Welcome to planDisney, Kevin! I'm so glad to be able to answer your question today. With your trip coming up in just a few weeks, it's super important that you have a full understanding of your
tickets and what you can do with them, so I'm happy to walk you through exactly what to expect on your visit to Walt Disney World.
Since you have date-based park hopper tickets, those "unavailable" messages on the calendar don't apply to you. The availability calendar you're seeing is for ticket types that require a park reservation, like
Annual Passes or certain other uncommon types of tickets. Your 3-Day Park Hopper starting December 29th doesn't use reservations, so you won't be blocked by that calendar. You can enter any park, including
Magic Kingdom, on your valid ticket days, then hop between parks later that same day at your leisure.
The one thing you need to be aware of during the holiday rush is capacity. On the busiest days, especially December 31, Disney can use phased capacity closures to manage crowds. Plainly, if a park gets too full, new entries to the theme parks may be temporarily paused in stages. While a phase is active, new entries, and sometimes re-entries or hoppers, can be restricted until enough guests leave and the phase is lifted. It's not very common, but it's something to keep in mind if you're planning to visit Magic Kingdom in the last few days of the year. Make sure to turn on push notifications in the
My Disney Experience app so you can stay up to date on all the information you need to know!
I hope this answers your question, Kevin, and please let us know if there's anything else we can do to help you plan your magical vacation.
Jessica