I’ll try for same day fast passes for FOP (yes, I have saved the drop times), maximize our TP for the day and hope for the best. I’m sure we’ll get in at least some of what everyone wants to do.

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Well, we had planned (assuming they still offered it) to do the AK DAH in our May 2020 trip specifically because we don’t necessarily enjoy AK. So it was a good way to get in the rides (FOP, EE, Navi, Dinosaur) without devoting a full day. BUT, your experience makes it seem like they somewhat oversell tickets for the event considering probably MOST people are doing it to ride FOP.

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My after hours, like many at AK, was sold out.