So... how carried away do you get with your WDW trip planning?

[Cowboy Steve]

Just how obsessive and disruptive to normal daily life is your pre-trip planning regiment? Being an analytical and compulsive planner, it was only natural that I would start to get a little carried away with the planning stages of our trips. Each trip my planning gets a little more involved. I'm sure I am an entry-level Disney pre-planner so I'm looking forward to what other folks do to organize and plan their trips! As we only can afford to come, at most, once a year, I try to make sure we maximize our experience!

Disney vacations are a family tradition for us. We first visited WDW in 1972 - I was 6 and my sister was 2. We lost count of the early visits, but we figure we are at around 14 visits - including 3 visits since 2011 (this year will make 4). Our recent return to Disney vacations was my mother's idea. She enjoys vacationing with my sister and I. And since we love to plan the vacation, she just sits back and let's us handle the planning. All the recent trips have been between Thanksgiving and Christmas - with the last 2 being the week after Thanksgiving. This year's trip will be the same time. We have learned a lot from those recent trips!

Mom always wanted to see the parks decorated for the Holidays, so in 2011 she planted the idea of going in December. Turns out we loved that trip sooo much, we have returned during that time period every trip since!

STEP ONE - Resort selection. In 2011 we stayed at the Port Orleans - French Quarter and LOVED it! We returned in 2012 and stayed there again. In 2014 we wanted to try something new and selected Coronado Springs. We didn't care for that location only because of the distance we were from the food court, front desk, store etc. For this year's stay we started our trip planning by making a 'short list' of new resorts we wanted to try. I, of course, made a spreadsheet. Complete with links to the various resorts:



After a long and somewhat exhaustive 'family meeting', we selected our resort for this year: Caribbean Beach Resort! Our first choice was going to be our first time at a Deluxe Resort - the Wilderness Lodge. But, after finding out the pool area would be closed during our trip, we decided to go with option 2 - CBR. We are rarely at the hotel, so it was hard to justify the cost of the Deluxe Resorts... but with a full 'rest day' scheduled in the middle of our stay, we thought we would try one. A day to rest around the pool is just what the doctor ordered on an 8 day trip! Since the pool at WL was going to be OOS, we opted to go back to a moderate resort. We went with a 'Preferred' room so we could be close to the main buildings (pool, food court, store, etc).

So... how nutso am I? My next post (if there is interest) will cover the current 12 tab spreadsheet and the lengths we went to selecting TS meals and making reservations for the trip!

Please! Share your pre-planning process! Please let me know I'm not alone... lol

 

[Wendy Pleakley]

That spreadsheet might appear excessive at first glance, but it's really not.

I've already looked at resort & package rates for 2016 multiple times, in order to get a feel for what a 2017 trip is expected to cost. I've written down a few notes, but throwing it into a spreadsheet rather than looking things up again and again makes so much sense.

My planning generally consists of a document listing the park hours day by day, making note of any EMH or special event such as MNSSHP. I have a list of restaurants I'm interested in. I have a rough idea of how many days I want to spend at each park.

From that it's pretty easy to come up with a plan of where to be each day. Once that is done I make the dining reservations, which occasionally warrants a change to park plans depending on availability.

 

[KikoKea]

Whether it's using a humble sheet of notebook paper or an Excel spreadsheet worthy of the boardroom, planning, plotting, and "researching" is a great deal of fun- especially if you have park music playing in the back ground.

Plan on, my friends!

 

[YozhikRoth]

That's eerily similar to my own vacation planning manifesto. My kids laugh that I take all the fun out, but I always tell them that planning a Disney vacation is on par with a military excursion. And there is definitely no fun in standing in line and not getting your ADRs.

 

[Much-Pixie-Dust]

That's eerily similar to my own vacation planning manifesto. My kids laugh that I take all the fun out, but I always tell them that planning a Disney vacation is on par with a military excursion. And there is definitely no fun in standing in line and not getting your ADRs.

This is me! I call it "structured fun" to my family. My family laughs at me, but they always love the trips!

 

[Cowboy Steve]

This is me! I call it "structured fun" to my family. My family laughs at me, but they always love the trips!

As long as they love the trips - that is all that matters!

 

[Much-Pixie-Dust]

As long as they love the trips - that is all that matters!

Yep! And I love the planning. It's fun to me. Have a great trip and keep planning on.

 

[KaliSplash]

Well, I now feel like a seat of the pants piker! We have a general discussion on date and resort. As time for trip approaches, we hold an official family meeting with food and drinks and plot out days down to half/hour periods, taking into consideration Magic Hours, restaurants we want, etc. Unfortunately, we have not had a visit of more than 2 days since 2008 so we will have to refine our planning methods for the next big trip, probably still at least a couple of years away. But we did plan a one-day family trip to introduce our new daughter-in-law to Epcot (she had only been o MK many years ago) and I was greatly encourage when one of my sons contacted me about planning session. We did that all via email exchanges a couple of years ago. I handled all the My Disney Experience stuff after the email exchanges. It worked well even for just a one day trip. Very much looking forward to planning our next 5-7 day trip! (and yes, while we plan in half-hour increments, we do adjust on the fly and update the plan at night based on extra things we've done, etc.)

Disney planning IS a very fund thing to do.

 

[MinnieM123]

Just how obsessive and disruptive to normal daily life is your pre-trip planning regiment? Being an analytical and compulsive planner, it was only natural that I would start to get a little carried away with the planning stages of our trips. Each trip my planning gets a little more involved. I'm sure I am an entry-level Disney pre-planner so I'm looking forward to what other folks do to organize and plan their trips! As we only can afford to come, at most, once a year, I try to make sure we maximize our experience!

Disney vacations are a family tradition for us. We first visited WDW in 1972 - I was 6 and my sister was 2. We lost count of the early visits, but we figure we are at around 14 visits - including 3 visits since 2011 (this year will make 4). Our recent return to Disney vacations was my mother's idea. She enjoys vacationing with my sister and I. And since we love to plan the vacation, she just sits back and let's us handle the planning. All the recent trips have been between Thanksgiving and Christmas - with the last 2 being the week after Thanksgiving. This year's trip will be the same time. We have learned a lot from those recent trips!

Mom always wanted to see the parks decorated for the Holidays, so in 2011 she planted the idea of going in December. Turns out we loved that trip sooo much, we have returned during that time period every trip since!

STEP ONE - Resort selection. In 2011 we stayed at the Port Orleans - French Quarter and LOVED it! We returned in 2012 and stayed there again. In 2014 we wanted to try something new and selected Coronado Springs. We didn't care for that location only because of the distance we were from the food court, front desk, store etc. For this year's stay we started our trip planning by making a 'short list' of new resorts we wanted to try. I, of course, made a spreadsheet. Complete with links to the various resorts:



After a long and somewhat exhaustive 'family meeting', we selected our resort for this year: Caribbean Beach Resort! Our first choice was going to be our first time at a Deluxe Resort - the Wilderness Lodge. But, after finding out the pool area would be closed during our trip, we decided to go with option 2 - CBR. We are rarely at the hotel, so it was hard to justify the cost of the Deluxe Resorts... but with a full 'rest day' scheduled in the middle of our stay, we thought we would try one. A day to rest around the pool is just what the doctor ordered on an 8 day trip! Since the pool at WL was going to be OOS, we opted to go back to a moderate resort. We went with a 'Preferred' room so we could be close to the main buildings (pool, food court, store, etc).

So... how nutso am I? My next post (if there is interest) will cover the current 12 tab spreadsheet and the lengths we went to selecting TS meals and making reservations for the trip!

Please! Share your pre-planning process! Please let me know I'm not alone... lol

One of the nicest comments in your post is about how everyone came together as a family, and all contributed to the discussion about vacation planning (with your detailed spreadsheets as a helpful reference ).

I'm not a planner, myself, but I respect the various approaches people have in making decisions about their trip. That's the beauty of a WDW vacation; there's something for everyone, and many different methods work well to guide us there. I wish you and your family a very pleasant vacation.

 

[epcotisbest]

Focus your energy on things that actually matter.

Interesting.

 

[Susan Savia]

Our planning sessions usually take place in the car on the way home from WDW.
When do we want to go next and how long do we want to stay (14 days of course).
Room is secured online. IF we eat in the parks its CS and we're not about to sit
up all hours of the night to reserve a 2 minute ride 6 months in advance. Works for us!

 

[Ghostdog]

When our kids were little my husband used to make do a spreadsheet for all our trips; now that they're teenagers we just wing it. We also get the park hopper ticket which makes things easier.

 

[jrogue]

My mom and I love to do the Disney planning, but I will admit that my vacations with my parents are wing it more than the ones I plan on my own. My parents make the ADRs and plan which parks we will go to based on park hours that day. However, I plan down to the hour to give us enough time to travel certain places, make sure we get everything in, etc. Of course there is leeway in my plans as well, but I feel like mine are way more structured and allow us to get a lot more done faster.

In my beginning planning stages I compare flight dates and prices. We only really stay at the Polynesian, but this year we decided to expand our options to both the Contemporary and the Animal Kingdom Lodge. We compare the prices for all 3 based on a few different travel dates. Then once we have an idea of prices we combine flights and hotel and see which would give us the cheapest option.

My family is easy in that we all generally like to eat at the same places and like to do the same rides, so we plan each accordingly with the available park hours. However, where my family and I differ is that I will make notes of when we need to leave, about what time we should expect to ride, etc. I also then print out mini booklets to make sure we stick to the itinerary as much as possible. Last time I went with my boyfriend we stuck to the itinerary and finished everything we wanted to do within 3 1/2 days of our 5 day trip! It left plenty of time to relax and take the rest of the time doing whatever we want.

 

[Cowboy Steve]

My mom and I love to do the Disney planning, but I will admit that my vacations with my parents are wing it more than the ones I plan on my own. My parents make the ADRs and plan which parks we will go to based on park hours that day. However, I plan down to the hour to give us enough time to travel certain places, make sure we get everything in, etc. Of course there is leeway in my plans as well, but I feel like mine are way more structured and allow us to get a lot more done faster.

In my beginning planning stages I compare flight dates and prices. We only really stay at the Polynesian, but this year we decided to expand our options to both the Contemporary and the Animal Kingdom Lodge. We compare the prices for all 3 based on a few different travel dates. Then once we have an idea of prices we combine flights and hotel and see which would give us the cheapest option.

My family is easy in that we all generally like to eat at the same places and like to do the same rides, so we plan each accordingly with the available park hours. However, where my family and I differ is that I will make notes of when we need to leave, about what time we should expect to ride, etc. I also then print out mini booklets to make sure we stick to the itinerary as much as possible. Last time I went with my boyfriend we stuck to the itinerary and finished everything we wanted to do within 3 1/2 days of our 5 day trip! It left plenty of time to relax and take the rest of the time doing whatever we want.
View attachment 145245 View attachment 145246

Nice! I might have to make up a little something like what you have printed up!

 

[Cowboy Steve]

Trip Planning Part 2: So once we decided what resort we were staying at, we had several months before our 180 days out to plan out what parks we would visit each day. And of course that gave me plenty of time to create a new spreadsheet! This proved difficult, as we had to wait for the release of the MVMCP dates, and the park hours for our week were not posted until about 190 days out... so we had a little over a week to figure out what parks we were going to on what day. That information was important so we could plan our ADRs around our daily schedule. We knew we wanted to do MVMCP... so that limited what days we could visit MK. We picked Tues of our trip for MVMCP... as it will be a late night (12:00am), and Wed is scheduled to be our 'rest' day. We opted to visit AK on Sunday... as there was going to be so many new things going on in the park, (assuming the extended hours listed for summer would be extended into the fall/winter schedule), This would give us an opportunity to revisit AK later in the week if we were rained out. EMHs were a factor in laying out the rest of our visit. That part of the new spread sheet looked like this:


We each (my sister and I - Mom and fiance don't care they just like to eat) came up with a 'short list' of where we might like to eat. We also discussed seeing a dinner show (we opted for 'Spirit of Aloha' the day we arrive), and any other special events we wanted to do (Wishes Fireworks Dessert Party). We then got together (and had several phone calls) to put together our 'wish list' of desired TS locations and times. At 7am on our 180 days out, I had my completed list and hit the Disney site! I then listed it all out, with our flight information, and our FP+ times (when we make them) on another page of the spreadsheet:


For the most part, we got every reservation we wanted with one exception - BOG. We wanted a dinner reservation on the day of MVMCP - but the dinner hours are only from 4-6:15pm, and they were long gone before we hit our 180 days. In fact, I barely got a dinner reservation at BOG on the very last day of our trip! The 'Wishes Fireworks Dessert Party' was not showing up on the online reservation page... but on a hunch I called the dining reservation line, and they were able to get us tickets on the night we wanted. It did not show up in their system as 'Wishes...' but rather as the 'Terrace Dessert Party' or something. Same thing for the 'Spirit of Aloha' dinner show - the dates during our trip were not released online for us to select. But when we called in - they were showing up in their system. Once all our dinner reservations were made... I started on the daily pages. Over the next few months, we will add things to these pages (FP+, Parades, Shows, etc). These will not be hard and fast schedules, but rather a way to see when and where things are happening we would like to do. An example of those pages are:



Just before the trip I will tweak the pages, and save them as PDFs on my smart phone. It will be our back up to the MDE app - which should have most of that information as well. I'm not as familiar with the MDE app yet... so a back up isn't all bad lol

 

[Noellikechristmas]

Steve...I'm I loving the spreadsheets...I use them all the time. I work with spreadsheets. I make them to figure out where to stay, where to vacation (if not DW), costs, comparing, DVC spreadsheets...I love em'...and I want to see all 12 tabs.

I've been to Disney 6 times, last year was my first on property and I must say...I wish someone told me sooner about renting DVC points. I would have rented them and stayed in a deluxe resort for a fraction of the price. But anyways...How I plan? Once I figure out where I'm staying and my dates, I look at crowd predictors. Figure out which park to visit each day. Look at reviews for restaurants and select my top picks. I then try to pair them up based on location to the park I'll be in that day. Anything to avoid bus rides. I'd rather walk, travel by boat or monorail. Last week I made a handy sheet of after hours stuff like fireworks, times the bars on my bucket list close and some other stuff. This why I don't have to google anything, I have everything right there ready to do, can look in a hot minute and figure out my plan for the evening. I may only go out once or twice cause I have a little one, but I'm also going with another couple that doesn't have kids and I know they'll appreciate it. I actually had everything planned before they decided to join us and they pretty much told me they really wanted to come with me (and my itinerary) because they know nothing about Disney and are overwhelmed by it.....I'm converting them ;-) Please share more tabs!

 

[Cowboy Steve]

Steve...I'm I loving the spreadsheets...I use them all the time. I work with spreadsheets. I make them to figure out where to stay, where to vacation (if not DW), costs, comparing, DVC spreadsheets...I love em'...and I want to see all 12 tabs.

I've been to Disney 6 times, last year was my first on property and I must say...I wish someone told me sooner about renting DVC points. I would have rented them and stayed in a deluxe resort for a fraction of the price. But anyways...How I plan? Once I figure out where I'm staying and my dates, I look at crowd predictors. Figure out which park to visit each day. Look at reviews for restaurants and select my top picks. I then try to pair them up based on location to the park I'll be in that day. Anything to avoid bus rides. I'd rather walk, travel by boat or monorail. Last week I made a handy sheet of after hours stuff like fireworks, times the bars on my bucket list close and some other stuff. This why I don't have to google anything, I have everything right there ready to do, can look in a hot minute and figure out my plan for the evening. I may only go out once or twice cause I have a little one, but I'm also going with another couple that doesn't have kids and I know they'll appreciate it. I actually had everything planned before they decided to join us and they pretty much told me they really wanted to come with me (and my itinerary) because they know nothing about Disney and are overwhelmed by it.....I'm converting them ;-) Please share more tabs!

Thanks! The other pages are just the individual 9 days of our trip like I show above with Thurs and Fri. And I have a tips/notes page we really haven't populated yet lol. So page one is the trip details summary (flight info; resort, dining reservation, and FP+ confirmation numbers & times), page 2 is the one showing the entire week's schedule, pages 3-11 are each individual day of the trip, and page 12 is the tips/notes page.

And I may just have to look into renting DVC points... I love the concept of the DVC, but at 50, don't know if I would get my money's worth out of buying in 125 points or so. I guess they do hold their value pretty good, so if I wanted to sell them later I would probably break even... but... lol

 

[MinnieM123]

Trip Planning Part 2: So once we decided what resort we were staying at, we had several months before our 180 days out to plan out what parks we would visit each day. And of course that gave me plenty of time to create a new spreadsheet! This proved difficult, as we had to wait for the release of the MVMCP dates, and the park hours for our week were not posted until about 190 days out... so we had a little over a week to figure out what parks we were going to on what day. That information was important so we could plan our ADRs around our daily schedule. We knew we wanted to do MVMCP... so that limited what days we could visit MK. We decided to on the Tues of our trip... as it will be a late night (12:00am), and Wed is scheduled to be our 'rest' day. We opted to visit AK on Sunday... as there was going to be so many new things going on in the park, (assuming the extended hours listed for summer would be extended into the fall/winter schedule), This would give us an opportunity to revisit AK later in the week if we were rained out. EMHs were a factor in laying out the rest of our visit. That part of the new spread sheet looked like this:


We each (my sister and I - Mom and fiance don't care they just like to eat) came up with a 'short list' of where we might like to eat. We also discussed seeing a dinner show (we opted for 'Spirit of Aloha' the day we arrive), and any other special events we wanted to do (Wishes Fireworks Dessert Party). We then got together (and had several phone calls) to put together our 'wish list' of desired TS locations and times. At 7am on our 180 days out, I had my completed list and hit the Disney site! I then listed it all out, with our flight information, and our FP+ times (when we make them) on another page of the spreadsheet:


For the most part, we got every reservation we wanted with one exception - BOG. We wanted a dinner reservation on the day of MVMCP - but the dinner hours are only from 4-6:15pm, and they were long gone before we hit our 180 days. In fact, I barely got a dinner reservation at BOG on the very last day of our trip! The 'Wishes Fireworks Dessert Party' was not showing up on the online reservation page... but on a hunch I called the dining reservation line, and they were able to get us tickets on the night we wanted. It did not show up in their system as 'Wishes...' but rather as the 'Terrace Dessert Party' or something. Same thing for the 'Spirit of Aloha' dinner show - the dates during our trip were not released online for us to select. But when we called in - they were showing up in their system. Once all our dinner reservations were made... I started on the daily pages. Over the next few months, we will add things to these pages (FP+, Parades, Shows, etc). These will not be hard and fast schedules, but rather a way to see when and where things are happening we would like to do. An example of those pages are:



Just before the trip I will tweak the pages, and save them as PDFs on my smart phone. It will be our back up to the MDE app - which should have most of that information as well. I'm not as familiar with the MDE app yet... so a back up isn't all bad lol

I'm still following along here, and enjoying your enthusiasm!! This is not even my trip, but I'm getting (vicarious) pre-trip excitement!

 

[Second Star to the Right]

My mom and I love to do the Disney planning, but I will admit that my vacations with my parents are wing it more than the ones I plan on my own. My parents make the ADRs and plan which parks we will go to based on park hours that day. However, I plan down to the hour to give us enough time to travel certain places, make sure we get everything in, etc. Of course there is leeway in my plans as well, but I feel like mine are way more structured and allow us to get a lot more done faster.

In my beginning planning stages I compare flight dates and prices. We only really stay at the Polynesian, but this year we decided to expand our options to both the Contemporary and the Animal Kingdom Lodge. We compare the prices for all 3 based on a few different travel dates. Then once we have an idea of prices we combine flights and hotel and see which would give us the cheapest option.

My family is easy in that we all generally like to eat at the same places and like to do the same rides, so we plan each accordingly with the available park hours. However, where my family and I differ is that I will make notes of when we need to leave, about what time we should expect to ride, etc. I also then print out mini booklets to make sure we stick to the itinerary as much as possible. Last time I went with my boyfriend we stuck to the itinerary and finished everything we wanted to do within 3 1/2 days of our 5 day trip! It left plenty of time to relax and take the rest of the time doing whatever we want.
View attachment 145245 View attachment 145246

Those mini-booklets are the best things I have seen. That's basically what I have going right now in an excel sheet in miniature form!

 

[BraveLikeMerida]

We are spreadsheet people too. Some of my family members love to tease me about it, but my printed copies of my spreadsheets saved us when MDE had some downtime during our trip. We still made all of our reservations and FastPasses!

 

[Minnesota disney fan]

Wow, OP, just WOW! I had no idea that some people planned so much for a Disney trip! It's amazing, and I am learning a lot and living through you about our upcoming trip in November to WDW.
I'm the planner for my husband and me. But we try to be less structured each trip. Last trip we gave up the dining plan, and just paid out of pocket. Gotta tell ya, it was great to Not have to be somewhere at a certain time to eat, even if we were not hungry, too hot, not in the mood for sit down, you get the picture. I also set up fp's for 4 of our 10 days only, and then we only used one or two at these parks. We stood in line for the other attractions if we felt like it. We do try to go to wdw at "slower" times of the year, if there is such a thing anymore

For us, this works great - some planning but not too much. For others the level of planning varies, and I always find it interesting to learn how other Disney fanatics are doing things. Have a great trip and will enjoy reading more!