Personally, I'd wait a few years so the kids will be old enough to remember the trip, but if you do go: definitely use the fast pass. stay at a Disney resort and take advantage of: they'll pick you up at the airport so you don't have to rent a car you can get into the park an hour earlier than the general public. get a meal plan for the park and hotel check out this website for more helpful info: http://www.mousesavers.com/
I've been six times, and could give loads and loads of advice as I did tons of research for each trip and had things pretty meticulously planned out. I made a long post on this a few years back, I wanna say. When I get home from work, I'll dig around the forums and look for it, or if someone else does a search of my posts, that'd be cool too. Or, when I have time later, I'll type some stuff up for ya. Happy to help. We had a blast.
Perfect. Buy tickets to Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party. I promise it's worth it. Extended hours at the Magic Kingdom...easier to get on rides...my kids love trick or treating through the park. And I'm not a big fireworks /parade guy, but the show for that party is far and away the best I've ever seen. Great stuff..well worth it. Were you able to get my email?
This is the longest post I could find from you about Disney http://bbs.clutchfans.net/showthread.php?p=6667731 Believe it or not, in Hangout you have only made seven posts with the word Disney in them....and 4 of those were in threads about Astroworld.
It was the one at the Polynesian. That all you can eat different meats really hit the spot. I actually enjoyed all of the food I had at Disney World much more than I would ever expect from any theme park. When we went we had one reservations/sit down/wait service meal each day. They were all good, but that one was exceptional, and seemed a really good value. The rest were either the park fast food options, or at our WDW hotel cafeteria/food court.
It's definitely possible. If you follow the plans and instructions, it tells you what time to go to which rides, including for which rides and when to grab a fast pass. If you get to the park before it opens and are one of the first in the gate, and follow the instructions it is possible to drastically cut down the wait times. The age of the children or senior citizens in your group can definitely affect the timing also.
Ha -- right. Nice, thanks. I remembered answering one of these before, but thought my post was longer than that.
Longest line we stood in at MK was probably Aladdin at about 20 minutes. I tell ya it's quite a good feeling to skip past people that have been waiting 60 minutes or longer in line and go right to the front. We were at the park from 9 to about 5 and did about 15 attractions. I can't fathom how or why people would stand in line longer than an hour when you have Fastpass right there.
Yeah, it's just that some rides and attractions don't have fast pass. A lot do have it, but some don't. Also the fact that you can only get a fast pass once an hour or whatever the time limit is might make it hard. But if you use a good strategy it should make wait times significantly less.
The restaurant you're talking about is Ohana. We loved that place. It might have been the best meal we had all that week. This is also why you do the meal plan. Last I saw i twas around $40 or so per person per day, when sitting down at some of these places would cost you upwards of $60 to $70 depending on what you order just for the one meal. I'd also recommend doing character meals at breakfast only. Get it out of the way early because these meals take a lot of time usually. You can get a reservation for one before the parks open, then spend more of your park time on attractions. I'm personally partial to the Crystal Palace buffet breakfast in Magic Kingdom. It's mostly Winnie the Pooh characters, solid food and you can do an 8am reservation that gets you in the park early (to access the restaurant), and finished before the chains drop for park opening. Also, if you're a resort guest, that opening is 9am instead of 10am on certain days. Quick tips, trying not to go long. Don't go to Magic Kingdom on Mondays. It's the busiest day of the week for that park. Most people have Monday as their first full day of their vacations, and everyone wants to do "the one with the castle" first. A Magic Kingdom tip that helped me the last time I went was, as soon as the park opens, have someone go get some fast passes for big line rides like Splash Mountain, Space Mountain, etc. Then, instead of going left or right like everyone else, go straight through the castle to Fantasyland and start in the back of the park. You can get on all of these rides with minimal waiting, which is a big thing because most of the Fantasyland rides have a very slow throughput of the lines. Later in the day it's not uncommon to see multiple hour lines back there. Advice specific to your questions: 1. As I mentioned earlier -- if you plan to have sit down meals at all, the meal plan is absolutely necessary. The sit down meals will be EXPENSIVE if not. The meal plan gets you appetizer, entree and dessert for each meal where you sit down, all included. You just pay the gratuity. That is, unless things have changed since I last looked. If you want to go economical and just do counter service, then the meal plan isn't necessary. You don't really save money on counter service. I personally like the meal plan, and loved the food there. Lots of good places to eat with fantastic theming and experiences. 2. When we go, I get the Park Hopper, which gives access to every park and lets you "Hop" from park to park. You can go to Magic Kingdom, then after lunch go to Epcot and then back again, if you want for example. Other add ons would include waterparks (hopping to both), etc. Price depends on how many days you choose. The more days, the better the deal becomes. For example, all four parks with park hopper priveleges INCLUDING waterparks would be about $329 for an adult for THREE days. If you do the exact same ticket for SEVEN days, it only goes up to $369, or approximately $10 per extra day. 3. Never used Southwest. I booked through Disney. They often have some really good incentives and deals, depending on the time of year. Look at either www.allears.net or www.wdwinfo.com and look in the discounts section. Those are really good sites for WDW vacation research. And definitely, DEFINITELY have a plan for each day. Depending on when you go, things can go wrong really quickly without some sort of plan. Although if you go in October, as you mentioned (I think), you may just about have the place to yourself. That's a really slow time, as is the first week of December. However one week before, around Thanksgiving is one of the busiest. Other busiest are Spring Break, Christmas week through New Years. January is slow, but they tend to take rides down for annual rehab a lot during this time. I've known more than one person who went at this time and ended up missing multiple rides because they were down for annual rehab. As said before, summer is busy but manageable. You just gotta have a plan. More gladly, if you want to know anything else.
My family and I went there last year --- the last week of June. So I am going to talk from experience. So let me answer your questions one by one. 1.) My family and I didn't do the meal plans. We didn't checked inside the resort either. We decided to drive there since we never went on an out of state road trip. It was both fun and exhausting. Since you have some young ones, I suggest not to do it. :grin: For that reason, we had the chance to lodge in a hotel and eat in restaurants that is outside of the resort. This saved us a few hundreds of dollars. But since you are going to fly there, I suggest doing the meal plan and lodging in there hotel. There are various of amenities in doing so. Their buses will take you to whichever park you want to go to. But, some hotels outside of the resort have affiliations with Disney World. So their hotel might have a bus service with Disney World. 2.) Yes, your assumption is right. Disney World Resort is full of themed parks, water parks, hotels, and a downtown area. Regarding the ticket pricing. The longer you stay, the cheaper the ticket gets. Let say you stay there for five days. At that time, one day ticket pass is $89. But, the five day ticket pass is $268. That saves you a couple of bucks. Yes I have a picture of the ticket price of that time. :grin: Also, there is also called park hopping. You buy a ticket and you can hop on the other parks. Its pretty convenient. We were in the Disney World for four days. So we visited all of the four major themed parks by the park hopper option. On our first day it was raining hard so we decided to go to the Downtown area. Then, the second day we visited Epcot and Hollywood Studio. After that day, we went to the Animal Kingdom. Finally, we went to Magic Kingdom on our final day. All of that thanks to the park hopper. So you buy a ticket and get the park hopper option. So each day you can go on a different park. 3.) Like what I said, we didn't lodge inside of the resort. So it was cheaper for us. We got a deal of $79 a day for a hotel room that have two queen size beds. It saved us a few hundred bucks. If you have more questions, feel free to ask. Also, you must get a FAST PASS. Don't go to the rides, go to the fast pass lane. Then organize where you want to go. It will save you a lot of time.
True and to be fair I decided from the getgo we wouldn't be waiting in hourlong lines if we could help it. So we missed Astro Orbital, Pirates and Speed Track, but I don't think anyone minded one bit. Kept the kid moving and entertained, kept him happy!
I think you're better off waiting until the older child becomes 8 and the younger one becomes 4. Bringing a 4 month old around is no fun. Plus, you're going have to go to these same parks again in a few years so the younger one won't feel cheated. Space Mountain, Dinosaur, Soarin', and even the Star Wars rides might be too intense for a small child. My kid's enjoyed Universal Studios way more than all the Disney parks combined. The new Transformer ride is probably the best ride ever. Good luck.
We went early June. Holy hell the place was packed. If you got in early you could manage to knock some rides out, but by late morning **** was bananas. Going to try make sure I never go during summer again.
I've been several times in the past several years and my father goes every year and practically has it down to a science. My recommendation is go to Touringplans.com and pay the ~$10 for their subscription fee to be able to create a custom plan for each day and each park. They do an IMMENSE amount of research and can tell you which parks are the most crowded on which days and approximately what the wait time will be for every ride at a given time throughout the day. As far as your questions go: 1) Meal plans are NOT a must. Meal plans do NOT save you money. It won't cost you that much extra, but the only advantage the meal plan gives you is that everything is paid for up front and you have peace of mind not having to worry about how much money you are spending on food in the parks and if you're going over budget. Just depends on your needs. 2) As others have stated, the more days you purchase, the cheaper the tickets are, and you will have the option to add the park hopper option onto your tickets. This option, for a flat fee, will allow you to go to any of the four parks on every day that your ticket is active. My advice is to definitely get the park hopper option. If you're going during a very hot time of the year, the best move is to get to the park as soon as it opens (lines will be much shorter and not as hot). Around lunch time when the weather gets unbearable and the crowds un-manageable, GET OUT and go back to your resort, rest up, take a nap, enjoy the pool. Then in the evening, go to a different park and enjoy a nice evening (PM me if you want any more details on this strategy). 3) I stayed at Animal Kingdom Lodge on my honeymoon and I have to tell you it is FANTASTIC!! The kids will LOVE it. I can't speak to the price, as the resort stay was gifted to us, but if you're interested I may have a few resources where you can shop around to see what more affordable options there may be. If done correctly, there's NOTHING like a Disney World vacation.
brookstephens- you said exactly what I told Lil Pun in an email. Meal plans are not money savers..at least not for my family. I make reservations for the restaurants we want in advance...and I price out what I anticipate we'll spend on those meals and counter service meals...and it's never even close to as much as people pay for the meal plans. Are you guys Disney Vacation Club owners? If you go that often, you should be My folks bought into that literally the day it became available. Second family to buy in. It's my vacation home. There's a picture of me and my family taken when I was like 15 years old that still hangs in the Old Key West lobby....back then that hotel, itself, was called Disney Vacation Club..now of course, they have DVC for a ton of different resorts.
