{"id":55326,"date":"2017-08-28T12:00:17","date_gmt":"2017-08-28T16:00:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.themouseforless.com\/blog_world\/?p=55326"},"modified":"2022-04-09T00:35:56","modified_gmt":"2022-04-09T04:35:56","slug":"how-picked-walt-disney-world-park-days","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.themouseforless.com\/blog_world\/how-picked-walt-disney-world-park-days\/","title":{"rendered":"How We Picked Our Walt Disney World Park Days"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"How<\/p>\n

Our pick for Day Three: The Magic Kingdom<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

My extended family is going on a trip to Walt Disney World<\/a> in January, and we\u2019ve been planning fiercely since the beginning of the summer. We booked our resort<\/a>, and we had a list of restaurants we\u2019d like to eat at. Our next step? Figuring out which park to visit on each day of our visit.<\/p>\n

In the past, our family has had a lot of luck visiting a park when that particular park does NOT have Extra Magic Hours<\/a>. In case you don’t know, Extra Magic Hours are times when a park is only open to guests of Walt Disney World owned and operated resorts<\/a>. \u00a0They can fall before opening to the general public, or after a park is closed to the general public.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Our choice for arrival night – hanging out at the Polynesian<\/em><\/p>\n

In general, the park that has Extra Magic Hours tends to be the busiest park of the day. Of course, many park goers think this through and strategically hit a park only during those Extra Magic Hours, and then hop to another park when the crowds start to get too thick. But our family is still considering whether or not to buy park hoppers. In fact, on my last Walt Disney World trip, we purchased park hoppers but wound up not hopping at all!<\/p>\n

So when picking our parks, we tried to pick parks that did NOT have Extra Magic Hours. This is our schedule so far:<\/p>\n

WALT DISNEY WORLD ARRIVAL NIGHT<\/h3>\n

My parents, sister, brother-in-law and nephews will all be driving to Walt Disney World, and thus will arrive earlier than my husband, my daughter and I, who will be flying. So, my immediate family will not hit a park this day.<\/p>\n

The rest of my family will likely visit the Magic Kingdom on this day. It won\u2019t have Extra Magic Hours according to the current schedule. My immediate family doesn\u2019t feel too bad about missing this, as we\u2019ll visit the Magic Kingdom on another day.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Day Three: We have lunch reservations at Be Our Guest!<\/em><\/p>\n

Our arrival should put us at our resort around dinner time. We have a 6:25 reservation for Kona Caf\u00e9 at the Polynesian Village Resort. Our evening will be spent catching up with the family, getting a huge family photo (while we\u2019re still happy to see each other!) and watching fireworks from the beach.<\/p>\n

DAY ONE<\/h3>\n

On our first full day, we\u2019re heading to Animal Kingdom<\/a>. This park does not have Extra Magic Hours on this day, and we are anxious to visit Pandora: World of Avatar<\/a> before the Walt Disney World Marathon crowds that are sure to arrive later in the week. We have reservations for dinner at Tusker House<\/a> at 5:25 p.m.<\/p>\n

DAY TWO<\/h3>\n

Next, we\u2019ll head to Epcot<\/a>, which does not have Extra Magic Hours on this day. We managed to snag a dinner reservation at Tokyo Dining<\/a> at 6:10pm, but it\u2019s only for 8 people, and there are 9 in our traveling party. We will continue to check back daily to see if we can change that reservation to 9 guests.<\/p>\n\n

DAY THREE<\/h3>\n

On this day, we\u2019re heading to the Magic Kingdom. The Magic Kingdom will have had Extra Magic Hours the night before, so we\u2019\u2019re guessing that many park goers will enjoy those, and not visit the Magic Kingdom the next morning. We snagged lunch reservations for Be Our Guest<\/a> at 1:15 p.m. Dinner, alas, was not available, even when we tried booking at 180 days out!<\/p>\n

DAY FOUR<\/h3>\n

On this day, we\u2019ll visit Hollywood Studios<\/a>. Of all the parks, this is the one we realize we\u2019ll spend the least amount of time in. There are no Extra Magic Hours at this park on this day. We have 5:25 p.m. dinner reservations at Mama Melrose\u2019s Ristorante Italiano.<\/a><\/p>\n

DAY FIVE<\/h3>\n

This decision was more tricky. At some point during the day, my sister and her family will leave to start the long drive home. It is also possible that massive crowds will arrive at the parks due to the Marathon.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Day Two: Epcot, including dinner at Tokyo Dining<\/em><\/p>\n

There were two parks we wanted to have multiple days at: Epcot and Animal Kingdom. As I stated previously, the Studios in its present state isn\u2019t more than a one day park for us. And although we all love the Magic Kingdom, I live about an hour away from Disneyland. So if we can\u2019t get on Dumbo or Space Mountain, it will not be the end of the world for us. One day should be plenty.<\/p>\n

On this day, Animal Kingdom has Extra Magic Hours. Thus, we picked Epcot for this day. Because of its size, it\u2019s more capable of handling large crowds. It also does not have Extra Magic Hours on this day. We\u2019ve decided not to make any reservations for dining on this day.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

We’ll need a day and a half at Animal Kingdom<\/em><\/p>\n

DEPARTURE DAY<\/h3>\n

This will be a half day for my immediate family, while my parents will stay the entire day. We didn\u2019t make any dining reservations, and have decided to have Animal Kingdom be our farewell park. It doesn\u2019t have Extra Magic Hours on this day, and because of Pandora, we feel like there is more here to see than on previous trips.<\/p>\n

Of course, it\u2019s a long time between now and then, and there\u2019s no guarantee that our plans will remain the same. But we feel that we\u2019ve come up with a good plan to do as much as possible with the least amount of crowds and hassle.<\/p>\n

How do you plan your trip days? Share your suggestions and tips in the comments.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Did you like this article? Make sure to share it with your friends! Check below for easy ways to share!<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Our pick for Day Three: The Magic Kingdom My extended family is going on a trip to Walt Disney World in January, and we\u2019ve been planning fiercely since the beginning of the summer. We booked our resort, and we had a list of restaurants we\u2019d like to eat at. Our next step? Figuring out which…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":94,"featured_media":55378,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wprm-recipe-roundup-name":"","wprm-recipe-roundup-description":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1695,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-55326","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-theme-parks","category-walt-disney-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themouseforless.com\/blog_world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55326","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themouseforless.com\/blog_world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themouseforless.com\/blog_world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themouseforless.com\/blog_world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/94"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themouseforless.com\/blog_world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55326"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.themouseforless.com\/blog_world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55326\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":56259,"href":"https:\/\/www.themouseforless.com\/blog_world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55326\/revisions\/56259"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themouseforless.com\/blog_world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/55378"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themouseforless.com\/blog_world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55326"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themouseforless.com\/blog_world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55326"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themouseforless.com\/blog_world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55326"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}