Walt Disney World -- Prologue and Planning

The Prologue

I love Disney. Disney movies. Disney characters. And, of course, Disney World.

Now, I never went to Disney World as a kid. We were a “two-weeks-at-the-beach” kind of family when I was growing up (which was fine, because I happen to love the beach). But we never went to Disney World.

For me, Disney World was a distant fantasy place. Oh, I’d heard about it on TV when it first opened, and, when I was younger, I’d heard tales of a different kind of amusement park called “EPCOT.” But, as a child, I never actually got to go to Disney World.

I first made it to Disney World in 1985, when I was in my twenties. Even as a young adult, I was captivated. What a wonderful place! In ‘85, there was only the Magic Kingdom and Epcot, but they were both amazing places to visit. They were everything I ever imagined the World to be, from seeing characters I grew up with, to riding rides I’d always heard about (like the then-amazing “Space Mountain”), to walking among palm trees on a sunny Florida day in February (an experience that a kid from the northeast had never had before). Even “It’s a Small World” was thrilling for me because I actually had hazy memories of riding on the earliest version of it at the 1964 World’s Fair in New York City. The World Showcase at Epcot was equally amazing to me. Never having traveled before, the tastes of the world I experienced there gave me a Disney-fied glimpse of what the Rest of the World looked like.

One of the things I remember most about that first trip is the music. There was always music playing – soft, subtle, unobtrusive, and happy. Visiting Disney World let me live life with a soundtrack, which I found to be a thoroughly enjoyable experience. My first trip to Disney World left me with the desire to return as often as I could.

It took almost seven years, but in late 1991, I finally made it back. There were three parks by then, with the opening of the Disney-MGM Studios. The Magic Kingdom and Epcot were still fun and fresh, but the movie aficionado in me absolutely loved MGM. From the Indiana Jones stunt show, to Star Tours, to the backlot tour, I was totally enthralled. I knew that I’d been away from Disney World too long, and I planned then and there to make Disney World a regular part of my life.

Well, as John Lennon so aptly put it, life is what happens when you’re making other plans. My other plans – thankfully – gave way to my life (which worked out just fine, thank you very much). In the 14+ years since my 1991 trip to Disney, we traveled as a family to a variety of places, from South America to the Caribbean, to Europe. But I always wanted to get back to Disney World, and I wanted to share it with my wife and my youngest (our oldest now believing himself to be past Disney – I’m still working on helping him understand that you’re NEVER too old for Disney, but that’s another story).

My wife had done Disney before we were married, but she’d done it during Christmas week – time of the 90-minute-wait (on a good day) for Space Mountain. Me, I’m a guide book hound, and I’ve only ever done Disney during the low season. I always figured that if I was going to go, I really wanted to enjoy it, and based on my experiences, you really do enjoy Disney World during the low season.

My wife was not looking forward to the prospect of returning to Disney World only to face hours of lines for minimal return. It took some effort, but I finally was able to convince the missus that it would be a totally different experience in the off season. She finally acquiesced, and I gleefully began the planning process.

The Planning

I started planning the trip in May 2005. I wanted to involve our 10 year old, Jake, both because I knew he’d enjoy being involved, and because I wanted us to be able to enjoy Disney World together, before he thought himself too cool to do it. So, after we received the vacation planning kit that I ordered from Disney World, we sat and watched the DVD together. We both started getting almost giddy with excitement just watching the places to stay, the things to do, and the foods to eat. Every place looked great. Jake loved the All Star resorts, of course, but we also really liked the look of the Animal Kingdom Lodge, and Port Orleans (which had added appeal after the Katrina disaster).

We ultimately decided on going in the fourth week of January. My plan was to avoid any holiday breaks, including Martin Luther King Day (which is actually blacked out at some hotels in the area, and, at others, hotel room prices are marked up significantly for that weekend.)

I figured a seven-day, six-night stay would be long enough. I thought that five days would be enough to do all four parks that Disney now operates in Orlando (with the Animal Kingdom being brand new to me), and using the fifth day to hop around and re-do things we’d enjoyed, or catch things we’d missed.

To make our week-long trip work, we planned on taking Jake out of school for that week. About two weeks before our trip, we advised his teacher of the plan, volunteered Jake to do a report on Epcot for the class and to keep a journal for English class. We also asked for his homework ahead of time so that we could get a jump on it. The teacher was very cooperative (although Jake was not at all thrilled about the idea of actually “working” while on vacation. It took some convincing for him to understand the benefit of the trade-off we’d negotiated.) By the way, if you’re considering going, I would heartily recommend this plan. You get to avoid the crowds and enjoy the parks with a minimum of hassles. But if you take the kids out of school, make sure to put yourself in the teacher’s good graces before hand.

As you might expect, the details of my research regarding the plans for our trip could stretch on for many pages more, but I won’t do that to you. Suffice it to say that I’m very, very thorough when it comes to weighing options and evaluating choices, and I was no less so with this trip. I wanted it to be as close to perfect as I could make it, so I compared travel packages, looked at on-site hotels versus off-site hotels, and priced rental cars, airfares, and meal packages. I’ll try to summarize as best I can, so that you may be able to benefit from my experiences.

The Disney packages are very nice, but they do get pricey. However, if money is no object (or you have your heart set on staying in a Disney hotel), I’d recommend the Disney packages without reservation, because Disney does things exceedingly well. (Of course, this is coming from someone who has not yet stayed at an official Disney hotel. I’m just going by what I’ve read and seen.) Disney’s facilities are nice, and bonuses like character breakfasts are a definite plus. In addition, there is the added benefit of the Magic Hours plan they have for Disney resort guests. During the low season, Disney keeps at least one park open for an extra couple of hours after the official “closing” time, but only for guests of official Disney resorts (during the high season, they may keep all parks open for extra hours. You’ll want to check that if you’re traveling then.) For the extra hours, you pick up wrist bands at various locations in the park during the day so that they don’t toss you out on your proverbial ear at closing time. So, if you want to maximize your time in the park, the extra hours are a nice way to do so. For us, though, we found that if we started early (at park opening), we were pretty much done by closing time and didn’t really need – or want – extra hours.

If you’re going to stay in a Disney hotel, I’d consider the Moderate resorts, like Port Orleans, over the Inexpensive resorts. Now, I haven’t stayed in either, but everything I’ve read suggests that you’ll be more comfortable, have more room, and have more dining options, staying in the moderate resorts. Of course, if your kids have their hearts set on staying in one of the All Star resorts, you won’t have a horrible time. With three cool pools, a food court, and neat looking things (like giant TVs and gargantuan foosball players), you’ll be just fine. It’s a matter of personal choice.

By the way, no matter which Disney resort you stay in, don’t make the mistake of believing that you’re going to be “right next door” to the parks. To be sure, some of the hotels (the Animal Kingdom Resort and The Contemporary, for instance) are right next to one park. But no matter where you stay, you’re going to need some kind of transportation – Disney’s or your own – to get from one park to the next, because it is literally miles between them. In fact, some non-Disney hotels are actually geographically closer to some of the parks than the Disney resorts are – but they are in another world as far as ambiance is concerned.

For us, after pricing things out, I finally booked us into the Best Western Lake Buena Vista, which is a Disney Good Neighbor hotel, on Disney property, but not a Disney owned resort. It’s “official,” in that you get some – but not all – of the benefits of staying at a Disney resort.

Based on information in my Frommer’s guide (which I swear by), I visited the Best Western website and booked directly through it. With the AAA discount, we saved $20 a night and got a room on the fourteenth floor for $90 a night. (When we got to the hotel, they wanted to charge us $10 more for a view of Disney World itself. I probably could have haggled for the room-with-the-view for free, but decided against it. But I’m jumping ahead.)

As for airfare, I love Expedia and Travelocity, but the discount airlines like JetBlue and Southwest don’t list their fares with them. Because I knew that JetBlue flies direct from Newark (which is nearest to us) to Orlando, I priced it out. Depending on what time we left, we could get a fare for as low as $69 each way for each of us. Because we were supposed to be on vacation, I didn’t want to drag us out of bed for the $69 fare on the 8:00 a.m. flight. It was worth an extra sixty bucks to take the 11:30 flight, which cost us $89 each outbound. We did get $69 fares on the way back, so all in all, our air fare, with taxes and fees, came in at about $500.

As I mentioned, I knew we would need transportation, and the question of a rental car was really a non-issue for us. We didn’t want to rely on buses or vans. If we are ready to go, we want to go. We don’t like to be at the mercy of a bus or van that might break down, or be delayed, or be too full, if we don’t have to be. Plus, if we wanted to leave the hotel and head out for a non-Disney meal, we wanted to have that option. So, just as I did for the hotel, I searched the travel sites for general ideas of the price range I was looking at, but then booked directly through the website of the agency I settled on, which was Thrifty. Thrifty is one of the cheaper sites, and one with which I was familiar. We reserved a nice, mid-size car for about $170 bucks for the week. (Once we arrived, we actually upgraded to a new Charger, which Dodge just put on the road. They had some available, it stood out from the standard Taurus-type car they were going to give us – and it looked cool!)

If you’re going to rent a car, your best prices will be with the Thrifty/Alamo/Budget companies. Hertz and Avis are good, but why pay about $100 or more per week for the same car? Unless you’ve got some special deal with Hertz or Avis, go with the less expensive guys.

So, air fare – check. Rental car – check. Hotel – check. Oh, yeah. Admission tickets. Almost forgot.

Disney World isn’t cheap. Parking in January 2006 was $9.00 per day, and that was about the best bargain of the day. (Of course, having paid $15.00 to park at Giants Stadium to watch the Jets try to play football, the $9.00 is fairly reasonable given the entertainment you actually receive.)

As for admission to the parks themselves, Disney has a seemingly endless variety of tickets, combos, options, and plans. There are “hopper” options, and “Plus Passes.” You can buy annual passes, and Florida residents get additional discounts. There are meal plans, and length of stay options and lifetime options and . . . well, you get the idea. One day tickets (at 2005 prices) were about $55 each for adults and about $44 each for kids. By the way, just so you know, in Disney World, ten year olds are considered adults. (Disney’s nice and all, but they’ve got a theme park to run, you know.) As an example, a five-day hopper ticket was $269 for adults and $216 for kids. (More on the hopper option below.)

We ordered our admission tickets on-line, at the official Disney Ticket page. Yes, I know; you can get additional discounts from other sites, but I know that Disney is a stickler for the security of its tickets, so for me, it wasn’t worth risking having my tickets rejected. (Disney employs what appears to be a finger-print-type technology to match your pass to you, which prevents you from re-selling unused days left on your ticket to other people. When you enter the park, you slide your ticket in the machine, then put your fingers into a slot in the machine. If they match, the machine kicks your ticket out to you, and you’re admitted. If not, it’s a trip to Customer Relations. But I’m jumping ahead again.)

Anyway, I did get a discount (about 5%) ordering on-line from Disney. In addition, I received hard-plastic, credit-card like passes with magnetic strips, not just little cardboard tickets like those you get at the ticket windows. Those are nice little keepsakes to have at the end of the trip, by the way.

We decided on five-day hopper passes. The hopper option allows you to “hop” from one park to another (and to another, if you’d like) in the same day. Without the hopper option, you’re limited to one park per day. I knew that we’d likely want to hop once or twice during the stay, so I just went with the hopper option.

I also elected not to worry about working any of the water parks into this trip. Disney World has two incredible water parks, in addition to the theme parks. Typhoon Lagoon and Blizzard Beach both have amazing looking water-park rides, including the tallest water slide in the world at Blizzard Beach. However, with so much to see and do at the four main parks, and given the vagaries of the weather in Florida in January, I decided to save the water parks for another visit.

Anyway, we bought five-day hoppers, but decided not to extend them. (Without the extension, the tickets expire fourteen days after the first use – meaning that you have two weeks to use your five days. If you purchase the extension option, you can use three days now, and two days in five years. It all depends on how soon you expect to use your days – and if you want to spend the extra money. (See, I told you it was complicated!))

Another tip – monitor the AllEars Net website for deals and discounts, and subscribe to the AllEars Net newsletter. They are invaluable for information and details. Through my various sources on the web, including AllEars Net, I learned on December 29, 2005 that ticket prices for the World were due to increase on January 1, 2006. Needless to say, that news ended my procrastination immediately. We got our tickets for use in 2006 at the 2005 on-line prices. It was a nice little deal.

With admission tickets purchased, that was about all we needed to go – except for one more little detail: getting to the airport. As you might have guessed, I’ve got one more tip for your trip regarding getting to the airport. Do a Google search of off-site parking near your airport. I know that AviStar has facilities near a number of major airports. Rather than park in the long term lot at Newark, I parked at an AviStar facility nearby. It’s a valet facility, with a secure lot and a free shuttle to the terminal. You simply drive up to the facility, get your ticket, leave your car, and they take you to the terminal. On your return, you call them from the terminal, they come and get you and, by the time you get to the facility and pay for your parking your car is started, warming up, and ready to go. You just pay your bill and leave. For $80, we parked for a week in a secure lot in Newark and spent far less than we would have for a taxi or car service. Not a bad deal at all.

Well, enough prologue. On to the trip.