Thanks everyone for the suggestions! It really helps because this is completely different from my normal strategy so I’ve never really thought about a trip this way. This continues to be an amazing community of folks with great ideas!
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Seven days after checkout and this thread in particular makes me want to go back immediately lol. Our planned unstructured “exploring” time at just Epcot didn’t happen. The combination of LL windows, midday breaks, rain, and long table service meals consumed the time. Plus I forgot how spread out everything is at Epcot.
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We go to parks (almost) every day but this is how we do it…
We sleep in every day, hit pool 10am-2pm, head up to room to eat/relax and then shower and head out and only go to the parks at night…
This seems to work well for teenagers especially since they like to sleep and might be willing to sacrifice some rides (for younger kids)…We also have the deluxe after hours, buy ILLs and use Genie+ which helps a lot
Our off day we go to water park, get cabana and everyone does their own thing 9either hit rides or chill in cabana)
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This 100%
My ideas of taking it easy are:
Prioritize: We’ve always picked our favorite things, which not only makes for a more relaxing trip, but also leaves new stuff for future trips. We’ve gone 4 times with my kids and there’s a ton of things we haven’t seen. The more we’ve gone, the more it has been possible to do this.
Slow mornings: On our last trip I realized that we really don’t need RD and the stress that comes with it. I used the mornings to stack G+ selections and we hit parks from lunch time to closing. So much more fun than rushing in in the morning and being exhausted in the afternoon. We are not mid day break people, I think it’s too much effort to travel back and forth.
Sit down to eat: We probably did more TS meals than on prior trips combined. These provided a much needed break.
Day off: A no park day is a must now for me, preferably after 2 park days. Something like DS is not my idea of a day off.
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We haven’t rope dropped in almost 10 years…we like to sleep in on vacation
Genie+ stacking and ILLs have made a HUGE difference to be able to enjoy the afternoons, hit most of the best rides without a wait while skipping rope drop
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Us too.
Park-park-rest
Park-park-rest
park-park-home 
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This has me wondering:
Are guests who want to forego the cost of G+ making up the most of the rope-droppers?
And, on the flip side, are guests who want to take it slow and easy more likely to G+ for stacking?
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I would bet this is the case…this is why i am dreading the anticipated changes with the rumored tiers and potential to have to use pre selections before booking another ride, which would eliminate stacking
stacking is the best feature of Genie+
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This is our typical vacation too…We just changed for the last 2 trips to the following (due to deluxe extended hours, party nights, etc)…
April 12-21 we are:
Fri 12 - land 4pm, staying BLT, dinner S71 and Villain’s Liar for fireworks
Sat 13 - MK
Sun 14 - HS
Mon 15 - Epcot (to get EEH)
Tues 16- off/resort day
Wed 17- MK (to get EEH)
Thur 18- AK (do half day here in place of second off day)
Fri 19- HS
Sat 20- Epcot
Sunday - fly home
This way we get every park 2x except AK and a resort day while getting EEH at both parks
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I love this!!
We are a RD to FW kind of family. Sprinkle in a party or After Hours in the mix to really make it nuts sometimes. But some of our favorite memories are in the slow spots. Like when my kids stopped in the middle of AK and rearranged their pin lanyards for over an hour. We missed a fast pass but they were so content. Or the morning it was POURING when we woke up to RD HS and instead we grabbed a 10AM ADR at Trattoria and then played in the arcade until the rain slowed down.
My last trip was just me and BFF. She was 2 weeks out from COVID and still pretty fatigued. So we did midday breaks every day. And I actually really enjoyed it. Most evenings we went on a new quest to see MK FW from a different perspective. No FW crowd battles. This might be a nice slow down activity for your family. Sometimes we were in MK but not in front of the castle. Sometimes we were on a boat or in a skyliner or on a monorail. It was really a lot of fun. We are going back in April and will do the same again.
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This is my style, for sure. Sure, I’ll make a TP with all of the things I want to do but that’s mainly just to see what kind of day that looks like… the plan is not the law. We really just go in with what we want to do (if it’s more than just me and one kid then I have everyone pick their 1 big must-do for that day), and anything else we get done is extra. It definitely is a lot easier to do this when you’ve been there before and have already done everything at least once. When I’m by myself or it’s just two of us I usually prioritize new things… like, any new attractions and at least one thing we’ve never seen or done, and then old favorites get filled in as we go.
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I can’t convince my family to go slow. They look at me crazy at the mere mention that we sleep in! So, we purchase Genie+ and also go rope drop to close most every day. Our only rest times are table service meals. It’s exhausting but tons of fun also. We just have to allow for recovery time once we are home.
Edited to add: I picture things slowing down when the kids have their own families and it’s just my husband and I in a few years.
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If my daughter is along there is no slowing down. She is famous for saying “We don’t sleep at Disney. We RIDE at Disney.” And, man, she means it. Even through the usual teen sleep in years she was standing at that rope.
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I find you get genie+, buy ILLs, get a VQ and rope drop that there’s no need to stay past 2pm in every park. If we did that strategy we would be done in AK in prob 3 hours, Epcot and HS in 5 and MK maybe 6-7.
We try to do same thing but just in afternoon vs the am so we can sleep in, go to pool every day
Stacking ILLs and VQs make this very efficient
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Would he enjoy mini golf or bowling at Splitsville? Maybe a movie at Disney Springs? A water park?
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I forego G+ most of the days of my trips, and I would say that rope drop indeed helps me maximize my time… but its not a must for me every day. Having to get up at 7 am to book a VQ/ILL etc kinda spoils my morning so I might as well hit the park.
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I am going to attempt to do some stacking though in April, I promised myself a little more relaxed vacation and more pool time for this next trip.
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The 7am start is for sure a bummer. But to me there is a big difference between being awake with a cup of coffee in my jammies on my balcony and a book and scurrying out the door to join a huge crowd of people to race for a ride. Plus I’m the only one awake (and I like it that way LOL) for G+ and I’m not nagging the rest of the family awake at an hour of they day they despise LOL
I guess that’s why it’s great there are so many ways to do it though - something for everyone.
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Goals
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