We’ve never been to Disney World on a holiday before, but Seth’s sister was in town and wanted to go, so we made some last minute plans, and put together a pretty decent itinerary.
We went in with the expectation that we’ll just do what we can, try and enjoy ourselves, and avoid the looming possibility of getting heat stroke. We saw horror stories online about the crowds, the heat, and really weren’t looking forward to seeing 2 hour “It’s a Small World” lines and having sweaty people crashing into us.
Luckily, it honestly wasn’t that bad. Since Seth’s sister’s flight arrived around noon, we made it to the parks around 2:30. Well after rope drop, the usual midday luls or groups of people leaving didn’t seem to be happening. In fact, the parking lot was full, the boats and monorails were full, and Main street was bursting.
Once we got inside we headed straight over to Plaza Ice-Cream Parlor on Main Street to get a couple of ice-cream treats to share. After that we meandered over to our 3:30 fastpass at our leisure while doing our best not to let any of the quickly melting ice cream go to waste.
It was nice to get out of the heat while waiting in the fast pass line for Pirates of the Caribbean and the splashes that occur at different parts on the ride were well received by all.
However, the line over at Big Thunder Mountain was a different story. It didn’t have the back rows open, and the line was astronomical, but – it was nothing compared to Splash Mountain, which was over 2 hours long at this point.
We wandered over to our next fastpass at The Haunted Mansion – The Haunted Mansion line crept over an hour, but we were happy to experience the cold running chills inside.
Then we walked around the carousel to check “Hundred Acre Goods” for our missing Christopher Robin stuffed Kanga & Roo. The midway area by the Carousel was just a disaster. It was apparent that this was a 90% capacity day. The hordes of people barely moved and it felt a little bit like the walking dead. Except, all the zombies wanted Turkey Legs and Churros.
We waited in the 25 minute people mover line while we awaited our Space Mountain fast pass time to start. When we were next to get on, some people caused the people mover to shutdown by going into a “Castmembers only” section along the tracks. Whoops. They left, but everyone else had to wait another 10 minutes while they cleared out all the cars and basically rebooted the ride, seemed like a strange protcall to us, but there must’ve been a reason for it.
When we went to fastpass in for Space Mountain, the Fastpass line stretched to the Tomorrowland Men’s room, but it went fairy quickly. The Space Mountain Standby Line was 2 hours at that point so we definitely couldn’t complain about a longer than usual fast pass line.
At this point in the day Splash mountain was nearly 3 hours and right in line with 7 Dwarfs Mine Train.
After Space Mountain, we grabbed a fourth fast pass for Buzz Lightyear Space Ranger Spin. The fastpass line stretched to the entrance of Tomorrow Land Terrace and that one didn’t move very quickly and it started to rain. The ride itself also seemed to be moving slightly faster than it would on a normal day, we assumed that was to get people in and out as quickly as possible to keep wait times down as much as possible.
By the time we left, it was about to rain again, and there were cast members directing walking traffic due to the insane volume of people.
It was now around 6:30. The firework show wouldn’t start for hours, but people were already claiming their spots.
As much as we would’ve loved to see the Firework display, we knew we were making the right decision for us by leaving early. We stayed on a regular weekend night for the fireworks once and the feeling of being herded like cattle getting onto the ferry boat is an experience we’ll be wanting to avoid from here on out.
As we made our way to the exit to head back to the Pop Century Hotel, we saw the insane barricade system they were setting up for the after fireworks traffic. And I’m not kidding when I say that the barricade system took up the entire entrance between where the monorail lets out and you scan your magic band to get in.
After seeing that, we couldn’t be any more sure of our choice to leave. It’s strange, but I’ve never been more relieved to actually be leaving Disney. There’s no other way to describe that setup than “Herding Cattle”. We watched the fireworks display on YouTube and were just as happy!
So – would we go on July 4th again? Probably not. It wasn’t as bad as we expected, but the hot weather, crowds, and risk of long waits just to leave are more than a little unnerving.