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DISNEY WORLD NEXT WEEK: DECEMBER 31, 2016 TO JANUARY 8, 2017

The material below details next week’s Disney World operating hours, Extra Magic Hours, parades, and fireworks.

For more on January 2017 at Disney World, see this.

OPERATING HOURS AT WALT DISNEY WORLD 12/31/16-1/817

The Magic Kingdom will be open from 8a-1a 12/31, 9a-11p 1/1, 8a-12MN 1/2, 9a-10p 1/3 through 1/7, and 9a-8p 1/8

Epcot will be open from 8a-1a 12/31, and 9a-9p 1/1 through 1/8

Disney’s Hollywood Studios will be open 8a-midnight 12/31, and 9a-8p 1/1 through 1/8

Disney’s Animal Kingdom will be open 8a-8.30p 12/31, 9a-7p 1/1 through 1/7, and 9a-7.30p 1/8

EXTRA MAGIC HOURS AT WALT DISNEY WORLD 12/31/16-1/8/17

Saturday 12/31 Morning:  Magic Kingdom, Animal Kingdom Evening: none

Sunday 1/1  Morning:  Animal Kingdom  Evening: none

Monday 1/2 Morning: Epcot  Evening: none

Tuesday 1/3 Morning: none Evening:  Epcot

Wednesday 1/4 Morning: none  Evening:  Magic Kingdom

Thursday 1/5 Morning: Hollywood Studios Evening: none

Friday 1/6 Morning:  Magic Kingdom Evening: Hollywood Studios

Saturday 1/7 Morning: Animal Kingdom Evening: none

Sunday 1/8  Morning: none Evening: Epcot

PARADES AT WALT DISNEY WORLD 12/31/16-1/8/17

The Magic Kingdom: Afternoon Christmas Parade noon and 3.30p 12/31; Afternoon Festival of Fantasy Parade: 3p 1/1 through 1/8

FIREWORKS AND EVENING SHOWS AT WALT DISNEY WORLD 12/31/16-1/8/17

Wishes at the Magic Kingdom: 7.30p 12/31; 9p 1/1 through 1/8. Special New Years fireworks: 11.50p 12/30 and 12/31

IllumiNations at Epcot: 6p 12/31; 9p 1/1 through 1/8. Special New Years fireworks: 11.40p 12/31

Fantasmic at Disney’s Hollywood Studios: 8 and 9.30p 12/31; 7p 1/1 through 1/8

Star Wars Show and Fireworks at Disney’s Hollywood Studios: Midnight 12/31; 7.45p 1/1 though 1/8

Jingle Bell, Jingle BAM! show at Disney’s Hollywood Studios: 9p 12/31

SHOW SCHEDULES FOR WALT DISNEY WORLD 12/31/16-1/8/17

See Steve Soares’ site here. Click the park names at its top for show schedules.

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Several new Walt Disney World discounts for late February into early June came out this morning. The later April through June dates are a new offer.

If you book your vacation through partner and friend of this site Kelly B as your travel agent, she will figure out the best deal for you!! Contact her Kelly@DestinationsInFlorida.com!

The most understandable part of the deal is a room rate deal, which has various levels of discounts by room class, date of booking, and period of stay.

DISNEY VALUE RESORT DEALS

Value resort deals exclude–as usual–Little Mermaid rooms at Art of Animation.

DISNEY MODERATE RESORT DEALS

Port Orleans French Quarter is excluded from the deal among the moderates, and deals at Riverside are slender.

DISNEY DELUXE RESORT DEALS

All of the Disney deluxes are in the deal, although savings range from 10% of to 25%.

DISNEY DVC RESORT DEALS

Bay Lake Tower and the Villas at the Grand Floridian are excluded from the DVC resorts on offer, and at the Polynesian Villas and Bungalows, only Studios are in the deal.

For detailed reviews of every resort hotel  option, see this or get a copy of my book.

For the full set of deals that came out today, see this. Or, if you sign with Kelly B as your travel agent, she will figure out the best deal for you!! Contact her Kelly@DestinationsInFlorida.com!

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Hey! This contest is over, and the winners are here.

On New Year’s Day—the first day of 2017—I will pick five winners of signed copies of The easy Guide to Your Walt Disney World Visit 2017, the latest edition of the best-reviewed Walt Disney World guidebook ever published.

From all the eligible comments on this page, I will pick three winners on the merits, and two randomly.

Eligible comments need to include two statements:

• One about how either this site, or The easy Guide itself, has actually helped you plan a Disney World trip
• And, in the spirit of the season, another statement about how another site (or another guide book) has ALSO helped you. The obvious selections here would be co-author Josh’s easyWDW.com and/or a prior edition of our guide book, lol, but your statement could be about any other Disney World site or any other guidebook!

(Note that live links to other sites are OK, but because I get so much spam, they will get held for my approval, so may not show up right away.)

Want a free, signed copy of the best-reviewed Disney World guidebook series ever written? Then page down and add a comment now.

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OVERVIEW: JULY 2017 AT DISNEY WORLD

This page reviews July 2017 Walt Disney World crowds, prices, deals and discounts, weather, and operating hours; adds a few other notes; and ends with week by week summaries.

Because pretty much every US school kid is on break in July, July overall is the most crowded month at Walt Disney World.

Prices begin the month low at the deluxes, OK at the moderates, and high at the values. Moderate and value prices stay at this level all month, but at the deluxes prices drop to even lower levels on July 7.

Weather is miserably hot and humid all month long.

[Read more →]

THE 4th OF JULY IN 2017 AT WALT DISNEY WORLD

Disney World celebrates the 4th of July at several parks–and on July 3rd as well!

Hours may change a bit later, but here’s the current scoop

On Monday, July 3, 2017, the Magic Kingdom has a special fireworks show “Fantasy in the Sky” at 9p.

On Tuesday, July 4, 2017

• The Magic Kingdom has the same show at the same time–“Fantasy in the Sky” at 9p
• Epcot’s Illuminations will likely have a special holiday ending added, and likely will be shifted from its normal 9p time to 10p, and

Moreover, the normal Wednesday evening Extra Magic Hours at the Magic Kingdom will happen Monday the 3rd instead.

Those following this site’s FastPass+ High Crowd Itinerary for Walt Disney World will be at Hollywood Studios the 3rd, and Magic Kingdom the 4th. I suggest that instead folks swap the itinerary on Tuesday and Wednesday this week, so they avoid parks wit fireworks entirely, because of the crowds.

If you must see fireworks, you best bet is to add a hopper to your ticket and hop to Magic Kingdom Monday evening.

FOURTH OF JULY CROWDS AT WALT DISNEY WORLD

July is the most consistently crowded month at Disney World, and in the month, visits that include the 4th of July see the highest crowds.

July is the most crowded month because every US schoolkid on a typical (that is, not year-round) calendar has the entire month off.  This is not true of either June or August. Within July, many parents gravitate towards the week of the 4th for their vacations, because since the 4th is a holiday, they need to take one fewer vacation day to get a week off.

And people want to see fireworks on the 4th…so the Disney World parks offering fireworks on the 4th of July will be packed!

For more on July 2017 at Disney World, see this.

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Welcome back to Fridays with Jim Korkis! Jim, the dean of Disney historians and author of Jim’s Gems in The easy Guide, writes about Walt Disney World history every Friday on yourfirstvisit.net.

By Jim Korkis

DISNEY WORLD ATTRACTION TRIBUTES

Many Imagineers are huge Disney fans as well and mourn the loss of an attraction or a removed venue as much as regular guests do. Sometimes, they will include little tributes to that former location in the new venue.

In the new AbracadaBar at the BoardWalk Resort is a framed copy of a newspaper on the wall that provides the back story of the magicians who mysteriously disappeared from there over seventy years earlier.

However in the lower right hand corner is an odd little news item:

• “Twin Sisters Advance in Beauty Pageant
• “The Sweets Invited to Seashore Finals

“The Boardwalk’s “sweetest” sisters have been invited to compete in the final round of the Miss Seashore beauty pageant. Their special talent? Serving confections with affection of course! Wish the ladies luck as they lead a celebratory rolling chair parade this Sunday on the boardwalk. At this pace, they may be on their way to becoming twin Miss America(s).”

The location used to be the home for a shop called Seashore Sweets supposedly run by two former Miss America contestants, the fictional Sweet sisters. The sign outside the shop proclaimed that it sold “confections with affection” and inside were all sorts of candy, ice cream and more.

The Barnstormer at Goofy’s Wise Acres Farm was a mini-roller coaster designed for children as a homemade “multiflex octo-plane” that was a popular attraction at Mickey’s Toontown Fair at the Magic Kingdom. A barnstormer was a term for a stunt pilot who traveled to rural areas to perform shows in a bi-plane.

In fact, it was so popular that when the area was redesigned as The Storybook Circus section for the New Fantasyland, the attraction was reconfigured as The Barnstormer featuring Goofy as the Great Goofini as one of the circus acts.

The back of the new sign for the attraction was designed to look as if the old sign had been taken apart and reformatted to make the new one.

In addition, the front of the sign states “An Acrobatic Skyleidoscope” which is a reference to the name of a daytime show that ran from 1985-1987 on the World Showcase Lagoon at Epcot. The small sea gulls in the top right corner of the new sign are meant to be a subtle tribute to the similar looking gulls found in the extinct Tomorrowland attraction If You Had Wings.

Under the Sea: Journey of the Little Mermaid attraction in the Magic Kingdom is on the spot where the former 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea attraction used to be located. In the queue line, on the left hand side is a “carving” in the faux rockwork of the silhouette of the famous Captain Nemo Nautilus submarine from the original attraction.

Before the original 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea attraction was removed, Imagineers bottled up some of the water from the attraction and kept it stored safely for nearly two decades when it was poured into the waters of the new attraction as part of the official opening.

The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh attraction in Fantasyland was originally the home for Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride. In the room meant to be Owl’s house is a framed picture on the left hand side of J. Thaddeus Toad handing over the deed of the land to Owl. On the floor to the right is a picture of Pooh greeting Moley, one of Toad’s closest friends.

In the pet cemetery at the exit of the Haunted Mansion attraction in Liberty Square in the upper part is a statue to Mr. Toad (actually one of the Big Fig merchandise items designed by artist Kevin Kidney).

Many other similar tributes are scattered throughout the vacation kingdom.

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Thanks, Jim! And come back next Friday for more from Jim Korkis!

In the meantime, check out his books, including Secret Stories of Walt Disney World: Things You Never You Never Knew, which reprints much material first written for this site, and The Vault of Walt: Volume 4, and his contributions to The easy Guide to Your Walt Disney World Visit, all published by Theme Park Press.

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