What is your typical Disney trip?

[KenHutch]

Our average trip is 10 days at WDW. We leave Kansas City and go to Daytona Beach for 2 days. Then we head to our hotel. That 1st day we never do a park. Instead we go to Disney Springs. We do each park 2 days each (exception this year 3 days at MK). We do rope drop to park close. I guess you would call this a break day. About day 5 or 6 the girls go into town to shop till they drop and I do an entire day of resort hopping and just talking to CM's (you really can learn a lot). This trip I added one more day so we could really do Magic Kingdom in style. And we have never used park hoppers.

 

[kiford]

We typically stay 7-9 nights, stay onsite and book TS for breakfast and dinner (frequently at other resorts). We usually arrive about 2-3 pm so we do go to the parks. Somehow, it has become a tradition to go for an early dinner at Teppan Edo that first night and to watch Illuminations. We go to a park every day but we may cut it short and go back to the resort, stay until closing, go back and forth or park hop. Really whatever we feel like since we know we'll be coming back one day. Our touring style is pretty relaxed. Breakfast between 8-9:30 am, over to a park, see a few attractions, maybe use fastpasses, maybe watch a parade or two or people watch or watch various performers or sit in a lounge or have a snack/drink somewhere. The last day (before departure day - we never go to the parks that day because of early flight) is usually Disney Springs in the morning for some shopping and then whatever we feel like later.

We're going between Christmas and New Year's this year for the first time and we expect that we will have to completely modify our touring style because of crowds. But we've also decided to get annual passes and that will also alter our touring style as we intend to visit 2-3 times per year, maybe with one 7-9 day trip and two 4-5 day trips over long weekends. We do think that our relaxed style of touring will easily extend to this type of change since we're not super stressed if we can't do anything or have to spend the afternoon at our resort whether in the pool or in a lounge or relaxing in our room. Having annual passes means we won't feel that we've spent money on a park pass that have to use or we lose it.

 

[piratepride]

We normally do 5-7 nights, we always go to Epcot on arrival day. MK for 2 days and HS & AK one day each for 5 nights. For seven we go to Epcot on arrival day followed by do two days at MK and HS. We take one day off during the week to swim, go to DS and eat at Ohana. We also make sure we go to AK for day at some point during the week too.

If we do a 4 night trip like we are this December....we spend one day at each park. Epcot on arrival day and one day at MK, HS and AK.

 

[coast2coastmickey]

Fly in Saturday: Get Rental Car, Get condo/suite, drop off luggage. Make a stop at a restaurant or pick up lunch nearby. Stop and get groceries for breakfasts and snacks for the rest of the trip. If it's early enough, we'll go to Disney Springs or Universal City Walk for dinner.
Sunday: Disney park (At least 2, unless it's an AK day)
Monday: Disney park (At least 2, unless it's an AK day)
Tuesday: Disney park (At least 2, unless it's an AK day)
Wednesday: Disney park (At least 2, unless it's an AK day)
Thursday: Disney park (At least 2, unless it's an AK day)
Friday: Fly home, usually too early that we say we're never flying so early again, yet...we always book the early flights to minimize the time spent in MCO TSA hell.

While at the parks, we wing it day by day, depending on which parks have EMH (avoiding those) and which parks are open latest. We usually start at the parks that close earliest, then hop over to something else. Our ADRs and FPs are usually done a day or two in advance, just depending on what's available.

 

[Barnabas T Bullion]

Everyone has a different schedule when you come to Disney, but what is your typical vacation like? How many days to you stay, how many parks, do you go to park on the day you arrive, any days off to relax? I am wondering because I want to know if you all like to cram everything in or if you leave some days to explore and cool off.

We normally stay for 5 nights and go to 2 parks. We never go to a park on the first day, we always play mini-golf and explore the resort (even if I've been to the hotel 10+ times before!). The next days are always park, day off, park, day off. Part of the reason that we love Disney so much is the atmosphere and you don't always have to go to a park to feel that Disney magic. So a few days off to relax and resort hop is a great way to spend our vacation time.

This is a GREAT question I don't see asked very often.

The simple answer is our trips continually evolve as the kids get older. I'm leaning towards longer trips (7-8 days) lately so we can get everything in rather than rush through things with long weekends. We used to do shorter trips and without kids wasn't much of a problem but I need to relax a bit more nowadays anyway. Wife is a teacher and can't take off more than 2 days consecutively basically so we're pretty much stuck to a Feb vacation week, Apr vacation week, or summer (late August preferred). I'm a big fan of April vacation for us when it's separated off from Easter by some length of time.

Generally speaking my past few trips follow some patterns:
- We do not hop and stick to one park per day.
- At least one character meal; last time we did two. Kids LOVED it.
- Stay on-site, mod or DVC rental, and do not leave the Disney property at all until it's time to go home.
- Use MDE and Disney transportation; no car rental/uber/taxi at all.
- Don't go to water parks although we had a slow/chill/relax day planned but last trip cranky kids changed the plans.
- Rope drop the parks, get back to the resort in the afternoon for swimming, then back to parks for dinner/night time touring.
- Ideally we fly in earlyish from Massachusetts area to tour a bit on the first day but last time we were tired and just hung out. Would have gone swimming but the baggage from MDE was brutally late and the wife missed packing the bathing suits into the carry-ons.
- Always take time to ride the monorail just for fun!
- Hit every park at least once, repeat for a few of the parks and leave a day open on the back end for the kids to decide... did we miss something? Did you want to go back to do something again? Etc.

 

[Newcastle]

Every morning I get up early, wolf down a bagel, grab a coffee then head over to the bench next to Atlantic Dance and have a cigar as the sun comes up.

This sounds wonderful .

 

[zebrastreyepz]

Last trips were 7 nights with 6 full park days. Christmas trip also had a MVMCP.

This one we have 8 nights with 6 full park days and the day of MNSSHP we are having a late breakfast at a resort and only doing the party.

Generally it's 2 MK, 2 EP, 1 AK, and 1 HS. We don't park hop but are getting APs so that may change.

 

[10MoreMinutes]

My typical trip is around 4 days, and I'm a commando-park-tourer. I live 3.5-4 hours away by car, so I drive. My main reason for the shorter trips is that I work at a small office and I get anxiety about taking more than a day or two of vacation time at once because my work will absolutely pile up while I'm gone and that makes it so much worse to come back to.

My normal trip would look something like this:

Friday: leave home by 8 am, get to resort by 12-1 pm. Check in and immediately go to a park.
Saturday: Park day (DS at night if I feel like it)
Sunday: Park day (DS at night if I feel like it) (and pack up when I get back to the resort that night)
Monday: Get up, check out, and head to my last park, then head for home around 2-3 pm.

If I'm at a park for a full day, I make one TS reservation per day. If I'm at a park for a half day, I typically just snack or eat QS. For FPs, I make my first three in the morning so I can use the system to make as many more as possible later in the day.

It's exhausting, but it's fantastic.

 

[FlightlessDuck]

We usually go for 6 full days plus two travel days.

2 days at MK
2 days at DHS
1 day at AK
1 day at Epcot.

With the major construction at DHS last time, I think we did two days at Epcot.

We took a morning to go to Typhoon Lagoon, but only once.

Order totally depends on when Fatasmic! is showing and what our ADR's are.

 

[ArielSRL]

I would probably say like 2 weeks...lol...but realistically, 8 nights is good. We don't normally do a park on arrival or departure bc we drive from Atlanta. However, starting next year we will have APs, so it won't be a big deal to go into a park for a meal and a few FPs. We like MK the most, so we do 2.5-3 days there with about 1.5 everywhere else. Its fluid though, so it will change based on whats going on at Disney. We are recent resale DVC members so we'll be back for several years.

 

[BalooFan]

Typically, we stay seven nights and have eight day park hopper tickets. We arrive at MCO in the late morning/early afternoon and or return flight is in the late afternoon, so we go to the parks for a while on both our arrival and departure days. I usually make a dinner ADR on arrival day and a breakfast ADR on departure day.

We rope drop the parks in the morning. In the early afternoon we return to the resort for a break. We may return to a different park in the evening or I may not plan anything and leave it up to my travel companions (all adults) to decide what they want to do. Because of this, most of our ADRs are for lunch. We go to Disney Springs one evening.

We don’t try to cram everything in. We pretty much move at a leisurely pace, but I leave enough flexibility in the schedule for anyone who wants to do more than I planned to do so, while anyone who needs a break can do so as well.

 

[Nebraska_Disney]

We have done 5 on-site and 3 off-site stays. The last 5 trips have been from 7-9 nights. We always get park hopper passes and have them for every night of our stay. We usually get to MCO around 1pm, head to our resort and stow away our gear and head to MK. We always do the "Tea Cups" as our first ride, it has always been that way. We try to rope drop most parks and will leave by 2-3pm each day back to the resort to go to pool and have some down time. We will return to another park in the evening for a meal and stay until close. Rinse and repeat for the entire trip. The last trip we did the hopper + tickets and started off 2 days at one of the water parks, leaving about 2pm each day to relax at the resort until we go to a park in the evening. We will plan one morning to go to Disney Springs to buy stuff and have lunch. Plan tix will run our family about $1,000-$1200 round trip (4 people) so we go longer and don't feel rushed. We go about every other year, but did go 2015, 2016, and 2017.

Usually this is how we break down our park visits by favorites:

MK
HS
AK
EP

We usually will "hop" to MK at nights as it is a good time to have less of a crowd present and they usually have the latest hours. We try to do EP early and hop to another park. EP is our least favorite park and don't care at all for the world showcase. AK and HS are about even and we do our best to be at both at rope drop to get on our favorites. One morning at HS, we did R&R roller coaster 5 times in a row at rope drop. Can't wait to visit when all the new stuff is done.

 

[rg35]

We have been each year since 2013 (we purchased DVC in 2012).

The first two trips we flew down, the last 3 years we drove down from NYC. On the drive down we stop somewhere more than halfway (Santee, SC the first two, last year, Savannah, GA). We usually leave our stopover point so that we can arrive at our DVC resort around noon.

We have a "go" bag in the car packed with bathing suits and pool items so we can head straight to the pool while we wait for our room to be ready. We generally get QS near the pool for lunch. Two years ago we started using Garden Grocer for groceries (mostly breakfast items) so that I don't have to run to the supermarket at some point on Day 1 to go shopping. For day 1 we have always have TS reservations at Disney Springs or a resort restaurant. One year we did Hoop Dee Do Revue. We never go to the parks on day 1.

Typically we stay for a little over a week. We usually get 5-6 day park tickets (we used to do hoppers, but no hoppers the last two years as we found that we didn't really use them 3 years ago and felt it was a waste of money). Our breakdown is usually two days at MK and one day at all of the other parks (sometimes two days at EP or AK), but this will change as the parks change and as our kids get older over the coming years.

We typically try to include 1 or 2 pool days to just rest and relax. On our pool days we generally do breakfast ADRs for breakfast (1900 Park Fare, Boma, Bon Voyage), QS at the pool for lunch and dinner ADRs at resort or Disney Springs restaurants.

On park days we eat breakfast in the room and have TS lunch and dinner in the parks. Whether or not we leave for a break depends on how the kids are doing and their energy levels. They were only 8 for our trip last year but they seem to enjoy staying in the parks all day on some days. Other days they enjoy going to the pool for a break.

We also usually spend time in the evenings at the resort community center playing board games or doing other activities w/ the kids.

 

[CynBeth]

We usually visit every few years during the holiday season for 9 nights. Our schedule depends on if it is Thanksgiving Week or the beginning of December and where we stay. We always seem to arrive on a Friday and depart the following Sunday and take a first or second flight of a day. Last trip we stayed at YC so on arrival day did Epcot where we saw some of the storytellers before dinner and then did CP. This year we visit Thanksgiving Week and will do MVMCP on Fri the 16th. Not sure if we will be at MK park most of the day or mini golf beforehand. We do not take a rest day but visit SW once during a trip and split the rest of the time between the 4 Disney parks and one evening have dinner and shop at DS. We always get park hoppers. The family members I travel with have food allergies so we pretty much have to eat TS for all meals so that is our time to relax and recharge.

 

[mister morrow]

my family is extremely sporadic when it comes to vacations; we usually book everything less than a month in advance and we just go with the flow haha.

we usually stay at disney for around a week (6 nights).

-2 days of EP
-2 days of MK
-2 days of AK
-1 day of HS

at disney, we prefer not to get up early as it is our vacation; we tend to sleep in almost everyday and stay out late at the parks.

 

[jaiminee krikit]

We typically do 7 nights. The first and last full day are always MK. Other than that, it varies. Sometimes we'll do Epcot our first partial day, then second to last day and AK and HS somewhere in the middle. I try to compare crowd calendars and go from there. Sometimes with ADRs I have to move things around. We always do at least 2 days at MK and Epcot, and 1 each for AK and HS. Sometimes we'll throw a break day in there, but usually not. There really hasn't been two trips we've done the same thing lol.

 

[agavegirl1]

We go once every four years to Orlando. 8 or 9 days at WDW and 8 or 9 days at Universal with an occasional side trip to Sea World or Busch Gardens or both. We do 2-3 vacations per year and do a lot of other things the years in between.

 

[Babs1975]

We usually stay 10 days, offsite at our timeshare. 4 park days, 1 at each Disney park. Plus Discovery Cove and Seaworld. Also do Christmas party once during our vacay. Visit Disney Springs a couple times and the outlets. We definitely take a few days off! We do ropedrop and are usually done by dinner time, just relax at the condo in the evening. No park the day we arrive. We get groceries, swim at the pool, maybe go to Disney Springs. We go every other year, on the other year we do the beach. Last year was Aruba.

 

[Jadyreen1282]

10 days. 9 nights. One dinner show (rotates). One Dessert party. One tour (Wild Africa Trek, Keys to and such). One MSSHP. Two Waterparks. and Yehaa Bob whenever he's still crooning when we get back to POR.

 

[bigbabyblues]

We usually do either 8 nights/9 days or 9 nights/10 days. We did 6/7 once and it was too short. 2-3 days at Epcot, 1.5 or 2 at MK, 2 at HS and 1 at AK, and then if we have extra time, we just go wherever we want. We take a break in the afternoons but not full days off from the parks. We drive, usually through to the night and arrive around 7 a.m., and we go to a park as soon as we get there until we need a nap. We also do a park on departure day, since we can really leave whenever we want. We split the drive home into 2 days, and we always drive at least to Jacksonville or FL/GA border the first day on the way home. We are fortunate that we aren't really tied to work schedules too much. We both work, but I can take as much time off in the summer as I want to, as long as there is someone in the office. My husband works rotating 24-hour shifts, and if we plan it around his scheduled long breaks, he can be off 14-16 days with using only vacation time for 5 or 6 days.