Who's back from last week? How were the crowds????

[Gregandmel]

Anxious to hear how the end of April crowds were for those of you just getting back! Were they are bad as touring plans said, or were they manageable? Keep us updated! Wondering about the lines at the theme parks!! (Moderator; feel free to move this thread if it belongs somewhere else!)

[stephntampa]

I took 2 day trips last week, Epcot on Wednesday the 29th and MK on Friday the 1st.
We entered Epcot around 11:00 AM and stayed only in Future World, except going to Mexico for the boat ride and have lunch. We were able to FP Soarin' and TT, and did pretty much all the rides before leaving around 6:30. The longest stand by time was 50 minutes for TT, Soarin' was the same. Not sure about M:S, but most other rides were walk ons, or very short wait times.

On Friday @ MK we arrived 11:00, and headed straight to BTMRR for a FP, the return time was 12:30-1:30. Again, most rides were walk ons or minimal wait. We were able to ride the following: POTC, Aladdin's carpet ride, BTMRR (2 times),HM,Tea cups, Peter Pan, IASW, Pooh, Mickey's Philharmagic, Speedway and Buzz before leaving @ 7:00ish. We also took time out for lunch @ Columbia Harbor House and a couple of sit down and relax breaks. The crowds were completely mangeable, I expected much worse and was pleasantly suprised, especially since in my area (Tampa) schools were closed for a teacher work day on Friday.

[Volunteer]

I was in from the 24th thru the 26th and the crowds were managable. It wasn't as bad as I was expecting.

[sweetsavannah]

I was there 22nd thru 29th and crowds were great. Practically walked on to everything. Rides that said 30-40 minutes for waits ended up 20 min at most.

[hope23]

Just returned from being there 4/29-5/4 and was VERY happy with the crowds! After reading about the potential large crowds, I was nervous and expecting chaos, but was very pleasantly surprised. I think our longest wait the entire time was about 20 minutes... that said, we utilized fastpass a lot, so it would have been longer without. The crowd levels were predicted to be a 5 & 6 on Wed and Thurs, and I would have said more like a 3. Friday, Sat and Sun was predicted as a 8 & 9... also a bit high, I think. Friday was probably a 5 and Sat & Sun a 6. My family was able to do absolutely everything we wanted at a leisurely pace... it was AWESOME. However, I HIGHLY recommend getting to the parks early... before gates open! You get a ton done in the first couple of hours. And we saw first hand that having a plan for how to tour each park is vital! I really think our ability to do all things we wanted is due partly to crowds and partly to having a plan of attack for how to move through what we wanted to experience in the parks each day. It was wonderful... I'm missing it already

[paragon]

We just got back from our 4/25-5/2 trip. I thought the crowds were very managable, saw only a few wait times over 50 minutes. Most were 30 min, and moved right along. I think the ongest wait we did was for RR at 45 min, then we used single rider line and got on in ten, two of us even rode together.
The busiest time was Friday night at Epcot, it was also EMH that night. Overall, it was very good.

[ERJDriver]

We just got back from a 4/25-5/1 trip, and crowds were great. Same as everyone else, longest line we waited in was probaly 30 minutes for Dumbo. Longest we saw was maybe 50 minutes, and most lines were shorter than advertised.

[Ksmith75]

We just got back yesterday . We were there from April 25-May 4 - and the crowds were not too bad. We get to the parks about 40-1 hour before opening - sometimes we were within the first 20 people in the parks. They were a bit busier than last year - but not by much. We always ride the big ticket rides first thing - then tour the rest of the day - so we did ok - we left most parks by 2pm each day to relax until the evening - so we missed the heights of the crowds. NOt as bad as we expected!