Parks Strategy Christmas week

[kyanmama]

A few questions about how to plan park days during the week of Dec 22-28. I have made my plans (for the most part- dependant on whether I get the FPs I want) and have ADRs booked. It will be me, DH, DS8, DS3

- my general plan at all parks is to RD or do EMH, do as many rides as we can until mid morning, without FPs if possible, and book FPs for late morning/afternoon. Good strategy?

-FPs- on rides we plan to use rider swap on, book FP only for me or DH (not both) and DS8. So we will each get to ride once with him. Correct?

-We are staying at AKL. I originally planned for us to take afternoon breaks at our resort, but is this just a big waste of time? Do most of you with children take afternoon breaks even during super crazy busy times like Christmas? Or just go hard and hope your kid sleeps in the stroller??

Sorry so many random questions. Just getting overwhelmed and nervous! Never been before!

 

[a*lil*bit*goofy]

with littles i never planned for breaks, daughter would fall asleep in stroller and then would be good to go .we didn't plan for it, but once we decided it was best to break. one day only. so just go with the flow sounds like you have the fastpass swap figured out. and I am told rope drop is best

 

[Moms]

We have done Christmas Week several times and Spring Break a few times as well ... we are not gluttons for punishment; just bound by the school calendar! That said, we love those times of the year and always feel a sense of accomplishment when we "beat the crowds"! Your strategy should work well ... we have found that getting to the parks at RD and scheduling our FP's for late morning works great ... especially at MK!

We don't travel with a child but still get out of the parks in the early afternoon (when the crowds get heavy) and take a break ... we either go back to our resort for a rest or a swim or to a resort to check out the decorations and have a peaceful lunch. We generally go back to a park in the evening ... often a different one as we generally do park hoppers. The crowds are still there but a break improves the frame of mind. You know your children best and know what they can tolerate without having a meltdown ... that is not fun for anyone! Have a wonderful trip ... love WDW at Christmastime!

 

[DisneyWishes14]

A few questions about how to plan park days during the week of Dec 22-28. I have made my plans (for the most part- dependant on whether I get the FPs I want) and have ADRs booked. It will be me, DH, DS8, DS3

- my general plan at all parks is to RD or do EMH, do as many rides as we can until mid morning, without FPs if possible, and book FPs for late morning/afternoon. Good strategy?

-FPs- on rides we plan to use rider swap on, book FP only for me or DH (not both) and DS8. So we will each get to ride once with him. Correct?

-We are staying at AKL. I originally planned for us to take afternoon breaks at our resort, but is this just a big waste of time? Do most of you with children take afternoon breaks even during super crazy busy times like Christmas? Or just go hard and hope your kid sleeps in the stroller??

Sorry so many random questions. Just getting overwhelmed and nervous! Never been before!

Your general plan is good. Yes utilize RD (make sure you leave AKL early to get on a bus. Traffic is quite bad that week so makes traveling to the parks even longer than usual) and EMH. I would start booking FP+ by 10:30/11:00 am. Especially in MK, by 11:00 am, it's wall-to-wall people.

We went Dec. 25 - Dec. 30 in 2015. We would typically park hop (taking an afternoon break) or call it quits by about 2 pm and do something else in the evening. In our experience, EP was the easiest park to navigate in the crowds. During that week, our strategy was to hit FW at opening, get to WS around 11 am and get out of WS around the time the CP shows started as WS got incredibly crowded at that point. FW was much emptier when the CP shows were happening in WS. AK was pretty crowded, but we found places to take breaks. DHS wasn't bad (and this was the last year of Osbourne Lights). MK - you couldn't pay me to go back there during Christmas week! If I ever went to MK again during Christmas week, I would go as early as possible and be out of there by 1:00/2:00 pm. Christmas week is also a good time to do those non-park things you might like to do - go to HDDR, do a monorail tour, take a stroll around the Boardwalk at night, etc.