Can I have some help planning from you pros please?

[Soexcited2804]

Hi we are off for Easter well holidays anyway we actually leave to travel home good Friday, anyway I'm really stuck on the planning, we are doing Disney (not blizzard beach ),Seaworld ,Aquatica, gatorland, I have also booked 1 night at a universal hotel so will be there 6-7 April,
We land at 17-15 local time on the Thursday 30 March and have scheduled in maybe Epcot for the following day or animal kingdom, but I'm stuck really for all the other days and don't want to just be picking randomly I wanted a plan so to speak that will work!
We also may shop at the outlets and would love to do Busch gardens, although I know this is a little ambitious seeing as we only have 2 weeks
Any help would be great fully received!

[klr15]

We are doing 2 weeks and have tickets for Disney, universal and the seaworld parks!

I planned mine by looking at the busy day guide and deciding which two parks would be better to follow on from each other. For example, one day we are doing a late night at magic Kingdom so we have decided on Hollywood Studios the day after as it is a smaller more relaxed park. We have also chosen how many visits we do to each place based on what we want to do at each and which parks we like the look of best.

Our plan looks like:

Sunday- Arrive, hotel, sleep
Monday- magic Kingdom all day
Tuesday- animal kingdom and Epcot
Wednesday- blizzard beach then magic Kingdom
Thursday- pool, Hollywood studios
Friday-Epcot
Saturday-animal Kingdom
Sunday-Hollywood studios
Monday-universal
Tuesday-Busch
Wednesday-Aquatica
Thursday-universal
Friday-universal
Saturday-seaworld
Sunday- leave for Home

Going to be a busy 2 weeks but it's do able!

[ratmanscoop]

Hi fellow pre-Easter goer

Since we're travelling around the same time as you and have broadly similar goals - here are our plans, and I'll include a few reasons for why I've chosen the dates I have.

Day 1 (Tue 28-Mar): SeaWorld [Allows early start and is busy but not too strenuous]
Day 2 (Wed 29-Mar): Typhoon Lagoon [Weekday, and DBB has one ride closed until 01-Apr]
Day 3 (Thu 30-Apr): Animal Kingdom [Busy day guide recommendation]
Day 4 (Fri 31-Apr): EPCOT [Busy day guide recommendation]
Day 5 (Sat 01-Apr): Discovery Cove [metered attendance, so weekend crowds irrelevant - early in the trip so allows for possible rescheduling]
Day 6 (Sun 02-Apr): Kennedy Space Center / Daytona Beach [also avoids spending a weekend at a busy theme park and splits up the days]
Day 7 (Mon 03-Apr): Islands of Adventure [Back to a full busy park day]
Day 8 (Tue 04-Apr): Aquatica [Weekday]
Day 9 (Wed 05-Apr): Busch Gardens
Day10 (Thu 06-Apr): Blizzard Beach [Weekday & rides should all now be open]
Day11 (Fri 07-Apr): Hollywood Studios [Shortest 'to-do' list so picked a busy day]
Day12 (Sat 08-Apr): Magic Kingdom [Busy day but park best able to deal with crowds]
Day13 (Sun 09-Apr): Universal Studios [Very late closing time so allows time to finish all the Universal rides]
Day14 (Mon 10-Apr): Spare - whatever wants re-doing, or got rescheduled.

The closer you get to Easter the busier it gets so perhaps counter-intuitively I've stuck some of the big parks towards the back as in my experience there is enough to do there to distribute the crowds better than smaller places (especially water parks) which get mobbed. Furthermore, Universal Express passes should hopefully see off any queue related issues at USF/IOA. If you're staying at the Universal hotel you should get a similar advantage.

I'm conscious our plan is very intensive for one with young children involved and I suspect we may end up bailing pre-close or arriving late some days but I'll do my best to keep that to a minimum. I've avoided the temptation to stack visits/revisits to theme parks on the evening of water park days because I'm conscious we'll need those as 'rest days' to break up the action for the benefit of pretty much everybody.

Busch Gardens is definitely doable in 2 weeks, we've always done it in the past, but not knowing the age ranges of your group, it's probably more fun for adults than kids from what I remember [though IMO definitely still worth doing as a family] - it's well over an hour's drive from the south of Orlando, so bear in mind it counts as a long day even if the park hours aren't particularly generous on the day you visit.

Make absolutely certain you can stay for the evening displays at all the Disney places. The Universal one you can probably take or leave, but no reason not to do it if you make full use of the park hours.

As far as I see it, you've got 5 disney days since you're excluding BB, 2 universal days (given the single night stay and I think 2 is a suitable number), 2 seaworld days then 1 for gatorland, which assuming you return 14 days after you arrive, gives you three spare days ignoring any time you have on the day you fly home. One of those you could do a second day at Magic Kingdom, the others you can do with as you please.

[Soexcited2804]

Thank you both for taking the time to write back! Also thanks ratmanscoop! Your plan sounds brilliant!
Our boys are 10 & 15 when they last went they were 4 & 9 so a big difference! Will take a detailed look at your plan,

[ratmanscoop]

It's the first time taking my niece & nephew (8 & 4 in May) and I'm conscious that my itinerary is very intensive for young kids, so I'll see how we fare. Unfortunately if you leave Disney parks early you miss out on evening shows, and if you arrive late you miss the best opportunities to get on popular rides without queuing for ages so the only way to make proper use of the parks is to be in from open to close. Easy with water parks, but 9am-9pm with the general high energy level that taking kids to Disney World etc. entails, is definitely going to be a stretch. Of course, at 10 & 15 your kids' stamina will have improved immensely since their last visit and they may well be the ones keeping you up rather than vice versa.

Couple of other points of note:

- Rivers of Light should be up and running at Animal Kingdom during our visits, make sure to find time to be there when that's on (it isn't every day of the week) - if not for the show itself, for being able to experience the park after dark.
- Visiting Universal after April 6th should mean that the new Race through New York ride is open.
- Hollywood Studios probably doesn't justify 1.5 days unless both the evening shows are on (normally it seems you can't do them both due to timing which is a bit frustrating) - I've yet to get clarification what's happening with the Star Wars show during our visit.

[Soexcited2804]

Great thank you! My boys play at lot for football so are very fit so I'm in no doubt it will be them pulling us along!
How do I find out when wishes and river of lift etc are on which days? Thank you,