Florida / WDW overwhelming?

[signtalker]

Not at all, I’m a huge planner , we’re also not sit around the pool type people, and what are these relax days people talk about ?
We’re also up and out at 5am , walking round the resort every morning ,making the most of every minute .
So love planning , but then we are an active couple , at home or on holiday .

Love the planning aspect , nothing better than a note pad and pen

Jules

[shack69]

I don't find it stressful . We have been to Paris & Anaheim also. I do look to book Fast passes and so we have to have an idea which day we are going to each park, but if something happens we just change the FP's. We generally stay offsite and so ADR's are not an issue and to be honest if i had to book where we wanted to each 6 months in advance I would find that a pain.
Universal does not have pre bookable FP so no stress , turn up and go to the attractions in any order you like, subject to queues. Our attitude in both parks is there are some attractions we must do and are willing to queue for, but others if the queue is long we come back later.
Oddly I found Paris at Christmas more stressful as in the studios to get into the shows you had to carefully plan on the day as they were reaching capacity, same happened in California adventure. At least with FP in advance i can spread the planning out instead of the pressure on the day.

[mikeishere]

I like the idea of the paid fp’s Paris are introducing. I like the idea of rocking up and showing your paid fast passes. Nothing more depressing than knowing you’ll be in the queue for splash mountain or any ride at 10am on a certain date. How’s that spontaneous fun holidays in a theme park?

It’s not just all the planning it’s the bigger the Florida parks get and more they add ,especially universal and Disney in competition, it’s like omg their is just toooooo much to consider and get around as I’m the type that what’s to see and do it all as I love my tv and movies and Disney so everything is appealing. I’m gogogo all the time.

[loldis]

I only plan my must dos. Everything else gets decided on the day depending what I feel like. Sometimes that will mean staying in the park all day, other times it's two hours and I'm done, head off to do something else for the day.

The thing I found most stressful was ADRs, now I only do QS and will try a last minute reservation or walk up if I fancy TS on the day.

[baggies]

I enjoy the planning so dont find that overwhelming at all it builds the excitement for me.

... BUT ...

Other than where I sleep, my plans have never been followed.

I changed fastpasses the day before and on the day

I change ADRs the day before.

I change planned Park days all the time.

Ofc the current WDW park reservations may not give me so much flexibility if they stay intact, but i will work around that when the time comes.

[curlysue2]

Wdw you can't really be spontaneous anymore with reservations and no passes and limited hopping and the need to get Rise of the Resistance passes at the crack of dawn.
Would be nice if you could just decide own the morning and queue up for as long as you wanted to.
Universal is more spontaneous you just turn up and decide what you want to queue for no real planning

[DanLees]

As much as I like a spreadsheet... We did "just" Universal at the beginning of 2020 (sneaked that one in!) and one day at Hollywood Studios for the new Star Wars stuff and it was SO NICE, just to be able to rock up to IOA or US and flash you Express Passes and be on rides pretty quickly without any forethought.

Disney takes lots more planning, especially currently.

[Claudette]

No I don’t find the planning overwhelming, I enjoy it and don’t find it difficult. I don’t overthink it though, don’t use crowd calculators to find out the best (apparently) day to go for example and I leave most of the afternoons as flexible.

I am also not wedded to buy plans, last time I went I compared the restaurants I ate in to my ADR plan and it bore no resemblance. I think I only turned up to a couple of them as they were in the plan.

I like the fast pass system (not as much as I like Universal express pass) and find it less stressful than having to turn up and hope for the best. I hope it returns and not sure we will go again until it does.

[cornishfrogboy]

A very interesting post.

It was the complexity of extracting the max out of Disney theme parks (along with never getting or understanding the ‘magic’ or being happy with value) that drove us away initially.
I never got involved in any way with DDP and stuff, but that would add to the complexity.

We got ‘complex’ the other way, going down the route of multi city, multi state and driving type vacations, using planes, trains and automobiles to see far more of the USA as a whole.

When we have an Orlando phase, we play it by the day (other than the compulsory Discovery Cove day and the stay in the deluxe universal hotel) and that suits us just great. When we enter a park, all of which we know very well and even as we pick up a park map, we are deciding which attraction to do first.

The thought of planning out Disney parks in Orlando with fast pass or whatever would leave us absolutely cold.
Disneyland California? We found most of the major rides either broken or down for maintenance when we visited Easter 2019, to the extent that I do not plan on returning. I did like the spontaneity of using the old, paper fast passes once more, though!

[dippiedawnie]

I’m a planner and chief organiser fir any holiday we do-cruise and activities and trips, centre Parcs etc so it’s just in my DNA to plan WDW visits to the nth degree. However we are DVC, have been going most years since 1993 and will be going as often as we can till we physically can’t (our DVC expires when I’m 72 &#128514 so we do not feel the pressure to do everything. If we miss something we are lucky enough to know we can just try and catch it next time. I mainly do ADRs we love and maybe a few new ones but then eat off site and do fast passes but change regularly if we just don’t fancy doing them in that park on that day. We also tend to do multi centre so WDW, cruise and Universal so that all adds to the complexity but I’m fine with that. 😊 Who knows what it will be like when we all return though!