Do you visit a park on the day you're going home?

[BlueStarryHat]

We *always* go to the Magic Kingdom for half a day, then back to the resort to hang out at the food court until it's time to go outside and wait for the ME bus. The only advice I would give is to give yourself extra time to get back to your resort no matter where you're staying. I always stay Value, and once on a solo trip I thought I had plenty of time to ride Pirates one last time and still get back for my pickup time...I barely made it, I mean *barely.* The bus driver was getting on the bus to leave, and I inconvenienced a lot of other people who were already on the bus.

 

[jmenjes]

Nope. My southbound Amtrak train leaves at 1 pm, and I'm at the station by 11:30-11:45 am.

 

[jtowntoflorida]

Due to flight times, we did this on our last trip and really enjoyed it. It was nice to have an "extra" day to just putz around the park and do all of our favorites. It did help that the MK had an 8 a.m. opening, so even with leaving the park at noon, we still had plenty of time. The only bummer was that we had a FP+ for POTC and it was down all morning, and we weren't interested in doing any of the POTC alternatives, so that FP+ opportunity went to waste.

 

[JoeA]

We usually take a late afternoon flight and use that as a pool day. We'll pack everything up and then use the pool changing rooms to clean up and get into dry, travel cloths. We always take ME so I've also been known to sip a few cocktails while chill'n poolside prior to our departure! Trying to stretch out every last minute of vacation is a good thing, no?

 

[Pmlocke]

After many trips to WDW our little ones want to visit a park prior to leaving to airport. I've never planned for or done this, I always felt it would be too much. We have to be at airport by 5:30pm. Anyone do this, enjoy this and all went smoothly?

Thanks a bunch for any tips/ideas

We always arrive no later than noon and departure time from the resort is usually 5:30 like you mentioned. My wife and I always spend the morning and early afternoon at the Magic Kingdom for one last hurrah. We then go back to the resort and laze around and in the pool until 5. We go back to the room, get changed for the return to the frigid north and we are at the Bad Bus Station at 5:30. They usually only charge me 74.00 for the extra time in the room but it is worth it. It gives us an extra day.

 

[Shmily01]

We never do. We drive and my husband likes to get up at the buttcrack of dawn and check out and head home. He's a party pooper sometimes! But if we were flying I would most definitely do it if I had a late enough flight. Have a great trip!

 

[grecorj]

We do. We stay at the Poly so hitting MK one last time and making our typical DME bus around 2 is no problem.

We have FP+ booked at 9, 10 and 11 for the last morning of our upcoming trip. We will leave by 12/1230 and have plenty of time at the Poly to hit bathrooms, get a snack and collect our carry-on bags from bell services.

 

[Elliemay2]

This will be our first trip. We are driving and our last day is actually our AK day. We plan on being there all day. Lunch at Tusker House at Noon.

 

[Crystal824]

Depends on the time of our flight. When we left last week, our flight was 7:20 p.m. so we did hit the MK until 3pm.

 

[mdgineok]

We plan to absolutely. Since our flight isn't until 7:19pm that night. We may just take a taxi to the airport versus MDE since we can do check in for our flight at the resort and bags( Flying United).

We have Liberty Tree Tavern lunch and even 3 FP+ scheduled.
It just makes sense to enjoy as much as we can. We are just two people so that may be different if we had a family.

Not to hijack the thread, but I was intending to do Resort Airline Check in(RAC) on our departure day and we have a car service scheduled to pick us up and bring us to the airport for a 6:40 PM flight. However, when I called to cancel DME the CM told me I couldn't do RAC if I was not riding DME to the airport??? BTW we are planning to go to Typhoon Lagoon on our departure day.

 

[han22735]

We always take a later flight home and spend our last day at MK until just after lunch then head back and relax until the DME arrives.

 

[Ambear]

I don't usually go to the parks the day I get there or the day I leave. Usually I get to my Resort at midnight or later. And I almost always leave before 10am going home. So it just doesn't work out.

 

[Disfan1968]

I added a room only reservation for one day to bring my total days to 12 for our upcoming trip. This way we don't have to cram a park day into either arrival day or departure day. This allowed me to book a flight that'll get me back to Buffalo at a reasonable hour, by dinner in fact. Our flight into Orlando will get us to the resort by 1:00 or so. In time to check in, likely find our room is ready (if not, an hour to kill at most looking around and browsing), settle in, hit Boatwright's for dinner, and then a carriage ride around the property. Gives us 10 full park days in between arrival and departure day.

 

[PeasandCarrots]

After many trips to WDW our little ones want to visit a park prior to leaving to airport. I've never planned for or done this, I always felt it would be too much. We have to be at airport by 5:30pm. Anyone do this, enjoy this and all went smoothly?

Thanks a bunch for any tips/ideas

We have a 9 hour drive so no, I've never gone to the park the day we are leaving. However, if I had a 5:30pm flight I would definitely spend the morning in a park.

 

[JaimieJ]

Depends on what time our flight is. The past two trips we went to HS in the morning the day we left, but we had a 4 or later flight. One time when we had rented a car we spent the morning in DTD and grabbed a sandwich at Earl of sandwich for the flight before heading to the airport.

 

[missangelalexis]

Yes. I usually schedule a flight between 7-8pm, gives plenty of time to visit a park for the morning and a little of the afternoon! But obviously this depends on your own schedule. But I would say you could easily spend the morning at a park!

 

[BudgieMama]

We originally planned the morning at MK for our departure day, but when we left the evening before, it was too perfect to return and spoil those memories.

We ended up sacking all our FP+ reservations around 7am, and rebooking for Epcot. We got FP+ for Soarin', Spaceship Earth and the Character Meet and Greet, all for times before 1pm, which is when we wanted to leave.

We arrived around half an hour after park opening, did Mission Space, Test Track 3 times on Single Rider, Soarin', Spaceship Earth, Living with the Land, did a little last minute shopping and finally said goodbye to Mickey, Minnie and Goofy. It was a great way to end the trip! So glad we did it. We left the park around 1pm, got the bus back to the resort, had lunch and then were ready for our DME pick up. Epcot is likely to be our final park again next year, if it works out as a good crowd level day.

 

[Disfan1968]

We originally planned the morning at MK for our departure day, but when we left the evening before, it was too perfect to return and spoil those memories.

I agree. I like our last park moments to be Wishes... a darkened sky, a silhouetted castle, music and fireworks... which is why I hesitate to tac on a morning park visit before flight.

 

[ELSA711]

When our kids were little, we had a family tradition that on departure day we'd book an ~8:30am character breakfast at Magic Kingdom, then each of us would choose our favorite ride to do one last time. When we did this, though, we were staying at the Contemporary and would walk back so there was no risk of a bus/boat/monorail delay that would jeopardize us catching our Magical Express bus.

We do this. Character Breakfast and shopping on main street. I don't really let kids shop all week. One special shopping day on Main Street on the departure day

 

[KEVD]

Typically no. If we do have a later flight out, the kids will enjoy one last dip in the pool before check out time then we'll either do a character breakfast or hit BW or DTD for lunch and browsing. If we have additional time we might stop in to a resort or two to check them out.

Although one time we had a 6pm flight and had time to hit Main St in MK after a late breakfast at Chef Mickeys. But we didn't go on any rides.