Visiting Walt Disney World alone or with family is an expensive adventure. If this is your first visit and you plan on staying within a tight budget, your plans must commence well before you travel.
We visited Orlando and Disney World from May 15-20, 2024. However, we purchased our tickets back in November 2023 when they had a discount for Canadian visitors.
From looking at their website over the last couple of years, it appears they offer the same 20% discount for theme park tickets starting in the Fall every year.
Depending on your family size, the savings can be significant.
To cut costs further, we opted for the “1 Park Per Day” ticket, instead of the “Park Hopper Option”. While it is nice to be able to visit more than one theme park daily, it can be impractical if you want to enjoy multiple rides in each park. And with kids, you probably won’t be able to move fast anyway, so save yourself the stress.
Walt Disney World Itinerary
Although we paid for the 5-day package, we only had four full days to spend at all the parks combined.
In hindsight, I should have squeezed an extra day into our schedule so we could spend an extra day at the Magic Kingdom.
I considered this while booking our travel, but work commitments, using vacation days for other summer travel, and other issues made things dicey.
There are four theme parks at Disney World:
- Magic Kingdom
- EPCOT
- Hollywood Studios
- Animal Kingdom
For our Disney trip, we stayed at the WorldQuest Resort which was only a few minutes drive away from the theme parks.
Day 1: Disney’s Hollywood Studios Itinerary
This movie-themed park overflows with many of the Disney films and characters that are popular worldwide.
It is a large park, and you should be prepared for long walks and queues.
To make the most of your day (assuming you are spending just one day at this park), consider paying for the Disney Genie+ service.
This cost us an extra $22 USD/person, but it was worth it. Disney Genie+ gives you access to individual Lightning Lane selections, where you can lock in specific time windows, bypass the standby queue, and get faster access to some attractions.
Summary of the day:
- Number of attractions and shows: 9
- Steps walked: 19,803 steps
- Time spent: 8:51am – 6:57pm at park
We planned to get to the park by 8:15 a.m., so we were at the front of the line, but a few things went sideways, and we did not get there until almost 9 a.m.
Of course, the lines were already long, and this meant that by the time we reached our first preferred ride, the wait time was already 40 minutes and climbing fast.
Once we saw it was going to be a long hot day with long waits and two skittish kids, we decided to pay for Disney Genie+.
All in all, we had a great day! Here’s how it went:
- Toy Story Mania! (ride)
- Alien Swirling Saucers (ride)
- The Twilight Zone Tower of Terror Attraction (ride)
- Mickey & Minnie’s Runaway Railway (ride)
- Indiana Jones Stunt Spectacular (Show)
- Millenium Falcon: Smugglers Run (ride)
- Star Tours – The Adventures Continue Attraction (ride)
- Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance (ride)
- Lightning McQueen’s Pacing Academy (show)
Toy Storia Mania
Alien Swirling Saucers
The Twilight Zone Tower of Terror Attraction
Mickey & Minnie’s Runaway Railway
Indiana Jones Stunt Spectacular
Millenium Falcon: Smugglers Run
Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance
Lightning McQueen’s Pacing Academy
Tips:
- Get to the park 30-45 minutes early and try to get on the Slinky Dog Dash first thing if this is a ride you don’t want to miss. The wait times for this ride were as long as 120 minutes throughout the day and it was not included in the Disney Genie+ service.
- Other rides to target in the first hour or so are Toy Story Mania and Millenium Falcon: Smugglers Run.
- If you don’t want to wait in line for Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance, you can pay for individual Lightning Lane access for this attraction separately. The cost was $22 USD per person during our visit.
Day 2: Disney’s Animal Kingdom Theme Park
Our plan was to visit Magic Kingdom on Day 2 which is a Friday, assuming it won’t be as crowded as it would be on the weekend.
The reality, though, is that we ended up at Disney’s Animal Kingdom Park. Don’t ask me how. In all the last-minute rush to get to the park on time, I somehow managed to pick the wrong location on Google Maps! Anyhow, after arriving at Animal Kingdom, we decided to just go along and change plans for the day on the fly.
Disney’s Animal Kingdom features exotic animals, such as tigers, lions, elephants, Zebras; lush jungles, interesting shows, and some truly spectacular attractions and rides, including Avatar Flight of Passage.
If you plan on spending the entire day at this park, you could realistically experience many or all of the popular attractions without paying for Disney Genie+.
Summary of the day:
- Number of attractions and shows: 10
- Time spent at park: 8:47am – 7:53pm
- Steps walked: 18,460 steps
Avatar Flight of Passage generally has the longest wait time. For our visit, it ranged between 70-180 minutes. If you can’t afford to wait this long, consider paying for the individual Lightning Lane for this ride alone. The cost was $17 USD per person.
These are the attractions we were able to cram into our day:
- Avatar Flight of Passage (ride)
- Na’vi River Journey (for kids under 44″ who can’t get on the Avatar ride, this attraction is part of Pandora – The World of Avatar and is open to all ages and heights).
- Kilimanjaro Safaris Expedition (ride)
- Kali River Rapids Attraction (ride)
- Expedition Everest – Legend of the Forbidden Mountain Attraction (ride)
- TriceraTop Spin (ride)
- Maharajah Jungle Trek (walk)
- DINOSAUR Attraction (ride)
- It’s tough to be a bug (show)
- Finding Nemo- The Big Blue … and Beyond! (show)
Avatar Flight of Passage
Na’vi River Journey
Kilimanjaro Safaris Expedition
Kali River Rapids Attraction
Expedition Everest – Legend of the Forbidden Mountain Attraction
Maharajah Jungle Trek
DINOSAUR Attraction
It’s tough to be a bug
Day 3: Magic Kingdom
When planning your day at Magic Kingdom, note that the Park itself is farther from the general parking area compared to Disney’s Animal Kingdom and Hollywood Studios.
To get to the park, you either take the monorail or ferry after parking your vehicle.
Magic Kingdom is the most popular of the four theme parks at the Walt Disney World Resort. It also has more attractions than the others.
Because this park generally has a larger crowd, you should be strategic with how you plan your day.
Summary of day:
- Number of attractions and shows: 17
- Time spent at Park: 8:44am – 8:26pm
- Steps walked: 22,101 steps
As is probably always the case in Orlando, the temperature ranged between 32 and 37 degrees Celsius all day. An unexpected thunderstorm in the late afternoon caused all outside rides and attractions to be temporarily closed for over an hour.
If you want to do a lot in Magic Kingdom and are visiting with kids, strongly consider paying for Disney Genie+. However, I’d add that even this does not guarantee you will get all the rides you want. This cost us $27 USD per person for the day.
The queues are pretty long for some of the most popular rides, like Peter Pan’s Flight and Seven Dwarfs Mine Train. During our visit, the wait times for these attractions almost never dipped below 75 minutes.
Even worse, the only option to use the Lightning Lane service for both rides was scheduled for later in the day.
For TRON Lightcycle/Run, individual Lightning Lane access is available for a separate cost ($20 per person).
Instead of spending another $80 on this ride, we used the Virtual Queue, which was available for this attraction.
Virtual Queue allows you to request to join a queue without needing to wait in line.
Here’s what we accomplished for the day:
- TRON Lightcycle/Run (ride)
- Jungle Cruise (ride)
- Pirates of the Caribbean (ride)
- Haunted Mansion (ride)
- It’s a small World (ride)
- Dumbo the Flying Elephant (ride)
- Mad Tea Party (ride)
- Tomorrowland Speedway (ride x 2)
- The Barnstormer (ride)
- Disney Adventure Friends Cavalcade (show)
- The Magic Carpets of Aladdin (ride)
- Space Mountain (ride)
- Buzz Lightyear’s Space Ranger Spin (ride)
- Mickey’s PhilharMargic
- Monsters Inc. Laugh Floor (show)
- Prince Charming Regal Carrousel (ride)
- Tomorrowland Transit Authority PeopleMover (ride)
TRON Lightcycle/Run
Jungle Cruise
Pirates of the Caribbean
Haunted Mansion
It’s a small world
Dumbo the Flying Elephant
Mad Tea Party
Tomorrowland Speedway
The Barnstormer
Disney Adventure Friends Cavalcade
The Magic Carpets of Aladdin
Space Mountain
Buzz Lightyear’s Space Ranger Spin
Prince Charming Regal Carrousel
Mickey’s PhilharMargic
Tomorrowland Transit Authority PeopleMover
Day 4: EPCOT
We picked EPCOT as the grand finale of our trip to the Walt Disney World Resort.
This park combines technology, culture, innovation, and interesting attractions all in one place.
EPCOT stands for Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow and was opened in 1982.
In my opinion, you don’t need Disney Genie+ to see many of the attractions in EPCOT. That said, some of them always have long waiting times, including Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure and Frozen Even After.
For the most popular ride (I think), Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind, you can join the virtual queue when it opens at 1pm or purchase the individual Lightning Lane entry to fast-track things.
We joined the virtual queue at exactly 1pm and eventually got on the ride around 7:30pm.
Summary of the day:
- Number of attractions and shows: 15
- Time spent at Park : 8:37am – 8:33pm
- Steps walked: 20,077 steps
Below is what we covered for the day:
- Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind (ride)
- Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure (ride)
- Spaceship Earth (ride)
- Mission: SPACE (ride)
- Test Track Presented by Chevrolet (ride)
- Disney and Pixar Short Film Festival
- The Seas with Nemo & Friends (ride)
- Living with the Land (ride)
- Journey into Imagination with Figment (ride)
- World showcase: Japan
- World Showcase: Morrocco
- World Showcase: France
- World Showcase: United Kingdom
- World Showcase: Canada
Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind
Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure
Spaceship Earth
Mission: SPACE
Test Track Presented by Chevrolet
Disney and Pixar Short Film Festival
Living with the Land
Journey into Imagination with Figment
World Showcase: Canada
World Showcase: France
