Help with trip planning? First ever family vacation!

[CourtneyKaro]

Hi everyone! A bit about our family to get started we are a family of 4 myself: 35, I need to plan it all. DH will have just turned 39 Pooh shaped (in case it matters) spontaneous hilarious fun parent. DD will have just turned 14, athlete, just had knee surgery 3 weeks ago, typical teen drama . DS is 8. Our only other family vacation is when our DD was 4 we went to Disney and we have spent the last 10 years dreaming of going back.
Our trip: Dec 14-31st
What we are doing so far:
Dec 13th the kids will go to visit Santa. (No the 14 yr old doesn’t still believe but she fakes it well for her brother. ) Santa will hand us a letter to be opened in the car. The letter will contain directions to the Westin Hotel at DTW. The front desk person will hand them another letter directing them to our room. The room will have our luggage and an envelope containing plane tickets.

Dec 14- depart DTW at 10:30 arrive MCO 1:30. Chauffeured limo waiting for us with another letter telling us we are going to Universal. We are staying at Portofino for 3 nights and 4 day 2 park tickets. I have no meal plans for during this time. No idea what the plan should be at all really.


Dec 14-17th universal studios: must do all the Harry stuff for the teen.
Dec 16th we will come back to the room to find another letter from Santa, this one tells us our next stop is our time share The Fountains for 2 nights in the presidential suite.

Dec17-19 The Fountains Orlando - only plans scheduled- dinner at a Brazilian Steakhouse for the 18th. We will come back from dinner to find another Santa letter telling us to enjoy our time at WDW.


Dec 19-27th WDW Carribean Beach Resort. 8 day parkhopper DDP And Photo Pass.

Dec 19th arrive at WDW check luggage and head to HS, Fantasmic Package at Hollywood Brown for 4:15. 1st fantasmic show.

Dec 20th
Bfast: 7:30am Wildnerness Cafe (should we Uber? To breakfast? To park?)
Lunch: 1:30 crystal palace MK (may drop this still haven’t decided we are typically 2 meal a day people)
Dinner: Spirit of Aloha 8:05

Dec 21st
Ultimate Day of Thrills of VIP tour
Dinner: Chef De France Epcot 7:15 (as I believe this is where our tour will end?)

Dec 22nd -AK Day
Bfast: 8:30 at Tuskers
Dinner: Tiffins 6:20

Dec23rd- no park picked yet
Bfast- Boma 8:05
Lunch-QS somewhere
Dinner- 1900 park fare 8:50

Dec24th-rope drop MK- Switch to Epcot for evening
Lunch- liberty Tree tavern 11:05
Dinner-Epcot- Teppan Edo-8:40

Dec25th- Epcot all day
Lunch- La Cellier 11:40
Dinner- Coral Reef 7:30p

Dec 26th- no park picked FP+ dependant maybe? Kids choice?
Dinner- Disney Springs Paddlefish 8:45
Return to room to find letter from Santa

Dec 27th
Check out of Disney rent car, travel to Daytona Beach for 4 days of relaxation only planned thing is a deep sea fishing charter on the 28th
Fly home out of DAB 31st

Soooo what would you change? Add? Do? I want this to be the most magician vacation ever. Neither kid is particular into any specific characters. Both love steak and seafood and rollercoasters so I featured heavily on those. It has been suggested I try to get a DAS to help with my Narcolepsy to maximize the time I spend in the park. Any and all advice appreciated! I am planning last minute as we only decided 2 weeks ago that we could make this all work so my ADRs have been very limited.

 

[NH-to-FL]

to DISboards!

What a wonderful family vacation you have planned!

Soooo what would you change? Add? Do? I want this to be the most magician vacation ever.

Overall I think you have a pretty good Disney plan. In the moment, I am not going to have many thoughts.

My first suggestion, since you didn't mention Fast Passes, is to study up on how FP+ works, decide and be ready at your 60 day mark to book Fast Passes for your "must do's". Since you are there during the busiest time of year, the 60 day on site FP perk will really help. There is a good FAQ here on DISboards:

https://www.disboards.com/threads/f...al-tier-1-booking-anytime-fps-cl-fps.3538258/

Your plan to do the Ultimate Day of Thrills tour gets you off to an excellent start!

It looks like you used Extra Magic Hours when you picked your park days. Since you are on site during the busiest time of year, taking advantage of the Extra Magic Hours, one of the biggest on site perks, can really help you visit the attractions.

I think you have done a good thing in not planning a park for the 23rd. you will have been going for a couple of days and it might be nice to have a rest day. You can always decide in the moment if you want to do something.

Again, you have a great vacation planned!
Wishing you a trip!

 

[Wild4Walt]

Wow! That is a great trip plan. If you don't have Memory Maker for the Disney part, I highly recommend it. It's so nice to have lots of photos of the whole family.

 

[CourtneyKaro]

Wow! That is a great trip plan. If you don't have Memory Maker for the Disney part, I highly recommend it. It's so nice to have lots of photos of the whole family.

We do.

 

[CourtneyKaro]

Your plan to do the Ultimate Day of Thrills tour gets you off to an excellent start!

That’s why we decided to spring for it since we know how crowded it will be

 

[LongLiveRafiki]

The biggest thing I noticed about the Disney portion is you have a couple of early mornings and late nights. That makes for REALLY long tiring days when you visit the parks. Also given that you mentioned you have narcolepsy, I would suggest doing mid-day breaks back at the resort to relax. It would give you a chance to nap, and the kids might need it too between getting up early and staying out late.

I'm assuming when you say Wilderness Cafe that you mean Whispering Canyon Cafe? If so, then that's at Fort Wilderness. I *think* you can get a bus to MK starting at 630, but personally I'd just Uber there as it would be much faster and you wouldn't have to get up as early.

 

[CourtneyKaro]

I'm assuming when you say Wilderness Cafe that you mean Whispering Canyon Cafe? If so, then that's at Fort Wilderness. I *think* you can get a bus to MK starting at 630, but personally I'd just Uber there as it would be much faster and you wouldn't have to get up as early.

Yes whispering Canyon. And that’s what I was thinking as well. We do have a few long days and I definitely plan on taking breaks I figure we don’t have to rush we have 8 days to do whatever we want

 

[YesterDark]

Santa is writing a lot of letters.

Looks like a great trip. Like someone else mentioned just keep an eye on your times and the travel distances from place to place. You don't want to waste your days with logistics of getting place to place and worrying about keeping a schedule.