Free Dining and Crowd Levels

[tennantsrwe]

Good Morning!!
So we have reservations at POP Dec 9-16. Luckily we already have all our ADRs bc we were offered a visa promotion which included free dining for the lenght of our stay. Now that Disney has opened up FD to the public is it likely the crowd levels for that week are going to sky rocket? We usually always go during this time of the year but never during FD. Just curious as to what kind of crowds, wait times, etc we're going to be looking at. Thanks! :mickey:

[Strmchsr]

"Free" dining has been done to death and now occurs so frequently throughout the year it won't have a noticeable impact on crowd levels. What it will do is make the restaurants a lot more crowded. As for crowds that week, not sure what to expect this year. It used to be a fairly uncrowded week leading up to the big crowds of Christmas week. However, the last 2 years I have heard of pretty big crowds that week. I guess we'll have to wait and see what happens this year.

[DisneyFr33k]

I agree with Strmchsr. Really, just be sure you have your ADR's all booked ASAP as the sit down restaurants do book up. I've never been in December, close to the holidays. Have fun!

[AllDisney]

We don't notice large unmanageable crowds during this time in December. Restaurants are really busy but you have your ADR so you are all set.

Have a great time:mickey:

[brivers222]

As annoying as it was that they made us wait to see times... it was actually a blessing that we could book our ADRs without the knowledge of free dining. Now all mine are booked and I can just sit back and relax

[tennantsrwe]

:thumbsup:Thanks all for the input. We LOOVE the World at Christmas time and are def. looking forward to going again. We noticed the past few years crowds were up a bit compared to 2005 and earlier visits but they still weren't too bad. Somehow tho all our visits were during the blackout free dining weeks so we never experienced the actual FD atmosphere. I'm so pumped we had our ressies beforehand, I bet it's crazy trying to snag them now the promo has been announced. Now I'm just patiently waiting on the release of the December dates for the Wishes Fireworks and Dessert party..tick tock!! LOL!! Thanks, again!

[jonahbear2006]

We did this in the past and we walked into boardwalk sweet shop and i said why is it so dead around here theres free dining and the CM said, "Nobodys gonna come down here just because they offer free dining. Its an off week, it always is this week." SO i dont think that BC of dining it will be busy. I think it will be a typical week.