5, 6 or 7 days in parks?

[DisneyJade]

Hello, WDW experts!

I have been planning for a big trip in late Feb/early Mar 2021 -- our longest stay ever with 8 nights and 7 full park days. My husband has expressed some reluctance about the length of the trip (9 days, including travel). As much as he has come to appreciate Disney parks, he worries he will get major Disney fatigue and that our children (age 4) will be exhausted by a trip that long. He would prefer a shorter trip of 6 nights and 5 park days. My counter argument is that a longer trip allows us to slow down, enjoy the moment, and avoid fatigue by not cramming so much into our days (especially as we may have grandparents with us, which definitely slows down touring.)

The main goals of the trip are to:

• Include one day that is a birthday celebration for our girls (relaxed day of characters, fireworks, parades - limited rides)
• Hit most of the headliners and everything new in the past 5 years
• Hit most of the rides aimed at small children
• Do multiple character meals
• Do a few non-park, non-home-resort meals, like Hoop de Doo and Sebastian's

*Note: We plan to stay Club Level and to purchase CL FPs, and we would likely also book a morning magic or after hours event. (We seriously hate standing in lines.) So these things would expedite touring.

With these things in mind, I would love opinions on whether we should do 5 park days, 6 park days or 7 park days.

 

[ScottishMickeyFan]

Guess it depends how often you plan to go,, my plans for this next trip is for 15 days with at least 12 days in the parks. Wont be returning for a few years,

 

[DisneyJade]

Wow, that sounds amazing!
If it were up to me, we would visit every year, but realistically, we will visit Disneyland every year (we live out west) and probably only do WDW every 3-5 years. That is another reason I'm aiming for a longer trip.

 

[Chami]

There are so many variables, that it is hard to say. I have a husband that gets Disney fatigue. We spent 10 days in the parks, taking breaks mid-day. At about day 7, he struggled. Mixing in 4 year olds would make it infinitely more difficult.

If you plan on doing an after hours event, I might cut it down to 6 park days.

 

[M&E]

Absolutely a longer trip. With a longer trip we don't feel guilty if we don't go-go-go, though I do have to say you have quite few must do's for your trip that won't allow for a ton of "down time." While I don't think 7 park days is short, I don't really consider it long either.

 

[rwdavis2]

Longer trip. We did 8 days in 2016 and although we went to the parks every day, we didn't go from open to close. Somedays was only about 4 hours or so. The slower pace and FP+ allowed us to even sleep in several days.

 

[kylenne]

Hello, WDW experts!

I have been planning for a big trip in late Feb/early Mar 2021 -- our longest stay ever with 8 nights and 7 full park days. My husband has expressed some reluctance about the length of the trip (9 days, including travel). As much as he has come to appreciate Disney parks, he worries he will get major Disney fatigue and that our children (age 4) will be exhausted by a trip that long. He would prefer a shorter trip of 6 nights and 5 park days. My counter argument is that a longer trip allows us to slow down, enjoy the moment, and avoid fatigue by not cramming so much into our days (especially as we may have grandparents with us, which definitely slows down touring.)

The main goals of the trip are to:

• Include one day that is a birthday celebration for our girls (relaxed day of characters, fireworks, parades - limited rides)
• Hit most of the headliners and everything new in the past 5 years
• Hit most of the rides aimed at small children
• Do multiple character meals
• Do a few non-park, non-home-resort meals, like Hoop de Doo and Sebastian's

*Note: We plan to stay Club Level and to purchase CL FPs, and we would likely also book a morning magic or after hours event. (We seriously hate standing in lines.) So these things would expedite touring.

With these things in mind, I would love opinions on whether we should do 5 park days, 6 park days or 7 park days.

I would highly suggest going longer AND having fewer park days, baking in resort down time especially since you are staying CL. With the hard ticket events you won't need as many park days. Which resort are you planning to stay at? That also makes a difference imo.

 

[rwdavis2]

I would highly suggest going longer AND having fewer park days, baking in resort down time especially since you are staying CL. With the hard ticket events you won't need as many park days. Which resort are you planning to stay at? That also makes a difference imo.

Downtime is important. We used to schedule an entire day off but doing half days and/or sleeping in did the trick for us. After 4-5 days the incremental ticket costs are minimal.

 

[kylenne]

Downtime is important. We used to schedule an entire day off but doing half days and/or sleeping in did the trick for us. After 4-5 days the incremental ticket costs are minimal.

We are usually rope drop, midday break, go back at night people. For our currently postponed trip we were also staying CL for the first time and planned to experiment with sleeping in later and relying on AH and CL FP for efficient touring while still having our resort days. We will likely still try that out when we do end up going next year.

 

[MICKIMINI]

Go for the longer visit but plan on lots of breaks in the action, for instance do a morning at a park and spend the afternoon at the pool, do a monorail resorts day including a character meal and shopping, sleep in and spend the afternoon at DS, rent a car for a day (Alamo Car Care Center near MK) and go to the beach. This is where PH's work well. We split many days like MK in the morning (nap, pool in afternoon) and go back to EPCOT for dinner. It is a luxury to be able to slow down and really enjoy your trip...

 

[StevieB81]

I'm a fan of longer trips with a couple non-park days. We've done 11 nights with 8 park days and 12 nights with 10 park days. We do Park hopper plus tickets, so we do water parks and golf which can take up a good amount of time. Our next trip will be 10 nights and 10 park days, knowing that at least some of those days will only be half days or less in a park. It really depends on what you want to do. After 5 days, the price of additional days really drops off. So, for a little extra money, you get a lot more flexibility. Plus, if you're getting 6 FP+ per day, I would try to maximize that as much as possible. I think you might be trying to cram in too much if you went with just a 5 day ticket, based on your goals for this trip.

 

[CastAStone]

Always more days to make the trip more relaxing.

Hoop de Doo might be over the heads of a 4 year old. For as much as it costs I might wait til next trip.

 

[mi*vida*loca]

I would absolutely do a longer trip and buy length of stay tickets. We have done 10 days the last few trips.

We mix this up with RD, midday pool break and a different park in the PM park days, sleep in and starting around noon park days and sleep in, hit the pool and hit a park in the PM. It really makes for a more relaxing trip. And with FP+ it's worth it. Even if you go into the park for your 3 FP+ and an evening show.

 

[DisneyJade]

I would highly suggest going longer AND having fewer park days, baking in resort down time especially since you are staying CL. With the hard ticket events you won't need as many park days. Which resort are you planning to stay at? That also makes a difference imo.

We are looking at Gran Destino, since it makes CL so affordable. But we've also considered AKL (our personal favorite), CBR (for skyliner, forgoing CL), or Poly or Contemporary (for proximity to MK - although CL would be out of our budget at the monorail resorts.)

I'm a fan of longer trips with a couple non-park days. We've done 11 nights with 8 park days and 12 nights with 10 park days. We do Park hopper plus tickets, so we do water parks and golf which can take up a good amount of time. Our next trip will be 10 nights and 10 park days, knowing that at least some of those days will only be half days or less in a park. It really depends on what you want to do. After 5 days, the price of additional days really drops off. So, for a little extra money, you get a lot more flexibility. Plus, if you're getting 6 FP+ per day, I would try to maximize that as much as possible. I think you might be trying to cram in too much if you went with just a 5 day ticket, based on your goals for this trip.

Thank you, everyone. It seems most of you are on my side! (naturally!) Haha.
I do like this advice from a few folks, suggesting longer stay with a break day in the middle. I think I can sell this to my husband!

 

[jshoemak]

We usually stay the same length of time, but we only do 5-6 park days. We like "off" days while at Disney. Those days could be spent by the pool, water park, or Disney Springs. You'll have fun no matter what you choose

 

[DisneyJade]

Always more days to make the trip more relaxing.

Hoop de Doo might be over the heads of a 4 year old. For as much as it costs I might wait til next trip.

Thanks for this insight on Hoop de Doo. It would definitely save time if we hold it for a trip when the kids are older.

 

[DisneyAlum91]

I always plan for 7 or more since that last day comes and you always wish you had one more!

 

[Stratman50th]

We used to do 7 days, but day 7 was the head home day. Had 6 days of tickets and they were park hoppers. Not sure how things are now, but the park hoppers used to be front loaded and cheap on the last two days. We always broke up each day. EMH at the early open park. come back for pool, lunch and down time. We'd go to the late EMH park just before dinner and close that park. Very easy and relaxing days. We used to be park commandos but after a few years we found the middle of day breaks to be relaxing and allowed for a less stressful trip overall.

 

[dmband]

Longer for sure, agreeing to take breaks mid day at least some times to break it up.
imo there is no way you get everything you want done in 5/6 days with 4 yr olds.
heck we do e get everything we want done in 7 days and go non stop with teens

 

[Brett Wyman]

We find 7 nights stays, with 6 days in the park, to be our sweet spot.