The Complete Guide to Walt Disney World 2008 (Complete Guide to Walt Disney World) by Julie Neal, Mike Neal Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of The Complete Guide to Walt Disney World 2008 (Complete Guide to Walt Disney World)
Book Review: Like National Geographic, but all about Disney
Summary: 5 Stars
If you haven't seen this book think of it as like a National Geographic magazine, with colorful images everywhere, but instead book-size and all about Disney World. It is outstanding! Disney World is many things, but it's not cheap. Therefore, you need this book! It has you everything you need to choose EXACTLY the right things for your particular family, including very detailed reviews of rides and shows and every other way to spend your time. I especially liked the little "Magical Day" touring plans. Unlike some other guides, the ones in here don't rush you. We have a 6 year old and a 4-year old, and thanks to this book's recommended Magic Kingdom schedule and many little tips and age-appropriate suggestions we had the time of our lives! All the photos really helped, too. Book Review: Really helped me
Summary: 5 Stars
An awesome combination of a book that's fun to look at (thanks to lots of color pix, some quite striking) and helpful to read, this Complete Guide to Disney World is the type that gets dog-eared and covered in post-it notes. At least mine did.
I found out I was headed to Disney World at the last minute, so I bought this on Amazon, got overnight shipping and hoped it would take the place of a few months of planning. It did its job perfectly.
A smart sense of organization makes it easy to find anything you need. Everything is grouped together into color-coded chapters, with all the information for each topic, such as a particular resort, all in one place.
Also very helpful is the huge section on each theme park and water park, with long descriptions of every attraction that include such things as wait times, a Fear Factor for young kids, handicapped info and, for parades and fireworks, exactly where to stand to get the best views.
Some things weren't that useful for me. For instance, I don't play golf or participate in things like parasailing and surfing, so those pages, though fun to look at with all the photos, didn't really help me any. Still, a great buy. I recommend it!
Book Review: Amazingly helpful
Summary: 5 Stars
My wife and I went to Disney World in April with our teenage son and 6-year-old girl. Before that we had been to Disney only once, and that was before our kids were born.
This book helped us every step of the way. Probably the most useful part of it for me was the resort chapter. I had bought a couple of other guides too (Unofficial Guide, Birnbaum's) but though helpful in their own ways, they really didn't compare. Like the rest of this book, the resort chapter is filled with photos (multiple ones for each hotel!) and so much detail. Very handy stuff like fax numbers (I needed to stay in touch with my office) and how far each place is from each of the theme parks. I liked that it didn't just rave about each place like Birnbaum's, or complain like the Unofficial Guide. You really got a sense of how the different resorts compare.
A few other things I liked:
* The planning section. It covers all the regular stuff just like the other guides, but also things like how to understand and take advantage of Disney World's FastPass system, which we used every day to cut our times waiting in line down to hardly anything. Very helpful.
* The in-depth coverage of the theme parks. I learned from this guide about the "Conservation Station" vet procedures at the Animal Kingdom park each morning, and our son was mesmerized watching an actual operation on an antelope. No other book seems to know abut details like this.
* The Hidden Mickeys chapter. It's just a big list in the back, but our kids really got into finding these hidden shapes of Mickey Mouse that Disney seems to have snuck in everywhere. We didn't know about these until this book, and it was fun for all four of us to look for them and see who could see the Mickey shape first. It gave us something easy and fun to do as a family.
* All the coverage of extra stuff. After looking over the article on Disney's Cirque du Soleil show we could tell it would be a good thing for us, and it was just fantastic. We also played miniature golf at the "easy" course and went to a marshmallow campfire at the Wilderness Lodge campground.
I can't recommend this book highly enough. The writing and descriptions are clear and thorough, the advice is sound, and the hundreds of color photos are really amazing, and show you what Disney World looks like.
Book Review: Not a helpful actual vacation guide.
Summary: 2 Stars
I think calling it a GUIDE to Disney is misleading.
TO me the BOston Globe calling it a souviner is more fitting.
While it is full of pictures, I quickly felt like I bought someone's vacation pictures instead of a guide book. The Authors' Daughter was in NUMEROUS photos. (She did write a very FUN review of hotel pools.) We were hoping for more photos of the hotels to get a better feel and were disappointed in those. I really didn't feel I got anything out of this book picture wise that the Disney website didnt already offer.
It is full of lots of Trivia whick can be fun to read but the stuff I read had no importance at all to our actual vacation. Nor did it offer any tips\help not readily found on most free disney planning websites.
I also found it annoying when reading about the rides that they explained them in DETAIL from start to finish. Some people may like that, to me it would ruin the fun of experiencing new rides.
Maybe I am spoiled, the unofficial guide to Disney has been so much more useful to actually planning a vaction, that this just could not compare.
We just got back from our 4th Disney Vacation.
Book Review: Best guide ever--plan your trip and maximize your dollars
Summary: 5 Stars
I think I've been to Disney World three or four times. Mostly, these were on business trips. Once I even got a behind-the-scenes tour (hint: if you are EVER offered this opportunity, jump on it! It's NOT a Small World, after all, but it is an amazing show.) The theme park complex is huge. And yes, complex. If I were planning a vacation, I'd be doing hours of pre-work to make everything I wanted to see and do was covered on a schedule, and that I knew roughly where I wanted to dine. I'd like to know about the resorts, and which one would suit my mood and budget.
The guide covers the resort, the parks, the town, the resorts and restaurants, entertainment, the special events and is absolutely loaded with color photos. If you are planning your trip, this will help you and your family select the things you most want to see. (Hint #2, go early in the day and plan to see the most-wanted attractions first so no one will be disappointed.)
What I liked best in this very complete volume was the section on the resorts. If you are planning to stay in any of these, you will get a good idea of what they have to offer. And if you are NOT staying at a Disney resort, there is a section on other accommodations (YAY!!!) And there is a following section on the dining facilities. These two sections will help you plan your budget and avoid sudden spending, things that bust the spending limit you may have set for your vacation.
Best guide ever. Do NOT plan a trip to Disney World without this.