Suggest a trip! Disney, universal, or something else

[liamthompson]

Background - cancelled a universal orlando trip due to sickness and now we have flight credit, a universal AP, and a disney bounceback stay to move around. Suggestions on what to do please, even the wild ones!

We are currently booked for 2 park days/3 nights at disneyland in July. I could extend this to 3 park days/4 nights but would have to break up the flights. I currently have flight credit for Delta. DL is booked with Breeze. To extend a day, I would have to book Delta there and Breeze coming home and then book a second trip using the remaining Delta/Breeze credits. The 3 cities that I can fly non-stop for both Delta/Breeze are Orlando, Tampa, and Los Angeles. None of us are keen on driving in any of the cities.

If I keep the disneyland trip as-is and only have the delta flight credit to figure out, I am open to flying any hub city (ex. atlanta, boston, etc) as long as it is feasible to get around without a rental car.

Here are some parameters:
-- Time off is my limiting factor. I want to spend a max of 5 days between now and August. DL is booked over the holiday weekend so current plan is only spending 2 vacation days.

-- I want to use the flight credit before August. We can travel now until the second half of May and the month of August. I thought about re-booking universal trip for a few weeks from now but our AP has us blocked out for spring break but we can go in early May.

-- Travel party is myself, husband, and 4yo. This will be his first time on a plane and I think he will be OK but not traveling with my giant cooler of snacks is making me nervous haha.

I made an earlier post about doing a quick weekend trip for MNSSHP in August but decided it wasn't a good fit for our family yet. I haven't entirely given up on doing a weekend WDW August trip but do feel somewhat silly about it since we will have just come back from DL.

 

[Nicnicnic.nic]

I haven't seen the other thread but I went to MNSSHP with my 3 yo and 6yo last Aug and it was so so much fun. And the rest of our trip was in the pool or water park which was also a lot of fun

 

[Nicnicnic.nic]

Ok saw your other thread. My kids werent interested in the shows or parades so we just did rides (all basically walk on) and trick or treating. I loved all the vibes and all the people dressing up and just going on rides with like no wait not worrying about my phone.

I also did an afternoon nap and they lasted until the end

Skip to the end to the MNSSHP part.

https://www.disboards.com/threads/resort-split-stay-with-mnsshp-aug-2025-akl-ssr.3972005/

 

[hardcorestitch]

Background - cancelled a universal orlando trip due to sickness and now we have flight credit, a universal AP, and a disney bounceback stay to move around. Suggestions on what to do please, even the wild ones!

We are currently booked for 2 park days/3 nights at disneyland in July. I could extend this to 3 park days/4 nights but would have to break up the flights. I currently have flight credit for Delta. DL is booked with Breeze. To extend a day, I would have to book Delta there and Breeze coming home and then book a second trip using the remaining Delta/Breeze credits. The 3 cities that I can fly non-stop for both Delta/Breeze are Orlando, Tampa, and Los Angeles. None of us are keen on driving in any of the cities.

If I keep the disneyland trip as-is and only have the delta flight credit to figure out, I am open to flying any hub city (ex. atlanta, boston, etc) as long as it is feasible to get around without a rental car.

Here are some parameters:
-- Time off is my limiting factor. I want to spend a max of 5 days between now and August. DL is booked over the holiday weekend so current plan is only spending 2 vacation days.

-- I want to use the flight credit before August. We can travel now until the second half of May and the month of August. I thought about re-booking universal trip for a few weeks from now but our AP has us blocked out for spring break but we can go in early May.

-- Travel party is myself, husband, and 4yo. This will be his first time on a plane and I think he will be OK but not traveling with my giant cooler of snacks is making me nervous haha.

I made an earlier post about doing a quick weekend trip for MNSSHP in August but decided it wasn't a good fit for our family yet. I haven't entirely given up on doing a weekend WDW August trip but do feel somewhat silly about it since we will have just come back from DL.

I don’t mind the layovers if it’s cheaper… if you get a long one you can definitely take in the airport in greater detail… as in dine in a table service restaurant or chill out in a lounge like the Sky Club if you have the status.

 

[liamthompson]

Ok saw your other thread. My kids werent interested in the shows or parades so we just did rides (all basically walk on) and trick or treating. I loved all the vibes and all the people dressing up and just going on rides with like no wait not worrying about my phone.

I also did an afternoon nap and they lasted until the end

Skip to the end to the MNSSHP part.

https://www.disboards.com/threads/resort-split-stay-with-mnsshp-aug-2025-akl-ssr.3972005/

Thanks for sharing your trip report, your kids are so cute! I'm going to remember the line about single mom dinosaurs, sounds like it will come in handy in all kinds of stores haha

Ironically, we also drove down to WDW last summer, overnighted in Jacksonville and did a resort-only stay with the free water park day and poking around animal kingdom lodge and riviera. From your report, the community halls and arcade looked like great AC breaks...my kid chose to visit a gazillion playgrounds instead ha. The most underrated thing about disney in the summer is their mosquito mitigation program. Yes it's hot and muggy but it's also hot and muggy at home but at disney, I can be outside without being eaten alive in 2 minutes.

It looks like you guys had a wonderful time at MNSSHP, just enjoying the short wait times and hanging out together as a family. It's amazing your kids made it to closing! Someone on the other thread commented that being a night time event would also help with the heat of August.

 

[liamthompson]

I don’t mind the layovers if it’s cheaper… if you get a long one you can definitely take in the airport in greater detail… as in dine in a table service restaurant or chill out in a lounge like the Sky Club if you have the status.

I keep forgetting that airports will be novel to my kid...my brother suggested that I take any leftover credit to fly to our next closest airport and then take the train home haha

But admittedly, I'm a nervous flyer and if I can fly non-stop, I would prefer to do so. That's why I'm waffling about adding an extra day to DL - our current flights are non-stop, with great departure/arrival times. Adding an extra day would require a layover and we would arrive pretty late, which is tough for all of us.

 

[Nicnicnic.nic]

Thanks for sharing your trip report, your kids are so cute! I'm going to remember the line about single mom dinosaurs, sounds like it will come in handy in all kinds of stores haha

Ironically, we also drove down to WDW last summer, overnighted in Jacksonville and did a resort-only stay with the free water park day and poking around animal kingdom lodge and riviera. From your report, the community halls and arcade looked like great AC breaks...my kid chose to visit a gazillion playgrounds instead ha. The most underrated thing about disney in the summer is their mosquito mitigation program. Yes it's hot and muggy but it's also hot and muggy at home but at disney, I can be outside without being eaten alive in 2 minutes.

It looks like you guys had a wonderful time at MNSSHP, just enjoying the short wait times and hanging out together as a family. It's amazing your kids made it to closing! Someone on the other thread commented that being a night time event would also help with the heat of August.

Thank you so funny we took similar trips. I like Jacksonville as our overnight stop cuz it's only a little bit more driving for the Disney day

Yeah it was definitely hot. I don't think the kids would have been able to handle (and have fun) being in MK all day during the day in August. I didn't know if the party would be "worth it" or not cuz I didn't know when the kids would fall asleep. But my plan was if they fall asleep then they will be in the stroller and my husband and I could watch the parade and shows....which I did want to do. The night was still hot but not like exhausting hot.

Lol luckily the hotels we stayed at didn't have any playgrounds...or like for SSR we weren't staying near the playground so they didn't see them. We've spent a lot of time at playgrounds on past trips and some of them don't have the best shade or places for the adults to sit. Our first trip to WDW my daughter asked to visit all the playgrounds on the skyliner route so we did I was pretty surprised riviera didn't have a playground. We kept walking around looking for it. It looked so fancy so I was like why don't they have all the amenities?

Whatever your family decides to do....maybe write a trip report so I can follow along?