Review: Magic Kingdom After Hours

If you had the opportunity to ride many of Magic Kingdom's headliner attractions with little to no wait, but you had to pay "extra", would you?

In the past year we have found ourselves deciding to give Walt Disney World's Magic Kingdom Park "hard ticket" after regular hours parties a shot. In the past much of this entertainment was considered part of general admission, but due either to greater crowds or perhaps just a desire for more sales there has been an increase in these events. We have attended Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party (Halloween in September, we went for Labor Day Weekend!), Mickey's Very Merry Christmas Party (we went Thanksgiving Weekend), and most recently "Magic Kingdom After Hours" which happened select nights in the period between New Year's and the beginning of Spring Break. They ended up having more of these after hours parties during the Summer 2018 season.

Magic Kingdom is getting increasingly crowded, some believe this is due to a combination of surge pricing and staffing levels. Generally the park "feels" more crowded than it has in the past to many people. We have only been going to Walt Disney World since 2015 and anecdotally we'd have to say that it does feel more crowded. We've spent Thanksgiving several years in a row there now...and while it continues to be manageable it "feels" like more people are "discovering" that time of the year. Due to that perception of increased attendance we'd thought we'd see if we liked the separate admission evening parties.

They have been having some version of this "Magic Kingdom After Hours" party for 3 years now. It was originally at a much higher price point, but they have since tweaked both the hours of the party and the charge for the event. The event we participated in was priced within the current ranges of a one day ticket. We are not really ones to say whether any activity at Walt Disney World is "worth it", that is a very personal determination to make. What we will always share with you was whether we were satisfied or if we feel an experience had value. In this case we were satisfied and we largely felt the experience provided some value.

We decided the "Magic Kingdom After Hours" party would be a terrific way to kick off the celebration of Tweenage Son becoming Teenage Son. The final Spring "Magic Kingdom After Hours" of 2018 would be a 13th birthday party for Agent P.  Possession of the ticket would entitle you to official admission at 7PM for an event that would run between 9PM-12PM. Since this was the last party of the season they had streamlined the process and allowed party ticket holders to enter the park at 6PM. We figured 6 hours of park time was acceptable value for the price. When Dad was in Junior High School the highlight of the year was a school trip to Disneyland. His school would attend an evening party that was not open to the general public. Often they were there to pad out the attendance of a company family night event...one year Dad specifically remembers it being essentially the company picnic of the TRW Corporation. Similarly while Mom & Dad were in France for a college educational exchange program they took advantage of an evening ticket promotion for Disneyland Paris. So we had a history of jumping at a chance for limited admission events. To sweeten the pot admission to the "Magic Kingdom After Hours" event included unlimited bottled soft drinks, select Ice Cream Treats, & Popcorn .

We were in the park by 6:30. We rode the Walt Disney World Railroad to Fantasyland, by the time we got to Fantasyland it was 7PM & Toddler Son had fallen asleep. Pre-purchased tickets to the party were sufficient to obtain fast passes for use between 6:00 and 8:00. We had managed to secure them for Seven Dwarfs Mine Train, and Teenage Son rode twice due to rider switch (Dad & Mom rode once each). We then rode Peter Pan via Fast pass. After that we rode Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, Teenage Son again rode twice due to rider switch (Dad & Mom rode once each). The line for Big Thunder was minimal as we hit it just after the fireworks had finished. 

Day patrons without separate admission were not allowed on the attractions after 8:00 PM. At 9:00 PM the party itself officially began. Also at 9:00 PM toddler son woke up from his nap. Much like our dinner at Chef Mickey's the previous night he slept for exactly 2 hours and then was up to enjoy the event. Our strategy was to hit the headliners Mine Train & Peter Pan before the party with fast passes freeing us from having to use party time for these two attractions. Even on a night like that night they still tend to have longer lines. Time was precious and we had to keep moving if we were going to maximize our time in the park.

We made our first snack stop at Liberty Square picking up our first order of Cokes, Mickey Ice Cream Treats, & Popcorn. We then headed to Adventureland through the Frontierland breezeway where we rode Aladdin's Magic Carpets twice without getting off the ride. We had never been on this ride because it never seemed worth the wait, but since this was a walk on and we were the only ones on the ride we gave it a chance. We were surprised by how much we enjoyed the ride and loved the view of Adventureland from it. Unfortunately from ground level we think that the ride takes up to much space. After that we headed for Walt Disney's Enchanted Tiki Room followed by The Jungle Cruise. We were one of three parties onboard. Our shipmates weren't enjoying the humor as much as we were, so we loved it when the Skipper joked that he would definitely save our family first if the need arose. We then hit the Liberty Square Snack Stop again.

At 10:00 PM we were in line for the Floating Lanterns Tangled Photo pass, and then we rode The Haunted Mansion. After that we enjoyed our 3rd snack stop outside of Haunted Mansion. Then we sailed on It's A Small World, followed by Winnie The Pooh and then the Mad Tea Party (Our Family was in one Teacup and we were the only ones on the ride).

We had made our way through Fantasyland and would head into Tomorrowland in the 11:00 PM hour. We rode the Astro Orbiter followed by Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin and then the Tomorrowland Speedway. We really took advantage of typically slow loading rides that tend to have longer waits. Our 4th & final snack stop was near Tomorrowland Speedway. We were encouraged to take as much as we liked so we started stockpiling Cokes pretty much at castmember insistence. They were extremely friendly and willing to give you as much as you cared to take, and many people had bags of extra treats with them. We closed out the 11:00 hour milling about Main Street U.S.A. enjoying several editions of "The Kiss Goodnight". The event was officially over at Midnight and the rides stopped taking people into line at that time, but we were not rushed off of Main Street. We were on the bus back to our Hotel by 12:45 AM.

We really had a great time! Since our objective was to maximize ride time once the party started we felt a sense of urgency to keep up an exhausting pace. We really had to be systematic and do what we wanted in each land and then move onto the next land to not waste our time. We started in Adventureland and moved north through Frontierland/Liberty Square, on to Fantasyland, down into Tomorrowland and then through the hub and down into Main Street. It was delightful to walk on to so many attractions.

The west side of the park was really the only part of the park that felt empty when we were there, and Fantasyland & Tomorrowland had quite a few people. I don't think Peter Pan or Mine Train were ever close to walk-ons. They seemed to have 20-25 minute posted waits(although waits seemed to be closer to half the posted times). There were longish lines for photo passes and snack carts although none of the carts we went to had much of a wait.

 

We had done the biggies with fast passes before the party started so we always went toward walk-ons. We feel we did a lot and had a blast, but the event rarely felt like an "empty" park. We did 14 unique attractions (and several re-rides) in 5 1/2 hours which really was a full day in arguably half the time. Like we said the pace was exhausting but it was such a unique experience it is very likely we would attend again.