Welcome to our trip report covering the start of Christmas Season at Walt Disney World! The primary purpose of trip reports is to supplement our existing content to let you know how our strategies are actually working at a given time! This post covers some updates from Magic Kingdom and a rainy start to Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party!
About This Trip Report
This trip report covers a five-night visit to Walt Disney World for the beginning of Christmas season at Walt Disney World. Following the end of Halloween season, Walt Disney World takes a few days to transform into Christmas mode. You can read the full introduction in part 1.
We don’t know exactly how we’ll be breaking up this trip for the purposes of this report, but posts will go up here as we publish them:
Disney World Holiday Trip Report Part 1 — Introduction, Booking, and Arrival
Disney World Holiday Trip Report Part 2 — Updates from around Walt Disney World
Disney World Holiday Trip Report Part 4 — Rainy Day at Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party (you are here)
Disney World Holiday Trip Report Part 5 — Day at Animal Kingdom
Magic Kingdom Christmas Decorations
We have a separate post covering what you can expect from Magic Kingdom at Christmas, but I wanted to at least give a gallery of some photos for the trip report…
A Rainy Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party
(Note: If you’re looking to learn more about the party, we also have a Guide to Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party)
Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party kicked off with a very rainy start. Best we can tell…
All showings of Totally Tomorrowland Christmas were cancelled
All showings of Mickey’s Most Merriest Celebration were cancelled
11PM Mickey’s Once Upon a Christmastime Parade was cancelled
Edge Effect, the a cappella group performing on the Tomorrowland stage, performed at least once. The 11PM parade was replaced with a “rainy day” cavalcade.
We watched the 8:30PM parade from a distance and it looked like it went off without a hitch. It’s possible it was modified, we really aren’t experts on that parade. And we watched the 6:15PM Frozen Holiday Wish, so we’re not sure if the 8:15PM was shown or not.
Unfortunately this means this post makes for bad “here’s what you should do content.” On the plus side, the schedule of events hasn’t changed much from last year, so the itinerary discussed in our Guide to Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party remains mostly intact.
For the rest of this post, we’ll discuss the things we were able to accomplish on this rainy day…
I was in the park early to take some photos of the holiday decorations, and at about 4:15PM I went and got my wristband and map for the party. You can pick these up at a few different spots if you’re already in the park.
Once you have your wristband, you still probably want to walk to the front of the park to walk down the welcome path and get your welcome cookie.
From 4PM to 6PM, there’s very little exclusive party stuff going on. On some days, the most popular characters (basically just Jack & Sally) may begin meeting, so this can be a good time to visit them (but be prepared to wait an hour or more).
Once you have your wristband, you can access the selection of party-exclusive merchandise in Emporium (it’s guarded by Cast Members). The stores remain open after the party, so you can make your purchases then, too.
The Main Street firehouse might be handing out the party-exclusive card for Sorcerers of the Magic Kingdom, but I didn’t grab one today.
And finally, there’s Jingle Cruise. Jingle Cruise is a holiday overlay on Jungle Cruise that operates all day long all season long, so it’s not a party exclusive. But with little else to fill this time, Jingle Cruise is a good option.
Most sources suggest you can get FastPass+ reservations at Magic Kingdom using only a party tickets. I can’t personally verify this though (annual passholder).
With rain in the forecast, we decided to watch the 6:15PM showing of A Frozen Holiday Wish, which is the show where Elsa lights up the castle.
This showing is open to everyone, not just party guests. The show also plays once during the party at 8:15PM. We didn’t want to risk it being cancelled, and we liked clearing some space on our schedule.
Right after the show finished, we hustled over to Tomorrowland Speedway, where the first party overlay was running. The wait was posted at 40 minutes but we only waited 14, boarding at 6:38PM.
This overlay was great. It’s basically a lights and music show on top of the existing ride. Honestly it might be the best overlay at either this party or Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween Party.
Finishing that ride at about 6:45PM, we decided to tackle another overlay—Space Mountain. We waited 34 minutes (posted was 35), boarding at 7:22PM.
The Space Mountain overlay is Christmas rock music playing with green, red, and white strobe lights throughout the ride. This creates something of a “lights on” effect on the ride. We’d put this a slightly lower priority than Tomorrowland Speedway, but still worth visiting.
That’s when the cancellations started. The 7:40PM stage show was announced as delayed when we gave up on it, and the Tomorrowland show was cancelled. When this show was cancelled the performers came out and did about two minutes of sing along before launching the small fireworks (they have to be launched once they’re loaded).
With that done, we just hopped over to the nearest activity, the Monsters Inc. Laugh Floor overlay.
At the Halloween party, this overlay was simple—the doors to the theater were left open for people to pass through or sit down while some monsters told some interactive jokes (in the style of the underlying attraction).
I liked that format, but they didn’t use it for Christmas. Instead the attraction was still basically the same show (15 minutes trying to fill up the laugh bar), but with holiday touches.
It’s fine, but it’s not different enough from the standard show to justify the time commitment. The irony is that the Christmas party actually has a much more tightly packed schedule than the Halloween party. It would have made much more sense to have this version be easy-in/easy-out (to be fair you can always leave the attraction whenever you want).
After this show we visited Club Tinsel briefly and had some snacks. Honestly—the kids who hung out at Club Tinsel most of the night probably had the best time.
The dance party (with reindeer) isn’t slowed by rain since it’s indoors, and I’d bet some of these kids don’t even realize how much the rain cancelled tonight.
As mentioned, we watched the 8:30PM parade from a distance. It looked like the normal parade to us, but we’re not the type to notice small changes.
We next caught most of the 9PM Edge Effect performance. Since they don’t dance, they’re much more tolerant of rain. I can’t say whether any of their shows were cancelled, though. We’re fans of the show, and with something like five performances it’s easy to catch it once.
We decided to go check out Frontierland before the fireworks. Everything on the party schedule is actually at the castle, in Fantasyland, or in Tomorrowland. It’s easy to forget there’s an entire other half of the park with treats and characters.
There were some performers and a few Country Bears out. They stayed under shelter most of the night, but we were surprised to see them still going later in the evening when the rain was much worse.
The 10PM fireworks weren’t cancelled…but weren’t perfect either. Here’s a look at 10:03PM…
The rain keeps the smoke at ground level, which obscures the views. While we did get some peeks at the projections, we really got little feel for the show overall.
Here’s one shot with just about the best views we had:
You can find it on Youtube if you wanted (search Minnie’s Wonderful Christmastime Fireworks Show).
After that, crowds started pouring out. This is typical during the party, but was more pronounced today as virtually no one had any desire to spend more time in the rain, and the forecast was pretty clear we wouldn’t be getting any relief. We stayed.
Emily insisted we go get this snowman pretzel. It’s a good treat when you’ve just been eating sugary cookies and beverages all night.
After some more time hanging out in Club Tinsel (cookies and indoor seating, for the win), we grabbed a spot for the 11PM parade.
This parade actually was cancelled, and the Rainy Day Christmas Cavalcade ran instead. All rainy day cavalcades are essentially the same—characters ride the Main Street Vehicles and wave as they pass you by.
Finishing up with one last lap around the park, we realized we might want to grab a few character photos. We don’t generally meet characters, but with the short lines decided to visit a couple.
Santa Goofy was way hidden, all the way back by the train tracks, under shelter in Storybook Circus. There was one group meeting him when we arrived and one group behind us as we left.
If you look closely at that photo you can tell that we were completely soaked.
The Seven Dwarfs are one of the major greetings at the party, so we decided to squeeze them in. We waited about 15 minutes at the very end of the night. This was a major get, considering there were already about 50 people lined up when I walked by at 4:30PM.
I considered buying a ticket to Monday’s party, but we had a dinner reservation scheduled and we’ll be visiting the party again in December anyways.
The biggest downside to the rain, and we didn’t cover it much here, is how much running back and forth we had to do. We’d rush to the Tomorrowland stage…cancelled…then to the castle stage…cancelled…grab a snack…back to the Tomorrowland stage…etc. On a regular party night, you’re already on a pretty tight schedule with lots of rushing back and forth.
Obviously I most feel for those who had their first party experience rained out. It’s an unfortunate aspect of any trip to Florida that you just can’t plan for, and it’s a good reminder that even with all the planning work you might do, you have to accept that some things are beyond your control.
Next In Part 5…A Day at Animal Kingdom
Learn More About The Holidays at Walt Disney World
Want to learn more about Christmastime at Walt Disney World? For starters, we've got a Guide to Christmas at Walt Disney World, which introduces you to everything you need to know.
Need more specifics? You'll want to read about the park that gets the most Magical decorations in our post on Christmas at Magic Kingdom. You'll also want to read about Flurry of Fun—the Christmas celebration at Hollywood Studios, the Epcot International Festival of the Holidays, and the Holiday Celebrations at Animal Kingdom.
But the flagship event of the season is Mickey's Very Merry Christmas Party—and our guide has you covered with everything you need to know. Or check out the quick version in our 12 Tips for Mickey's Very Merry Christmas Party.
Last but not least, let's not forget that the celebrations don't stop at the parks! You can visit our post on Christmas decorations at the Disney World hotels to see how even the hotels get into the spirit!
All Your Other Disney World Planning Questions Answered
Don't be overwhelmed by Disney World planning! Take a second to check out our most important content and you'll not only be an expert, but you'll save big $$$ along the way.
Just starting out? Check out our Walt Disney World planning guide! If you're still picking dates, we've got everything you need to know about Disney World crowd calendars. For picking your hotel, check out our Walt Disney World hotels guide.
When it comes time to book we’ll help you find discount Disney World tickets. Decide whether you need a dining plan in our Complete Guide to Disney World Dining Plans! And at 180 days out it's time to book those Disney World Advance Dining Reservations!
Don't forget to master your Disney World FastPass+ strategy a few months in advance. We'll keep you out of long lines so you can maximize the magical time in the parks! We've got park-specific guides as well: Magic Kingdom FastPass, Epcot FastPass, Animal Kingdom FastPass, and Hollywood Studios FastPass.
Know what to ride with our guides to: Magic Kingdom rides, Hollywood Studios rides, Epcot rides, and Animal Kingdom rides! Plus learn about the water parks with our guide to Blizzard Beach and our guide to Typhoon Lagoon! And for some some fun prep, check out our Ranking of Every Ride at Walt Disney World.
Finally, before you head out, be sure to check out our to-the-point packing list, 10 essentials you forget to pack for every Disney trip. And if you're interested in saving, there's no better list than our 53 Ways to Save on your Disney trip from start to finish.