Michael Westerfield wrote:
Cool. I thought it was well worth it to stay off site and drive in everyday. The cost to stay onsite or try to schedule things based on a shuttle schedule just didn't seem worth it.
Wow, really? We've always found that the time taken to drive in, get through the traffic and lines at the parking booth, the PRICE to park, plus the cost of the rental car, made staying on site worthwhile (Disney's airport shuttle system combined with them handling your luggage for free) for us (I get that if you're doing a timeshare and thus need the car anyway thing, I just don't get the hotel off-site thing). Maybe I just never shopped well enough for the right hotel deals, but the price difference just wasn't good enough to justify it *if* you use mousesavers or other ways of getting on-site discounts.
Often if you stay on-site that qualifies you for other pretty good discounts, too, like the mealplan (which the thought of makes me cringe, but at Disney it actually works very well).
We've been going a couple times per year for the last few years, usually once with kids and once without (and with a couple other families or couples). We don't even investigate off-site anymore, but we do shop the Disney discounts REALLY hard to make sure we get the best deal we can.
We're booked for an adults-only long weekend in September right now. $516 all-inclusive for Southwest flights for two roundtrip. $688 for our room for three nights at the Yacht Club (would have been $556 at the Wilderness Lodge, which is our choice when we're with kids, but on the adults trip this is a little better located and we just wanted to do something a little different).
Haven't done anything with admission tickets, because deals on THOSE are the thing that's the hardest to find and we already have days on our passes. We go enough that we usually buy ten days at a time on the passes because once you get over four days or so, the rest of the days are REALLY cheap to add. And if you add the parkhopper and waterpark option at that point, it's insanely flexible and really inexpensive per day.
They don't expire, but be warned! Disney claims their "system" won't let them find your pass info if you lose it UNLESS you have the number on it. Our system is to just take digital pictures (with a couple cameras for safety) of each card right when we get it. Instant backup info. As long as you have that number, you're golden.
--Donnie
Login
Register
FAQ
Search
- AB