Disneyland or world?

[Babysaurs]

We are planing a Disney trip next sept or nov 2014.
Originally we were planning to go to Disney land for 1 week then spend 2 weeks visiting la and San Diego.
But I'm wondering if one is cheaper then the other?
I realise flights from Adelaide to Orlando would be more then la and longer (which was the main thing putting me off with a 4 yr old and a 7 yr old), but am I right in that you can stay in Disney resort hotels at dw for cheaper then dl?
Accommodation seems cheaper even around dw then la or sd.
So what makes you go to one verses the other? Can it be cheaper to go to dw verses dl?
Is there much other then universal and lego land around dw to do if we stayed there for 3 weeks? Probably split stay.
Planning a dw trip seems more overwhelming then a dl one *** its so much bigger lol!
Any advice appreciated

 

[PrincessInOz]

Welcome to the Dis and Happy Planning!

Is this your first trip to the US or have you been there before?

If it is your first trip, then with a 4 and 7 year old, you might be better just sticking to California and experiencing a broader range of things other than just the theme parks.
If, on the other hand, you've been to the US before, then Orlando and theme parks might suit you and your family.


You've got quite a number of question below. And there is no right or wrong; you'll find that there will be a wide difference of opinion depending on how each individual feels regarding DLR or WDW.

We are planing a Disney trip next sept or nov 2014.
Originally we were planning to go to Disney land for 1 week then spend 2 weeks visiting la and San Diego.
But I'm wondering if one is cheaper then the other?

Price is relative to how deep your wallet is. Do you have a budget in mind? Once you have a figure or budget, you can then work out what sort of experience you want to spend it on.

You're planning on going to the US in Sept or Nov. There is usually a very high likelihood that WDW may offer free dining if you purchase a package at full rack rate for accommodation. Depending on how you eat, free dining may save you money; or you might be better off with a room-only discount.
Free dining is a major incentive for a few ANZACs to head to WDW.

I realise flights from Adelaide to Orlando would be more then la and longer (which was the main thing putting me off with a 4 yr old and a 7 yr old), but am I right in that you can stay in Disney resort hotels at dw for cheaper then dl?

If you're only considering staying at Disney owned hotels, then there is definitely more options at Orlando than at Anaheim. But as the parks at Anaheim are really close together and there are a number of close off-site hotels/motels, you could look at a Good Neighbour or partner hotel in Anaheim instead.

Accommodation seems cheaper even around dw then la or sd.

There are definitely more hotels/resorts in Orlando. With the increased room capacity, competition to attract you to stay will invariably mean cheaper room rates.

So what makes you go to one verses the other? Can it be cheaper to go to dw verses dl?

It depends on what I'm wanting to do. If I want to do more than theme parks, then DLR is much better in that way. If I want full immersion in Disney, then WDW will be what I choose to do.

Is there much other then universal and lego land around dw to do if we stayed there for 3 weeks? Probably split stay.

There are at least 25 theme parks in Orlando. Take your pick!

Planning a dw trip seems more overwhelming then a dl one *** its so much bigger lol!
Any advice appreciated

You can easily spend 3 weeks in WDW and not see and do everything. WDW offers a heap of Disney experiences aside from the theme park rides......dining, water parks, shopping, extra activities, behind the scene tours etc. And depending on your dates, you could be at WDW during Food and Wine festival time. There is lots to do.

Just work out what you want to do and go from there.

Most of us on the ANZAC section of the Dis start out planning that "once in a lifetime" trip. I think you'll find that most of us on the ANZAC section of the Dis have had multiple "once in a lifetime" trips.

Aside from Disney and the theme parks, there is just so much to see and do in the US.


Have fun with the planning!

 

[Babysaurs]

Thankyou for that hubby and I have been to Vegas and Hawaii for a week each in 2010 but that's the extent if our us experience our budget would be around 20k for everything.
Might have to do a bit more research into wdw to make a decision lucky I've got plenty of time

 

[ssour]

I'm an East Coast girl, LA just doesn't do it for me so I would choose Disney World over Disneyland any day. Add a Disney cruise and maybe spend some time in New York before coming home. If your main motivation for going to the states is Disney, then Disney World gives you more Disney for your buck in my opinion. Yes flights are more expensive to get there but worth every penny for our family.

 

[aussiecookfamily]

This is some info I did up last year for a friend - most of it still rings true (although if you head for WDW you should look into renting DVC points as an option). This year we are heading to the USA for 6 weeks - two 4 nights stays at DL (beginning and end), 23 nights at WDW (we are DVC owners now) and a 7 night Disney Cruise.

Getting there:
DL: Based in Anaheim just 30-40 mins south of the Los Angeles airport.
WDW: Roughly a 6 hours flight from LA to Orlando, once at Orlando there are well organised shuttle buses to accommodation.

General layout:
DL: Disneyland is a very compact location. There are 2 parks – Disneyland and California Adventures, but they are only a couple of hundred metres apart. The three Disney Hotels are “right there”, so it is very easy to come home for a quick nap, relax, swim in the pool or something to eat. This is the biggest difference between the 2 locations. The tight layout means that you can realistically do the whole location in 3 or 4 days easily.
WDW: Disney World is a vast location – it is actually 30 000 acres, but only 7000 are developed. There are 4 parks – Magic Kingdom, EPCOT, Hollywood Studios & Animal Kingdom. The parks are mostly around a 15min bus trip apart, but the buses don’t actually run between parks, but instead run between hotels and the parks. So essentially it is designed to go to one theme park a day, and trips home during the day can waste a significant amount of time. So the end result is that you need a longer stay, I would think a minimum of one week.

Accommodation
In both places the first decision to make is whether to stay “on-site” in a Disney hotel or stay off-site.
DL: We have always spoiled ourselves and stayed on-site at Disneyland - advantages being VERY close to the parks and being surrounded by the whole Disney experience. There are 3 Disney Hotels covering various price ranges, but all are fairly expensive (ranging from $400 - $600/night, including park tickets and other Disney treats). The most expensive hotel – The Grand California – also has villas which include full kitchens. The Disneyland booking website also has partner hotels, which are independent hotels close by to the park, here you can get an apartment style room for less than $300/night including tickets. From most of these partner hotels you would have a longish walk or short bus ride to the park.
WDW: At Disney World if you don’t stay in a Disney Hotel then you will need a car to get you everywhere, as the Disney buses are only for guests of Disney Hotels. The good thing though is that there are 18 Disney Hotels to choose from, giving a very broad range of options and prices. Rooms vary from $100 - $500/night for a standard room, but there are also plenty of apartment style rooms with kitchens that could sleep 6+. All of the hotels are serviced by a great Disney bus service, which will get you anywhere in under 15 mins. Overall getting good Disney accommodation is certainly cheaper at WDW.

Theme Parks
DL: Disneyland has all the classic rides, parades and fireworks, California Adventures similarly has rides, parades and the amazing “World of Colour” light and water show! Also of great interest would be the new “Cars” land which features everything from the Cars movies. As I said above because the 2 parks are so close together you can wander between both as you please during a day, and easy enough for the party to split up and re-group throughout the day as interests take (you need to buy a “park-hopper” ticket to ensure you can do this).
WDW: WDW has 4 parks which require bus trips between, essentially it means you spend the whole day at one park only. Across the 4 parks you have every ride that is at Disneyland, plus more, although at this stage there isn’t a “Cars” land at WDW. One of the big differences is that there are more live shows (with dancing and singing) at the WDW parks – we really liked this, and it does give you a nice break from walking/standing. The Animal Kingdom Park has a great African Safari with real animals (versus the normal Disney animatronics), and EPCOT has a great World Showcase with exhibitions from around the world. All of the parks are more spacious, but that in its self does mean more walking.

Food
DL: Food is always cheap in the USA compared to Australia, but options can at times be frustrating. We have never found a decent supermarket in walking distance of Disneyland, and have struggled at times to eat well, although that said if you are happy with either salads or burgers you are fine!
WDW: We found food much easier at WDW, all the parks and hotels had at least one restaurant offering “buffet” style food at reasonable prices, which had lots of options to keep everyone happy. There were also plenty of supermarkets about a $15 cab fare away, so if you had a kitchen you could easily fill the cupboards.

Surrounding area
DL: Disneyland is in the middle of American suburbia, not really the nicest environment. You can arrange trips to San Diego (Legoland and Seaworld) or LA (Universal Studios, Hollywood) but both will take 60-90 minutes to get there.
WDW: Orlando is really a tourist hub. Universal Studios (with Harry Potter World), Sea World, Legoland, outlet shopping are all within a 30 minute shuttle bus, or 15 minute taxi ride away.

Overall
DL: In our opinion Disneyland is perfect for a short Disney experience, everything is so close you can pack lots into a relatively short period of time, but still manage to have breaks as required. DD and I often popped back into the parks at night leaving Dad to read, watch TV or sleep! And one night we always stay to midnight. The extra cost of accommodation is offset by the fact you are there for fewer days. We have been 3 times and have stayed between 3 and 6 nights.
WDW: WDW is more of a total holiday destination, and most people there are treating it like that. Overall everyone is more relaxed, and the pace is slower, and it is very family orientated. Although we ended up spending the whole day at a theme park, because of the time to get there, our days were relatively short and we spent most of the evenings just lounging around our hotel. The hotels all have great pools and most have kid’s clubs and kids activities as well. We actually spent 14 nights and easily filled the days. There are also 5 golf courses, 2 water parks and endless shops and spas.

 

[zanzibar138]

I haven't been to WDW, but I'll happily share my experiences with DLR

You don't need to stay on site at DLR - there are plenty of decent, well-priced hotels within a 5-10 minute walk. Depending on your standards, you can definitely stay somewhere for under $100 per night.

When we were there Carsland was being built, and they were just finishing off a LOT of renovations in both parks, so there were a lot of things we didn't get to do. We had 6 day park hoppers and enjoyed the parks at a nice leisurely pace. I could have easily spent another week. Disneyland itself is so charming, and I could really feel Walt's prescence, which made it very special

We didn't try to find any supermarkets, but there were heaps of decent priced food options around the area (Mimi's Cafe, Denny's, the Cheesecake Factory etc). We were very pleasantly surprised with the prices of food and drinks even in the parks. Although the exchange rate was very good when we were over there, so that makes a difference.

We only had a couple of 'special' meals. We did a gospel brunch at the House of Blues, Breakfast in the Park with Minnie & Friends at the Plaza Inn, lunch at the Blue Bayou, and the WOC dining package at Ariel's. I thought they were all worth doing. We also took a couple of days out to do Universal Studios and a tour around the Newport area. You could also go to Knott's if you're into rollercoasters etc, or do a tour of LA.

As far as the surrounding area, I'm not at all interested in LA, but am planning to visit San Diego when we're there next, as the start of a road trip kind of circling around LA through the desert, bottom of the Sequoia forest, then down the coast. Accommodation on the coast is generally expensive, but you can find cheaper by staying in one of the smaller towns close to the place you're actually interested in seeing. Another great road trip is from San Francisco down the coast, but that was going to work out too expensive for us with flights, car hire, and expensive coastal accommodation.

If you're looking at including places like New York on an east coast itinerary, you'll definitely be up for higher costs for accommodation, plus the flights to get there.

It really depends on what sort of holiday you're looking for. If you have young kids I would definitely try to see more of the US than just theme parks.

 

[Meemoo]

This is some info I did up last year for a friend - most of it still rings true (although if you head for WDW you should look into renting DVC points as an option). This year we are heading to the USA for 6 weeks - two 4 nights stays at DL (beginning and end), 23 nights at WDW (we are DVC owners now) and a 7 night Disney Cruise.

Getting there:
DL: Based in Anaheim just 30-40 mins south of the Los Angeles airport.
WDW: Roughly a 6 hours flight from LA to Orlando, once at Orlando there are well organised shuttle buses to accommodation.

General layout:
DL: Disneyland is a very compact location. There are 2 parks – Disneyland and California Adventures, but they are only a couple of hundred metres apart. The three Disney Hotels are “right there”, so it is very easy to come home for a quick nap, relax, swim in the pool or something to eat. This is the biggest difference between the 2 locations. The tight layout means that you can realistically do the whole location in 3 or 4 days easily.
WDW: Disney World is a vast location – it is actually 30 000 acres, but only 7000 are developed. There are 4 parks – Magic Kingdom, EPCOT, Hollywood Studios & Animal Kingdom. The parks are mostly around a 15min bus trip apart, but the buses don’t actually run between parks, but instead run between hotels and the parks. So essentially it is designed to go to one theme park a day, and trips home during the day can waste a significant amount of time. So the end result is that you need a longer stay, I would think a minimum of one week.

Accommodation
In both places the first decision to make is whether to stay “on-site” in a Disney hotel or stay off-site.
DL: We have always spoiled ourselves and stayed on-site at Disneyland - advantages being VERY close to the parks and being surrounded by the whole Disney experience. There are 3 Disney Hotels covering various price ranges, but all are fairly expensive (ranging from $400 - $600/night, including park tickets and other Disney treats). The most expensive hotel – The Grand California – also has villas which include full kitchens. The Disneyland booking website also has partner hotels, which are independent hotels close by to the park, here you can get an apartment style room for less than $300/night including tickets. From most of these partner hotels you would have a longish walk or short bus ride to the park.
WDW: At Disney World if you don’t stay in a Disney Hotel then you will need a car to get you everywhere, as the Disney buses are only for guests of Disney Hotels. The good thing though is that there are 18 Disney Hotels to choose from, giving a very broad range of options and prices. Rooms vary from $100 - $500/night for a standard room, but there are also plenty of apartment style rooms with kitchens that could sleep 6+. All of the hotels are serviced by a great Disney bus service, which will get you anywhere in under 15 mins. Overall getting good Disney accommodation is certainly cheaper at WDW.

Theme Parks
DL: Disneyland has all the classic rides, parades and fireworks, California Adventures similarly has rides, parades and the amazing “World of Colour” light and water show! Also of great interest would be the new “Cars” land which features everything from the Cars movies. As I said above because the 2 parks are so close together you can wander between both as you please during a day, and easy enough for the party to split up and re-group throughout the day as interests take (you need to buy a “park-hopper” ticket to ensure you can do this).
WDW: WDW has 4 parks which require bus trips between, essentially it means you spend the whole day at one park only. Across the 4 parks you have every ride that is at Disneyland, plus more, although at this stage there isn’t a “Cars” land at WDW. One of the big differences is that there are more live shows (with dancing and singing) at the WDW parks – we really liked this, and it does give you a nice break from walking/standing. The Animal Kingdom Park has a great African Safari with real animals (versus the normal Disney animatronics), and EPCOT has a great World Showcase with exhibitions from around the world. All of the parks are more spacious, but that in its self does mean more walking.

Food
DL: Food is always cheap in the USA compared to Australia, but options can at times be frustrating. We have never found a decent supermarket in walking distance of Disneyland, and have struggled at times to eat well, although that said if you are happy with either salads or burgers you are fine!
WDW: We found food much easier at WDW, all the parks and hotels had at least one restaurant offering “buffet” style food at reasonable prices, which had lots of options to keep everyone happy. There were also plenty of supermarkets about a $15 cab fare away, so if you had a kitchen you could easily fill the cupboards.

Surrounding area
DL: Disneyland is in the middle of American suburbia, not really the nicest environment. You can arrange trips to San Diego (Legoland and Seaworld) or LA (Universal Studios, Hollywood) but both will take 60-90 minutes to get there.
WDW: Orlando is really a tourist hub. Universal Studios (with Harry Potter World), Sea World, Legoland, outlet shopping are all within a 30 minute shuttle bus, or 15 minute taxi ride away.

Overall
DL: In our opinion Disneyland is perfect for a short Disney experience, everything is so close you can pack lots into a relatively short period of time, but still manage to have breaks as required. DD and I often popped back into the parks at night leaving Dad to read, watch TV or sleep! And one night we always stay to midnight. The extra cost of accommodation is offset by the fact you are there for fewer days. We have been 3 times and have stayed between 3 and 6 nights.
WDW: WDW is more of a total holiday destination, and most people there are treating it like that. Overall everyone is more relaxed, and the pace is slower, and it is very family orientated. Although we ended up spending the whole day at a theme park, because of the time to get there, our days were relatively short and we spent most of the evenings just lounging around our hotel. The hotels all have great pools and most have kid’s clubs and kids activities as well. We actually spent 14 nights and easily filled the days. There are also 5 golf courses, 2 water parks and endless shops and spas.

Great summary there - I enjoyed the read It has reinforced my idea to do Disneyland with the kids whilst they're still younger then Disney World when they are a little older.

 

[ColinA]

The parks are mostly around a 15min bus trip apart, but the buses don’t actually run between parks, but instead run between hotels and the parks.


At Disney World if you don’t stay in a Disney Hotel then you will need a car to get you everywhere, as the Disney buses are only for guests of Disney Hotels.

You have posted a good summary!

Disney buses do run between theme parks. There is also the Monorail between MK and Epcot and the boat between Epcot and HS or quicker to walk.


Non Disney guests are welcome to use any of the Disney buses, boats and Monorails. There is no charge or check!

 

[Toy Story]

Welcome to the boards - I can't comment on DL.

But, we have loved our visits to WDW, it is so big - we will just have to keep going back until we see/experience it all

We will get to DL one day

 

[baf65]

Personally I prefer WDW because I think there is more to do in Orlando as a family. Particularly as a base for a whole holiday, after all it is so far away to me it makes sense to unpack once and stay there !! We rent a house for 3 weeks as family from the UK come and meet us there. This year our house is only 5min drive from the disney gates, last year we were a bit further but still it was easy getting there and back. you are out of the disney bubble, but it suited us and it was a very economical way to holiday, and left us plenty of spending money!

 

[BecBennett]

There's so much info here, so here's my short answer: If you have less then a week, stick to DL, if you have more then a week, head to WDW