Very early flight with toddler: planning the day

[branv]

Our flight into MCO in November has us leaving at 6:55 am and arriving 10:30 am. Of course, that means leaving our house around 5 am with a 2y2mos old. Yippee.

Assuming best case scenario (no delays, room available), we will be in a room in time for DS to take his usual afternoon nap (ha! And assuming he's not too keyed up to sleep). My question then is what to do when he wakes up. If he sleeps until 3 or 4, and normal bedtime CST is 7 or 8, would a short trip to a park be worthwhile or the worst idea in the universe? Downtown Disney? Maybe just Ohana or Chef Mickey's? Or play it super low key and do pool time if the weather is warm enough and dinner at our resort? I know every child and every day with that child is so different, but I'm simply looking for your experience as to what worked or didn't work for you on your arrival day. This will be our first real trip with DS, so I'm completely flying blind.

Also, any tips for super early flights with little ones?

 

[jalapeno_pretzel]

We have taken several early flights with our kids, though not to Disney. It actually has worked out really well, because they are excited to wake up knowing they're going somewhere, excited all through the airport, and then once they are on the plane and in motion, they frequently fall right asleep due to waking up so early (at least when they were younger). We bring some breakfast food to the airport to eat while we wait - granola bars, bags of cereal, etc.

If it were me, I would go into a park for a couple of hours that evening. One of our trips we arrived at CSR about 2pm, did the pool for a couple of hours, and went to MK for a dinner at Crystal Palace and then a couple of rides. It was a great way to start our vacation; they were 2 & 4.5 that trip. We didn't have that early of a wake up, but we did have several hours in the car and no nap for either. Our most recent vacation, we were at WL by about 3pm and just used the pool and ate QS at the resort the first night ... I was kind of wishing we had gone into a park that evening.

 

[jacknsally19]

I think it depends on where you are staying. Personally, I tend to keep the first day open and hang out at the resort or goto a nearby resort. I have done Fort Wilderness on arrival day and eaten at the buffet there (drawing a blank on the name) and you can take your son to see the horses and there is a playground. I have ridden the boat over from the Contemporary. Perhaps dinner a AKL might be nice too. I find traveling a bit much with toddlers so I don't love rush off to the parks as soon as we arrive.

 

[DisneyRegulars]

For us, our son has ALWAYS fallen asleep in the car on the way to the hotel. We've even driven around randomly for an hour while he's slept. Even with extra driving it's not a very good nap. We've also tried keeping him up in the car, but then he's too excited to sleep at the hotel. This then ruins any chance of an afternoon nap no matter what strategy we take, and results in a crabby kid the rest of the day. We usually start off the trip with a trip to downtown Disney, and an early night to sleep so we are ready for rope drop the next morning.

 

[TheDisneyNurse]

When I was a kid, we always started off the first night of our trip at Chef Mickeys. I think that's a wonderful place to go the first night He'll love seeing all the characters, and it's not stressful in the slightest. It'll keep everyone well rested for the rest of the trip

 

[MunchkinSweetPea]

A swim at the resort hotel and a character meal dinner would give everyone the opportunity to enjoy some Disney and also rest up for rope drop in the morning. I also find that I myself need a nap and a shower to refresh after travel just as much as the kids do. Good luck in whatever you choose and enjoy your trip.

 

[miracledaughter]

We are in the same boat with our 2 year old but want to keep things simple day 1. You just never know how a 2 year old is going to react to so much newness, sleep being disrupted, etc. we are going to keep it simple and hang out at resort and do downtown Disney with NO reservations just in case. They have a build your own potato head, princess mirror in world of Disney, and legoland so plenty to keep a 2 year old busy! Plus we are planning on doing MM so might take advantage of the free photoshoot there.

 

[TOBS2010]

You might be pleasantly surprised. We are flying out at 7 a.m. with our DS (who is only a few months older than your will be) on purpose. Last time we traveled we dressed him in a t-shirt and sweatpants when he went to bed. Then we packed up the entire car and he was the last thing to be added, besides ourselves. He slept the rest of the way to the airport because he was still half asleep when we put him in his carseat. Then he woke up at the airport and eventually took another nap on the plane.

If I were you---I would play it by ear. He might take a nap on the plane and then be ready to go into the parks with a ton of energy that afternoon---on the other hand, he could be exhausted and cranky and need the nap in afternoon. Keep in mind that check-in doesn't start until 3 p.m., so your hotel room may not be ready before then if you are counting on it. We are planning on finding some low key shows like the Presidents for later afternoon to try and see if DS will fall asleep for a while. It will be dark and cold--you might be able to find something like this that afternoon if need be if your son will go for it.

 

[Happyjen27]

I wouldn't make any dinner reservations you'd have to pay $10 pp to cancel.

If you ask a bunch of 2 year olds what their favorite part of their trip was, most of them say it was swimming. So, might as well start the vacation off with that. Nothing wrong with hanging around your resort, maybe enjoying the campfire (which was my 5 year old's favorite part of their first trip)

Otherwise, I'd tentatively plan on a park visit. I think you can add another day's worth of tickets when you get there for a pretty affordable price. (I could be completely wrong here, there are tons of people on the DIS that know more about ticketing than I do.

No matter what, I'd stick to bedtime so everyone is up and raring to go in the morning!!

 

[Jess_S]

My experience with early flights has been the same as jalapeno_pretzel's. DS will fall asleep on the plane, though usually not right away. My husband is a pro at transferring him to the car seat or stroller without waking him, so we're often able to get in a full hour or two of sleep. I think with small kids you always have to be flexible with planning because I'd be fine doing a park after a good nap. But if there was no nap or a short one, I'd probably do something more low key.

 

[pigletgirl]

Yep, play it all by ear. Swim in the afternoon, have quiet time and maybe have an easy dinner at Wolfgang Puck Express in DTD for a nice casual counter service meal. I would try to do bedtime at his normal hour.

 

[epsmith921]

I'll agree with the posters saying to make no plans. We had an afternoon flight when we took our daughter (28 months at the time) and she missed a fair amount of nap as she fell asleep on the descent in the plane. There was to be no additional napping of course and we wound up riding the friendship boats around crescent lake. It was surprisingly lovely. It also gave me time to get our room set up, get her ready for bed, and just relax. I was prepared to use a day of tickets, but even with Epcot and HS so close I didn't feel that pulled.

Depending on where you're staying, there are great activities not within the parks.

I was personally happy to hit rope drop our first full day and really got a ton done.

 

[Cruisin Spartan]

We're having a similar debate right now. We're going in late Oct. and our DS will be 3, our DD will just have turned 1. We are debating between a flight that leaves at 6:05am & 8:15am. These are both early flights, but the 6:05 flight would mean getting up around 2 am (kids probably around 3am or so) to get around and get the airport, check bags, through Security etc. The 8:15 flight would be require waking up around 4 for us, 5 for the kids. The only plan we have is a reservation at T-Rex in DTD for dinner on our arrival day. We are actually thinking of skipping the pool if we can help it, simply because we don't want to start the vacation by tiring our DS out (DD will likely just wade if she even goes in the water). We would kind of like to catch a bus to walk around AoA (we're staying @ CBR) so our DS can see the Cars themed area there (He's a HUGE fan), but even that is going to be up for debate. We just aren't sure how much we want to try and do on our first day with such an early start.

 

[mcjaco]

We take early flights every time....like 5 or 6AM flights. They end up finishing their "bedtime" sleep on the flight. We then usually head over to Downtown Disney until our Timeshare is ready (3PM), after that it's too the pool to completely wear them out, dinner, and back to bed. Sometimes they pass out in the car from Downtown Disney to the Timeshare for about twenty minutes.

 

[Wosmama6]

great info in this thread. we are taking our DS who will be 2.5 for our oct trip, and we have an early flight (leaving the house at 5a) but it's also direct and short. we get in at 9:30 am. right now, i'm hoping they will have the room ready for us after lunch time so he can take an early nap, and then we can head to epcot for a few hours. we have dinner reservations at coral reef at 6 because he loves "ish"...
right now, our plan is to do EMH through lunch, eat TS lunch in each park and then head back to Pop for naps. After naps, pool time and QS dinner... my 30th bday is during the trip so we might go back out one night, maybe the night we do HS in the am since that will be a less intense day than the MK days.

 

[HeatherL1985]

This is EXACTLY what we did in May. Our kid stayed awake for the flight but passed out for the Magical Express ride. Once we got to Disney, we ran to get something to eat and by then our 2.5 DS was ready for a longer nap. We napped and then did Mickey's Backyard BBQ. Our kid takes a little while to warm to his surroundings and we found it was too much too soon. There was strobing lights, loud music, costumed characters, etc. and he just was NOT feeling it. Later in the week he would've LOVED it, but it was too much right off the bat. If I could do it again, I would've taken it easy and spent the afternoon doing resort activities and playing in the pool.

 

[puffkin]

When we take early flights, my kids are up for the day. We just did a 7:30 flight 2 weeks ago to Disney. Went from airport to the Mara for a very early lunch and then we hung around at the pool at Kidani until our room was ready. It wasn't ready until 4:30 which REALLY put a kink in our plans as we had a 5pm ADR at Cape May. We then walked over to Epcot to do a few rides and I had an Illuminations FP so we stayed for that show. My DS2 made it the entire time with surprising few issues. He is normally a 3 hour afternoon napper but when my kids get into an environment like Disney, the just go, go, go. You just never know how they will react.

 

[glk2009]

We frequently take the 6 AM flight and our kids either fall asleep on the plane or fall asleep on ME. And for whatever reason our first day has always been at Epcot, which for us is a great low-key way to start. After we arrive, we drop off stuff at the resort (we've had good luck so far with a room being ready for us) and find lunch either at the resort or at Epcot. And then we spend a leisurely afternoon at the park and I usually have an early TS reserved for us at Epcot. Then it's back to the resort for an early night so that we're ready to go for the next day.

But, I would stay open to enjoying the pool at the resort because the kids love the pool too! There just aren't enough days!

 

[Fantabulously Cherry]

We have a 7:05 am flight from RIC, arriving at MCO at 9:05 AM. I plan on HS and dinner at Sci-Fi that evening. Past that, I'm letting my 2YO DD's actions dictate the day. If she can nap in the stroller during the day, great. If not, we'll go back to the hotel for a while.