Arrival Day Resort day or add half day?

[DisneyCharacter]

We just booked at last minute trip staying at the Contemporary! (2/24-2/28) 2 adults, 5 kids (13,10,8,6,2) we want to get to all 4 parks. We should get to the resort 1pm Saturday and have to catch a ride to the airport Wednesday 5pm. What do you think is the best park strategy for allowing us to experience all the parks but also have a bit of resort and rest time?

Option A:
Day 1: 1pm arrival and resort
Day 2: MK
Day 3: EP
Day 4: HS
Day 5: AK (depart park by 4pm)

Option B:
Day 1: 1pm arrival, head to MK
Day 2: HS
Day 3: AK, (hopefully early evening at resort)
Day 4: EP
Day 5: MK (Depart park by 4/4:30)

 

[disneydreamer1980]

With such a short trip I don’t think you’ll get much resort time, but if it were me I’d do MK on arrival day and another full day there as well. Id do Epcot on Monday so you can take advantage of the extended deluxe evening hours. Id do this:
Arrival day- MK
Day 2- HS
Day 3- Epcot (extra evening hours)
Day4- MK
Day5- AK then leave
Doesn’t leave any downtime but you’ll get to do a lot more in the parks. MK really is a 2 day park (at least) Or skip a park and have a resort day. If you do Epcot on Monday you could start late since you’ll have the extended evening hours. Have fun!

 

[ShazzySteph]

My personal preference would be as follows:

Arrival day- AK
Day 2- MK
Day 3- Epcot
Day4- HS
Day5- MK then leave

We were just there mid-December and arrived at our hotel at around 3pm. We went to Animal Kingdom and had 3 hours in the park before it closed at 7pm. While we did pay for an ILL to do FoP, we were able to get through our other favorites (Everest, Dinosaur, playing games in Dinoland, snacks in Pandora).

I'm such a fan of doing Magic Kingdom on my last day before heading out. If I'm able to rope drop, I can do a good number of rides before I head back to reality.

 

[DisneyCharacter]

With such a short trip I don’t think you’ll get much resort time, but if it were me I’d do MK on arrival day and another full day there as well. Id do Epcot on Monday so you can take advantage of the extended deluxe evening hours. Id do this:
Arrival day- MK
Day 2- HS
Day 3- Epcot (extra evening hours)
Day4- MK
Day5- AK then leave
Doesn’t leave any downtime but you’ll get to do a lot more in the parks. MK really is a 2 day park (at least) Or skip a park and have a resort day. If you do Epcot on Monday you could start late since you’ll have the extended evening hours. Have fun!

Thanks! Good reminder about evening hours.

 

[DisneyCharacter]

My personal preference would be as follows:

Arrival day- AK
Day 2- MK
Day 3- Epcot
Day4- HS
Day5- MK then leave

We were just there mid-December and arrived at our hotel at around 3pm. We went to Animal Kingdom and had 3 hours in the park before it closed at 7pm. While we did pay for an ILL to do FoP, we were able to get through our other favorites (Everest, Dinosaur, playing games in Dinoland, snacks in Pandora).

I'm such a fan of doing Magic Kingdom on my last day before heading out. If I'm able to rope drop, I can do a good number of rides before I head back to reality.

Love the idea of magic kingdom the last day before reality! Hadn't thought of AK first day, fun idea.

 

[scrappinginontario]

To me the biggest thing I use to decide on arrival day activities, and people often forget to calculate in is, ‘What time are you getting up in the AM to begin your travel day?’

If you’re getting up close to normal wake-up time then I’d head to a park for sure! If you’re getting up at the crack-of-silly then I’d make you arrival day an easier one, enjoy the resort/DS and make it an earlier night ready to go bright and early the next day.

Arriving at parks for rope drop comes with the recommendation of arriving at transportation 90 mins before Early entry begin. That makes for some early mornings.

 

[DisneyCharacter]

To me the biggest thing I use to decide on arrival day activities, and people often forget to calculate in is, ‘What time are you getting up in the AM to begin your travel day?’

If you’re getting up close to normal wake-up time then I’d head to a park for sure! If you’re getting up at the crack-of-silly then I’d make you arrival day an easier one, enjoy the resort/DS and make it an earlier night ready to go bright and early the next day.

Arriving at parks for rope drop comes with the recommendation of arriving at transportation 90 mins before Early entry begin. That makes for some early mornings.

We will be getting up at 7am eastern, so not terribly early. Though flying is always exhausting.