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In last week’s post, I talked about the advantages and disadvantages of making advance dining reservations (ADRs) for Disney table service restaurants.  If you read that post, you know that I am a FIRM believer in ADRs, and ideally, I recommend booking as soon as your window opens, whenever possible.

Currently, I am 8 days away from my November anniversary trip with my husband, and in the midst of planning a spring trip with my mom.  This weekend, the 180 day window opened up for the May trip I’m planning with mom, and I promised to let you know how my ADR mission went.

In a nutshell…Very smoothly.  I was able to book every reservation that I wanted, and in fact, I booked several extra as I’m not 100% on our vacation schedule and our plans just yet. I’ve set reminders in my calendar to make sure I cancel extra reservations as we get closer to finalizing our plans.  It helps that our dates fall in the first week of May—after most of the heavy Spring Break crowds are gone, and before all the kids get out of school for the summer.  Generally, this is a slightly less crowded time to visit, and it works perfectly for my mom and I.  We’re going the weekend before her birthday and Mother’s Day, and while I’m expecting pretty warm temperatures, the heat and humidity won’t be at the extremes of June and July, making for a more tolerable visit for us northerners.

When mom and I go to Disney, generally the big draw is the Epcot Flower and Garden Festival.  My mom is an avid and gifted gardener, and Epcot is never more beautiful than it is during Flower and Garden.  In past years, my job made it difficult for me to take time off work, so our trips were usually very short weekend trips, sometimes two full days, sometimes three.  This year, my work schedule is a little more accommodating, so we’re planning a full 5-6 days for our trip, which is very exciting.  I’m planning two days at Epcot for sure, and we’ll have one day where we don’t visit any parks at all—probably spend a few hours at the pool and visit Disney Springs (formerly Downtown Disney).

We have not made flight arrangements yet and Disney has not released official park hours yet, so I’m not able to completely plan our agenda this early.  However, I don’t want to lose the advantage that can be gained by booking ADRs 180 days out, so even though I don’t have an EXACT plan yet for our trip, I made a loose plan, with a couple contingencies, and went ahead and booked the reservations that I wanted. That’s the strategy I recommend for you, whenever possible.  Take advantage of that early booking window.  You can always make changes later!

Key things to think about:

• Who is in your traveling party? Are you traveling with kids?  With seniors?  With people that love sushi or only eat fried food?  It’s important to understand WHO you are traveling with.  I’ve learned that my trip is much more enjoyable when I plan the trip keeping everyone else’s preferences and priorities in mind.
• Are there any special celebrations during your trip? Are you celebrating anyone’s birthday or an anniversary?  If so, make sure that at least some of your plans center on that person or that event.
  1. Make sure you note any celebrations on both your resort reservation and any meal reservations you make. While you should never expect special treatment, Disney will sometimes add some extra magic to make your celebrations extra special.
  2. Make sure you get celebration buttons at the front desk or at guest services. Again, you don’t want to expect any special treatment, but if the person in your group with a celebration is wearing a button advertising that fact, you’ve increased the odds that SOMETHING COULD happen for them.  At minimum, they’re likely to get a lot of happy wishes from total strangers, and that’s always fun, right?
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• How does your party like to travel? Is everyone a night owl that would sooner starve than be up early for breakfast?  Or do you have a group of early risers that will be chomping at the bit to get going by sunrise?  It’s important to try to structure your touring (and, by extension, your meal plans) to accommodate your group.  This minimizes the stress on everyone, and significantly increases the odds that everyone will be happy with your plans.
• How many meals per day will your group eat? Some families always eat breakfast, lunch and dinner, while others skip breakfast completely, but might have a late-night supper a few hours after dinner.  It’s important to consider the habits and needs of your unique group.
• How many days of your trip will be “Park” days? How many will be “Resort” days?  Do you have any water park visits planned? How about Downtown Disney?  While I don’t want you to feel that you have to nail down exact activities for each day of your vacation, it is a good idea to map out at least a general outline.
• Does anyone in your group (or more than one) have a FAVORITE restaurant or quick service meal location that they MUST visit during your trip or [insert dramatic tone here] their “vacation will be ruined!!!” ? (You’d be surprised how often I hear that a vacation will be RUINED if something is left out, or a particular attraction is closed, or it rains, or is cloudy…you get the idea.)  Perspective is important!  But, while I don’t think we want to assign vacation destroying potential to any one meal or attraction, if your party has favorites, you may want to try to include at least some of those considerations in your planning.
• If you have people in your group with very different tastes or priorities, you may find it helpful to give everyone a day where THEY are the primary focus. For example, if you have one kid that LOVES Sci Fi, and the Rock-n-Roller Coaster is their FAVORITE attraction, perhaps you plan your Hollywood Studios day to include lunch at the Sci Fi Dine-In Theatre and fast pass plus reservations for Rock-n-Roller Coaster and Star Tours.  Then plan another day around a different child’s interests at their favorite park.  If you have eight kids and a 5-day vacation, you may have to get more creative than that, but hopefully, you get the general idea.
• What kind of budget are you working with? I’ve found the farther in advance I plan my trip, the better I’m able to manage my budget to make sure we can do the things we want to do.  Shorter notice trips generally mean more economical meal and snack choices—perhaps more meals back at the resort or in the room, or perhaps even off property.  Eating at Disney is not a budget friendly proposition, so it’s a good idea to review menus and prices when you are planning to help set expectations and to help set goals for pre-trip savings.  In the trip I’m planning for the spring, I have a couple higher end meals planned.  If, as we get closer, I’m not able to save as much money for the trip as I currently plan, I may cancel or change those reservations.  Right now, I have lots of time, so I’m optimistic, but we all know that things can happen to derail the best laid budget plans.

Over the years and planning MANY trips to Disney, I have learned that my strategy in planning a trip for my husband and myself is very different than when I plan for trips that include my nieces and nephews or the trips that I plan for my mom and myself.   Consider your audience.  Just because your read about “the perfect Disney itinerary” on a Disney trip planning website, doesn’t mean it’s perfect for YOUR group.  YOUR perfect itinerary may be very different, based on what is important to your group.  AND that may change year-to-year, as your family or travel group changes.  Don’t be afraid to re-assess and re-focus during your planning.  People change, priorities change and Disney changes.

I realize I’m advocating a lot of planning ahead, both in this post, and in some of my other trip planning posts.  And absolutely, I think advance planning is KEY to a successful and enjoyable Disney vacation.  BUT, I have also learned to relax a little bit, and to build some flexibility into my plans.  I think it’s just as important to include some blocks of time in each day where anything can happen.  I might have a loose idea, for example, we will hit Park A, and we will be there ½ hour before the Park opens.  We have lunch reservations at X and dinner reservations at Y.  I’ll plan some fast pass plus reservations for late morning or early afternoon, and have a plan for where we will start when the park opens.   If there is nighttime entertainment, I’ll be cognizant of what time that’s happening and have a general idea of when and where we want to get positioned to enjoy that.  Otherwise, I try to relax and see where the day takes us.

The trips I take with my husband tend to be a little more structured, because we both have a TON of favorite attractions and I want to make sure we both get to do as much of the things we like as possible, so I will have a stricter plan of attack, to make sure we get to everything.  Trips with kids tend to be much more loosey goosey, just because there are so many variables and unexpected surprises that pop up with kids…you have to be much more flexible—but it’s also critical that you have a broad idea of the major attractions that are a priority because you will have more distractions making it more challenging to stay on track and get the major stuff on your list accomplished.

My trips with my mom are less structured than when I travel with my husband, but more structured than when I travel with children.  When I travel with mom, our schedule tends to be more relaxed, and we spend more time sitting, talking, and people watching with a glass of wine and not quite as much time going from attraction to attraction.  I also don’t usually plan any character meals with mom as she’s not really into the character thing.  (Although I do generally drag her in for some character photos here and there, and she’s always a good sport about it!)

Also, neither one of us are much into breakfast, so we’ll probably get some bagels or toast and fruit and just eat light breakfasts in our room at the resort.  Saves a few bucks and helps get the morning off to a bit more relaxed start.  It’s been a few years since our last trip, and I’m really looking forward to some quality time with mom.

I’m hoping we’ll have some time to stop by the newly remodeled Wedding Pavilion where Frank and I got married…I want mom to see it since they’ve redone it.  We also may tour a couple of the resorts that have changed a lot in the last few years.  I’d love to see the Polynesian now that it has DVC Villas on Seven Seas Lagoon, and Wilderness Lodge now that it has new additions.  We’ll play it by ear, but resort hopping is always fun.  Lots of great places to sit and relax, have a glass of wine and enjoy the views!!  We haven’t decided how many park days we will do this trip yet, so I built a few different options into my preliminary plans.

We will arrive on a Wednesday—since we don’t know yet what time our flights will be, I don’t know if we’ll end up visiting a park that day or not.  Usually on a travel day, we’ll visit Disney Springs or check out the Boardwalk area.  I made reservations for dinner at the California Grill.  Located at the top of the Contemporary Resort, California Grill offers great views of the Magic Kingdom and the Seven Seas Lagoon, terrific food and a diverse and large wine list.  An added benefit is that the restaurant features a couple of catwalks where guests can walk out onto the roof and watch the Magic Kingdom fireworks.  During the daytime, the catwalks are a terrific location for pictures.  I usually try to plan one really good meal during our trips where we can dress up a little bit and take our time and have a leisurely meal.  This trip, this is that meal.

I also have an alternative plan, in case we decide to visit a park that day: I booked a dinner reservation at Tusker House at Animal Kingdom with preferred access to Rivers of Light.  I don’t expect we’ll end up doing this, but I have a couple of months to make that decision.

Since the primary focus of the trip is the Epcot Flower and Garden Festival, I’ve planned two days at Epcot: Thursday and Sunday.  I made reservations for lunches at Rose and Crown in the UK and Via Napoli in Italy, and our dinners are planned for Chefs de France (in France ) and La Hacienda de San Angel in Mexico.  These are all places we’ve visited before and enjoyed.  Via Napoli was a favorite on the wedding trip, and mom and I both really like Chefs de France, so I wanted to make sure we hit both of those.

Friday is a little up in the air at the moment.  We will either do Magic Kingdom or Hollywood Studios that day.  Or, if we decide to park hop, we will visit Magic Kingdom in the morning and Hollywood Studios in the afternoon and evening…probably with a break in between.  To allow for any configuration of those two parks on that day, I booked one lunch and one dinner reservation at each park.  Once I have a better idea of our actual plan, I will cancel the extra reservations.  At MK, I booked lunch at the Plaza and dinner at Jungle Skipper’s Canteen.  At HS, we have lunch at Sci Fi Dine In Theatre and dinner at the Brown Derby.  The Plaza is one of our favorite restaurants at Magic Kingdom and is a great place for a sandwich or a salad.  Brown Derby is a higher end dining experience at Hollywood Studios; we’ve eaten here for both lunch and dinner before and had great experiences each time.  Jungle Skipper’s Canteen is new, and we haven’t been there before.  Frank and I are trying it out next weekend–how THAT goes may affect this reservation!

Saturday, I have planned as a rest day—possibly a water park day or maybe a pool and shopping day.  I booked a dinner reservation at the Boathouse in Disney Springs in case we end up over there, and I figured we’d grab lunch at our hotel or by the pool.  The Boathouse is one of the new places at Disney Springs, and I thought it sounded like a place we’d both enjoy.

Monday will be our last day and will be a travel day.  Depending on how many park days we decide to do, we will either visit Animal Kingdom today, or we will have a casual day, maybe at Disney Springs or hanging around the resort until we go to the airport.  In case we go to Animal Kingdom, I made lunch reservations for Yak and Yeti.

As you can tell, I’ve left a lot kind of up in the air.  At this point, that’s ok.  I’ve made sure we have reservations for most meals, and I have a loose plan for our trip.  I may still play around with reservations over the next few weeks, until we firm up our travel plans a little bit.  Given specific week we are traveling, most reservations should be attainable for another month or two.  If we were going during a busier week, booking early like this would have been CRUCIAL.  Now, it’s just more of a security blanket.  By about 90 days out, I like to have a pretty solid plan, and at that point I’ll release any extraneous reservations, if I haven’t already, and I’ll start planning our fast pass plus reservations.

Also starting to make lists for a potential big family trip with the nieces and nephews in late 2018 or sometime in 2019.  The more people involved, the more lists I find myself making.  Absolutely love seeing the kids at Disney; their perspective is so different and so much fun to watch.

What trips are on your horizon?  I’d love to hear what you’re working on!

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Epcot Flower and Garden Festival: Cogswell

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Happy dreaming,

Brooke