On your arrival and departure, do you arrive early/leave late?

[edk35]

We have never flown out to ANYWHERE on an 8:15 a.m. flight. LOL In Aug. we are doing just that. My dh and one son wanted to take the 6:35 flight out....STILL ASKING ME TO CHANGE IT. On the return we are flying out at 5:45. There is still a 6:45 and a 9:00 p.m. still wide open. My son wants to fly out at 9:00. We are returning on a Friday with school starting back up the following Monday. So this is our LAST HOO RAH of the summer. I am on the fence about it...because it is summer and it will be sooooo hot down there. I am sure all we would our last day is sleep in, stay at SSR until check out at 11:00....go to DTD, maybe another afternoon at DQ and eat there. Not sure if we have enough to keep us busy til departing for airport at say 7ish if we fly out at 9:00. I am thinking if we change anything......change it til 6:45 one hour later. Any suggestions....

 

[lyzziesmom]

I always take the earliest morning flight out to WDW, and the latest reasonable flight home. Gotta maximize the time in the parks!! By reasonable, I mean I take into consideration what day we are returning home and what I have to do the next day. If the next day is a school/work day, I make sure we will be home around the kids' bedtime.

For my upcoming trip, it actually worked out to be about $50 cheaper to take a late night flight to WDW the night before (arriving at 11pm) than to wait until the next morning - the flight was that much cheaper the night before that it offset the cost of an additional night in the hotel. So, we will try something new and see how we like it!

 

[jade1]

I always take the earliest morning flight out to WDW, and the latest reasonable flight home. Gotta maximize the time in the parks!!

Same here, especially with AP in the pocket.

 

[pilferk]

We typically fly out very early and leave about mid to late afternoon.

Keep in mind when arriving early, there is a good chance your room will NOT be ready (ESPECIALLY in the summer, because it's busy and occupancy is so high). Maybe keep the swimsuits in carry on luggage if you think you'll want to use the pool, etc, at the resort while you wait rather than just hitting the parks.

We also find that leaving mid to late afternoon does 3 things:

It ensures OUR kids (younger than yours) sleep most of the flight home.
It gets us in (it's about a 2 hour flight to CT) just in time for dinner.
We get home early enough so that the kids aren't in "monster mode" and we're not dead tired.

Next trip will be a bit different as it looks like we're going to drive it....so I'm not sure if we'll arrive early or not (depends on how much ground I can cover). But we're planning on starting the drive back at about the same time we fly out...

 

[GAN]

Are you crazy! Get your @#% out of bed and get on that 6:35A flight. It's the least you can do for your men!

 

[castleri]

We take an early flight down and the latest back that is reasonable for the people traveling. Just DH and I take the late one- traveling with DGC and we take the one that will get them home for a bedtime around 8-9 pm. Once we have checked out we do the pool for awhile and DTD for some more of the time depending on how much we have. The order we do it changes from trip to trip according to how we feel at the time. We change into traveling clothes near the pool and if bathing suits are wet pack them in plastic bags in the carryons or stuff them into luggage before checking it at the airport.

 

[abk96]

We always take the first flight out usually around 7 AM. On the return flight we have taken afternoon and evening flights before and we prefer the early afternoon flight. ( I would just prefer to stay forever. A girl can dream right. ) We usually just hang around the resort until we have to leave anyway, so why not take the earlier flight. And when traveling with kids it's easier. The one time we took the late flight we didn't arrive home until well after 10 PM and everyone was exhausted.

 

[Jimbo]

We used to take an early flight out. There was a 7:30 flight that was our "regular" one. But it just didn't work out that well. The airports want you to get there 90 minutes or so ahead of time, so now you're leaving the house at 5:30. Plus everybody's pretty keyed up the night before, and at least some people won't sleep well that night.

So we were usually a tired, grouchy crew by the time we arrived in MCO. We used to go to Chef Mickey's that first night, but it was never as much fun as if we went later in the week.

So now we take a flight that leaves around noon. We arrive in a better mood, and our room may be ready when we get there, which is nice. Being DVC members we are frequent visitors, and don't feel like we have to cram in non-stop action like we used to.

 

[DisneyDVCdad]

We usually take an early flight out about 6 am. It turns into a really long day! So This year we are taking an evening flight out to arrive in Disney around 9 pm. Then hit the parks fresh the next morning. We generally take an afternoon flight out!

 

[Lady V]

funny-I fly out tomorrow am at 7:30 so I will be at the airport by 5 and up by 3:30!! yes-I will be tired-but!!!-I will landing in Orlando at 9 am so I have a whole extra day! better go pack!

 

[edk35]

We usually take an early flight out about 6 am. It turns into a really long day! So This year we are taking an evening flight out to arrive in Disney around 9 pm. Then hit the parks fresh the next morning. We generally take an afternoon flight out!

That is what we usually do.....we fly out in the afternoon and get in that night and hit the parks the next morning.

 

[Boston5602]

We used to take an early flight out. There was a 7:30 flight that was our "regular" one. But it just didn't work out that well. The airports want you to get there 90 minutes or so ahead of time, so now you're leaving the house at 5:30. Plus everybody's pretty keyed up the night before, and at least some people won't sleep well that night.

So we were usually a tired, grouchy crew by the time we arrived in MCO. We used to go to Chef Mickey's that first night, but it was never as much fun as if we went later in the week.

So now we take a flight that leaves around noon. We arrive in a better mood, and our room may be ready when we get there, which is nice. Being DVC members we are frequent visitors, and don't feel like we have to cram in non-stop action like we used to.

We felt the same way ( well at least I did ) we were so tired and grumpy getting up so early we pushed our time to leave til mid to late afternoon but we go down a day earlier then we use to and just go out for dinner and unpack and wind down. Going home I now try to get a flight that DME will be picking us up about checkout time. We get up get ready go have breakfast and then head down for the bus.

So far I like our new times.

In May I'm going down with friends and we are leaving EARLY in the am !!! ugh

 

[hsmamato2]

We take an early flight down and the latest back that is reasonable for the people traveling. Just DH and I take the late one- traveling with DGC and we take the one that will get them home for a bedtime around 8-9 pm. Once we have checked out we do the pool for awhile and DTD for some more of the time depending on how much we have. The order we do it changes from trip to trip according to how we feel at the time. We change into traveling clothes near the pool and if bathing suits are wet pack them in plastic bags in the carryons or stuff them into luggage before checking it at the airport.

It's like I wrote this post,and forgot about it! Same for us, every minute there is a good minute...... earliest down, latest back i can manage...
last trip we left home at 4:30- arrived by 10 a.m.- left orlando at around 5p.m......
our last trip on our last day, we packed the car, went to our fave hotel for a leisurely breakfast, took a long walk among the beautiful surroundings, sat by the water, watched the kids play....sigh....it was 85 degrees,and when we got off the plane later that night in CT,it was 15 degrees, like i said, I squeeeze every extra bit i can...

 

[DisneyDVCdad]

We normally go Friday to Friday. This year we are catching a 5 or 6 o'clock flight out on Thursday! the main reason is that with our son 3 and daughter newborn I think it would be a lot easier than catching the 6:15 am flight on Friday. That way we will be rested up to hit the parks on Friday and not be dragging the whole day.

 

[rubbergypsy]

we like to arrive mid afternoon because the room is never ready early. we always try to fly out as late as possible to maximize that last day.

 

[CarolA]

I get the impression the tickets are already purchased? If so you may find the change fees are going to kill you and you are stuck with what you purchased.

 

[edk35]

I get the impression the tickets are already purchased? If so you may find the change fees are going to kill you and you are stuck with what you purchased.

No change fees. We fly Southwest and my dates/times are wide open...79 bucks each way. SO that is why I can make changes..no extra charges or penalties with SW. .

 

[CarolA]

I would make your decision soon. The closer you get the more likely SW will be out of the $79 fares.....

 

[edk35]

I would make your decision soon. The closer you get the more likely SW will be out of the $79 fares.....

oh I am pretty much happy with our return time.....I just check every so often and so far the dates are wide open. I might change it to one hour later but I don't think I want to go for the 9:00 flight especially in Aug.

 

[3 Hobbits 2 Disney]

We fly as early in the day as possible...with an easy day planned..AK and pool, then an early dinner. On flights out, we go for the 5 to 8 p.m. time frame since ME requires a 3 hour before departure window. We have stayed at SSR so we usually sleep in, grab brunch, and then shop. Once that's done, we keep a bag for swim suits, and we'll go back to the pool and eke in one more swim/hot tub before we go to ME. We fly into Dulles when we can, but if we go into National, we have a sedan service pick us up so we can chill on the ride home.