the1975christina
when hinges creak in doorless chambers...
- Joined
- Oct 6, 2016
Hi there!!!
I have been lurking Disboards for a while now, but I am just now making an account and posting things (this is my first official post AHHHH)!!! I'm roughly near the middle when it comes to WDW planning but honestly, I'm not 100% sure. This is my first time going to WDW and so I'm entirely guessing here. First, a little bit of background:
Who:
This trip is going to just be me (17) and my best friend (18). We're going for her 18th birthday and we've both been heavily preparing as this is our first trip alone without parents. This will be my first lengthy vacation ever and my first time on the East Coast! We are both paying for our halves of the trip entirely on our own (which has been surprisingly manageable when neither of us have to *big* bills and we both work 30 hours a week), so literally every step of this process has been on us. I'm hoping that some of you on here who are experts at this whole thing can help me out with some of the aspects of the trip. However, I happen to be obsessed with planning (I plan vacations I would never be able to afford just for fun) and for never having visited WDW I am pretty familiar with it.
About me- I love Disney Parks, obviously, particularly Disneyland, Tokyo Disney Sea, and now Disneyland Shanghai! My favorite Disney movies are Monsters Inc, Beauty and the Beast, and any of the Disney revival princess films (especially Princess and the Frog)! I also have a semi-recent obsession for Star Wars, especially Kylo Ren!
My favorite Disney rides are Haunted Mansion and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad!!
About my best friend- She loves Disney Parks, especially Disneyland. Her favorite Disney movies are Hercules and Tangled! Her favorite Disney ride is it's a small world!
Here's us at DCA (I'm on the left)!
Why:
Growing up, the Disney parks (Disneyland specifically) seemed like a myth to me. Every year my mom would tell me that we would try to go and we never ended up being able to go. When I was 13 I found out about the Disney College Program and my first thought was, "oh my God, I can work there?!?!" Since then a kind of love that I've never felt for anything else has been instilled in me and I've spent countless, countless hours watching vlogs and reading posts on Disboards. For my best friend's 16th birthday (January 2015), she invited me to go to Disneyland with her family and we talked about it for months on end. I cannot even begin to describe what I felt when I stepped foot on Main Street, but I'm sure that anyone reading this understands. Actually spending three days in Disneyland made my obsession even worse, which my family didn't think possible. They ended up surprising me with a one day trip for my 16th birthday (June 2015), and that was the last time I was at a Disney park. So naturally, seven months ago when my best friend texted me and said she "kinda" wanted to go to Disney World for her 18th birthday, my response was "I am literally planning right now." Fast forward to now and we are deep in the planning stages of a nine day WDW trip. I decided to take to Disboards because I am literally driving everyone crazy with the non-stop Disney talk.
When and Where:
My best friend's birthday is January 24th, and we are leaving January 25th (on the earliest flight we could within our price range) and coming back February 2nd! I know that the Pro Bowl is going on during this time, but we were already so far into planning when we found out that we figured we'd just hope for the best in terms of crowds. We have 5 day single park tickets and we're also going to Universal!! We decided to stay at Art of Animation, because I have a particular liking of it and there was no way we could afford her first choice (Wilderness Lodge!)
The Plans So Far:
We are only 110 days out from our trip (ahhh!!!), so we have already booked everything, paid for our flights, and handled our ADRs. I did ADRs entirely on my own and I've never felt so proud of myself. We've already chosen which parks we wanted to go to on which days, based on a crowd calendar, so that we could get our ADRs done but since then the crowd calendars have changed so much that I'm not 100% sure we'll end up sticking to this schedule.
So far this is our rough itinerary:
Day 1 (Jan 25): Arrival- fly into MCO at 10:54am, explore our resort (largest pool on WDW property!!) and possibly visit Disney Springs if we're feeling up to it!
Day 2 (Jan 26): Epcot- a lot of what I read recommended Epcot as the first park you visit so we are doing it first! So far we have no *real* food plans in Epcot, and we have no FP+ because we are still 110 days out.
Day 3 (Jan 27): Magic Kingdom!!- I am SO SO excited for this day because we have a 6:15pm reservation at Be Our Guest (definitely the thing that I am most looking forward too)! We are also planning on seeing FoF on this day but those are our only plans so far.
Day 4 (Jan 28): Animal Kingdom- We are probably going to eat at Restaurantosaurus, but nothing is for sure yet. We're also eyeing Rainforest Cafe.
Day 5 (Jan 29): rest day/Disney SPrings/resort hopping (?)- We decided we needed a break day or we would quite literally die
so we'll probably just lay around for most of the day. However, we definitely want to get some DTD exploring done (shopping!!) and we have a reservation at 1900 Park Fare at 7:30pm!
Day 6 (Jan 30): Hollywood Studios- one of the things I'm most excited for!!! Star Wars and Fantasmic?? YES!!!!!! Fantasmic is one of my favorite things in the world, so we decided to Minnie's Seasonal Dine at Hollywood & Vine (4:35pm). We are hoping to also catch the Star Wars Fireworks (fingers crossed) and of course do literally every other Star Wars thing (she's not a big SW fan, but I am)!
Day 7 (Jan 31): Magic Kingdom day 2- We're eating at Be Our Guest again (!!), but this time for lunch (2:00pm)!! No other plans so far.
Day 8 (Feb 1): Universal Studios/Islands of Adventure- We know that we are FOR SURE eating at one of the Harry Potter restaurants but we haven't decided which one yet (if anyone has any opinions on which one is better, I'd love to hear)! Best friend is not big on thrill rides so a lot of them are out of her comfort zone, which is fine because we only have one day here! As of right now we also have a breakfast reservation at 'Ohana at 7:30am, meaning we'd get to the park late. I'm wondering if we could possibly switch this to our last day, but I'm not sure if that's too ambitious considering we fly home at 11am (opinions? I'm not very familiar with flying and we don't know how early we'll have to be at the airport yet).
Day 9 (Feb 2): Arrival- fly home from MCO at 11:23am
It's a semi-early flight back, but I need to be home that night so we had no other choice! 
The Next Steps and Questions I have:
We are currently in the midst of making must-see lists for each park that way we know what we want FP+ for and we can make more in depth touring plans. I'm also editing my budget (again!) because we just bought our flights and everything! The only big questions/concerns I have at this point are mostly regarding flying and transportation to and from the parks. If anyone could offer any tips on flying: how early we should be at the airport, how exactly Magical Express works, etc., I'd be more than thankful. To get from our hotel to the parks and back we'll most likely use the Disney busses but again I'm not very familiar with those: how will we know when a bus is arriving and how many stops it's going to make before we get to the park we're trying to get to that day?
My next update will most likely just be a general update, maybe a more in depth itinerary. If you actually read through this whole thing then thank you!!!! Any tips or comments would be much appreciated!
PS: Sorry for the excessive use of explanation points! I'm just so excited!!
I have been lurking Disboards for a while now, but I am just now making an account and posting things (this is my first official post AHHHH)!!! I'm roughly near the middle when it comes to WDW planning but honestly, I'm not 100% sure. This is my first time going to WDW and so I'm entirely guessing here. First, a little bit of background:Who:
This trip is going to just be me (17) and my best friend (18). We're going for her 18th birthday and we've both been heavily preparing as this is our first trip alone without parents. This will be my first lengthy vacation ever and my first time on the East Coast! We are both paying for our halves of the trip entirely on our own (which has been surprisingly manageable when neither of us have to *big* bills and we both work 30 hours a week), so literally every step of this process has been on us. I'm hoping that some of you on here who are experts at this whole thing can help me out with some of the aspects of the trip. However, I happen to be obsessed with planning (I plan vacations I would never be able to afford just for fun) and for never having visited WDW I am pretty familiar with it.
About me- I love Disney Parks, obviously, particularly Disneyland, Tokyo Disney Sea, and now Disneyland Shanghai! My favorite Disney movies are Monsters Inc, Beauty and the Beast, and any of the Disney revival princess films (especially Princess and the Frog)! I also have a semi-recent obsession for Star Wars, especially Kylo Ren!
My favorite Disney rides are Haunted Mansion and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad!! About my best friend- She loves Disney Parks, especially Disneyland. Her favorite Disney movies are Hercules and Tangled! Her favorite Disney ride is it's a small world!
Here's us at DCA (I'm on the left)!
Why:
Growing up, the Disney parks (Disneyland specifically) seemed like a myth to me. Every year my mom would tell me that we would try to go and we never ended up being able to go. When I was 13 I found out about the Disney College Program and my first thought was, "oh my God, I can work there?!?!" Since then a kind of love that I've never felt for anything else has been instilled in me and I've spent countless, countless hours watching vlogs and reading posts on Disboards. For my best friend's 16th birthday (January 2015), she invited me to go to Disneyland with her family and we talked about it for months on end. I cannot even begin to describe what I felt when I stepped foot on Main Street, but I'm sure that anyone reading this understands. Actually spending three days in Disneyland made my obsession even worse, which my family didn't think possible. They ended up surprising me with a one day trip for my 16th birthday (June 2015), and that was the last time I was at a Disney park. So naturally, seven months ago when my best friend texted me and said she "kinda" wanted to go to Disney World for her 18th birthday, my response was "I am literally planning right now." Fast forward to now and we are deep in the planning stages of a nine day WDW trip. I decided to take to Disboards because I am literally driving everyone crazy with the non-stop Disney talk.
When and Where:
My best friend's birthday is January 24th, and we are leaving January 25th (on the earliest flight we could within our price range) and coming back February 2nd! I know that the Pro Bowl is going on during this time, but we were already so far into planning when we found out that we figured we'd just hope for the best in terms of crowds. We have 5 day single park tickets and we're also going to Universal!! We decided to stay at Art of Animation, because I have a particular liking of it and there was no way we could afford her first choice (Wilderness Lodge!)
The Plans So Far:
We are only 110 days out from our trip (ahhh!!!), so we have already booked everything, paid for our flights, and handled our ADRs. I did ADRs entirely on my own and I've never felt so proud of myself. We've already chosen which parks we wanted to go to on which days, based on a crowd calendar, so that we could get our ADRs done but since then the crowd calendars have changed so much that I'm not 100% sure we'll end up sticking to this schedule.
So far this is our rough itinerary:
Day 1 (Jan 25): Arrival- fly into MCO at 10:54am, explore our resort (largest pool on WDW property!!) and possibly visit Disney Springs if we're feeling up to it!
Day 2 (Jan 26): Epcot- a lot of what I read recommended Epcot as the first park you visit so we are doing it first! So far we have no *real* food plans in Epcot, and we have no FP+ because we are still 110 days out.
Day 3 (Jan 27): Magic Kingdom!!- I am SO SO excited for this day because we have a 6:15pm reservation at Be Our Guest (definitely the thing that I am most looking forward too)! We are also planning on seeing FoF on this day but those are our only plans so far.
Day 4 (Jan 28): Animal Kingdom- We are probably going to eat at Restaurantosaurus, but nothing is for sure yet. We're also eyeing Rainforest Cafe.
Day 5 (Jan 29): rest day/Disney SPrings/resort hopping (?)- We decided we needed a break day or we would quite literally die
so we'll probably just lay around for most of the day. However, we definitely want to get some DTD exploring done (shopping!!) and we have a reservation at 1900 Park Fare at 7:30pm!Day 6 (Jan 30): Hollywood Studios- one of the things I'm most excited for!!! Star Wars and Fantasmic?? YES!!!!!! Fantasmic is one of my favorite things in the world, so we decided to Minnie's Seasonal Dine at Hollywood & Vine (4:35pm). We are hoping to also catch the Star Wars Fireworks (fingers crossed) and of course do literally every other Star Wars thing (she's not a big SW fan, but I am
)!Day 7 (Jan 31): Magic Kingdom day 2- We're eating at Be Our Guest again (!!), but this time for lunch (2:00pm)!! No other plans so far.
Day 8 (Feb 1): Universal Studios/Islands of Adventure- We know that we are FOR SURE eating at one of the Harry Potter restaurants but we haven't decided which one yet (if anyone has any opinions on which one is better, I'd love to hear)! Best friend is not big on thrill rides so a lot of them are out of her comfort zone, which is fine because we only have one day here! As of right now we also have a breakfast reservation at 'Ohana at 7:30am, meaning we'd get to the park late. I'm wondering if we could possibly switch this to our last day, but I'm not sure if that's too ambitious considering we fly home at 11am (opinions? I'm not very familiar with flying and we don't know how early we'll have to be at the airport yet).
Day 9 (Feb 2): Arrival- fly home from MCO at 11:23am
It's a semi-early flight back, but I need to be home that night so we had no other choice! The Next Steps and Questions I have:
We are currently in the midst of making must-see lists for each park that way we know what we want FP+ for and we can make more in depth touring plans. I'm also editing my budget (again!) because we just bought our flights and everything! The only big questions/concerns I have at this point are mostly regarding flying and transportation to and from the parks. If anyone could offer any tips on flying: how early we should be at the airport, how exactly Magical Express works, etc., I'd be more than thankful. To get from our hotel to the parks and back we'll most likely use the Disney busses but again I'm not very familiar with those: how will we know when a bus is arriving and how many stops it's going to make before we get to the park we're trying to get to that day?
My next update will most likely just be a general update, maybe a more in depth itinerary. If you actually read through this whole thing then thank you!!!! Any tips or comments would be much appreciated!
PS: Sorry for the excessive use of explanation points! I'm just so excited!!
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