Inside Universal Forums

Welcome to the Inside Universal Forums! Register a free account today to become a member. Once signed in, you'll be able to participate on this site by adding your own topics and posts, as well as connect with other members and unlock our forums features!

  • Signing up for a Premium Membership is a donation to help Inside Universal maintain costs and offers an ad-free experience on the forum. Learn more about it here.
Mar 7, 2019
20
2
Hey, guys! Well, I came back from Orlando/Miami about 5 months ago (I was there for 10 days and it was perfect.. small crowds, christmas etc).

Now I'm coming back in September, to be exactly I'll be ir Orlando between september 5th to 17th. I didn't wanted to go because:

- Star Wars Land will be opening at August 29th
- Hurricane Season

But it was my only option. Now I'm concerned about my plans to the parks. After some researchs, I create a "final" plan but I have some questions:

thursday (may 5) - we'll be too tired for the airplane and the car travel of Miami to Orlando so it's a day off
friday (may 6) - Epcot
saturday - day off in Orlando
sunday - Universal Park-2-Park

^ The first "problem" is in here. Will be the first weekend of HHN and it's a sunday, so I'm a little bit scared that it's going to be a lot of people in both parks! And, in the night, I'm only going to be on Island so, I don't know.. But there's not how to change, the Universal tickets only let me enjoy 5 days of parks in 7 consecutive days.

My tickets it's park-2-park so when I'm not going to HHN but the event is happenning, Island gets bigger crowds? And the Hogwarts Express closes?

monday - Hollywood Studios
tuesday - Animal Kingdom
wednesday - Universal Park-2-Park (this day there's no HHN, so it's ok, I can enjoy the whole day on both parks!)
thursday - Magic Kingdom
friday - Universal with HHN (night 1)
saturday - day off
sunday - Universal with HHN (night 2)
monday - Miami
tuesday - Miami

The second question it's: When I'm going to HHN, I can ride the Hogwarts Express till Studios and just stay there the whole event, right? (And if the Express is opened, I can ride back to Island or only go to Studios to the event if on Island?)

Ahhhhh, so many questions!!!

The Disney parks I picked searching for the Extra Magic Hours, Halloween Events and stuff.

Example: Hollywood Studios it's on Monday because in the day after it's Magic Hours on the park + it's weekend, after all. So I expect that it's going to have a little less visitors....
 
Last edited by a moderator:
I'd highly recommend booking your flights and majority of trip with a credit card that offered Trip cancellation or trip delay insurance. Or buy it if you don't have a card with those offerings.

It bailed me out during Irma and I got several meals and nights free at the Contemporary due to it.
 
I'd highly recommend booking your flights and majority of trip with a credit card that offered Trip cancellation or trip delay insurance. Or buy it if you don't have a card with those offerings.

It bailed me out during Irma and I got several meals and nights free at the Contemporary due to it.

We think about this and for the planes, its ok!! So as the hotel, we have a free cancellation till 24h before the first day of the trip.

But the parks..
 
We think about this and for the planes, its ok!! So as the hotel, we have a free cancellation till 24h before the first day of the trip.

But the parks..

You're there 13 days. A storm can advance further along in that time easily and you can get stranded there. The trip insurance isn't so much for going to Orlando, but coming back from Orlando.
 
You're there 13 days. A storm can advance further along in that time easily and you can get stranded there. The trip insurance isn't so much for going to Orlando, but coming back from Orlando.

I’m not goin to lie. I’m so scared of something goes wrong because of Hurricanes or storms. This week I read some news that this Hurricane season will be “softer”. But at the sime, as they all said in these news, it only need one single storm to cause a lot of trouble.

But let go, just hoping that everything will be okay.
 
I’m not goin to lie. I’m so scared of something goes wrong because of Hurricanes or storms. This week I read some news that this Hurricane season will be “softer”. But at the sime, as they all said in these news, it only need one single storm to cause a lot of trouble.

But let go, just hoping that everything will be okay.

Hurricanes are no big deal in Orlando. Nothing to worry about. Flight cancellations are basically the worst of it. Hence, getting insurance.
 
Hurricanes are no big deal in Orlando. Nothing to worry about. Flight cancellations are basically the worst of it. Hence, getting insurance.

Yea, that is what make me a little bit “happier”. In Facebook, there’s a big brazilian group about “Orlando” and a lot ot people talked about being on Orlando during a hurricane. 99% said that it was all ok in Orlando, in the max they have to stayed in the hotel for 1 or 2 days and the parks closed for a day or 2 as well.

But about flights, a lot of people had problems and had to spend a lot of money with new flights and new hotels.
 
^ The first "problem" is in here. Will be the first weekend of HHN and it's a sunday, so I'm a little bit scared that it's going to be a lot of people in both parks! And, in the night, I'm only going to be on Island so, I don't know.. But there's not how to change, the Universal tickets only let me enjoy 5 days of parks in 7 consecutive days.

Besides the opening night of HHN the parks are not too bad during the first few weeks of the event.

My tickets it's park-2-park so when I'm not going to HHN but the event is happenning, Island gets bigger crowds? And the Hogwarts Express closes?

IoA is more crowded but not by much, a lot of the daytime guests at the parks are there for HHN anyway. Hogwarts Express does close.

The second question it's: When I'm going to HHN, I can ride the Hogwarts Express till Studios and just stay there the whole event, right? (And if the Express is opened, I can ride back to Island or only go to Studios to the event if on Island?)

Hogwarts Express closes when USF closes for daytime guests, it does not run between USF daytime hours and HHN or during HHN.

The Disney parks I picked searching for the Extra Magic Hours, Halloween Events and stuff.

Example: Hollywood Studios it's on Monday because in the day after it's Magic Hours on the park + it's weekend, after all. So I expect that it's going to have a little less visitors....

If you're worried about crowds on a granular level like this then check out a subscription to Touring Plans. They offer touring plans and a crowd calendar for a small fee. That will answer your question about which park will be more crowded on certain days.
 
TouringPlans is great! The information is super useful (although the user interface could use some work) and it's easily worth the ~$10 they ask for.

There's a whole bunch of crowd calendars out on the Internet. I'd look around and see if there's a general consensus on how busy the parks are going to be. I'd be most worried about Hollywood Studios as nobody really knows just how big the Star Wars opening is going to be.
 
Top