Category — 9. Spring Break and Easter at Walt Disney World

THE WALT DISNEY WORLD PEAK SEASON

I recently posted on the 2012 Spring Break season at Walt Disney World.

Because this period is during Disney World’s “peak season,” and there’s a lot of confusion about what “peak” means, I thought I’d clarify the peak season and its implications for crowds and prices at Walt Disney World.

The key messages?

• While prices are quite high during the peak season…they get even higher! The peak season is not the peak of Disney World prices…
• While some periods of the peak season are quite crowded, some are not…and other times of the year, not in the peak season, are even more crowded! The peak season is not the peak of crowds, and some periods within it are relatively uncrowded.

THE PEAK SEASON AT WALT DISNEY WORLD

[Read more →]

For Spring Break 2012, click here.

OVERVIEW: DISNEY WORLD DURING THE 2011 SPRING BREAK SEASON

As I noted previously here, Disney World Spring Break 2011 is a little different because of how late Easter is–April 24, as late as it has happened since 1943.

Disney World Spring Break crowds are driven by three factors. 

• The least important is college spring break dates, which will peak the first two full weeks of March 2011.
• Next is the wish for Northerners to get out of the cold, which begins over President’s Day weekend and continues through March
• Most important is the timing of school kids’s Spring Break dates.

I’ve recently analyzed 2011 public school spring breaks (March to May) for 135 school districts covering more than ten million kids. 

Based on that and other data, this page highlights the best and worst weeks to visit Walt Disney World during Spring Break 2011.

See also 2011 Weeks to Visit Walt Disney World, Ranked in Order.

SCHOOL SPRING BREAKS AND THEIR LIKELY EFFECTS ON 2011 WALT DISNEY WORLD CROWDS

[Read more →]

OVERVIEW

(Update: you can find specific forecasts for Spring Break 2011 at Disney World by clicking this link.)

I started digging into Easter and Spring Break analysis as work in preparation for the release of 2011 Weeks to Visit Walt Disney World, Ranked in Order.

2011 has a couple of interesting calendar features.

One is that Christmas Eve and New Years Eve are both in the same week–both are Saturdays. This means that the week starting Saturday December 24, 2011 is gonna be a real zoo at Disney World.

Second is that Easter is unusually late. It occurs on April 24, 2011, as late as it has happened since 1943. I did a fair bit of research to estimate the effects this would have on March 2011 attendance at Walt Disney World.

Some of that research is reflected in this post.

GEEKY DETAILS

[Read more →]