What is you basic vacation strategy?

[WDWprincessloyola]

Here's a question for you.....

Everyone has their own different strategies when they go to WDW, so what is yours'?

With my family we always arrive in FL early, check in the hotel, go to Downtown Disney and prepare for a whirlwind trip. We will usually go to each park twice and won't go on early entry days. We hit the rides we love first, getting fast passes along the way, and make sure we have plenty of time to see the parades and shows. Then we spend two days winding down either to going to Downtown Disney again or to a zoo, museum, etc...... Then after 10 days in FL we head back home to catch up on our sleep!

What is your basic vacation stategy?

 

[tiberius]

We take the earliest flight out, which gets us to the resort by lunch time. After checking in we take the first bus to a major park for that afternoon. We pick up a quick lunch and do what we want casually at that park. Then we get dinner back at the resort and check into room if we could not earlier. Finally, we catch fireworks somewhere and head back to room.

We generally follow a plan for a half day at park, get lunch and maybe relax at hotel or swim and then a half day at park.

We set aside one day for shopping, and maybe a plus day at water park. This is the day we recharge for the last few days.

On the last day each child is allowed to choose any one must ride they feel the need to go on before leaving.

 

[the kabuki]

Quick question tiberius, how long does it honestly take from the time you get off the airplane till the time you're actually in a room checked in? Just trying to figure out that first day, we're coming in early too. Do you know how long it takes to get to the hotel(staying at the POP) from the airport, approx. ? Thanks

 

[sters]

Our basic strategy is to arrive in the evenning and check into a very cheap but convenient local hotel for the night, wake up at the crack of dawn (that's what it seems like anyway), check into our Disney hotel, eat breakfast and hit a theme park, usually MK the first day, at park openning. We always go on Dumbo first then hit the other Fantasyland attractions. We've managed to complete this whole land before lunch, sometimes hitting more than one attraction. By lunchtime, Fantasyland starts getting crowded. From lunch till about 3 we hit another land... last time, it was Tomorrowland where we got Fastpass for Buzz, hit CP and peoplemover, then ride Buzz, smiling smugly to those waiting in standby. By 3, when the parade starts, we go to Toontown where it is practically devoid of rugrats, so that MY rugrats have the run of the place (tee hee hee). We'll hit the parade another day. Our basic strategy, then, is to visit a land and get a fastpass for the premier attraction and thendo standby on the other rides, shop or eat a snack/people watch in the area. Another strategy: splurge on meals, save on snacks. We always transport juice boxes, a small water bottle, and snacks such as fruit snacks/peanut butter crackers, in our fannypacks, which as a bonus saves us time as well.

The EMH... I like it, husband hates it. But, he's not an earlybird like me. His thinking is that the parks are more crowded on the EMH days. He sees no value... parkhopping takes time and wouldn't the time have been better spent sleeping in than going to EMH and then park hop later in the morning???

 

[kirbsam]

I love this question. We usually get to our resort in the early evening. We take a ride on the monorail or walk around the boardwalk, depending on what area we are in. Always go swimming that first night. Get to bed early and spend the first four days going to whichever park has early entry. Always knock off every major ride at the park by 1 or 2. Back to our resort for a rest, my dw usually is done touring for the day at this point and gets a drink and lounges/sleeps/naps by the pool. Then my two DD's and I go to another park for the afternoon and evening. My DW usually joins us for the night time show. After four days of this, we are happy but drained. We spend the rest of our vacation leisurely doing whatever we want, that is park related, or not(disney quest, hoop de doo, character meal, lounging by the pool). My thought is we take advantage of our energy at the beginning of our vacation to do as much as we can. It works well for us.