Category — i. Itineraries for Walt Disney World

DISNEY WORLD NEXT WEEK: JULY 21 TO JULY 29, 2012

The material below details operating hours, Extra Magic Hours, parades, and fireworks.

The same stuff is in the table, but organized by park, not by topic.

(For more on July 2012 at Walt Disney World, click here.)

[Read more →]

(This page is one of a series explicating Walt Disney World lingo, abbreviations, and FAQ for first time family visitors to Walt Disney World.)

TO PARK HOP AT DISNEY WORLD OR NOT?

The itineraries on this site are designed for first time visitors who may never return, and as much as possible don’t include the “park hopper” ticket option.

The park hopper option lets you go to more than one of the four main theme parks in a day.

There’s nothing wrong with park hoppers.  Rather, it’s that on a long enough visit, most of the time you can make everything work without one, and avoid the extra cost of more than $200 for a typical family.   While this site is not shy about spending your money, I do try to eliminate avoidable expenses.

But there are some perfectly good reasons why a park hopper may make sense for your family. Almost all of these reasons come down to simply adding flexibility to your choices.

But be warned: once you’ve been on a visit with a hopper, it’s hard to be at Walt Disney World without one!

PARK HOPPERS AND DINING

Some of the best-loved dining venues at Disney World are in the parks themselves.

Without a hopper, you can indulge in one of these only if that’s the only park you go to that day.

Adding a hopper lets you separate where you dine from where else you might go that day, and can be a big help if the restaurant you are targeting is sold out the day you plan to be in a park.

PARK HOPPERS AND EVENING EVENTS

Much of the year, the key evening events–the Main Street Electrical Parade and Wishes at the Magic Kingdom, Illuminations at Epcot, and Fantasmic at Disney’s Hollywood Studios–are on pretty much every night, and thus don’t influence hopping.

But certain times of the year because of either special evening parties or lower demand they aren’t on every night.  This makes it harder to fit them into an itinerary–and also typically means that the parks are more crowded on days they are showing.

A hopper can make them easier to see, because you can see them any evening they are on without worrying about where else you are that day.

PARK HOPPERS AND EXTRA MAGIC HOURS

With some exceptions this site avoids Extra Magic Hours. Morning Extra Magic Hours (“EMH”) themselves are great, but by around lunch the park with morning EMH will be more crowded than it is on non-EMH days.

Evening EMH times often begin not much less crowded, and although crowds diminish the later they go, they can keep you up so late as to make you miserable the next day.

(I do like morning EMH at the Animal Kingdom on days it closes at 5p, and evening EMH at Epcot and Hollywood Studios the nights you are seeing Illuminations and Fantastic.

In the Animal Kingdom case, it can be hard to see the park between only 9 and 5, and for the Epcot and the Studios, it’s nice to not have to leave the park at the end of the show along with 10,000 other people.)

If you plan to take the afternoon off anyway, hoppers really help take advantage of EMH.  You can visit a park during morning EMH, leave for a nap and a swim at the hotel when it gets too crowded, and head to a different, less crowded park later that day.

Similarly with a hopper you can see evening shows on nights a park has evening EMH without committing to that park the rest of your day.

HOPPERS AND HALF DAY VISITS

If your visit is short or your kids are young, some parks may be worth only half a day, but you may be unwilling to take the rest of the day off. Hoppers make this possible.

Young kids, for example, don’t get much out of Epcot, but are the perfect age for Turtle Talk with Crush, the Seas with Nemo and Friends, and, if they are tall enough, Soarin.  Illuminations is also a hit with the part of the younger set that’s not overly fearful of fireworks.

A hopper lets you begin your day at Epcot and see everything little kids love there in a couple of hours, return that night (or another night!) for Illuminations, but spend the middle of the day at another park.

HOPPERS AND DARK, CONFLICTED, FILMS

A park hopper won’t help much with building a film like Blue Velvet, but a dennis hopper will.

DISNEY WORLD NEXT WEEK: JULY 14 TO JULY 22, 2012

The material below details operating hours, Extra Magic Hours, parades, and fireworks.

The same stuff is in the table, but organized by park, not by topic.

(For more on July 2012 at Walt Disney World, click here.)

[Read more →]

DISNEY WORLD ITINERARIES UPDATED TO INCLUDE NEW HOOP DEE DOO REVUE HOURS THAT BEGIN IN OCTOBER

The Hoop Dee Doo Revue is on every one of this site’s itineraries. Because its show times will change on October 1, 2012, I’ve spent the last coupla of weeks re-doing and re-posting the itinerary charts, To-Do Lists, and the relevant daily guidance.

This also gave me the chance to suppress some old links (2009 week rankings!), clean up some top and bottom of the page links, and take out–with a tear–Snow White and Kim Possible. [Read more →]

DISNEY WORLD NEXT WEEK: JULY 7 TO JULY 15, 2012

The material below details operating hours, Extra Magic Hours, parades, and fireworks.

The same stuff is in the table, but organized by park, not by topic.

(For more on July 2012 at Walt Disney World, click here.)

[Read more →]

DISNEY WORLD 2013 PRICES TO COME OUT NEXT WEEK

Multiple sources, including crack commenters Brandon and Terri, have noted that Disney World will begin online booking for 2013 visits next week, on July 11.

This means that the full 2013 Disney World resort hotel price schedule will be out by then as well. (2013 Disney World ticket prices were announced in June, and will be good until Disney raises them, likely in the summer of 2013.)

THE 2013 VALUE SEASON AT DISNEY WORLD TO BEGIN JANUARY 6TH?

We won’t know for sure until Disney release the prices itself, but it looks like the value season for 2013 won’t begin until January 6.

You can currently book into January 2013 if your arrival date is in 2012, and the 2013 prices Disney shows when you try to book, as I write this, are sky high January 1st, drop like a rock the 2nd, then go up again for the 3rd, 4th and 5th, and then on January 6 drop to what looks like value season levels for the rest of the month, other than the Marathon and holiday weekends.

This may change next week–the 2nd looks especially odd–but is consistent with the thought that the week beginning 12/29/2012 will be much busier than I had earlier forecast.

WHERE ARE THE JANUARY 2013 ITINERARIES?

Usually by now I would have published suggested itineraries and To-Do Lists for January 2013, and published an overview of the month (like this one for December 2012).

However, Disney’s calendar for January 2013 is incomplete–it’s still missing Extra Magic Hours.  These affect the itineraries, so I won’t publish material for January until they are up. Josh at easyWDW.com suggested last week that the delay is because Disney World is sorting out how to schedule and price for the crowds the week of the 29th, and perhaps also for the Marathon.

If Josh is right–and he usually is–then the January schedules should be sorted out by the 11th as well, and I’ll get the updates out as soon as I can after the Extra Magic Hours are posted.