This week marks one year since our Walt Disney World vacation and I’ve actually had a few people ask me about what went into planning our trip! So what better time to write up a blog post about it?
If we really start from the beginning, I have to admit that going on this trip took a year in the making. I know that sounds crazy, but we knew a year beforehand that we wanted to take a trip and spend time with family or friends and do something epic! And we knew we, and others, may need time to save up the time off or money etc to be able to make it happen. We ended up inviting our friends to go with us to Disney World and they were immediately on board. So the planning began! Step 1: Where And When
There are so many options of places to stay in and around Disney property. After looking into the pros and cons of staying off-property, we decided it was more cost effective to stay on property and use Uber and Disney transportation rather than rent a car and pay for gas and parking and take the time to get on and off property each day.
Now we just had to narrow it down to one of the 25 hotels on Disney property! Haha no, realistically, we know Disney. And even the cheapest options are going to be great. So with our family of 4, and our friends’ family of 4, we had decided to go with the most cost-effective place to stay. This whittled it down to the All-Star Hotels or the military option of Shades of Green. Shades of Green is DoD owned and the rates there are dependent on rank. They don’t fluctuate like the Disney-owned hotel rates do due to peak attendance times for the parks. So staying at Shades of Green would be beneficial when visiting the parks during a peak travel time. Disney also offers military discounts at most of their hotels. They only release a certain number of rooms at these discounts and once they’re booked, they’re gone. So using this discount would also take into account when you are planning on visiting. We knew we didn’t want to go during a peak travel time. There are half a dozen websites that will give you a ‘calendar’ on the best times to visit Disney World. We knew we wanted to go around Thanksgiving time and it just so happened that the best time in November was the week after! We were able to book 3 nights at All-Star Sports with the military discount and then 3 nights at All-Star Movies.
A little note about Disney Airport Transportation: Because we were staying on property, we were able to take advantage of a lot of different perks! We checked our bags with the luggage tags they mailed us and they were picked up and delivered to our room after we arrived. The shuttle to and from the airport was also included with our stay. And our hotel switch mid-stay was also taken care of. On the day of the switch, we checked out and turned in our bags and when we came back from the parks, we arrived at All-Star Movies and our bags were in our room. It was so seamless. As is the Disney way °O°
I will say, our stay at All-Star Sports wasn’t bad. But we definitely enjoyed All-Star Movies. The enormous character statutes around All-Star Movies were a lot more entertaining to our kids and the rooms were newly renovated so they were obviously a little nicer. Our 2nd room was near the Toy Story Themed area and, I mean, how cool is this??
Step 2: Meal Planning
It may seem a little intense to get your meals planned ahead of time. But most of the sit down restaurants are impossible to get into if you don’t have reservations-especially the good ones! Another perk to staying on property was that we were able to book our dining reservations 6 months in advance. Yes, SIX!! And yes, some of these restaurants do book up six months in advance. So we definitely set alarms on our phones so we could get in on that ASAP.
Part of meal planning was also deciding whether or not we were going to go with the Disney Dining Plan. The Disney Dining Plan has 3 different tiers: Quick Service, Standard, and Deluxe. Each plan is priced out per person per day but everyone is on the plan or no one is. You can’t have some people in your room on the Dining Plan and some not. I won’t get too much into the specifics because we didn’t end up going with it. Once we had decided the places we wanted to eat we actually looked at it a few different ways and the Dining Plan always came out more expensive than just paying as we went. So we figured we saved a couple hundred dollars by NOT choosing to get the Dining Plan. It probably had something to do with our small kids not eating that much. We also used Amazon grocery delivery and got snacks and things delivered right to our room, which saved us a little money as well. Another reason was that we stayed for 6 days but only had 4-day park tickets. We did spend a day at Universal Studios so we would’ve had to pay for meals there on top of having unused credits for the Disney Dining Plan...so for us it just didn’t make sense. ANYWAYS, to plan our meals we used that trusty ‘crowd calendar’ to decide what days we were going to visit each park. We then decided each place we wanted to eat and were able to put that on our itinerary according to what area of Disney World we would be each day. This is how it broke down: The first day we just ate at the cafeteria at All-Star Sports. We had originally planned to grab some food at the Boardwalk, but we were tired from traveling and were ready to rest up for the week ahead. Big plus, All-Star Sports is the only place on property to get edible cookie dough! And it was delicious!
Our first full day at Disney World, we had breakfast at Capt. Cook’s at the Polynesian Resort. This is a Quick-Service Restaurant, no reservations. It was fun to sit outside and eat and then explore the resort and the island theming. While those Mickey Waffles were a big hit for almost every breakfast, we really went there for...
...the Tonga Toast! This bad boy consists of giant pieces of Sourdough bread stuffed with bananas and then battered, deep-fried, and dusted with cinnamon and sugar. If you find yourself looking for a quick, sweet breakfast like nothing you’ve had before near the Polynesian Resort, this is definitely a must-try!
Our next meal of note, was dinner at Beaches & Cream Soda Shop, located at Disney’s Beach Club Resort. This restaurant is actually very small and reservations do book up rather quickly. You can probably guess that these guys are famous for their shakes and sundaes, which we definitely took advantage of.
The kids’ meals came with these cute Mickey Sundaes, which I’m actually surprised I have a picture of, as they didn’t last long! I’m just glad I didn’t have to share my shake ;)
Day 2 was EPCOT day for the first half. We ate breakfast after riding Frozen Ever After at the Norway Pavilion. The School Bread from Krigla Bakeri Og Cafe came highly recommended. I gotta say, I was a big disappointment. I’ll just say you gotta be a fan of black licorice to appreciate this snack and that is not me!! But I’ll tell you what did hit the spot...Les Halles Boulangerie Patisserie in the French Pavilion. Croissants, macarons, all the things...go there for a quick and easy breakfast! For dinner that day we were actually at Hollywood Studios! 50s Prime Time Cafe was our reservation of choice and it is a fun one. The atmosphere and the theme set you back in mama’s kitchen in the 50s, with the waitresses getting after you for elbows on the table and no dessert until you eat all your vegetables! It’s super fun and pretty good food! Day 3 was a big highlight!! Magic Kingdom Day opening with breakfast at Cinderella’s Castle!
Even though the food wasn’t bad, this was definitely a time where you pay for the experience. And we had a blast watching the girls get so excited! Cinderella herself greeted us as we checked-in and as we ate, we were visited by the rest of the Disney Princess gang, including Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, Jasmine, and Rapunzel. Hayden had a perma-grin as we ate and Colbie (barely talking at the time) kept saying ‘more, more’ after each princess would leave. Such an awesome introduction to Magic Kingdom.
For lunch, we hit up Sleepy Hollow for some waffle sandwiches.
The fresh fruit waffle sandwich and the sweet and spicy chicken waffle sandwich were both delicious and our little table outside was in the perfect spot to watch the beginning of the Festival of Fantasy parade.
Day 4 was Universal Studios Day! We actually had breakfast reservations at Olivia’s Cafe at the Old Key West Resort. Banana bread french toast, omelets, all the good things. You can’t go wrong with this cute and yummy restaurant. Lunch was at the Three Broomsticks in Hogsmeade. Cold Butterbeer, fish and chips, and sheppard’s pie was a meal we won’t forget anytime soon. Day 5 started at Animal Kingdom. After our ride on Kilimanjaro Safaris, we had a quick breakfast at Kusafiri Coffee Shop and Bakery. But the big hits in Animal Kingdom were the lunch items...
You can’t miss the macaroni & cheese with pulled pork at Eight Spoon Cafe! And while you’re at it, grab some French fries with pulled pork from Flame Tree BBQ. Go big or go home, right?? But the real showstopper was the Mini Mango Pie at Yak & Yeti.
You guys, I can’t with this. If I were to pick only one Disney World treat and kick the rest out, I mean...I have to go with this. Hands down!! I need to go back just for a few more of these...okay, and maybe a few other things...
Dinner was back at EPCOT. With our love of German food, we got reservations at the Biergarten at the Germany Pavilion. It was lots of fun and the food wasn’t bad but our kids could NOT have cared less and if there was anything we could’ve done without, I’d have to say it was this. Our last day was spent back at Magic Kingdom. We miraculously got reservations at Be Our Guest for breakfast. We had read rave reviews and while the decor and atmosphere was very extravagant and exciting, the grey stuff is better at Disneyland ;)
Couldn’t go to Disney without getting a dole whip! Aloha Isle is where you can pick these babies up. OR you can head over to Storybook treats and grab a Peter Pan Float. .
We did both...because you gotta compare, right? If you know, you know and I think I gotta go back to try them again because I can’t decide which is better ;)
Dinner on our last night was absolutely magical. We had reservations at the Plaza Restaurant and while everyone was being directed out of the park unless they had tickets to A Very Merry Christmas, we got to eat dinner on the plaza and watch Elsa turn the castle into an ice castle and afterwards meander down Main Street with snow machines (bubbles) going.
While the dinner was good, it was mostly a perfect example of taking advantage of dining reservations and getting more than just food. We got just that little bit of extra time in the park and it made all the difference! With all of our reservations, we made sure they didn’t overlap with magic hours (when guests get extra time in the parks either in the morning or at night) because that gave us no advantage. You can see that we stuck to only one sit-down restaurant a day and the other two meals were quick service and snacks. This was another way to optimize our food budget as well as plan reservations. We got all the reservations we wanted because we planned it out so well!
Step 3: FastPass Strategy
This may seem a little overkill but one thing to understand about Disney World is that there is SO MUCH to do and it’s SO BIG! The only way to get the most out of your trip is to have a rough idea of where you’re going to be and when you’re going to be there. This part of the planning goes back to that handy Disney World Crowd Calendar but we also had to prioritize what rides we wanted to go on! Especially when it came down to Fast Passes. Because we were staying on property, another perk we had was that we could schedule out 3 fast passes per day 60 days in advance of our trip. These book up just like restaurant reservations. Some rides are impossible to get on if you don’t have fast passes, unless you want to stand in line for over 2 hours (yikes! Not me!) So once we knew what days we were going to spend in each of the parks, we wrote down what rides were our top priority so we could get Fast Passes for them. You guys, we spent 4 days at Disney World and the longest we waited for a ride was 30 minutes. It was AWESOME! Rather than give you our whole itinerary, we’ll just go over which rides we would recommend fast passes for in each park.
EPCOT rides with long wait times tend to be Frozen Ever After, Test Track, and Soarin’. The only issue is that EPCOT fast pass rides are broken into two tiers, where you can only get one fast pass in tier 1 and all three of those rides are in tier 1! We were able to get there at rope drop and get on Frozen Ever After with a short wait time and we scored fast passes for Soarin’.
Magic Kingdom attractions that regularly have long wait times are Seven Dwarfs Mine Train, Space Mountain, Peter Pan’s Flight, Splash Mountain, Thunder Mountain, Meet Mickey Mouse, and the wait at Jungle Cruise can get up there! There are no tiers for fast passes in this park and we spent two different days here and got gasses for all those (except Mickey Mouse)and then some. We highly recommend fast passes for Seven Dwarfs Mine Train as it’s not unheard of to have a 2 hour wait!
Animal Kingdom has a fast pass tier system. Tier 1 includes the Avatar rides-Flight of Passage and Na’vi River Journey. I used my fast pass for Flight of Passage and Jon and Hayden used theirs for Na’vi River Journey. For Flight of Passage, we used child swap so Jon got on the ride after I got off. Basically 2 fast passes in 1! Which was awesome because when we got in line, the stand by wait time was over 200 minutes! P.S. that ride is SO INCREDIBLE!! If you’re wondering which is better for fast passes, we recommend Flight of Passage, hands down. Kilimanjaro Safaris is another one we recommend for a fast pass. The animals are most active in the morning so the lines tend to get longer at that time. We got fast passes for quite early in the day and had an amazing time!
Hollywood Studios also has a tiered fast pass system but it has changed since our trip! And it is expected to change again in the near future, so we can’t really make any comment on it at this time. I will, however, say that this author rode Rock-n-Roller Coaster back to back without fast passes near park closing time and it was the best ;)
Can we really do a proper Orlando trip without a visit to Universal Studios? More specifically, the Wizarding world, of course! Was it possible to see everything we wanted to see in the one day we spent there? We’ll let you be the judge:
(Not pictured: hot butterbeer, cold butterbeer, frozen butterbeer, all three Harry Potter rides, lunch at The Three Broomsticks, and even a few Dr. Suess World rides on our way out. So epic!)
A few more tips and tricks: Our first day, before even going into any of the parks, we actually spent exploring other resort properties! It was so fun to ride the monorail and boats especially to check out the resorts around Magic Kingdom. Each was decorated for Christmas and had giant Christmas trees and gingerbread houses. And it was a good time to check out restaurants outside of the parks.
We were obsessed with our magic bands!! Magic bands are customized wrist bands that act as your tickets, fast passes, room keys, and even credit card throughout the parks! They were yet another perk of staying on property and so convenient!
We did schedule in hotel breaks for each day (except universal studios day) to recharge and get a nap in...for the kids ;) We also took our own stroller rather than renting one and it was worth it. We had such a good time during our week at Disney World that’s it’s still being talked about, a year later, by our girls asking when we can go back. Our only regret was getting on the plane to come home!
If you're planning a trip to Disney World, we hope this helps! If you've been and have other tips to add, let us know in the comments! We'd love to hear from you! As always, follow us on instagram for more of our day-to-day adventures! And until next time, get out and enjoy where YOU live!
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AuthorWe're just a military family enjoying where we live, one PCS at a time. Follow us as we explore our current home, South Carolina, and beyond. The world is our backyard. Archives
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