I'm really starting to regret my grand idea of Christmas break at Disney lol. Got a feeling the family is going to be cranky for our day at HS.
I don’t think it will be any different than previous christmas trips for me. The official park hours this time of year are already earlier and they always open each park at-least 30 minutes earlier than official opening this time of year.
The reality is the parks don’t start getting really busy until late morning.
Last year I rope dropped MK Xmas eve. It was a 7am opening. We got their just before 6. We rope dropped AKs. Got there a hour and a half early and ended up in the first FOP theater. Our Uber canceled on us and we ended up being to DHS 45 minister prior to official opening(15 minutes before they started the tapstiles). We ended up getting in the tail end of SDD. Instantly said it had a 3hr wait but it only took us about 1hr 15. It was before their retiering so we had FPs for everything else.
This year is slightly different, well have two 16 year old exchange daughters going with us. We are also doing Dec 22-Jan 1.
But my park strategies remain the same. Rope drop every morning and Arrive 1.5 hrs. So everything by 11ish. Go back and relax, nap, do dinner at 5 the go to a different park in the evening.
I’ve done well previous Xmas trips, I’ve done two laps around Magic Kingdom on both Christmas Day and Christmas Eve by 11am on separate trips.
The reality is only a small percentage of guests Christmas and New Years week is informed as we are on here. You see a lot of melt downs etc but if you know what you are doing you can do everything pretty quickly and get out before the crowds swell.