Help with Land & Sea package

[Jasminerk13]

I need some help.
We have booked a 3 night land and 4 night sea vacation package. This includes a 4 day park ticket. Unfortunately, we aren't in the parks for 4 days. We arrive on a Thurs. and leave on the ship on a Sunday. That really only gives us about 2.5 days in the parks (half day Thurs, Friday, & Saturday). My question is can we book a totally separate reservation arriving in the parks a day early on Wednesday but somehow get our tickets to the parks and use those so we can get that extra day?

One call my husband placed to WDW the person said yes, we could do that by going to guest services and requesting our tickets from the other package. But then 3 other calls to WDW and the Cruise line, the people said no, there was no way to do that.

What do you guys think? It seems like a waste to have tickets for 4 days, but only able to use them for about half that time.

THANKS!!!!!

 

[castaway]

You can depart from Animal Kingdom Park for your cruise so it would give you until noon that day of sail there.

 

[kcashner]

You've just hit one of the big reasons not to book a land/sea package. What I would do is to cancel the package and book just the cruise (since you are way outside of the penalty period there is no disadvantage to this. Then re-book the land package any way you want to.

Depending on the choices you make, you can save serious money this way. For instance--you'll only have 3 or 4 days. Do you really need park hopper tickets or can you choose to do one park each day? (savings about $50 per person). Do you want to stay in the category of resort that is tied to your cabin or might you be happy with a lower category of resort? For instance, say you are in a cat 6 cabin--that would tie to a deluxe resort. If you would be happy in a moderate resort, you could save serious money. Or you could look into renting points from a DVC member and stay in a DVC villa where you would have either a kitchenette or a full kitchen (depending on the size of unit you choose) for the same or less money as a regular WDW resort would cost you. In addition, if WDW has any discounts available on rooms or packages, you don't qualify for them in a land/sea package, but you do if you book separately. You can book the DCL bus transportation even if you don't use the package...or you could choose a rental car and save money.

No, if you check in on a land/sea, you can't get your park tickets early.

 

[Disneydreamer5]

I have to agree with the PP. I have been working this out for months and still haven't booked anything yet but when I do I will be doing it seperatly.
We are a Value resort family due to the fact that we need 2 rooms where ever we stay, unless in a villa, which for us is not worth the cost as we are never in our room or at the hotel other then the occasional swim.
We spend the money on hoppers and water parks so to have DCL tie us into a delux or mod is a waste of a lot of money that could be used for something better in our eyes.
When I did the land and Sea package together is came out to almost 6 grand and when I did it seperately I was saving almost $1200.
Thats a huge amount to save for anyone.
Good luck and let us know what you decide to do.

 

[tjbaggott]

We've also booked a land and sea package that starts on a Thursday with ship day on the Sunday. We will actually have 3 1/2 days in the parks because we are arriving in Orlando on the Wednesday, staying in a hotel off site then checking into our Disney hotel FIRST thing Thursday morning and hit the parks at opening time. Animal Kingdom in my opinion is the easiest park to do in a half day. We've done it before and it worked out well. If you are flying in, perhaps you can get a really early morning flight on the Thursday, check into your hotel early (they'll let you do that even if your room isn't ready), and you can hit the parks early to give you a full day the first day instead of a half day.
We checked into getting park tickets for one additional day at the beginning, but it was going to be atrosciously expensive.
So we are happy with the way we've now planned it out.

 

[Jasminerk13]

Thanks for all the replies....

I went and priced out the vacation if I book everything separately, and it ends up being about $200 more expensive. Right now, our vacation is priced at $4002 in a Cat 6 room, with a stay at the Polynesian resort. Includes Magical Express, but no insurance or airfare since I can get those cheaper elsewhere.
When I priced it separately, with a stay in a moderate resort, arriving a day early like I wanted to, 4 day park hopper, and then a Cat 6 room on the cruise - the total comes to a little over $4220.


So I'm not sure that it's worth changing for an extra day with the convenience of the monorail and it being $200 cheaper......


Another thought I had was, if I can't get my tickets a day early, what about going to a value resort AFTER the cruise and using the left over day then. The tickets have to be used within 14 days right? So maybe that would work... what do you guys think?

 

[Jasminerk13]

We've also booked a land and sea package that starts on a Thursday with ship day on the Sunday. We will actually have 3 1/2 days in the parks because we are arriving in Orlando on the Wednesday, staying in a hotel off site then checking into our Disney hotel FIRST thing Thursday morning and hit the parks at opening time. Animal Kingdom in my opinion is the easiest park to do in a half day. We've done it before and it worked out well. If you are flying in, perhaps you can get a really early morning flight on the Thursday, check into your hotel early (they'll let you do that even if your room isn't ready), and you can hit the parks early to give you a full day the first day instead of a half day.
We checked into getting park tickets for one additional day at the beginning, but it was going to be atrosciously expensive.
So we are happy with the way we've now planned it out.

Are you taking a cab to the offsite hotel from the airport and then another cab from the hotel to the WDW resort? We've thought about doing this too but were unsure about magical express and transportation from the airport to hotel to hotel to cruise to airport...

 

[kcashner]

Some off site hotels offer a shuttle to WDW...but it's usually a once or twice a day run, not known for convenience. To get to Port Canaveral, you'd either need to rent a car or use a towncar service.

Yes, you can use your extra park ticket day after the cruise.

 

[TanyaLovesPooh]

We did the 3 day land and 4 day sea package. Arrived in Orlando on Wednesday night and got our tickets at 7am Thursday morning, our Polynesian room was ready around 2 in the afternoon that day.

Worked out well for us.

 

[*kokokopelli*]

We are booked on a land & sea cruise in December. If you want to add a "pre-day", you can call the reservations number and ask to add a "pre-day." We will arrive Wednesday afternoon - not a huge amount of extra time, but it helps. It is reflected in our reservation when I pull it up online. We also did this on our honeymoon in 2007 and it worked fine.

We did have a slight problem when we were at the hotel - they checked us out accidentally on Thursday, but a stop at the front desk fixed that quickly.

The only problem is that when you add a pre-day to the land and sea vacation, you can't use the Disney Dining Plan (unless that has changed since January).

A travel agent recommended that we simply book a separate day under a different reservation, but that seemed more complicated.

 

[mindy327]

Actually, we have done this twice!!! YOU CAN ADD DAYS on and get your ticktes the day you arrive. You need to call DCL and tell them you wish to add room night on to your package. We felt cheated out of time due to the fact we fly from AZ. So we always add room nights on to give us more time in the parks. No problems. I PREFER to do land and sea as package vs. booking seperately. THIS is a seemless and perfect way for us. We found it easier to book as a package vs sperate and having to do it all ourselves. They will take care of you from day one! As far as booking.. read my Trip Report. It explains in detail what happens when you do book as a package.

 

[kcashner]

ANother thought is that you can arrange to fly in on Wednesday evening and get an inexpensive room in the MCO area for Wed. nite. We do this thru Priceline. All the 2.5* hotels have complimentary shuttles and many have complimentary breakfast. In the morning, take the shuttle back to MCO and catch ME to your resort hotel. You can do this early in the morning and have all day at WDW...and your additional cost would be in the range of $50 instead of hundreds to extend your WDW stay.

Yes, you can add additional days to your land/sea package, but this will add a day to your ticket as well.....your initial question asked if you could book a day separately but pick up the ticket from the package which didn't start till the next day.

 

[tjbaggott]

Are you taking a cab to the offsite hotel from the airport and then another cab from the hotel to the WDW resort? We've thought about doing this too but were unsure about magical express and transportation from the airport to hotel to hotel to cruise to airport...

We are actually driving down in our own vehicle.

 

[mrstbalt]

We did the land/sea package back a few years ago... 4 land/3 sea. We came a day early, stayed at Pop Century then over to the Polynesian. Our room was ready so we checked in, had lunch then to the park. We took private transfers to the Wonder, so we were able to leave when we wanted to. We book airfare seperate but kept insurance through DCL. I stressed out about the best way to go, then after awhile I just did and didn't look back. The rest of the vacation was WONDERful