Winging It .. kinda

[Fudbutter]

Sorry to repost this , but I put this under another forum and got no replies, and this seems the easiest place to get answers, so ...

Can you help?

With nine days left before we leave, I thought that it might be a good idea to start planning a bit (what the heck, I’ll start early). There’s a lot of useful info obtainable via this forum, but I can’t seem to get to it because I always get caught up in reading somebody’s trip report, so it’s your fault (or some of you) that I haven’t a clue about what I’m getting into. C’mon now, admit it, how many of you tell yourself that you are spending an inordinate amount of time reading these epic tales (with digital pictures from every angle for your viewing pleasure) but just can’t seem to put it down because it’s just too humorous, informative, over the top, flat out lights on but no one is home, or a combination thereof. Meanwhile, the little voice in your head is saying, “ … don’t open that thread, don’t open tha … awww ..you opened that thread, now we’re stuck here for the next hour …”

We're a married couple 54/48 with no kids and we live to travel. The general idea is to take a 5 day drive from NY and stay 5 nights in Kissimmee at the end of February, of which three full days are free for Disnexploration. Lifetime success of projects started by “Hey Hon, I have an idea …” is approx. 28%, slightly above league average. The real Hey Hon idea is to go to spring training which is the next destination after Disney, but I can’t admit that here can I? That would be like the time we were going through Memphis and decided to stop to see Graceland. While waiting for the bus after going through the house, an employee was asking people what they thought. Some people had tears in their eyes they were so moved to have stepped through Elvis’ house. I had the wisdom to say in my profound NY accent, “Gee, I couldn’t believe I was standing in the living room where the Beatles once stood!” Oops, that got us some stares. Hey! I said I’m 54, life started the day the Beatles walked off that plane in NY.

We have been to Disneyworld before. Travel rule# 2 is "Never Return Within 5 Years". Since our prior trip was in 1983, it meets the rule by 20 years. The problem is that, after the facts that it’s in Florida, kids like it, a lot of people go there, we are woefully short on Disnowledge (No kids, remember?) After my preliminary investigation, I have come to the conclusion that a thing or two has been added since 1983. Disneyworld has become DISNEYWORLD.

So, if you would be so kind to opine, correct, comment on, add to in regards to any aspect of the items below and/or just general tell me something that I can write in my notebook, my appreciation would be unbounded.


KISSIMMEE
The plan is to stay 5 nights. Wed-Fri is dedicated to the parks. One day is for a jaunt to Tampa to see the beloved Sister-in-law and nieces and nephews and financees and grand niece and people who hang around her house and other people vaguely related to her late husband, etc. We thought that Sat. made sense for Tampa as the parks must be more crowded on that day of the week. I decided to stay in Kissimmee because that’s what we did last time and it seemed to be close by. The hotel is simply for sleeping, showering, Sports Center watching and stowing our stuff. The Quality Inn Eastgate had acceptable comments on the travel sites and it was $66/night all in. I originally looked at the on-site resorts, but for that price, it seemed to make sense to stay in Kissimee, but since that does not seem to be the prevailing opinion, I’m a bit concerned about this decision.


WEATHER AND CROWDS
1. I’m guessing nice for end of Feb (last three days)? Perhaps a day of rain?
2. What do you do if it rains?
3. How much of a “spring break” or other crowd concern should we
have?


THINGS TO CARRY INTO THE PARK
1. Can we bring unopen bottles of water?
2. Can we bring in fruit like oranges?


TICKETS
Subject to the wise and sage counsel that you all will provide, I’m thinking that we go to EPCOT on Wed, MGM on Thur and leave Friday open. We’ve been to Universal-Calif and Disneyland enough times that we can skip Universal-Fla and Magic Kingdom, so that leaves an open day to either return to EPCOT or MGM or do what I learn about in your gracious replies. We'll get to the parks in a sec.

1. With only one day each planned for the two parks, we shouldn’t need a park hopping option.
2. Since the swing day will also be Disney, we should get a three day pass.
3. Should be get the tickets at the park or through some other source ahead of time?

Side Note: My initial reaction to these ticket prices is to say that this is outrageous and expensive and when I was young blah blah blah. Then when you break it down, it’s actually not bad. It works out to $6-7/hr. $130 ticket to a play gets you 2 hours. $20-75 ticket to a baseball game gets you three hours and could cause prolonged crankiness if your team blows a 7 ½ game lead with 17 games left and you can’t use the Playoff and World series tickets that are still in a cup on your bedroom bureau. Pound for pound, dollar for dollar, it’s a low fee for what you get. However, I do feel for you poor folks that have to buy tix for a whole family.


PARKS
I read somewhere that there are specific days that are less crowed than others by park. I had thought that Wed was best for EPCOT and Thur for MGM. I can’t figure out where I got that, though.

1. So the first thing that we do when we get to a park is go straight to the most popular ride and get a fastpass?
2. What are the ones that require a fastpass in EPCOT and MGM?
3. How long does it take to leisurely walk around the lake in the Int’l part of EPCOT not counting the stops?
4. Do you need reservations for the back lot tour at MGM (I’m assuming that they have one like Universal’s?)


PARKING
1. Just follow the signs and park for $8 (still way cheaper than the ballpark)
2. I think I read on these boards that you show your AAA card and there’s a special place to park? Really?


EATS
We love food. The wife was born in Venice and cooks like it. We got so large at one point, that we would take a trip to the West Coast and affect the tides. We couldn’t go to the beach because Greenpeace would show up and try to push us back in the ocean. Finally, we bought a talking scale, I got on it and it said “one at a time please”, so it was off to the nutritionist. 2 years and 135 lbs lost between us later and we are each within both 20 lbs of our goal. I promised the wife dinner at Per Se (a restaurant in NYC) when we’ve made it, so I’m in no hurry to get there.

The point of all this is that we cannot gain weight on this trip. OK, stop laughing, we actually took an 11 day cruise and didn’t gain and this must be easier. We love to walk and that will help on the park days, but only to an extent. What we try to do when we travel is to have a nice dinner in each city we go to and try to “be good” the rest of the time. We always choose the dinner by Zagat’s food rating. Not a foolproof method, but it’s worked well for us. In Orlando, they rate two restaurants "27" for food. That’s pretty high (30 is the highest, but I’ve never seen a 30). One is V&A. The other is Le Coq au Vin in downtown Orlando, which looked a tich more appealing to us so we’ll go there Fri. night (but V&A looks right up our alley). Oh well, no breaking the “one city, one dinner” rule.

Anyway, if you have ever been in our predicament, we can really use your advice. What we can’t have is starches (bread, rice, pasta, potatoes) or fats (which cuts out anything fried or dairy related). If you don’t think that’s easy, consider the fact that she’s of Italian descent and she can’t serve up pasta, bread or cheese. Now that doesn’t mean no cheating ever. You try to save that for the Dinner. We may even have a piece of bread. We’ll have breakfast covered by a case of Fiber One bars so we need to cover 3 lunches and 2 dinners on park days. I’ve seen someone eating a turkey leg, that’s not too bad if you pull off the skin. Asian restaurants tend to have healthy choices. Otherwise, I am clueless. Anyone with this experience out there?


CHARACTERS
Mickey is about the same age as me (I’m 54, am I older or younger?) so we kinda grew up together, but I don’t think that he went to high school on Long Island so we never met. To me, Disney was cartoons and the occasional classic fairy tale like Snow White. I probably watched some early Mousekateers but all I remember is Annette Funicello and some guy named Jimmie who was, well, a bit creepy. My wife and I were quizzing each other about the characters and neither of us knows as much as we thought we would. I know that this is not an important point regarding trip planning, but we should know what we’re looking at here.

1. Are Mickey and Minnie married?
2. If so, are there little mice?
3. Goofy and Pluto are both dogs with one who talks and one barks or is Goofy a moose?
4. Goofy is Mickey’s friend, but Pluto is his pet? Doesn’t that bother Goofy if they are both dogs?
5. Mickey, Goofy and Donald Duck are friends. Is there more to that fraternity?
6. Donald has ancillary characters, three nephews and a rich uncle? If there are nephews, what happened to Donald’s siblings? And what were the names of those nephews?
7. Is that it for the main gang (you know, the Disney BOD)?


We promise to behave ourselves in your park. We're never rude or unfriendly and even take up less space on the line now. We even understand that it is unacceptable to discipline some stanger's kid no matter how much the urge to give the little darling a bit of a useful lesson (we've actually seen this happen)

So thanks in advance for any commentary. I have a feeling that this might be more fun than I am expecting.

 

[druidcat]

sorry, I'm no help...I had that "don't open this thread" moment and I did anyway. Thanks for the entertaining read

 

[michellem1118]

WEATHER AND CROWDS
1. I’m guessing nice for end of Feb (last three days)? Perhaps a day of rain?
2. What do you do if it rains?
3. How much of a “spring break” or other crowd concern should we
have?

Late February should be fine as far as crowds go - the NE has a "midwinter break" but its next week, and spring breaks don't typically happen til mid-March.

THINGS TO CARRY INTO THE PARK
1. Can we bring unopen bottles of water?
2. Can we bring in fruit like oranges?

You can bring water into the park. I don't see why you couldn't bring fruit in, though I've personally never tried.

PARKS
I read somewhere that there are specific days that are less crowed than others by park. I had thought that Wed was best for EPCOT and Thur for MGM. I can’t figure out where I got that, though.

1. So the first thing that we do when we get to a park is go straight to the most popular ride and get a fastpass?
2. What are the ones that require a fastpass in EPCOT and MGM?
3. How long does it take to leisurely walk around the lake in the Int’l part of EPCOT not counting the stops?
4. Do you need reservations for the back lot tour at MGM (I’m assuming that they have one like Universal’s?)

You must visit Animal Kingdom as well. It's one of our favorite parks. In fact, we usually hit EPCOT, Hollywood Studios (formerly MGM), and Animal Kingdom, and skip MK entirely.
1 & 2) Yes, get fastpasses early - EPCOT: TestTrack, Soarin', Mission:Space; Hollywood Studios: Rockin' Roller Coaster, Tower of Terror; Animal Kingdom: Expedition Everest, the Safari, Kali River Rapids
3) I'd plan at least an hour or so, it depends on your definition of leisurely, and on the crowd levels.
4) as of October, no reservation was needed for the backlot tour.

CHARACTERS
Mickey is about the same age as me (I’m 54, am I older or younger?) so we kinda grew up together, but I don’t think that he went to high school on Long Island so we never met. To me, Disney was cartoons and the occasional classic fairy tale like Snow White. I probably watched some early Mousekateers but all I remember is Annette Funicello and some guy named Jimmie who was, well, a bit creepy. My wife and I were quizzing each other about the characters and neither of us knows as much as we thought we would. I know that this is not an important point regarding trip planning, but we should know what we’re looking at here.

1. Are Mickey and Minnie married?
2. If so, are there little mice?
3. Goofy and Pluto are both dogs with one who talks and one barks or is Goofy a moose?
4. Goofy is Mickey’s friend, but Pluto is his pet? Doesn’t that bother Goofy if they are both dogs?
5. Mickey, Goofy and Donald Duck are friends. Is there more to that fraternity?
6. Donald has ancillary characters, three nephews and a rich uncle? If there are nephews, what happened to Donald’s siblings? And what were the names of those nephews?
7. Is that it for the main gang (you know, the Disney BOD)?

1) Minnie & Mickey are married (or so the cake toppers lead me to believe).
2) I'm not sure about little mice
3) Goofy & Pluto are both dogs, correct.
4) I assume Goofy is bothered by the fact that his friend has a pet of the same species, but I've never asked him.
5) That's the original.
6) No idea what happened to Donald's siblings, unless Daisy Duck is his sister... but I always assumed she was his wife...
7) yes, that's the main gang...

 

[Fudbutter]

Thank you so much michellem1118. Now I have something to write in my notebook. I always can count on my fellow NYers.

These are excellent tips. I wrote it all down, except it's going to be hard getting the wife to agree to any activity with the word Terror in its name.

 

[Rylee]

Hi

Weather - We were there in Feb. 2006, and we froze the first half of our vacation. The second part of the week was much nicer but still quite cool in the evenings. Most of the attractions are indoors, if it rains, grab a rain poncho and continue on.

Crowds - President's Day is Feb. 18. My children (Central NY) have 2/28 - 2/22 for winter break.

Tickets - I would buy 3 day tickets, no hoppers. I would visit Epcot, Hollywood Studios and Animal Kingdom. Check the calendar at the Disney site, (click on each day, at each park, to see park hours and special events.) There is a pattern to Disney attendance, but I would also check which park has the Extra Magic Hours. You won't be able to take advantage of those, (for Disney Resort guest, only) so I would visit the park that doesn't have any EMH scheduled, since parks with EMH's are likely to be slightly more crowded.

*Gotta run... but I'll be back.

You can read menus (and check park hours and attendance) at the allears site.

 

[Fudbutter]

Hi

Weather - We were there in Feb. 2006, and we froze the first half of our vacation. The second part of the week was much nicer but still quite cool in the evenings. Most of the attractions are indoors, if it rains, grab a rain poncho and continue on.

Crowds - President's Day is Feb. 18. My children (Central NY) have 2/28 - 2/22 for winter break.

Tickets - I would buy 3 day tickets, no hoppers. I would visit Epcot, Hollywood Studios and Animal Kingdom. Check the calendar at the Disney site, (click on each day, at each park, to see park hours and special events.) There is a pattern to Disney attendance, but I would also check which park has the Extra Magic Hours. You won't be able to take advantage of those, (for Disney Resort guest, only) so I would visit the park that doesn't have any EMH scheduled, since parks with EMH's are likely to be slightly more crowded.

*Gotta run... but I'll be back.

You can read menus (and check park hours and attendance) at the allears site.

The EMH tip is excellent. Thanks !

Duh (hitting myself on the forehead), on the pancho idea. I always have fresh ones in the car for those rainy days at the ballpark but I forgot to replace it after last season. I wouldn't have thought to carry a couple with us if you didn't bring that up.

 

[Rylee]

The EMH tip is excellent. Thanks !

Duh (hitting myself on the forehead), on the pancho idea. I always have fresh ones in the car for those rainy days at the ballpark but I forgot to replace it after last season. I wouldn't have thought to carry a couple with us if you didn't bring that up.

Okay, where was I...

If your Disney dates will be Feb. 27 - 29, it looks like your best bet might be... Wed/27 @ Studios, Thurs/28 @ Epcot, Fri/29 @ Animal Kingdom (AK usually closes earlier than the other parks, and would work out good for your dinner in Orlando).

Again, you should definitely read the menus and prices at the allearsnet site. If you find a Tables Service restaurant you would really like to try, you should call to make an advanced dining reservation. Due to the popularity of Disney's Dining Plan, TS restaurants are often full, so unless you are content with counter service meals, reservations may be necessary.

*You will need to know which day you'll be at which park, before scheduling ADR's.


So the first thing that we do when we get to a park is go straight to the most popular ride and get a fastpass?

YES. I don't think it's much of a vacation if we have to stick to a tight schedule, but when at Disney...
Have a list or an idea of must-see-and-do attractions for you and your wife. Plan on getting to the parks early and hitting these attraction first thing upon your arrival. After you have experienced your "must" attractions, relax and discover the magic at your own pace.
What are the ones that require a fastpass in EPCOT and MGM?

We are a family of 7. My husband, the biggest kid in the bunch, is a roller-coaster nut. We have teenage and "20 something," daughters and 2 little boys. Naturally, our must-see-and-do list is geared towards our taste but it probably covers something for everyone.

*Fastpass - Put your ticket in the machine and it spits out a stub with a return time listed, for when you can enter the fastpass lane. It will also list the time you are eligible to get another fastpass. Tip -in our experience, you can ride anytime after the time listed. If you miss the time frame listed, the ticket is still good.

At Epcot... Soarin', Test Track and Mission Space are very popular and wait times will be long without Fastpasses. I would head directly for Soarin', first. (For the extreme Disney enthusiast... grab a fastpass for Soarin', cross the park to Test Track and wait in stand-by line. After riding, it should be close to the time you will be eligible for another fastpass, grab fastpass for Mission Space, cross park and use fastpass to ride Soarin', when finished, cross park, again, and now ride Mission Space with fastpass. Then, grab another fastpass for Soarin' to ride later that evening when you have finished the World Showcase.) Whew! Got that?

Many excellent restaurants in Epcot... my family likes the Coral Reef.

Illuminations is the nightly show.

At the Studios... Tower of Terror and Rock 'n Rollercoaster will definitely need fastpasses. These are located next to each other, grab a fastpass for one, then ride the other from the stand-by line. Or, if you'd like to ride ToT twice, (lots of details) grab a fastpass for ToT, but then get in the stand-by line to ride. Next ride RnR and the return to ToT with fastpass. You might also want to grab a fp for Star Tours (Star Wars attraction).

Grab a schedule on your way into the park and check show times. We enjoy all the shows... Lights, Motor, Action, Indiana Jones and Beauty & the Beast.

Don't miss Fantasmic!

Disney offers a dinner package which, for the same price you would normally pay, guarantees reserved seating (off to the side of center stage) for the nightly Fantasmic show. I don't think it will be necessay for the time of year you are visiting.

If you aren't interested in any of the Hollywood Studio restaurants, the Boardwalk and some Resort restaurants are just a beautiful boat ride away. (Board boat at, and return to the Studios.) Just be sure you are back in time for the Fantasmic show.

At Animal Kingdom - Fastpass Kilimanjaro Safaris and Expedition Everest, as they are very popular. You may also want one for Dinosaur. See Finding Nemo - The Musical, It's Tough to be a Bug, (3D movie, each park has one and my family loves all of them) and The Festival of the Lion King. Spend some time at the Tree of Life. (Very detailed.)

Have a great trip! I would enjoy reading your trip report when you return.

P.S. - I have 5 children, ranging from 6 - 26, (that's right, 20 years apart). I'M TIRED. Please, if you happen to see one of my perfect angels acting inappropriately... I don't know, say he kicks his brother in the shin for taking the last sip of the soda, feel free to step-in and give a lengthy lecture on the importance of manners. Just be sure it's while your on your way to buy him another soda. Thanks.

 

[teacup317]

Fudbutter, if your not in comedy you should be. Excellent post, it made my day. I wish I could help with some of the planning, but I'm sure you'll get as much information regarding your questions as you could imagine by posting on this board. Have a wonderful trip!

 

[Rylee]

it's going to be hard getting the wife to agree to any activity with the word Terror in its name.

Don't let her skip this one!

If you've ever watched the Twilight Zone, (and even if you haven't) you'll love it. My kids could all handle this attraction as soon as they met the height requrement, around 5 or 6 years old.