Experiment Nine: A Less Stressful Way to Visit Disney World with Toddlers

We just got back from our road trip to Disney World. After LOVING our road trip to Arizona last summer, we decided we wanted to road trip every summer with our girls. Our girls are in love with the disney princesses, so we decided to road trip it from Wisconsin to Florida with Disney as our destination.

When we made this decision, I started looking at the Disney website. Man is it overwhelming! All the different parks and all the different attractions within each park could take you forever to explore. With a 4 year old and two 3 year olds, I knew conquering all the parks was out of the question for us. On top of the energy level needed to explore all the parks in a short period of time, getting into the Disney parks is expensive - almost $100 per person.

In order to make Disney fit our budget, we decided we would spend one day visiting Disney. And in order to make our trip easy (bus transportation to the parks) and Disney themed, we stayed at the new value plus resort, Art of Animation. It was awesome for our girls. There is a great splash pad and a zero depth entry pool - PERFECT!!! We stayed in a NEMO themed room. We had 3 beds, a kitchenette, 2 bathrooms - we would stay there again.

With our resort picked out and booked, how do you visit Disney for just one day? For me, I had to think simple. Simple is less stressful and makes our time together more enjoyable. With our girls' ages and interests, we knew they would love to meet their favorite princesses. We decided this would be our sole goal of our trip - MEET PRINCESSES. 

With that in mind we decided to go with Magic Kingdom, focusing our time at the Fantasyland area. We got fast passes for Cinderella & Rapunzel, Belle, and Ariel. We were also able to wait in line to meet Elsa & Anna, Tinkerbelle, and Mickey Mouse. Our girls LOVED the Ariel Undersea Adventure ride as well. We also caught the fantasy parade at 3pm - AMAZING! And a ton of additional princesses and their princes were in the parade!

Their was one glitch to our plan to only visit Magic Kingdom. One of our daughter's favorite princess was Aurora and she was no where in Magic Kingdom. We searched and searched and found out that she was located at Epcot. Now what? 

In order to stick with our one-day-at-disney rule and within budget we decided to pay an extra $35/person and get a hopper pass to Epcot for the same day. In Norway in Epcot they have a character dinning with 5 princesses (Aurora, Ariel, Snow White, Belle, Cinderella). It was a more expensive way to eat dinner, but it completed our MEET THE PRINCESSES THEME of the day and we loved it. The food was great too!


We had an amazing day at Disney. I wouldn't have done it any other way.  Of course there were cranky moments - naps were missed - but we still look back and loved it all. The next day our legs were wobbly with fatigue and we enjoyed a relaxing day at the pool at our resort. 


There is a lot of Disney we didn't see, and that's ok. We hope to go back to Disney when the girls are a bit older - maybe in 5 years. Our focus can be on other areas of the parks then. We can enjoy discovering all that Disney has to offer at our girls' pace and enjoy the smiles on their faces as we experience the wonders of their imaginations come to life.

Side Note: Souvenirs get expensive. We decided the girls could each pick one thing (they each picked out a disney princess dress). We got an ornament to remember our trip. And I bought each girl a necklace that I am holding onto until Christmas as a Christmas present. We kept it simple and the girls cherish their dresses.

ROAD TRIP TO DISNEY:

Our road trip for our Disney destination was just as awesome. We planned our days on the road similar to our last trip to Arizona. But with the girls a bit older we were able to push bedtimes and be a little more flexible. Here's an overview of our trip on the road:

Day 1: 9am on the road, picnic in El Paso, IL, dinner in St. Louis, MO, hotel in Blytheville, AR

Strawberry Patch Park

Day 2: 9:30am on the road, lunch at McDonalds in Grenada, MS, play at the park in Madison, MS (awesome park - Strawberry Patch Park), dinner in Hattiesburg, MS (found out not a place you want to stop in), hotel in St. Rose, La

Day 3: 9:30am drove through French Quarter in New Orleans, drove along beaches in MS (awesome!!! want to return there some day!!!), picnic and park in Spanish Fort, AL (awesome dream park on Ember Lane), pizza and ice cream at Seagrove Beach, FL (cool vacation area on scenic 30A), quick stop to visit the beach in Panama City, FL, hotel in Tallahassee, FL.

Panama City

Day 4: 9:30am on the road, Picnic at largest live oak tree in FL, at Disney Hotel (dinner and pool time)

Little Talbot Island, FL

Day 5: Magic Kingdom & Epcot

Day 6: Pool Day at Resort

Day 7: 9am on the road, Picnic at Little Talbot Island State Park (awesome! great for sea shells!), dinner in Valdosta, GA, hotel in Mcdonough, GA

Day 8: 10am on the road, quick picnic in Chattanooga, TN, ice cream stop in Jasper, TN, stop in Nashville, TN to visit Family

Day 9: 2pm on the road, drove through Kentucky, stop in Champaign-Urbana for late dinner and hotel

Drive Through Kentucky

Day 10: 11am on the road to HOME

We had a great road trip. And now we are looking forward to planning our next summer road trip (thinking out to the west coast)!