What do you do on arrival day?

[soulmates]

I guess we're like SO many of you, we just hang out and unwind. After driving 10 hours, we plan to get into our room, enjoy a nice hot shower, dress and go find dinner at another resort. We'd like to head back to our resort, get the bathing suits on, head down and grab some drinks and sit in the hot tub!!!! Going to get a great night sleep as we will be UP at the crack of dawn for ROPE DROP!!

 

[churchpilot]

We do the same thing every trip----arrive around 3PM, check in, usually have our room, haul luggage (but don't unpack) and head to the Magic Kingdom for a quick burst of adrenaline, let the kids get their first souvenier (they always pick out a hat), get the kids yearly picture against "our" landmark, and then head to Chef Mickey's for dinner. After dinner head back to the resort, unpack, and prepare for commando Disney the next day! Enjoy your trip.

 

[brekin67]

Check the schedule for Spectromagic and Fantasmic. They don't show every night. Maybe they will fall on the evening you arrive.

 

[cmusschoot]

Usually we arrive around noon, which puts us to the resort by 2:00. I have kids who nap, so this is the perfect time for a snooze...

Ideally we head to DTD for the night...shopping and dinner.

We are usually arriving on Saturday and figure it is a waste of a day on ur tickets to hit the parks for a few hours....

THIS time the night we fly in Sat. is the ONLY time they are running Spectromagic at the MK, so after naps, we will be heading to MK for the evening...it will be interesting to see how that goes...as I am sure my kids will be exhausted from our travel day....

So, look at your schedule and decide from there

 

[scousemouse09]

We arrive late afeternoon and just relax at the resort on our first day. Unpack, explore the resort, grab something to eat, and then have an early night! Coming from the UK, where we're five hours ahead, the earlier we get to bed, the easier it is to wake up the next day

 

[momandseandodisney]

Our first day after we check in, we usually go get something to eat. Check out the resort see where everything is. We either will go for a swim, walk around DTD, just unwind from traveling. When room is ready we get settled, get needed supplies from store, Eat again, then try to get a good nights sleep.We usually get up early have a good breakfast then start the day refreshed. Take a break in the afternoon, relax and enjoy the trip because it goes FAST!!!!

Same thing - we always arrive around 3pm, so we dont get in the hotel til 5 or so, we usually do a later dinner res (always go to ohanas the first night)

 

[RainbowWit]

This year we will be flying in at 11.10 am. Hopefully will be at our hotel around 12.30 We'll check in grab our KTTW cards and head to EPCOT. We usually head to the MK but figured a liesurely tour around the World Showcase, dinner at Teppan Edo and illuminations will be a relaxing way to start!

 

[Paxtrist]

After we check in, we head to Downtown Disney and eat at the Earl. Then we are off to the outlet malls to shop til we drop! We end the day swimming in the pool.

 

[MariDisney]

We arrive to MCO at 9:30 and are generally at our hotel by 11:00. We check in and if our room is ready we may get lunch at the food court and then unpack a bit, then we go to Tour Guide Mike's recommended park for that day. If it's not Epcot, we'll generally catch the afternoon parade. If the room is not ready, we head right to the recommended park and then eat there.

 

[scdisfan]

We usually try to stay low key on our first day too. After the long drive, it is a nice way to unwind! Usually what we do is schedule a character meal for dinner and get settled in our room/resort. Sometimes we will take a boat ride or a ride on the monorail - just depends on where our ADR is located! Another thing that we have done in the past is to head over to Fort Wilderness. I think around 7:00pm, the camp fire with Chip and Dale starts! There is also a "song leader" that leads the crowd in camp fire type songs and you can even roast marshmallows. The whole thing is free (except if you want to purchase the marshmallows). Some nights I think that they show a movie on a an outdoor screen. The kids have a blast (so I DH and I ). BTW - 11 days - I am so jealous! Hope that you have fun!

 

[jennyraye]

We only have 5 days for our trip this year, so on arrival day--hopefully before noon--the plan is to go to the resort, check-in, and hit the MK. It will be our son's first trip (he's 6). I want that day to be about the Disney magic--stroll up Main St to the castle and the requisite photo ops. Carousel ride. See the show in front of the castle. Parade. Dinner at CP for some character interaction. Fit in more rides as we can. Spectro. Wishes...and the Kiss Goodnight, if they're doing it in September. I can't wait to see fireworks and lights from the castle reflected in his eyes. Nothing hurried. Just soaking in all the pixie dust we can. We'll hit the pavement running the next morning.

 

[aanderson5]

Our next trip we arrive at 3:30pm. The plan is to pick up our rental car, do a quick stop at Walmart and then check in. Our first day is our friends last day so we plan to meet them at the Boardwalk at 7pm. We have a 7:45 priorty seating reservation at Big River Grill and will hopefully be in bed by 10:00.

 

[Danauk]

Our flight hopefully should land at around 2:30pm, we plan on spending the afternoon/evening just hanging around the resort. We are staying at AKL and we plan on just going out onto the savannah overlooks and watching the animals, then we have a 7:00 ADR at Boma. If teh flight isn't delayed and we get to the hotel quite quickly we might go for a swim. Then I think we will have an early night so we are ready to be up and out to the parks early the next day!

When we stay at the BCV we spend the evening just hanging out at the Boardwalk.

 

[dyna]

We always drive usually arrive in the disney area mid afternoon or later. If staying onsite we get a room outside disney that 1st night. If we arrive mid afternoon we usually go to the outlet stores an maybe DD.

We up early the next am an over at our resort checking in by 8am usually our room is not ready so we go on to the park of the day. We usually in the park shortly after rope drop. Once room is ready 3 or 4 we go back to resort an unpack we always take an afternoon break anyway it's just that day we might not get to rest like we do other days.

 

[YorkieMom]

We set up the camper and then the fun begins !!!

Motor launch to the Poly, get a Pina Colada.

Hop onto the monorail, to the Comtemporary, get a "Tropi-glow" Cocktail

On to the monorail to the Grand Floridian, get a Grand Margarita.

(get the pattern ?????)

Back to the Poly, motor launch to the Wilderness Lodge, get a martini.

Motor launch back to the campground, stop at Crockett's Tavern, get a Mudslide.

Back to the campsite, pass out !!!!!

 

[Macduffy]

I guess it depends on your travel time that day. We are leaving for the airport at 4 AM so we plan on laying low the first day and touring the resort and doing a early supper at Downtown Disney. If there were EMH until Midnight and our kids were older I'd would definetly hit up a park to get in some extra "magic" time!

 

[Tinkerbell3014]

We drive and arrive around 3:00pm. We settle into our room, maybe go for a quick swim, and then usually head to DTD for dinner. Then try to get to bed at a reasonable time (the kids are always too excited for sleep) and head off to an early character breakfast then MK.

 

[RoYo1]

well me and my mom are going to get there late around 7 pm so we are planning on just staying at the hotel and swimming in the pool for a few hours and eating dinner then go to bed early so we can get up for our first fun day, but we didnt buy a ticket for our arrival day since we were arriving so late, but i think your downtown disney idea is a good one. youre getting there pretty early in the afternoon so that would give you time to shop for a few hours and then get to your hotel and go to bed early so you can be well rested for the next day (the only problem is you are probably going to be so excited that you wont want to go to bed )
well anyway that you spend your day have fun!

 

[Disfan891]

After we check in we go directly to our room, unpack, rest for a bit, check out the resort and then head on down to downtown disney for dinner. We usually have a room only reservation for the first night there, so no parks for us. We get to bed early and try to rest up for the next morning, we then head out early to a park!

 

[When'sTheNextTrip]

We usually try to arrive at the resort by 11 or 12, so we can still enjoy a mostly full day at a park.

Lately, due to working schedules and other factors, DF and I haven't been able to arrive until 2 or 3, which isn't enough time to really enjoy a park. So we've been hitting DTD, getting a nice dinner, and relaxing around there. There's enough Disney to get us excited for hitting the parks the next day, but not enough to be fully emersed. We think it's perfect, and we love our new tradition.