Hi
So we have done Disneyland a hundred+ times but are planning our first WDW+Cruise trip for January 2009. We are thinking of January 11-14, 2009 for the parks but I'm worried about the WDW marathon. Will it be more crowded than say the weekend before (Jan 4-7 '09). The 3rd week is MLK so should we wait until Jan 25-29 '09.

Thanks!!!

Hi

I'll be there this weekend so I'll let you know when I get back how bad the crowds are due to the marathon....

J

Thank you so much!!

I did the marathon in 2006, and we stayed for the week after the marathon ...here is what we found:

Marathon weekend, a bit crowded yes. Not horrid, keeping in mind that we got there Friday morning. Did the expo & check in that afternoon. Checked into All Star Sport ...which was a madhouse - never again!...did my thing over the weekend. Went to dinner @ DTD Portabello Yacht Club. Party of 12, no problem making the ressie for dinner a few weeks out - found DTD a bit crowded, but then again it was a Sat. night. Did Animal Kingdom on Sunday - didn't really notice to much is crowds. Did notice my fellow runners walking funny, though! I was one of them!

The entire week after the marathons we found to be the usual, wonderful crowd - free experience we always have in January. I may be biased, but we've nver not had a good crowd-free time in January...going down next Friday for 8 nights as a matter of fact!
(Sunday checked outta All Stars & into Old Key West for 6 nights- which was a prearranged resort switch prior to finding out what a $%*&-hole the All Stars was...)

I'm not sure if this is going to help but....the marathon crowds were okay. It was busy at the parks but not awful. It was also kind of cool to see the runners at EPCOT on Sunday morning. It was very organized. There were yellow cones set up to keep the park visitors away from the runners. Touringplans.com actually said to stay away from EPCOT all weekend but we actually found it to be the least crowded. MK was quite crowded with families of the runners. BUT, it was not as crowded as summertime and we were easily able to ride everything more than once without long waits. On another front there were a large amount of Brazillian tour groups who were more troublesome than the marathoners. These tour groups were very large and sometimes loud. Once they descended on a ride we felt we had to leave and go somewhere else. We did this at Pirates because there were just too many loud kids to stand in the cave!

I hoped I help a little...enjoy your trip. J

I noticed all the Brazilian tour groups too. I had only heard about them and thought people were exaggerating. Nope! Loud and in the way.

I wonder if this is when they normally visit or if it is hit or miss. I would not want to be in any resort where they are staying. I also would rather visit when there are not so many large groups. The groups were so big and I think that is what made them troublesome. Put 50 teenagers together with just a couple of adults and its a recipe for disaster.