your best strategy to include Universal into your Disney Vacation

[maclondon]

We have it in the middle - we have 5 nights onsite, then move to a villa for 9 nights
the monday / tuesday of the second week will be universal we have monday night in the hard rock hotel.

We're also doing kenedy space centre, seaworld, and aquatica so maybe 5 of the 9 days offside will not be disney
and 4 days will - one will be back to hollywood studios for starwars jedi dinner
and the last day is at magic kingdom early entry crystal palace breakfast.

 

[ArwenMarie]

We always rent a car so transportation isn't an issue. I like to see Universal at the beginning because I like the Disney parks more, although I like the whole onsite experience at Universal more. Are you staying onsite or offsite?

 

[hpriamson]

Last trip & next trip, we do 3 nights at a Universal hotel, then move to rental house and do Disney & other stuff for the next 7 days. So we get the Express Pass & early entry & resort experience at Universal, but get a chance to stretch out and not cram the 5 of us into a tiny hotel room for the rest of the vacation.

Transportation-wise - cab from the airport to Universal, then on the final day of Universal pick up a rental car to transfer to the rental house & use for the rest of the stay.

 

[dsdeleon]

We have done all combos (Uni 1st, visiting Uni from Disney, etc) and our trip next week is planned perfectly IMO with our fav resorts (2 boys 7+9). A week at AKV Jambo and then 4 days at Uni onsite at RPR. Ending with Express is just AMAZING. Going to Uni without express is painful. I am picking up a car at the Wyndam near DTD and driving over, dropping the luggage at RPR, dropping the car off at a local resort and taking the shuttle to Uni. Then cabbing it to MCO.

 

[Catvondita]

I do it in the middle of my trip because for me Disney is the best and I like to start off with it and end with it. Before we were able to do the two parks (IOA and US) in one day but my feet were killing me. This time since me and my boyfriend are going for a longer trip were going to try to do US one day and IOA the next day. The parks only take us about half a day to do and see everything so it will be like half a day at US then back to the hotel were we can nap and relax then even go back to the Disney Parks for the evening. Keep in mind if you want to do this it $40 from Disney Property to Universal (there and back) so $80 a day.

 

[totallytigger]

We did a split stay last Nov/Dec. We checked in to AoA on the Tues before Thanksgiving for 11nights. Black friday--we toured AK until mid afternoon and then packed one small suitcase and headed to Universal HRH for one night stay. We had two day park to park tickets--so we headed into Universal right after check in and used FOTL passes and rode a lot of rides. The next am--we checked out of HRH and headed to park with early entry privelage and toured both parks until early evening--then headed back to AoA. I realize that we actually were paying for two different hotel rooms for Friday night--but getting the FOTL passes around the crowded Thanksgiving time was well worth it to us. Also, walking to and from Universal parks & hotel was very convenient. Plus--we really liked starting and ending our trip at WDW.

 

[KathyM2]

Wow...there are a lot of great ideas here that I never would have thought of! Gotta love the DIS

 

[gunderda]

We're taking our first trip down to Orlando in June and doing both Universal and Disney. A large majority of our group prefers Universal (the in-law part of the family that has been there before). They were doing a deal of buy 2 days get 1 free for Universal so we bought that. And then I chose 2 days at Disney.
I looked at the crowd calendar and saw that they suggested doing universal sunday-monday-tuesday, Epcot Sunday or Thursday and MK Wed or Thurs.

Well I got reservations for BOG breakfast on Thursday so that put one disney day in stone. Then I figured doing Universal Sun-Monday-Tues would probably be the best and then do Epcot and Mk Wed/Thurs and leaving Friday as a lazy/shopping/pool day. (we're staying sat-sat)

I debated alternating disney and universal days but to me it just kinda makes sense to get one done and of with and start on the other.

 

[tesslor]

We will be visiting Disney and Universal in June. I originally planned to go to Universal first so that we could end on Disney. After reading some posts here and thinking about it more I switched it around and we will do Universal second.

We will be staying on site at a Deluxe at Universal so we will have FOTL. After not having to stand in lines at Universal I think my kids would be upset and annoyed that they have to stand in lines at Disney. Also, we were able to score an excellent deal on hotel rooms and I booked 2 for the 4 of us at Universal and we will be sharing 1 at Disney. I thought it would be better to go from cramped quarters to being able to spread out and relax than the latter. It will also be nice to be a little more relaxed at the end of our trip since meals and rides don't have to be planned out so much at Universal. I plan to let my family have more pool time at Universal too because I don't feel like we are missing quite as much.

For us it just made more sense to do Universal second.

 

[angierae]

We're going for one day, and we're not staying at Universal, so we'll just get the package with transportation from Dreams Unlimited (we're going the second week of October)

 

[Belle61513]

When we go to the Dark Side, we only go for 1 day, and we put that day in the middle of our trip (usually a Tues or Wed). We use Mears transportation to/from our resort and only go to 1 of the 2 Universal parks. Now with the expanded Diagon Alley, IDK if 1 park in a day would cut it, since you need both park tickets/a hopper to get into both sides.

We're not going to Universal this year, since we went to IOA in '12 and US in '14 and it's just too darn expensive...although we may do a quick weekend trip later this year just to Universal for DH charac4.

Anyway, I do like going in the middle of the week, it's nice to "see something different" but oh-so-nice to go "home" to Disney at the end of the day

 

[Cyrano]

Our first trip we stayed in a condo for 21days. Half way through the vacation we had 3 nights on-site at Universal, just left the bulk of our clothes/cases at the condo. Then back to the condo and Disney for the remainder of the trip.

Subsequently we have always had 14 nights at Disney, thereafter ending the trip at Universal. Our Universal stays have normally been between 5 to 7 nights.
We go to the parks every day but also include time shopping, enjoying the resort etc.

 

[abouley]

We are staying 5 nights on-site (W-M) then moving to a condo (M-Sun). Our plan is to hit universal on Tues/Wed. We are leaving Thurs, Fri, Sat kind of open in case we want one more day. We have never done US/IOA so kids are excited but we aren't sure how long we'll want there. I have debated booking a room for Tues night to get the express passes. We are renting a car our entire trip. Generally I can get good enough deals on car rentals that they pay for themselves with being able to go to the grocery store, eat off-site, etc plus I'm not a huge fan of Disney buses! Since we're going in Aug trying to leave enough time for water parks too and feeling like we just don't have quite enough days!!!

 

[Fuhnuh]

We've done US/IOA onsite at the beginning, middle and end. I prefer middle or end. After several days with EP at US/IOA it is a little hard to adapt to our WDW vacation. It's worked out in the middle because we haves just added a few days at WDW at the end to wrap up loose ends. This year it's 9 at WDW, 7 at US/IOA and then DCL with a decompression day afterwards. I think if DD14 was 6 or more years younger we would do the opposite and stay less at US/IOA. Also we are staying at RPR for 7 days because we found a good rate and are going to be spending a day at Discovery Cove and Aquatica.

 

[agavegirl1]

I like to stay onsite at US/IOA at the end of the trip. It's nice to not have to plan a lot and have Express. I find it a very relaxing thing to do before leaving for home. Last trip, I stayed at POP for 9 nights and ended with Portofino for 4 nights. No, you do not need four days of tickets to enjoy Universal but I do love the Deluxe hotel prices at US/IOA. We purchased Orlando Flex Tickets and used them at Busch Gardens and Sea World as well as Universal.

 

[sharona]

Our upcoming trip was going to be Universal only after some beach time in the Keys but we decided to add 1 day at MK in the middle. I chose the MK day based on crowd calendar/lack of EMH for MK and shortened hours at UOR due to grad nights. Mostly we want to check out the new stuff in Fantasyland and see how we like FP+ as we're considering a WDW only trip in December.

If I were doing a long Orlando trip, I'd save the Universal piece for the end and stay at a UOR deluxe for at least 4 nights. Enjoy the less than 10 minute waits for almost every ride and the freedom to change plans and decide at the last minute where to eat dinner. Plenty of time to see and do it all with lots of pool time too. It's a nice change from the necessarily more scheduled WDW part of the trip. Buying an AP and getting the APH rate at the hotels is the way to go!

 

[Planogirl]

Some interesting ideas here. I'm a complete Universal fan now but I do try to work in some Disney time. My issue is just the opposite.

Objectively speaking, the Universal parks are way more relaxing so there's that to consider. If you travel over there for just the day, I would try to go around the middle of your vacation. If you decide to stay there for a night or two I would personally enjoy relaxing at Universal after time spent at WDW. However if you are totally excited about Disney then you might want to do it last.

 

[sky13]

Last year I went with a friend (both of us in our 20s) and we had 3 nights at AOA then 1 night at RPR. As we were leaving we came to the conclusion that if we ever managed to make it back to Orlando together we wouldn't end with Universal as it felt so much of a let down compared to Disney - it was still fun, but Disney was better. (There were various little things about Universal that we got annoyed with, such as about 3 TMs at RPR not knowing where the walkway to Universal was, TMs at IOA/USF telling us information that turned out to be completely wrong, getting harassed by the timeshare people at IOA/USF everytime we walked by... although the unlimited Express was a nice perk)

Still, I can't imagine going to Orlando and not doing Universal (but I live about a 10 hour flight away) so this upcoming trip I'm planning to spend most of my time at Disney (staying at Pop) but with a day trip to Universal. Planning on buying the unlimited Express pass for that one day and probably doing the Mears shuttle between Pop and Universal (though Uber is looking like quite an attractive option).

 

[pampam]

This was the first year we went to U.S. We went from the airport to Royal Pacific resort. It was ok, but not in the same league as the Poly. We went to the parks for 3 days, then checked out of Royal Pacific and went to Pop. We spent a few days at Pop, shopping, relaxing and then bought our annual passes. We will go back next year before our APs expire to get another vacatrion out of them but do WDW first and probably move onto U.S. to the end. The major draw bck from this way was we didn't get to use Magic Express on the first leg of the trip, so we had to shlep our bags with us. But by doing WDW at the end of the trip, it will work to our advantage next year.

 

[WriterGina]

We're plopping Universal into the middle of this trip. Based on the crowd calendars, we planned for our first day at Epcot, then 2 days at MK, then 2 days at Universal/IOA, then back to the Mouse for another Epcot and 1 1/2 HS (departure day is the half day). (No AK this time based on everything we've heard about the mazelike construction walls and how crowded it feels).

We've never stayed off-property before, but this time we're trying Wyndham Bonnet Creek (2BR deluxe), and we saved enough over what we usually spend on lodging that we decided it made sense to get an "extra" room for one night at the Loews Royal Pacific so we can take advantage of the early opening and UEP for our two days at Universal. We won't check out of WBC but will check into our LRP room by 7:30 on Universal Day 1 to make the most of both days. Even factoring in the extra room, we're still paying only $150 a night for our stay, which is way less than we've ever paid for a 2BR on Disney property.