Disney Park Pass Reservations and October 1

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Cinderella Castle is ready for the anniversary! 

As you probably know, October 1 will be the Golden Anniversary of Walt Disney World. Fifty years ago the Magic Kingdom was the only theme park. On October 1, 1982 EPCOT Center opened. This year, in honor of the anniversary, Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure will open at Epcot on October 1. As you might expect, Disney Park Pass reservations are full for both parks in all categories for October 1. Does that mean that you won’t be able to go? Not necessarily.

I’m an Annual Passholder, and as such I can only make three Disney Park Pass reservations at a time. I didn’t want to have one or two of those reservations booked for months! I decided that maybe a Staycation was in order. I booked a room on property for one night only, October 1. That opened up two more days that I could make reservations for, without using any of my three. The added bonus is that we’ll get to spend a night on property! I’m pretty happy with this idea.

There was still the problem of all reservations being gone for October 1, but that turned out to not be a problem at all. I only had to refresh a few times before reservations for the Magic Kingdom came open on October 1! I took them immediately, and then made reservations for Epcot on October 2. Those are now gone for Annual Passholders, but there are still openings for Disney Resort guests. I was honestly surprised by how easily I got the reservations for the Magic Kingdom. In my mind I pictured it being the end of September and I still didn’t have them. I didn’t doubt that I’d get them eventually, as I’ve shared before I’m good at getting reservations when there don’t appear to be any available.

Remember, people change their plans all the time. October 1 is almost five months away. Reservations are going to come open, but you might not see them on the Availability Calendar. Disney is also cracking down on people who make resort reservations, booked Disney Park Pass for those dates, and then canceled the room but kept the theme park reservation. Those Park Pass reservations are now being canceled so that people won’t be cheating the system.

I fully expect for capacity to increase by the time October 1 rolls around anyway. We’re not out of the pandemic, but we’ve come a long way. I don’t think that Disney will raise capacity if they don’t believe that it’s safe, but we are starting to see a light at the end of the tunnel. I doubt that things will be totally back to normal by October 1, but they should be closer. Stay safe and keep being careful, my friends.