First time to WDW

[Guest]

Hi
we are travelling to Florida in May and Staying at the Caribbean Beach Resort, this is our first visit and will be mine and my husbands first holiday abroad for 12 years.

Our son is 7 and will be 8 whilst we are on holiday and he has never been abroad before.

Can you please offer us any advice ?

Many Thanks:

[Bartswife]

Where to begin!

If it's your Ds's birthday get him a birthday badge. Have you booked any adr's? Do get fastpassess when the time comes. Have you done ESTAs? Read trip reports and learn tips or ideas from them, on our first visit I was planning for 17 months beforehand and it made it one of the best holidays we've ever had. My knowledge isn't that up to date as its thee years since our last trip and I don't keep on top of new things anymore as we've moved on from Disney to other things now.

[Animagus]

All great advice from Bartswife. Make sure you have set up a My Disney Experience account via the Disney website. You will be able to use that to book dining reservations and Fast Passes for rides, as well as link your tickets and reservation.

Your time of year can be busy, so definitely do some planning. Our dd was 8 on her first Florida visit and she really liked being involved. I downloaded park maps and we watched YouTube vids of different rides.

Make sure you know when your FastPass window opens and be ready to book the ultra popular rides first.

Keep asking questions on here. There is always a dibber to help. 😁😁

[klr15]

I went in May last year and it is a lovely time to go! We went for the last two weeks. It got a little busier during memorial weekend, but other than that it was perfect. It was between 30-38 degrees celsius the whole time and we only had two occasions of rain. The crowds in the Universal were pretty non existent and the only Disney park we found to be busy was magic kingdom.

Definitely make the most of booking fast passes at 60 days out by linking your reservation to My Disney Experience. You can start booking fastpasses 60 days before your stay and the fastpass window opens up at 12pm. I’d recommend having a look at the park opening hours on here for your dates and make a rough plan of what parks you want to and when as this will make it easier for you to choose fastpasses and to pick what days to book these for. Also as you’re onsite you can also make the most of Extra Magic Hours.

If you’re flying in MCO then make sure to book a place on the magical express. This is Disney’s free bus transfer service that runs from MCO to the Disney resorts. You can book this online or by phone.

Also have a look and see if there any restaurants you’d like to eat at. Are you on a dining plan? If you are on a dining plan then definitely have a look at the planning pages on here and research the one you are on to make the most out of it. If you aren’t on a dining plan then you can still book disney restaurants and character dining, you just pay out of pocket.

[Guest]

Our boy was six when we went for the first time in 2004..Stayed also at the CBR...Never done any planning...Big mistake...Plan,plan, research, and plan more..This year will be our 8th Disney vacation, know every restaurant we want to book, all our FP, early hours, late hours, all gets laminated nearer the time..Don't even need a park flyer to know where we are heading to...The more you plan and research, the easier your vacation will be..

[Guest]

Hi , thanks for the replies I need to get planning - can you tell me what fast passes are and adr?
I have booked dining plan - how do I book restaurants in advance ?

[Guest]

Any character restaurants yous would recommend?

[NewtoOrlando]

Originally Posted by LLG1972

Any character restaurants yous would recommend?

See more...

What characters does he like?

Garden grill - Epcot is Chip and dale

Tusker house - animal kingdom is Mickey, Minnie, Donald, daisy and goofy in their safari gear

Crystal Palace - MK - Winnie the Pooh and friends

1900 Park Fare - Alice in wonderland/mad hatter and others

Ohana - at the Poly hotel, Lilo & stitch

Plus you have Cape May cafe, chef mickeys, the princess dining places! There's loads and we pick by character. This year we're hoping to book Ohana and Garden Grill. If you look at this link it will give you a list of all the restaurants with chacater dining.

disneyworld.disney.go/en...ng/sort=alpha/

[Guest]

Thank you

[klr15]

Originally Posted by LLG1972

Hi , thanks for the replies I need to get planning - can you tell me what fast passes are and adr?
I have booked dining plan - how do I book restaurants in advance ?

See more...

Fast pass basically allows you to skip the normal queue and enables you to get onto the rides quicker. You can book 3 fast passes a day for the rides in Disney for free.

An adr is an Advanced Dining Reservation. Create a My Disney Experience account, link your reservation to there and then search for the restaurants through the Disney website, choose which one, pick a date and it should show you available times, if there are any.

If you have a look at the trip planning section on here then there will be a bit that will explain it all better than me.