THANKSGIVING 2013 AT WALT DISNEY WORLD
Update October 23: New extended operating hours and 8a openings.
Thanksgiving week at Walt Disney World is busy–particularly Wednesday through Saturday.
While not as crowded as some other holiday weeks–Easter and Christmas, for example–it can be very challenging, and the material below gives some hints on how to deal with it.
WALT DISNEY WORLD 2013 THANKSGIVING WEEK ITINERARY AND DINING
Park schedules indicate that this site’s Autumn-Winter-Spring Itinerary works for Thanksgiving Week, but you will need to arrive at MK and AK an hour earlier than it indicates.
Moreover, a couple of other things are worth noting.
First, this itinerary has you largely off on Thanksgiving itself, and with the only formal meal a morning brunch. Your meals otherwise are in your hotel food court.
If you are looking for something both more formal but fun in your Thanksgiving dinner (not necessarily in menu, but in ambiance and waiters and such), then consider
- Reserving the Liberty Tree Tavern at the Magic Kingdom Thursday, or
- Changing your Whispering Canyon Cafe at Disney’s Wilderness Lodge Resort from lunch Tuesday to dinner Thursday, or
- Moving your Hoop Dee Doo Revue reservations from Tuesday evening to Thursday evening
The first option means both another table service meal and another day of park tickets; the other two don’t cost any more, as they are just moving items already in the Autumn-Winter-Spring Itinerary to another day, and are at resort hotels, not parks.
Note that to get a sit-down meal on Thanksgiving it’s critical that you make your dining reservations well in advance. See this for more.
DISNEY WORLD OPERATING HOURS DURING THE 2013 THANKSGIVING WEEK
Starting the day after Thanksgiving, Epcot is open thirty minutes later, and a special Christmas version of Illuminations is shown nightly at 9.30p rather than 9p. Adjust your Friday itinerary for this change in times.
The Candlelight Processional also begins the Friday after Thanksgiving.
Moreover, Disney has changed the operating hours of the parks to accommodate the crowds.
This includes 8a openings all week at the Magic Kingdom and the Animal Kingdom. Disney may also add additional Extra Magic Hours and more 8a openings.
These changes mean that some of your days need to start one or even two hours earlier than the itinerary suggests.
You can get updated park operating hours when you arrive at Walt Disney World. If you want to know what’s up before then, check the park calendars a day or so before you depart for Florida, and then while you are there as well.
Click the links for park calendars
And Disney veterans–please feel free to add more suggestions for Thanksgiving dinner at Walt Disney World to the comment box below!
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125 Comments on "Thanksgiving 2013 at Walt Disney World"
Thank you so much for this great website. We are traveling to WDW this Thanksgiving. Just started our planning. We will be there nov 29-dec2. We have 2 kids (ages 6 & 3). We aren’t doing AK this trip.
We will have a 4 day pass.
Does this sound reasonable
11-29 MK (with a CT lunch reservation) (we are driving in from in laws and I think arrival would be around 9am at hotel check in)
11-30 HS
11-31 MK
12-1 Epcot (or back to MK)
Becky, ummm, you have sort of hit every park on what will be its busiest day. A much less crowded and lower wait set of days would be
Sunday: HS
Monday: Epcot
Tuesday: MK
Wednesday MK
Thursday: AK
Hi! We are going to Disney over Thanksgiving (arriving 11/22 but not doing parks that day; departing Friday morning after breakfast and no parks that day). Care to critique my park schedule?
Sunday – MK
Monday – HS
Tuesday – Epcot
Wednesday – AK
Thursday – MK
Any changes or suggestions? I know it is going to be crazy crowded. Thanks!
Hi Sharon! The official dates for the party will be out likely in early May, and I’ll have a forecast for them out tomorrow. The processional narrators tend to firm up much later than that…
We are travelling to Disney from the UK on Tuesday 25th – Saturday 9th December. Me and my husband have been numerous times but it is the first visit with our Daughter – 3 yrs. We originally wanted to avoid Thanksgiving knowing it would be busy but it actually worked out much cheaper to fly the Tuesday rather than the weekend after! We obviously want to book the Mickey party, candlelight processional dinner package etc. Do you think everything will be published end of April? We ideally would love to see Neil Patrick Harris if he is doing it again!