Do you schedule a "break" day?

[zomama]

We will be there from sat-sat and I'm thinking of having a non park day the day we arrive and then one more mid week. WDYT?

 

[MamaBelle4]

That's precisely what we do.

 

[FutureDisneyEventPlanner]

going from Sat-Sat next year and i'm doing a few rest days. 2 or 3 we've decided.

 

[smiths02]

With small children and summer heat, we've preferred to have 2/3 days or 1/2 days. We tried a rest day and we tried afternoon breaks, and that didn't work the best for us.

Given that multi-day tickets aren't much more expensive and FP+, we liked to pop into a park every day (even arrival day) if nothing more than to use the 3 FP+ and/or eat a meal or enjoy a show

 

[zomama]

With small children and summer heat, we've preferred to have 2/3 days or 1/2 days. We tried a rest day and we tried afternoon breaks, and that didn't work the best for us.

Given that multi-day tickets aren't much more expensive and FP+, we liked to pop into a park every day (even arrival day) if nothing more than to use the 3 FP+ and/or eat a meal or enjoy a show

that's a good point! Didnt think about the FP+ we'd be missing out on.

 

[jacknsally19]

We never do parks on arrival day and we always have at least one break day. Our whole family generally needs a break.... We usually have annual passes too and it hasn't really changed our approach to touring. I feel like my kid just needs to chill out and play to continue enjoying the week.

 

[ajwolfe]

No break days for us. We may take some downtime for the pool or mini golf here or there but never a full day. For us we are there primarily to do the parks and not lounge in our room or around a pool.

 

[jvz82]

We do 2 "break" days because my husband isn't a huge Disney fan and the parks overwhelm him. I'm a commando Disney tourist, but I've learned to slow down for him and I actually enjoy the break days now. They're not really breaks, because we still keep busy, but we're just not in the parks. We usually do one table service meal at a resort so we get to explore a new place, and then spend lots of time at the pool. I figure we are paying money for the resort, we might as well try to get some fun out of it other than just sleeping! And honestly the kids sometimes just need to veg out and watch TV for an hour.

 

[Nettester]

Yep, we're arriving at around noon, and have no plans but pool and relaxing on that day. Then 2 days of rope drop touring. 3rd day is a total break day, no parks. Next 3 days are park days. Last day is not scheduled. Some or all of us may add a park day last minute, go back and repeat our favorites or whatever we missed. We may split up if we want to do different things, some of us may just rest and swim.

 

[Dismama2boys]

We do a "break" day after a night with fireworks. Regular days for us are rope drop until whenever - sometimes noon, sometimes 4 or 5. With my littles, we need a day after a super-late (for them) night since that means that day was a really long day for them.

 

[pigletgirl]

We always schedule a break day, AND do mid afternoon rest/pool time. This is vacation after all and my kids just need the down time. I find that if we go when it's HOT, it's even more imperative that we take a break. Your feet and body will thank you!

 

[MickeyWaffles]

Nope!

We don’t schedule a park for arrival day. Sometimes we add a day when we get there if we feel like going to the parks upon arrival.

We’ll take an afternoon or night off here or there, but aside from arrival day, we go to the park at some point every day until we leave. We have never taken a full day off mid-week even when I was little.

 

[Childs1stTime2Disney]

Never a whole rest day. Maybe half a day, but always go to one park per day at least, for some time.

 

[PollyannaMom]

We will be there from sat-sat and I'm thinking of having a non park day the day we arrive and then one more mid week. WDYT?

Absolutely!

We usually do shorter trips, but when we have been there for a whole week, we definitely needed that break in the middle!

 

[Klayfish]

No way, in our opinion it's a total waste. We're spending good money to be at WDW, don't need to stare at a hotel wall or a hotel swimming pool. I'm not saying we go nuts every day...far from it. Many days we'll just do 4 or 5 hours in the park, then go relax or do something else. But to skip an entire day seems like a serious waste to us. Heck, our summer trips are 17 days long and we hit a park all 17 days.

 

[MainMom]

Usually we do one day where we sleep in, go to the pool, water park, or Disney Springs. Then we go to a park in the evening for dinner, 3 FP’s and fireworks. On our upcoming trip we are doing evening EMH, sleeping in the next day, hitting Disney Springs for lunch and shopping, then heading to Epcot for dinner. Sometimes a change of pace is nice, but I still like to use all of the scheduled FP’s I can.

 

[londontime]

If we are there 2 weeks, we would have 2 or 3 rest days in there, which is either a shopping trip, hanging by the pool or a long day out to the beach. Hitting the parks every day gets a bit repetitive, and we find the kids enjoy it more the day they go back.

 

[mi*vida*loca]

We did a break day when they were younger, didn't do a break day on our 2011 trip and they were but last trip was 10 days and I included a break day. My kids (15 and 9) got bored on our rest day by 4-5 pm. Now I'll add on a day of tickets and hit a park in the PM even if it's just to do our 3 FP+ and grab a bite to eat. We aren't Disney Springs people and I don't like to shop so the outlets are out of the question too.

Next trip we have 8 day PH tickets and I plan on doing MVMCP. We will do a park everyday except departure day. I'm planning 4 RD days and 5 sleep in/start later days. MVMCP day will be our "rest" day since we won't go to the parks until 4 pm.

ETA: I want to add that my kids were bored on our break day at the Poly. We did a split stay and once we got to the BC they barely wanted to hit the parks. They wanted to stay in the pool the entire time. I think there were 1-2 days that they just stayed in the pool or back to the room after being in the pool ALL DAY while we hit Epcot at night.

 

[Jess_S]

We are doing the same. With a young child, a week at WDW is just too much without the break. We'll be doing dinner at Disney Springs on both arrival day and break day and participating in resort activities, so there will be stuff to do. It just won't involve all the walking in the heat that had our son exhausted and whiny by the end of our last trip.

 

[Julylady]

We never take an entire break day. But, most days we are only in the parks for about 6 hours or so. We take the morning, the afternoon, or the evening off most days. This works better for us than a whole day away from the parks and with the way tickets are priced with subsequent days being less expensive, it only costs about $15 a ticket.