I would appreciate your thoughts on my Epcot TP below. We are a family of 8: Myself (GMA) GPA, DS, DDIL, DGD 8, DGD 7, DGD 4, DGS 2. We will be renting a double stroller and brown bagging our lunch and snacks. GMA and GPA live in Florida but for the rest of the family this is their first time in the Florida heat. DS is a marathoner and the family normally vacations at national parks with alot of hiking and outdoor activities. I am not worried about their endurance but am concerned how they will react to the heat. I asked DDIL and this is their first amusement park type experience and they do not want to do FEA. They are all over Frozen but do like the princesses I was told I thought Epcot would be a good “first” park to ease them into Disneyworld. Still trying to get my head around FP scheduling so any suggestions for these would be great. We have Silver Annual Passes so going back to Florida a month early to work this out hopefully.
7:30 Depart Orange Lake
9:07 Character meet and greet (our rope drop)
10:00 TT FP for 9:30 (GMA and DGS will sit this out)
11:00 Seas Nemo FP for 10:30
Grab our lunch and head to World Showcase and hopefully find a place to sit down and eat???
France Pavilion and see Belle and Aurora; stop and get a dessert somewhere???
Morocco Pavilion and see Jasmine
Germany Pavilion and see Snow White
Walk back to Future World West the way we came; less distractions and hope to come back to see more World Showcase the PM of our DHS day
1:07 Turtle Talk Crush unless we stay longer in World Showcase
1:47 Spaceship Earth FP for 1:30
Need to leave park @ 2:10 for princess makeovers
Thank you for your time in reviewing this as I know it is very long…
One of the things that jumps out at me is the eating your food in World Showcase. There is pretty much no seating, so you would either be at the standing only high tables scattered around or sitting on the ground. Instead I recommend you take your food into one of the QS restaurants in Future World to eat. Sunshine Seasons (in the Land pavilion, it has a lot of seating in the A/C, also Electric Umbrella would be an option). You will be close to Sunshine Seasons after Nemo and before you head into World Showcase. After eating, head to World Showcase. It may be hard to make it all the way to Germany and then all the way back in the awful heat/humidity. There is wonderful ice cream in France, that will be wonderful after the trek from The Seas or The Land.
My experience is that you don’t need a FPP for Nemo, it is usually walk on for us over busy spring break. But not sure what else you would use it for. I do like TT and Spaceship Earth for your other FPP choices. Personally I would make your FPP 9-10, 10-11, and 11-12 (SE at 9, TT at 10, Nemo at 11), that way you are not tied to returning to Future World if you want to stay in World Showcase longer. Here’s my rough plan I just made for you:
Arrive, rope drop the Character meet and greet, ride Spaceship Earth with FPP, then Test Track at 10 with FPP. Let the kids play in whatever the area at the exit of Mission Space is (it is inside). Then head to the Seas and ride Nemo at 11 with FPP, it exits into The Seas where you can see the fish, take a picture in the giant shark head, see the Crush show (maybe FPP for this instead of Nemo?), then head over to the Land to eat your prepacked lunch. Next head to World Showcase. Make your way back to France passing by Canada and the UK, stop in France for characters and ice cream, then Morocco for Jasmine. (No idea what time these characters meet, so you need to see what those times are). It will be a walk over to Germany from there, and it will be very hot. Is there a character over in Canada or the UK that would be easier to meet? Once you make it to Germany you are looking at a pretty long haul to get back to the front of Future World, and it will be scorching by this time.
Hopefully this helps, I have taken many years to figure out how to tour World Showcase when it is hot, I always come back to not being there between 1 and 5 pm, it is just so hot out there with no shade and all the concrete. Plus it will be Food and Wine festival time, which means more crowded than a non festival time.
Thank you for the suggestions; they all make sense. We will visit the United Kingdom, France, and Morocco Pavilions. The Germany Pavilion would be too far. It would be wonderful to eat in A/C; you don’t think someone would approach us and ask us to leave as we did not purchase any food?
Food and wine will cause world showcase to get crowded in the latter part of the afternoon. You can try different things and maybe get good deserts. Living with the Land and Soarin are good for escaping the heat in the afternoon.
I left my son and his girlfriend in the afternoon sun in Epcot and ducked into Canada and China on my way to the air conditioned buildings in Future World.
Belle & Aurora meet in two different spots and alternate times, so it’s easy to go from one line to the other. I arrived after Aurora’s line had been cut off and Belle’s was already 10ish families long. I got in that line and waited to meet Belle. Then I immediately moved to Aurora’s line with 1 other family. We only had about 10 minutes to wait for Aurora to come back out and we were the first two in line for her.
This sounds like a great first day! The first time we took our kids they were 7, 5, 3 and 1 and we rented two double strollers also. Pain in the rear navigating the buses with them but they saved our kids’ feet! Was glad we had two!
My concern is how long the lines are for the princesses. No idea how long they normally get but I don’t think it’d be surprising to see 20-30 minute waits for them. So I’d plan conservatively for the wait times for them and prioritize your top two and then do the other ones assuming time allows.
Also…I feel like I saw on Chat recently that Epcot Character Spot was bumped back down to Tier II. Can anyone confirm? If so, you could use your second Tier II FP for that.
I thought Epcot would be a good “first” park to ease them into Disneyworld. Still trying to get my head around FP scheduling so any suggestions for these would be great. We have Silver Annual Passes so going back to Florida a month early to work this out hopefully.