The First Trip as a Family of 4 - April 13-21, 2018

Liking that line up of FP experiences. We rode FOP for the first time on our last trip and just loved it! Hope you are able to score everything you want.
 
72 days to go and checking in. The game plan is set and in a few more days I will be able to make my FP+ for our trip!

FP+ plan is as follows: Time listed is when I plan on being on the ride, so as long as I get the FP+ window to fit, then I'll be good to go.

4/14 - RnR @ 10:30AM, ToT @ 11:00AM, For the First Time in Forever 12:30PM Show
4/15 - Late FP+ because I friend will be joining us after lunch. Buzz @ 4:10PM, Space MT @ 5:30PM, 7DMT @ 7:10PM
4/16 - EE @ 1:15PM, Festival of the Lion King 11:00AM show, FOP @ 2:30PM
4/17 - Living with the land @ 10:55AM (I know, a waste..., Crush 11:50 AM, FEA @ 2:20PM
4/18 - TSM @ 10:10AM, ToT 11:00AM, Star Tours @ 1:50PM
4/19 - EE @ 2:35PM, Nemo 4:00PM Show, FoP @ 7:45 PM
4/20 - Splash Mt @ 10:50AM, Space Mt 1:20PM, BTMRR @ 3:40PM

I welcome other suggestions if you have them. Although w/o posting my full itinerary it would be difficult to see what else is planned and when.

Hi there! OK I looked over your plan and I would suggest a couple of changes.

On your HS day, I would not use a FP for First time in Forever. It is easy to get into this show with out a FP. I would instead use it on Toy Story which is pretty much packed all day. Much better use of your FP. Even though you have it planned for on the 18th, it is the kind of ride you'll want to do twice.

On your MK day, drop the FP for Buzz which you can do later in the evening with no lines and choose Peter Pan, Jungle cruise, or Enchanted Tales with Belle which all see crazy long lines. Actually,another option and the one that I would lean on is to do BTMRR on the 14th instead of Buzz and do 7DMT again on the 20th.

On your AK day, again I would forgo the FP on F. of the Lion King and book either Kali River Rapids, Dinosaur or Kilimanjaro Safari. Better use of your FP. Same goes for Finding Neemo, replace it with one of the later.

On your Epcot day, your two first FPs are useless. The wait times on both these are low to minimal and you can do them between your other FPs. Change them out for Spaceship Earth which fills up quickly and for Mission Space (green or orange). You can do TT using single rider line.

Hope that helps.
 
Hey just wanted to give you a heads up about the AP. It looks like the prices will go up after this weekend. You might want to purchase it before this happenshttps://www.disboards.com/threads/m...-upgrade-your-ap-before-this-weekend.3662867/

I was just looking over that little piece of news and its looks like it will cost us a extra $120 to upgrade to AP now. Due to or situation (not a bad thing) the best way of going about the AP is upgrading once we are on site. Kinda stinks that prices went up which isnt fully expected, the amount was more than I thought. The good news is I booked all the hotel stays we are planning. Port Orleans French Quarter in September, and the Contemporary in January of 2019. The price should only adjust for our stay in January sometime this summer when 2019 prices come out.
 


The countdown continues! 51 days to go for our much anticipated return home!! FP+ day went well and I was also able to get my friend nearly identical FP+ for when he joins us 2 days later. So here's what we got:
4/14 - RNR, ToT, For the First Time in Forever
4/15 - Buzzlight Year, Space Mt, 7DMT
4/16 - Festival of the Lion King, EE, FoP
4/17 - Living w/ the Land, Crush, FEA (Not a great lineup but oh well)
4/18 - RNR, ToT, Indiana Jones
4/19 - Finding Nemo, EE, FoP
4/20 - Splash Mt, Space Mt, BTMRR

Its worth noting that FP+ for Toy Story Mania is not available for what seems like most of April. So rope drop it is! I am a little sad about this though since I normally rope drop and FP+ this attraction. Maybe next trip.
 
Minor Update:

Final payment has been paid a few days early and we are officially under 40 days with 36 days to GO! A little more than 5 very busy weeks to go.

Things to do before leaving:
Rent a stroller via 3rd party.
Decide if we will ship some supplies to the resort ahead of time v/s bringing it with us.
Fine tune the schedule and what time we will leave the house.. Currently planned for 4:00 AM, which has us getting to POP at 6:30 PM local time. Going to be a long trip with a 7 month old.

The countdown continues!!!!
 


29 Days to GEAUX!!!!!

Stroller deal is wrapped up and now it's just a waiting game until I can update my plan using Touringplans.com to adjust wait times. I will start that process 5-7 days out and will also use the app in the park for my first time. Couple of questions I would like to ask today.

1. How do you make your stroller stand out from others at the parks? With the strollers being moved around by cast members and many people using similar makes and models it can get accidentally lost easily.

In the past we have used a scarf that is very unique. A church group mailed me a blue and yellow scarf after the 2013 Boston Marathon. We wrap it around the handle bars and it is easy to locate. Since we will be at the parks during the 2018 running of the marathon it sounds like a easy choice this year again.

2. Touringplans... How well does the app work in the parks? Is it easy to upload your wait times and get good real time info from the app? Do you use the site to plan your trips?

I am using it, but some of the wait times seem really short, maybe they are, but I will find out soon.

Next thing that should happen would be magic bands being delivered in the next week or two.
 
1. We used duck tape. We let DD pick out the color. She picked bright neon pink. We wrapped in on a part of the handle bar I think or on the name tag part.

2. We have used Touring Plans twice. We like it better them Disney's app. It was pretty accurate. We did not give our times though so I don't know how that works. We had our plan together and followed it mostly. But checked the rides we went on after we rode them. Sometimes it was easy to jump in line for something that had a short wait posted but not on the list until later so we would improvise too. We also made Fastpasses for the morning and added more as the day went one. One year I think we got a total of six fastpasses in one day at MK.
 
Just checking in with 15 days to go! DW and I sat down to work on some of the minor details of the trip and the what to do's if/when this or that happens in regards to the baby. DD is very excited and ask every night before bed to watch a Disney ride. I'm happy to do so, but earlier this week she asked to watch a ride we have never seen.... I told her thats a very small list, but we went with the Primeval Whirl. After watching she said, "I dont think I want to ride that one." I agree with her, I struggle with the tea cups, so that one would do me in.
 
Just checking in with 15 days to go! DW and I sat down to work on some of the minor details of the trip and the what to do's if/when this or that happens in regards to the baby. DD is very excited and ask every night before bed to watch a Disney ride. I'm happy to do so, but earlier this week she asked to watch a ride we have never seen.... I told her thats a very small list, but we went with the Primeval Whirl. After watching she said, "I dont think I want to ride that one." I agree with her, I struggle with the tea cups, so that one would do me in.

I can't do tea cups AT. ALL! Or any spinning ride. Usually I am down for the day if I ride one as I have a constant feeling of nausea and dizzyness. But I love Primeval Whirl! It doesn't affect me that way at all. Of course, YMMV and I wouldn't want anyone's day ruined! Just giving my 2 cents. :)
 
My DH can't do the spinning thing either so we don't do teacups or Primeval Whirl. I did ride PW without him though and enjoyed it. I didn't find the spinning to be too excessive.
 
2. Touringplans... How well does the app work in the parks? Is it easy to upload your wait times and get good real time info from the app? Do you use the site to plan your trips?
I subscribed to TP and had plans for each park day. We have more of an exploring touring style, so the plan was more of a loose guide, at least to get the day underway. As we got distracted by things (Disney distractions are some of my favourite things) I would re optimise the plan through the day when we were ready to reset. Sometimes we would drop rides off or even cancel afternoons if we wanted to go back for a swim. The great thing about the reset was that it then gave us a clear path until the next distraction. If we made a last minute decision to go to a different park in the evening I would make a plan on the bus just to see how things looked.

I would try and make an effort to update posted and actual wait times, had no issues apart from the times I would forget to stop the timer once on a ride.

Good luck with the rest of the packing! You flying or driving?
 
I subscribed to TP and had plans for each park day. We have more of an exploring touring style, so the plan was more of a loose guide, at least to get the day underway. As we got distracted by things (Disney distractions are some of my favourite things) I would re optimise the plan through the day when we were ready to reset. Sometimes we would drop rides off or even cancel afternoons if we wanted to go back for a swim. The great thing about the reset was that it then gave us a clear path until the next distraction. If we made a last minute decision to go to a different park in the evening I would make a plan on the bus just to see how things looked.

I would try and make an effort to update posted and actual wait times, had no issues apart from the times I would forget to stop the timer once on a ride.

Good luck with the rest of the packing! You flying or driving?

Thanks for the info. We are driving from the Baton Rouge area. It’s currently 2:41 AM and we are going to hopefully leave in a few minutes.
 

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