I love to Plan the Disney trips

[4 The Love Of Disney]

Hi there - I (DD - 40 ), my DW (40), DS ( 9), DD (7), and DS (3) go to Disney World pretty much every year. And pretty much every year I look forward to the planning of the whole trip - from the activities, to the park visits, to the dining etc... I thrive on it so much that I usually start planning a year in advance and was able to justify the purchase of my iPad 2 to my DW in saying that I need it to plan and maintain all my info in one medium. Is it just me or are there other Disdads that enjoy planning Disney trips//

 

[FreezinRafiki]

Hi there - I (DD - 40 ), my DW (40), DS ( 9), DD (7), and DS (3) go to Disney World pretty much every year. And pretty much every year I look forward to the planning of the whole trip - from the activities, to the park visits, to the dining etc... I thrive on it so much that I usually start planning a year in advance and was able to justify the purchase of my iPad 2 to my DW in saying that I need it to plan and maintain all my info in one medium. Is it just me or are there other Disdads that enjoy planning Disney trips//

I'm pretty sure all of us fit that qualification. Our wifes run the gamut from barely caring about Disney to being just as excited as any of us for our next trip.

When is your next trip?

And don't forget to pop on over to the main DDC X thread to introduce yourself!

 

[afwdwfan]

Yes, it is a common disease. I plan trips even when I can't go, and am more than happy to help others plan. I actually had a friend who went to Disney World last spring for a work related conference at the Swan/Dolphin. He got out of meetings mid-afternoon and then would head to the parks. He didn't have enough time to do everything and was asking me to recommend some highlights to hit. We were communicating by text message and I was suggesting where he should go next and the quickest way to get there and then he'd send a pic message once in a while. Living vicariously is the next best thing to being there I guess. The good news is that he had fun and we're still friends.

 

[Turkey Lurkey]

My wife probably loves going to Disney even more than I do, but she leaves all the planning to me. Of course, she didn't have a choice the first time, as it was a surprise honeymoon. I must have done well enough for that one that she trusted me with our last one and our next one.


TL

 

[prattpak]

My wife and I are equally as crazy at the planning stage. I get a little more obsessed when it comes to Disney in general. We try to go every year as well so we ALWAYS have a trip to plan for (keeps us sane). Once the trip is over we set our dates for the next one and make the deposit. We try to make the deposit a year in advance if possible to be able to make the payments throughout the year. This makes it so we arent completely broke when the trip comes. Im on the phone at 530mst at 180 to go to make those ADR's that we really really want. The others we play with and adjust to the opening/closing or special occasions. We also have a big water jug with a small hole in the lid that we save our pocket change in year long. We had over $600 in spending money just from doing that simple task.

 

[trennr]

I'm the master planner for my family...we all love Disney...but they leave it up to me to plan everything.

Not like I could Beverly it up too bad.

As long as DW gets some shopping time...DS1 gets Epcot...DS2 get Animal Kingdom...I'm golden.

 

[AJRitz]

I'm the family vacation planner. DW has said more than once that she loves the fact that she doesn't even need to think about vacation details. She told me that whenever she starts thinking she's getting annoyed by my WDW obsession, she remembers that leaving me to my devices ends up leading to a flawless trip. For her, the "relaxation" part of a Disney vacation comes from not having to sweat details. And I'd rather not waste time relaxing on vacation, so I'm happy with the planner/"cruise director" role.

 

[4 The Love Of Disney]

I'm pretty sure all of us fit that qualification. Our wifes run the gamut from barely caring about Disney to being just as excited as any of us for our next trip.

When is your next trip?

And don't forget to pop on over to the main DDC X thread to introduce yourself!

LOL - we head to POR for a week in August, then our first - a 4 night cruise on the Dream, and then a couple of nights at the Boardwalk Inn before we head home.

 

[RodBelding]

LOL.. I love to plan them too... but then my wife comes in and changes 90% of my plans! unfortunately, hers are usually better...

 

[dsnydaddy]

I caught the bug when I planned our first trip to WDW. I stumbled upon the DIS and began to read everything I could on the subject. I obsessed of the smallest of things and planned one of the best vacations my wife had ever been on. After that it became a matter of personal pride for me. I'm now starting to branch out and work on non-Disney trips. That's been a bit harder because I've found there's no DIS for Germany.

 

[5stljayhawks]

dudes..... my wife had no clue what a disney freak i could become.... I have planning fever something bad. In fact I pretty much run a year around weekend excel sheet. this covers opening trout day march 1st, march weekend with the boy fishing if weekend is nice, turkey hunting, memorial day, fathers days, 4th of july, labor day.. sept 15 AKA opening archery deer season, every weekend from first of oct to dec, Nov 15th+/- is firearm deer season time to get the kids in the woods.

Pack up the camper for a few month for spring fishing and repeat.

So every now and then I get in a WDW trip. Three with the kids the last 6 years and two with just the wife and me. OK it was really her work, but still had to plan golf and fishing!!!!!!! I planned from 10/2008 for our 12/1210 trip. Yep 2 plus years. I am a planning dork!!!!!


who has the most tricked out excell spread sheet?????????

 

[mattsdragon]

We aren't over planners, like the type that schedule tings down to the minute. But I do come up with the main itinerary, which parks on each day and where we are eating. Afterwards, we pretty much play it all by ear. My wife loves the meet and greet things, so she pretty much runs the actual times inside the parks.

 

[T Morrows Child]

The planning is such a fun part of all WDW trips . . . especially when crowd levels are at a 10. Then it's a challenge to get some really great dining and really short waits despite the really tough crowds!

And, like most of you, I'm the itinerary planner for many of my friends and co-workers. Which is cool, since they get more excited when they see how really excited I get about their trips!

What tools do you guys use? I'm a devotee of the Unofficial Guide and touringplans.com for my basic framework. I like how touringplans allows you to customize plans and print them - works out handy to share.

 

[Wadecool]

I am also the master planner of our family and enjoy putting it all together. I used a combination of the Disboards and the Unofficial Guide to plan our trip. DW said that I was a little OCD about the planning prior to our trip, but she thanked me when we had great ADR's and never had to wait in line more than 10 minutes.

 

[middlepat]

I'm definitely the travel planner of the family (both Disney and not). As I was reading this thread I thought about our/my planning style and wanted to ask the group to see how we each plan.

Typically the way I plan a trip is as follows:

- Pick time of year that we can go
- Figure out the best days to visit parks during out time (using multiple resources such as TGM and TP)
- Figure out ADRs that would fit into this schedule
- Build the spreadsheet that includes Park planned to visit, ADR & confirm #s, EMH & park hours for each park and the crowd level / crowd color based on previously mentioned reference.

Once we get to the World, we try to take a much more relaxed approach, but I always have my reference chart to verify that if we want to call an audible that it would line up with plans.

Let me know your planning techniques and methods.

 

[dsnydaddy]

dudes.....

who has the most tricked out excell spread sheet?????????

I don't use excel except for the budgeting of the individual trips. I'd love to know exactly how you use it for vacation planning. Although, I have to admit I don't plan many of our outings but that's more because I work in an industry where there is no weekends and my schedule changes every month.

What tools do you guys use? I'm a devotee of the Unofficial Guide and touringplans.com for my basic framework. I like how touringplans allows you to customize plans and print them - works out handy to share.

I need to try out touringplans.com sounds kinda cool.

 

[AJRitz]

I don't use excel except for the budgeting of the individual trips. I'd love to know exactly how you use it for vacation planning. Although, I have to admit I don't plan many of our outings but that's more because I work in an industry where there is no weekends and my schedule changes every month.

Excel is just easy to use for trip organization, because it helps put things in easy-to-adjust columns. My spreadsheets are quite detailed. One sheet in the document is devoted to budget, including a running balance of what's already been paid and when. Another sheet as park opening/closing times and parade/fireworks/special event times for each park for the length of our stay. That sheet is color-coded according to TouringPlans.com park recommendations. The third sheet is the "money" sheet. It has the full schedule laid out for each day - which park we're going to and the complete touring plan, including wake-up time, time to leave for the park, any dining plans, planned break time, etc. It's important to point out that I plan in detail like that precisely because I know we'll never follow the plan exactly. But the process of putting it together puts me in the best position to adapt as circumstances require.



I need to try out touringplans.com sounds kinda cool.[/QUOTE]

 

[T Morrows Child]

Once we get dates figured out, my focus goes squarely to Advance Dining Reservations.

 

[5stljayhawks]

DSNYdaddy,

Oh boy, not really sure where to start. I came everything into the sheet. Since we are traveling with a camper, I have a few more items.

The following are colums going from left to right.

Nghts - this shows the number of nights on vacation
Location - Where we will be spending the night - Nght 1 - Forysth GA -
Date - I ALWAYS use the full date feature - Saturday May 21 2011 - easy format change in excel
Sunrise/Set - by location of night. Keep in mind daylight savings changes and time zone changes
RV Site cost - daily cost cost including tax...
Food - This is budget about $40, but also include any extra nice meal like charater meals, or dates with wife Cali Grill..

 

[5stljayhawks]

DSNYdaddy,

Oh boy, not really sure where to start. I came everything into the sheet. Since we are traveling with a camper, I have a few more items.

Sheet A holds ALL my reservation info. phone #, prepayment info, .... dining

The following are colums headers going from left to right. then I input data dropping down under each header. At the very bottom I can run budget totals through the sum function.


The major chunk is formatted as such -
Nghts - this shows the number of nights on vacation
Location - Where we will be spending the night - Nght 1 - Forysth GA -
Milage - this is daily driven . Also figure in 100 or 200 during trip at the site.
Date - I ALWAYS use the full date feature - Saturday May 21 2011 - easy format change in excel
Sunrise/Set - daily by location of night. Keep in mind daylight savings changes and time zone changes
RV Site cost - daily cost cost including tax...
Gas - excel equation of =(cell that hold daily miles drive / MPG ) * another cell that holds current gas price. I only need to chang gas $ once and they all update.
Food - Daily This is budget about $40, but also include any extra nice meal like charater meals, or dates with wife Cali Grill..
entertainment - daily . What parks or if the day is scheduled off or another item like, beach, Gatorland, Prirate dress up, MMNSSHP, BBB, golf, fishing.... I also put in ticket cost if I need to by any tickets


I also have a section on the same sheet of must do - based on research and want. These are special things that are normally rigid in schedualing and unable to change. Events Shuttle Launch/Charter meals, Golf res/ BBB/ MMNOSHP or MMVSCP and come off my Daily park hour sheet. sheet B I also come back and update sheet A

On Sheet B - This is where my park strategy really gets going. I list out each park, operating hours, along with extra magic hours by color cells Across the top I list out the dates same format as on sheet A , the #nght of vacation, and any special events for that day and what # day in the park. This way if I we have ADR at epcot, i don't plan a day in animal kingdom. This sheet really provides a visual flow, as we don't park everyday and can schedule down days on those with no magic hours. A new item i added this year was antipated crowd levels for each park. (Side Note, went to MK on dec 25th. We had the BEST day with rides and shows out of all our trips. really!)

On sheet B - I also a daily time sched based on 6-10, 10 - 2, 2-6, 6 to 12. Each park has a color code that runs across the entire sheet. left to right. then in the daily sched I color the boxs to park and can type in spec events, dinning reservations, extra magic hours.

it took me two vacation to build this sheet to where I really like it and it is functional. I now use this for all my trips, less the sheet B for parks. I can plan out an entire year. In fact I was working yesterday on 4th of July 2013 gettysburg 150th anv.