How many days to spend in Disney world area?

[ChunkyNicksChunkyMom]

Planning trip with 4 and 5 year old. How many days are enough and what would you see in those days? Also if anyone has rented pts for DVC I would be interested in hearing experience. I need 2 bedroom suite type accommodations and have been thinking this might be the cheapest way to go to stay in site- but still very expensive!

[egoldber]

Do you need a full kitchen? If not, getting 2 connecting rooms at a Moderate or Value is much cheaper than a suite at a DVC resort. Moderates have a small refrigerator and a coffee maker.

Well, we have been over a dozen times and still not seen everything. ;) But a week is a good start. You won't see it all. In a week you could easily "do" all 4 parks, plus a water park and a second day at the Magic Kingdom. Or you could do a day at Seaworld for something completely different.

[clc053103]

I agree a week is necessary to be able to see all the parks (but as Beth said, still not see all!)! We typically stay in a 2 BR villa, paying cash, but have friends that rented points with no issues. We love the extra space over 2 regular rooms, but you do pay the price!

[JTsMom]

Are you planning on doing any non-Disney parks? If so, I'd do a minimum of 8 days, preferably 10. Another thing to consider is what time of year you'll be going. If lines are longer (peak season), it takes longer to see a park.

We are going in December and have 3 MK days planned, 2 Epcot, 1 DHS, 1 AK, and our arrival day we're doing the Hoop Dee Doo Revue.

In addition to the main parks, there are the water parks, Downtown Disney, and all sorts of activities. You'll never run out of stuff to do!

[firstbaby]

We literally just got off the plane 2 hours ago from WDW. We have a 3 yo and 5 yo and spent 6 days / 5 nights. We arrived around 10:30 am into the Orlando airport on arrival day and our flight left at 6:30 pm tonight to give you an idea of how much time our travel cut in those days. 6 days was nice, 8 would have been even better for this trip - it was our first. We did 3 MK days, 1 DHS, 1 AK and 1 Epcot. The Epot day was our arrival day so we didn't get to see all of Epcot and today we did our 3rd MK day. If we had 2 extra days, we would have had a down / resort day and an extra day for Epcot. GL - we had an AWESOME time!

We stayed at the Contemporary and it was great for easy MK access. Having that travel time cut down made us feel like we got the most of our MK park time. And the monorail was great for Epcot. :)

[g-mama]

Just wanted to say that we have gone to Disney 4x in the past 8 years and we have never stayed longer than 4 days. We've usually gone Friday thru Monday or (one time) Tuesday. Many of our family vacations have to be that way due to my husband's job or we'd never get to take a vacation.

No, we could not see it all, but we (obviously) don't intend to make it a once-in-a-lifetime trip, so we're fine with it.

I wnated to add my .02 because if someone told me I *had* to go for a week or more for it to be worth going at all, I'd probably think it wasn't somewhere we could even dream about going.

[KrystalS]

We literally just got off the plane 2 hours ago from WDW. We have a 3 yo and 5 yo and spent 6 days / 5 nights. We arrived around 10:30 am into the Orlando airport on arrival day and our flight left at 6:30 pm tonight to give you an idea of how much time our travel cut in those days.

Just curious but did you take the Magical Express from the airport? Our flight arrives at 1145 am and I'm just wondering how long it will take to get from airport to resort.

[firstbaby]

Our flight arrived around 10:30 and we were on the Magical Express by 11:30. The lines looked long to check in to the ME desk but the bus lines were the longest. We were in Epcot just before 2pm that day and that includes checking into our hotel, changing clothes, etc. Hopefully your arrival and hoping on the ME goes well too :)

FYI, we made our ME reservation but our luggage tags never arrived, so we had to give them our baggage claim ticket at the ME counter. I wish I had been more proactive with insisting they sent out the tags and we received them prior to leaving home because we stressed over our bag not being marked and them having to pull it. Just something to think about :)

[KrystalS]

Our flight arrived around 10:30 and we were on the Magical Express by 11:30. The lines looked long to check in to the ME desk but the bus lines were the longest. We were in Epcot just before 2pm that day and that includes checking into our hotel, changing clothes, etc. Hopefully your arrival and hoping on the ME goes well too :)

FYI, we made our ME reservation but our luggage tags never arrived, so we had to give them our baggage claim ticket at the ME counter. I wish I had been more proactive with insisting they sent out the tags and we received them prior to leaving home because we stressed over our bag not being marked and them having to pull it. Just something to think about :)

I hope we get to the park that fast as well! I thought it would take much longer on the ME to get to resorts.
We already got our luggage tags in the mail so we are all set! Can't wait! Only 10 more days!

[SnuggleBuggles]

While I could have easily spent 2 weeks there, we spent 2. It was fine. Just pick things you really want to do and do them. Don't worry about doing everything. And, if you are doing WDW and know your kids could take or leave a character meal, just skip it. Think of food as a necessity to keep you going and just grab a quick bite to eat when needed. You'll have more time for the parks that way. :)

We did Sea World, Typhoon Lagoon and Downtown Disney when we were there, btw.

Beth

[rlu]

It's been years since DH and I went to Orlando, probably late 90s, Animal Kingdom was new. One non-Disney thing we thought was unique was Gatorland. I think it has kid-appeal, but depends on the kid of course. http://www.gatorland.com/

As far WDW goes, we have been twice, pre-DS. I think we spend one day between the two trips at the Magic Kingdom, since we're relatively close to DL. We loved the Animal Kingdom and went on the safari ride several times. Loved Epcot, but again, as adults, not kids. I don't recall even going to Downtown Disney and did not do the water parks or movie studio, but that's just us. We loved the swimming pool at the Coronado but overall would not have been our pick (work conference) since we see that architecture all time here in CA.

[las710]

I just sent you a PM with info on the DVC rental. Please let me know if you have any questions.

Lisa

[SnuggleBuggles]

I have never been to any disney land. I am just curious if is it really true that one day is not enough to take a tour in the entire disneyland. Just how many days will it really take you to finish touring the whole place? wow.. i am so excited to have a trip to any disney land in the world.

WDW in Florida or DL in California?

Beth

[StantonHyde]

Susan--we are going in May and we are staying at the Mariott Residence Inn in Lake Buena Vista. Basically, we got hotel and air fare for what it would have cost us just for the hotel to stay onsite. And I really, really like my space. I want a kitchen and a dining table and a separate living room. And I have never been dissappointed with the Mariott RI. We stayed at a Homewood Suites (I think that was it--Hilton property) and it was also nice. So we decided the travel time to/from the park was worth it for the price and space.