Hi ya'll! I'm new to this site, though I've been lurking around a lot since
hubby said maybe this year we can finally take our FIRST trip to Disney!!! We both went as children a few times, but I remember NOTHING and he remembers only a little. We have 5 children ages 8 down to 2, and are trying to plan a trip for maybe early October when the kids have a week break. I stay at home and go to nursing school part-time, hubby works from home for a large web hosting company, and our kids attend school
I am VERY over-whelmed by planning our first trip since I don't know what all is even at Disney World! We plan to drive since we're not all that far from it, like 10 hours or so (Tennessee). Any help is very welcome! Traveling to Disney with 5 kids is going to be intereting, but a lot of fun I'm sure!
We also have 5 children and have been traveling to Disney annually since our first 2 were babies, they are now 15, 12, 10, 9 and 7. We like to stay on WDW property. We also live in the South and usually drive and never use our car the entire time we are there. We have flown before and we still didn't need a rental car. We like the Disney transportation system and if you are flying you can use the free Magical Express service from the airport to your Disney resort.
The slowest times to visit Walt Disney World and the weeks with the lowest resort rates are at the end of January into the first week of February, first 2 weeks of May, last week of August through the end of September, last 2 weeks of October, first 2 weeks of November and mid December between December 10 and 19. Also, For the last few years Disney has had a
Free Dining promo during most of those dates. We now plan all of our yearly trips around the Free Dining Promos. With a free dining discount your family can save a huge amount of money at a value or a moderate resort. A room discount is better at a Deluxe resort - if the discount is at least 40%, if the room discount is less, then a free dining discount is better. Here's a link to everything about Free Dining discounts and promos:
http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=2771101
All of those dates are good crowd times to go, but they will be opening a huge new Fantasyland expansion in the fall, so you may want to wait until October or November to go, which will have good rates, discounts and crowd levels.
I highly recommend the All-Star Movies Resort, it is definitely our kid's favorite resort. Getting 2 connecting rooms at a value resort for your family will be the cheapest way to stay on-site. They will be opening a new value resort called the Art of Animation and it will have Family Suites and will be themed with Nemo, Lion King and Cars - we are really excited about this new resort - I am afraid though, with it being new, that it will be blacked out for discounts. Port Orleans is our favorite moderate resort and The Polynesian is our favorite deluxe resort. The website
www.allearsnet.com has great pictures and reviews of all the Disney resorts.
We really like the
Disney Dining Plan, the regular plan with 1 Table Service/Character Meal, 1 Counter Service/Fast Food Meal and 1 Snack per person per day. I find the Quick Service Plan a wash and the one time we did the Deluxe Plan but we felt like it took up too much time and I would not recommend it for someone new to Disney. It's hard enough to navigate everything in WDW the first time you go without spending 6 or more hours per day getting to an from restaurants and eating. Our favorite restauarants are:
Ohana - In my opinion, the best restaurant in all of Disney World
Kona
Chef Mickey's
1900 Park Fare
Crystal Palace
Liberty Tree Tavern
Whispering Canyon
Coral Reef
LeCellier
Boma
Sci-Fi Drive In
Mama Melrose's
You really don't need the hopper ticket option added to your base tickets because you are new to touring Disney World, you really won't miss it. I would recommend 5 to 6 park days for a first visit - 2 days MK, 2 days Epcot, 1 day Ak and 1 day DHS. If you are wanting to visit one of the Water Parks, it's cheaper to just pay out of pocket for one of Water Parks.
I do recommend The Unofficial Guide to Walt Disney World and their companion website,
www.touringplans.com. I use their crowd/best days calendar to plan all our park days and then once I know which park we will be in on which days I can make my Advance Dining Reservations around those parks or in resorts close to those parks. Again, I highly recommend the Basic Disney Dining Plan if your party is going to eat at least one sit down/table service/character meal per day.
You can make Advance Dining Reservations 180 before your check-in date. Make sure you have Advance Dining Reservations as a lot of the popular table service restaurants and character meals do not take walk-ups and book up quickly.
