Fall 2016 planning (continuation of 2016 Free Dining Watch)

[deana222]

I'm getting all anxious thinking about how to use the FD I wasn't planning on having lol. You could called me an over planner (obsessive?) You get all of your meal/snack credits at once, right? So theoretically, I could use some of them for my youngest, who is under 3 and not getting any plan? I ask because we'll be checking in late on our first "night", so we won't won't be eating, but will have credits to use. We'll be using the TS part of the allotment for our last day when we'll have time for breakfast with the princesses before our flight home. But we'll still have 3 QS and 3 snacks from that day. What's our best use for them? Kids meals for my little one don't seem like enough value, but I don't imagine needing ourselves to eat that much extra...although this talk of F&W on our Epcot Day is enticing...how does that work?

 

[G719]

I'm getting all anxious thinking about how to use the FD I wasn't planning on having lol. You could called me an over planner (obsessive?) You get all of your meal/snack credits at once, right? So theoretically, I could use some of them for my youngest, who is under 3 and not getting any plan? I ask because we'll be checking in late on our first "night", so we won't won't be eating, but will have credits to use. We'll be using the TS part of the allotment for our last day when we'll have time for breakfast with the princesses before our flight home. But we'll still have 3 QS and 3 snacks from that day. What's our best use for them? Kids meals for my little one don't seem like enough value, but I don't imagine needing ourselves to eat that much extra...although this talk of F&W on our Epcot Day is enticing...how does that work?

Yes all the credits are available at once. Remember your credits are per night of your stay. 7 night stay is 7 ts, 7 qs, 7 snacks perror person

Yes you can use your snack/meal credits to get something for your youngest. You could use your snack credits to buy me a mickey bar if you wanted. Lol

For your left over snacks you could buy some packaged items to take home as souvenirs. They have stuff like sour gummies and other candy all over the place.

You can trade a QS for 3 snacks if you end up not using them.

 

[G719]

I'm getting all anxious thinking about how to use the FD I wasn't planning on having lol. You could called me an over planner (obsessive?) You get all of your meal/snack credits at once, right? So theoretically, I could use some of them for my youngest, who is under 3 and not getting any plan? I ask because we'll be checking in late on our first "night", so we won't won't be eating, but will have credits to use. We'll be using the TS part of the allotment for our last day when we'll have time for breakfast with the princesses before our flight home. But we'll still have 3 QS and 3 snacks from that day. What's our best use for them? Kids meals for my little one don't seem like enough value, but I don't imagine needing ourselves to eat that much extra...although this talk of F&W on our Epcot Day is enticing...how does that work?

Forgot to say that for F&W, most of the food items at the booths can be bought with a snack credit.

For the kids, you could use 1 QS credit and get them a regular QS meal (not a kids meal) to share. Swap the dessert for a drink so they each get a drink and split the food. A lot of places have bottle milk, juice, water if you don't want the little ones having pop.

 

[sahm2two]

Oh this sounds like a fun conversation topic! What kinds of crowds are being predicted for everybody's dates? I have 1,1,1,3. If that is even close to accurate, I will be in heaven!

Pretty sure my planned parks are 4/5s. All green except for Saturday when there was only one green option that I didn't want to do again. It'll be our last day and I wanna see Wishes so I'm just gonna suck it up!

Sorry completely , but I was lost for a while.....did you end up getting CBR or POR??

CBR, I originally had POR but was able to find CBR this morning and changed my reservation (my TA did anyway). I just really looked around online at pictures this afternoon and it looks pretty. From what I hear the main downside is that it's big thus a lot of walking and bus stops.

 

[kjw42]

Also, I might've had an almost full on panic attack when I saw the other treads were closed! I thought I had somehow bitten banned because it said I did not have the privileges to reply or something. SO glad we are back up and running!!!!

I thought I'd been banned too!

Love this board! So glad it's still up and running.

 

[littlelamb70]

The way we do the parks is we get there when the park opens and we ride the crap out of everything with low wait times and short lines until lunchtime. Then we go back to the resort to lay by the pool and read all afternoon to relax with a poolside cocktail (it is vacation after all lol) ... then we head back out for our dinner ADRs.... and use our FP+ rides that we have booked in advance. If we have already used our fp+ rides we will go to shows or anytime attractions

Every family does it differently and this way is just how we like to do Disney. We like to leave room for spontaneous attractions and lots of pool time.

I think you can make it work without all that. We are disboards people, which means we are planners.... which means we (at least I) aren't scared of a detailed plan. My husband on the other hand would rather just wing it the whole time and not even have FP+! The last time we went was the old FP system which was nice... this one requires a good bit more preplanning!

I'm sure it will be totally fine! I'm just an obnoxious planner

I'd say research what FP will save you the longest waits, use the morning time to get more done if possible then use your FPs when it starts to get crowded late morning/early afternoon.

I have never used an official touring plan, but I've looked at some of the non-TP ones for ideas. I sketch out a rough idea of the day based on what I want to ride and what wait times I'd expect. Then once I get there I adjust as necessary and/or based on what I feel like doing in the moment. Kind of like Meeko5 did but I don't feel compelled to follow it. The main thing for me has been strategically planning FP+ times to coincide with the busiest parts of the day.

Hopefully what I wrote above answers this for you, but if not here it is: I don't find it necessary. I do think that the more people you have the more structure it provides, and with groups that can be worthwhile so everybody gets to see their priorities. But I'm going solo and you will find me wandering aimlessly this trip! Haha, okay not quite, but I will probably only use a couple FP+ per day, utilize single rider line often, and then just kind of float around doing whatever I want. Long story short, at the most all I do is ID ahead of time what my **must ride** attractions are, schedule my FP+, and get a good look at the map. Then once I'm in the park, I make ample use out of wait time apps so I don't tramp across a park only to find a 70 min wait. If you do that, I think you'll be more than covered. Meeko5's ideas will help you a lot.

OMG you guys are seriously the best! You've definitely calmed some of my fears about not having a crazy, down to the hour, touring plan in place when we go. I will absolutely take everyones advice into consideration. I have the wait time apps so I'll be obsessively checking them LOL and I do plan on using FP+, but I also don't want to be dragging my family around the parks trying to hit everything (which I know is totally unrealistic) and I want to give the kids a chance to do what they want since they won't be involved in any planning beforehand (we're keeping it a secret until the day we leave!!) I appreciate you all helping me out more then you know!!

Its funny too because I'm an obsessive planner when it comes to most other aspects of my life, I need things written down and planned out or else I go crazy, DH is the laid back one about everything, but when it comes to vacation, I just like to go with the flow...I know, it's @$$ backwards

 

[sahm2two]

I'm getting all anxious thinking about how to use the FD I wasn't planning on having lol. You could called me an over planner (obsessive?) You get all of your meal/snack credits at once, right? So theoretically, I could use some of them for my youngest, who is under 3 and not getting any plan? I ask because we'll be checking in late on our first "night", so we won't won't be eating, but will have credits to use. We'll be using the TS part of the allotment for our last day when we'll have time for breakfast with the princesses before our flight home. But we'll still have 3 QS and 3 snacks from that day. What's our best use for them? Kids meals for my little one don't seem like enough value, but I don't imagine needing ourselves to eat that much extra...although this talk of F&W on our Epcot Day is enticing...how does that work?

I wouldn't waste any credits on kids meals. He (I don't think you said... She? lol) can eat off your plates and will probably have plenty. We took 2 kids under 3 for our last trip any never paid for any kids meals. For the extra meal, you can add in a breakfast... We are using our " extra" ts to eat at CRT and our "extra" cs is helping us use a couple ts as breakfasts/brunches. The extra snacks will take care of themselves

For f&w you can use snack credits and you can change a cs into 3 snacks credits... But not at food and wine. So if you wanted you could use lots of snack credits at f&w and then later when you wanted 3 Mickey bars, use 1 cs credit. Hope that makes sense!

 

[Roxyfire]

Villas at Wilderness Lodge from 10/1-10/7, Deluxe Studio up for grabs right now!

 

[Sharongal74]

I thought I'd been banned too!

Love this board! So glad it's still up and running.

I had the same fear!!! I was trying to think what I posted that got me in trouble!


My DD that is 11 informed me that the side pockets in our new suitcase can hold the snacks we will bring home because she loves Disney snacks!

ROL may be postponed til fall? That's heartbreaking. I was so excited I would be there after it opened. Oh well Everest at night should be great!

 

[littlelamb70]

Love this. I wonder how the sizing runs, if it's true to size or not.

I can let you know how it fits when I get mine, if you want!

 

[Becky Mouse]

I could use some input on MVMCP. the tickets are a ton on money for me and last year I saw quite a few posts that people who went thought a lot of the nights were packed and every year more and more tickets were being sold and it was becoming so crowded that it was not worth the expense. I don't mind spending what for me is a considerable amount of money but not if it's so crowded that it's a waste.

Last year, the least crowded MVMCP days were November & early December, EXCEPT the first MVMCP date and the ones close to Thanksgiving weekend.

 

[SJSloan]

Since we are talking about park strategies, hopefully you all can share your experience with PH. I am struggling with my planning. We have never gotten PH, we pick a park and for the most part stay all day. I usually use the crowd calendars at easywdw but he recommends parks with non-EMH.

With park hopper should we hit up the parks with morning EMH and then once it gets crowded hop to a recommended park? Or should we pick the two recommended parks and do those? My head is spinning with options… anyone's insight would be appreciate!

 

[deana222]

I wouldn't waste any credits on kids meals. He (I don't think you said... She? lol) can eat off your plates and will probably have plenty. We took 2 kids under 3 for our last trip any never paid for any kids meals. For the extra meal, you can add in a breakfast... We are using our " extra" ts to eat at CRT and our "extra" cs is helping us use a couple ts as breakfasts/brunches. The extra snacks will take care of themselves

For f&w you can use snack credits and you can change a cs into 3 snacks credits... But not at food and wine. So if you wanted you could use lots of snack credits at f&w and then later when you wanted 3 Mickey bars, use 1 cs credit. Hope that makes sense!

Thanks!! Yes, a "he" lol. And he hardly eats anything as it is, so we'd definitely be wasting stuff on him lol

Forgot to say that for F&W, most of the food items at the booths can be bought with a snack credit.

For the kids, you could use 1 QS credit and get them a regular QS meal (not a kids meal) to share. Swap the dessert for a drink so they each get a drink and split the food. A lot of places have bottle milk, juice, water if you don't want the little ones having pop.

Great ideas, thanks!!

 

[sahm2two]

OMG you guys are seriously the best! You've definitely calmed some of my fears about not having a crazy, down to the hour, touring plan in place when we go. I will absolutely take everyones advice into consideration. I have the wait time apps so I'll be obsessively checking them LOL and I do plan on using FP+, but I also don't want to be dragging my family around the parks trying to hit everything (which I know is totally unrealistic) and I want to give the kids a chance to do what they want since they won't be involved in any planning beforehand (we're keeping it a secret until the day we leave!!) I appreciate you all helping me out more then you know!!

Its funny too because I'm an obsessive planner when it comes to most other aspects of my life, I need things written down and planned out or else I go crazy, DH is the laid back one about everything, but when it comes to vacation, I just like to go with the flow...I know, it's @$$ backwards

We are surprising our kids too!!! I'm so excited! I keep all my planning hard copies at work because my oldest is a snoop and figures stuff out! For a while when we first decided we were going we didn't know if we would tell them or not but knew we would at least wait a while, but we were excited so we would watch videos on YouTube and the girls would watch with us asking when they could go.... So I said if it's really gonna be a surprise we need to stop doing that lol. Now we keep all talk of Disney world till after bedtime unless of course they bring it up

How are you gonna tell them??

Since we are talking about park strategies, hopefully you all can share your experience with PH. I am struggling with my planning. We have never gotten PH, we pick a park and for the most part stay all day. I usually use the crowd calendars at easywdw but he recommends parks with non-EMH.

With park hopper should we hit up the parks with morning EMH and then once it gets crowded hop to a recommended park? Or should we pick the two recommended parks and do those? My head is spinning with options… anyone's insight would be appreciate!

Never used PHs before either and honestly may not even use them! Last trip we had two toddlers so the thought of packing the stroller and diaper bag up and loading/unloading and all that wasnt appealing at all. Now they all walk and don't have so much crap so we could park hop.... Just don't know if there's a reason to. We are going to the least crowded park every day! But there's a couple of days that we have wiggle room so if the girls want to do AK again we can and then go to MK after lunch or just do MK for CRT dinner.

 

[Disneylover99]

Since we are talking about park strategies, hopefully you all can share your experience with PH. I am struggling with my planning. We have never gotten PH, we pick a park and for the most part stay all day. I usually use the crowd calendars at easywdw but he recommends parks with non-EMH.

With park hopper should we hit up the parks with morning EMH and then once it gets crowded hop to a recommended park? Or should we pick the two recommended parks and do those? My head is spinning with options… anyone's insight would be appreciate!

I love PH!!! But we're getting Waterpark instead this year so I'm really going to miss it.......who am I kidding....I'll probably add it on once I get there.

Anyways, we always avoid morning EMH at all parks, but we'll sometimes take advantage of night EMH at MK. I find we try to use Josh's recommended parks, but it's not as critical, once you have the freedom to hop. If we start the day at HS, MK or AK, we always end up at Epcot.....for the food! We loooove to eat there. If we start the day at Epcot, we might end the day at MK.

 

[littlelamb70]

We are surprising our kids too!!! I'm so excited! I keep all my planning hard copies at work because my oldest is a snoop and figures stuff out! For a while when we first decided we were going we didn't know if we would tell them or not but knew we would at least wait a while, but we were excited so we would watch videos on YouTube and the girls would watch with us asking when they could go.... So I said if it's really gonna be a surprise we need to stop doing that lol. Now we keep all talk of Disney world till after bedtime unless of course they bring it up

How are you gonna tell them??

I still haven't decided exactly how we are actually going to tell them, but they will be going to school that morning like normal except we will pull them out early to come home and get on the road. I'll be keeping our suitcases at my parents house and slowly taking clothes over there to pack so they don't find anything around the house. I'm thinking about doing something from Santa since it will be their Christmas and birthday present (Their birthday's are 12/20 and 12/27) PLUS they will also be getting an added surprise because we are going with my BIL, SIL, and their kids. The niece and nephew's know THEY are going to Disney, they just don't know that we are coming too, so all the kids will find out when we leave. It's a lot to pull off but I'm determined to do it!!

 

[G719]

Since we are talking about park strategies, hopefully you all can share your experience with PH. I am struggling with my planning. We have never gotten PH, we pick a park and for the most part stay all day. I usually use the crowd calendars at easywdw but he recommends parks with non-EMH.

With park hopper should we hit up the parks with morning EMH and then once it gets crowded hop to a recommended park? Or should we pick the two recommended parks and do those? My head is spinning with options… anyone's insight would be appreciate!

We did some of that last November. One day we did AM EMH at AK and rode primeval 2 or 3 times, EE, 2 times on kali, and 1 safari all by 930. Then we did breakfast at tusker and headed out. (We're of the take an afternoon break group even though the adults are the only ones who would nap. Lol)
Then we did evening EMH at MK the same day. We love the late nights the most!
The thing with the fall is that some of the closing times may be earlier at some parks than others. You can always hop to whichever is open the latest. I'm excited to see how making same day fast pass from your phone works now. They recently made that change. As soon as your use your first 3 FP, you could use your phone to pick a fp for the park you plan to hop to. It will be interesting to see what will be available.

 

[Sharongal74]

We haven't had a hopper in years so it may take some getting use to. Last year my DD 22 went and kept complaint about park crowds and realized she was going to the emh ones so I told her to leave and go to a different park and she had no waits!

 

[CandiceF]

Since we are talking about park strategies, hopefully you all can share your experience with PH. I am struggling with my planning. We have never gotten PH, we pick a park and for the most part stay all day. I usually use the crowd calendars at easywdw but he recommends parks with non-EMH.

With park hopper should we hit up the parks with morning EMH and then once it gets crowded hop to a recommended park? Or should we pick the two recommended parks and do those? My head is spinning with options… anyone's insight would be appreciate!

Our last trip we didn't use our PH very much because the kids were so little and it took forever to load the kids and the strollers on and off the busses! We did use them for our AK days because it closed early we would hop over to MK or Epcot. With all the construction at HS, that might be a good place to use FP in the morning and then go to another park later.

 

[littlelamb70]

For those wondering about the ROL and the Jungle Book show I just checked the rumor board and the moderator posted a rumor that the Jungle Book show will be for the summer and ROL may not debut until the fall (possibly with changes from what they had planned) and supposedly will contain some of the Jungle Book stuff.

Hey, I just noticed your ticker! Looks like we will be arriving the same day! Our dates are 12/10-12/16! I'm always excited to find people that will be there at the same time we will!