Short trips... what does your itinerary look like?

[hsmamato2]

upcoming trip planned is 4 nites..... we fly in early- take ME to resort- stay 2 nites- switch to another resort-stay 2 nites- take shuttle back to airport for LATE flight home.
This maximizes vacay time..... Also haven't decided yet- we will either 1) NOT visit any parks at all (except a water park one day) and devote ourselves entirely to relaxing,and dining,and playing at places we never seem to have time for (bowling,movies,etc etc)
-OR- 2) we relax, and then do one LONG park day...literally from rope drop thru closing at the latest park open..... and relax again....(do 3-4 parks in one day)
this is our first 'short' trip,and with busy lives it may be our future.... we have yet to decide on actual plans.....

 

[loves to dive]

I think it would depend on the make up of your party, how many times you've been before and what your goals are. Are there kids? Younger or older? Are you staying on site? Is your goal to ride as many rides as you can or to enjoy the parks and maybe have some decent resort experiences? When are you going? We are two adults when my son goes with me, otherwise I go solo. If F&G or F&W is happening at Epcot, I end up there every night to sample the booths and rarely get ADRs. I tend to do the other parks in the morning, get whatever done I want to get done and then hop over to Epcot, maybe even just doing a few hours at the booths then hopping to another park. Since we are adults, MK doesn't hold as much of our attention as it might for a family with small children so that is only a half day park for us, we will hop over some night to see wishes but that's it if we've already been in the morning some other day. We always stay in an Epcot resort, again because MK doesn't hold the appeal and Epcot and HS do for us.

 

[famy27]

We've got 3.5 days coming up in three weeks:

Day 1: AK; hopping to EP for dinner
Day 2: HS all day, including Star Wars dessert party
Day 3: MK all day
Day 4: EP until 1:30 or so, then head to the airport

We go pretty frequently and have APs at the moment, so we don't feel compelled to do everything. We try to do at least one or two new things each trip. This time, it will be the dessert party and Skipper Canteen. We don't usually go back to the resort for a break. We try to get to the parks pretty early, but we normally don't get there right at RD.

I still love longer trips, but I've really come around on the idea of shorter trips. We're doing two shorter trips this year, and possibly one longer trip, but it won't be more than six nights.

 

[Dallas_Lady]

Thanks for all the input. It seems like people around here talk about making trips longer and longer and though that can be fun, I think making Disney less of a vacation priority is the direction my family is going in. I'm also looking at throwing in a Disneyland trip in the near future.

This is what I'm thinking:
Saturday: Early flight, Epcot by 2pm. FP+ a few rides then enjoy WS
Sunday: MK
Monday: DHS
Tuesday: AK
Wednesday: MK morning with FP+, early evening flight home

I like the idea of using sit-down lunches as midday breaks. Doing this will also allow us to travel in the off season when weather and crowds are better.

 

[toni nicole]

We always go for 3 or 4 nights. Our upcoming trip looks like this:
Day 1: Arrive for rope drop at Animal, hotel break, Epcot at night (WS AND ILLUMINATIONS)
Day 2: Hotel day, we have fast passes for Hollywood starting at 4.
Day 3: Rope drop MK, hotel break, back to MK
Day 4: Arrive with fastpasses at 11 am for Hollywood, magic kingdom at night
Day 5: Pack and relax in the room until checkout. Head to any park to say goodbye.
Our key is to always give time to relax in the room, usually at least 3 or 4 hours between parks. We find 5 days enough time to do everything we want more than once, of course I'd love more days to relax but I still find 5 days a great trip.

 

[patster734]

For our upcoming April trip, our flight lands around 9am Wednesday and leaves at 9pm on Saturday. It will just be DW and I.
Our itinerary:
Wednesday: Take DME to BWV. Check-in, grab beakfast or early lunch, and go to AK. Evening at DS.
Thursday: EPCOT.
Friday: DHS.
Saturday: Checkout. MK in the morning. EPCOT in the afternoon. Catch DME back to MCO by 6pm.

 

[GaSleepingBeautyFan]

For my 4 night 5 day trips (2 are half days) - I do a park every day. I usually go to MK on my arrival day, plus spend another full day there. Then I will spend one day in each park.
Sometimes I skip a park (mostly DHS) if I want to drive to the beach for a day since I love the beach and haven't gotten to spend much time there in the past few years.

After my AK day I will either go to Disney Springs for the evening or to Epcot for World Showcase if I want to spend more time there. Since DHS usually closes earlier than the others, I squeak in extra time at Disney Springs or just go back to the resort and pack up since I tend to do DHS the day before I leave.

On my last day, I pick a park to go to before leaving since I normally leave between 1p or 3p or go to Disney Springs if I hadn't been there earlier in the trip.

 

[twinsmama]

Here is my exact plan for our trip in less than 2 weeks:

Day 1: flight arrives 9:30am, AK by 1pm til close, bus to Contemp ADR at Chef Mickey's 6:30pm, monorail/walk to MK to take bus to AOA.
Day 2: Arrive at MK for RD, lunch at Crystal Palace, stay at MK as long as we can handle
Day 3: Pre-open ADR at Akershus in Epcot, around 1 or 2pm head over to MK, stay as long as we can
Day 4: Pre-open ADR at BOG in MK, head back to AOA at 12:30pm for DME at 2:30pm and fly home :'-(

MK is our favorite park, as you can tell we are fitting it into 3 days! If we didn't have to wake up so early for our flight day 1, we may even pop into MK after the Chef Mickey ADR. Will depend on my twins behavior!

Skipping HS this time, it just didn't do much for us last time. My only regret will be not getting one last play in the Honey I Shrunk The Kids playground.

 

[luvthemouse71]

I'm thinking of compressing our WDW trips in the future so we can devote more resources to other vacations but still get our Disney fix. For those of you who do shorter trips (~4 nights) how do you structure your days? A lot of the extras that used to draw us in (like dining) just aren't a big deal to us anymore.

Good post. We are doing a short( 3 night, four day) trip next month. This is the shortest one we've ever done so I want to make the best out of it. I'm experimenting with taking more shorter trips per year, because I have a new job I really like, and I don't have to do call or work weekends anymore. Being new, I don't want to ask for extended vacation time yet, so a long weekend trip will do for now.

 

[Hannahinwonderland]

My family's last trip was five days. That's how long our Disney vacations typically are. Arrival day was late at night and we had to move hotels, so it was technically a 6 night trip.

Arrival Day: Check in at first hotel.
Day 1: Main hotel check in, then DHS, then lunch at Kona, then back to DHS for evening entertainment.
Day 2: Full day at Epcot including dinner in W.S
Day 3: Started off with BOG breakfast, spent the morning at MK but after the parade it started to DOWNPOUR. We rested at hotel until around 7pm and then braved the rain for the rest of the evening at MK.
Day 4: Morning at AK, lunch at Sanaa, evening at MK.
Day 5: Pool time and eventual departure!

 

[mrzrich]

3.5 days planned for next week. We live 2 hours away so we are driving, plan to arrive check in at POFQ by 9 AM

Day One: AK, have FP+ for EE, KS and Dinosaur. QS Lunch. Will see FOTLK and/or Nemo as schedule allows. ADR at 6:30 for Morimoto, evening at Disney Springs taking boat back to POFQ
Day Two: Epcot, have FP+ for SE, TT, and Figment. QS lunch and fill in with whatever until 2:30PM. Plan to take the Friendship boat over to DHS to catch the 4PM show of LMA as it will be our last chance. Dinner ADR at 5:30 at Il Mulino, hope to get back to DHS before the 8PM fireworks.
Day 3: Total Day devoted to MK. With FP+ for SDMT, PP and JC. QS lunch, probably at CHH. FP+4,5,etc hopefully. Dinner that evening is at the Wave at 5:30
Departure Day: Drive my car to DHS FP+ TSMM, Star Tours and TOT. Lunch at Captain's Grille at 1PM, Depart.

 

[maxiesmom]

For a 4 day trip I would be sure to buy park hopper passes. Animal Kingdom and Disney Studios are only half day parks for me, so we would hop to Epcot or MK for fireworks at night.

 

[leebee]

In November 2015, we had a quick, budget friendly trip to WDW with 3 day park hopper tickets (park hoppers were our cheapest ticket option for this trip through a deal at work), tickets to MVMCP, flew to MCO, stayed onsite. Breakfasts were in our room- we brought mini bagels, cheese, fruit cups, breakfast bars with us. Bought one mug for coffee. Lunches/dinners were QS or TS, except for Epcot day- Food and Wine festival!
Arrived at MCO around 5 on Saturday. DME to hotel (ASMu), check in, bus to Downtown Disney for supper at Wolfgang Puck's counter service. Walked around a bit. We'd planned to a MK resort to see the fireworks but it was rainy and we were tired, so we went to bed.
Sunday- full day at the Studios, starting around 10:15am. I used touringplans.com so we got in everything we wanted, with QS lunch. Decided to take the boat over to Epcot for supper (without park hoppers we would have gone to the Boardwalk for a sit-down meal at ESPM, Big River Grill, or Captains Grille), then back to the Studios. We decided to skip Fantasmic (which is how we were able to have supper at the Biergarten) so had dinner, saw Illuminations, then took the boat back to DHS for Osborne Lights.
Monday- Full day at AK, once again arriving around 10am. Stayed all day, had lunch at Flame Tree and dinner at Boma. Because we had park hoppers we'd planned to go to MK for Wishes, MSEP, and maybe a few fast rides, but we were tired so went back to the hotel to swim and go to bed early (which we didn't, because DD22 and I found the pool bar...)
Tuesday- We had a down day at the pool, relaxing. We had a big lunch at The Wave at 2pm, then over to MK by 3:45 for MVMHP. We had our 3 FP+ before the party started, and stayed until the party ended. This was our MK day.
Wednesday- Arrived at Epcot around 10, had FP+ for Soarin. Also did LwtL, SSE, and TT. Food and Wine Festival was our main focus. We did two Food/Beverage seminars and then headed for the food stalls. Stayed all afternoon/evening to see Illuminations again.

Thursday- off to NYC for a two-night stay to watch a friend dance at City Center. We were pretty beat from WDW so didn't do too much sight-seeing. We go to NYC annually, so it was no big deal to just take it easy.

 

[caroline1851]

My last trip looked like this:
Day 1: Arrive resort 10, at AK by 10:30. Stay until 3. Back to resort to check it out and eat. Early bed
Day 2: RD MK.Stay until 3. Go back to resort. Nap.go back to MK for 8. Stay until midnight
Day 3: RD EPc. Stay until noon. Go back to resort. Nap. Return to Epc and stay until after Illuminations
Day 4: RD at TSM. Stay until 2/2:30. Go to resort, swim/relax. Disney Springs 6-9
DAy 5: RD Mk. Stay until 2. Back to resort then to airport

 

[Adam6952]

I'm thinking of compressing our WDW trips in the future so we can devote more resources to other vacations but still get our Disney fix. For those of you who do shorter trips (~4 nights) how do you structure your days? A lot of the extras that used to draw us in (like dining) just aren't a big deal to us anymore.

Skip animal kingdom... Hit the top 4 restaurants you like.. Fast pass your favorites.. Come early leave late!

 

[KatherineDisney]

My upcoming short trip includes one park day, possibly two. Although I am not too keen on spending money for an extra day of passes to just use for dinner. Here is what it looks like for me...

Arrival Day: Check in at Swan and Dolphin and head straight to ESPN to pick up race packet
Day Two: Breakfast ADR and Magic Kingdom
Day Three: Half Marathon, lunch at Beaches and Cream and pool (toying with the idea of heading into EPCOT for illuminations and QS dinner)
Day Four: Fly home!

My shorter trip philosophies stem around the fact that I did an intense short trip and ended up grumpy, sick and overall moody. With all of the sensory overload at Disney I have a hard time staying all day everyday in the parks. I actually really enjoy the short trips because I kind of allow myself to just "relax." I won't ever get to see or do it all. I don't feel the need to try and it works!

 

[Dallas_Lady]

What resorts do you prefer for short trips? I'm thinking we should keep it simple (Value or Mod) because we won't be in the room much.

 

[Praying Colonel]

We did a 3-day DCL cruise last month and had 1 partial day before the cruise and 2 partial days after.

Arrival Day: We took DME to the hotel, then spent the rest of the day (noon-9) at EP.
Day 2 (Disembarkation Day): Took our DCL transfer to the hotel, then went right to DHS and spent the rest of the day (noon-9) there.
Day 3 (Departure Day): We had to be back at the hotel by 3 to catch the Tragical Express to MCO, so we had an early ADR at BOG, got in a couple of rides on 7DMT before RD, then hit the parks hard until 2:15 or so.

So for us the main difference was we didn't take a break. We only had 3 days, and no full days, so we made the most of what time we had.

And I'm no FP+ fan by any means, but late arrivals are where it works best. Under the old system we couldn't have got TT or TSM FPs due to our late arrival on those days.

 

[IvyWinter]

Doing a 3 day solo trip.
2/29: fly in, check in to All Star sports, hop a bus to MK immediately. Whole day there, dinner possibly at Kona Cafe.
3/1: AK rope drop to hit like 3 rides (or i may pass on AK altogether), HS afternoon until 8pm for Symphony in the Sky, then Epcot for EMH and Illuminations/shopping.
3/2: Epcot rope drop until about 4pm, and then time to head to the airport!

 

[2girlsmom]

I'm nearly local, about 2 hours away, so all my trips are weekends/long weekends anymore. We have annual passes, though, and go several times a year, so its a little different. We don't try to do everything, but we try to prioritize faves. For example, we will be there next weekend celebrating my daughter's birthday, we'll drive up Friday afternoon, hit MK, where we'll do our fp+ and likely get 3 or 4 other rides plus the fireworks before we leave. Saturday morning, we have breakfast at Kona, followed by AK day, no shows this time, as this daughter isn't into them, so focus on animal exhibits and a few rides, late lunch @ 3pm at Rainforest, before heading to USO to hit a few rides there and let them see Fall Out Boy in concert that night. Sunday, we have early prepark reservations at Garden Grill for breakfast, and we'll stay at Epcot till 4 or 5pm before heading for home. Since it's her birthday, we are doing ADRs that she wants, and FP on the rides that she cares about. Next confirmed trip up will be end of May/first of June for my younger daughter's birthday, and she'll be choosing where she wants soon.