September travel

LDisney123

Earning My Ears
Joined
Jul 16, 2017
I have noticed on the crowd calendar that the first full week of September (in the USA the week of Labor Day) the tuesday-thurs is listed as being the second most empty in the parks. It has been like this for several years, and I'm wondering if this is because school has gone back the week before, and usually the Halloween event does not start till after that week? I know the Halloween merch in the past has come out a week before the event starts so I could still buy the items, but I'm wondering if there would be such a difference between going a week when it is 2nd most empty to the 3rd most empty. I've been to WDW a lot.

My other question about September travel is that it seems to be mentioned in passing that its typhoon season, and my worry is that my plane will be delayed getting to Japan or leaving it. Have any foreigners had significant trouble with the weather in early September?

I'm trying to choose September 2020 as a way to get there after the Olympics and after the spring opening of Beauty and the Beast. Would early September or late September be better? Or is it just one big mosh?
 
Yes. Crowds go down after summer is over and don't pick up until the Halloween event. If this is going to be a once in a lifetime type of trip, lower crowds are probably preferred. If you want to see the Halloween stuff, then you should probably go later but avoid long weekends and the first day of the event. Halloween is the event when the parks are most likely to reach capacity.

The likelihood of flight delays is low but there may be a 50% chance of rain on any given day. That means that outdoor shows may be cancelled and you may have an uncomfortable time. I went for 5 days towards the end of September last year and the Halloween parade and Disneysea harbor show was sometimes modified or cancelled.

I don't think weather is going to be too different for the beginning vs. the end of the month. If you like shows + parades or want a chance to take pictures of Halloween decorations/characters (villians such as Jafar, Maleficent, etc) I suggest going at the end of the month. If all you care about are slightly shorter wait times on rides then go at the beginning of the month.
 
Yes. Crowds go down after summer is over and don't pick up until the Halloween event. If this is going to be a once in a lifetime type of trip, lower crowds are probably preferred. If you want to see the Halloween stuff, then you should probably go later but avoid long weekends and the first day of the event. Halloween is the event when the parks are most likely to reach capacity.

The likelihood of flight delays is low but there may be a 50% chance of rain on any given day. That means that outdoor shows may be cancelled and you may have an uncomfortable time. I went for 5 days towards the end of September last year and the Halloween parade and Disneysea harbor show was sometimes modified or cancelled.

I don't think weather is going to be too different for the beginning vs. the end of the month. If you like shows + parades or want a chance to take pictures of Halloween decorations/characters (villians such as Jafar, Maleficent, etc) I suggest going at the end of the month. If all you care about are slightly shorter wait times on rides then go at the beginning of the month.
Thanks! I’ll be going with my husband who does not normally go on rides so I sort of want to be able to go on and off a ride without making him wait too long. I’ve never been one for the shows or parades, so it sounds like the beginning of the month might work out in our favor then.
 
We booked our our first Tokyo trip during that week for that reason... we'll be there this September 1-13 and planning on spending Tue-Thurs of the first week in the parks. Fingers crossed low crowds actually feel like low crowds (the pics of Japanese crowds made me super nervous). I can update you on the weather/ crowd situation so you know for next year :)
 


We booked our our first Tokyo trip during that week for that reason... we'll be there this September 1-13 and planning on spending Tue-Thurs of the first week in the parks. Fingers crossed low crowds actually feel like low crowds (the pics of Japanese crowds made me super nervous). I can update you on the weather/ crowd situation so you know for next year :)
Great! I’ll look forward to your update :)
 
We're back! Well, the crowd levels were definitely an experience. American parks really have nothing on the Japanese crowds. By the crowd calendar Sep 2-4 was sposed to be very quiet, but I would compare DisneySea crowds to California Disneyland during Thanksgiving week- eek! The Japanese are also extremely good at fast passes (which they can access on their phone now thru an app only available on Japanese iTunes), so it was really difficult to hit the major attractions. To give you an idea, we rope dropped DisneySea, headed straight back to River Delta for Indy, and within half an hour Indy was up to 90min. It was crazy!! Also big lines for popcorn and food. My guess is maybe there were more crowds because of Souring opening recently (which was a 4 hour wait when we were there- WOAH).

Tokyo Disneyland was so much better, we were able to get fast passes for most major rides and meet a ton of characters with no huge waits. I actually much preferred DL to DS, which I know is an unpopular opinion. But DS had the 'magic' feel to me. DS felt like Vegas and a bit soulless.

The weather was hot, but we lucked out that our disney days were pretty good. There are a lot of drinking fountains and water misters, and plenty of seats in shady areas. We did go back to our hotel mid afternoon and return in the evenings, which was perfect weather.

Two nights before we left Tokyo Typhoon Fuxai went thru. Damage was minimal to Tokyo itself, however the area around Narita airport was hit harder. All trains to Narita were closed, so our day of departure we left our hotel at 9am to make sure we got on a bus for our 7:30pm flight (which ended up being delayed anyway). Its a real credit to the organisation of the Japanese that everything was handled as well as it was. I wouldn't hesitate to travel in typhoon season if I was going again- other than that we had no rain in 10 days.
 

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