Need park hopping, late night itinerary help

[v.t.]

I am in charge of planning our girls' trip (Nov 27-Dec 2) and I am at a lost. Since we are traveling without kids or spouses, the other moms want to take it easy, sleep in and stay at the parks late.

But, I am a rope drop type of girl that has never had a park hopper so I am struggling. Is going to 2 parks everyday worth it or is it too time consuming. I know the crowd calendars suggest you skip the EMH parks but with so many having PH during FD I was wondering if that was still the case. I also have to work in a trip or 2 to Disney Springs. After all, it is a trip without husbands right before Christmas.

 

[KittyKitty]

I'm an early bird person too.

Are you staying onsite? If so, then meet them at the park. There is enough to stay at one park a day, especially if they get there later. So I would get FP's for the 1st park, see if how it goes, then decide to go to another park, maybe for fireworks or Disney Springs, or not.

Have a great time.

 

[Alesia]

I recommend giving the sleeping in/staying out late method a try. I enjoy my trips more when I'm not doing the same things I've always done.

For park hopping with late nights, go to the park that had EMH the day before first and then hop to the park that has EMH. Easy peasy.

 

[Delirium]

Hopping is an excellent touring option if done wisely. But, the time commitment to do so depends on where you are staying. I would lump where you are staying into three categories.

• Offsite - Hopping is toughest, especially if you are wanting a mid-day break.
• Onsite at a resort requiring bus travel. Buses take time, and if you want a break mid-day, you have to assume that bus transportation back and forth will eat into 60-90 minutes of that break.
• Onsite at a monorail/boat resort for MK or Crescent Lake resort for Epcot/HS. The ideal resorts for hopping, especially between Epcot & HS.

 

[ktlm]

Just a warning, Disney Springs is an absolute madhouse during the Christmas season. Since it doesn't require a ticket- you will have a ton of local shoppers in addition to the tourist shoppers. After doing it a few times, we now avoid it if we go to WDW that time of year.

Hopping takes time, but we do use it. We like to hop to the park that has evening EMH- as rope drop is about as early as DD is getting anywhere. The EMH parks are more crowded during the day-- but we enjoy hopping to mostly just the EMH time itself. We also do hop if one park is open later than the other parks.

What I have learned from traveling with others is that you will drive yourself crazy if you try to make everyone happy or keep everyone together at all times. Plan your ADRs and FP+ together. If your friends want to sleep late, fine--- book the FP+ for a little later to let them sleep and you go ahead and head out early to the parks and do some of the things you want while the lines are short. You can do it again with them later if you decide to do so. You can meet them as soon as they are up and in the park.

 

[v.t.]

Thank you so much for the advice, exactly what I was looking for! We are staying onsite and planning on sticking together. I which will help with travel but I do have a few ADR's to work around but hopefully I can follow your advice on EMH and FP+.