Today I have Disney on the brain! We are 62 days out from our trip to Walt Disney World for our third wedding anniversary…because we are staying at a Disney resort and have already purchased our ticket media, our Fast Pass Plus booking window will open Sunday morning at 7 am Eastern time. Guess who will be on her computer at 5:55 am Central time on Sunday? ME. SO not happy about that, but it MUST be done, haha. (Yes, yes, I know. FIRST WORLD PROBLEMS.)
Over the last few days, I’ve been thinking about our Fast Pass Plus strategy so I will have a plan of attack Sunday morning. The end of our trip falling into Thanksgiving week means that I really will probably have to grab the fast pass reservations for the END of our trip first to hopefully get what we want. I’ve tentatively planned Animal Kingdom for our last full day at Disney, which will be Monday, November 20. I am SUPER EXCITED to see the new Pandora (Avatar-based land) attractions, and I know they’ve made the two Pandora attractions both Tier 1 attractions, which means I can only book ONE of them as a Fast Pass attraction. ☹ I’ve got to spend some more time on my Fast Pass strategizing, so I will sit down tomorrow and review our meal reservations and each day’s tentative agenda and write down my basic plan for each day, and then identify which attractions I want to try and get Fast Passes for.
When I was younger, I was the Queen of Exhausting Disney Vacations. We had to be at the park for rope drop (or earlier), we had to see and do EVERYTHING and we had to stay until the bitter end (or the Kiss Goodnight), regardless of how late that might be. I also liked to park hop, just on principle, so on Hollywood Studios or Animal Kingdom days, I almost always included at least a few hours at a different park. While we had a BLAST, those trips were a little frantic, and VERY tiring. It always seemed like we needed a vacation from our vacation when we got home.
Now that I’m a LITTLE older (😉), some of the URGENT must do everything or die mentality has faded. I love Disney so much, and I truly love almost every single attraction, show, shop and mode of transportation. BUT, I don’t have that “I don’t know when I’ll ever be back here” again feeling I used to have. Some of that is maturity (we can only hope), some of it is owning DVC (when you KNOW you have points every year, it’s a little easier to calm down and say, we will have the points to come back next year), some of it is knowing my husband has also become a Disney fan (not that I gave him a TON of choice, but he honestly DOES really love it too), some of it is knowing that I have friends and family members that also enjoy it A LOT that I could probably talk into a trip eventually…. Regardless, I no longer tour the parks “COMMANDO” fashion. I do still try to be at the parks for rope drop…honestly, that is the SINGLE best tip I could give anyone planning a Disney vacation. If you do nothing else, GET TO THE PARK BEFORE IT OPENS. You can usually get more done in the first two hours of the day than you’ll be able to do the rest of the day. SO many people like to sleep in, or have a hard time getting their families up and going, they don’t get to the parks until late morning, or even early afternoon. TAKE ADVANTAGE OF THAT.
But where before, I would plan our days to run run run, now I strategize and prioritize a little more. I think it makes a BIG difference in how much my husband (and my Mom, in the trips I take with her) enjoy our trips.
More on this tomorrow….
Happy Dreaming!
Brooke