Thanks .. I think we will go the two stroller route! Appreciate the feedback.
As much as I would not like to add to having more strollers in the parks, I think it is probably a good call for a happier trip.
For me .. the main thing is the "speed" factor of getting from point A to point B. The walk from the car/bus and to the first rides are long (and you want to be moving quick at rope drop). After one day, if the boy doesn't seem to use it much .. we just leave it behind.
Although we haven’t done the double stroller, I think you’re making a good decision with going the two-stroller-route. We’ve now done trips when they were 2.5 and 4, 3.5 and 5, and 4 and 5 yr 8 mo. This last trip our son walked a bit more, but there were times, as you mentioned - for speed purposes - or when it was particularly crowded where we told him he had to get in the stroller.
We flew and brought our own strollers since they don’t cost anything to bring on the plane and have found them helpful in the airport at times as well.
The first two trips we brought our good Britax stroller and a cheap umbrella stroller - that umbrella stroller was nice because when it was folded up, the curved handle could hang over the handlebars of the Britax - made it very easy for parking and could even walk with it like that, albeit a bit awkwardly. That got pretty beat up on the trips though, so we bought a new one this time for the second stroller.
We bought this
https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B017ERMTUK/ref=oh_aui_search_detailpage?ie=UTF8&th=1 this past time. We got a damaged box
Amazon Warehoues deal so only paid $42 for it. It held up well and worked for both kids okay size-wise. It could be something that goes along with one of the suggestions I saw for buying a stroller and just leaving it there being cheaper than renting (I wouldn’t leave it myself, we haven’t used them other than Disney trips in a while anyway).
The two strollers method is very nice because it’s versatile - you can walk next to each other, or when it’s crowded or you’re in a rush, you can go single file or even split up to get through the crowds. As others have said, you have the option to split up completely, and as you said, you have the option of only bringing one at times.
There could be one problem that I didn’t see mentioned with two strollers - the FIGHTS!!! Mine are closer together in age, so you might be okay, but every trip we’ve had the fights over who was in which stroller, or even more frequently - OVER WHO WOULD PUSH WHOM!! (“I want Mommy to push me!” — Aaaaaaahhhhhh - bad memories - ha!). So just be prepared to have some kind of a system or be ready to negotiate that element - especially with grandparents - my parents came for one day and it switched to wanting one of my parents to push them.