4 night with WDW, 5 night repo...or save the money for later?

[YawningDodo]

It's looking more and more likely that the January 2020 cruise my housemate and I have been noodling for the last few months is going to get switched back to a solo trip. It's not due to anything bad having happened, so no worries there, but it has me changing gears a bit in my daydreaming--and that's all it really is so far, since I don't have any January 2020 itineraries to look at yet. Based on 2019's January itineraries and the amount of money I'm able to set aside each month, I can afford to cruise solo again by January 2020, but fall 2019 would probably start to be a bit of a squeeze. My placeholder expires near the end of January 2020, so under the current plan I'd just be squeaking this trip in ahead of that deadline.

In the larger picture, though, I'm planning to visit all of the Disney parks in the world, and that's always at the back of my mind when I'm looking at vacation budgeting. I've already done all the American parks and will knock Disneyland Paris off the list this fall, which leaves Shanghai, Hong Kong, and Tokyo--I'll probably spread that across at least two trips in order to see some of the surrounding areas while I'm at it, so it's going to be pretty expensive. Ultimately I have to make my own choice once I've had a chance to take all the factors into consideration, but I'm interested to hear how others would approach this. And, remember, the options below all assume that January 2020 itineraries will be pretty similar to January 2019. On either of the cruise options I would be experiencing a new ship (which is why there aren't any Magic itineraries on my list). Longer itineraries are very unlikely to fit within my budget (I did a spreadsheet that accounts for per-day costs and it really looks slim on the 6- and 7-night itineraries), which leaves two main options...again, assuming 2020 looks like 2019. This really is mostly for early-stage, daydreaming purposes at this time.

Option 1 is a 4-night on the Dream out of Port Canaveral with at least one full day in WDW pre-cruise. I'd probably spend that entire day in DHS to experience the new Toy Story and Star Wars lands...but it would be fairly likely to be on a weekend. Even if I added a second WDW day (which I may or may not be able to do), it would probably be a Saturday-Sunday WDW trip, which is not ideal. I've done WDW to death, but there would be new things to see.

Option 2 is the Galveston->San Juan 5-night cruise on the Wonder. The cruise itself is much cheaper, but airfare is much more expensive, so it more or less evens out. No Castaway Cay, but tons of sea days, and I really enjoy sea days. No real interest in spending time in Galveston or San Juan, buuut depending on whether I do well on airfare I might be able to upgrade my stateroom to oceanview.

Option 3 is...no cruise at all. I would let my placeholder expire, get refunded for the payment I made on it, and be able to save up and go to one or more of the Asian Disney parks probably about a year sooner than I will if I take the cruise (not sure yet how long it'll take me to save up for an Asia trip, but expect at least a year and a half, more likely two years).

What would you do?

 

[MomOTwins]

I voted for Dream and WDW, but that is mostly because Star Wars. I can't tell from this if you are really interested in seeing the Star Wars land, but it sounds like it will be amazing! Also, I think it would be stressful to have to go with an international flight back from San Juan, since it always takes so much longer to get through customs etc. at the airport than a domestic return flight.

I also read that one of the Asian parks (sorry, not super up to speed on this, so don't know which one, maybe Hong Kong?) is undergoing a major expansion with a new Beauty and the Beast land and other lands, so I would say hold off on the Asia trip for a while and wait till you can budget to go to multiple Disney parks in Asia at once, which would be less expensive than flying out on separate trips to China, Hong Kong, and Japan.

 

[mevelandry]

Asia sounds like a once in a lifetime experience so I gave it my vote.

 

[YawningDodo]

I voted for Dream and WDW, but that is mostly because Star Wars. I can't tell from this if you are really interested in seeing the Star Wars land, but it sounds like it will be amazing! Also, I think it would be stressful to have to go with an international flight back from San Juan, since it always takes so much longer to get through customs etc. at the airport than a domestic return flight.

I also read that one of the Asian parks (sorry, not super up to speed on this, so don't know which one, maybe Hong Kong?) is undergoing a major expansion with a new Beauty and the Beast land and other lands, so I would say hold off on the Asia trip for a while and wait till you can budget to go to multiple Disney parks in Asia at once, which would be less expensive than flying out on separate trips to China, Hong Kong, and Japan.

Of the two cruises, I think I am already leaning toward going out of Port Canaveral. I'm not a huge Star Wars fan, but I do think the new land's concept art has looked awesome. I've kind of been hoping to make a big WDW trip with my housemate, though, so I guess I'm less excited about WDW itself than I might have been in the past when I'm looking at it as another solo trip (she took me on my first Disneyland trip, and I want to take her on her first WDW trip...but now I don't know how many years away that'll be).

I was doing some googling today and you're right--it's Tokyo Disneyland that's getting the Beauty and the Beast land, set to open in 2020. Tokyo's also hosting the Olympics in 2020, so I know Tokyo in general will be unbearably crowded around that time (and it'll probably be a year or two until crowds die down for the new land). That being said, all the stuff happening there in 2020 means a lot of things will be freshened up, both in Disneyland and around the city. It's a good point to consider, though; it may be better to wait to go to Japan until something like 2022 anyway. So that leaves Shanghai and Hong Kong for 2021ish if I fast-track the Disney 'Round the World project over the cruise.

The trouble with hitting all three in one trip is more about vacation hours than money. Right now I get two weeks of vacation per year, and once you factor in the time lost on travel days, it's half a week at each of the Asian Disney resorts with no time at all for visiting the surrounding cities. Otherwise, I absolutely agree; it's so much cheaper to fly there once and just get connections within the continent. I may get more vacation hours as the years go by...but right now I'm not making any kind of plans that bank on it, because I haven't had any indication that I should expect it.

Edit: I don't think you have to go through customs for San Juan, though, since Puerto Rico is a U.S. territory. I've never been, though.

 

[YawningDodo]

The issue of upcoming expansions is actually turning out to be a really important consideration I hadn't looked into. As far as I can tell from a brief googling, Shanghai doesn't have any upcoming expansions announced, but that makes it the only one of the three. Hong Kong has a Marvel land opening in 2023, so I'm clearly going to have to wait for that. I suppose I could do Japan in 2021 and probably be far out enough from the expansion opening, but it does make me think that waiting an extra year to make my first trip to Asia might not be the worst thing in the world.

 

[DietCokeMommy]

Unless you have to have Castaway Cay, I’d do the Galveston to San Juan. It’s longer, so more days on the boat, and it’ll be warmer in the Caribbean than in the Bahamas. Bahamas in January can be kinda iffy if you want to do any beachy stuff.

As an aside, we did a repo out of San Juan last year and we really liked Puerto Rico and San Juan. Old San Juan is gorgeous and fun to walk around, as is the the fort. And the beaches are really nice.

 

[Frozen2014]

I voted 4 night Dream + 1 day WDW....To me, that's the best of both worlds...cruise plus parks. I know a lot object to a short cruise. We are doing our first one ourselves in August so can probably comment better then. A 4 night cruise will go quick, but can still be amazing and packed with 4 days of fun. And 1 day at the parks is better than none. You'll probably come home needing a vacation...ha ha...but to me it's worth it. But honestly, you can't go wrong with any of the above options.