Disneyland and Universal logistics

[PixieT78]

We are contemplating a 6 night trip to California in October. I'm wondering about the logistics of getting from a Disney area hotel to Universal without a car. My brief look is that it would be a good hour to hour and a half by car which seems like it would end up a pretty expensive cab ride.

One option I'm considering is staying near Universal for the first two nights and then moving over to the Disney area after that so we're only worried about getting between hotels once.

We are open to renting a car, though I kind of hate the idea of paying to have one rented just to really use it for one day, if we stay within walking distance of Disney.

What are my other options? What kind of cost from Disney to Universal am I looking at? Is there a shuttle that runs from the Disney area hotels to Universal?

 

[SMD]

There is a tour company that offers Universal, but you're tied to their schedule and I believe that they don't get your there for the opening, which is important now with HP. You could rent a car at Disney for the 1 day at Universal. You could take public transportation to downtown LA and then take the red line to Universal, but that would take even longer than driving.

 

[ADLFAN]

We rented a car at the Alamo in Downtown Disney for the weekend and did one day at Universal and one day at the beach. It was a quick and painless drive, everything is well signed for you.

I would probably compare the cost of a rental to the cost of a round trip Uber and go with one of those options.

P.s., pay extra for the front of the line pass at Universal! Those lines are brutal and I wished a million times that I hadn't been so cheap!

Have fun planning!

 

[PixieT78]

They have front of the line passes at Universal Hollywood? I haven't come across those!

Awesome on a rental company at Disney though - that sounds like a great option as we do prefer to be on our own schedule (we usually rent a car at WDW).

 

[sheetz]

So far the predicted huge crowds for Harry Potter haven't materialized so I wouldn't recommend buying FoL unless you're going on an absolutely peak day. Yesterday afternoon waits for Forbidden Journey were only about 15 minutes.

 

[jammyjam25]

We are doing this in October and decided to stay at a hotel near Universal for the first night of our stay and then move to DLH for the remainder of our trip. We'll have a car with us but even so we didn't want to deal with the drive back and forth across LA to get to Universal. It opens at 7am the day we're planning to go so getting in the car by 5:30am didn't sound appealing!

And as someone else mentioned, the buses that *are* available only seem to run once each day to/from USH and the times won't work for our schedule.

 

[Disney_Alli]

We opted to rent a car for our trip coming up in August. Uber estimates are in the $25-$50 range and our rental from Saturday night to Monday morning is only $40. Even with two nights parking at the hotel it's cheaper than Uber round trip. Flat rates for cabs from Disneyland to Universal are $100 I'm unsure if you could get a flat rate back or not.

 

[PixieT78]

Thanks so much for the info all!

I think we'll probably end up renting a car. Between being able to leave and arrive when we want and the price basically being comparable to other transportation, we'll likely pick one up the afternoon before we plan to head over to Universal, park one night at the hotel and drop it off on our way back. I think this works out a fair bit cheaper than staying a couple nights closer to Universal too.

You know, assuming we actually book the trip

 

[jlmarr]

You could take the commuter train Metrolink from Anaheim station to LA Union Station, then the Metro Red Line subway from Union Station to the Universal City station. Since it's a commuter train they start running at O Dark Thirty and last I heard the Metrolink fare covers the Metro. (Maybe you need to buy a round trip but you were going to do that anyway.) I hate driving into LA, and have used Metrolink a couple times for downtown meetings. A potential downside - you might not get to sit together on the trip into LA - but you would be able to on the way back since Union Station is where outbound trips start. Oh, and pay attention to the outbound schedule - if you extend past Metrolink hours you can take Amtrak (which is a different fare).