Anyone ever stay 15 nights?

[Mom2OakandEm]

More specifically anyone ever stay 15 nights during free dining? I know the maximum on free dining is 14 days so do you book 14 days and then do another reservation for 1 night? Can you pay OOP for 1 day on the dining plan?

Trying to decide is we should stay 13, 14 or 15 nights.We've never done Universal and I'm thinking about catching it this time around.

- We could stay for 13 nights and then transfer over to a Universal Studios hotel for 2 nights, but I really love the Disney resorts and we weren't planning on getting a rental so the magical express back to the airport would be nice (This is my least favorite option)

- We could stay 14 nights and just forget Universal all together

- Or we could stay 15 nights and just catch a cab to Universal 2 of the days. I know our park passes are good for 14 days from the first day we use them and we don't do the parks the day we arrive or the day we leave so we should be okay there, but I don't know how booking the hotel and the dining plan thing would work exactly.

Any thoughts and feedback or what you have dones are greatly appreciated.

 

[lacrosse_lady72]

Yes, we have stayed 15 nights during free dining, we did it last year. But we did not have free dining the whole time. We usually stay 14+ nights.

What I would suggest is to book the same category of room at your resort and do the 14 nights of free dining, and add one night (if you can) under a room only discount. Or if you can't get the room only discount, just buy the room only at regular price. That we you can ask to just stay in the same room for both reservations. As long as it's the same category, even though it's not a guarantee, we've never had a problem with them making us switch. The only downside is you'd only have the 14 nights of dining but for us 14 is enough, even on trips that we're there for 16 nights.

What I'd suggest is book the room only for the very first night. If they make you switch, you won't have been settled in so it won't be the end of the world and you don't want to go to the park the first day anyway so it should be fine. Again, the only problem is the dining, but you can officially check the the next morning, so you're only having to pay for food OOP for a few hours.

If you get a dining package for the one night, you'll have to deal with the price that comes along with buying a package. You'll have to pay for another park ticket, etc. It will be a lot for the one night, more than it would be to just pay OOP for the food with the room only.

 

[Ellen]

You can rent a car on site and it would cost less then a cab ride to universal if you decide to go there.

Ellen

 

[purple figment]

More specifically anyone ever stay 15 nights during free dining? I know the maximum on free dining is 14 days so do you book 14 days and then do another reservation for 1 night? I agree with the PP to make the 1 night reservation a room only and pay OOP for food on the last day. Your dining credits are good through 11:59 PM on check out day (for the first reservation) so if you have any left over credits you could use them on your check out/check in day for the second reservation. You would have to pay OOP for food only on the final day of your vacation.

As long as the 1 night res is for exactly the same room category/resort you can let the CM know when you check in that you have a continuing reservation. While they cannot guarantee that you'll remain in the same room they will try their best. You will have to go to the lobby and check in again on the day of the second reservation.

Can you pay OOP for 1 day on the dining plan? Not exactly sure what you mean. If you are asking about skipping one day of using credits during the 14 night stay and using those credits on your very last day when you are checking out of the second reservation, you cannot do that. However, as mentioned, you can use credits on the check out/check in day.

- Or we could stay 15 nights and just catch a cab to Universal 2 of the days. You could take a taxi, but here's the sticky from the Universal forum that details several additional transportation options to get to Universal from DW:
http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=2494908

Any thoughts and feedback or what you have dones are greatly appreciated.

My answers in red.

 

[Mom2OakandEm]

What would I do without you

I like the idea of doing a 1 day reservation at the beginning of our trip that way if we have to move rooms we won't be "settled in" and I wouldn't have to worry about switching rooms in the middle of one of our park days.

On our arrival day we can just pay out of pocket, we'll only be eating dinner that night at the hotel as our plane won't arrive until 5 anyway.

And thank you for the options on transportation to Universal I'll crunch some numbers to find out what will work best for us.

Thanks again.

 

[SillyFamily]

i would stay 2 a universal studios resort for a few of your days if you plan to visit. Front of the line access rockssssssssssss!

 

[lacrosse_lady72]

i would stay 2 a universal studios resort for a few of your days if you plan to visit. Front of the line access rockssssssssssss!

It's not really necessary most days in September though. I assume that's when the trip is per the poster's signature, it's for September 2015.

Just avoid the weekends and you should be okay, and maybe Labor Day or one of the Halloween Horror nights.

 

[jcvalenti]

i would stay 2 a universal studios resort for a few of your days if you plan to visit. Front of the line access rockssssssssssss!

If you're going to try Universal (and I highly recommend you do), I would really encourage you to stay at a Universal resort. We did that last trip, going straight from the airport to Universal for 3 days/ 2 nights with a 2 day park ticket with front of line access and it was one of the most enjoyable moments of our 12 day trip. I love Disney - and I was happy when we finally got there - but it really was fun to see the great stuff "the other park" is doing.

The hotel we stayed at was lovely (Portofino Bay), and the restaurant there (Mama Dellas) was better than almost anything we had at Disney. The pools were great, and the kids absolutely loved Universal's parks.

Front of Line Access might not be necessary when you go, but it really is a great perk if it comes with a short stay package. Staying on site will get you into Harry Potter an hour before the park opens, which is always a great thing (not sure if it will for Diagon Alley - they haven't confirmed that yet, to my knowledge).

 

[Wendybird55]

If Universal is a thought for you I agree with PP re getting hotel at Universal for those days. We are thinking of doing something similar next year.

You can stay at Disney around 11 / 12 nights and get free dining for all nights.
On your last day at Disney spend most of day at Disney use rest of FD credits and get one last day in parks then head over to Universal early evening or so (cab, mears, car) for rest of your trip.

Check into Universal resort in evening and then enjoy the next 2 or 3 days (whatever you prefer) at Universal making use of free front of line and early HP opening. Also by being at Universal while in the parks you have similar options as Disney of taking break at resort in afternoon and heading back to park in evening.

The only caveat is transportation to airport. If you're using ME you can of course use it when you arrive, but when going home you will be coming from Universal so have to arrange other transportation. I see 3 options...you can rent car at Disney (see if you can return it at airport) and use it to get to Universal and then to airport. You can price out cab / mears shuttle from Disney to Universal and then from Universal to airport...but who knows, Universal resort may have an airport shuttle you can use...

For me personally, I like having my resort near the parks as I don't feel like I'm "stuck" in the park all day because I either have a time schedule of shuttle bus or if driving have the time and hassle of getting car leaving park going back to Disney resort then heading back out again if I want to go back to Universal. And in Sept. parks aren't opened as late so not much time to take an afternoon break and then back out again for a few hours in evening.