We are traveling in mid July (we had no choice on dates based on parenting plan and summer school dates) with a 7 and 8 year old and 6 month old infant. We are staying at the Art of Animation Resort.
Would it be worth renting a car to be able to travel more easily/freely to parks? I don’t want to be sitting and waiting for a bus for an hour.
I can’t speak to how well transportation at AoA is - so keep that in mind.
We have never found the buses at WDW to be AWEFUL - not great at times - but not awful. However haven’t stayed at AoA and haven’t gone the middle of summer.
I think it will depend on what parks you are going to.
If you are doing MK - for those days it may just be easier to take the bus as you will need to drive to MK, get a tram (perhaps), take monorail or boat to MK. Which may take similar time. However I actually MISS taking the monorail etc to MK - I liked how Disney used it as a “arrival” technique.
To any of the other parks - I would say a car is worth it.
The fact that you have an infant I would lean towards having a car. You get back in it, crank the air, and you aren’t smashed up against a lot of other people.
Plus - you can always use a car to go off property for a meal or get supplies etc. I would probably suggest a car
Definitely rent a car with kids that age at that time. Disney transportation is fine, but the ease of having the car to avoid the waits and crowded busses associated with them
is well worth it.
I always drive to WDW, so I always have a car. That being said, when I go solo I almost always use the WDW transportation. I frequently stay at POP, and the buses are similar to AoA (in that they don’t share with other resorts) and I’ve never had an issue with them. The one exception is resort-to-resort travel; driving (or taking a cab) is MUCH easier. When DW comes with me, she prefers to drive, and as she is handicapped, it works better for us. I’ve never had to hustle kids around the resort, but I imagine it would be a lot easier with a car than waiting for (and possibly standing on) a bus.
But regardless, I recommend taking the bus to MK; even with a wait, it’s much easier than dealing with parking at the TTC and taking the mono or bus over.
Ooops - that should have said “mono or boat”…
If cost is not an issue, I would rent a car. It’ll be easier with the baby and dragging around a stroller and diaper bag(s).
We have always used the buses. Even when we rented a car. I always found after a day of walking it gave me a break on the bus to sit and relax. Most the time when I had an infant someone always gave up their seat for me. I enjoy using it for everything unless I was going off site for some reason. If you plan to dine and everything on Disney I would suggest saving money and take te bus. One thing we also didn’t have to worry about was a car seat! Which made it nice to not have to haul on the plane and everything.