First Trip AHHH Hotel please????

[pookie10]

We are going to disneyland March 5- March 9.
We were planning on Disney world for 10 days, but want to save some money, so we are making this mini vacation, and planning disney world in 2014
That being said, We know we are going to fly from Colorado and arrive around 1130am, then we will get on the shuttle bus (yes we know it costs money) from L.A. We chose L.A. because of more flight choices.
Here is my itenerary:
Day 1: Arrive at hotel around 2, go to disneyland park, have character dinner reservation
Day 2: Disneyland Park character breakfast, day at the park
Day 3: California adventure, character lunch
Day 4: Character breakfast, Disney land park
Day 5: Fliight home at 9 am.


Here are my questions,
What hotel should we do? Our kids are almost 5 in april and 10. Girl, boy. We are doing on site hotel. If we do grand californian we do standard view, if we do disneyland hotel we can do upgraded park/pool view

Which character dinner,lunch and breakfasts ??? We are doing the 4 day dining plan

 

[sonnyjane]

I'm only saying this because in your post you mentioned that you changed your trip from WDW to Disneyland to save money, so I'll give you two disclaimers.

The first is that you should NOT do the dining plan. It is not like the WDW dining plan. You will NOT save any money and can potentially lose it. At Disneyland you simply pay for food vouchers that have dollar amounts and use them like cash to buy food. If you pay $100, you get $100 worth of vouchers, and you DO NOT get change back if you don't use it all. For example, if you use your $15 voucher to pay for your $13 lunch, you just lost $2 because they don't give change. If you want to prepay for your meals, put cash on a Disney gift card, but do not waste time or money on the dining plan.

Second, I'm assuming you are choosing to stay on-site by choice after carefully comparing to off-site hotels? The on-site hotels can easily be three times more expensive than the off-site hotels and with the exception of Grand Californian (the most expensive), the other two on-sites (PPH and DLH) are nearly twice the distance from the parks than places like Park Vue Inn or Best Western Park Place Inn. Again, I'm only bringing this up because you mentioned that money was a deciding factor in your trip change.

Also, since you posted your itinerary, make sure you take advantage of park-hopping between the two parks and don't limit yourself to one park per day. They are literally 90 seconds apart from each other. You'll maximize your trip if you parkhop.

The Minnie & Friends breakfast inside the park is a favorite for many. The only character dinner is Goofy's. Ariel's has princesses for breakfast and lunch but not for dinner.

 

[pookie10]

Thanks for the advice, so do you reccomend not staying on site? We were thinking on site because of the disney theming etc.

 

[skiingfast]

Sounds like you haven't made reservations yet. You should probably skip the dining plan, it is not a money saver.

I think you would like the DLH more. Very Disney rooms, super pool area. The walk will be longer to the parks but you view will probably be over the GCH with the park view, you want the park/DTD view.


Remember no dining plan unless you want to super plan everything, read the link. http://www.disboards.com/showpost.php?p=40974724&postcount=420

Minnie and Friends at the Plaza Inn has great character variety and interaction for breakfast. Goofy's Kitchen serves character meals all day long, if you want to eat in the DLH. Storytellers Cafe has a character breakfast with a choice of buffet or menu.

Blue Bayou in the POTC is a top choice, Cafe Orleans is very good. You can look at the menus in this link. http://allears.net/dlr/din/menu/menus.htm

March 5 to 9? http://disneyland.disney.go.com/vacation-packages/one-more-disney-day/

 

[pookie10]

Thanks!!! I am disney obsessed, our bedroom, my car, its everywhere!!! We are very very very excited, and we are going during the promotion Thats why we picked early march. Is it warm enough to swim early march?

 

[sonnyjane]

Thanks for the advice, so do you reccomend not staying on site? We were thinking on site because of the disney theming etc.

I won't tell you not to stay on-site. For those that can afford it, it's quite nice to stay on-site, but I have stayed on-site before (Paradise Pier) and found that it didn't merit the additional cost. If I REALLY came into a lot of money, I would stay at Grand Californian because it is so close, but other than that, from now on I will likely go back to staying off-site at Park Vue/BWPPI and those places because they are half the distance. PPH is the cheapest of the three on-sites and is the second closest (cutting through GCH). DLH is the next most expensive but is the farthest, and GCH is the closest and most expensive. DLH has an awesome theme. If you have the money and don't mind the distance (about half a mile), then stay at DLH for sure if you love that "Disney" theme. I just wasn't sure how much you were familiar with the Disneyland area. Many people that have planned for WDW aren't aware that at Disneyland, the off-sites are often closer and much less expensive.

 

[pookie10]

We were planning 4500 dollar trip, thats for EVERYTHING. for 2 adults, 2 kids (my oldest is 10, so pays adult rates)...so I was thinking DLH because of the theming, but I do like GCF too...

NOTE: when we go to disney world, we are staying at Animal Kingdom Lodge FOR SURE, thats why im tilting away from GCF, because its similair

 

[c&m]

I won't tell you not to stay on-site. For those that can afford it, it's quite nice to stay on-site, but I have stayed on-site before (Paradise Pier) and found that it didn't merit the additional cost. If I REALLY came into a lot of money, I would stay at Grand Californian because it is so close, but other than that, from now on I will likely go back to staying off-site at Park Vue/BWPPI and those places because they are half the distance. PPH is the cheapest of the three on-sites and is the second closest (cutting through GCH). DLH is the next most expensive but is the farthest, and GCH is the closest and most expensive. DLH has an awesome theme. If you have the money and don't mind the distance (about half a mile), then stay at DLH for sure if you love that "Disney" theme. I just wasn't sure how much you were familiar with the Disneyland area. Many people that have planned for WDW aren't aware that at Disneyland, the off-sites are often closer and much less expensive.

I totally agree. While it's important to stay on-site at WDW, at DL it's nice to stay on-site if you can afford it, and if you can afford it, the hotel would be GCH. If theming and Disney nostalgia is important to you, the hotel would be DLH.

However, at DL, I'd rather just save my money (for WDW) and stay at the off-site hotels. There are so many of them at a fraction of the price and better location. Your budget of $4500 would really go a long way by staying off-site.

 

[pookie10]

ok, im running into a little problem reading other peoples posts, we were going from monday-friday, are we going to be missing stuff that they only have on weekends???

 

[sonnyjane]

ok, im running into a little problem reading other peoples posts, we were going from monday-friday, are we going to be missing stuff that they only have on weekends???

The schedule likely won't be released for another month (they usually come out a month before), but since you're going earlier than "Spring Break" time, it's definitely a possibility that they won't be running fireworks or Fantasmic! during the week. During off-season, it is Friday, Saturday, and Sunday nights only, so if you're leaving Friday morning, you would miss those two things. World of Color is reducing their schedule but I believe it will still have dates during the week.

 

[pookie10]

Thanks sooo much!! I think we are going to switch from sunday night - thursday!! So we can see fireworks!!!