First and foremost, a great resource is your travel agent if you're fortunate enough to get one. My travel agent is absolutely wonderful, and she never fails to answer my questions, no matter how ridiculous they are. It's part of your travel agent's job to help you and guide you, so don't be afraid to reach out and ask questions!
As soon as Bryan agreed to go to Disney World, I immediately bought two guidebooks. I couldn't help it, that's how my parents plan trips, so it's how I plan trips as well. At first, I was just going to get one book, but I wanted the official guide to Disney and an unofficial guide.
Birnbaum's book is the go-to guide for most people when it comes to planning their Disney trip. It's even considered the official guide. For that reason, I knew I wanted to have it to see what Disney has to say about itself. The amount of information is staggering. It starts out with basic information, including sample itineraries based on how many days you'll be there, pricing and tips for traveling with children. It is important to note that Birnbaum has another book entirely for children, so if you are taking your children to Disney World, that might be a book you want to invest in.
Each hotel is given its own information as well. There's a description, including beautiful photographs and information about the restaurants and activities available at each hotel. It is important to note that the hotels at Disney are much similar to resorts. many of them have far more than just hotel rooms, meaning you'll want to scope out what's available at each hotel when making your decision. Like I said in last week's Walt Disney Wednesday post, you can visit the hotels even if you're not staying there, which is why this information is important as well. It gives you a chance to plan out which hotels to visit and explore.
What I use this book for the most is the information about each park. There's a chapter for each of the four parks with descriptions of the rides, shows and restaurants. "Hot Tips" are scattered throughout the book as well, imparting on the reader little tidbits of information to help make his or her trip just a little better.
Another part of the book I used a lot was the food chapter. I've struggled a lot with picking out where to eat (more about that when I talk about each individual park). This is one of the many resources I used when deciding on food. It gives a brief description of every restaurant, both table and quick service, along with any places you can get snacks throughout the park. They indicated average price, along if it service breakfast, lunch, dinner or snacks (or any combination of the four). This chapter also includes a breakdown of type of food, so if you have children who like ice cream, you can find where to get the best ice cream throughout all four parks.
The other book I got was the Walt Disney World Unofficial Guide. I wanted this book because, like the name implies, it's the unofficial guide, so it's not published by Disney World. Therefore, I figured it was going to have more honest information. This book also covers the area around Disney World, including a little bit about Universal Studios and other activities to do in the Orlando area. So if you're looking to do some non-Disney days, this book would definitely be helpful for you. There's so much fantastic information in this book, I don't really know where to start. One thing that's great is a "Small Child Fright Potential Chart", where it outlines rides that children who are easily frightened should probably avoid. What I love the most about this book is it rates each ride as it would appeal to the following age group: preschool, grade school, teens, young adults, over 30 and seniors. This was extremely helpful when Bryan and I were trying to pick some of the rides. There were a few rides we thought would appeal to us, but when we looked at these ratings, I discovered that these rides were more for children. There's also an overall rating for each ride as well. Each ride and attraction also has some touring tips, along with when you should visit to encounter the shortest lines, duration, along with the scope and scale (minor attraction, major attraction or headliner).
Once again, the restaurant information in this book is wonderful. Each restaurant has how many credits will be used on the dining plan, cost range, when to go, ratings based on service and friendliness, if there are alcoholic beverages, etc. Like I said before, there's an overabundance of information in this book, which is why it's a fantastic resources to have in your library as you plan your trip.
When it comes to digital resources, I have used two websites extensively. The first is WDW Prep School. The amount of information on this website is absolutely staggering. I like to look at the breakdown of information based on park. It's important to note that the information about the attractions is a little bit lacking, more information can be found in the Unofficial Guide. It just includes a brief description, duration, height requirements, suitability for various ages and when to visit. The food information is what I heavily relied upon from this website. While brief, it breaks restaurants down by breakfast, lunch and dinner, so you may see the same restaurant appear more than once. What I really enjoyed were the pros and cons for each restaurant. This is great information that could help be a deciding factor when trying to pick a restaurant to visit.
Another website is one I've just come across recently: Mouse Travel Matters. My favorite part of this website is the Top Ten Lists. It's important to note that not all of these lists have to do with Disney World itself, but all of them are Disney themed in some capacity. Right now, since it's close to Christmas, a lot of the lists have to do with Disney themed gift giving, which is also important information to have if you have loved ones who enjoy Disney.
There are plenty of YouTube channels dedicated to Disney World, and it can be overwhelming trying to find ones that have the best information. For the most part, there are two channels that I like the most: TimTracker and DIS Unplugged. Both have fantastic information as they explore the parks and give you their opinion on food, rides and other experiences.
One thing I like about DIS Unplugged is the reviews of each of the hotels. While photographs are helpful, it's even more helpful for get a virtual tour of sorts of the hotel when trying to make decisions. DIS Unplugged also gets the inside scoop in upcoming attractions (such as Rise of the Resistance in Galaxy's Edge). It also has information about parks around the world, the cruises and special events such as Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party. For a taste of DIS Unplugged, check out the video below.
The other YouTube channel I like is TimTracker. TimTracker is a husband and wife duo who live in the Orlando area and visit Disney World frequently, almost every day it seems like. Whenever they go, and by them I mean mostly Tim, he usually has one goal in mind, and takes viewers through that experience. For example, he went to Hollywood Studios once to see the new Incredibles themed food and entertainment. While he's in the park, if he hears about something new that's going on in the park, he makes sure to check it out and share his thoughts with his viewers. I love the humor and amount of information, along with the honesty. If Tim doesn't like something, then he's going to be sure to let you know. Check out one of his videos below.
Finally, one of my favorite resources is Pinterest. Like I've said before, I absolutely love Pinterest, and there is an absurd amount of information out there, and I have quite a bit of it on my Pinterest board. I have information about each of the parks, Memory Maker (which I'll talk about in a later post), food, packing, travel tips and Disney Springs. It's a lot of information. Some of it might lead to the previously mentioned blogs, but there are plenty of other blogs and websites I've pinned as well. What I love the most about Pinterest is that I can make various sections and organize the information in a way that works best for me. I was going to make a binder with all the information, but I eventually just opted to keep it a Pinterest board to save paper and space.
I hope you find these resources useful as you continue to plan for your trip. If you feel like I've left something out, please leave a comment and let me know so I can look into it and add it to either this post or a later post.
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