Do naps/breaks make more sense in current environment?

[mom2grace]

Visiting 3/10-3/14. My 5 year old is now 20 + myself & her grandparents who are active & healthy.
We were always midday nappers and then as the kids got older we moved away from that. I’m just wondering if we should plan for midday breaks in order to survive this week & what I assume will be late return times for genie +. I am adjusting my expectations.

Thurs - CG @ 5 & then stay/return for fireworks
Fri - MK
Sat - DHS - plan to be there by 7:15 for ETPE - focusing on Star Wars
Sun - AK.

My parents will stay for the rest of the week with my brother & his young daughters (3-8).

Staying at Car Beach.
TIA!

 

[BridgetBordeaux]

Are you park hopping?

That impacts the strategy.

 

[mom2grace]

Are you park hopping?

That impacts the strategy.

No

 

[bigbabyblues]

Our trip is next week, and my plan right now is to go with the flow. If (when) waits get too long and there is a lot of time until our next G+, we may take a break. We didn't get park hoppers and are all 18+, so no kids.

 

[BridgetBordeaux]

You will need to to assess each day as it unfolds.
Genie+ and/or $ILL causes last minute chaos.......... and so flexibility will be required.

I will say that we found the resorts to be much less crowded during lunchtime than the parks.

We found the lunch diversion worked will for us.......EP/DHS we ate at Rivieria.....MK, a monorail resort.....AK, we left and went "somewhere".

Yes we were park hopping, but you will need to evaluate your schedule and the crowd levels at rides and at food places.

 

[DeeBee3]

I agree with the others - see how it goes. Personally, if everyone in your group are "morning people" I would take advantage of getting there early and then evaluate mid-day based on crowds and how everyone feels. Would definitely return in evening hours as things tend to slow down, but I'm sure that week will be crazy and unpredictable.

I think go with the flow will be necessary for all of us traveling during spring.

 

[Kingoglow]

How often to you go? Is everyone accustomed to walking around 9 miles a day in the Florida Sun, elbow to elbow with 50,000 other people? If all that is new to you, then you might find that you will hit a point where you think to yourself, 'dang, I should have left the park an hour ago to rest.'

If it is your first or only trip, then I totally understand why you don't want to give up a single minute. Stay hydrated and find quiet moments in the parks when you can to relax.

My family goes often and we leave the parks for breaks and naps most days.

 

[DisneyFive]

Afternoon breaks make just as much sense now as ever, but unfortunately G+ makes it more difficult to plan for and still make good use of G+.

I feel like our need for afternoon breaks has been backwards over the years. Our first few years, starting when the kids were only 3-8 yrs old, we never took breaks and pretty much did park open to close, and by about the 4th day we needed a good sleep in day or we would be zombies.

Fast forward to the most recent 4-5 visits and we always take a mid day break. We will this summer too, somehow. Hopefully by the time we want to go back to the resort, say 1pm, the G+ selection windows that we want will be in the evening sometime. Taking afternoon breaks allows us to typically miss the heat and rain that tends to be the worst in the afternoon, and we are rested for later park hours. (speaking of which, please Disney add later park hours please!!!)

Dan

 

[loves to dive]

We almost always take an afternoon break. When my son was a toddler it was for a nap, as he got older it was for a pool break, now he's 41 and it's for me to rest. We do always have hoppers so it's also a good time to refresh and go to a different park. We don't really plan on it, just go with the flow but it does usually happen.

 

[TheSouthernBelle]

G+ will or may throw a wrench into your best laid plans but if we can take a break in the middle of the day, we usually always do. My kids are teens but we all like to do something to get out of the park for a bit, whether to the resort to swim, eat or just go somewhere else via some fun transport, we try to do something to slow down.

This is the reason I almost always book a lunch ADR more so than any other meal especially in the summer so we have a guaranteed place to get out of the heat and crowds to recharge.

 

[kilik64]

At least for MK its open from 9am to 11pm, so you might want to do a break that day for sure. We are going next week as well and what I am hoping is that with the extra later hours the park might clear a little after fireworks and ride wait times the last hour+ wont be all that bad.

Our plan is rope drop, hang out till 1-2pm, nap/pool, then head back for dinner res we have in park. Staying BLT for the MK days so will be super easy to go back and forth.

 

[Kerr84]

On your HS day, it is easy to take a break at Caribbean Beach using the skyliner. The bus rides take so long from MK and AK that you may just want to “rest” in the park at shows or something.

 

[Brian Noble]

We've been a steadfast morning/break/evening family for as long as we've been going to theme parks. We'll do that for two or three days, and then take either a sleep-in day or take the night off. So, in a typical week we usually have two sleep-in days. Those allow us to be out late the night before.

 

[Bullseye]

Even during the Covid period the last two years with crowds lower than usual we took breaks everyday like we always have knowing that returning for the evening would be a shorter stint. No idea personally yet how G+ will affect this strategy though I know there's just about no ride that I would choose to stay for over a two hour mid-afternoon nap.

 

[Anna131517]

Maybe? We’ve been considering this because wait times do appear to go down later in the day. Of course if you go at a very busy time you run the risk of the park hitting capacity and not being able to go back. I wouldn’t at AK just because of how long it takes to get there.

 

[DisneyFive]

Maybe? We’ve been considering this because wait times do appear to go down later in the day. Of course if you go at a very busy time you run the risk of the park hitting capacity and not being able to go back. I wouldn’t at AK just because of how long it takes to get there.

That’s true. Animal kingdom is probably the exception for us. We either go early in the morning and get everything done and leave by dinner, or sleep in and do the park in the afternoon and evening

Dan

 

[_19disnA]

Disney parks involve MILES of walking with HUGE numbers of other people and this time of year the temperature is starting to get into the 80's regularly. I would assume most people don't walk that far on a daily basis when at home. Some seem to think they suddenly become Olympic athletes when at Disney. Taking a break is also a way to be considerate of your elderly relatives. I doubt anyone in your party will want to go non-stop at the various parks for 4 consecutive days. Whether it was FastPass or now Genie doesn't change the issue of how much ground you will be covering. In fact with either FastPass or Genie, you are probably more likely to want to zig-zag all over the park to get to your next reservation.

 

[dclDream2018]

Mid-day breaks are a great idea, the parks seem crowded these days and in my experience, Genie+ still means waiting in line. I traveled with littles last week so we didn't aim for any thrillers. Yet all our Genie+ lines were 20+ minutes (IASW was 35, if you can believe it; 20-25 for HM and POC) - I can't imagine how we would have made it though the standard lines. We did break during the day because my littles were getting hot and heading for meltdown. I also had better luck snagging doable Genie+ rides when we returned in the evening with smaller lines ( HM, OOC).

 

[HashberryOTG]

Naps... ALWAYS a good idea!

 

[CaptainAmerica]

The only thing that messed up the midday break strategy for awhile was when Epcot was opening late, but that's set to sort itself out in the coming months. My family naturally wakes up at 6:30 most days, so rope drop has always been easy for us. We usually do rope drop to lunch, then break, then 4ish to 8ish, bed around 9.