My family of 4 typically hit WDW in mid-October (during my teacher wife’s fall break), but I had the bright idea to delay by a few weeks this year, pull the kids out of school after the election day holidays and go in early November. “The crowds will be even lower”, I thought. I have since become aware of something called Jersey Week.
I find wildly diverging opinions on the impact of JW from sites/forums I typically trust. Some make JW sound like World War III w/ we’ll need to bring mace to ward off the crowds and we’ll have to scavenge for food. Other sites make it sound like it’ll just be slight uptick in the normal November crowds. The Crowd Tracker at this site paints a very rosy picture, but page that aggregates holidays and seasons predicts twice the normal crowd size.
When we go in October, the parks feel about 60-70% full (EPCOT maybe a little worse). What are we talking about for Jersey Week?
We went last year 4-8, so similar to your dates. It was not bad at all. It was in between the Halloween parties and the Christmas parties, so MK was available every night, which we liked.
The crowds were manageable and we enjoyed it quite a lot. Sunday will be the F&W Marathon, but we actually ended up in Epcot that day and it was not bad at all.
We had ZERO rain while we were there. I stayed one week longer in Florida and it only rained one time. The weather was nice (I hate hot and humid and I felt pretty good).
I remember once going and being asked if I was from New Jersey. That’s about all I ever noticed about Jersey week. I don’t think it had any effect whatsoever. You’ll be well armed with a TP either way so don’t worry! Have a great time!
One thing to mention: are you flying to WDW? If yes, keep an eye on plane tickets and book them early. My sales meeting is around Jersey week every year and it becomes hard for lots of people to get the flights they want the closest it gets to the date.
We went during Jersey week two years ago and it didn’t seem crazy crowded. Spring break is so much worse. And honestly we used to go often during our fall break (second week in October) and felt that was much worse.
I’m from NJ too and find great offence to the leather pants comment but Taylor Ham or pork roll can be found at Publiks now a days in the deli case.
But that’s ok forget about it
I’ve never been there that week, but simple math indicates to me that it couldn’t be that big a deal. On any given day, there are upwards of 200,000 people in the parks. I just can’t see how even if several thousan families from NJ decided to descend on WDW on that week, would really be all that noticeable.
I’ve been a couple times and it’s a busy week. The vacationers from New Jersey are part of what makes it so, but the Wine & Dine Marathon at the start of the week brings a lot of people in as well. Things settle down as the week goes on, but the start of your trip will likely be more crowded that an ordinary fall weekend.
According to the “Asbury Park Press” in the 1800’s it was Taylor Ham but after food regulations to be called “ham” it has to come from certain cuts of pork. So Taylor changed it to “pork roll”. North NJ still calls it “Taylor Ham” and South NJ calls it “pork roll”. I live in the middle of the state while still on the shore it goes by both name.
Whatever you call it, it tastes great.
Do you really want to get me started with WAWA? How do you compete with a company that goes back 200 years? How do you compete with a company that had Abraham Lincoln as an in house lawyer.
Yes I worked for Wawa many years pt great job ft nightmare.
Wow, I never knew about that connection to Lincoln. I’ve actually read several books about him and funny enough, Wawa’s Hoagiefest was never mentioned.
Thanks for the fun fact, I’m gonna make sure I quiz the kid at the gas pump tomorrow about that (as I hope everyone knows us Jersey people still don’t pump our own gas…or maybe you can say we’re not allowed )
I realize I’m bumping my own topic here, but I’m still concerned about the accuracy of this site’s crowd calendar. I happened across the Historical Crowd Calendar and if you look back at Jersey Week in 2016 and 2017, there is a SIGNIFICANT impact to crowds. Lots of 7s, 8s and 9s and even a 10. If you go back to 2012-2015, though, there’s a slight uptick (4s-6s), but nothing much more than that.
So, when I look at this year’s projected crowd size and I see almost nothing about a 5, that doesn’t seem to follow the pattern from the last two years. Not only is there that inconsistency, but I got an email two weeks ago that the crowd sizes during my trip were actually being adjusted DOWN. Some 5s became 4s, some 4s became 3s, etc.
Much like Fox Mulder, “I want to believe!” but if history is any indication, I shouldn’t expect the mostly 3s and 4s at WDW during Jersey Week. I should, instead prepare for a floor of 5 and a ceiling of 8 or 9 most days.
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