A different way to do Disney… should I?

[Brob2132]

My favorite schedule is park in the AM, back to resort at lunchtime for swim and rest, then TS dinner at resort or Springs, then back out to a park for a nighttime spectacular and some late night attractions. If we don't feel like getting up early, we don't. If we want to take our time eating breakfast, we do. If we want to wander through shops or stop and watch some entertainment, we do.

If we're really feeling like throwing caution to the wind, we go to the bus stop with no plan, and whichever park's bus shows up first, that's where we go! That's kind of fun.

As long as I ride Haunted Mansion, Pirates, Small World, People Mover, Kilimanjaro Safari, and the Gran Fiesta boat ride in Mexico, I'm good. LOL. I can spend the rest of the time wandering and watching and browsing and of course...eating.

This is my preference as well and made everything a ton more relaxing. Also allows a table service, which I very much enjoy.

Going with our daughter affected our schedule but we tried to keep a similar ish schedule pushed back given her sleeping. I add this last snippet because I don’t think kids mean you NEED to have a specific schedule.

 

[kylenne]

I agree with pp who said solo trips are a totally different beast than going with even one other person. I do a mix of both every year as an AP and enjoy both for different reasons but a solo guest is always going to have a far easier time pivoting and making decisions on the fly and being more spontaneous. You only have your own needs and expectations to manage.

I have never been about the commando touring life though. Solo or not. Ever since my family trips growing up we have rope dropped, taken a long long break for the hottest and most crowded part of the day, and then gone back at night. We also never rope drop 2 days in a row, breaking it up with rest days at the resort. This is the most optimal way to do it for me and my partner, as we are nocturnal and love park vibes at night but neither us of can handle lines. Last summer we experimented with mixing in late starts with G+ stacking and adored it so much it’s probably the only way we’ll do HS moving forward.

Our mornings are structured so we get everything done that we want during low waits and go into a park with next to no plans in the PM after our extended resort break. No zig zagging, stress, or being glued to phones required. Just knowledge of crowd flow and patterns that comes from my experience, and certain trusted online sources (RIP Josh but I still use most of his tips to this day, and also Bricker and EarScouts to keep up on changes between my trips, and ofc the here and back again thread here!). My touring strategy is down to a science and it is fun to optimize bc I’m a nerd and have to gameify everything (“how fast can I walk to HS from YC? Can I beat my personal best from BC?”). But within reason. I’ve never planned down to the minute, that’s insane and unnecessary. But I know the exact order I’m doing rides in at EE, bc it works every time.

BUT my golden rule as someone who is disabled and very much not neurotypical is breaks even in the park are non negotiable and my health trumps everything else. I know my triggers and my body and the second I feel overwhelmed I’m beating feet back to the resort. No “but there’s a LL right over here for right now”, no “but this show is in 5 minutes”. When I don’t is when I end up laying down in First Aid in the dark and silence for half an hour. My partner has similar challenges on top of cystic fibrosis so we are very practiced at checking in with each other.

If that means we miss a nighttime spectacular or eat the cost of ILLs because we just Can’t, that’s totally fine. One trip we skipped out on Fantasmic dining package bc neither of us were feeling going back out and just ordered room service at Poly and watched cartoons. Last summer we threw our Epcot rope drop plan out the window the morning of my birthday bc partner was tired, instead we mobile ordered breakfast from Ale & Compass to leisurely eat on the balcony. Only then did we go into Epcot, and just to ride Remy and Cosmic Rewind. We spent the whole rest of the morning at SAB before going into HS in the evening for our Star Wars reservations with a stack of LLs. Granted, we don’t have kids. It’s easier to do that kind of thing w just 2 adults. But it was so much more fun than being married to plans we made 6 months earlier.

tl;dr: most groups are best served somewhere between the two extremes of over planning to the Nth degree and totally winging it. Having some idea of what you want to do, a decent plan for that, but being flexible and building in downtime is the key I find to not going crazy and actually enjoying yourselves.

 

[jaredjohn4]

If you go frequently, then morning to night is just not worth it. I really miss the 180 day dining and 60 day fast pass system. The last few years we have been during spring break. We try to rope drop when we can, then go back to Fort Wilderness to walk the dog. Later in the day we will hit up another park. We usually go for 10 days. We were there for hurricane Ian a few years ago. That made it interesting.