We were at Epcot yesterday and AK today. It was insanely busy. Cheerleaders everywhere both days. They were well behaved - they were just everywhere. If you spit, you would hit one of them, It was the adults with that were super cranky, I noticed, cursing about all the cheerleaders. Wait times for FOP hit 235 minutes today. Everything was a long wait yesterday and today.
We were here at the same time 5 years ago and it was nothing like this. With the insane crowds, the extremely long wait times, the disappointment of having to miss our ROTR ride on Friday due very poor performance / conflicting ADR (our boarding group got called 3 mins before dinner ADR at MK so no way would we have made it back in the hour that they gave us plus it took BOG 50 mins from our ADR at 6 PM to seat us so we missed HEA fireworks), the changes for VAH, and the short park hours, this has already not been a great trip so far.
I’m trying to scale back on my expectation, but Disney is not a cheap vacation And doubly so given the exchange rate for Canadians. I love Disney but it Is hard when so much planning goes into a trip and when you spend tens of thousands of dollars on an 8 day trip, it is hard to not have expectations. Our last trip, we did everything we wanted and repeated a few experiences. We are barely getting anything done this trip due to the crowds. I know: this is the new normal and I need to get used to it.
i could use the same amount of money in an 8 day WDW trip for a trip to Europe and have a beautiful vacation complete with amazing service and good food (sorry, I think the food at Disney is bad compared to what I am used eating for the same price). I am a value-driven personality. Right now, the amount of return / enjoyment I am getting for the amount of money I am spending Is very low.
i will likely come back to WDW one day, but not anytime soon. Our last trip was so magical while this trip has been... not magical. But I am thankful that this a first world problem.