Anyone else feel like they WAY overplan?

[Cando86]

I've been reviewing and changing my plans constantly! Our days are so packed, it feels like there's hardly any time to just relax and soak in the atmosphere. But I feel like if I don't plan the way I did, we won't get anything done. Just feeling a little overwhelmed and looking for some therapeutic Dis support !

 

[mm1971]

I've been reviewing and changing my plans constantly! Our days are so packed, it feels like there's hardly any time to just relax and soak in the atmosphere. But I feel like if I don't plan the way I did, we won't get anything done. Just feeling a little overwhelmed and looking for some therapeutic Dis support !

We do not plan everything on all days. I scheduled FP+ for 3 attractions each morning (to get the added ones if we decide to) and ADR's for dinner that we knew we wanted to do and that's it. We have an off day, a couple nights with no ADR's and if we miss a FP window, so be it. We always end up changing things as we go so I try not to overdo it. If you have things you "Must do" then you need to really plan it. If you are Ok with changing on the fly or missing some things, you'll be a lot more relaxed. It really depends on how you like to vacation. I like my vacation to be just that so no stressing.

Good luck. With the FP+ and ADR's so hard to get for a lot of things it's hard not to over plan. I have to fight the urge constantly.

 

[Tinydancer34]

You need to plan a bit otherwise like you say you don't get anything done but I had all my fast passes ready so we could walk around in a circle and not have to wait in between fast pass times and the 7 dwarfs mine train broke down and was shut for 2 hours so my plans went wrong! I'm a planner I plan and write lists for everything I even write a list of lists I need when we go to Disney but sometimes you have to go with it and see what happens, sometimes when a plan goes wrong you discover something you might have missed otherwise, Don't worry You're going to the happiest place on earth!! I'm home now and not going again for 667 days (see always planning)! Have a great time

 

[minnie mum]

There is a fine line between planning well and overplanning to the point of obsession. Between organizing your days and cramming in so much that your family will be exhausted and having no fun at all by the 3rd day. Between planning your park touring and obsessing about making it to every attraction at the expense of just enjoying the moment.

You just cannot see and do everything on a single visit. This may be the single most important thing to learn about a WDW trip. Learn it. Live it.

Make your resort reservations. Make your ADRs. Make your FP selections. Make your park touring plans (but promise yourself you will be flexible). And then Let It Go.

 

[wareagle57]

There are so many variables to our trip right now that I am driving myself crazy trying to plan park days. We don't do ADRs so that at least takes the pressure off, but I just like knowing, even though it's not necessary until 60 days out which days we are going to which park.

Right now we don't know if my cousins are going with us, and if they are when their last day of school will be. (they don't know which days their exams will be on yet and we want to leave as soon as possible for the lower crowds and lower hotel prices)

We also don't know if we will stay on-property for our one Universal day, and if we do will we do it at the end or beginning of the trip. If we don't will we just go one day in the middle of our Disney stay?

How many days will we stay? We are getting 4 day military salute tickets (assuming they renew the promotion, another variable but i'm certain they will) and a MVMCP night, preferably Tuesday the 16th. I don't know if we will combine that with an AK morning, or stay an extra day and do just that one day.

So many variables yet I keep planning and trying to pick park days.

 

[shyjade]

There are so many variables to our trip right now that I am driving myself crazy trying to plan park days. We don't do ADRs so that at least takes the pressure off, but I just like knowing, even though it's not necessary until 60 days out which days we are going to which park.

Right now we don't know if my cousins are going with us, and if they are when their last day of school will be. (they don't know which days their exams will be on yet and we want to leave as soon as possible for the lower crowds and lower hotel prices)

We also don't know if we will stay on-property for our one Universal day, and if we do will we do it at the end or beginning of the trip. If we don't will we just go one day in the middle of our Disney stay?

How many days will we stay? We are getting 4 day military salute tickets (assuming they renew the promotion, another variable but i'm certain they will) and a MVMCP night, preferably Tuesday the 16th. I don't know if we will combine that with an AK morning, or stay an extra day and do just that one day.

So many variables yet I keep planning and trying to pick park days.

I tend to be an obsessive planner too, and will be going to Universal for the first time during our upcoming trip. After much debating (with myself) I finally decided to do a day trip to Universal and just stay onsite the entire time. When it came down to it, I figured it would be much less hectic this way. We'll take the shuttle early in the morning, spend the day and head back to our Disney hotel when we feel like it.

 

[kay1864]

Way overplan? Not possible

Seriously, by planning ahead (we use RideMax), we regularly experience 5-15 minute waits for rides during Spring Break, Thanksgiving, and New Year's week. Stroll by the same ride two hours later... and standby time is 75 minutes or more.

And no, we aren't exhausted, nor do we run around the park. We take our time, get PhotoPass pictures, stop for Nutella waffles, etc.

We just go at the right times. And RD of course. 4 parks in 5 days is the norm for us, plus 1 or 2 waterparks, and 2-3 visits to DisneyQuest. And we still get plenty of sleep.

Planning pays!

 

[wareagle57]

I tend to be an obsessive planner too, and will be going to Universal for the first time during our upcoming trip. After much debating (with myself) I finally decided to do a day trip to Universal and just stay onsite the entire time. When it came down to it, I figured it would be much less hectic this way. We'll take the shuttle early in the morning, spend the day and head back to our Disney hotel when we feel like it.

Yeah, my mom want to stay on-site (and I tent to agree) so we can get early entry to WWHP,and express passes for everything else since it is our only day. The problem is she doesn't want to change hotels more than once which means doing Universal first most likely. And there are only 1 or 2 days where Universal crowd calendars are moderate instead of busy during that time. If it was me, I'd do 2-3 nights at Pop, a night at universal, and a night or two at a deluxe. Or some combination of that. I'd even consider camping at Ft. Wilderness 2 nights and using the extra money to stay at the deluxe hotel an extra night.

 

[Aurora0427]

Yes. I was actually happier going to Disney before discovering DIS, easywdw etc etc we just went. And every trip was great. Now I find myself feeling anxious- did I plan the perfect trip? Are we hitting the right parks on the perfect days? Did I pick the perfect ADR's to match our perfect plan 180 days in advance?

Don't get me wrong- it's super helpful now that we have a little one, and my mil remarked how smooth our last trip went, so I know planning is worth it. I'm grateful for all these websites. But I find myself feeling anxious until we actually get to WDW. And FP+ and Anna and Elsa has added a whole new level of anxiety.

 

[dkrauss]

There is a fine line between planning well and overplanning to the point of obsession. Between organizing your days and cramming in so much that your family will be exhausted and having no fun at all by the 3rd day. Between planning your park touring and obsessing about making it to every attraction at the expense of just enjoying the moment.

You just cannot see and do everything on a single visit. This may be the single most important thing to learn about a WDW trip. Learn it. Live it.

Make your resort reservations. Make your ADRs. Make your FP selections. Make your park touring plans (but promise yourself you will be flexible). And then Let It Go.

Excellent advise above........

I'd think if you're stressing out about planning than......for you.......you probably are over planning My suggestion would be walk away (or "Let it go ) for a week or so. Come back with a clear head.

As said above the key is "flexibility". I've been planning our Sept trip since Oct 2013............its changed a ton of times. Primarily because we start out real general..........and as time moves on we add more detail. But nothing above ADR's, FP's, and 1 or 2 other things each day. What we've allowed is the flexibilty to change things up (parks on a particular day, tours, etc) for 80% of our trip........the other 20% are the things we MOST DEFINATELY want to do. For this trip its the MNSSHP, 7DMT, Drinking around the world at Epcot. Those three are staples and have stayed put! BOG Dinner was our #1 ADR and it didn't happen......what ya gonna do? Move on and don't worry about it. We originally had 2 days at HS (arrival and day 4)..........that got modified to 1 day to allow for a tour and a FP for the "Festival of Fantasy" parade.......but that change didn't happen until Wednesday night!!!

I imagine, things will get modified again.........but I work real hard to not let it make me nuts..........when it does (and yes it does sometimes ) I walk away..........

This is your WDW vacation....... if its a chore.........than its not a vacation its a job........that won't be any fun...................right!!

Doug

 

[jhaig]

I plan on underplanning sometime, but it's not in the plans to do so at this time.

 

[marissamayhem]

My first adult only trip in 2010, I went crazy with the planning. I didn't get too attached to the schedule because I knew we might get tired or want to do other things. It ended up being great, we did pretty much everything we wanted (multiple times for some) and still got to relax.

No matter how great it was I still felt that I had over planned. My next adult only trip this January, I decided to play loose with it. I made my ADR's & fastpasses but nothing beyond that. I figured that since it was a slower time that it'd be easier to tour this way. Boy, was I wrong. I really had no plan which meant lots of "Where do you wanna go now?" "I don't know. Where do you wanna go?" It was pretty annoying very fast. We also ended up doing a lot less and it was overall less relaxing. When I planned out our days, we were much more efficient with our time and it was nice not worrying about what to do next.

I'll always overplan from now on. It just works better for us than underplanning.

 

[MooksterL1]

I way overplan, plan obsessively, scrap plans at the last minute and replan. I am all over the place! It's a sickness.

 

[HiHoWeGo]

I've been reviewing and changing my plans constantly! Our days are so packed, it feels like there's hardly any time to just relax and soak in the atmosphere. But I feel like if I don't plan the way I did, we won't get anything done. Just feeling a little overwhelmed and looking for some therapeutic Dis support !

I, too, am a compulsive planner. I find it adds to my excitement to do the level of planning I do, which includes spreadsheets and timelines. But I also find that by the time the actual trip time comes around, I'm a little burned out.

One thing that I noticed is that you seem to be completely filling your itinerary. My advice, as someone who has done this before, is don't. Now, if you and your family are totally commando then go for it. But your comment makes me feel that they and/or you are not. In this case I'd highly recommend scheduling some down time to stop and smell the Disney roses. Having a day or two with no firm plans can be very therapeutic.

Have a great trip!

 

[asmit4]

By the time you plan 3 FPs per day, at least 1 TS meal per day....you are basically 'packed'..... if that makes sense. That kind of set up ensures that you have somewhere to be for approx 5 hours out of each day. While you CAN change it on the fly- you really sorta can't. Finding new FP times the day of or switching your ADRs around is tough.

 

[darkpixie08]

I think it depends on if you enjoy planning or not. For me the planning is the best part of the vacation. Everything is all perfect in my head, and I get to imagine the vacation a zillion different times.

When it comes to the actual vacation you just have to be flexible and determined to have a good time. Find something you want to look at or do, but your fast pass window is coming up? Oh well, smell the roses, and enjoy the activity. So what if you miss your fast pass window. The object is to have a good time, and things never go according to plan.

For each day, I plan out breakfast (sometimes just cereal in our room, sometimes sitdown), which park we are going to visit, our 3 fastpasses, and dinner, and our 3 fastpasses are all negotiable. We'll do our absolute favorite rides in the morning, and everything after that is a bonus.

 

[ArwenMarie]

If it is stressing you out, then you are overplanning. I like the idea of leaving it for a few days and coming back to it.

I have to say, for myself, I never feel like I overplanned. In other words, once I get there, I am always glad that I did spend the time planning and researching.

That being said, I really really really enjoyed our last trip to Orlando where we stayed onsite at Universal only. Zero planning! Book your room and flight and go! But Disney is just not like that, so in order for us to have any kind of rewarding day at the Disney parks, I feel like the planning is a necessary evil for us. (or fun, depending how you look at it!)

 

[sethschroeder]

There is a fine line between planning well and overplanning to the point of obsession. Between organizing your days and cramming in so much that your family will be exhausted and having no fun at all by the 3rd day. Between planning your park touring and obsessing about making it to every attraction at the expense of just enjoying the moment.

You just cannot see and do everything on a single visit. This may be the single most important thing to learn about a WDW trip. Learn it. Live it.

Make your resort reservations. Make your ADRs. Make your FP selections. Make your park touring plans (but promise yourself you will be flexible). And then Let It Go.

Bingo you need to be flexible that is the reason over planning actually works against you. One of the main reasons I am on this forum is to learn the tips and tricks to all of WDW.

I have 4 ADRs at this point for our 12 days trip in September and 3 FP+ each day, other than that I pretty much know what we want to do but will go with the flow in the park. This also gives us the flexibility to do little detours during the day such as stopping in a shop or grabbing a snack which I wouldn't ever put in a plan.

You see quite a few people who come on this forum that are utterly devastated because a FP+ wasn't available for a specific time or a certain ride broke down and they had to move the FP+ and it just ruins their day

My mantra when getting on the plane will be "we cant see everything, and that's fine because were going to have a great time"

 

[1stvisit0909]

I plan on underplanning sometime, but it's not in the plans to do so at this time.

 

[lam0037]

I am currently re-planning our trip because I felt it was too planned

My issue is balancing crowd calendars with ADRs with MVMCP. One day I had us going to three parks in one day. And other was planned with Epcot, miniature golf, ADR at Cape May, HS for Osborne lights and then finally Jellyrolls. Just looking at it written down was giving me anxiety, i could only imagine how bad it would be to try to actually do it.

I agree with others that making a list of what you must do, and build your schedule around that. Get FP and have a general plan of attack for rope drop, your ADRs, and you should be fine!

And if you feel you are over planned, just plan time to sit, take a break and just soak up everything.