Would love some opinions on this plan

[ruthies12]

so we've been to WDW 3 times in the past 5 1/2 years and have another trip planned for next year. Last 3 times was at Pop, but we have a really nice class A motorhome and I've finally convinced DH to make the drive instead of flying, so next trip will be our first one to the Fort!

At the time of the trip it will be myself, DH, DD 6 and DD 2 (will be 33 months to be exact). This trip will be special because oldest DD was actually born on my birthday and our real birthday is on the Thursday of our trip! She will be turning 7 and I will be turning... ahem... 29.... again.

I am a huge park person, I will spend every waking second in the parks if I can. I have a habit of wearing out my family to the point of exhaustion cause I have a hard time making myself leave the parks. So I'm trying to plan this next trip easier on them, make the days shorter and spend more time at the campground relaxing, therefore I have a few half days planned for parks.

First part of the plan is that we are going to make the 12 hour drive on Thanksgiving day. I'm hoping that with it being the actual holiday there won't be much traffic and if we leave at 5 am we may get there by 8 pm after accounting for stops. (I have the ability to cook while we are driving so plan to put a small turkey breast and small pan of stuffing in the oven for our Thanksgiving dinner) Has anybody done a long drive on the actual day of Thanksgiving and can you tell me how traffic is on the highways?

Rest of the plan:

Friday- Fort day, late breakfast at Chef Mickey's (traditional first Disney meal for my family), renting golf cart from Disney for one day to cruise FW, swimming if warm enough, campfire sing-a-long, and pony rides.

Sat- Epcot all day

Sun- MK for half day (Adventureland and Frontierland)

Mon- Universal Studios and Harry Potter stuff all day (first time at US)

Tues- Hollywood Studios half day, H&V lunch for characters then stay for beginning of Osborne Lights

Wed- Universal Islands Of Adventure half day

Thurs- BDAY!! MK all day concentrating on Fantasyland. Oldest DD will be going to BBB late morning, then we will do lunch at CRT, then planning on having tickets to MVMCP and doing the Wishes Dessert Party for dinner (did the dessert party on our last trip and LOVED it, though it wasn't during a party) this will be our first party

Fri- MK half day, Tommorrowland, then repeat favorites.

Sat- AK in am, then swimming if warm enough, or Disney Springs/DTD, Mickeys BBQ for dinner to say goodbye to the characters and a scheduled sleigh ride to say goodbye to the Fort.

Sun- Drive home.

So a couple of questions- We've never been to Universal and oldest DD gets very motion sick and so does DH so we will not be going on any roller coasters. Youngest DD isn't tall enough for a whole lot. We are only going cause oldest DD and I are huge Harry Potter fans. Should I plan two days at these parks or just one day? If we only do one day then we could do a second day at Epcot. obviously adding another Disney ticket to a 6 day ticket would be a heck of a lot cheaper than buying a second day at Universal, but even though Epcot is my favorite, my kids don't really care for it much, though I'm hoping the Christmas storytellers will help them like WS more.

Also I'm planning on ordering a Disney cake for our bday. Has anyone done this at the Fort? I believe I pick it up from Trail's End? I thought about having it at CRT lunch but don't want to mess with carrying around the leftovers in the park so I'm thinking about picking it up wed night and having it for breakfast for our Bday.

Any suggestions/opinions would be appreciated! We have exactly 400 days, I'm hoping if I get my plans figured out I can stop thinking about it for awhile. At least it's worth a try!

 

[tina.tina]

FW looks fun in the same way Pop does and I think you'll enjoy yourself. I love Pop and I think I would love FW so I lurk around here trying to make up my mind. We would be tent glamping!

I think your plans look good and the 1/2 days will give you time to relax and enjoy yourself at FW and not wear your feet out too much in the parks.

I believe you will get more answers to your US questions if you post on that forum.

We sometimes drive an hour on the Interstate to visit family on Thanksgiving. Traffic was very light and almost non-existent. It has picked up the past several years and was kind of crazy in my area last year due to people driving out to Black Friday sales which are now on Thanksgiving.

FYI: The pony weight limit is 80 lbs. My DD was well under that when she was your older daughter's age but my DS was just over.

To engage our kids at Epcot, we got them Duffy bears and they enjoyed shopping for outfits in all the different countries. We told them they couldn't buy him an outfit until they had seen them all so that gave them a purpose in each country. DS5 enjoyed posing with his Duffy at all the picture spots, too. You could easily do this with a similarly sized bear (like Build a Bear size). DD10 bought herself things from a few of the countries but she has always been a power shopper. We also split snacks in several of the countries and that made it interesting, too.

 

[ruthies12]

Yeah I saw that about the pony rides and I'm not worried about the weight limit cause DD is only 44 pounds right now and I can't imagine she'll gain more than 30 pounds in one year, however, she is 46 inches and I saw the height limit for it is 48 inches so she may end up being too tall. Youngest DD's favorite thing is animals though so we'll have to go do it for her at least, especially since the rest of the trip will be about older dd's birthday.

I like the Duffy idea! I was considering candy around the world too as an enticement. I wonder if anyone here has done the storytellers and has any advice about that? We've never been at Christmas time before.

 

[luckycharm19335]

Sounds like a very busy trip.
I personally like to relax at the Fort.
We were there for 18 days over Thanksgiving last year. We only went to the parks 4 times.
There is just such a nice relaxxed atmosphere at Fort Wilderness. I love taking advantage of it.

 

[Teamubr]

You like to do trips the way we do.

Traveling on Thanksgiving should be great. Limited traffic. There may also be limited services with things being closed. We try to stop at truck stops anyway and they are almost always open.

The only issue I see with your plan is accounting for the crowds at the parks. Thanksgiving week is one of the busier weeks, along with Christmas-New Years and Spring break. You may not be able to accomplish everything you want in some of the half days at the parks. When we have been down over spring breaks, the crowds have really limited what we could do. It won't be the end of the world. You just have to change your attitude. We pick 1 or 2 things we really want to do. Get those done and everything else just happens on where the least crowd is. Strangely, it feels a lot more relaxed despite all the people.

j

 

[ruthies12]

Yeah our last few trips have been in January so I'm not looking forward to the higher crowds. That's kind of why I was wanting to spread MK over 3 days, I figure with 3 fp per day we should at least get our must do's in. I'm also hoping the crowds will thin out that Monday after Thanksgiving weekend, probably just wishful thinking on my part though.

That's a good point about some service stations not being open, I didn't even consider that! Our motorhome is 35 foot and we'll be towing our jeep behind it so DH will be looking for truck stops anyway, we'll just have to make sure we don't wait til we are too low before looking for gas. Thanks for that tip!

 

[Teamubr]

That's kind of why I was wanting to spread MK over 3 days, I figure with 3 fp per day we should at least get our must do's in. I'm also hoping the crowds will thin out that Monday after Thanksgiving weekend, probably just wishful thinking on my part though.

The 3 days at MK should be great. Perfect way to manage the crowds and still see what you want.

If you haven't been down during one of the busy times (Thksgving/X-mas/Sp break), be prepared. I always used to go in the summer. Crowds are projected at 8-10 on most June/July/Aug days. I wasn't afraid of the "10"s for spring break. And then I went during spring break... twice. The volume of people in the parks is incredible! I've heard people talk about Christmas week being the worst. I find it hard to believe it could be much worse than spring break.

I don't want to scare you off. We still had great trips despite the crowds. It is just a much different experience than the "off" months or even summer. It takes a whole different attitude/strategy. Your plan seems ambitious, but manageable as long as you know you won't be able to do "everything".

j

 

[staceyrhood]

We took our son to US/IOA for his 6th bday last year. We did both parks in one day because there was not much he would or could ride. You could probably combine it and add another Epcot day. I hope this helps! Have a great trip

 

[ruthies12]

We've never visited during high crowd times so thanks for the heads up! I've looked at Josh's crowd calendar though and it looks like the levels drop from an 8 the week of Thanksgiving to 4's for the majority of the days I plan to be at the parks. Still not going to be the 1's and 2's we had on our last trip but I'm hopeful it won't be too horrible.

Best day ever was the 29th of this past January. It was a Wednesday and it was cold and raining. I walked onto Space Mountain at 11 in the morning, seriously walked right on and sat down without even stopping once. In the middle of the afternoon my daughter rode Aladdin's carpets over and over again, there was nobody in line so they didn't make her get off. It was just a fluke combination of bad weather and a great time to be there. We will never be able to duplicate the awesomeness of that day but maybe we will get really lucky with some more bad weather and getting something close on our next trip!

 

[KristinU]

Here's how I would play the Universal thing: Since Universal has the fastpass-ish Express line and early entry to WWoHP for hotel guests, I would spend one night at a Universal Hotel. I'd probably do it just you and your DD since you're the birthday girls and the ones who will get the most out of it. Plus, it is nice one on one time for you and DD and your DH and your younger DD. DH and I both enjoy some one on one park time with DS, it just creates a whole different dynamic!

The Express thing is good for the day of check in and day of check out, so one night would buy you two days of Express line.

We did a 3 day pass a couple of years ago - first day/evening to get the lay of the land, then stayed at our camper that night, then the next day we checked into the hotel and got our Express passes and did the parks, stayed overnight, then hit WWoHP with the early entry the next day. Three days made it really relaxed, but two would have definitely been fine for us. This was the week after Christmas (we hadn't visited WDW, we were further south spending Christmas with my parents). Anyway, one day would be OK if all you were after was Harry Potter...but during a busy time the waits will be long if you can't get in early.

 

[PEC]

Instead of a 2nd Universal day you could consider Sea World. Otherwise it appears the 2nd EPCOT Day is the better option for your particular family. Another option could be a slow day at the Fort. Considering price of Universal you could do horse back riding, archery, fishing etc right at the Fort.

 

[ruthies12]

Great suggestions! Since Harry Potter is pretty much all we are going to Universal for, and the express pass isn't good for any of the Harry Potter stuff, I probably won't bother with the expense of a hotel room just for early entry. The only other things I think we are going to do are the Suess Landing and the Minion ride cause my dd loves minions. I'm hoping since we will be doing it on a week day it won't be too crowded.

Since we will have our car, Sea World is a definite possibility. I will have to give that some thought! I'm starting to lean towards only one day at Universal the more I think about it. Thanks everyone!

Did anyone have any experience with getting a custom cake at the Fort?

 

[KristinU]

Great suggestions! Since Harry Potter is pretty much all we are going to Universal for, and the express pass isn't good for any of the Harry Potter stuff, I probably won't bother with the expense of a hotel room just for early entry.

OK, then I'd go for rope drop and make a beeline to HP. When we were exiting the area after maybe an hour and a half after the early entry time there were already people queued up just to get into the area, and that was before the new part. Maybe things are different now with more room, though. I'd hop over to the Universal board for more current tips