To Go or Not To Go

[zackiedawg]

I vote for going...it's up to each person to weigh their risk, fear, family, etc. and decide. I went back to Disney for the first time over 4th of July weekend, after having not been since March 2020...it was a solo trip, I'm vaccinated, not in a high-risk class, have no kids, am reasonably isolated from co-workers in my office, and can self-quarantine for a few weeks upon returning before visiting any family in high-risk health classes, so for me, there was no real worries and I was happy to be able to go with all the mask mandates removed in the parks and resorts. I have a trip planned for September 24th and another for December 10th, and all of the above still applies, so I'm keeping my trip plans. I still have a large box of disposable masks, so I'll be able to easily comply with the indoor mask mandate if still in place at the end of September, and/or December. My own health and risk is not a concern with Covid of any variant, but if I lived with someone I care about who was unvaccinated, had children to worry about, or had a very high-risk health person in my house, I'd weigh those things and might come to a different conclusion.

 

[donaldbuzz&minnie]

Just please be careful in Orlando everyone! My husband just got back from a conference there. Most people remained masked the whole time, didn't leave the hotel (which followed covid protocols), and we've just heard of 2 people who tested positive for covid shortly after getting home. Pretty sure they are just the first we're hearing of, with more to follow.

 

[jphilhower]

We go in 12 days.This our 4th attempt since 2019 so yes we are still going. The 3 of us are all vaccinated and have masks. We are all adults, well my wife doesn't think I'm one.
It is time to see the Mouse.

 

[HashberryOTG]

Exactly. I have the opinion I have because I am traveling from North Texas. Our numbers are, and have been, following a similar track as Orlando/Florida. So, I personally don't feel at any higher risk there than I do here. Now, that perspective would likely be different if I lived in an area with completely different percentages/numbers.

This is how I felt going on our other "covid trips". There was actual mask wearing, safety measures, reduced capacity, distancing... everything the CDC recommended at any given time really, at Disney. Not so much at home (also N Texas). I feel Disney is doing what they need to do by following the current CDC guidelines. Some guests want more, some want less. It's going to be a big personal decision on if a family still wants to take their trip. So much to consider! Our next trip is in November, and current plans are to still go.

 

[robinb]

They could still reduce capacity for days and parks that are not fully booked. They could not return cancelled reservations to the pool of available reservations (I've noticed October 2 keep going from yellow, back to green, back to yellow, so it doesn't appear that they are doing even this for fully booked days.)

It seems like they are still keen to continue marketing to the people who aren't risk averse, rather than return precautions. And that seems to be working out fine for them, so it seems unlikely they will change course.

Unfortunately, I don't think they could reduce enough number of people in the parks through attrition. It was foolish of them to increase park capacity when they did.

 

[persnickity]

Unfortunately, I don't think they could reduce enough number of people in the parks through attrition. It was foolish of them to increase park capacity when they did.

You are probably right (especially for the time periods already showing yellow). Reducing capacity at parks that aren't fully booked might ease some of the evening pressure on MK and HS, as people might hop? It would just be really nice to see them try.

Thanksgiving week, the only week we could reschedule our trip 2020 to, looks brutal. Our group is all vaccinated, and obviously we knew Thanksgiving would be crowded, so we're still considering going. I guess I'll just keep a close eye on any scientific developments for vaccinated people, etc., so long as Disney makes little effort to mitigate risk.

 

[mousefan73]

I am the only one vaccinated in my family - and we are still planning on going in September and again at Thanksgiving. My kids go to public school, so honestly, I don't see any difference in going to Disney World. I actually would have more control on vacation with them than I will having them in school. In our state, schools are not allowed to mandate masks, where at Disney, they can. And I can make sure they are wearing them. Our decision to keep the trips is based on the fact that I don't see any increased risk associated with going than we already have living our normal daily life. Just my perspective.

Your points are very interesting as it shows how different Different perspectives influence the decision a person makes. For you your level of risk is probably less going to WDW vs your day to day life. For us coming from Germany we are coming from a very low incidence level and low risk area with tons of mandates to Covid central. So I am doing lots of pros and cons and risk management scenarios in my head, changing how we tour or travel. At the moment we are still going. As irresponsible as it sounds I think Covid exhaustion is the deciding factor and the fact that we are vaxxed. At this point for us it’s seriously become a mental health issue.
Another deciding factor is if Germany changes their entry policy and requires testing even for vaccinated. Right now hypothetically if we catch Covid and are asymptomatic, nobody knows including us. What happens if we are required to pay for an expensive Covid test before we get on that plane and are positive. As horrible as it sounds, and I don’t think I’m the only one, many of us would rather not know if positive if ones has zero symptoms and are vaxxed. For us the fear of the positive ramifications are more than the fear of illness.

edit: I take that back the best scenario for me would be to have a positive test result through a screening and not have symptoms. That would really be for me the ultimate Confirmation that I’ll be OK Knowing I am vaxxed and natural immunity. I just want this to happen while I’m at home I can comfortably quarantine in my own house and work from home. It would totally suck if this were to happen while traveling and then deal with the what if

 

[Belleandtinker]

I'm a no vote. With Covid aside, we went there for 10 days at the end of July. We were honest with ourselves (so we thought) that it was going to be different but we'd have fun no matter what. We had fun, but boy it was very different. We have a trip in March booked which is all dependent of fastpasses, characters and entertainment coming back. I have never in my Disney lifer ever stood in so many hour lines. It took away the "magic" for us.

Good luck!

 

[magik]

I’m not trying to convince anyone to go or not go. It’s such a personal decision with so many factors. Here’s my experience of recently going. I’ve been home 10 days now with no signs or symptoms of illness in me or anyone else in my travel party. Covid tests taken shortly after returning were negative.

My trip bridged the ‘no masks for vaccinated indoors’ to the newer ‘masks for everyone indoors’, so I was there for both. All adults in my travel party were fully vaccinated, kids not old enough yet. I was super nervous about the kids.

I wore kn95 masks with a fabric mask over it at the airport/on the plane/magical express both directions. The fabric mask was more because it was cute than for added protection. Most of my travel party did the same, or double-masked with a disposable surgical type mask on the bottom with a fabric mask on top for the airport/plane/bus.

Some days I double masked with a disposable surgical style mask with a fabric mask over or a kn95 with a fabric mask over (again for fashion….got to use my cute Disney masks), some days just a disposable mask, but most of my travel party did not double mask, they just used disposable surgical style masks or a fabric mask. These are the situations we masked up the entire trip, whether required or not:

• on transportation
• indoors (stores, attractions, restaurants if not eating/drinking)
• in queues (indoors or outdoors)
• outdoors when in crowds, which honestly was a lot of the time

At the beginning of the trip, we were definitely in the minority wearing masks anywhere but the buses. We used the Disney buses every day. We dined indoors at restaurants once a day. We spent time at the pool several evenings. We stayed for fireworks. Before the masks were required for all indoors, if my travel party was alone in a ride vehicle, we sometimes did take our masks off on rides. If we were with strangers or after the masks for all came back, we kept them on. We all had our own hand sanitizer bottles attached to our bags and sanitized after getting off attractions.

Would I do it again? I don’t know. It’s hard to know if our decision to mask up most of the time when we were around other people is what kept us all safe or if we just got lucky. I definitely went back and forth a lot about the indoor dining, but in the heat, the draw of a nice AC break won out. We did have a good time, but with the crowd levels what they were and almost all the previous covid safety precautions not in place for the beginning part of our trip, there was always that worry in the back of my mind.

 

[Ecomommy09]

I’m not trying to convince anyone to go or not go. It’s such a personal decision with so many factors. Here’s my experience of recently going. I’ve been home 10 days now with no signs or symptoms of illness in me or anyone else in my travel party. Covid tests taken shortly after returning were negative.

My trip bridged the ‘no masks for vaccinated indoors’ to the newer ‘masks for everyone indoors’, so I was there for both. All adults in my travel party were fully vaccinated, kids not old enough yet. I was super nervous about the kids.

I wore kn95 masks with a fabric mask over it at the airport/on the plane/magical express both directions. The fabric mask was more because it was cute than for added protection. Most of my travel party did the same, or double-masked with a disposable surgical type mask on the bottom with a fabric mask on top for the airport/plane/bus.

Some days I double masked with a disposable surgical style mask with a fabric mask over or a kn95 with a fabric mask over (again for fashion….got to use my cute Disney mmasks

You’re one of the first I’ve seen in awhile to mention double masking so I want to highlight that for the group. I like double masking when I'm not actively in a Covid room because it’s easy and saves N95s for real, purposeful use in treatment areas. I double-masked on my last trip and it worked well!

 

[Mr. X]

I’m not trying to convince anyone to go or not go. It’s such a personal decision with so many factors. Here’s my experience of recently going. I’ve been home 10 days now with no signs or symptoms of illness in me or anyone else in my travel party. Covid tests taken shortly after returning were negative.

My trip bridged the ‘no masks for vaccinated indoors’ to the newer ‘masks for everyone indoors’, so I was there for both. All adults in my travel party were fully vaccinated, kids not old enough yet. I was super nervous about the kids.

I wore kn95 masks with a fabric mask over it at the airport/on the plane/magical express both directions. The fabric mask was more because it was cute than for added protection. Most of my travel party did the same, or double-masked with a disposable surgical type mask on the bottom with a fabric mask on top for the airport/plane/bus.

Some days I double masked with a disposable surgical style mask with a fabric mask over or a kn95 with a fabric mask over (again for fashion….got to use my cute Disney masks), some days just a disposable mask, but most of my travel party did not double mask, they just used disposable surgical style masks or a fabric mask. These are the situations we masked up the entire trip, whether required or not:

• on transportation
• indoors (stores, attractions, restaurants if not eating/drinking)
• in queues (indoors or outdoors)
• outdoors when in crowds, which honestly was a lot of the time

At the beginning of the trip, we were definitely in the minority wearing masks anywhere but the buses. We used the Disney buses every day. We dined indoors at restaurants once a day. We spent time at the pool several evenings. We stayed for fireworks. Before the masks were required for all indoors, if my travel party was alone in a ride vehicle, we sometimes did take our masks off on rides. If we were with strangers or after the masks for all came back, we kept them on. We all had our own hand sanitizer bottles attached to our bags and sanitized after getting off attractions.

Would I do it again? I don’t know. It’s hard to know if our decision to mask up most of the time when we were around other people is what kept us all safe or if we just got lucky. I definitely went back and forth a lot about the indoor dining, but in the heat, the draw of a nice AC break won out. We did have a good time, but with the crowd levels what they were and almost all the previous covid safety precautions not in place for the beginning part of our trip, there was always that worry in the back of my mind.

Thank you for this post its reassuring. Our family has made the decision that we are going to stick with our 8/29 trip. I've been reading a lot of articles written by doctors (as opposed to watching the news) the last few days and I like what they are saying from a scientific and medical aspect without all the "noise".

I'm staying highly optimistic that crowds will dissipate by then and there will be some cancellations mixed in limiting the crowds. Now we just have to keep our eye on Hurricanes....

 

[Daniella_t]

It's really a personal decision. I was at Disney & Universal for 10 days in December & January, coming from Toronto Canada. Went with my brother, his fiance, & my two parents in their 60s. Most people weren't really vaccinated at the time, either. The case numbers were really high when we were there & we were all fine. My brother also stayed longer in Florida (Naples) for another 3 weeks & was healthy as ever. Then, they went back to FL for a month with some friends. Again, all tested negative when returning home. Going next week to visit my cousins down there in Boca Raton. This is just my personal experience though, wanted to share

 

[butterscotchcollins]

Talked to my Mom this AM since DH and I are going with my parents (in their late 60s/early 70s) for our Sept trip. I asked if she was reconsidering and she said no - we’re all fully vaxxed and perfectly healthy, and plan to mask indoors and out. It’s the rest of FL she’s worried about when they depart to visit family and friends in the rest of the state but on Disney property we feel reasonably safe.

Going and taking safety precautions doesn’t make you a bad person/parent. NOT going and postponing doesn’t make you a bad person/parent.

 

[StuckInKS]

I am the only one vaccinated in my family - and we are still planning on going in September and again at Thanksgiving. My kids go to public school, so honestly, I don't see any difference in going to Disney World. I actually would have more control on vacation with them than I will having them in school. In our state, schools are not allowed to mandate masks, where at Disney, they can. And I can make sure they are wearing them. Our decision to keep the trips is based on the fact that I don't see any increased risk associated with going than we already have living our normal daily life. Just my perspective.

This was a big part in out decision to go to DL. While we might have to still cancel our fall vacation to WDW that we just pushed back, going to CA did not seem any riskier than being at home where we have low vaccination rates, full hospitals, and not a mask in sight until they reinstated the mask mandates around our area last week. At least when we got to DL, many guests and most CMs were already wearing masks (before the new mandate that started on our last park day) and the vaccination rates are higher.

 

[lovethattink]

This is my last friendly reminder. Please stick to all DIS guidelines. From this point on, we’ll be giving warnings with full points. I’m sure no one wants to get points or lose their privileges to participate on the boards.

 

[Iggipolka]

Exactly. I have the opinion I have because I am traveling from North Texas. Our numbers are, and have been, following a similar track as Orlando/Florida. So, I personally don't feel at any higher risk there than I do here. Now, that perspective would likely be different if I lived in an area with completely different percentages/numbers.

You are correct in that the rate of cases in Texas is similar to Florida. Your family is probably at a similar risk in either state.
The thing I'd be concerned about if I were traveling to/from states with high rates of infection, is possibly spreading virus to children and other vaccinated people from states that currently don't have as high a count as Texas or Florida.

We canceled our August 2021 WDW trip from a highly vaccinated area due to our 9 year old not being able to be vaccinated yet. I'm sad to not go to WDW, but less sad than our child becoming seriously ill or unknowingly spreading virus to someone else's family member and them potentially getting ill.

 

[Jadyreen1282]

We canceled Aug27 to Sept4 this afternoon. Moved BWI to next June. We have POR booked in Feb. Hopefully better times. Might do a long weekend here before end of year. What a bloody mess. If we were closer than WI we'd probably just throw away the 6k and go drink in Epcot all week.

 

[Kmedders]

You are correct in that the rate of cases in Texas is similar to Florida. Your family is probably at a similar risk in either state.
The thing I'd be concerned about if I were traveling to/from states with high rates of infection, is possibly spreading virus to children and other vaccinated people from states that currently don't have as high a count as Texas or Florida.

We canceled our August 2021 WDW trip from a highly vaccinated area due to our 9 year old not being able to be vaccinated yet. I'm sad to not go to WDW, but less sad than our child potentially getting seriously ill or dead.

It might be different if I wasn’t confident that my family would follow social distancing practices and wear masks. If we are driving our own vehicle, wearing masks indoors and keeping our space from others, then we are not any higher risk to others. It truly does boil down to whether or not you are comfortable with the risks. It’s a personal decision. Anybody traveling to a “hot spot” right now has to weigh the risks on a personal level.

 

[GAN]

I’m not trying to convince anyone to go or not go. It’s such a personal decision with so many factors. Here’s my experience of recently going. I’ve been home 10 days now with no signs or symptoms of illness in me or anyone else in my travel party. Covid tests taken shortly after returning were negative.

My trip bridged the ‘no masks for vaccinated indoors’ to the newer ‘masks for everyone indoors’, so I was there for both. All adults in my travel party were fully vaccinated, kids not old enough yet. I was super nervous about the kids.

I wore kn95 masks with a fabric mask over it at the airport/on the plane/magical express both directions. The fabric mask was more because it was cute than for added protection. Most of my travel party did the same, or double-masked with a disposable surgical type mask on the bottom with a fabric mask on top for the airport/plane/bus.

Some days I double masked with a disposable surgical style mask with a fabric mask over or a kn95 with a fabric mask over (again for fashion….got to use my cute Disney masks), some days just a disposable mask, but most of my travel party did not double mask, they just used disposable surgical style masks or a fabric mask. These are the situations we masked up the entire trip, whether required or not:

• on transportation
• indoors (stores, attractions, restaurants if not eating/drinking)
• in queues (indoors or outdoors)
• outdoors when in crowds, which honestly was a lot of the time

At the beginning of the trip, we were definitely in the minority wearing masks anywhere but the buses. We used the Disney buses every day. We dined indoors at restaurants once a day. We spent time at the pool several evenings. We stayed for fireworks. Before the masks were required for all indoors, if my travel party was alone in a ride vehicle, we sometimes did take our masks off on rides. If we were with strangers or after the masks for all came back, we kept them on. We all had our own hand sanitizer bottles attached to our bags and sanitized after getting off attractions.

Would I do it again? I don’t know. It’s hard to know if our decision to mask up most of the time when we were around other people is what kept us all safe or if we just got lucky. I definitely went back and forth a lot about the indoor dining, but in the heat, the draw of a nice AC break won out. We did have a good time, but with the crowd levels what they were and almost all the previous covid safety precautions not in place for the beginning part of our trip, there was always that worry in the back of my mind.

You described to a "T" my plan for our trip in 3-weeks. Thanks for sharing....

 

[tentaguasu]

Part of the problem with postponing is... until when? Right now, I'm about 70% cancel, 30% go. (I don't need to decide for a while because we're set for December.)

But I have limited times when I can go - May works. December works. Maybe summer, but mostly May or December. So is it going to be better in May 2022? Or even December 2022?

It's just impossible to know.

And what if I push to December 2022, then get hit by a bus? I mean seriously - I had a coworker in her mid 50s. Started Covid lockdown happy as a clam (other than the lockdown). Just planning out the next half of the work year, when suddenly she doesn't show up to work. Had a terrible stomach ache, went to the ER. 5 months later, she's dead from colon cancer. Just. Like. That. Had no idea it was coming. She didn't get Covid, but she's not here today anyway.

Just to be clear, I'm not suggesting that everyone should go running to Disney. I probably wouldn't go today. Today, the risk is too high for me personally.

It's just that, and not to be creepy about it, but tomorrow isn't guaranteed for anyone. I have a relative that always wanted to go to Europe. She had friends that lived there that offered her places to stay in several countries. She definitely wanted to go one day. But "one day" was always next month or next year or whatever. There was always a reason why it'd be better tomorrow. Nothing happened to her, just that she got old. Now she's more than 80, has two hip replacements, and has trouble getting around. 20 years ago, when she first started thinking about going, she could have totally tromped around Rome or taken a walk in the French countryside. That's all gone now. I don't think her health would hold up. She never consciously decided not to go, but she postponed herself right out of the opportunity.

I have a teen. He'd excited to go. 12 months from now, who knows? I might have a sullen rebel who won't want to be there.

Anyway, just some random thoughts from someone who probably won't end up going until sometime next year (hopefully).

I have a few months yet to decide, but I'll *probably* postpone to May, eat my nonrefundable plane tickets (that I have from getting a trip to Europe cancelled back when this all started), and stay away from buses.

It has been helpful to hear everyone's perspective, so thanks for that.

Good luck to everyone with your decisions!