Every 2 years my highschool friends and i get together for "Geekfest", one week of solid DnD with no wives/kids... just DnD, beer, videogames and such. 2007 was EtCR and we had a blast! We had gone through the original back in the day, and later on the House on Griffon Hill too, so there were lots of memories with Strahd.
Our group did manage to get to the end and get Strahd, grapple, pin stake before he went gaseous... but not w/o a mighty battle that looked like a potential TPK until the dice sang for us.
I played a human Warlock, i flew, alot. We also had a 1/2 fey Cleric of Pelor, a Goliath Monk and a Tank... he died quite abit, the dwarven figther, the 1/2 orc, and finally the 1/2 Minotaur fighter...
My personal funny memory is chasing Madam Eva through the forest (i'm flying) and shooting her repeatedly in an overreaction to something she did to us.. until her help arrived, then i backed off...uh, guess you had to be there.
Also, the DM cackled at us tward the end of the week when we were finally heading into the castle, we went in just a couple rooms from the enterance and then ran screaming out... about 3 times before we got any progress into the castle...
Overall i'd have to say it was a blast, from our arrival in the town to taking down Strahd, it had plenty of stuff for us to do during the week of gaming, and the DM said he could have added or deleted as needed with the time we had.
If you're going to run or play it, IMHO you'll have fun.