For Those of You Who Take Long Vacations and Have an Annual Pass

[DisneyStarWisher]

I can easily see Disney deciding to limit AP to 1 park per day, but for the same price, not less. And charging extra for adding park hopping for the convenience.

Sadly, you are probably right.

 

[disneynutz]

We pre-purchased 10 day non expiration tickets and AP certificates. Enough for around 10 years. Our last 10 day stay we went into Epcot one time for around 4 hours. The crowds and same old attractions just aren't the same for us anymore. We sleep in, watch movies, go for walks, eat out if we feel like it, eat in if we feel like it, get to know CM's, sometimes we get invited for backstage stuff. One year I stayed up all night and watched the crew put up the holiday decorations at BWI/BWV.

Bill

 

[peabody58]

Congrats on having your retirement date within your 5 year plan window. As part of a hedge on future price increases, DW and I stocked up on APs before we retired in 2015. We have 4 - AP vouchers ready to use over the next 8 years. Since we know we are going anyway, the AP's are an investment growing at the rate of Disney's price increases. Our next planned AP year 2019 - 2020 [TSL / SWL] will work out to about $15 per park(s) day. We also were able to get 10 day No-Expire+ tickets which will fill in the off years and allow us to sun burn at the Water Parks up to 10 times. If you know you will be going to WDW and have the disposable $$, stocking up on AP's and or other tickets which don't expire would be my recommendation. Be aware though, Disney is slowing moving to have all new ticket purchases have some sort of expiration date. This strategy may not be available much longer.

 

[bumbershoot]

I can easily see Disney deciding to limit AP to 1 park per day, but for the same price, not less. And charging extra for adding park hopping for the convenience.

Same.

 

[Murron]

I guess it also depends which resort. We stay usually at BWV, so no matter what park we may be at during the day, in the evening we inevitably wind up just strolling through World Showcase. So the hopping features work for us.

 

[DisneyStarWisher]

Congrats on having your retirement date within your 5 year plan window. As part of a hedge on future price increases, DW and I stocked up on APs before we retired in 2015. We have 4 - AP vouchers ready to use over the next 8 years. Since we know we are going anyway, the AP's are an investment growing at the rate of Disney's price increases. Our next planned AP year 2019 - 2020 [TSL / SWL] will work out to about $15 per park(s) day. We also were able to get 10 day No-Expire+ tickets which will fill in the off years and allow us to sun burn at the Water Parks up to 10 times. If you know you will be going to WDW and have the disposable $$, stocking up on AP's and or other tickets which don't expire would be my recommendation. Be aware though, Disney is slowing moving to have all new ticket purchases have some sort of expiration date. This strategy may not be available much longer.

This is awesome! We have done something similar with the NE tickets. We have enough to get us through 2021. I wish we had disposable money right now to buy AP vouchers, but we have two kids in college right now and my DH just retired. Things are tight for the next couple of years.

 

[DisneyStarWisher]

I guess it also depends which resort. We stay usually at BWV, so no matter what park we may be at during the day, in the evening we inevitably wind up just strolling through World Showcase. So the hopping features work for us.

That makes sense. We own at AKV, so that's why we are less likely to hop.

 

[Meriweather]

We go for 14 night usually, couple times a year......don't really park hop.
But still very worth it

 

[RachaelA]

We park hop almost daily. We had 18 or 19 days (2 trips) with last year's AP. This year we'll have 11 or 12. We are a young family with active kids under 5 so we hop to keep them happy

 

[DougEMG]

We take long trips, usually 3-4 weeks and always get an annual pass. Parking hoping is an excellent benefit that we use all the time. We are always either in the MK area or the EPCOT area so no matter which park we were in during the day we'll hope into the park within walking distance at the end of the day. I especially like just going for a walk around EPCOT or popping in to get something to eat or listen to a band.

 

[DisneyFansInNYC]

We park hop with our AP when MK is open late. We love being at MK late and the park hoping is perfect for that.

 

[DisneyStarWisher]

For all of those saying you park hop, I'm interested in knowing your age group. I'm retiring pretty young (49) but I'm finding that I don't want to run, run, run as I get older.

 

[kboo]

I'm going on 49 and not planning on retiring for a while. We have 2 young kids. Park hopping works for us for all the reasons above. Sometimes a park is too crowded, or we want to have dinner somewhere else. When we stay on the Boardwalk, we like walking to World Showcase in the evenings, or for dinner. If staying at an MK resort (especially BLT), we can easily hop over to MK (or one adult will go after the kids are in bed), etc. I agree if you are at AKV it's harder/less likely to park hop.

Another point - hard-to-get reservations, esp BOG dinner, are a little easier to get when you can look across all days and you don't have to rearrange FP+ to do it. We'll do that for Akershus and CRT and pre-park open Crystal Palace as well.

 

[disfanforlife]

We bought our first AP's almost 4 years ago. I love the idea of getting 2 trips out of one AP. We usually go for 6 or 7 days and do hop. Especially is we are staying at Boardwalk simply because I like to walk around EPCOT in the evenings. This March we bought new AP's and got the 13 month bonus, so even better for us we will be getting 3 trips out of those passes. We are going in November and again in March. I am about the same age as you and do still enjoy rides, but also enjoy hanging out by the pool a few afternoons too.

 

[disfanforlife]

Congrats on having your retirement date within your 5 year plan window. As part of a hedge on future price increases, DW and I stocked up on APs before we retired in 2015. We have 4 - AP vouchers ready to use over the next 8 years. Since we know we are going anyway, the AP's are an investment growing at the rate of Disney's price increases. Our next planned AP year 2019 - 2020 [TSL / SWL] will work out to about $15 per park(s) day. We also were able to get 10 day No-Expire+ tickets which will fill in the off years and allow us to sun burn at the Water Parks up to 10 times. If you know you will be going to WDW and have the disposable $$, stocking up on AP's and or other tickets which don't expire would be my recommendation. Be aware though, Disney is slowing moving to have all new ticket purchases have some sort of expiration date. This strategy may not be available much longer.

I did the same thing as you when we became DVC members. I bought a variety of tickets - 5,6,7 days as well as a couple AP's too. Then, one trip I upgraded tickets to AP's and renewed our AP's twice. So, I still have my stock pile. Also my DD worked at at Disney in the DCP and she bought some tickets at that time too. So, we are set for a few years.

 

[ccigliano]

Another way that we use our annual passes is we activate it in the middle of December and make sure we go back in the beginning of December the next year before it expires. Of course we always find a way to add in a trip or two when we have the APs but we get to go to the parks every year while purchasing APs evry other year.

 

[mort1331]

One bonus for us that I don't know how many use is for transportation. When we stay at BW or BC there have been times that instead of the bus we walk thru EPCOT and catch the monorail to MK. Then the reverse home. Nice relaxing going against the crowds.

 

[J.C.&ALI'SMOM]

We generally stay for 10-12 days each trip and park hop pretty frequently. But I like to go to a park every evening for nighttime shows and attractions that are cool to experience at night. Not all in my party do this however.

 

[DougEMG]

For all of those saying you park hop, I'm interested in knowing your age group. I'm retiring pretty young (49) but I'm finding that I don't want to run, run, run as I get older.

I'm 57 and will run around parking hopping or resort hopping all day.

 

[DougEMG]

One bonus for us that I don't know how many use is for transportation. When we stay at BW or BC there have been times that instead of the bus we walk thru EPCOT and catch the monorail to MK. Then the reverse home. Nice relaxing going against the crowds.

We like doing the same thing.