Yeah I think I’m going to get Touring Plans just to play with it. It’s $8 in a thousands of dollars vacation. I need to stop being Cheapy McPennypincher
. Plus it’ll probably be more like a game to me, lol.
Yes. To me the whole prepping is one of my favorite parts of the vacation. Playing around with my touring software and printing out my various plans make me feel all high tech! Also, I love that those programs not only give wait times but also tell me the approximate length of each ride, which is great information when you’re trying to come up with the perfect time line (of course there are things such as ride breakdowns, so a bit of flexibility and backup plans are always great—keep in mind that you can adjust your touring plan in the park to account for changes if you are using it on your smart phone’s app)..
Another thing I forgot in my above comment: I recommend having a preliminary plan ready about two weeks before you leave and then “dry run” that plan, looking at the waits and FPs return times using the app (make sure to match the proper weekdays with those of your trip, since crowd patterns can vary throughout the week). Hopefully those two weeks have the same opening and closing times—if they don’t, that can throw things off. This helps you make further adjustments to hone and tweak your plan. Make sure you also factor in the occasional pee break (when we traveled with my mother-in-law one year, her bladder really threw my plan for a loop...).
Meals are a bit of an unknown in each of my plans, since their lines can vary quite a bit. What works for us is using mostly counter service places at odd times (right after they open or between their typical lunch or dinner crunch times). I haven’t used mobile ordering yet but figure that might be helpful, too. Breakfast we do either really early at the hotel, if they have it, or on the run—or speed walk—to the parks (granola bars, Odwalla juice, stuff like that—lately we have been staying at DLH, so no BF but refrigerator in the room, which increases BF choices). My own BF is my patented (not quite but ought to...) coffee shake: freshly made coffee from the machine in our hotel room, add some extra instant via coffee from Starbucks, a blub of heavy cream, some peanut butter, and vanilla protein drink—I usually bring my purée stick to whip it to the right level of creaminess and large cups/straws that I got from my friendly neighborhood Starbucks or Jamba Juice before the trip. That drink + my excitement for the parks = supercharged energizer-bunny type mommy!
So, as you can see, I got this down to a science!!
Again, I do involve my kids for my meal planning, too, using menus from the Disney website and photos people post on Yelp or here on the board. Our planning together has become a fun part of our trip (and at this point, my kids actually start asking a while before we leave when we will finally start planning!). Especially with kids, having an idea what to do helps a great deal, since decision making can be hard in the middle of all the intensity of a crowded park. In my opinion, a great plan is a wonderful foundation for a magical trip, with the many surprises and pixie dust moments that are likely to happen building on top of that!