How do you plan your disney trip

devjohnson

Member
Original Poster
How do you guys plan your Disney trip? What I do is we go on a 7 day trip.

Day One - Relax at the resort after 2 days of driving to Florida
Day Two -Magic Kingdom (full day)
Day Three - Hollywood Studios plus Fantasmic! (full day)
Day Four - Rest and possibly go to Downtown Disney!
Day Five - Animal Kingdom (morning) and Epcot (evening)
Day Six - Blizzard Beach or Typhoon Lagoon
Day Seven - More Downtown Disney or some attractions outside of Disney property

What do you guys do?
 

alanbrai

Member
First off decide how many days and that has to be 10 or more. As far as Parks rotate in this order 1: MK 2: Epcot 3: DHS 4: AK 5:Water park, DTD or hang at resort. Then do it over again
 

timeman

Active Member
I don't plan anything until I get to Florida. For example I will be going again from June 19th - 29th which will give me 9 days down there. The parks I plan on hitting are Universal Studios & IOA, Busch Gardens, Seaworld, the Magic Kingdom, Epcot and Hollywood Studios. I plan on visiting one park a day which will leave me with two days to do anything else I want.

I don't know which days I will go to each park, but I do know that I will have to plan at least one day for Universal before I go so I can book the VIP Tour and hopefully get the guide I had last year.
 

sbkline

Well-Known Member
How do you guys plan your Disney trip? What I do is we go on a 7 day trip.

Day One - Relax at the resort after 2 days of driving to Florida
Day Two -Magic Kingdom (full day)
Day Three - Hollywood Studios plus Fantasmic! (full day)
Day Four - Rest and possibly go to Downtown Disney!
Day Five - Animal Kingdom (morning) and Epcot (evening)
Day Six - Blizzard Beach or Typhoon Lagoon
Day Seven - More Downtown Disney or some attractions outside of Disney property

What do you guys do?

You do that exact itinerary every trip? Nothing wrong with it if you do, but I was just curious if that was a sample itinerary for your next trip, or if you do it that way every time.

On our previous trips, I have always planned which park for which day. And on the last two trips, which were our 1st and 2nd on property stays, I not only planned which park on which day, but also what non-park activity we would do each day, which sit down restaraunt, etc.

I felt the magic sorely lacking on the last trip, and there are a few reasons why I can think of that this might be. I'm thinking perhaps one reason why the magic was missing is because I had such a detailed itinerary that it was like living out a script instead of just enjoying where the day takes us. So on the trip we hope to take in April, I'm going to try a different planning method. I'm going to have as little of an itinerary as possible. Obviously, we want to visit all four parks, and we want to visit Universal and possibly Islands of Adventure. As far as non-park activities, we want to go to Ft Wilderness and see the horses and everything. We want to go to DTD, and play some mini-golf both on property and off property. We want to go shopping in Orlando, like we always do and maybe go to GatorLand. Those are among the activities we plan to do, but unlike the last couple trips, I'm not going to make an iron clad itinerary for each specific day of what we are doing that day. I kind of want do decide as we go what we are doing next. For example, instead of memorizing my itinerary and telling my wife "This is Wednesday. Today we are going to the Magic Kingdom, then tonight we are going over to Ft Wilderness", I want to go to the park of our choice that day and then say to my wife "what do you want to do tonight? Ft Wilderness or Downtown Disney?" Maybe if we just decide as we go what we want to do and let the trip unfold as it may, rather than memorizing a schedule months in advance, I will experience more magic on this trip than on the last one.

So that's the plan for this next trip; have a few things we definitely want to do, but decide day by day what we're doing that day. :D
 

devjohnson

Member
Original Poster
You do that exact itinerary every trip? Nothing wrong with it if you do, but I was just curious if that was a sample itinerary for your next trip, or if you do it that way every time.

On our previous trips, I have always planned which park for which day. And on the last two trips, which were our 1st and 2nd on property stays, I not only planned which park on which day, but also what non-park activity we would do each day, which sit down restaraunt, etc.

I felt the magic sorely lacking on the last trip, and there are a few reasons why I can think of that this might be. I'm thinking perhaps one reason why the magic was missing is because I had such a detailed itinerary that it was like living out a script instead of just enjoying where the day takes us. So on the trip we hope to take in April, I'm going to try a different planning method. I'm going to have as little of an itinerary as possible. Obviously, we want to visit all four parks, and we want to visit Universal and possibly Islands of Adventure. As far as non-park activities, we want to go to Ft Wilderness and see the horses and everything. We want to go to DTD, and play some mini-golf both on property and off property. We want to go shopping in Orlando, like we always do and maybe go to GatorLand. Those are among the activities we plan to do, but unlike the last couple trips, I'm not going to make an iron clad itinerary for each specific day of what we are doing that day. I kind of want do decide as we go what we are doing next. For example, instead of memorizing my itinerary and telling my wife "This is Wednesday. Today we are going to the Magic Kingdom, then tonight we are going over to Ft Wilderness", I want to go to the park of our choice that day and then say to my wife "what do you want to do tonight? Ft Wilderness or Downtown Disney?" Maybe if we just decide as we go what we want to do and let the trip unfold as it may, rather than memorizing a schedule months in advance, I will experience more magic on this trip than on the last one.

So that's the plan for this next trip; have a few things we definitely want to do, but decide day by day what we're doing that day. :D


Well these arent really in order. We will go out to eat off property and stuff too, but our main activity for the day is listed above
 

Crush Dude!

Back from WDW!Counting down to DLP in November!
same here how can any1 plan wdw!! im goin for 3 weeks in july and all thats set in stone is princess storybook dinner at epcot the 1st week and ohana best friends breakfast at the polynesian the third week!!!:sohappy::sohappy::sohappy:
 
We don't plan much when we go. I feel like it takes the fun out of it. I think it is funny when I see families running around trying to see and ride everything because it is what was planned. I think you have much more fun if you just wing it. If you don't see everything, which you most likely wont unless you dont give yourself time to enjoy it all, then you have an excuse to come back again. Not that you need an excuse.
 

scheat

Active Member
We do plan it because that's part of the fun of the build-up to the trip. When we get there though, there's a lot of winging it that occurs instead of going by the pre-plan.
 

gwhb75

Well-Known Member
In general we only plan what park we are going to each day (altough with park hopper it isn't always what ends up happening). We do a lot of research before we go so we kind of know where things are and what the "big" attractions are to see, but we don't follow a formal plan (I think the plan would make things too stressful).
 

blackthidot

Well-Known Member
In the Parks
Yes
As soon as the park hours, and EMHs are released I start to schedule my days, and meals according to what parks stay open late...There is probably ZERO chance Id ever be up in time to use the extra hours in the morning!

Aside from making ADRs I probably dont need to plan like I do, but it really keeps me sane during the waiting time!
 

DizneyPryncess

Well-Known Member
It depends on how many days we stay, and how recently we've been there. We try to do parks that we haven't done as recently as others if we're crunched for time. We also promise to try a new restaurant to each time, and stick to a few favorites too. We typically schedule resort dining for days that we are not in parks. Here's our schedule for this week

Monday: Check in, dinner at Kona, watch fireworks from beach
Tuesday: EMH morning Epcot, lunch at Akershus, break during the afternoon, back at night.
Wednesday: Pool day, dinner at Cali Grille. DTD visit in the afternoon maybe.
Thursday: EMH morning at MK, afternoon & evening at DHS for Fantasmic
Friday: Morning at MK, afternoon picnic lunch at AK. Night is open.
Saturday: Pool day, DTD visit in late afternoon, dinner at Boma.
Sunday: Segway tour in Epcot in morning, afternoon/evening open.
Monday: Leave. =(
 

Enchantâmes

Active Member
Well its usually just me and my mom who go so we just do what park or parks we feel like doing that day. No real planning involved because we rarely ever follow those plans.
 

10East75South

New Member
Final Itinerary:
Day One - leave Texas, drive to Florida
Day Two - Magic Kingdom, lunch and swim, check in at Movies, dinner at Ohana's
Day Three - Hollywood Studios, dinner at Primetime, hoping to be able to stay for Fantasmic
Day Four - (Anniversary) - Magic Kingdom, kids have Tea in Wonderland in afternoon, dinner at The Wave
Day Five - Epcot - dinner at Teppan Edo
Day Six - Magic Kingdom - dinner at Crystal Palace
Day Seven - Animal Kingdom - swim day, dinner at Boatright's
Day Eight - Epcot - dinner at Le Celliar
Day Nine - leave Florida, drive back to Texas

Plan requirements suggested:
- 1 day at AK and DHS, just feel like we can't ignore those parks, but the other 2 just have more to them
- basic ideal that through dining plan counter service meals for lunch and ADR for Table service credits for dinners, set for some time before 6pm.
- MK on day we get there and our anniversary

Action in place:
The last 3 days got all switched around based on when we could get in at Le Celliar - did want to have last day at MK but couldn't get Le Celliar any other time.
Any day can be ditched/back to room for swim given children are 7, 5 and 2.

Past results:
We've planned this way before - having most planned out - we get the Magic out of it by getting the most out of the planning.

Trick this time:
Have been planning this trip since November - and children have no idea it is occuring.
 

BigB911

New Member
Last year, I planned which parks we would visit on each day, and then made my ADR's.

This time around, I'll make my ADR's first to make sure I get the ones I want. The park we visit will depend on the ADR. Except for 09/29, MNSSHP night and our last night there. Our last park has to be MK.
 

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