We took our first trip to Disney World before our oldest started kindergarten. We figured the kids would be good ages (3.5 and 5.5) and it would be nice to fit it in before we became a slave to the school calendar. We booked for May 2013 but then had to cancel due to work obligations. In a last ditch effort to squeeze it in before school started, we booked for mid-August. Yes, August. It was a great trip. But it was HOT. I’m absolutely glad we went. But it was HOT.
I have always advocated to my husband that we take a Disney World trip every 3-5 years. I think kids change so much that if you spread out your trips in 3-5 year increments, each trip will be a completely different experience. Our first trip when they were pre-school age, we focused on rides like Dumbo and the tea cups and just enjoyed the excitement of being in the parks. Our next trip I knew we’d be able to step it up a little with the rides and add on some of the evening shows that we hadn’t stuck around for on our first trip. And I knew our next trip would be less stressful since we wouldn’t be dealing with naps and strollers and all that fun pre-school age stuff. I was ready!
Looking at our future trips that were already in the works (Italy (without kids) in April of this year, Belize in 2018 and Alaska in 2019), I knew that 2017 would be our only chance to squeeze in a trip in my 3-5 year window. My husband argued that we had already done “Disney” last year by going on the cruise. I argued that it was a completely different experience. I also argued that our youngest was on the cusp of growing out of the character stage and with such amazing memories of him with the characters on our cruise, I wanted to capture that magic one last time. For Christmas we gave them this puzzle, so I think you can guess who won the argument.
Our compromise was a 4 day trip (which translated to 3.5 park days). The kids would only miss 1 day of school thanks to a teacher workday. I would have loved one more day so that we could do a full day in each park but I knew I could make the most of our days there. I immediately began to strategize. I wanted to do each of the evening shows (Wishes in Magic Kingdom, IllumiNations in Epcot, and Fantasmic in Hollywood Studios). We had three nights there so at first glance it seemed easy – one full day ending with the shows in each of those three parks and our last half day in Animal Kingdom. But I knew a half day in Animal Kingdom would not be enough for us. Our kids loved that park on our first trip and although many people claim it is a half day park, I felt like they could have easily done two full days there. So just spending a few hours in Animal Kingdom before leaving for our drive home was definitely not enough. So that meant shuffling things around so that we could have a full day there but still be in the other parks for the evening entertainment. So that meant Park Hopper passes. Yikes! Things were getting complicated.
I took a step back and figured out our priorities: a full day at Magic Kingdom and Animal Kingdom, seeing the evening shows, and getting in our character fix with multiple character meals. I picked the meals we were interested in, figured out which park we wanted to end in each day, and worked backwards from there. This was our schedule:
Day 1 – Magic Kingdom all day with lunch at Crystal Palace, Wishes at night
Day 2 – Animal Kingdom in the morning, Epcot in the afternoon with late lunch at Garden Grill, IllumiNations at night
Day 3 – Magic Kingdom in the morning, Hollywood Studios in the afternoon with dinner at Hollywood and Vine, Fantasmic at night
Day 4 – breakfast at ‘Ohana, Animal Kingdom until early afternoon, drive home
Phew! It was a challenge but I seemed to have it all jammed in there. How did it work out??? You’ll have to read on…
