DISMeet 5 years in the making - August 2017 - Quick and Commando!

[momjeeps]

History - back in Early 2012 I began planning my family's first ever trip to WDW. I had grown up in California and had been a DLR person for many years. Had APs back when DCA first opened. So I came to DIS to learn and plan. Our November 2012 planning group also had a FB page and we all got really close over the months of planning and sharing. We got to do several DISmeets during our trip. But I just missed meeting my favorite fellow planner. We are both also avid Denver Bronco fans and we have enjoyed the Peyton and SB era together remotely. We have planned another time to meet in Denver for a game, but family priorities got in the way. Fast forward, my cousins daughter is getting married on 8/26 near WDW. I debated going until the last minute before RSVP was due. Contacted my Disney Bronco buddy who now lives in Atlanta and asked if there was any chance she could join me. Guess what she said!

So we are meeting with no kids in tow. We won't have much time so we are planning to be pretty commando with what little park time we have. We didn't start getting ADRs until about 30 days out and FPs just yesterday. So we were challenged. But I'm an ADR and FP stalker LOL. I will continue to stalk for a FOP FP but doubt I'll snag it.

Here are the plans. I welcome any input. I've been studying up here on DIS since so much has changed since 2012 including FP+ and Pandora.

Friday, August 25 - Travel/AK
I fly out early from PHX to MCO with a connecting flight change in Charlotte. Arrive 2:41pm if all goes as planned. DisneyBroncoBuddy (DBB) drives down from ATL and picks me up at the airport (I'm doing carry on so no luggage capture time needed.). Straight to AK.

EE FP 5:35-6:35
hope to catch it on the early side and be to Safari by 6 and Lion King by 7 (no FPs) may not workout for both we will see. If we can rush and get Lion King at 6 we will do that first then Safari but that's pushing it.
Navi FP 7:20-8:20
Plan to hit this one at the late side. Then hope to get into the line for FoP before park close.

Currently holding an ADR for this night for Raglan at 10pm. May let it go on Thursday night if it looks like there are plenty of open late times for Raglan because if we are too tired we may just head to the hotel. We are at the Wyndham in DS area (not the garden one the other one).

Saturday, August 26 - MK
Have a PPO BOG ADR at 8:15am plan to arrive by 7:30-7:45 for early entry and go directly to BOG (preordering) hoping to be done before 9:00 and head to 7DMT first thing.
Then hit LM quick before heading to Philharmagic (would normally do this later in the day but this is wedding day)
Have HM FP for 9:30-10:30. Plan to hit that at the end of the window.
Then have POTC FP 10:40-11:40 which we will hit early in the window. After That I'd love to hit Country Bears if we are on track (miss it at DL).
From there we go to Tomorrowland. Have SM FP 12:00-1:00. Then if time allows people mover and/or carousel of prog
Finally back to BOG for 1:45pm ADR and then back to the room to rest and cleanup for the wedding. If we don't stay too late at the wedding and haven't done Raglan yet we may hit that late Saturday.

Sunday, August 27 - EP
We plan to rope drop Soarin'
Have TT FP 9:45-10:45
Have Pixar FP 10:45-11:45
Have Napoli ADR at 2:05pm
The rest of this day is no plans, snacks, drinks, etc in worldshowcase. Much less hectic!

Monday, August 28 - Travel
Cape May ADR 7:30am before we hit the road to ATL together. She will drop be for my flight out of ATL around 5pm.

So excited! Do you think my plan is too ambitious for our limited time?

 

[momjeeps]

A couple of pictures to add. I went through my old Disney pics and realized there aren't any of me that don't include XH.

Here is one from 2012 of me and my kids and DBBs travel mates that trip. DBB was in a gift store not far away and we never met. I'm the one on the right.


And this picture is of my whole family in 2014 when we were chosen to open DL. Don't mind the guy standing next to me in this pic. He is irrelevant now. ;-)

 

[suse66]

Sounds like fun! I love your plans and think you will have a wonderful time! I am there the same time as you (I leave in 8 days!!) and will probably be at Epcot that Sunday morning as well. Hope you have a magical trip!

 

[momjeeps]

Sounds like fun! I love your plans and think you will have a wonderful time! I am there the same time as you (I leave in 8 days!!) and will probably be at Epcot that Sunday morning as well. Hope you have a magical trip!

8 days! That'll fly by! It's about packing time! Excited for you. 11 or 12 for me too early in the morning to count. Welcome to my mini PTR. I'm sure it will turn into a TR later.

 

[momjeeps]

So I tweaked our Epcot FPs and plan a little. I was looking at the map and decided it was silly to do Soarin then TT then go back to Pixar then back over to MS.

So now EP looks more like this:
Rope Drop Soarin
Hit Living Land
Hit Pixar
TT FP 10:20-11:20 use toward end
MS FP 11:30-12:30 use toward beginning
Then head to world showcase.

 

[momjeeps]

So I plugged those into Touring Plans and optimized and realized we may have 45 minutes to spare around 10:00am. So I plugged in Sunshine Season quick coffee and snack.

Not that we will stick to it but here is our plans in schedule form.

 

[momjeeps]

Look what I got today!!! 1 week and 2 days to go!

 

[momjeeps]

I was able to make my PPO BOG a little earlier just now! 8:05am should give us plenty of time to eat and make it to 7DMT before RD. Anyone looking for PPO on 8/26 should go look NOW. I just dumped mine for an earlier one.

 

[DaisyDuck001]

It's great that you will finally get to meet your online friend in person. Yes, I do think the plan for the first day is too ambitious. You are getting up early, flying across country, going straight to a park, and planning to get in line for FoP before the park closes, and then maybe a late dinner at Raglan Road. Maybe you are way more energetic than I am, but I'd find this to be too much for the travel day. Also, I haven't been there yet since FoP opened, but I wonder if once you get in the standby line for FoP before the park closes, you may have to wait in line a couple hours or more? Someone who has been there recently may be able to provide an idea of the wait times at closing. I'd for sure cancel the late dinner reservation for the first night, because if the FoP line is too long, you'd have to choose between FoP and the dinner. Also I hope at some point during your trip you will have time to just visit with your friend, as your time together may be of higher quality if you take a break from park commando mode (it looks like you do slow down a bit at end of Sunday, so that's good). But I understand it's tough with a trip that short, to find time for any breaks. Anyway, have a wonderful time!

 

[momjeeps]

It's great that you will finally get to meet your online friend in person. Yes, I do think the plan for the first day is too ambitious. You are getting up early, flying across country, going straight to a park, and planning to get in line for FoP before the park closes, and then maybe a late dinner at Raglan Road. Maybe you are way more energetic than I am, but I'd find this to be too much for the travel day. Also, I haven't been there yet since FoP opened, but I wonder if once you get in the standby line for FoP before the park closes, you may have to wait in line a couple hours or more? Someone who has been there recently may be able to provide an idea of the wait times at closing. I'd for sure cancel the late dinner reservation for the first night, because if the FoP line is too long, you'd have to choose between FoP and the dinner. Also I hope at some point during your trip you will have time to just visit with your friend, as your time together may be of higher quality if you take a break from park commando mode (it looks like you do slow down a bit at end of Sunday, so that's good). But I understand it's tough with a trip that short, to find time for any breaks. Anyway, have a wonderful time!

Thanks we are having a great time! Didn't end up doing FOP or Raglan last night. FOP had tech difficulties yesterday. So tons of people were using earlier in the day FPs. We would have had to wait 3 hours. But we did get to do EE and Festival. The river ride and a night time Safari which I recommend.

Today has been amazing. I'll post more during our break soon.

 

[momjeeps]

Ok. So AK didn't go completely as planned but we got everything in that was on my plan except FOP. If we would have stayed for FOP it would have meant walking all the way to the car because tram ended 2 hours after park close. And we had PPO BOG today so we wanted to get some sleep.

This morning was perfect! Although we hit some snags, they ended up working out.

Woke up and got out the door about 15 mins later than planned. Then for some reason got lost on our way to MK. Got to MK gate about 7:45 and they were already letting everyone on Main Streeet.

Went and checked in for our PPO ADR and got to BOG right about 8:05. Loved it. Sat is the main dining hall. I'll write more about this later.

After breakfast, went to 7DMT and they had a line formed outside of the queu for PPO guests. While the morning show was going they let the line in. We were on about the third train of the day and off before RD. So we headed for PP. But it was closed for tech diff. So we rode IASW then headed for our HM FP which we were a little early for. It was still a walk on so we rescheduled our FP to Winnie the Pooh. After HM we did Jungle Cruise. Standby was about 20 mins. Next we headed for our POTC FP. Closed!!! grr. This was getting old quick. Decided we'd hit Country Bears. Nope doesn't start until 11. Ugh again. Got a Dole Whip float to ease our frustration. It helped. Headed for Winnie the Pooh. Guess what. Closed! We were starting to get discouraged since we didn't have much time today.

But the day improved from there. Since our two FPs were now eligible for any ride but PP or 7DMT we decided to trek over to Splash. After Splash we did Country Bears. By the time we got done with the Bears POTC was open. So we used our other FP there. At some point I remembered I had meant to do LM ride after 7DMT and completely forgot. Was a little sad about that.

At some point we did Philharmagic I can remember now when that fell into all this. Maybe before Splash.

Anyway we headed to SM to use our FPs and on the way stopped for a Mickey bar. The CM asked my friend if there was anything else he could get for her and she jokingly said a FP for PP. He said, OK how many in your party! Seriously he hand wrote us an FP for PP!

After checking in for SM we had used our original 3 FPs so I looked to see what else was available before we needed to leave.

Snagged an FP for LM for 2pm. After SM we rode COP and then hit footed it to our ADR for lunch back at BOG. Had French Onion soup and the grey stuff cupcake. Yum.

Finally we used our LM FP and PP FP and whew we did everything we originally intended plus a couple of extras. 12 rides and attractions and 2 meals. Were out of the park by about 3:30.

Perfect day!