Advice From Anyone Who's Been New Years Eve

[Orion33]

Ha pretty much what the title says really , this year it will be my first NYE experience, can anyone reccomend somewhere good to see the main event from?

I understand main street is a total scrum but are there any restaurants you can see the new year in from overlooking it all? or a good non crowded spot in the park? (ha chance would be a fine thing)

What is the drill for New Years Eve what does everyone do? what are good things to do??

anyone that has been previously all tips and advice greatly appreciated

(I already got the gist that if you want to toast in the new year not to bother waiting in line for their over priced stuff!)

many thanks

Karenxx

 

[Orion33]

anybody???

 

[mickey4kids]

Hi my friend came back from having a new year trip and she said that it was very very busy. She said to make good use of all magic hours & fast passes for rides as you will need it. She did say though that on the actual new years eve she left the park at 11 pm and there was a party laid on in the hotel which was fantastic. The following morning she heard everyone saying that nobody could get on the buses, there were no taxis and people walked and got back to the hotel at 3 am!!! So depending on where you are staying you might want to take this into account (she stayed at Explorers which is quite a good walk). You may want to check if your hotel is putting anything on for the new years eve as if you are travelling with children it may not be a wise move to stay in the park after 12, or if you do just walk back to your hotel and dont even wait for a bus or taxi. She has been to Disney before and said that is was more exciting at new year than any other time but that was the only negative comment she made.

 

[maleficent_man]

I've been there for 3 out of the last 4 New Years. I know there were a lot of posts here after the last one of it being crazy/scary busy. I had learnt from previous experience to avoid the main crush on Main Street and stood down by the train station.

The atmosphere in the park is great during the day - it is mega busy. It's the only time I've ever seen the whole queue for Pirates being used. You're looking at an hour wait for just about anything.

If you are wanting to stay beyond midnight, you could spend midnight in Frontierland or off to the sides of Central Plaza. It's gonna be busy wherever you are but as long as you know this then you'll be ok. I've never had kids with me though - It may be a different scenario if little uns are in tow. Any questions drop me a PM.

 

[tigger300686]

Hi Karen,
My BF and I had our first NYE trip this year- it was wonderful, I can’t think of a better place to spend NYE than DLP, NYE'S have something to live up to now!!!! I have to admit I was abit put off about going after hearing some peoples experience but I would defiantly go again it was brilliant. Here are a few tips/ observations from our trip- I apologise now as I may start to ramble on amongst reminiscing our trip.
NYE Meals- There of special meals you can book they tend to have two sittings one at 6:30pm and one at 9:00pm you can book them for any of the hotels and a number of restaurants in the parks, I think walts is included in this which may be an idea as you might be able to see the fireworks form in there – I’m not sure but that’s depending on whether they are open until that late and if you can get a table in the right room to see down main street. There is also a meal and show at NPB. All of these tho are very pricey – but I’m sure they are worth every penny, when we walked back to the Cheyenne about 12:30am past the NY hotel restaurant there was still lots of ppl in there and there seemed to be some Disney entertainment and a real party atmosphere going on.
We decided however just to book a table for late afternoon at the steakhouse, at the restaurant that will be hosting the special meals you can only book up till 4:30pm it you just want to have a normal meal, everywhere else I don’t think it matters. We decided to go for afternoon time as we figured that the restaurants would be very busy, we ended up eating at 3:15pm abit earlier than we have hoped but it was the only time they had left. I booked our meals mid Nov but I would def book earlier then that if you want certain times. Our meal works out well as we ate while the parade was on so it wasn’t busy at all but we knew the parade had finish because it was crazy busy with ppl trying to get a table- also def book your meals cuz there no chance of just turning up.

The parks- We went from the 30th to the 2nd the 30ths happen to be a Sunday and when we got there the parks weren’t busy at all hardly any wait for the rides- I guess because it’s a common switch over day. This was just the clam before the storm lol. The next day was mega busy, we joined the 40min queue for rock n roller coaster- turned out to be nearly a 2hour wait!!! We didn’t make it out for EMH NYE morning as we were meeting family that were joining us but I would have thought they would have been very useful. We used the EMH two mornings and were having breakfast everyday at 7am and the park was empty both times. If you can make it and you want to get on the rides – getting up early on new year’s day is a really good idea its really dead until about 12 than the park starts to fill very quickly.
On NYE the park/ride everything is open until 1 am, we finished our meal at about 5pm and then took a wonder around the park- waits times were terrible and it was once again mega busy, but managed to get on a few things like POTC , then fantillusion parade was on and as we couldn’t really get a good view of it we decided to go see what the ride waits were like- the queues was 15 mins for the Haunted mansion so we went on that but once again we knew when the parade had finished because the queue tripled-we then thought we’d see what BTM was like – 70mins so we stood trying to decide whether to wait of not and this French couple in form of us flashing some fast past tickets in our face, the girl didn’t want to go on it and the ticket were valid from that time- I nearly bit her hand off loll- I love going on BTM in the dark, I couldn’t believe our luck we must have had the biggest grins on our faces lol. After that we decided to grab a hot choc and hotdog- main street and the central plaza was really busy all the shop were just packed. After we finished munching we just stood around central plaza from about 11:30- they have music playing, that castle lights start doing summat crazy – lots of dancing round in the street and a general party atmosphere, it was just lovely to stand and absorb it. Ppl slowly started taking their places for the fireworks, some ppl were even getting up on the grass verge which I felt was abit naughty as there no need to ruin Disney property after all fireworks do go up in the air!!! At about 12:30 we were asked to move back into main street- I’m not sure how many ppl actually moved but it didn’t seemed many, however we moved round to the back of the 15th stage which we fine, main street looked packed where as in central plaza is didn’t seem it I could have swung my arms about if I had wanted, whereas main street looked very much like sardines. Anyway the fireworks are very much worth the wait and the cold!!! Definitely wrap up!!
Ok so getting out of the park when the fireworks had finished was abit of nightmare!! Now is was like sardines and you could only just put one foot in front of the over but we had the odd person trying to get to the park lol, how ppl cope with this with buggies and small children I don’t know it must be horrible! Luckily we only had to injure about 5mins of it as we cut down through the walkway behind the shops- at first I wasn’t sure about going this as I thought we might end up in a even smaller squashier space but it wasn’t busy at all and we were out of the park in no time at all- in fact we walked back to the Cheyenne and were tucked up in bed by 12:30am lol. There was alot of ppl going off over the rides and I guess if you have the energy left to do so then you might as awell stay in the park until u can walk down Main Street at a normal pace.

Ok so my advice is-
Book all your meals before ASAP
Make good use of EMH and quiet mornings
Go on the rides while the parades/ shows are on if you want to go on them on NYE and parades/shows on another day
Wrap up!!- The first two days were fine but the 1st and 2nd of Jan were freezing!!
If you want to watch the fireworks try and stay on the outskirts of central plaza
Use the walkways to get out of the park
Get fast passes early for later on in the evening
Don’t bother trying to get on the shuttle buses on NYE
And just bear in mind that everything just takes longer because of how busy it is

But the main thing is – just enjoy it!! You’ll have a brilliant time and it will be worth it. Yes it’s busy and yes its cold but that’s just how it comes. I think if you want to get on rides and see all the shows/parades than you’d probably need longer than four days over this time of year but if you’re going for the purpose of NYE then your best just going with flow and doing what you can when you can. For me the main point in going for NYE was to be there for see the New Year in and celebrate and thing else we did was just a bonus.

Hope these helps- I’ll add more if anything else comes to mind

 

[Orion33]

You stars thank you for all that info it is so appreciated!

Fully prepared for the business as it was madness when we went last year for the 21st-24th december so i have warned the family it will possibly be crazier and rides will be totally out-though hoping that as we are there till late on the 4th it may quieten?? who knows it'll just be brilliant to go.

We always stay at the Seqouia in winter so transport won't be an issue

plus no children with us (just my 60 year old parents and husband - same difference i suppose! )so thats easier!

I will have an AP by then but do i still have to pay extra to get in NYE as it's an event? I know I do for Halloween but not sure for NYE.

Interesting about the restaurants now where to go...?

Kxx

 

[thelittlemermaid83]

Wow, great advice.
I would love to go New Year but leave the little one with family. Maybe i can plan that for next year

 

[tigger300686]

You stars thank you for all that info it is so appreciated!

Fully prepared for the business as it was madness when we went last year for the 21st-24th december so i have warned the family it will possibly be crazier and rides will be totally out-though hoping that as we are there till late on the 4th it may quieten?? who knows it'll just be brilliant to go.

We always stay at the Seqouia in winter so transport won't be an issue

plus no children with us (just my 60 year old parents and husband - same difference i suppose! )so thats easier!

I will have an AP by then but do i still have to pay extra to get in NYE as it's an event? I know I do for Halloween but not sure for NYE.

Interesting about the restaurants now where to go...?

Kxx

Your Welcome
Yeah it will def be less busy 2nd,3rd and 4th. You dont have to pay anything for NYE, Anyone can go in on just a normal ticket, as its not really an event thing like the halloween party.

I'm sure u'll have a great time
x

Wow, great advice.
I would love to go New Year but leave the little one with family. Maybe i can plan that for next year

Lol ur keen, how many trips are u planning your just like i was when i came back from my first trip wanting to go in every season&event lol

 

[thelittlemermaid83]

Lol ur keen, how many trips are u planning your just like i was when i came back from my first trip wanting to go in every season&event lol

I seem to planning about 3 at the moment haha.