Disney Sour Grapes

[Maddies Mama]

Paying for premium spots for a parade? I thought that was what FPP was for? I guess I missed this one. For what parades is this available and how much? Sorry

Could be wrong here in what the OP was referring to but they mentioned Star Wars Weekends and WDW offers a premium parade & fireworks viewing package for an additional fee for the related events.

 

[Kpskyman]

We love the planning aspect of any vacation we take, be it WDW or somewhere else. I know it can get frustrating and cumbersome given how early you have to plan a WDW trip, but to get the best for your budget, you have to plan. My wife and I first plan when it is best for us to visit, and where to stay. The planning then goes to me to figure out what days we spend in what parks. Then my wife plans the ADRs based on where we are on a given day. Finally the kids get to chime in on FPP for what rides are most important to them. Sometimes things get altered due to availability, but we always figure it out and have a great time. It actually gives us many fun family evenings planning our trip and seeing the excitement on the kids' faces is priceless

 

[MrInfinity]

Does anyone just get tired of all the planning required for a WDW trip? It's getting insane with ADR's, fast passes, extra costs for premium seating at parades. I have no idea why it took Disney do long to announce an opening date for 7DMT except it's probably just hype to draw more guests in June. Does it really take that long to build and open a "kiddie" coaster? I don't even care if I get a soft opening ride. I'm sure BTMRR and EE will be much more fun to ride. More and more, WDW seems less about the customer experience and much more about taking your money. Yes, I know it's a business. I'm excited about Star Wars weekend but this is probably our last trip. going on a cruise or beach vacation is much easier to plan and more relaxing.

If anyone gets tired of the planning... well no one is forcing them to spend thousands of dollars on something they're tired of doing! Probly a good time for a break. But no, I don't get tired of it. I love it. I plan these trips because I enjoy it... and if I was taking a trip to Europe or anywhere else I'd plan just as much.

Really - picking some ADRs and rides is not all that challenging. You do it all in one place, on one website, or by calling one number. You can observe all your reservations in a nice clean report that you can call up instantly. It's actually all pretty darn easy to plan. And if you're calling the SDMT a "kiddie" coaster then perhaps you could just skip it!

 

[Missymouse18]

Planning? I thrive on it. Makes me feel closer and closer to the big day. I love Subway sandwiches, but there is one location in our town that has horrible service, so my solution is to avoid it and eat somewhere else - if you are not pleased with prices/amount of planning/etc at Disney then vacation elsewhere. If you work hard for your $ then utilize it in an area that brings you joy and not stress. Just saying.

 

[BigAlsGal]

I love planning my wdw vacations!! I even have a friend who is a travel agent who told me to let her plan our trips but I just can't. I love planning it all myself!!!

 

[txnana]

Like many situations, we believe what we read here on the Disboards where people complain about what goes wrong and we believe that those things are the "norm" when in actuality these glitches are very rare. People don't come on here in droves and say "everything went great today". Hundreds of thousands of visitors are there every month and are having NO problems, we just read the posts titled such as this one and decide not to even give it a try!
I, for one, got up at 5AM yesterday, drove to my daughter's house, made the call at 6AM and waited with all the others all over the country and indeed the world to book a 10 day Christmas trip to WDW. DD and I had a great hour waiting, planning, and dreaming. Yes, it is going to be crowded, yes, kids will get cranky, yes, we will spend money on extras, Yes, we may not get everything we want, but we will plan, dream and enjoy this trip as much as we have all the others!

 

[msdroz]

We don't do any of those things and have a great time. We book FP+ the night before or morning of, don't do ADRs (Disney doesn't have a restaurant good enough to warrant me planning my vacation around it), and the premium seating isn't "premium" enough to warrant our use of it.

You are the only person who I have heard this from! Everyone else drinks from the Disney Restaurant Kool Aid and I have to agree with you.. the dining doesn't live up to the hype. I can eat better at home with our locally owned restaurants!

 

[Nancyg56]

I echo this one- I seem to have missed it- which and how much? That could be very handy for us!

I think maybe the dessert parties. For a fee, you can book a nice viewing spot and have a dessert buffet before the "show." I was actually considering it. No one has to pay extra for anything, so I don't get the OP's level of frustration with this aspect of the planning.

You are the only person who I have heard this from! Everyone else drinks from the Disney Restaurant Kool Aid and I have to agree with you.. the dining doesn't live up to the hype. I can eat better at home with our locally owned restaurants!

Oh, there are plenty of people who tour like this, but because we are on a "planning" site, I think that we hear more about those who do, rather than those who do not! LOL!

OP- I have to admit that while I can understand a little anxiety over changes you have not experienced, I don't understand why you are that stressed. I am a planner when it comes to a WDW vacation, and no matter what I say, I end up blocking days, parks and meals. I have a loose idea about the order I start attractions, but that is it. I am planning an October trip, and will book FP+, and I will research how others have made this work. I will also admit I am really looking forward to that darn mine train, and will try to get one for that attraction. But there is no way I am going to let this make me crazy. If I want to leave one park for another, I will do the same I did with FP-...drop that pass and head out. I cannot understand why folks get so wound up over this. If you have used it and it was a disaster, then I respect that the system was not good. But to have this preconceived negative notion before you even get there is a set up for disappointment IMO.

 

[DisneyFamily123]

Paying for premium spots for a parade? I thought that was what FPP was for? I guess I missed this one. For what parades is this available and how much? Sorry

Feel the Force for Star Wars weekend parade and fireworks.

 

[TomiRocket]

Sorry, I love all the planning and don't think it takes anything away at all from our vacations.

 

[DisneyFamily123]

I'm gong to have to let go of all the planning and try a different style of touring that will result in more fun and less focus on perfecting the trip. I almost postponed this trip to Fall because WDW announced the 7DMT opening with only 20 some days left. Here's hoping for some magic.

 

[amberg93]

I enjoy the planning so much. It's fun for me and the FP+ is such a great addition because I can do things like get to the park mid-day and go to Soarin' on FP+. So, I'm really happy with it. Personally, it doesn't seem like much work for me. Pick 3 FP+s a day. Make a dinner reservation or lunch if you want to and then just plan to be in certain places for those times.

I like having an outline for the day like that. It's so sparse that I can fill it with additional things if I want or I can just play by ear and do whatever seems best to me.

 

[Nancyg56]

I'm gong to have to let go of all the planning and try a different style of touring that will result in more fun and less focus on perfecting the trip. I almost postponed this trip to Fall because WDW announced the 7DMT opening with only 20 some days left. Here's hoping for some magic.

See, I don't understand that. I respect it, but don't get it. On our last trip BOG was in the planning and it looked like they would open. DD and I wanted to go, but not enough to even consider moving dates around. On my next trip, I am going to try for the Dwarfs Train, but at the end of the day, it is one attraction in a Disney Sea of experiences.

I always tell folks to be careful to navigate planning ahead, and becoming too invested in the schedule. It can sneak up on you, and the next thing you know, BOOM! You are THAT person. On our first trip back since my own kids were little, it took me less than one hour to be THAT drill Sargent, and all of two seconds for my DH to haul me back down to Earth. You are going to have a magical time! You are with your family! In Disney, what could e better?

 

[disnut8]

To each their own with "planning a vacation". Does Disney World require more than other locations? Maybe, maybe not.

My husband and I were tired and fried and really wrung out from all sorts of personal things (the top being my father passed) and we needed to get away. We did a quick Disney World trip in early March. We are Annual Passholders so, at the time, we couldn't prebook any FastPasses and we're not the type of people we want a ton of ADRs. We also stayed *gasp* offsite. So, we didn't plan a darn thing. We came back refreshed and awake and alive.

That worked for us, won't work for others.

So, trying to express frustration at planning versus non-planning is a moot point. Some can enjoy with tons of planning, others don't want it. You choose what you want to do and go with it.

For our Memorial Day trip, we have magicbands now so can do the advance FastPasses. We have five things we really would like to do but have already decided that if it doesn't happen, it doesn't happen.

As an aside - going back to a trip I carefully, and I mean carefully planned with my son, I had it all on paper. Go to the Grand Canyon, stay right there overlooking the site, have a nice dinner at the lodge, it was all great. On paper. We got there. We both looked at the Grand Canyon and said "OK, now what?" Our nice dinner? The one dish I knew my son would eat was the raviolis. And he ordered it. What neither of us knew nor realized was it was spinach raviolis! Poor kid ate them anyway. but the point is - we had a good time anyway and we just had a good conversation about that recently.

The point is, no vacation to anywhere is going to be perfect. You plan what you want, when you want it and then realize it's not going to happen the way it fits in your mind. Then you go and have a good time anyway.

 

[Princess Katherine]

To be honest the planning is better than the trip to me. I really like to go through everything. I get a big kick out of experiencing the trip while planning it. It's like being on a vacation right at home. I am not one who likes surprise so when everything is planned to the T I feel a lot better than if I was just free roaming the park. A vacation is only as good as the planning that goes into it!

 

[tinkerbella16]

I love all of the planning! It keeps me sane and busy while counting down the days until our trip! I love looking forward to the 180 day mark to make ADR's and 60 day mark for FP+. Do I really like having to pick our meals so far in advance? Nah. I miss the days when all of the restaurants were considered hidden gems and you could walk up to any one of them at any time. I've used the FP+ and loved it! So much better than pulling them at the park. What I'm not crazy about is the day that free dining and room discounts become available... people go absolutely nuts! Holding on the phone for almost 3 hours is crazy. All the systems crash, etc..

Basically I love the planning but thankfully I've gone 20 times and i know all of the ins and outs. It's the newbies that I feel bad for. They never knew how stressfree planning a wdw trip used to be, they are just coming into it and can easily be overwhelmed. It would scare me a bit if I was a first timer. I plan all of my friends trips and they have said over and over again that they would have done everything all wrong if I didn't give them as much info as I did and help so much.

 

[TuneTownMagic]

My Dsis and I love to plan out dining and our itineraries for each day at WDW, but I agree there can be a lot that goes into it, and you just have to do what is right for you. Honestly, even though we plan things out, we sometimes don't stick to our schedule and end up experiencing some other spontaneous magic that wasn't planned for. The way I look at it, the technology and tools that Disney gives its guests for planning a trip is convenient and valuable in order to be aware of everything the parks have to offer, but it's more of a jumping off point than a strict commitment. I'm really glad to have the online tools so that I can learn about things like dining with Imagineers, Behind the Seeds Tours, fastpasses for parades and special events. I think without them, I would miss out on simply having that awareness that all these things are going on.
I do understand where you are coming from, and respect your sentiment; so the best thing to consider is that at the end of the day it is up to you how you make your magic!

 

[akadada]

I side with the OP.

But I think it makes sense so many disboarders are going to like to plan; that's a huge benefit of this site and it naturally draws planners, so the results posted here likely are skewed for good reason.

A lot of people don't like planning trips and it's fair to say the need to plan a Disney trip has grown quite a bit in the past 5-10 years and will certainly push people away more than the past. Most people I know that go or have gone to Disney never heard of this board before I told them about it. They have all said the same thing, they're exhausted with the planning (along with the costs and other usual complaints) and don't "plan" to do Disney again anytime soon. This is all anecdotal of course.

We're done with Disney trips for a while because of it as well (plus the absolutely horrible experiences we've had with crowds during offseason and really poor CM behavior), but as the OP noted, we're heading to the beach or, when the kids get a tad older, certainly consider the cruise.\

Great discussion though.

 

[DisneyFamily123]

See, I don't understand that. I respect it, but don't get it. On our last trip BOG was in the planning and it looked like they would open. DD and I wanted to go, but not enough to even consider moving dates around. On my next trip, I am going to try for the Dwarfs Train, but at the end of the day, it is one attraction in a Disney Sea of experiences. I always tell folks to be careful to navigate planning ahead, and becoming too invested in the schedule. It can sneak up on you, and the next thing you know, BOOM! You are THAT person. On our first trip back since my own kids were little, it took me less than one hour to be THAT drill Sargent, and all of two seconds for my DH to haul me back down to Earth. You are going to have a magical time! You are with your family! In Disney, what could e better?

That is GREAT advice. I know DW doesn't want me to be a drill sergeant. I think we should really plan some down time at the resort.

 

[Donut23]

Does anyone just get tired of all the planning required for a WDW trip? It's getting insane with ADR's, fast passes, extra costs for premium seating at parades. I have no idea why it took Disney do long to announce an opening date for 7DMT except it's probably just hype to draw more guests in June. Does it really take that long to build and open a "kiddie" coaster? I don't even care if I get a soft opening ride. I'm sure BTMRR and EE will be much more fun to ride. More and more, WDW seems less about the customer experience and much more about taking your money. Yes, I know it's a business. I'm excited about Star Wars weekend but this is probably our last trip. going on a cruise or beach vacation is much easier to plan and more relaxing.

Not sour grapes at all and my gosh don't worry what people say.

We too felt nostalgia for the WDW we loved......spotless, maintained, more spontaneous, fewer hands in our wallets.

Some things we cannot avoid (hands in wallets). We have, however, found a way to still enjoy our Disney passion. We simply go to DL. Much of what we love about a Disney experience can still be found there. Doesn't hurt that our all time favorite Disney Resort is the Grand Californian.


Finally, for some of us I find we simply outgrow Disney. Fantasy is nice and all, but for example, in a month we leave for 2 1/2 weeks in Alaska. Disney has absolutely nothing that can touch staying in a georgous lodge at the base of Mt. McKinley, fishing on the Kenai River or upclose and personal with Hubbard Glacier.

We found we needed more than standing in line for Space Mountain could ever offer. There is a wonderful World out there waiting for us. Quick trips to DL feed our childhood addiction. We just added more adventure and discovery to our travel. Side note? LOVE to meet the children out there having fun.

.....but just our opinion.