EMH or not?

[beckylovestink]

I am planning a Sept/Oct trip and I am not sure what to do. I have always used the EMH and those parks. Now I am looking at touring plans and they suggest to stay away from the parks that have EMH. What have some of you done?
I think this will be a good time for smaller crowds. Does it matter?
Has anyone every followed touring plans crowd suggestions? How has it worked?:confused:

[faline]

I don't follow them at all. I've gone into the parks for some of the morning extra magic hours and have managed to accomplish quite a lot in a very short time span. I do believe it does drive up the crowds for the day - particularly for folks who take advantage of the extra magic hour but don't have the capacity to park hop. For me, if the park is too crowded during regular operating hours, I can leave and go to another park.

[ibelieveindisneymagic]

We're the same as Faline. We will take advantage of AM EMH, and find that we can get a lot done before the park gets too crowded, but we find evening ones way too crowded.

[MarkC]

Remember that Touringplans advice is that the park will be more crowded due to EMH. However, I think that mainly pertains to people who don't have that option. We routinely use early morning EMH and can see almost everything we want to see by noon when the park starts to fill up. Take advantage of it while you can.

[Tinker Fan]

We go during Sept./Oct. also and love the EMH in the evening, lots of times there were hardly any people in the park(Hollywood Studios) and it was great, seen things we didn't know was happening. With the exeption of the MK, which still wasn't so bad and in the evenings the weather is so nice, not so hot and humid as during the day. I don't know if we just always hit it right, but we've yet to be at an overly crowded park. Hope this helps

[brownie]

We always avoid the parks with Extra Magic Hours in the morning. We haven't been to Walt Disney World since they added the evening Extra Magic Hours.

[crltkcagle]

Since your going at a time of year when its not too crowded I would go to the EMH. We went in September a few years back and we did the EMH hours just fine.

[Goofy Pluto]

In the past we've always tried to go to the parks with the EMH. But this trip we are trying a different tactic: Avoid them like the plague. We're going to the parks the day after they have an EMH night. We'll see how that works out.

[renecat]

We have used both AM and Pm EMH. The crowds have never been that bad. We do sometimes morning hours and then go to another park after our breakfast. Then for evening hours we may not go until EMH. the later it gets the better the crowds thin out.
You should at least try it and see what you think of the crowds. AM and Pm EMH we always seem to be able to pretty much walk on the attractions.

[TheMartellFamily]

This family is a firm follower of evening EMH at the parks. We use them to our advantage. We get more in, in those few short hours, than we sometimes get in the parks during regular business hours. This is just my opinion.

[DizneyRox]

We vacation during the summer, so take that into account.

AM EMH aren't a bad thing, if you get up and out to the park by 8am. With limited breakfast options in the parks, this has been tougher for us.

PM EMH though are a different beast. We have found MK to be unmanageable for the first few hours of an evening EMH. Epcot is so spread out that it's tougher to get a lot done, but it hasn't been all that bad. MGM don't bother with, and AK is nice, but there's not a tremendous amount to keep you busy for three hours.

On a lot of days, there's a morning and evening EMH. I would say with Disney charging for park hopping, the PM EMH park will be busier (relatively speaking) than the AM EMH park. I would weigh that into my decision, but a park having or not having EMH on any given day wouldn't be THE deciding factor.

We get park hoppers, which helps a ton!

[Jennifer_and_Chris]

We too go in October. And before that have mostly always gone in Sept. We do the opposite of most. We've only done am EMH a time or 2. Works awesome for MK Fantasyland rides especially!

We have done PM EMH more often though and because of the general low crowd levels of Sept/Oct, evenin EMH are excellent. ESPECIALLY AT AK!!! Nothing like having the park almost all to yourself! For AK, we got to the park betweek 2-3pm and were the last ones to leave the park at about 8:20pm. Loved it!!!!

[Fastpasssteve]

The fact that you are going in Sept/Oct is the major factor in your question. There will be fewer people...period. So, while a park might experience a spike because of EMH on any particular day, the total number of people going to all the parks during that time of year will keep everything very managable. Go for it.