33 days - help making the most of it please!

[wycombedad]

We're lucky enough to have an extended time in Florida next March as part of a longer visit to the USA. A lot of thought's gone into it but now I'm putting together a park schedule with Fastpass booking in mind at the end of the month.

For a bit of context, there's five of us, three kids 10-18, we're flying into Miami on the 19th February, spending a few days down there, dropping off our big luggage at our friend's villa, and heading over to New Orleans for a few more days (somewhere we've always wanted to see).

That gets us back in Winter Haven, where the villa is, for a rest day before our adventure in Orlando kicks off.

I took advantage of the Blue Friday Discovery Cove offer (didn't imagine we'd be able to afford that too!), and have bought 21 day Disney and 14 day Universal tickets. Plus a day at the Kennedy Space Centre.

I've also done a throwaway booking at Fort Wilderness to give us free parking for the first two days, extra magic hours at MK and Epcot, and 60 day fastpass access.

We're regular DLP visitors so we're pretty used to making the most of four to five days, but a whole month is a different prospect. I went as a kid, but it's the first time for the rest of the family.

So with that all in mind, here's my initial plan for your thoughts.
The idea is to hit Disney hard with some rope drops the first four days, then ease off, visiting the parks during weekdays and mostly taking the weekends off for rest days and other activities. I've used busy park days here and on TouringPlans to target lower days.

Disney gets the focus the first three weeks, trying to make the most of the quieter period before Spring Break kicks off. Universal gets the latter two weeks and Seaworld parks is mostly the last two too.
Weekends are in bold to give structure to it.

Day 1 MK - rope drop (maybe) and evening EMH
Day 2 Epcot - early magic hours
Day 3 AK - rope drop to get to Pandora
Day 4 HS - bit of a later start with FPs for SDD I hope.
Day 5 Sunday Rest Day
Day 6 Blizzard Beach half day (weather dependent)
Day 7 HS-Epcot park hop
Day 8 MK - another full day
Day 9 AK - later start if we get FPs
Day 10 HS-Epcot
Day 11 Saturday rest
Day 12 Sunday rest
Day 13 Blizzard beach if we fancy it
Day 14 Kennedy Space Centre
Day 15 ?
Day 16 ?
Day 17 Busch gardens (start Seaworld 14 day passes)
Day 18 Discovery Cove (Saturday)
Day 19 MK (St Patrick's Day)
Day 20 Typhoon Lagoon (first day it reopens, great timing!)
Day 21 Universal Harry Potter focus (huge fans) - rope drop
Day 22 Universal day 2
Day 23 Seaworld
Day 24 Busch gardens
Day 25 Saturday rest
Day 26 Sunday rest
Day 27 Universal day 3
Day 28 Volcano Bay
Day 29 Rest
Day 30 Busch gardens second day if wanted
Day 31 Seaworld second day if wanted
Day 32 Rest and packing
Day 33 Final universal day

So that's 12 actual days at Disney parks inc. water parks, 5 days at Universal including VB, and 5 at Seaworld parks including Discovery Cove.

After this we're driving up the east coast to see friends, and stop off in Washington and three days in New York to finish before we fly home.

Really it's only the Disney stuff that needs tightening up due to fast pass booking, but I'd love any thoughts on it all. Reading these forums have been so useful already and I'm keen to get your wisdom on the initial plan.

Thanks in advance everyone,
Simon

[7SeasSailor]

To me, any day not in a theme park is a rest day. In the second week you've got Saturday - rest day, Sunday - rest day and Blizzard Beach. I would re-arrange that. On day 29 you've got a rest day, I would be weighing the cases to see how heavy they are.

[wycombedad]

Thanks for the feedback!
So you mean I should try to fit more in? Not have rest days during the week and get to the parks more?
Is avoiding the parks at the weekends a good plan, it just seemed sensible off our UK and Paris experiences.
Good point on the cases, I'll add travel scales to the packing list.

[7SeasSailor]

You've got 3 kids so rest days are important. But at some stage you may want to cruise round Premium Outlets of something similar to see what bargains there are. I would also involve the whole family in the planning so that everybody has a say in which parks you are going to visit twice and what they want to see.

[Guest]

I don't think you have got much Disney time in there, I would probably use up days 15/16 and 29 on going back to all four parks.

There are a lot of water park days, so maybe you don't need as many rest days.

I couldn't do Day 1, rope drop to evening EMH. But then we don't like MK evening EMH anyway.

[wycombedad]

Thanks Claudette - very useful. We've never done the waterparks before so hadn't really thought of them as restful but that's a good point.
I'd be interested to know what you don't like about MK evening EMH, there's not much info on them compared to morning ones.

[Shooby doo]

We've always found the evening EMH pretty busy, just seems easier for guests to stay later rather than up early. If day1 was your first USA day then I would agree with rope drop plus EMH but in reality to do both is being overly optimistic It's not clear if you have been before, I know you mention DLP but WDW is a whole different animal so in reality you are looking at 8-10 miles a day- more if you decide to zig zag.
We are going for 31 nights but at this early planning stage we don't envisage any/many full days & more a "suck it & see..." plan
SD

[Guest]

Originally Posted by wycombedad

Thanks Claudette - very useful. We've never done the waterparks before so hadn't really thought of them as restful but that's a good point.
I'd be interested to know what you don't like about MK evening EMH, there's not much info on them compared to morning ones.

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Evening MK EMH is rammed and you can't even get fast passes during this time. It is nothing like a morning EMH, which is an opportunity to visit the parks before they get busy.

[wycombedad]

It is our first day at WDW so I think we'll be full of excitement and energy. I know the park's much busier than an early morning emh but it's what we have on the day we arrive. Even if we don't get on many rides the extra time wandering around and maybe getting on one or two and taking in the night time experience is probably worth it. Good to know that we can't use FPs then though, thank you.
I've got quite a lot of sit down relaxing stuff in the middle of the day and a sit down meal too, so hopefully we won't run out of energy.

The other general message is stick more Disney days in, so thank you! I've printed out a big day by day calendar and got post it notes so I'm going to get the kids involved in planning what we might do, just to get them (even more) excited about it.

We've also decided to make our first day at Universal mostly Harry Potter focused and then use subsequent days to try all the rest. We're all huge HP fans!

Did anyone have thoughts on if avoiding the parks at weekends is generally a good move if we can?

[Guest]

I am going to avoid parks at the weekend on my next trip. However I don't think they need to be avoided at all costs, at Disney we would book the first three FP, do them and then probably leave.