Any MISTAKES made on past trips?

[kris082668]

Bump

 

[Mrs. Ciz]

I have one more...

Our first family trip I was so intent on following the touring plan in my hand and getting from ride to ride that I literally forgot to look up and enjoy all the scenery in the parks.

Now I always make time to just look and take it all in.

 

[Julie521]

Hold onto your bag on tower of terror! and then when you are holding it, make sure you really are. I swore my bag was wrapped around my arm and held down. After the first drop, my bag is in front of my face and I had to grab it mid air!!!

 

[Honeybee83]

We packed all of our clothes in travel space bags. Allowed us to carry on and when our clothes were all sweaty and yucky from exploring, contained the smell! Must have for long trips when you have limited access to laundry services! You can also add a dryer sheet in each bag to help with smells. Hopefully, we're not the only ones who end up with smelly luggage at the end of a long sweaty trip.

 

[beck02]

We did a lot of stuff right, but some of our biggest lessons from our last trip:
1) forgetting my allergy medicine (I rarely need it). I was miserable by the 3rd day
2) Staying on-site & expecting a 'magical experience', and expecting the hotel to have a microwave & small fridge. For us, it's much more comfortable to stay off site, and so we can enjoy the parks better because we're all more refreshed
3) Not taking advantage of all the perks--like fast pass, or sending our purchases to the hotel room. We figured most of them out, but it did take 2 or 3 days
4) going to downtown disney. Really not all that great (felt like a tourist trap)


Otherwise, I think we did pretty good for our first time! And now we've found dis boards, so our trips will only get better

 

[Loki0panda]

I havent even gotten to disneyworld yet and I'm having problems. My lesson I've learned already is not trust your travel agent when booking flights and dont book it too early. I'm having huge problems with the airlines that I'm not dealing with trying to get the reservations of my flight back to something that can make my reservations correct and logical.

 

[KathieSmallwood]

Eeek, this is my first post

Last year was my first time in Disney as an adult (my family went quite a few times when I was a kid). I headed down there with my boyfriend, now fiance.

First mistake--TOTALLY packed too much. I'll blame it on wanting to look good for my man but I think I brought like 3 bottles of perfume and at least 5 pairs of shoes--for a five night trip!!! I don't think I wore perfume the entire time we were there and wore only one pair of shoes. Well, two, if you count flip flops to the pool. My bag must have been 100 lbs and the wheel on my suitcase was broken from a trip earlier in the year. FI carried the whole thing across CBR in the rain the day we checked out - we'll just call him a saint.

The biggest mistake though was the Hoop Dee Doo. It was something we used to do when I was a kid, and I wanted to take FI. I bought the tickets, made the reservations, and we trek all the way from CBR to Fort Wilderness for the late show only to find the whole place empty. We wait and wait, STARVING because it's 8:30 at night, thinking that people will show up in time. No one ever does show up, because the show was cancelled due to low attendance. And of course, I was never notified--not because of any mistake by Disney, but because the tickets I bought were NOT EVEN FOR THAT NIGHT. I looked back at the tickets and realized I bought tickets for a show one week after we would leave! Luckily Disney is fabulous and changed my reservation to a night when we actually would still be in Disney. Unfortunately, that still left us to find food at 9:30 in Disney World with no reservations!!

Well! What did you think about the hoop de doo?Was it worth it? Trying to decide if we should go.

 

[delilah]

My biggest mistake during my last trip was not asking to be put in a different room. We were staying at Kidani Village, and booked a Savanna room. When we got to the room, the view outside looked a little desolate. I almost told the guys right then and there that we were going back to the lobby to ask for a different view, but I didn't because we had dinner reservations. The next morning we get up for breakfast time. When I stay at AKL, my favorite thing to do is sit on the balcony in the morning and enjoy my coffee, have breakfast, and watch animals. On this particular Savanna, my breakfast time corresponded to the time when the animals are taken in for their morning feedings and checks, about 7-9 am or so. One morning I got to watch them mow the lawn. There was a vulture there most of the time. Note to self: next time ask for an even number Savanna room, not on Pembe savanna. Paying savanna points for this room in mid-June is the biggest rip off I have suffered at Disney. And I totally love AKL, and stay there at least once a year with my DVC.

 

[Purplebaby1216]

Okay, so we just got home late Friday night from Walt Disney World and my BIGGEST mistake was packing WAY TOO MUCH! I had read through all of this forum on mistakes and on what not so normal things to pack that were the best etc and ended up packing so much stuff "to make our trip easier" that I ended up never using and only cost me so much more in checked luggage So, in my opinion, pack just the stuff you usually pack for any week long trip and make sure you get your tums/gas-x in there since there is such a change of diet and skip the other stuff. Also, for us, we did not take a break out of the park because the time it would take to transport out, rest, and back in again, was more stressful for us. Instead, we just woke up when we woke up (no alarm clocks), ate a good breakfast at the condo and headed to the park and stayed there until the fireworks show was done on our first day of Magic Kingdom and our one day at Epcot....other then that, we typically left around 8 pm or so and headed back to the resort and had gotten good full days in while still feeling like we were rested and out kids were wonderful in behavior! No tantrums, no meltdowns, etc!

 

[danjoan14]

My biggest mistake? Coming home and leaving all the magic behind!

 

[purplegirl1818]

I didn't buy the big Stitch. He's my favorite character but I couldn't stomach paying $50 for a stuffed animal and I wasn't sure he would fit in my carry on.

When we got to the airport, we saw at least 3 people carrying said Stitch (regardless of if they already had a carry on) AND I had saved to buy souvenirs I should have sucked it up and bought him.

 

[danjoan14]

Buses! They were crowded everyday. I don't think I was ever able to sit down without being polite to get up and have someone else use the seat. I think next time we should either stay on the monorail route or closer to the park. Does anyone know if you have to pay for park parking if you stay on site and rent a car?

And DW did not think the meal plan was worth it!

 

[djmeredith]

You do not pay parking if you stay onsite. They give you a parking pass for your car.

 

[danjoan14]

Do they let you park in a certain location, or do you park in the same lot as the non onsite guests do?

 

[popp17]

I didn't buy the big Stitch. He's my favorite character but I couldn't stomach paying $50 for a stuffed animal and I wasn't sure he would fit in my carry on.

When we got to the airport, we saw at least 3 people carrying said Stitch (regardless of if they already had a carry on) AND I had saved to buy souvenirs I should have sucked it up and bought him.

My DP was one of those people carrying around his "Super Stitch" as he now calls him. Like you, he was going back and forth on getting him. We probably looked through 20 large Stitches before finding "the one".

I'm sure our favorite mischief maker will be waiting for you when you get back to the magic kingdom

 

[momimouse27]

Do they let you park in a certain location, or do you park in the same lot as the non onsite guests do?

Same lot as everyone else. They give you a pass for your window and you ride through without paying. That parking can add up when you have to pay.

 

[Moonwolf]

My two mistakes from my last trip were:

1. Not bringing enough batteries for my camera. My dad even offered for me to take more but I thought I wouldn't go through that many. Ended up running out on our second to last day and I had to run all over EPCOT to look for more AA batteries (which they apparently don't have in the international showcase or they had run out by the end of the day because I had to go all the way to future world to get them)

2. My other mistake was giving into my friend who said we had time to try out the more intense version of Mission Space in future world when we a) already rode the less intense version on our previous half day at EPCOT day b) My friend (and I) are not big on larger thrill rides c)were supposed to dedicate the half day to exploring international showcase. Result is my friend did not feel well after the ride so we had to stop to rest. Then we ended up rushing through the countries to make our dinner reservations. (I am determined to explore each of the countries someday)

 

[Gamegrl1]

Pre-emptive strike on a couple things so we don't make mistakes when we go (learned from mistakes on past non-WDW trips!) - that is, the following are NOT mistakes, they're good things!:

1. Booked separate hotel rooms for WDW because my mom snores so loud it keeps me up. So we'll have our own rooms. Seriously, it's worth the extra $654 to know I'll get a good night's sleep each night!

2. Will bring extra memory cards and batteries for camera and camcorder and fully charge them each night.

3. Will take a LOT of videos and I'm making mom practice with the camcorder before we go so I can be in the videos too! Last family trip we went on I was in literally one second's worth of footage!

4. Put name and contact info in each item of value (camera, etc. and a photo of my contact info on the camera as well.) I lost the camcorder at DLR one time - thank goodness I got it back but again...I learned the hard way to include that.

5. I agree with one of the first posts on this thread to buy a lot of souvenirs, including things for folks back home...not just junk for everybody I know, but a few nice things for family and close friends. I'm bringing an extra, empty suitcase to bring back all the loot!

 

[bluezy]

Pre-emptive strike on a couple things so we don't make mistakes when we go (learned from mistakes on past non-WDW trips!) - that is, the following are NOT mistakes, they're good things!:

1. Booked separate hotel rooms for WDW because my mom snores so loud it keeps me up. So we'll have our own rooms. Seriously, it's worth the extra $654 to know I'll get a good night's sleep each night!

2. Will bring extra memory cards and batteries for camera and camcorder and fully charge them each night.

3. Will take a LOT of videos and I'm making mom practice with the camcorder before we go so I can be in the videos too! Last family trip we went on I was in literally one second's worth of footage!

4. Put name and contact info in each item of value (camera, etc. and a photo of my contact info on the camera as well.) I lost the camcorder at DLR one time - thank goodness I got it back but again...I learned the hard way to include that.

5. I agree with one of the first posts on this thread to buy a lot of souvenirs, including things for folks back home...not just junk for everybody I know, but a few nice things for family and close friends. I'm bringing an extra, empty suitcase to bring back all the loot!

We've made that preemptive strike as well. We put a locked "file" on every memory card with that information as well as a file on every camera. And I put an address label with our cell phone numbers added on our Photopass/PhotopassPluss card(s) (and we take a picture of the back of them as well so that we have the number in case they get lost). I had 2 PP photographers comment on my labels and tell me what a good idea it was to do that because cards get lost or mixed up quite often.

 

[Katelly]

The biggest mistake I've made on practically all our trips is overbooking our dining arrangements. I used to make a reservation (or in the past a priority seating arrangement) for every night of our stay. I always felt I had to keep an eye on the time and factor in how long we could stay at a park, get back to our hotel to freshen up and then catch Disney transportation to whatever resort or park we were dining in.

Sometimes we just didn't feel like eating at a restaurant I had booked, or weren't hungry for dinner so I had to cancel reservations. I felt like I had to arrange our entire day around where and when we were having dinner.

For our upcoming trip, we'll be staying six nights and I only made dining reservations for three nights. The balance of the time, well, I'm sure we won't go hungry.