The Unofficial Guide to MRYPPNS' WDW Vacation: TR link is up!

[DisMomAmy]

First of all... Love that our dates overlap!! And for exactly the same reason... late Easter! I'm just hoping late February/early March 2011 won't be as cold as late February/early March 2010! And I'm super excited that we'll be there during the F&G Festival!! I guess I never realized how early it starts - I thought we were going to miss it this year.

Thanks for the inside scoop about the DHS parade... we've never taken the time to watch that parade - maybe we will after the change?? Not big parade people either... I'm sure for similar reasons.

 

[Charleston Princess]

I did actually know the Block Party was going away! Can't wait to see the new parade!

Is it sad that I did a happy dance when I saw that we use the same resources? I have to agree with you about the restaurant and the trip report boards. That's where I hang out, too.

Did you read Jack Spence's blog about the new Mexican restaurant? I so want to try it on the next trip!

 

[KathyRN137]

...I didn't know about the parade change, either!

It's so important to keep up-to-date... thanks for the resources. I'm definetely going to sign up for the Disney Parks Blog!


Kathy

 

[All7OfUs]

You can never have too many resources!! But like you, Jack Spence's and the TR boards are the BEST for accuracy and sheer volume. GREAT update, Heidi!

 

[MRYPPNS]

Our second choice of dates overlap with yours...so maybe, just maybe we will cross paths!!!


So tell me - is Muppets going to get a refurb?
And how about that rumored Monster's Inc ride???

2nd Choice! 2nd Choice! I want to have a meet with you!!

Didn't Muppets que and pre-show just get a rehab? I doubt we'll see a new movie until after HISTK movie is replaced....that is by far worse.

I think Monsters is a good possiblitly.....plus I think we'll get a Carsland at DHS AFTER Fantasyland is done.

Selfishly glad that your whole trip overlaps my dates.

Let me know if you want a sneak peek to my itinerary so we can figure out a meet or evening together.

it wasn't all dry...hey everyone needs good resources! and I didn't know about the DHS parade...I didn't like BPB anyways

J~

I've got a feeling most people didn't like BPB....I haven't seen it...maybe it was because it stopped along the way??? I bet we see Disney re-use a lot of the parade pieces from BPB to use in the new parade.

More replies after the brownies are in the oven!

 

[MRYPPNS]

First of all... Love that our dates overlap!! And for exactly the same reason... late Easter! I'm just hoping late February/early March 2011 won't be as cold as late February/early March 2010! And I'm super excited that we'll be there during the F&G Festival!! I guess I never realized how early it starts - I thought we were going to miss it this year.

I really need it to be warm enough for pool time....but that shouldn't be too hard since we're hardy New Englanders!
Flower and Garden didn't always start so early. In fact my 2007 edition of the UG states that it's from April to May. I'm glad just to not be going in October again.....all my pictures are starting to look alike from the MK.

Is it sad that I did a happy dance when I saw that we use the same resources? I have to agree with you about the restaurant and the trip report boards. That's where I hang out, too.

Did you read Jack Spence's blog about the new Mexican restaurant? I so want to try it on the next trip!

I totally get what you mean about the resource happy dance! I feel so disconnected when DISers say they love TGM and Passporter....because I can't deal with either one of those just from a personal preference point.!

I totally read Jack's blog about Mexico....I went looking for it because I knew he'd have something up about it. As I was reading it I shouted out to DH...."BTW we are eating at the Cantina on our trip!" The tacos sounds really good.

...I didn't know about the parade change, either!

It's so important to keep up-to-date... thanks for the resources. I'm definetely going to sign up for the Disney Parks Blog!


Kathy

Kathy you are going to love the Disney Parks Blog...they cover a little bit of everything (plus Disneyland).

We'll have to see if we want to see the new parade in Jan!

You can never have too many resources!! But like you, Jack Spence's and the TR boards are the BEST for accuracy and sheer volume. GREAT update, Heidi!

Sheer Volume and TRs huh? You wouldn't know anything about that now would you???

 

[Charleston Princess]

I totally read Jack's blog about Mexico....I went looking for it because I knew he'd have something up about it. As I was reading it I shouted out to DH...."BTW we are eating at the Cantina on our trip!" The tacos sounds really good.

I was showing Charles pictures of all the tacos and tostadas this morning! I want to try the shrimp and tilapia ones. Yum, yum, yum!

 

[KathyRN137]

Kathy you are going to love the Disney Parks Blog...they cover a little bit of everything (plus Disneyland).

I just hopped over from there... thanks for sharing it!


Kathy

 

[Native NYer]

Ohhh what a great time of year to visit WDW.
How long is the drive?
I have some things to put in the mail to help with your planning

 

[eandesmom]

ok that's kind of a bummer about the parade. I (now that you wrote about it) recall reading about the new pixar one but somehow didn't connect the dots about Block Party bash going away.

I actually really like Block Party. Because that's what it is. You aren't stuck like you are for a parade! You can watch but still get through the park. My family, who are not parade people either, actually stopped in their tracks to watch it. That never happens.

And apparently never will gain.

Too bad you aren't doing the late April, you'd have overlapped our girls trip but from a crowd perspective, your earlier dates will be lovely.

Driving from NH?

wow.

 

[brookelizabeth]

2nd Choice! 2nd Choice! I want to have a meet with you!!

Didn't Muppets que and pre-show just get a rehab? I doubt we'll see a new movie until after HISTK movie is replaced....that is by far worse.

I think Monsters is a good possiblitly.....plus I think we'll get a Carsland at DHS AFTER Fantasyland is done

As you know via PM, 2nd choice has been made! We'll now be there Feb. 26-March 12.

I have no idea about the queue or pre-show, we skipped it this trip - Joe wanted to, but I was kinda whatever about it.

But now that I think about it, I think at least the queue did - I think I saw some pics.

Good point on HISTK. That one is awful. Captain EO was fun though!

LOVE the Carsland! I hadn't heard that one!!!!!

 

[MRYPPNS]

Ohhh what a great time of year to visit WDW.
How long is the drive?
I have some things to put in the mail to help with your planning

It's a 24 hour drive. That's without stops and any major traffic. DH plans on drive AROUND NYC....

oooohhhhh.....I love Mickey Mail, thanks!

ok that's kind of a bummer about the parade. I (now that you wrote about it) recall reading about the new pixar one but somehow didn't connect the dots about Block Party bash going away.

I actually really like Block Party. Because that's what it is. You aren't stuck like you are for a parade! You can watch but still get through the park. My family, who are not parade people either, actually stopped in their tracks to watch it. That never happens.

And apparently never will gain.

Too bad you aren't doing the late April, you'd have overlapped our girls trip but from a crowd perspective, your earlier dates will be lovely.

Driving from NH?

wow.

I'd have to move to Orlando to make it to all the DIS-meets that I would love to go to!

Yea, driving from NH. But the thought of flying with an almost 4 yo with Autism and an almost 2 yo PLUS a DH who is motion sick the whole flight is more frightening!

As you know via PM, 2nd choice has been made! We'll now be there Feb. 26-March 12.

I have no idea about the queue or pre-show, we skipped it this trip - Joe wanted to, but I was kinda whatever about it.

But now that I think about it, I think at least the queue did - I think I saw some pics.

Good point on HISTK. That one is awful. Captain EO was fun though!

LOVE the Carsland! I hadn't heard that one!!!!!

I can't wait to see Captain EO.....I saw it when it originally came out.

 

[MRYPPNS]

Part Two
Making the Most of Your Time and Money


Now I have been called an Uber-planner before but what most DISers don’t know is that I am a long ranger planner as well. As far back as 2005 I began buying more park days than I needed on our vacations because back then the cost of the no expiration option was a good deal AND I knew that once we had kids we wouldn’t have the same kind of cash flow that we once had. So that left me with park tickets to use for this vacation for DH and me. Except one tiny problem….I went to Disney in October 2009 solo and I’m going to Disney in January without the family too. So now DH and I have different amounts of park tickets.

Here’s the break down:

DH - 6 Park Hoppers
Me - 3 Park Hoppers

“Unassigned” – 2 one-day base tickets

Plus we each have roughly 14 water park tickets…..EACH.

So my original idea was ……scratch that, I had a page full of “original” ideas on what to do for tickets this trip….. What I ended up deciding to do was for me to use my 3 hoppers plus the 2 non-hopping tickets and John would use 5 of his hoppers and we’d need to get Liam tickets (more on that in a minute) Danica is still free this year! So that meant that I had to be careful in planning our itinerary because we would have a mix of hoppers and non-hoppers to use. More challenging that you would think!

But since we chopped a whole day out of this trip we only need 4 days of park tickets. I’m going to use one of the base tickets in January for that trip and upgrade it to what I need for that weekend.

And yes I thought about an AP….but it’s the wrong year/time of year for me to get one. Shhh! don’t tell DH but I see one in my future.
OK on to Liam’s ticket. Now I could have just gotten him exactly what he needed for this trip to save some cash upfront but I like to invest for the future too. Because we needed both the Hopping option and the Water Park option for his ticket it actually made the most sense to buy the Loaded Baked Potato of tickets…..

The Magic Your Way 10 Day Park Hopper with Water Parks and More with the NO Expiration option!!

And because I try to keep up with all Disney happenings, I know that historically ticket prices go up the first part of August….Every Stinkin’ Year!

I get the Mousesavers newsletter so I was able to use their link to Uncover Tourist to buy Liam’s ticket for $521.96 before prices went up….I saved about $65 between their discount and the increase in price had I waited to buy at Disney in 2011.

Not to mention that I now have water park tickets for Liam for like the next 5 trips to WDW!! That saves some serious dough right there. Oh and did you know that child tickets are not Bio Scanned….so if I wanted to take Danica on a mother/daughter trip after she was 3....….well you get the idea.

UG (not so) fun fact: In the 2007 edition the 10 day No Expiration option is listed at $142.78. In the 2011 edition the price has jumped to $222.59 (tax included) That’s $80 in 4 years.


Now that you know where some of our money is going, how ‘bout I tell you how we plan to spend our time.

I take several things into account when I plan our itinerary.

The first being that I don’t plan much for the arrival day…no parks….no ADR’s. This really takes the pressure off the travel and makes the number one goal of the day to just arrival safely at the resort and check in.

Next, I don’t plan a theme park day for our first full day in Orlando. This gives everyone a chance to get into a routine in the resort room and gives me time to get organized. An organized Heidi is a happy Heidi. (No dwarf jokes please.)

Thirdly, we never go to a park everyday of the vacation. I like to put at least one non-park day in the middle of the trip… the men folk like the downtime.

For this trip I had to be mindful that I have 3 hopping days and 1 non-hopping day to work into the schedule.

All that, plus I use the Park Hours and EMH schedule along with the touringplans crowd calendar to put it all together. I avoid AM EMH but not so much on the PM ones.

And on this trip I really wanted our first park to be Animal Kingdom. I want to ease the kids into this vacation and I think AK will be the best for doing this since there are so few rides, tons of animals that they “know” and just the overall look and feel of the park is more real than fantasy if that makes any sense.

I tried to just post a copy of my spreadsheet but it wasn't working so I had to do it this way.


Day Itineray************ Night Itinerary

Sa 2/26 TRAVEL *************TRAVEL

Su 2/27 TRAVEL *************CHECK- IN AT RESORT

Mo 2/28 TYPHOON LAGOON *************BOARDWALK and/or DTD

Tu 3/1 ANIMAL KINGDOM ************MAGIC KINGDOM

W 3/2 EPCOT ********** EPCOT

Th 3/3 TYPHOON LAGOON ********Monorail ride and watch Wishes from Poly Beach

F 3/4 MAGIC KINGDOM ********** DHS and/or EPCOT

Sa 3/5 ANIMAL KINGDOM *********** MAGIC KINGDOM

Su 3/6 BEACH/POOL *************TRAVEL

M 3/7 TRAVEL ********** TRAVEL


Couple notes:
1. We still don’t know if we are going to DHS at all this trip.
2. We’ll arrive just as the gates open or a few minutes after….Liam does not do well waiting in one spot for very well. Lesson learned from our 2008 trip.
3. We’ll take a break at the resort each park day from 1pm to about 430pm.
4. We’ll go out for the evenings by 5pm and (hopefully) stay to close.

 

[mousescrapper]

Looks great Heidi

the ticket thing is a crazy good kind of organized...

and I love the start of your itinerary...many of your "rules" I have adopted since our '08 trip the no park days, major goals on the travel day and the break day is something every family w/ little kids should live by IMHO (too)

and now that we forked out the extra points for 1 more night to travel hm on a non-park day I think will be great.

I am so glad you are easing in this trip and I really think that now that you know for the most what Liam can do and handle...it will make this trip almost like the first one you had wished for

can't wait for more

J~

 

[JPFamilyMom]

I'll be looking forward to your traveling with two young children tips as we are also driving to WDW in March.

Looks like GREAT plans

 

[All7OfUs]

I totally think if I knew I had a DH more onboard with my Disney obsession, and knew I'd be getting to go more often than I do, I'd plan very similarly to you- using all the money saving pre-purchasing, banking tickets, etc...

I do love your itinerary this time around. Lots of chill time mixed with park time.

 

[englishrose47]

Loved the pland!!When I go with the family we don't get hoppers as Judy doesn't like going from one park to another which makes the planning alot different !!She LOVES the DDP !! For us it is a must!!The girls are sooo happy to be able to order steak whenever they want and now Kyle has added Shrimp to his favorites I see some changes in his ordering !!!Judy also likes a NON park day in the trip, she mainly wants to relax at the pool!!!Next year we are getting waterpark tickets ans DQ I think they will love them!!

 

[Charleston Princess]

I have always been in awe of your ticket stash! I wish I had been as far thinking as you -- I miss the days when multi-day tickets were park hoppers and didn't expire automatically.

 

[jenjolt]

As usual I'm late to the party!! But I'm really enjoying reading your updates! You are super organized...WOW!!! Really impressive!! Looking forward to hearing more about your plans!

 

[KathyRN137]

"...the loaded baked potato of tickets!"

I love it!!

Hmmm. Possible AP purchase in the near future...

Now that's planning ahead!


Kathy