Park Time

[DNS]

Curious what most do when you visit the parks. The first several trips we made, we would start early at one park and stay all day, or park hop and stay until closing. Then we would to to P.I. or the marketplace until they close. Go back to our room late, get up early and start again. After several trips we slowed a bit and would start our days a little later and stay out all day until closing. Now we tend to start early, go back for a couple of hours in the afternoon to rest up, then go back until closing.

[Disneymom4ever]

We have been 8 times so far, and we STILL have a plan of attack, are at the gates before opening, and stay at one park until closing. We are very die-hard when it comes to this. We have the absolute best times, but DH is burnt out on Disney. I think if we took our time more and relaxed, he would come around again. It's just so hard, I want to fit it all in and see everything! I need a happy medium. :mickey:

[Imagineer1981]

Growing up with my parents it was Hardcore all the time, Open to Close the entire trip, never a hotel break, our rest day would be a Typhoon Lagoon/Marketplace day, but we never went back to the hotel to rest. When I got married, we worked there too, so we would go to the parks at like noon and leave at 5 and be happy, but now we have a DS 18months and we are planning a long day again to experience it all for the first time with him

[ransam]

I usually go w/ my sister and my best friend. My sister is the kind of person that knows exactly when and what she wants to do. she's very organized...my friend is a "let's just go w/ the flow" kind of guy. me i'm in-between. i'd like to have a plan but have no problem verying off that plan. it's an interesting combiniation.
but when we go we usually have the park set we want to go to, but very rarely end the day where we thought we would!

[bruin1344]

As a kid with my family we went early in the mornings, rested at the hotel in the afternoon, and went to another park for the evening. Now i go to the parks later in the morning.

[Gregandmel]

We've only been once as a family, but we'll do the same plan of attack on our next trip. We are at the parks about 30-40 mintues before official opening with a "plan of attack" on where we are heading. We stay until about 3pm, then we are done for the day. Back to the resort for rest, swimming, dinner, and an early night. This works for us because we can't do the "go go go" ! We stayed at the WL last trip and honestly couldn't wait to get back to the lodge most days because we loved it there. Next trip we'll be at POFQ and it looks like there will be plenty to do to keep us busy in the late afternoons. We simply enjoy things 100 times more if we aren't over tired. We know we can't see and do everything while we are there, so we have our "must do's". On this next trip, we have already staked out a couple of things and places to try that we didn't do last time.

[Gooftroop5]

We usually are hardcore park opens & we are there stay until the end. However this is when it was slower times & the parks weren't open as late. This past trip we did a lot more of either going in later & staying until almost close (emh were until 2am we usually left by 12:30) There was a couple of times we were at the park when it opened then left went to our hotel then back to the park for late nights. We did this for 2 reasons to get out of the heat & the crowds for a little while. It also worked out we managed to time it for the storms that came thru each day. By the time we went back the humidity had dropped so had the crowds because of the rain.

[Tinkerbella16]

I'll be taking my 18th trip in november and we've been doing it the same every year.

We wake up early, have breakfast and head straight to one of the parks at opening, stay until the afternoon...go back to the resort to relax, swim, or nap. Freshen up in the early evening and head to dinner or right to the parks at night and stay till close. Being at the parks at night is my favorite time of the day to go. Not getting burnt by the sun and the crowds die down a little bit makes a big difference in everyones mood. We also love going to DTD during the evenings, so we do that after the parks close, since they close fairly early when we go in november.

[Seasonscraps]

The only time we plan to get to the park early is when we go to AK which only happens every 2nd or 3rd trip. Otherwise, we just kind of get there when we get there - I guess between 10:30 and 11:30. We hang out for a while - there's no plan. We go on favorite rides, maybe see a show, grab a bite to eat., head back to the resort. Sometimes we go back in the evenings. We have been there a bunch of times so maximum park time is not as much of a priority for us at this time.

[PAYROLL PRINCESS]

I usually wake up when I wake up, get ready to go, stay at the parks all day, usually hopping from one park to another. I don't have to stay until closing but usually end up doing it anyway. Gotta see the night time show at whatever park I'm in. We've even seen one night time show, and flew to another park to see another one! I hardly ever go back to the resort during the day for a rest.

[Giggy]

We've never made it for a park opening before, we don't deliberately waste time in the mornings though so get there when we can. Once we're there though we don't leave until the end of the night. We may switch parks during the day but we don't go back to rest during the day and don't take days off. We have days at the water parks where we finish off at a park/Disney Quest that evening but we don't see those as days off as we still keep ourselves busy with the rides. Once we're done in the parks (when they're closing more or less) we have a late dinner and possibly swim in the pool at our hotel. We stay off site so don't have EMH in the parks.

We schedule what we plan to do each day, sometimes it's a full day at one park, sometimes it is split between two places. We do this as we know how long we need at each park to do everything. We will swap days around when we need to or if it becomes more convenient. We don't have a rigid plan once we get into the park, we just start where we want and carry on around the park. If we don't get everything done in the time given for that park we may alter our plans for later in the holiday accordingly.

Basically we don't obsess about organisation and sticking to a plan. However we keep enough structure to it to make sure we get things done while staying flexible. We want to see and do everything so we try to maximise use of our time. We can sleep at home, we can't hang with Mickey at home so he gets priority. :mickey:

[kemps@wdw]

We park-hop every day! Early...always @ rope drop @ our chosen park, back to the resort around mid-day(ish) for a little down time, and off to our late afternoon/evening choice (to be determined by our dinner ressies) around 4-5 (ish). We rarely do late EMHs, and avoid the parks that have early EMHs as well. :mickey:

[BPATSMouse]

We don't make rope drop but we do try to get to the park by 10am. We try to schedule Dining each day at the park with late EMH and stay til close. We do not park hop, its cost prohibitive for my family and my kids are diehard enough that they will not leave even when offered.

[Kathy Jetson]

Our arrival day is our down day. By down day I mean after driving 9 hours through the night and checking in we go to gift shop and swim in pool until room is ready. Then unpack. Then drive to ttc to ride the monorail loop. Then go to dtd for shopping playing and dinner at T Rex. The rest of our stay we will arrive at a park around 10:30-11:00am and stay till park closing always one with emh. Go back to room fall into bed wake up and repeat till its time to get in car and drive home.