I keep booking trips to WDW on DVC points but I keep finding myself chickening out and canceling or postponing the trip, pushing it back to a later date. I think it’s because I have this underlying anxiety that once I get there I will feel uncomfortable regarding crowds and the virus, as well as just the way things are now. I work at home so I’m not used to wearing a mask for long bouts of time, and definitely not at a theme park in Florida. I want to go so bad, but I keep getting scared that once I’m already there I’ll feel like I’ve made a mistake.
Being a DVC member adds an extra layer of complexity with banking windows etc. My banking window closes 5/31 so as that approaches I keep finding myself going back and forth on “do I just go for it because things won’t be changing any time soon” or “just bank what you can and rent out what’s left of you are feeling nervous”? We aren’t in a high risk group for the virus so I wouldn’t say I’m super concerned about the virus itself (although that’s always in the back of my mind) but I’m just worried about spending money on plane and park tickets just to be stuck in an uncomfortable situation for several days.
I was just curious how others are feeling and handling thoughts like this?
We went to WDW back in December. My wife has to go in to work every day and she wears a mask the whole time she's there so she is used to it. I was working about two days a week on site throughout the summer and wearing a mask the whole time. We also wear masks whenever we do our weekly shopping on the weekend. Bottom line, we were used to wearing masks for long stretches of time. I understand that you're not used to doing it, but I don't think it would be that hard to get used to it. If you want to try it out, just wear a mask for a whole day at home and see how it goes. I think it's also important to find a mask that's comfortable for you. We went through a few different types at the start of the pandemic and finally found some that work for us. I think the paper ones are actually the most comfortable, but they don't work well at all with my glasses.
When we were there in December, we never really got in a situation in the parks where we found that the crowds were too much. There were certainly some choke points in the parks (Adventureland in MK especially) where it would get a bit tight, but we just went around a different way if we were uncomfortable. One thing to note is that Disney Springs started to get out of hand in the early afternoon. I'd recommend avoiding it after about 2:00 or avoiding it totally if you're ok with that. There are also certain parks that are better at certain times. Here's what we did that worked for us in December, I'm not sure if these still hold true:
1) Magic Kingdom - Go on a Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday. We heard multiple people say that it was too crowded on the weekends (likely due to locals showing up)
2) Epcot - Avoid on the weekend and Friday night because of the locals. It really wasn't crowded during the week
3) Animal Kingdom - I think you can go here any time. It never felt crowded at all. Pandora had the most people, but it wasn't bad.
4) Hollywood Studios - We didn't go here, but people said to go ahead and do DHS on the weekend since it's nearly full any day of the week.
I think the biggest thing that you need to be ready for is to be flexible while you are there. A Disney vacation during COVID is fairly different than going during normal times. You may not be able to do everything you plan on when you want to do it exactly. You may need to work around crowds during the day. It does seem that most parks get less crowded later in the day.
With all that said, we had a really good time on our trip and found it to be a lot more relaxing since we didn't have fastpasses we needed to hit or a lot of dining reservations.
