Disney on a Dime

A few things that I want to remember for the future, and that you may want to know too:

1. We flew Spirit Air and had a great experience. The seats are cozy, we paid for our one shared carry on (no charge for laptop bag or a reasonable handbag), they don't serve free water, but for $175 a round trip ticket, it is a price that would be hard to beat.

2. We stayed at a Holiday Inn outside of the park. It actually was a mistake on our part...we thought we had booked at the Holiday Inn inside the park. Surprise. But later we heard that the rates at Disney's All Star Sports, All Star Movies and All Star Music resorts were incredibly low. Like $55 a night for two double beds! (That's what one man told me he was paying while riding on the train around magic kingdom.) These resorts seem like they may be a bit older than the others, charging a lower room rate. Good to know!

3. Because we were not at a Disney resort, after landing at the airport we had to walk right past all of the free coach buses going to Disney and instead got in a taxi that charged $60 for our drive to our hotel. Yikes. So now we know we could have stayed in the park for a reasonable rate and not paid for the taxi to and from the airport.

4. No matter what, Disney is expensive. The tickets to get in each park are pricey, the food and everything else add up fast. So just plan for that. This is why the free monorail rides to explore each resort felt like such a good value. It was like free Disney, right in the middle of the park.

5. The weather in January is spotty. Our first two days both hit upper seventies. Awesome. Our day at Epcot was freezing. The morning was 41 degrees and windy! (You may notice in that picture with Mary Poppins I was literally wearing every single shirt I had packed.) So plan a winter trip to Orlando with no expectations for the weather. When we booked our tickets I was excited about weather in the 60's because that would have been 80 degrees warmer than what we were living though in Minnesota. My bar was low, and I was so pleased when the forecast was for 70. And planned for the day with the forecast of 45.

6. A perk of the weather at Epcot was that we did not wait one minute for a ride. Every single ride was walk up and get on. Disney World was a little longer wait time, but we got a few fast passes and were glad for those.

7. Go without your kids sometime. It's different. But totally worth it. I felt a little smug when I saw other parents lifting big strollers up and down curbs and stairs. I've been there. I live that nearly every day. It was so nice to be nap-schedule free, not carry a bag of tricks everywhere we went and to have the only exhausted meltdown of the day be my own.

8. Read each ride description carefully. We ended up in a line for Belle's Storytime, assuming it was a ride. Ninety minutes later (the very longest we waited for anything, by far) we realized it was a photo shoot with Belle. We died. Died that we wasted so much of our day to see a princess. Died we didn't have any kids with us. Died laughing. Died when we realized two hours had passed that we could not get back. Ah!