Official AK Moonlight Magic Discussion

[com_op_2000]

I respectfully disagree. There were 4 choices at least, satulii, flame tree, pizzafari and one other in dino land. Also, keep in mind flame tree was not scheduled to be open all night so they would not have had the same amount of food as the other places. It was also free.
...

I said:
that we went to Pizzafari and had no issues.
the agenda said it was open from 09:30 till 11:30.

My issue was it was 10:05 and they were already out of food.
Yes, I knew of the other choices and we chose to go somewhere else. We were offered the opportunity by the management team, to stay inline and wait (they could not provide a time frame of when the food would be ready even for those who had already ordered - we chose to go somewhere else.

 

[DisneyPiPhi]

Thank you to everyone who shared info from 7/18. We are attending 8/22 and this will be our first MM experience, so it's great to learn a little bit of the lay of the land before hand.

I'm curious: How does the park "feel" on a MM night - does it feel busy (like a holiday party) or like a low crowd day?

Somewhere in between, TBH. It felt less busy than MNSSHP (at least, the early hours of MNSSHP). But not as dead as when MK used to have EMH until 2am back in the mid-2000s. Not even as dead as Disneyland in the rain, or as Disney After Hours. Somewhere in between holiday party and After Hours, I would say.

 

[mumto3girls]

Thank you to everyone who shared info from 7/18. We are attending 8/22 and this will be our first MM experience, so it's great to learn a little bit of the lay of the land before hand.

I'm curious: How does the park "feel" on a MM night - does it feel busy (like a holiday party) or like a low crowd day?

We attended the MM at AK on 7/18. We did an after hours event at the studios on 7/19. The after hours event at the studios had a far smaller crowd. The park actually felt almost empty. MM felt busy.

 

[han22735]

We attended the MM at AK on 7/18. We did an after hours event at the studios on 7/19. The after hours event at the studios had a far smaller crowd. The park actually felt almost empty. MM felt busy.

Thank you to everyone who shared info from 7/18. We are attending 8/22 and this will be our first MM experience, so it's great to learn a little bit of the lay of the land before hand.

I'm curious: How does the park "feel" on a MM night - does it feel busy (like a holiday party) or like a low crowd day?

I read a review on another site that said it was very busy and FOP had a posted wait of 80 minutes around midnight.

 

[mumto3girls]

I read a review on another site that said it was very busy and FOP had a posted wait of 80 minutes around midnight.

Yes. I’m not sure what the exact posted wait time was, but we were wanting to ride FOP and kept waiting for the times to go down. Finally got in line around 11:15 and I think we waited less than an hour. It seemed faster than expected though and we were off the ride headed out of the park by 12:10. The posted times were shortest for the Pandora rides during the 9 PM River of Light Show. There was another showing at 10:30 (I think—might have been 10:00) specifically for the MM Event and we thought the ride lines would be low then, but we were mistaken. It was still a really fun night. If we ever get lucky enough to do it again, I will have a better strategy!

 

[MaryKM]

Yes. I’m not sure what the exact posted wait time was, but we were wanting to ride FOP and kept waiting for the times to go down. Finally got in line around 11:15 and I think we waited less than an hour. It seemed faster than expected though and we were off the ride headed out of the park by 12:10. The posted times were shortest for the Pandora rides during the 9 PM River of Light Show. There was another showing at 10:30 (I think—might have been 10:00) specifically for the MM Event and we thought the ride lines would be low then, but we were mistaken. It was still a really fun night. If we ever get lucky enough to do it again, I will have a better strategy!

Argh! That was totally my strategy/plan! I figured the RoL showing at 10 might decrease the ride lines. Foiled!
I also did hear that the posted waits were longer than the actual waits, but still... we have a FP for FoP earlier in the evening, so that might be our one and done. I am not a good line waiter- I would rather be out doing other things than standing in line.
We‘ll just feel lucky to ride it once if the lines are long.

 

[bwvBound]

FWIW, we attended the 10:30 RoL show. Attendance was very, very sparse.

My husband was set against going and used the low attendance to rib me, "See? Nobody here. Everyone knew it would be awful and they were right." Sigh.

 

[jlwhitney]

I read a review on another site that said it was very busy and FOP had a posted wait of 80 minutes around midnight.

The posted times during MM have almost never been right. We have done 4 of them and every posted time we waited less.

 

[IndyPilot]

We went to the July 18th Animal Kingdom MM and can answer any questions. I am very non dramatic and didn't have any expectations really, so I can just give you answers based on our experience! It was my birthday, it was free and we thought we would try it out! It was me, my husband, 17 year old son and 20 year old daughter. My daughter wanted to meet characters and my son wanted rides and free Mickey bars so we all experienced different things here and there.

I will say, it was way more crowded than I thought it would be, but that was probably because when people on podcasts talked about how many tickets they have for these events they were just way wrong. My daughter loved it, but was kinda sad because they weren't checking for wristbands (after party had started) in some of the places so that may have been the problem in the places she was in. They did check our wristbands going into Pandora for sure. There was just so much to cram into 2 1/2 hours and we didn't get to come close to doing it all. We were there around 6:30, but of course all the regular park attenders were still there then so obviously still crowded then. And I think it just takes awhile to get people out of the parks...

I wasn't hungry, but the rest of my family loved their meals from Flame Tree. Yes, there was a long line when we were there, but we are patient people and it was free. The only bad part was that it ate up a lot of our party time. So go way earlier. We just didn't plan that well.

Also, to note...they said you could check in at the resort at 6 pm. They were checking people in well before that, so go early because by the time we got to the lobby before 6 there was a good line! People were getting onto the buses for AK with wristbands before 6 pm!

I'm sure there are other things you might want to know, so let me know!

 

[robinb]

Also, to note...they said you could check in at the resort at 6 pm. They were checking people in well before that, so go early because by the time we got to the lobby before 6 there was a good line! People were getting onto the buses for AK with wristbands before 6 pm!

I'm sure there are other things you might want to know, so let me know!

Did you see anyone giving wristbands away at the resort? I wasn't able to get wristbands for the 8/22 MM and I keep on trying to pick some up from the DVC website but I don't think it works. I'm wondering if it's worth my while to hang out in the lobby and see if someone has extras.

 

[IndyPilot]

Did you see anyone giving wristbands away at the resort? I wasn't able to get wristbands for the 8/22 MM and I keep on trying to pick some up from the DVC website but I don't think it works. I'm wondering if it's worth my while to hang out in the lobby and see if someone has extras.

I never would have thought of that possibility! I didn't notice anyone at our resort doing that, but even though there was quite a line to get the wristbands it actually moved fairly quickly so we were not in the lobby for too long!

 

[CarolynK]

For those of you who were there on the 18th, was Safari open at all?

 

[IndyPilot]

For those of you who were there on the 18th, was Safari open at all?

Short answer: the official map/brochure didn't list it as being one of the attractions open during the party, and I was really bummed about that so we didn't go over there.

Longer answer: But then later on, (after the party started) it kept showing a short wait time (on the app). We never did go over to check it out because we were so short on time and my family really wanted to eat and the other rides were more important to them. So, I'm not sure if that wait time was still showing overflow from regular park guest still or what? But it was definitely still up on the app AFTER the party started. The park officially closed at 9 and party started at 9:30. So I'm sure there had to be quite a bit of crossover as regular park attenders could have definitely been in lines for awhile after party started (not just talking about safari but other rides with longer waits as well)

 

[bwvBound]

For those of you who were there on the 18th, was Safari open at all?

Yes, until 10p.

 

[IndyPilot]

And if you haven't done Safari at night, you should! We have done it several times during the day, but went back another night and rode and it was so great!! Our guide even stopped the truck for awhile near the lions, so we could just watch them because they were more active!

 

[DisneyPiPhi]

We did the safari around 8:30 PM, before the park actually closed. It was great!

Re: Flight of Passage wait times, we got in line at like 9:45. The posted wait was 75 minutes, but we were off the ride in an hour. So, maybe 45 minutes of waiting, then the pre-show and the ride? It was pretty reasonable. (We did not have park tickets and therefore weren't able to set up FP+ for earlier in the day.)

 

[DisMomme]

Have AKMM tickets but not park passes. What time can we check in and enter the park for the party?

 

[Madame]

Have AKMM tickets but not park passes. What time can we check in and enter the park for the party?

6pm

 

[Newsies]

We went to the July 18th Animal Kingdom MM and can answer any questions. I am very non dramatic and didn't have any expectations really, so I can just give you answers based on our experience! It was my birthday, it was free and we thought we would try it out! It was me, my husband, 17 year old son and 20 year old daughter. My daughter wanted to meet characters and my son wanted rides and free Mickey bars so we all experienced different things here and there.

I will say, it was way more crowded than I thought it would be, but that was probably because when people on podcasts talked about how many tickets they have for these events they were just way wrong. My daughter loved it, but was kinda sad because they weren't checking for wristbands (after party had started) in some of the places so that may have been the problem in the places she was in. They did check our wristbands going into Pandora for sure. There was just so much to cram into 2 1/2 hours and we didn't get to come close to doing it all. We were there around 6:30, but of course all the regular park attenders were still there then so obviously still crowded then. And I think it just takes awhile to get people out of the parks...

I wasn't hungry, but the rest of my family loved their meals from Flame Tree. Yes, there was a long line when we were there, but we are patient people and it was free. The only bad part was that it ate up a lot of our party time. So go way earlier. We just didn't plan that well.

Also, to note...they said you could check in at the resort at 6 pm. They were checking people in well before that, so go early because by the time we got to the lobby before 6 there was a good line! People were getting onto the buses for AK with wristbands before 6 pm!

I'm sure there are other things you might want to know, so let me know!

Love the review and love your attitude! Thanks for sharing with us.

 

[DisneyMaleficent50]

We went to the July 18th Animal Kingdom MM and can answer any questions. I am very non dramatic and didn't have any expectations really, so I can just give you answers based on our experience! It was my birthday, it was free and we thought we would try it out! It was me, my husband, 17 year old son and 20 year old daughter. My daughter wanted to meet characters and my son wanted rides and free Mickey bars so we all experienced different things here and there.

I will say, it was way more crowded than I thought it would be, but that was probably because when people on podcasts talked about how many tickets they have for these events they were just way wrong. My daughter loved it, but was kinda sad because they weren't checking for wristbands (after party had started) in some of the places so that may have been the problem in the places she was in. They did check our wristbands going into Pandora for sure. There was just so much to cram into 2 1/2 hours and we didn't get to come close to doing it all. We were there around 6:30, but of course all the regular park attenders were still there then so obviously still crowded then. And I think it just takes awhile to get people out of the parks...

I wasn't hungry, but the rest of my family loved their meals from Flame Tree. Yes, there was a long line when we were there, but we are patient people and it was free. The only bad part was that it ate up a lot of our party time. So go way earlier. We just didn't plan that well.

Also, to note...they said you could check in at the resort at 6 pm. They were checking people in well before that, so go early because by the time we got to the lobby before 6 there was a good line! People were getting onto the buses for AK with wristbands before 6 pm!

I'm sure there are other things you might want to know, so let me know!

Could you tell us about the character line wait times?