itstrue56
Mouseketeer
- Joined
- Apr 11, 2018
I will preface this entire thing by saying that I was very apprehensive initially when my wife brought up taking a Disney trip. Although my kids are the perfect age to go (7 and 5), it just didn't sound like a fun thing to me.
In the end, I think it will go down as the best vacation I've ever taken for a variety of reasons, which I will explain below.
The most important thing I believe we did was prepare and do research. Friends of ours who are annual passholders were also down at Disney at the same time as us and stayed at the same resort as us. We did a lot on our own and a lot with them and their kids, who are 10 and 14.
This was a trip that we originally booked back in December and changed our resort reservation once back in the spring after we found a better rate at a comparable resort. One must for us going in was staying at a monorail resort for the convenience to Magic Kingdom. We stayed at the Grand Floridian, which was excellent for this. From our room, we could get on the monorail and be in Magic Kingdom in less than 20 minutes.
When people say you can't do it all at Disney, they're absolutely correct. When you're going with kids, you have to prioritize what is important to you and your kids. For us, it was getting an early start each day. That meant that we didn't stay in the parks past 9 p.m. any night. We saw fireworks from a distance from the resort. We probably could have pushed it and tried to stay, but I also wanted to avoid a meltdown from the kids, which we did by keeping them well rested (the best we could) and hydrated. We went back to the resort in the afternoons every day to either shower or just rest for a bit.
In terms of attractions, we covered a ton of ground. We initially went with 6 day hopper passes and the Grand comp'd us a 7th day, which we used to go to Epcot on Wednesday night on our scheduled off day after spending the morning and afternoon at the pool.
Here's the parks we saw by day:
Saturday - Magic Kingdom
Sunday - Magic Kingdom
Monday - Epcot and hopped to Magic Kingdom
Tuesday - Animal Kingdom and hopped to Hollywood Studios
Wednesday - Epcot
Thursday - Magic Kingdom
Friday - Hollywood Studios and hopped to Magic Kingdom
Using Fast Passes and the Touring Plans lines app, we didn't wait in any line for more than 45 minutes the entire trip.
In terms of headlining attractions, we did Seven Dwarfs Mine Train three times, Flight of Passage, Na'vi River Journey, Expedition Everest twice, Frozen Ever After twice, Soarin' twice, Test Track, Splash Mountain twice, Toy Story Mania twice, Tower of Terror twice and my son did Space Mountain seven times.
Other attractions we saw: Peter Pan's Flight, It's A Small World, Pirates of the Carribean, Mad Tea Party, Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin, People Mover, Haunted Mansion, Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, Dumbo, Jungle Cruise, Under the Sea, Barnstormer, Winnie the Pooh, The Seas with Nemo and Friends, Turtle Talk with Crush, Spaceship Earth, Tomorrowland Speedway, Magic Carpets of Aladdin, Kilamanjaro Safari, Primeval Whirl, Festival of the Lion King, Star Tours, Living with the Land, PhilarMagic, Monsters Inc. Laugh Floor, Regal Carousel, Carousel of Progress, Enchanted Tales with Belle and Astro Orbiter. Many of these we did more than once.
Flight of Passage was absolutely the best attraction we did. My son got to ride it twice as we used Rider Switch because my daughter didn't want to do it. Just incredible and if you go to Disney, it's a must see.
In terms of characters, I kept a list of every character the kids met and got pictures/autographs from: Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Goofy, Alice, Tinkerbell, Rapunzel, Tiana, Cinderella, Buzz Lightyear, Woody, Doc McStuffins, Donald Duck, Daisy Duck, Princess Jasmine, Anna, Elsa, Snow White, Princess Aurora, Joy and Sadness, Belle and Ariel.
The PhotoPass was a great investment as we got close to 500 pictures from the trip and didn't have to worry about taking our own photos at every stop. It was worth every penny.
As for food, we did the Quick Service Dining plan and used mobile ordering quite a bit so our food was ready when we got to our stop. This saved A TON of time that others wasted in line. We also did the breakfast in Cinderella's Castle, which was great for the kids and also a lunch at Be Our Guest Restaurant.
Overall, I took more than 130,000 steps over the seven days there and while it was not at all relaxing, the kids loved it so much and it's a trip they will never forget. That was the goal for us going in and we accomplished that goal.
In the end, I think it will go down as the best vacation I've ever taken for a variety of reasons, which I will explain below.
The most important thing I believe we did was prepare and do research. Friends of ours who are annual passholders were also down at Disney at the same time as us and stayed at the same resort as us. We did a lot on our own and a lot with them and their kids, who are 10 and 14.
This was a trip that we originally booked back in December and changed our resort reservation once back in the spring after we found a better rate at a comparable resort. One must for us going in was staying at a monorail resort for the convenience to Magic Kingdom. We stayed at the Grand Floridian, which was excellent for this. From our room, we could get on the monorail and be in Magic Kingdom in less than 20 minutes.
When people say you can't do it all at Disney, they're absolutely correct. When you're going with kids, you have to prioritize what is important to you and your kids. For us, it was getting an early start each day. That meant that we didn't stay in the parks past 9 p.m. any night. We saw fireworks from a distance from the resort. We probably could have pushed it and tried to stay, but I also wanted to avoid a meltdown from the kids, which we did by keeping them well rested (the best we could) and hydrated. We went back to the resort in the afternoons every day to either shower or just rest for a bit.
In terms of attractions, we covered a ton of ground. We initially went with 6 day hopper passes and the Grand comp'd us a 7th day, which we used to go to Epcot on Wednesday night on our scheduled off day after spending the morning and afternoon at the pool.
Here's the parks we saw by day:
Saturday - Magic Kingdom
Sunday - Magic Kingdom
Monday - Epcot and hopped to Magic Kingdom
Tuesday - Animal Kingdom and hopped to Hollywood Studios
Wednesday - Epcot
Thursday - Magic Kingdom
Friday - Hollywood Studios and hopped to Magic Kingdom
Using Fast Passes and the Touring Plans lines app, we didn't wait in any line for more than 45 minutes the entire trip.
In terms of headlining attractions, we did Seven Dwarfs Mine Train three times, Flight of Passage, Na'vi River Journey, Expedition Everest twice, Frozen Ever After twice, Soarin' twice, Test Track, Splash Mountain twice, Toy Story Mania twice, Tower of Terror twice and my son did Space Mountain seven times.
Other attractions we saw: Peter Pan's Flight, It's A Small World, Pirates of the Carribean, Mad Tea Party, Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin, People Mover, Haunted Mansion, Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, Dumbo, Jungle Cruise, Under the Sea, Barnstormer, Winnie the Pooh, The Seas with Nemo and Friends, Turtle Talk with Crush, Spaceship Earth, Tomorrowland Speedway, Magic Carpets of Aladdin, Kilamanjaro Safari, Primeval Whirl, Festival of the Lion King, Star Tours, Living with the Land, PhilarMagic, Monsters Inc. Laugh Floor, Regal Carousel, Carousel of Progress, Enchanted Tales with Belle and Astro Orbiter. Many of these we did more than once.
Flight of Passage was absolutely the best attraction we did. My son got to ride it twice as we used Rider Switch because my daughter didn't want to do it. Just incredible and if you go to Disney, it's a must see.
In terms of characters, I kept a list of every character the kids met and got pictures/autographs from: Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Goofy, Alice, Tinkerbell, Rapunzel, Tiana, Cinderella, Buzz Lightyear, Woody, Doc McStuffins, Donald Duck, Daisy Duck, Princess Jasmine, Anna, Elsa, Snow White, Princess Aurora, Joy and Sadness, Belle and Ariel.
The PhotoPass was a great investment as we got close to 500 pictures from the trip and didn't have to worry about taking our own photos at every stop. It was worth every penny.
As for food, we did the Quick Service Dining plan and used mobile ordering quite a bit so our food was ready when we got to our stop. This saved A TON of time that others wasted in line. We also did the breakfast in Cinderella's Castle, which was great for the kids and also a lunch at Be Our Guest Restaurant.
Overall, I took more than 130,000 steps over the seven days there and while it was not at all relaxing, the kids loved it so much and it's a trip they will never forget. That was the goal for us going in and we accomplished that goal.
