Most Laid Back Touring Plan?

[meggiemouse]

So my family has always done rope drop, walk to you drop, type touring. We are toying around with doing a laid back Disney vacation. We have kids (3, 6) so most of our time will be spent in parks. But we are staying on property (not sure where... value probably).

Tell me how to be laid back at Disney! How do you get to do many things AND get to sleep past 6am lol.

 

[ArielSRL]

We do a midday break every day for pool and rest time.

 

[ashleymrush]

I don't know if I can help you with the sleeping past 6 am but we try to make it laid back by taking a midday break every day. I also have two kids that are 3 years apart. Last time we went they were 2 and 5. This year they will be 5 and 8 when we go. My husband loves Disney but hates the idea of needing a vacation from vacation. I on the other hand could go rope drop to close every day. Both of our boys are early risers so there is no point in us missing rope drop. When we last went we would do rope drop (or very close to) every morning and stay until about noon. We would usually eat lunch at the hotel food court (we stayed at All Star Sports) and then would either have nap time or pool time. This gave us a break from the midday heat so that we didn't feel drained after rope dropping. We would head back to the parks around 3-4pm and stay until close, or until they needed to go to bed. This worked out GREAT! I was worried that I'd feel like I was missing valuable park time each day but it was worth it for the sanity of the children. If it was a napping day one parent would stay in the room (and likely nap as well) and the other would go to the pool and relax. We are staying at CBR this time and looking forward to doing the same each day.

 

[Accident]

Tell me how to be laid back at Disney! How do you get to do many things AND get to sleep past 6am lol.

Welcome to the club.. I think you actually get more done or more to the point you don't really waste your time on things that don't really matter. My change was both wanting to feel like I had a vacation when done and one day I discovered we spent a half day, nobody was really thrilled and we were just going ride to ride because we thought someone else wanted to ride it in the group... this is when the list of what we don't care about started and it was interesting to see how little we wanted to actually do....

Planning for this is really simple. Where are we staying, what places do we actually care about eating at, getting random rides we don't want to miss fastpasses. Basically 15-20 minutes of planning and we're ready to head over.

going is even easier, you just show up and do what you feel like. If that doesn't match your fastpasses that day, just delete them and do your best for rides you care about. If you pass by a ride you haven't done in awhile and it strikes you, you go in. You will start to notice hundreds of things in rides and around you that you just walked past previously. You'll get happy with just showing up and whatever you ride is great and you know what to skip unless someone says, lets do that! Magic Kingdom not doing it for you or your mind is thinking another park just leave and head there instead.. enjoy yourself and don't be a family of zombies just marching around because you used to think that doing it all was gonig to disney..

Our first couple days looks like a whirlwind though. We like to lap al the parks quick, basically hitting hte 3-4 rides each we care about but seeing what is different or closed or whatever.. basically 2 days of getting the important done and checking out what we didn't hear about and then the rest of hte week we go where the mood and moment takes us...

half day touring style is great. basically you hit a park, you don't overdo it, you don't stay when you hit the zombie feeling like your "forcing the magic" or just going through the motions. You take a break, maybe it's a resort, maybe another resort, maybe you see if you can walk in somehwere for lunch (works better than one might think). then later you head to the park you want to be in that evening. Parks have morning, afternoon and evening things. your just splitting them up and you'll do a whole day or three at mk, just not the same day.. also works great for weather if your in rainy season or it's just too hot or humid.

The secret is forget how you did disney and just go with the flow. Make a list of we don't care about, we care about this trip, and places you might want to try to eat and plan around those lists and do whatever ends up happening when there. You must dos will completely change and will change not only every trip but ever visit of the park on your trip. You'll quicly discover the families favorite park which might not be the one you think already when you start to relaxing visit them. Some trips we're just there for hte food, other we're there for the snacks, sometimes we just need to be there and rides really don't matter at all.

 

[Travis B]

So my family has always done rope drop, walk to you drop, type touring. We are toying around with doing a laid back Disney vacation. We have kids (3, 6) so most of our time will be spent in parks. But we are staying on property (not sure where... value probably).

Tell me how to be laid back at Disney! How do you get to do many things AND get to sleep past 6am lol.

No ADRs unless there's one or two really special ones you want to do, make FP+ but get in the mindset that it doesn't matter whether you make it to them or not - it's not like a Dr's appointment even though it can feel that way. You've been before and I assume will probably be back again, so even if you miss something you can do it next time. Just be flexible. If you need to sleep longer one day, don't worry about it - just get there when you get there. Like I said, you'll probably be back, right? So don't worry about how much you get done, just try to enjoy -being- there and whatever you're doing at the moment. Sit on benches and people watch, or watch character meets.

I don't have kids, so I'm sure that will change things - LOL. But I think it's more about your mindset than any plans you make. It's all easier said than done - once I step in the parks I want to do everything all at once. But honestly, most of my favorite Disney memories are not from attractions we've done but from quieter moments where I was able to appreciate my surroundings.

 

[Ava]

I'm trying to do the same thing this summer, be more laid back and flexible with our plans.

My first change is not doing the dining plan. We did it the last two trips and while being able to do all those character meals was fun, it was a lot of scheduling to get to an ADR every day. So this time we will book just a few favorites or new places we want to try, but without the dining plan locking us in to using up credits it will be a lot easier to just cancel if we don't feel like going once we're there.

I'm also trying to plan our days so I won't get stressed out if we miss rope drop. We're staying at BLT so it shouldn't be hard to get to MK in time, but I don't want to have to be at the bus at 7:00-7:30am to make sure we're at the front of the line at rope drop for the other parks.

ETA: I kind of feel the opposite about the midday breaks. We did them most days the last two trips, because my younger DD was still napping, but it always felt more like a waste of time than a relaxing break. Maybe because they were scheduled (for toddler nap time) and not something we did because we felt like we needed it. I'm not specifically planning any breaks this time. My kids will be 4 & 8, so we'll play it by ear as to how long we stay in the park or if we take a break and go back later.

 

[Parker Clan]

We've always done mid day breaks, this helps keep our energy going through our whole trip.

 

[PrincessWithABlaster]

If you figure it out, let me know.

I think it's easier when you don't have young kids. I find myself wanting to maximize things for them but that's probably counter productive. But I've been thinking about a trip with a friend and as adult only I could totally follow what the pps recommended. I have very few must do's. It's trying to do the must do's of multiple people that gets me spun up.

What I do to balance the desire to do things with the desire to take it easy is to not plan the afternoon (but please don't look at my touring plans because I'm violating that rule right now ). This will be the first year we don't have to take a kid or 2 to the resort for a nap (DS4 never slept in his stroller and got to total meltdown tired on both of our trips even with naps). So I'm kind of excited to just play afternoons by ear. If they want to go back the resort, great. If they're not feeling that we can finally indulge DD8's desire to see Carousel of Progress. Maybe let your kids decide (or take turns deciding).

 

[anomamatt]

I'm no WDW expert, but here are my strategies with 2 young kids (4.5 and 2.5) that worked quite well over Christmas:

1. Naps. Essential for my kids, so we do the parks until 1pm and head back to resort. In the evening, we do a few rides centered around our evening meal.

2. Meals. One ADR per day max, and usually in the evening. My kids would revolt if we had more than one long meal a day.

3. Minimize walking. Make the next attraction the one right nearby (if of interest to my kids). And split up a park across several days if needed.

4. I schedule a resort afternoon every 2 days. Just to keep the kids (and parents) fresh.

5. I hate to say it, but stroller is key for us. With the crowds our kids don't want to walk. We carried them a ton the first day and then stroller to the rescue. I would much rather not use a stroller because they make it harder to navigate crowds and it's something else to keep track of. But it was a lifesaver (back saver) last trip.

 

[mickeyluv'r]

In one sense, our efforts to have laid back days at WDW tend to fail, almost in a humorous way. Sometimes we try to plan non-parks days, then change our mind. Or we explore all the things we ordinarily don't get a chance to see, and it is surprisingly busy.

Then again, one of things we love about Orlando, is that there is always SO much going on, that we can't possibly see and do everything all at once.

I'm mixed on the value of what others call afternoon breaks at WDW, at least if we follow our old pattern of dinner ADR's. Transportation takes a while, pre- and post-swimming prep take a while, walking within the resorts takes a while, trying to nap in the afternoon often fails.

If you want to make it more relaxed, avoid ADR's. Consider exploring off-WDW property. Maybe spend a night on the FL coast. You can go towards St. Augustine for amazing history, to Honeymoon Island for a beautiful park, or just force yourself to relax at an offsite hotel (with a nice pool!)

Second, we find our pace is more relaxed when we stay at the deluxe hotels. Have a nice dinner AT your hotel. If you pick a monorail resort- all the monorail resort dining is pretty close. At the BC/YC/Swan/Dolphin - all the options in that area are fairly easy to access.

Third, we find touring Universal less stressful than WDW when stay at one of the 3 hotels that include Express Pass. Universal is more compact, so walking back to 4 of the 5 onsite hotels is easy, plus there are frequent boats and pedi-cabs. Their boats run far more often than WDW's, and they go directly to each hotel! Eating is also simpler at Universal. Same day reservations are easy, plus many walk-in options.

 

[Klayfish]

Tell me how to be laid back at Disney! How do you get to do many things AND get to sleep past 6am lol.

You answered your own question. As Nike said "Just do it". Just be laid back. In my opinion, it's that easy. We gave up rope drop cold turkey. Just don't do it anymore, not worth it. We stay offsite, and still get up at 7:30am or sometimes later. We don't run around like crazy. We don't take mid-day breaks. Nor do we have days where we don't go to the parks either. We hit the parks every day, but we do things with a "relaxed efficiency" style, if that makes sense. In other words, we're not hustling spot to spot, but we're also not just walking around aimlessly. We know where we want to go and we go there at our own walking pace. We certainly use FP+ to make things easier, we know where things are in the park, we know what rides are more crowded than others, and we utilize MDE and the Lines app to assist us. But we never stress about trying to get "x" number of things done. We do as much as we can, but at our own pace, and we're happy with it. When we feel we're done for the day, we're done. Not to say that we won't come back at night, but when we do, it's ad hoc, not planned. Of course, we do sometimes have days where we don't show up to the parks until 4pm, so those are our planned WDW nights. Basically, we have our 3 FP+ when we walk in the gates (obviously) and we also have a rough idea what we want to ride in between the FPs. Once those are done, it's "freestyle" time...we just do whatever we feel like until we feel like going home. Sometimes it's several hours worth, sometimes we're tired and pretty much ready to go home right away.

I'd rather do 13 things at our own pace than 16 things at a rushed pace where we had to get up at 6am, wait outside the gates for an hour, etc...

You can be as relaxed as you want to be. It's all about your mindset.

 

[bellebud]

When mine were your kids ages, we did rope drop, knew what rides we were going on (now I'd have the fastpasses reserved), had lunch ADRs for 11:30am, then left the parks. Naps, pool time, playing at the resorts. Sometimes dinner at the resort, sometimes back to a park for dinner and a few rides if the lines were short, sometimes went to downtown disney. Every 3 days we'd even just have a resort day. Never felt like we needed a vacation from our vacation, always hit all the rides we wanted, had nice meals, went to sleep at a good time. We also split up sometimes if dd wanted more park time and ds didn't.

 

[mrzrich]

I take advantage of AM EMH and do that park without FP. I either leave after lunch, or have lunch at my resort's food court. We nap or swim, or both. Then we head back out around 3 or 4. We have a dinner ADR and FP for the evening.

 

[mikedoyleblogger]

So my family has always done rope drop, walk to you drop, type touring. We are toying around with doing a laid back Disney vacation. We have kids (3, 6) so most of our time will be spent in parks. But we are staying on property (not sure where... value probably).

Tell me how to be laid back at Disney! How do you get to do many things AND get to sleep past 6am lol.

Use rope drop selectively, as your hit as much as your can with no/short lines park 1 strategy. Schedule your Fastpasses and an ADR in the later afternoon/evening as a relaxed touring with stuff already reserved so you can go slower park 2 strategy. Take a non-park break in-between for pool, Disney Springs, resort-hopping, napping, etc.

Mix and match. Some days let your break be your whole day until evening park time. Some days do all three. That kind of thing. DSO and I use this strategy and it never feels rushed unless you want it to.

You'll also never have to avoid or worry about EMH. At park one, you'll be gone by the crazy afternoon crowds. At park 2, you'll already have your preferred rides and dinner nailed down so you can mosey, anyway.