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Planning is the key to a wonderful holiday & can also be fun!
Deciding where to stay
Buying your passes
Finding information on WDW
Making reservations at Disney restaurants
Budgeting
Fun planning ideas
Planning Tips
Deciding
where to stay
You have two options - staying on-site
in a Disney Resort or staying off-site. Off-site will be much cheaper.
But staying in a Disney Resort has many benefits which you may decide
outweigh the extra cost. If you do stay off-site you will have further
to travel to the parks, it probably won't be feasible to return
to your hotel for an afternoon break, if you don't have a car, you
have to rely on shuttle buses that may stop running at a certain
time.
Once you decide where
to stay, you need to book your room. You can either book through
a travel agent, online with our
travel agent or direct with Disney, either on their site or
by phone. If you book with Disney be sure to ask if there are any
special packages or discounts for when you want to go. Discounts
are offered seasonally.
When booking your flights,
try to get the earliest possible flight there & the latest back.
that way you get to spend as much time as possible at WDW.
If you're going to be
arriving late, arrange to spend the first night at an offsite motel,
especially if you're staying at a WDW resort. Then you won't have
wasted a full day at the more expensive resort.
Buying
your passes
You can either buy your
passes before you go or when you arrive, you can get discounted
tickets from Maple Leaf Tickets.
Disney stores sell the theme park passes, so you can buy from them
or direct from Disney CRO before you arrive. If you're staying at
a Disney resort, you are entitled to buy a length of stay pass,
which can work out cheaper than buying other passes.
Finding
information on WDW
It helps to learn about
your destination, & WDW is no exception. WDW is constantly changing,
the last few years have seen more new attractions added than ever,
so if you've never been or you haven't visited recently then it's
time to start reading! Start by visiting the many websites on WDW,
starting with this site of course! I highly recommend buying a guide
book, they can be a valuable source of information that you
can pop in your bag & take with you.
If I had to recommend
one guidebook for visitors to WDW it would be Passporter,
as it not only contains information on WDW, it also acts as a planning
tool, journal & trip keepsake. Next would be the Unofficial
Guide for touring strategies.
Making
reservations at Disney restaurants
All WDW restaurants
offer
'Advanced Dining Reservations' which you
can book up to 120 days in advance. Many don't always fill to capacity,
so you can wait until you arrive & book, or just turn up on
the day
& hope for the best! There are those that are extremely popular
& you will have to call 90 or 120 days in advance at 7am in
the morning if you want to be in with a chance of getting a table,
e.g. Cinderella's Royal Table Once Upon
a Time Character breakfast. See the dining
page for more information.
Decide which days you
want to eat at certain restaurants, then mark on a calendar 30/60/90
days before to remind you when to ring for priority seating.
Budgeting
Unless you're a millionaire
or have just won the lottery, you will need to budget for your stay.
Your expenses for your stay will fall into five main categories
- transport, lodging, admission, food, & extras such as souvenirs.
You can plan for the first three before you go, but food & extras
are hard to estimate.You can get a rough idea of how much food costs
by visiting various websites (including dining
on this site), work out roughly how much each person might spend
per meal, for each day. You can save money by taking snacks with
you to eat for breakfast & in between meals. Work out roughly
how much you can afford to spend each day & try to stick to
it.
Fun
planning ideas
If you've booked your
holiday far in advance like I do, then it probably seems an age
away, but there are things that you can do in the run up to it that
can make the waiting a bit more fun.
Make a chain of paperclips,
one for each week there is left before you go, & as each week
passes remove one paperclip, you'll be surprised how fast it shrinks
in length!
At regular intervals,
say each month, or maybe every 50 days before you go, have a 'Disney
tea'. Invite everyone in your party & cook some of the Disney
recipes. Discuss the planning you've
done so far, have a Disney quiz. You could even have a Disney party.
Invite all your friends around, get them to dress up as Disney characters,
& cook Disney food. The theme could even be related to the resort
you'll be staying at - Polynesian (luau), Grand Floridian (afternoon
tea), Caribbean Beach (Jamaican).
Organise a hidden Mickey
hunt for everyone going on your trip. The prize could be something
related to your vacation, such as Disney Dollars.
Watch a Disney film each
week.
Dig out your photos and
videos from your last trip. Looking back through these memories
can help you remember your favourite parts of the trip, which can
help plan what you want to do this time.
Send for the Walt Disney
World Resort planning video.
Buy a small notebook
or file & have a page for each day you'll be there. Write down
what parks & attractions you want to go to on each day. Also
make a note of any Priority Seating arrangements you've made, along
with the number. Keep a note of important phone numbers & make
a list of everyone's addresses who you want to send postcards to.
Take this book with you when you go. If you use a file, you can
also put things in it from your trip, such as maps, tickets, etc,
it makes a great keepsake. Consider buying the Passporter
book, which turns into a keepsake after your trip.
Visit one of the many
Disney forums
or newsgroups online to discuss your planning,
you may even make new friends who you can meet up with there.
Have a jar to put your
loose change into, you'll be surprised how much there is by the
time you go, you can use it to buy things like ice creams once you
get there. You could also buy Disney Dollars from the Disney Store
each week/month.
Let each person in your
party decide what they want to do the most, what attractions they
want to see, where they want to eat, & try to accommodate their
wishes in your schedule.
Use our printable information
sheet to record the important phone numbers & other details
for the airline, rental cars, hotel, priority seating, etc.
Use our printable
itinerary sheet to plan your days.
Planning
Tips
"To help build the excitement for our upcoming Disney World vacation,
my young sons (2 & 5) and I created a paper chain (like the
ones you made as a kid for the Christmas tree). We put a
Disney character sticker and name on each one (Goofy, Buzz, Nemo
and of course Mikey - he was last). Then each day, one of
the children got to tear off the link. This really helped
them to visualize how much longer it was going to be before we
left for the Magic. And it was a fun project to spend time
together too!"
"I go to the forums and the official Disney site to see what
is going on while we are there. There is always something new and
exciting that we haven't seen before like a dinner show or a character
meal. (We've been going to Disney for 20 years and I just found
out there is a barber in Magic Kingdom where they can get their
hair cut, spiked with a color, and pixie dust!)
I always reserve in advance for special events, even in a slow
season, because it adds to the excitement to KNOW what you are
doing." Teresa--Canada
"I've been to Disney World alot but everytime we go, I try
to plan something different. Even if it's just a new resaurant.
I love to find out what's new at Disney too. This website helped
me with that."
"I'm 20 years old and planning the first trip for 4 adults
to WDW in early May. Since I work in the travel industry, I've been
dubbed the "vacation planner" for the whole thing. The
only thing I can say is READ, READ, READ! Every piece of advice
and every piece of knowledge is valuable and likely to help! Plan
as much as you can, especially with money. Budgeting is essential.
WDW is not the cheapest vacation, trust me! We already have the
countdown going! I have no doubt in my mind that this will be the
most exciting vacation I've ever taken. If you happen to be the
travel planner, keep in mind that the amount of information out
there is overwhelming! Plan your vacation MONTHS in advance and
take it little by little. By the time the vacation comes, you'll
be even more excited and prepared than you ever imagined. The most
important part is this...HAVE FUN!!!!"
"Everytime we go to Disney we take out the Birnbaum's edition
from that year and make a list of things we are going to do! We
figure out every attraction we want to do then we plan on where
we are going to eat! .. It works and it makes the vacation so much
more relaxing!"
"I am 20 years old, going to Disney in 2 months and I have
never been so excited for anything in my entire life. I have all
these fears that it's going to be super crowded when we go (in early
may) however I have been reassured by doing some research. Anyway,
I have been hardly able to contain my excitement, and I'm driving
my family crazy, but what does help is watching the Disney Vacation
Planning video. I watch it once a week, and it gets me so pumped
up for my trip!" Chelsea, Canada
"make a check list for your family to make sure they pack
everything because you no every family forgets something"
"Work out your route from the airport to villa or hotel prior
to getting there. Read up on the "Rules of the Road,"
driving in America is different to the uk."
"Even though I am 16, my family made me the official planner
for WDW. I cannot stress enough: KNOW WHAT YOU WANNA DO AHEAD OF
TIME! Also plan for the unexpected, such as blisters on feet, (happened
to me) rain, (luckily not for us), and walking. And what I mean
by this is you gotta be a fast walker, or you won't see anything!"
"We booked our trip several months in advance. To make the
time go by faster, I created a count-down chart. Each day we cross
off one Mickey Mouse head until the big day is finally here."
"We've had our trip planned for about four months and when
we were about two months from our departure date I started writing
how many days we had left on my daughter's napkin that I put in
her lunchbox each day and noted something like "Mickey can't wait
to see you"! That was a bright spot in the middle of her school
day and reminded her of our fun to come!!" JoJo, Huntsville,
AL
"During the planning/waiting stage, I used guides to note
the best time to visit each attraction. I then printed out daily
agendas/planners on a single sheet of paper and carried it with
me (and stuck to the plan as much as possible) each day while visiting
the park. Planning is essential in maximizing your opportunity to
see EVERYTHING."
"A sure tip is to get the disney dollars. They are a real
help. If you scared to take cash into the theme parks or just for
fun. You can even save money."
"Make reservations ahead of time
for the restaurants in all of Disney World. If not, the restaurants
will either make you and your family wait or say they are booked
for the day."
"Disney's Dining Experience Club gives you 20%off table service
meals and the food court at the All Star Resorts among other things
- the cost is $55 - $60 Becoming a Disney Club Member is an eccptional
value - the savings it brings far outweighs the nominal fee If you
belong to AAA or the Entertainment club there are other Disney discounts
available." (see the save money section)
"Go through a guidebook with your child(ren) and use a yellow
market to highlight the attractinos or restaurants that are a Yes
(definitely want to visit!), pink for those that are a MAYBE (i.e.
not as important as yellow but would like to see if you have the
time) and blue for NO (have no interest in seeing. Better yet, I
devised a spreadsheet with the attraction or restaurant name in
the first column and either a YES MAYBE or NO in the second column.
Print the spreadsheet and put it in your purse or pocket, then you
don't have to drag a guidebook out all the time." Michelle,
Buffalo Grove, IL
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