Planning your day in a park

[sunnymom02]

I was just wondering how many people actually plan every little thing that they do in the WDW parks! I understand that you have to have some sort of plan in force, but it seems like people plan their days on a time schedule (ex. that they have to do this ride at this time and have to be here at this time) Doesn't that get a little overwhelming? Do people out there just go to a park and go with the flow?

Also, we are not into making reservations for every meal. Do you have to have ressies at the counter services? Are they worth eating at? We will have kids with us and I guess eating at an upscale restaurant where you need a reservation is not on our "top priority" for our trip. (not trying to sound sarcastic, it is great for those of you who do it ) But I guess that does not interest us. Maybe doing a character lunch or breakfast, but that is it for the reservations on eating. Are we crazy for not wanting to make ressies for eating??? (especially with younger kids).

My kids are not big ride goers, so will we have no problem getting through MK in one day? They will go on rides like "it's a small world" and kiddie like rides, but they will not go on rides like splash mountain etc. (as a matter of fact, I do not like those big rides either but DH does). Basically, my DH and I have been to the MK and we are doing this trip for the kids. I have read in other posts that people just kind of go with the flow with their children and let them set the pace for seeing everything. Is this a good idea? Obviously we should have some kind of plan of action on how we are going to view the park.

Also, we are going in February, is this a busy time of year? We are going the week before presidents week. Thanks for all of the advice. I don't mind planning some of this stuff, but some of the planning that people do seems to be too much and stressful. My DH thinks I am crazy for even stressing on a plan, but I realize you have to have somewhat of an idea on what you want to do. Thanks

Sunnymom02

 

[klwdisney]

Hi There... Im hoping I can help you out with some of your questions...

First of all... DH & I can't stand the idea of being on a time schedule. It would make us stressed out for the entire week. That's not what I call a vacation. We read up on crowd levels, special events, etc. and decide when we get there what parks we're going to do. If we get to the chosen park and it's jam packed, then we hop over to another one.

No you do not require a reservation for counter service restaurants. DH & I tend to eat at this type of restaurant for most of our vacation. We tend to avoid the sit-down restaurants due to reservation requirements that would trap us in an itinerary or due to the cost. You will be quite happy with counter service restaurants if this is the style that suits you!

I think the idea of letting the kids set the pace of your vacation sounds great! They'll know what rides they're comfortable with and which ones they're not. I can't tell you how many times we were stuck in line with crying terrified little ones who were being forced onto a ride by a pushy parent who really just wanted to ride it themselves . It wouldn't hurt to check out the theme park section of http://www.wdwig.com and also check out the park maps on the DIS to get an idea of what rides are appropriate for your kids. If you haven't gotten the travel video, get it, watch it with the kids and see if you can get an idea of what rides they'd be interested in. There are things that might scare them or not interest them from the outside in person, but if they see the inside of the ride on the travel video it might get them excited about going on that ride.

I believe that the week you are going is still within a quiet time. And if so, you can definitely get away with not having an itinerary. Especially if you're not planning to hit any restaurants or ride the big rides that tend to have the biggest lines. There's a section on the touringplans .com website that shows crowd predictions for any given time. Check it out! Have a wonderful trip!!

 

[Got Quattro?]

No time schedule, but going as many times as we have, it just comes natural how and where to go.

We will set dinner or breakfast plans 2-3 times a week and plan around that. For example, if I know we have dinner at Le Celiar in CANDA @ EPCOT for 6:00pm, we know we need to be in EPCOT by 5:00pm and we will stay there for Illuminations...but beyond that, no planning of the day.

We often go to one park, ride a singal ride and ecide, we are just not in the mood for this park, lets go here instead.

For us, it's not about rides. it's about the entire Disney experience. theirs not a blade of gras that doesn't have the disney touch too it. you are missing so much if you think disney is just about rides.

 

[Zippa D Doodah]

Sounds like your family would tour about like we do -and especially did when the kids were preschoolers. We know which park we are going to go to each day. Most often we arrive in time for park opening, and know which first 2-3 rides are that we want to do. After that it becomes a "go with the flow" thing. We just enjoy being there and having a good time together.

We eat almost exclusively at CS places, mostly because we like the freedom of not having ADRs (and the cost is lower).

On our upcoming vacation we will have two full days at MK (our fave) not including a night doing MNSSHP. I am most excited about these two days because we will not have a real plan either day, other than where we are going to start. One day will start with Fantasyland and some of the more popular rides there. The other day will be start with Space Mt and Buzz. After that.... , but it sure is gonna be fun and will include lots of sugar and a relaxing swim back at the CBR in the middle of the afternoon.

 

[loafskier]

This will only be our second trip, so I am by no means an expert. I do plan which park, which day (I don't have park hoppers) and we have one reservation a day, either lunch or dinner. The other meals we do counter service. I like to have at least one longer, relaxing meal a day.

I also have a general idea of what rides the kids want to do. We watched the video before we went last year and it really helped. It avoided alot of discussion and uncertainty once we were in the park - the kids were comfortable with the rides we were going on. Plus, watching the Disney video only adds to the anticipation... I had them tell me 2-3 rides in each park that are a must do...it was really fun watching them try to decide and gave us some great dinner converstation. You can't talk about school and homework every night

We enter the park with a general idea of the popular rides we want to hit first or get a fast pass. After 1-2 hours and we have a few rides under our belt we really start to wing it and just go with the flow.

Enjoy your trip and do whatever works best for you and your family.

 

[Marilou]

I guess we are sort of in between, I do have a rough plan of what land we hit 1st for specific rides and I do plan on what rides to hit in a certain order but thats just to eliminate backtracking across the park. Since i have one daredevil and one not so brave children I do plan on if daredevil wants to do ____ ride.....the other one can go with Gramma to _____ ride and thats mostly so nobody is standing around bored waiting for someone to get off a ride. Depending on FP return times, parades getting in the way, etc we can flex the schedule.

We always do one breakfast ressie at Chef Mickey's and we do a ressie for Rainforrest Cafe our first night in DTD. But that's it for scheduled meals for us.

Oh and I am a stickler about scheduling night activities....if we are seeing Illuminations, we grab prime viewing near bathrooms & food options pretty much 2 hrs prior. We bring bubbles and take turns running for food & bathroom breaks. Same thing for Spectromagic & Fantasmic.
So I guess I am anal on some stuff.

 

[sunnymom02]

Thanks for all of the replies I am glad I am not the only one planning every little detail for our trip. I realize Disney has more to offer than just rides, but it seems like a lot of people stress over all of the rides that they want to get to. I want to experience disney for all of the magic that it holds, the characters, the exhibits, parades, rides etc. and hope that my kids will feel the magic too . We are not big on rides, and I realize Disney has all sorts of things to do and look at. .

Also what does MNSSHP mean? I don't know all of the appreviated lingo on here yet ?

Also, I know MK has fireworks at night, what does Epcot and AK have? Do they have parades or nightly things?

Also, where can you find the hours that the parks are open until?

Do you buy your passes at the Parks or would you buy them through the travel agent?

I am glad to hear that the counter service has good food Thanks for all of the great info so far.

Sunnymom

 

[Conan the Librarian]

We schedule things around our Dinner Reservations, but, nothing beyond that. We do rounds (First to Adventureland kind of thing), but, no timetable.

I have a co-worker who's family went to WDW a few years ago and the father (ex military) did a time table. He had times for everything down to the minute. He had studied all the travel books and they said which was least busy when, and he went from there. He even had walking times from point to point worked out! The bad thing was that he lost the list the second day there. Not to worry, he had a back up copy in the room.

When they got home, he recieved a letter from Shades of Green with his lost schedule. He had put his mailing address on the paper, just in case.

 

[whogirl'smom]

I am a definite planner so I planned the first day we did in each park. DD is 5, so we didn't do big rides, either, but I found if I hadn't had a plan, it just gets so overwhelming trying to decide what to do next. "Mama's Plan" went wonderfully the day at MK and the day at Epcot--then came day 3 at MGM, DH's birthday to beat it al! Somehow we deviated so far off the plan it was like being on another planet, and we ended up arguing and me crying in front of Mickey's hat because I didn't think we'd get to take DD to see Beauty and the Beast! This was not a pretty sight! So, my advice is plan enough so you know when all the shows are you want to do (especially at MGM when they are all at the same time -ugh!) so there will be no crying 39y/o women in your trip, like there was in mine! And if you do plan, only do hard core touring for 2 days in a row, then rest on the 3rd. . But our 2nd days at Epcot and MK were wonderful because we just went to the things we hadn't gotten to that weren't headliners and it was so much more relaxed those days

 

[STEAMBOAT209]

DW and I are both planners in the fact we plan our dinner meals each day, because we prefer a sit down meal in the evening, and based on which park that meal is in sets the tone for that day. We also make ressies for the attractions we do not want to miss, especially around holiday events or special tours. Once we are in the park for the day, we normally do not have a plan layed out, except to enjoy the day in that park doing whever we have time for.

 

[rlovew]

I love planning out days and do it over and over again for both myself and others in many different ways (depending on ages, ride likes, amount of walking, time frame) but I never worry about wether we stick to it and normally I don't even bring it to Disney with me. I do it for the fun of planning and will plan out days we aren't even going just to plan the vacation. Of course our plans might include- wanmder through Adventureland watching the lampposts changes and find a spot to hear both types of background music.

 

[punkin1763]

Late January/early February is a good time to go to WDW. The crowds are usually lower and the weather is cooler (not a fan of the heat and humidity!)

As far as fireworks and such: MK has a nighttime parade (spectromagic) and Wishes is a wonderful fireworks display. Epcot has a fireworks show too called Illuminations and Animal Kingdom will close too early for fireworks, but their afternoon parade is one of my favorites. Also, MGM has a nighttime Fantasmic show (although I don't know if they have it every night.)

On Disney's website they will list park hours - I don't know if they'll have February hours posted yet, but there are some websites that will list the hours for previous years. Most parks will have daytime parades (except Epcot) and some kind of nighttime show/parade.

If you aren't big on rides - enjoy the shows, parades, fireworks and just walking through the parks and soaking in the disney magic. We love seeing the characters and that can take time too. We also like to ride the monorail and go to the deluxe resorts. We love the parades and shows and that is what we let decide our schedule daily.

As far as planning, I have to admit I like to have a general plan and then when we know park hours and parade times we work around that. On our last trip we had the free dining plan and it really dictated what we did and where we were each day. I probably wouldn't do that again - unless it was free - because it kept us on a time schedule and took away some of our choices. We have eaten at some really good counter service restaurants, but we also enjoy some of the nicer dinners - just so we can see the characters and enjoy some nice food. (we try to do that a couple of times during a week stay)

MNSSHP - Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party
you may also see:
MVMCP - Mickey's Very Merry Christmas Party

If you are staying at one of the WDW resorts - I would buy park tickets as part of your package. If you are staying off resort - you can purchase park tickets online at disneyworld.com and they will mail them to you.

Have fun and I hope this helps!

Cindy

 

[sunnymom02]

Thanks for all of the info Where do you get a list of when the parades are etc? Is that when you get there, they give you a schedule of shows etc. or is there somewhere online that you can get this? Thanks.

Sunnymom

 

[klwdisney]

You can find that info right on Disney's website. Here you go: http://disneyworld.disney.go.com/wdw/calendar/parkhours/calendarHome? id=MKCalendarParkHoursMonthlyViewPage

 

[U2_rocks!]

We have a plan, but it's not ride by ride. We also have some alternatives in case of rain, illness etc.

We like some sit down meals with ADRs - to meet characters, to enjoy certain entertainment or food etc. But not for every meal. So, the days with ADRs are lightly more structured in order to avoid a lot of back-tracking (i.e. ending up too far away from the restaurant and having to backtrack). Days we're not doing ADRs are more loose.

Also, we plan our first line of attack on park entry, so as to make sure we hit highlights with minimal wait time. Once we've gotten that out of the way, the plan is much more fluid.

Also, it depends on time of day. Generally, our mornings are for rides and the evenings are for entertainment (and maybe a ride or two if things go that way).

 

[Cool-Beans]

I like to have a plan. It is so much easier than trying to decide where to go and when. And trying to work in all the different things everyone wants to do.

I went once without a plan and it was a pain in the butt!

To me, it is easier to have everything all set and just go along for the ride, not having to make any decisions.

Different strokes for different folks!

 

[U2_rocks!]

I went once without a plan and it was a pain in the butt!

I know! The first time DH and I went we had no plan, we knew nothing! We enjoyed ourselves, but we missed so much, either b/c we didn't know it was there, or we hit it at the wrong time and the wait was longer than we wanted! And this was in September!

Second time I went was with girlfriends, and I planned it carefully b/c we had newbies with us and very little time. The girls loved it, and the one friend who's been several times before with her family was absolutely amazed at what we accomplished - her family generally don't plan! I was convinced from then that that was the way to go. Mind you, the girls were scared at first b/c they thought I was going to ruin things with my detailed plan, but when they saw me in action they were absolutely amazed, and very, very grateful! To this day I am known as the "Disney Expert" by them!

So planning can really work if you enjoy doing it, and you know how to be flexible enough with it as to not drive everyone mad!

 

[KikiFan]

I'm normally the anti-planner. I just prefer to take it day by day. We normally go in Oct. so it's not a big deal. Plus we've never done the dining plan either so we didn't do very many table service meals.

This trip we're going at Christmas and doing the dining plan. I'm having to plan a lot more. I really had a difficult time deciding which park we'd want to be in each day 180 days before the trip, so I can make ADR. How the heck are we supposed to know that? We usually get up in the morning and decide! Some days we don't even go to a park, we lay out by the pool all day. As excited as I am about this trip, I am missing some of the spontaneity. Some how it just seems more magical that way, or at least more like a vacation.

 

[klwdisney]

I agree with you kikifan!! DH & I are in the same predicament for our November 2007 trip. Im thinking that Im only going to make a few ADR's... We'd like to try the luau, there's 1 or 2 Epcot restaurants we'd like to try... but we may end up using them mostly at our hotel restaurant. A couple Breakfasts and a couple Dinners... that way we don't have to stress ourselves out so much with the where will we be on what days panic. We tend to end up at Epcot a lot at night so that's not a big deal for us and I think we'll save the luau for the end of the vacation.

Good Luck with your trip!