Last month, my hubby Michael and I took a trip to Walt Disney World in Orlando, Florida! We were SO excited to take a trip somewhere warm and exciting in the middle of winter (and after a year of limited traveling).
I’m sharing a recap of the whole Walt Disney World trip with you all, and at the very bottom of this post you’ll find a whole list of all my recommendations of what to do at each park!
HOTEL & TRANSPORTATION
We stayed at a Disney Hotel, Pop Century, and LOVED IT. We were able to find inexpensive direct flights from Columbus to Orlando, take the free shuttle from the airport to the Disney hotel, then used the free Skyliners and Buses all week – which meant free transportation, which was amazing! We flew in on Sunday and left the following Saturday – made for cheaper tickets and hotel stays. We did a full day at each park with a break day on Wednesday!
EPCOT
The first day, we went to Epcot! This was definitely our LONGEST day at a Disney park (we quickly learned that we can’t do long days every day haha). We headed there early and took the skyliner to get to the park! We got there for rope drop and were one of the first ones on the Frozen ride. We also had super short wait times for Soarin’ and the other popular rides at Epcot!
ANIMAL KINGDOM
After the first day at Epcot, we were SO TIRED but we still woke up early to get to Animal Kingdom when it opened. We were definitely sleepy, but I LOVED visiting that park!
I love it even more now that they have the new Pandora area. Flight of Passage is, by far, one of THE BEST Disney rides ever. It’s something you just have to experience… completely worth the wait (I think we waited close to 1 hour, that was our longest wait for any ride).
In Pandora, we also grabbed these yummy drinks called Night Blossoms, and they were SO GOOD. Highly recommend. We also did the Safari Tour, It’s Tough to be a Bug, Mount Everest (three times) and grabbed Starbucks. We ended up heading back to our hotel at around 3pm to rest!
I also got really into pin trading! I wish I had brought more pins to trade and DEFINITELY plan to bring more in the future (you can find big batches of cheap ones on Ebay) – such a fun activity that was surprisingly fun to get into and try to collect different sets or characters. They have the most pin trading at Magic Kingdom and Hollywood Studios, but 1-2 spots at the other parks too!
OFF-DAY
On Wednesday, we had the day off and got to lounge around the pool, eat dinner at Disney Springs, and have some time to just do nothing. SO NEEDED after a couple of days of being on our feet all day!
MAGIC KINGDOM
Thursday was Magic Kingdom day!! This is probably my favorite park. I’m super nostalgic with all of the classic Disney movies so I LOVE this one. It’s a Small World and Peter Pan’s Flight are two of my favs!
I also got to meet up with my Insta photography friend, Laura Eddy! It was SO fun to meet her in person because we both happened to be in Orlando/going to Disney at the same time!!
We also grabbed Dole Whip, which is one of my new favorite snacks. SO. GOOD. I love this and am now craving it, haha!
HOLLYWOOD STUDIOS
Lasty, on Friday we went to Hollywood Studios. I was pleasantly surprised at how much I loved this park! It has basically DOUBLED in the past few years, with the addition of Toy Story Land and the Star Wars area. Blue Milk at a little shop in Star Wars was SUPER yummy!!
We also are HUGE FANS of the new Mickey & Minney’s Runaway Railway ride – I was surprised at just how good it was and wish we had done it a couple more times!!
We also got to see the Frozen Singalong show, which was pretty much the only show happening right now. I loved it! It was super cute and cool to see some actors performing. Afterward we grabbed some starbucks and took a break by the water fountain!
PROS & CONS
Biggest pro going to Disney right now? THE WAIT TIMES are SO short! The longest we waited was an hour for one ride and 45 minutes for another… but most wait times were 15-30 minutes. So awesome.
Biggest con… no shows are happening, which are normally one of my favorite parts! There’s also no character meet and greets, no fireworks, and no big parades – but mini parades happen throughout the day.
We felt plenty safe throughout the whole trip, they constantly are cleaning different parts of the park, masks are required at all times except when actively eating/drinking, and they have a capacity limit for their parks. We are so glad we went and were able to experience it together!
RECOMMENDATIONS LIST!
Since I’ve been asked a lot, here’s a list of the best rides/snacks I would highly recommend if you’re planning to a Walt Disney World trip anytime soon!
Magic Kingdom
- Seven Dwarfs Train
- Space Mountain
- Big Thunder Mountain
- Peter Pan
- Small World
- Dole Whip (snack)
Animal Kingdom
- Flight of Passage
- Na’vi River
- Expedition Everest
- Night Blossoms in Pandora
Hollywood Studios
- Slinky Dog Dash
- Rock ‘n Roller Coaster
- Tower of Terror
- Mickey & Minney runaway railway
- Star Wars area drink: Blue Milk
Epcot
- Frozen Ever After
- Soarin’
- Mission: Space
Glad to see you love Disney too! We are HUGE fans and go often as we are Disney Vacation Club members. We went two weeks ago and back in December for Christmas decor. Great to see your photos. One recommendation to add for rides is quite possibly Disney’s greatest ride to date….Rise of the Resistance at Hollywood Studios. I am not a Star Wars fan, but the complexities of that race honestly raise the bar for future rides. It is difficult to get on as you have to pre-register for it in a virtual cue the morning before the park open and it typically sells out in less than 3 seconds. But if you do get on it….it is A BLAST! The short wait times are fantastic lately. We did Everest 4 times and Flight of Passage twice two weeks ago!
It’s Grandma. I thoroughly enjoyed seeing you two. You are both very photogenic. Michael, after seeing these pictures, I can definitely say, I prefer no facial hair because it hides your handsome face. I LOVE looking at you without it. Do they require the masks even outdoors? That hides beautiful Stephanie and Michael’s good looks..
I can see that you had a GREAT time. Thanks for sharing.
I love you and miss you,
Grandma xoxo