Which park for which day?

[Rubygoose]

Hi Everyone,
Our family of 4 (Kids are 8 and 10) will be going to WDW for the 2nd time. We have done DLR 6 times now, and we did a very short trip to WDW in 2015. We will be in WDW for a week during Spring Break, likely staying at Art of Animation, and then flying to the Bahamas. I need help figuring out which order to do our park days, as we'll have 5 day base tickets, and we also want to go to Kennedy Space Center. Here's my plan so far:

Sunday March 18: Fly in from SEA to TPA or MCO for 4:30pm arrival (Tampa has cheaper flights, but the cost of renting a car may cancel out the savings.) We'll be exhausted from the flight, so just getting something to eat at the hotel then going to bed.
Monday Mar 19: Magic Kingdom (or Kennedy Space Center - if we are renting a car in Tampa. This also gives us more time to adjust to time difference.)
Tuesday Mar 20: Hollywood Studios (Fantasmic in evening)
Wednesday Mar 21: Epcot
Thursday Mar 22: Animal Kingdom (Tusker house breakfast before park opening)
Friday Mar 23: Magic Kingdom-early entry
Saturday Mar 24: Kennedy Space Center
Sunday Mar 25: Fly to Bahamas

If we do Kennedy Space Center on the 19th, then everything gets pushed 1 day, putting our last day in MK on a Saturday of what is likely the beginning of an extremely busy week, with Spring Break and Easter coming up the following weekend. Also, I've read to avoid Early Entry at WDW - I think I understand why, but I'm so used to staying onsite at DLR and making the most of Early Entry that it's hard for me to wrap my brain around this idea!

Any insight is appreciated. My 180 day window is coming up soon, so need to get this all figured out!
Thanks!

 

[JennaDeeDooDah]

One concern I have is the early breakfast at Tusker House followed by another early morning at Magic Kingdom. I might try and space those out differently. If not, I'd head back to the resort early on my Animal Kingdom day to make sure I got enough rest to be at Magic Kingdom in plenty of time for the extra magic hour rope drop. Personally, I'd switch the Animal Kingdom and Magic Kingdom days. But, if you are a family that has no problem getting up early or you naturally go to bed earlier at night, your schedule looks great.

 

[TheSouthernBelle]

I'm a little confused--Kennedy Space center is near Cape Canaveral and no where near Tampa. Your park days look great, I always like to do MK last since it's our favorite park. Do you have any interest in riding the pandora rides at AK?? If so, you may want to look at a date that offers extra magic hours as your odds of getting on those rides is better. Also when you do HS, keep in mind about half of the park is under construction, a full day at HS makes for a LONG day.

 

[Rubygoose]

I'm a little confused--Kennedy Space center is near Cape Canaveral and no where near Tampa. Your park days look great, I always like to do MK last since it's our favorite park. Do you have any interest in riding the pandora rides at AK?? If so, you may want to look at a date that offers extra magic hours as your odds of getting on those rides is better. Also when you do HS, keep in mind about half of the park is under construction, a full day at HS makes for a LONG day.

Thanks for you suggestions. What I meant about the Space Center was it might be best to do on Monday, since we'll have rented a car in Tampa on Sunday to get to WDW - then we can drop off the car on Monday evening after going to the Space Center, instead of keeping it for a full week. But if we fly into MCO, we'll just take Magic Express and rent the car when we need it.

We only spent half a day at HS on our last trip, and I had thought about just doing HS in the evening after going to Kennedy Space Center, and maybe staying overnight in Tampa to start our trip off slowly.

 

[Rubygoose]

One concern I have is the early breakfast at Tusker House followed by another early morning at Magic Kingdom. I might try and space those out differently. If not, I'd head back to the resort early on my Animal Kingdom day to make sure I got enough rest to be at Magic Kingdom in plenty of time for the extra magic hour rope drop. Personally, I'd switch the Animal Kingdom and Magic Kingdom days. But, if you are a family that has no problem getting up early or you naturally go to bed earlier at night, your schedule looks great.

We are very much early morning park goers! We would do 5 straight mornings of 7am EE at DLR in the summer! The only time we sleep in on Disney trips is after a late night, but we usually only do one or two late nights. Still need to figure out which night time entertainment we want to do.

 

[TheSouthernBelle]

Thanks for you suggestions. What I meant about the Space Center was it might be best to do on Monday, since we'll have rented a car in Tampa on Sunday to get to WDW - then we can drop off the car on Monday evening after going to the Space Center, instead of keeping it for a full week. But if we fly into MCO, we'll just take Magic Express and rent the car when we need it.

We only spent half a day at HS on our last trip, and I had thought about just doing HS in the evening after going to Kennedy Space Center, and maybe staying overnight in Tampa to start our trip off slowly.

OK now that makes sense. Yeah kind of sad, even if you linger at HS it's not even a full day. When Star Wars and Toy Story land open that will make it a full day then. Have fun, your trip sounds like a blast!