Hello and welcome to Disney Tourist Blog! We’re Sarah & Tom Bricker, and we founded this website over a decade ago as a place to assemble our reviews, recommendations, tips & tricks, and guide for doing Walt Disney World and Disneyland like pros. We strive to provide informative and unbiased advice to fans and first-timers alike planning trips to the Disney Parks around the globe.
Since being founded in 2011, Disney Tourist Blog has helped hundreds of millions of readers save money, time, and reduce stress in preparing for truly magical vacations. Our site and expertise have been featured by several prominent publications, including the New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, CNN, Forbes, NBC News, The Hill, Travel & Leisure, Business Insider, USA Today, and more. Our charitable efforts have also been highlighted on several television news outlets, including the Today Show and local broadcasts in Central Florida and Southern California.
We created Disney Tourist Blog after graduating from college and law school initially as a place to share daily photos and trip reports from our visits to the parks. We resided in the Midwest at the time, and this blog was a good outlet in between trips. In the years since, DTB has grown beyond our wildest expectations.
We’ve relocated on multiple occasions to be closer to the parks to gain a fresh perspective as locals. We’ve lived less than 30 minutes from Disneyland (twice!) and under 10 minutes from Walt Disney World (we could see the Magic Kingdom fireworks from our bedroom window) for over 4 years. We’ve made these moves in order to intimately understand the ins and outs of Walt Disney World and Disneyland.
While the primary perspective of this blog remains one of tourists–to help you plan memorable vacations–living near the parks offered invaluable experience as locals. We’re current Annual Passholders on both coasts, as well as Universal’s parks in Orlando and Hollywood. We’re past Annual Passholders at Disneyland Paris, Tokyo Disney Resort, Hong Kong Disneyland, and Universal Studios Japan.
To that end, we continue to visit Disneyland on a weekly basis and make monthly research trips to Walt Disney World. During those visits, we field test new strategies, put our plans through the paces, conduct hotel stays and restaurant reviews, and more to ensure that our guidance is up-to-date and accurate. On-the-ground field testing to produce planning guides is critically important to us; that along with Disney news & rumors and analysis thereof have become DTB’s primary focus.
You can subscribe to our highly popular and totally-free Disney email newsletter here for regular news, planning posts, and other updates.
Disney Tourist Blog remains owned and operated solely by Sarah & Tom Bricker. While our family has grown in recent years to include our daughter, Megatron (real name not used here for privacy), the team behind the website has not. It’s just us. You will never find a guest post on DTB, because we strive for this blog to have a singular voice and consistent, high-quality research and planning recommendations.
We take seriously being objective and critical, but we still enjoy the parks a lot. If we didn’t, we wouldn’t visit the Disney parks so regularly or have a blog devoted to the subject. Our goal is to present a frank and candid assessment of all things Disney. You will seldom meaningless fluff words like “magical” here, and this blog most certainly is not “sprinkled with pixie dust.” This is written by real people trying to offer unbiased advice based on actual experiences visiting the Disney theme parks.
In addition to Disney Tourist Blog, we also own and operate a sister site, TravelCaffeine.com, that revolves around our non-Disney trips. That mostly focuses on California, U.S. National Parks, Japan, and a handful of international cities (mostly ones with a Disney presence, conveniently enough). In addition to bouncing between residing in Florida and California, we also took two “gap years” (or whatever you call it when you’re already established adults), put our stuff into storage, and spent extensive time living as digital nomads in Tokyo, Kyoto, Paris, etc.
Just found this blog, and I love it! Bookmark? Done. Love the humor and insiders’ tips. This is a selfish thought, but… how about NOT becoming larger than Google so that you can keep the insiders’ tips to just a few? 😉
Regardless… sincere thanks for sharing your thoughts and discoveries.
I just love this site and reading your blog really enhanced our latest trip to WDW this past October for the Halloween party. We have already booked a trip for next year! Thank you for such great information on WDW.
This is absolutely the best Disney blog out there. I feel like you speak to literally every single thing I might want to know and I never leave with more questions than answers. Like you, I love the whole Disney experience. My husband and I visit Disney World several times a year to stroll through the parks, enjoy the attractions, eat at some of our favorite restaurants and enjoy the shows. We’re a young couple without children (yet!) and love how EASY Disney makes vacationing. I appreciate how much your blog compliments Disney’s values and provides something that is TRULY useful to your readers who share your same passions. Thank you for what you do!
We are promoting a Free Give Away trip to Disneyland. Would you give me permission to use some of the photos on your blog?
One family will get to go for 5 days during the Halloween time this year 🙂
HOpe to hear from you soon,
Best Disney blog i’ve come across! Although I’m a passholder, I’m trying to find ‘random facts’ and plans to show a first-timer around, and this site has really helped! It’s great! 🙂
I have been looking for perspectives about Tokyo Disney that comes from casual visitors. The hotels, the experience, the bad, and the good, everything!
And that is what I’ve found in your site – honest opinion about it. In fact your site is soo thorough that it includes stuff that I did not expect – complete hotel review in Tokyo Disneyland, first hand experiences of staying there, how to spend time in Disney Sea and Disney Land…
Suffice to say, I am very happy to have come upon your site 🙂
I stumbled upon you website today and ended up spending the whole afternoon reading and looking at your beautiful photos. I honestly have a list of over 25 “Disney related” sites bookmarked on my computer, but yours is the best I’ve come across. Your website is amazing, and honest, helpful, fun, and enjoyable! You and your wife are an adorable couple, too! Thanks for having this wonderful way to explore Disney.
what are your predictions for the dates of the free dining plan for 2017?
Big fan of the site. I read it regularly and think it’s the best of the bunch, by a long shot. I’m curios why you don’t date stamp your articles? I know you update many older posts regularly, which is great. It would be really nice to see the “last modified” at the top of the article so we know going in when it was published or updated. As things change fast in the Disney universe it’s nice to know if the article is current or a bit dated.
I can see a potential downside is articles appearing dated, but actually I think this wouldn’t be a issue for you as you seem to regularly update the important ones.
Of course If there is a date somewhere I’m missing please clue me in.
Keep up the good work.
Please sign me up for the newsletter.
Good Day…As an admirerer of your photographic skills I am wondering your opinion on a common photo problem. I have started a web site and looking for a new camera. I have a compact Sony HX30. I have great limitations in dark lightning but excel at Zoom capabilities and quick draw camera shooting. I am thinking about the Sony a6000 for quality,LOW LIGHT CONDITIONS and a zillion other features the camera is famous for. However i will miss the HX30 zoom lens feature. Close up shot, no problem….distance close up shot, no problem….without changing lenses. I understand I can carry 2 camera…the question is…if you had only one camera to carry with one what would you recommend and the lens size? . Also what fixed lens compact camera would you recommend?
Thanking you in advance….Tom
Great site. Makes the creation of a mini “project plan” (and to get the most bang for the buck, you gotta have a plan. Only thing that can’t be planned is the weather) easier and more encompassing. I’m taking my two granddaughters (one turns 13 while at WDW, and the other is 8) to WDW in June. We are taking Amtrak’s Auto Train from Lorton, VA to Sanford, Fl which is a fantastic trip and avoids the TSA pat downs and PITA searches.
Only suggestion I have for the site, and I also posted it in another section, is to have the date a comment is posted displayed. It really would help to know which comments are current, and those that are older which may or may not be still valid. But, if that’s my only comment, then I really don’t have anything to complain about :).
P.S. I do love the photography section and photos. I just upgraded from a Canon 20D to a Canon 7D Mark II. It’s like going from a flip phone to a smart phone.
Tom and Sarah,
i just want to tell you how much I truly love reading your blog. I found this blog what seems like years ago, in 2014 while planning my first real trip. I have been reading it ever since, with every Disney vacation. I love your advice, tips, guides, and photos. I even read it while I am not vacation planning because I enjoy reading your opinions. I even tried searching out that Tie Dye WDW resort retro shirt that Sarah didn’t want you to buy.. with no avail, I was unable to actually find one in stock during my last visit 🙁
I just wanted to let you guys know how much I appreciate all of your hard-work and dedication to this blog. This has become one of my favorite blogs and my go-to guide for everything Disney! Thank you.
I really love reading your blogs on this site! Your tips have helped me make my decisions on when to go to Disney World, and the ins and outs of having the best time at Disney! I do have one question though. I tried signing up for your newsletter and downloading the ebook you are currently offering, but it keeps saying my email is invalid. I’ve tripled checked to make sure I put it in right but it still says it’s invalid. Anything you can do? I would love to get your newsletter and the ebook would be an awesome bonus!
Please sign me up for the newsletter.
Keep doing your thing. This is hands down my favorite Disney related site and I think it’s such a valuable resource for planning our trips. I recommend you guys so much on my forums, I’m sure people must think I work here, lol!
Do you have an RSS feed that I can use to subscribe?
Hi Tom!
I stumbled upon your blog to learn more about the Disneyland Resort! I’m going next month and was wondering if you have any suggestions on how to plan a 1 day, two park trip. My friend and I have park hoppers and want to get as much things done! Any advice? Thanks!
🙂
Hi there,
Just purchased tickets through ParkSavers – which was a great deal btw, so thanks for the tip! – however, the vouchers I received show a start and end date of only six days (for a 6day park hopper pass), when we will be in town for 8 days and were hoping to take 2 rest days in between all the fun to stretch out the magic. Will our tickets really expire before the end of our trip? I thought they were good for 14 days once usage begins. Can you advise?? Thanks!
Hi Tom,
Just wanted to send you a message and tell you how much I enjoy your blog. I actually ran into you last week at the Magic Kingdom and introduced myself. (Hope you didn’t think that was weird) I felt like a complete goof ball afterwards because I just didn’t know what to say. I have to say, actually seeing you in the park was the highlight of my trip. My husband and I saw you the next evening at Epcot taking photos but didn’t stop and say hello. Any who, we too love going to the Disney Theme Parks and your blog and tips are very helpful with trip planning! Thanks!