Isn’t that always the way it goes? Â As a parent, you plan this big thing, and then… your kids end up liking some inconsequential part. Â The classic example is the kids who don’t spend any time playing with their big Christmas present because they’re too busy playing with the box it came in!
Of course, sometimes playing with the box IS a lot of fun, as evidenced by this recent picture of our Cub Scout den making a cardboard box castle fort at a recent campout 😀
Overscheduling a Disney trip
Disney World is an amazing place, and there is SO much to do. Â Even in the Magic Kingdom (which is one of 5 parks inside just Disney World Florida, not to mention any of the other Disney parks), you could easily spend days.
There’s a reason why Haley Bach (our resident #FT4RL Disney expert) scheduled in 2 rest days in her example 8 day Disney itinerary
(SEE ALSO: Disney World: Travel Hacker Style)
If you try to go all day every day, you will burn yourself out and end up having a miserable time. Â So in that case, a few trips to the swimming pool make sense.
In our case though, we were only there for 3 days, so for us it was all Disney all the time. Â Which isn’t to say that we were at the park from rope drop to close, but we didn’t have much time for just relaxing and swimming. Â Our 3 days were Magic Kingdom, Epcot and Hollywood Studios, and we didn’t even come close to doing all there is to do in just those 3 parks, not to mention Animal Kingdom or Downtown Disney, neither of which we visited at all.
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- Disney World? Yeah but when can we go SWIMMING!
Keep it simple with kids
You always hear the story of the ultimate family vacation – it’s Hawaii, it’s Disney, it’s London or Paris. Â Maybe my kids are different than most, but for them, most of the time they don’t really care about the different things that are at a particular location. Â They mostly just want to do the basic things that are available at most places. Â You don’t have to go far away to have a fun family vacation
I’ve said it before – all my kids want is a swimming pool and a waffle maker, and that’s not even mentioning the fact that they love getting to watch Nickelodeon and the Disney Channel when we stay at hotels (since we don’t have cable) . Anything else is just a bonus!
Readers tell me your experiences – have your kids ever been more excited to swim in the hotel pool than go to the awesome places you took them?
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Dan Miller travels with his wife and 6 (SIX!) children. He loves to help families travel for free / cheap, especially larger families. If you are looking for help, drop him an email at 
Our kids need a mix for sure! They love swimming in the hotel pool but they also generally enjoy whatever attraction we have taken them to.
Our travel plans have changed some now that our kids are old enough to care about where we are going and what we are doing.
Now, sometimes instead of planning a trip to the big tourist destination in an area, we spend more time visiting parks or children’s museums and we always try to find a hotel with a good pool.
The problem is that you might want to keep it simple and plan some rest time, but the kids have other plans. Their batteries get charged a lot faster and you’ll have to take them everywhere even if you’re still trying to catch a break.
Just did 7 days at Disney and my kids (ages 6 & 7) were definitely all about the pool. Once we went to magic kingdom a few times they were done and ready to just swim as much as possible. Epcot? No thanks, why can’t we just swim?!?! Animal Kingdom again? Ugh, I prefer to swim all day. Hollywood Studios? It’s cool but when can we leave and go back to the hotel to swim.
This was our Disney vacation. They loved going to Disney but it would’ve been MUCH better to just have 2 days where they just swim and hang out vs going to a park.
Yup – that sounds like every vacation that we take ever 🙂