Help find flaws in my plans

[mamaanna]

I need to discuss this with other Disney people that understand, haha! My poor husband is probably tired of all of my wafflings... so I'm turning to you all. I have a *ROUGH* itinerary and plan worked out - but we haven't booked anything yet, because Husband and I haven't had the chance to sit down and really discuss. It's all been via text or 2 minute whisper conversations when the kids aren't under foot (if big sister hears we might be going we will be bombarded every day with questions about if it's time yet).

All that to say: our traveling party is me/mom, husband/dad, and 2 girls (they'll be 7 and basically 2 when we travel). We want to do this not as inexpensively as humanly possible, but, also, not... $$$$$. We have AKL tastes but an All-Star budget lol. We honeymooned at WDW in 2013(POFQ) took a trip before we started having kids in 2017(Pop), and then took our older daughter in 2021 before she turned 3(ASMo). So onto this next trip I am trying to plan!

We are planning for the end of May, after school gets out. I know Memorial Day weekend means higher crowd levels, but H and I would much rather deal with lots of people than Florida heat (Indiana is hot but not Florida hot). After our outrageous shared spreadsheet, it's looking like Port Orleans Riverside is going to be our best resort option - especially with the room package deal going on right now. Since we'll be going in 2026, we also would take advantage of the kids-eat-free QS meal plan. We are currently planning on renting a car and driving down, but it's like a 15.5 hour drive and I'm not sure that's how I want to start/end this trip... Our girls are semi-decent road-trippers, but it's a LOT of time in the car and sitting. We don't want to put 1800+ miles on either of our cars, which is why we are looking at a rental. H thinks we can do the drive in one day. I am skeptical - the 15.5 hours is without any stops. Even if we leave at 4 am, we wouldn't arrive on property until 8pm - without stopping. Add in stops and traffic, and we're looking at an 18 hour travel day probably. (Gross.)

Base: 4 park days, no hopping. 1 day in the middle for a resort/rest day. Stay at POR, get the QS meal plan and memory maker.

• Travel Option 1: rent a car, drive down on a Saturday, then drive home on Friday. We would use Disney transportation to/from parks and Disney Springs. We don't anticipate leaving the bubble, so the car would probably sit in the lot for the week. Unless we decide it's worth it to check out the Disney Character Warehouse - anyone have input on that?
• Travel Option 2: fly to MCO on Saturday, fly home Friday. From MCO to POR we could: Mears Connect, Uber, rent a car, or LYNX.
  • Mears connect would be easiest, probably, but that's almost $100 for the 4 of us. BUT they'd haul our luggage, and we wouldn't have to worry about hauling a car seat for the toddler.
  • Uber: not really a solid option, since I know it will be more than Mears and then we'd have to bring the toddler seat. Older daughter has the ridersafe vest, and we don't need to get a 2nd one. Younger will not be old enough to FF in a car, so that's a non-negotiable item. I'm also not comfortable renting a car seat.
  • LYNX: now this one is tricky - because it would only truly be worth it if they expand the "DME Lite" they just announced to the moderate resorts before our visit. IF they do, we'd take advantage and fly Southwest. LYNX would take us + our carry ons to DS, and then we could hop on a boat to POR from there. If they don't, we could fly whatever airline and then we run into the issue of "what do we do with our luggage" upon arrival in DS. I know we can't take them on Disney transportation, so then do we: uber (and haul a car seat??) or one of us ubers with the luggage and the other 3 take Disney transportation to POR? Is that a terrible plan? (It seems like it could be terrible. Both time consuming and then also potentially costly)

Then we'll need to figure out how to get back to MCO if we do end up flying: Mears Connect on the way back? Or repeat LYNX? I guess it's dependent on them expanding this "new" luggage service...

So that's getting to/from WDW. Once we're there: we have 4 park days. My current itinerary has us doing EPCOT Sunday, HS Monday, resort day Tuesday, then MK Wednesday and AK Thursday. We are a rope drop family, and will probably end up going back to the room around mid-day for a rest. HOWEVER... that's also negotiable because younger sister does nap pretty well when we're out and about, so she could just conk out in the stroller and we could keep rolling with big sister. We'll play that one by ear. Current park plan is based on us driving for forever on Saturday and Friday.

Okay fellow planners: what do you think? What changes should I make? What else should I consider that I've forgotten?

 

[DizneyFamof4]

I have driven straight from Michigan to Florida but that was by myself, NO WAY would I try it with my family, DW and 2 DD's! We have driven back and forth between FL and MI a bunch of times and have always broke it up into 2 days. If you're really needing to drive, than I would suggest straight thru going to FL, with the anticaption and excitement it will be a bit easier, but definitely break it up on the way home. But I really do not know about doing RD the day after the drive, that's a lot.
No issues with the park schedule and we also take a R&R day in between 2 or 3 park days. For us, we enjoy the parks so much better at night and so we rarely RD and during our first trip with our 1st DD, we tried doing the midday break and we all hated it and found it so much better to stay in the park and our DD would fall asleep in the stroller. BTW; we LOVED having our stroller, it prevented so many melt downs because they could always sit or sleep while we kept going, not to mention the great benefit of having a place to store stuff without carrying it or needing a backpack. We had absolutely no issues dealing with the stroller(s) on the buses, I laugh at all the parents post about it's difficult. SMH

 

[Mle8308]

Fly. And rideshare from MCO, it will cost anywhere from $45 and up, depending on surge pricing, but probably no more than $70. And many rideshares have car seats since they know a lot of families are travelling, it is something you can request. If you have not already signed up for Uber or Lyft, wait until about a week before you go to register. They will often send new "members" discounts for use within a certain time period. Absolutely do not use the Lynx bus system. It is cheap but it will take you over 2 hours to get to Disney, it's not worth the time spent. Plus, Disney transportation will not allow suitcases on their busses, boats, or monorails - even carry-ons.

 

[Kite16510]

Fly. The energy that you would spend on the trip would waste two days and you'd have a recovery after all that driving. Southwest will transport your luggage straight to the resort for free. That might be worth considering if they fly out of your area. I wish I had known that before I booked with Breeze.

Your girls might enjoy seeing the horses at Fort wilderness. They could also go for pony rides. You don't have to stay there to do it.

 

[mamaanna]

I have driven straight from Michigan to Florida but that was by myself, NO WAY would I try it with my family, DW and 2 DD's! We have driven back and forth between FL and MI a bunch of times and have always broke it up into 2 days. If you're really needing to drive, than I would suggest straight thru going to FL, with the anticaption and excitement it will be a bit easier, but definitely break it up on the way home. But I really do not know about doing RD the day after the drive, that's a lot.
No issues with the park schedule and we also take a R&R day in between 2 or 3 park days. For us, we enjoy the parks so much better at night and so we rarely RD and during our first trip with our 1st DD, we tried doing the midday break and we all hated it and found it so much better to stay in the park and our DD would fall asleep in the stroller. BTW; we LOVED having our stroller, it prevented so many melt downs because they could always sit or sleep while we kept going, not to mention the great benefit of having a place to store stuff without carrying it or needing a backpack. We had absolutely no issues dealing with the stroller(s) on the buses, I laugh at all the parents post about it's difficult. SMH

We still have the stroller we took with us when daughter #1 was 2.5. We bought it specifically for WDW because it's a one handed fold. The biggest problem we had was always remembering to unload the stuff from under the seat before folding! haha This time I'm going to bring a large empty bag to put it all in for the bus ride.

 

[mamaanna]

Fly. The energy that you would spend on the trip would waste two days and you'd have a recovery after all that driving. Southwest will transport your luggage straight to the resort for free. That might be worth considering if they fly out of your area. I wish I had known that before I booked with Breeze.

Your girls might enjoy seeing the horses at Fort wilderness. They could also go for pony rides. You don't have to stay there to do it.

I thought the luggage transportation was just for the value resorts for now? Are they definitely going to be expanding to moderate resorts?

 

[Mle8308]

I thought the luggage transportation was just for the value resorts for now? Are they definitely going to be expanding to moderate resorts?

Nothing has been announced for moderates or above.

 

[mamaanna]

Fly. And rideshare from MCO, it will cost anywhere from $45 and up, depending on surge pricing, but probably no more than $70. And many rideshares have car seats since they know a lot of families are travelling, it is something you can request. If you have not already signed up for Uber or Lyft, wait until about a week before you go to register. They will often send new "members" discounts for use within a certain time period. Absolutely do not use the Lynx bus system. It is cheap but it will take you over 2 hours to get to Disney, it's not worth the time spent. Plus, Disney transportation will not allow suitcases on their busses, boats, or monorails - even carry-ons.

Good to know about the carry-ons. I am not comfortable using a car seat that isn't mine or a close friend, even just for a one-off trip, so if we ride-share, we will be hauling our own car seats.

 

[sponica]

Driving in one day seems like a recipe for disaster. My sister drove a camper down and planned 2 overnights and was glad she did. Basically everything that could go wrong on the way down did go wrong. The battery died, a rock hit their windshield, and then they got stuck in weather so missed their safelite repair time at the safelite location they picked. So if you were going to drive, I'd plan an overnight in each direction. Maybe drive through all the way on the way home?

I'm the wrong person to talk to about containing costs, post COVID my husband has gone for a car service as transportation (to help with luggage assistance for starters). And we used their car seat.

My sister had a camper so she stayed at Ft. Wilderness, but I don't think they did a park the day after they arrived. They had a resort day, park day, resort day, park day, resort day, etc. I think they only had 4 park days but they had resort days in between.

Memorial Day weekend itself might have crowds, but I have friends who have gone that week and the crowd levels were still manageable as the rest of the country isn't done with school until mid to late June.

 

[Mle8308]

Good to know about the carry-ons. I am not comfortable using a car seat that isn't mine or a close friend, even just for a one-off trip, so if we ride-share, we will be hauling our own car seats.

Also, with the Lynx bus, though unlikely, you may have to stand if it is full. It is a long ride, and you probably won't be able to use a car seat on the bus. I'd definitely take that option out of consideration. Looks like Mears Connect might be best, it will take time - especially on your trip back to MCO, but you won't need car seats and it's not a public bus.