Crowded vs down times

[acmom]

We have been to Disney 5 times in the last 10 years or so but have always been at relatively low crowd times - early Nov, Jan, early Feb. We are considering a last minute trip over our kids' Feb break which is President's Day week. We know it will be much more crowded then and are trying to decide how much of a difference we will feel. Our other option is to just do a Florida beach trip and then do Disney next year in Nov. For those of you who have gone at both crowded and down times, were you disappointed in the crowded trips?

[georgiegirl]

I think it will be okay if you plan to be there at rope drop and have fast passes and tour the parks smartly.


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[rkold]

We go to WDW a lot. Personally, I find the "down" times seem less "down" each time we go. We're going for President's Week and went last year for it as well. I find there are certain pluses to busy times. It's actually easier to book restaurants because there are no free meal plans and lots of people stay off property, so getting FP+s seems easier too. (We had no problem getting everything we wanted.) The parks tend to be decently quiet from opening until around lunch time and if your kids like staying up late some of the attractions get really quiet again as it gets later into the evening as well. My DD loves Belle's Enchanted Tales, and we did it 2 or 3x in a row at 9ish at night with the only wait being getting together a large enough group for the performance. The weather can really vary. Last year one day it was freezing in the am and only got up to around 55, 2 days later it was 80!

One thing to be aware of, the week end after the Presidents, 19-20, is the Princess 1/2 marathon. It does make it a necessity to make meal ressies from Thurs-Sunday but you can make them only a day or two ahead and be fine. (As we found out Disney Marathon week end.) I think the biggest issue is the race itself can cause traffic issues, so just be aware of it for park planning. The 5k and 10k on Fri+Sat aren't too disruptive, but the 1/2 on Sunday can be. I'd recommend not going to Epcot or MK that day until afternoon if one of those is the park you want to visit.