Maybe you’re not a planner type. Maybe you think that a vacation should be an exercise in spontaneity. Or, maybe you’re the kind of person that just likes to wing it… Well, I’m here to tell you that you that if you decide to eschew a Type-A planning mentality for your Walt Disney World vacation, you might decide to never go back again.

And maybe you never intend to go back. Maybe you’re spending $10,000 this one time as a rite of passage… and you’ll be a hard-pressed to ever go back.

Or maybe you only care that your kids are getting to meet princesses and ride Dumbo, and everything else is gravy.

But, my suggestion would be that you might want to make sure that YOU (parent / guardian / benefactor) actually ENJOY the trip that might have just taken years to save up for… as opposed to grinning and bearing it. I promise you that a little planning can make the difference between having a great time, and never wanting to go back.

Admittedly, my primary focus (as you can tell from the title of this site) is the architecture of Disney World. (You can read more about my story in this post.) However, as much as I’m an Architecture Geek, I’m also a Trip Planning Geek! I have obsessively planned for many trips to Disney World. And I am utterly convinced that having a plan is the key to a great time.

Basic Planning for Disney World

I consider there being a few different levels of planning when it comes to Disney World. But, even the most basic will help you enjoy yourself more than simply winging it. And just to say it up front, I personally plan to the nth degree… I plan down to the minute. And while I know I am a total geek when it comes to this, I will tell you that it helps me get closer to MY ideal vacation almost every time. Laugh if you want. OK, stop laughing – that hurt my feelings.

But, when it comes to the bare minimum level of planning a trip, I’m talking about simply thinking about the time of year; looking at what days you should go to which park, and which days are rest days; pre-planning advance dining reservations at restaurants you deem important. It might involve planning around a tour you signed up for, or thinking about whether to rent a car or to rely on Disney transportation. I beg you – if you do nothing else – think about things like this. You don’t want to show up at Walt Disney World and just wake up whenever and decide what you want to do that day.

At least map out a general plan for your Disney World vacation: what parks on which days; if you’ll need a rest day or at least a break in the afternoon, whether you’ll stay for the fireworks; how to make sure you get Lightning Lane reservations.

If you don’t do this, you run the risk of running into longer lines than you’d like, experiencing less attractions than you anticipated, and hitting the proverbial wall of exhaustion on your trip. In other words, your trip could very well be a disaster.

I’ll plan on doing a “Top 10 Basic Disney World Planning Tips” that trends on google in the future. But, for now, for goodness sake… just do SOME planning.

Using a Touring Plan

So, I’m admittedly new to this whole blog thing… and maybe hyping other sites is not the best way to build a following. But, www.touringplans.com is, in my opinion, a critical resource in order to plan your Disney World trip so that you get more bang for your buck. I’ll let them do their own marketing spiel, but after subscribing for a nominal annual fee, you get access to a crowd calendar which helps you decide when to go and which parks to go to on which days. This is accurate to a point, but not infallible. But you also get access to an amazing touring plan optimizer that helps you decide in what order to ride the attractions, see the shows, and eat at the restaurants.

Is it perfect? Well, no. A fully prescient Artificial Intelligence hasn’t been invented yet. (The computer takeover of the world is still a few years off. Or maybe the future is now with the rollout of the Disney Genie service.) But, although it can’t perfectly predict your trip, it can give you a HUGE leg up.

How Personalized Touring Plans Work

Touringplans has gathered an enormous amount of wait time data – both posted by Disney, and actually experienced by guests. With all of this information, they are able to forecast what the wait times are LIKELY to be on the date of your visit. And with THAT information, along with the knowledge of how long it takes to walk between attractions, they are able to suggest the most efficient order that you should visit the rides and shows. It’s a very powerful tool. And it can save you hours of standing in line on crowded days… which is most days.

Let me show an example of what having an optimized touring plan can do for your trip:

Version 1 – Winging It

Let’s assume that a party of 4, a couple with two elementary school-aged kids, are going to the Magic Kingdom. They know enough to get to the park before opening. So, while not at the front of the crowd, they’re there at rope drop. But, they’re a few hundred people back in line.

They decide to follow the immense crowd and start their day at Seven Dwarfs Mine Train – the most popular ride at the park. The problem is that a few hundred people are in front of them, and the line is LONG. “No matter, it’s what everyone else is doing,” they think.

They next decide to go to The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh right across from the ride exit. Then, because they want their kids to experience the quintessential Disney kid ride, they head to Dumbo. Peter Pan’s Flight is next because it’s a classic and still in Fantasyland. They arrive to a 60 minute wait, but decide to stick it out. Upon finishing that ride, they see it’s a small world right across the way, and head to that nostalgic attraction.

At that point, after only 5 rides, everyone is hungry (and melting from the heat). So, when they see Pinocchio Village Haus from the exit of the ride, they head there for lunch. And they encounter long lines there because it’s after 12 o’clock.

The youngest then wants to take a spin on Prince Charming Regal Carrousel – which they can see from their seats at lunch. They exit that attraction and see Mickey’s PhilharMagic right down the path, so that seems like a natural place to head next. After all, the kids LOVE Mickey!

Hold on – what about the bigger attractions. The adults want some thrills! So, they head to Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, then Splash Mountain right next door – even though the afternoon waits were quite long. Given that they have dinner plans outside the park, they have time for one last ride – Space Mountain! It takes an hour, but they get it in before having to leave. They leave the park at 5:30PM – exhausted and ready for dinner.

The above “plan” is fabricated, but it’s a fairly believable order of attractions for a typical family. I plugged the mock day at Magic Kingdom into touringplans’ “Evaluate Your Plan” feature. I chose a random Friday in April – which was only a 2 out of 10 on their Crowd Calendar. This was the result:

A few things to notice so that we can compare this with an OPTIMIZED plan for Disney World:

• I have assumed 60 minutes for lunch because that is peak meal-time and long lines are normal.
• This assumes no breaks of any kind – restrooms, shopping, sitting on a bench. That, of course, is totally unrealistic.
• I’m assuming the family leaves the park at 5:30 PM – 18 minutes after getting off Space Mountain.
• The PLAN TOTALS at the bottom tell us a few things:
  • This family waited 339 minutes in line, and spent 49 minutes walking between rides. The combination of these two numbers is a helpful comparative metric. 388 total minutes waiting and walking.
  • There is ZERO “Free Time” which is unallocated time between the first ride and the end of the day.

Version 2 – Using a Touring Plan

Now, let’s run this through the “Optimize” feature on touringplans.com, which uses magic (or an algorithm or something) to place things in the most efficient order to save you time in line, time walking, or both.

Here’s the result:

Some notes from the optimized plan for Disney World:

• I have assumed only 45 minutes for lunch because the family is eating at off-peak times. (This is a great way to save some time.)
• There is an 18 minute break in the plan before lunch. And as we’ll see in a minute, there is also ample room at the end of the day. So breaks / restrooms / shopping are easily accommodated.
• I’m still assuming the family leaves the park at 5:30 PM – 91 minutes after getting off Space Mountain.
• The PLAN TOTALS at the bottom tell us a few things:
  • This family waited only 267 minutes in line (72 minutes less than “Winging It”), and spent 41 minutes walking between rides (8 minutes less). The combination of these two numbers – 308 total minutes waiting and walking – is 80 minutes less than “winging it”.
  • There is 18 minutes of “Free Time” baked in, as we mentioned, before lunch. But, in actuality, almost all of the 80 minutes saved becomes additional “Free Time”.

Takeaways

So, what does this mean? Well, the most important takeaway, is that this family of 4 could spread out those afternoon rides a bit, sprinkling in resting on a bench, having a snack, shopping, etc.! OR, the family could leave the park over an hour earlier! OR, they could squeeze in a couple additional rides or shows!

The point is, with some additional planning, you can get more out of your (expensive) day at the park! It seems like a no-brainer to me. But, I can understand that this could sound a bit too scripted… a bit too Type A. It might just be that you would much rather be spontaneous at Disney World.

In fact, when I planned mine and my wife’s first trip to Disney, her reaction upon seeing my spreadsheet for our trip was a lot like this:

She envisioned a drill sergeant-led vacation, with me making us run to the next attraction to keep up with “The Plan”, knocking over small children along the way. She, however, was convinced, when we waited in lines no longer than 30 minutes long the entire week. Now, she goes to Disney with me, and says, “Where do we go next, Dear?” I’ll admit, that was during the Legacy Fastpass era. You’d be hard-pressed to do that well today. But we’ll have to see a bit more of what Disney Genie service does for wait times before we make any firm predictions about what the future holds. Early returns are that it is likely less than the “good ol’ days”, but better than the “no-fastpass” recent past.

Maybe you think all of this planning is not worth a mere 80 minutes freed up in your day. Well, I’ll admit that there are some rare days where it really doesn’t matter if you plan. Like when a tropical storm is bearing down on Central Florida.

But, let me point out that the example above with the family of 4 is assuming a 2 out of 10 on the calendar. If you can save 80 minutes on a Level 2 day, it will be FAR more valuable to have a plan on a more crowded park day. And a 2 is a rarity when you look at the entire calendar year.

I would also point out that on this sample day, the family leaves at 5:30 PM. If they were planning on staying through a 9:00 PM close, there would likely be additional time to be saved in having a daily plan.

Caveats

Just a couple caveats:

One, please know that, as I said before, using a touring plan is not perfect, no matter the source of the data. Rides break down, weather changes, parks end up more crowded than anticipated. And people aren’t perfect either, right? Bathroom breaks are needed at random times. Families wake up late. Folks miss the bus from their hotel. People run out of steam. So, you can never expect a touring plan to be a perfect representation of what your day will look like in the parks. But, it will virtually guarantee a more efficient day, with more rides, and less lines.

Secondly, I do want to reemphasize the fact that we are entering “A Whole New World” (copyrighted) due to the elimination of Fastpass+, which allowed you to reserve ride times well in advance of your trip. With Disney Genie service, and Genie+, and Lightning Lane individual selections ($$), it will take a few months to figure out exactly how plans are affected. Even several weeks in, some patterns are becoming clear, but things will crystallize as the months go by. www.touringplans.com is working on their algorithms as we speak.

Geek Level Planning at Disney World

As usual, I’ve run out of room, and you’re running out of attention span. I am eager to do a post about taking planning to the next level… the “Geek Level Planning” (not copyrighted). But, I’ll have to do that in the near future. In short, I’ve found success in “microplanning” (also not copyrighted), partially based on keeping records from previous trips as to how long things ACTUALLY take. From drive times, to getting ready in the morning, to bathroom breaks, I plan things for my Disney World trips beyond the detail of a touringplans printout… I’ll share some ideas with you soon.

Thanks for reading. I’d love your feedback,