How much will a good trip cost?

[ChristinaDK]

What did you pay for your trip, and what was in it?

 

[Huff]

Different people will have different expectations for what is or is not a good vacation so the costs will vary widely.

Some people only enjoy onsite or other very expensive resort hotels. Others spend their time in the parks and the hotel is just a place to sleep.

Some people dine at high end restaurants every night while others just want a cheap hamburger from Mcdonalds across the street from Disneyland.

Last year I went to Disneyland 14 times with 2-4 kids each trip. I used Priceline.com to get our hotels staying in 3* resort hotels offsite for an average of $60 a night. We ate breakfast offsite each morning at an inexpensive restaurant. Lunches and dinners were usually in Downtown Disney. Kids are easy to please to any food will do. We only dined at one nice restaurant each trip.

All of us had Annual Passes so only the first trip where I purchesed them was rather expensive. Not counting ticket prices I averaged $500 per trip to take the kids on a 3-4 day trip. That included hotel, food and gas (600 mile drive each way).

 

[LifeIsTinkIsLife]

I am thinking about $250 is a good amount for our trip coming up at the end of August. I know that seems like a crazy low amount but it's how much our trips are usually because we love to save money. We have annual passes as well! So we have $120 for the hotel, $80 for gas, and $50 for food. We are only going to be there late Friday-early Sunday. We love going to Quiznos across Harbor(?) so that saves us a lot of money on food. If I want to I may add $50 for a souvie but DBF usually frowns upon that. But $250 is all it takes for me to consider it a good weekend trip, although I would LOVE to be able to stay onsite. Maybe next January when I'm a dental assistant for sure and after DBF gets his big bonus!

 

[HydroGuy]

Huff said it very well. It depends.

We have four kids and the Disney hotels have never worked well for us because they have rooms for five max.

When kids were younger and DW and I were younger, money was tighter. We stayed at decent but releatively inexpensive hotels on Harbor (Hojos and BWPPI usually). We brought a lot of our own food. We ate breakfasts and most lunches and some dinners at our hotel room. We minimized expenses on food. We did not do tours or special seating, etc. Every once in awhile we would splurge for Blue Bayou or something special.

Now kids are teenagers (oldest is in college) and money is not as tight. Last month we:

• Stayed at the GCH (expensive hotel - but had good summer deals)
• Ate lunch and dinner out every day for 5 days - all on Disney property
• For the first time got Fantasmic dessert reserved seats
• Did Ariel's Grotto dinner package for World of Color preferred viewing
• Ate at Blue Bayou for lunch
• Four of us did the Seqway tour at DCA (we have never done a paid tour at Disney before)
• I did the Walk in Walt's Footsteps tour
• I bought a Deluxe Annual Pass for myself (first time I have ever had an AP) because it was $100 more expensive than the park hopper ticket and I used it to get 10% off all of our dining and most mechandise - which for a group of seven (we also had another friend along) came out to discounts of over $100

Last month's trip cost 3-4 times as much as a trip we took five years ago when kids were younger and money was tighter. But we did experience more unique things this time.


So, like Huff said, you can make your trip inexpensive or more expensive, depending on what you do. For a family of four on a budget, a 3 day trip to DLR can be pretty easily done for $1500 I would expect.

 

[Kittyskyfish]

I do not know if you have children, but here are costs for an upcoming husband/wife trip:

Airfare: $650 total.
Airport parking: count this in, if you don't have people taking you to the airport. $50
Hotel: best buy for 2 is the Howard Johnson Entertainment Rate at $59 per night. So let's say a 5 night stay is $350, adding all taxes.
Auto: we use the SuperShuttle, so about $70 total (including tip) for transportation from and to LAX.

Transportation and housing, total: $1120.

DL tickets: $98 for 2 Mickey's Halloween Party tickets, plus $398 for 2, 4-day park hopper passes.

Tickets, total: $496

Food and beverage: we don't hold back. A typical day begins with breakfast in the park at the River Belle Terrace, lunch somewhere, ice cream bowls, a snack mid-afternoon, and a good dinner. We can *easily* spend $100 per day. I'll say we spend about $115 on a normal day and $155+ on a Blue Bayou day.

Food total, for 4 1/2 days: about $550.

Souvenirs: about $100 per trip. Obviously this can vary greatly.

Trip total: $1120 + $496 + $550 + $100 = $2266

 

[atomsmom]

We are leaving tomorrow....YEAH! My husband loves the pool at the Disneyland Hotel, so that is where we are staying.

Our trip cost $2100 for 5 nights in the hotel with a lower resort view. We have 6 day parkhoppers. There are 4 of us. I booked through Costco and received a character meal for each person and a $20 gift card.

We also had to pay for airfare, that was $225 a ticket from Seattle. At least it includes luggage. Our shuttle, Zippy shuttle, from long Beach is $110 roundtrip, and includes a stop at the grocery store. I need to stock up on munchies and beer! I figure I will save money but not having to pay $7 every time I want a cold beer. I will also buy lots of sodas and waters. I try to carry a few beverages (nonalcoholic of course, the beer is for the pool) into the park to save a little money. We usually bring $1,000 for spending, but we come home with some. It is the one time of the year where we like to feel like we are rich!



Not a cheap vacation, but we LOVE it!

 

[teach1abc]

We are going in December. We booked Paradise Pier for 3 nights for around $650. We need to get 3 park hopper tickets for almost $600. We have young kids so we will buy food to make sandwiches, breakfast, drinks, and snacks in the room so food costs will be minimal. I bought tshirts and pjs for the kids for each day in the park on the disney website to cut down on costs for souvenirs.

 

[disneychrista]

There are many variables. How many people, how long your stay is, driving (and how far), flying etc.

For our up coming trip I there are 3 of us and our budgeted costs are as follows:

Gas - $120 (over estimated, 1300 miles round trip)
Hotel - $285 (4 Nights - days inn just north of Ball on Harbor)
Tickets - $550 (3 Day Park Hoppers - 2 adults, 1 child)
Food - $250 (5 days - breakfast at hotel/room, no table service, counter service & fast food/subway)
Total Cost - $1205

 

[Dobie]

OK, here is how Dobie trip broke down:

Airfare for three from Tri-Cities---$900
Four nights at DLH ---$920
5 for 3 Parkhoppers ---$568
Food (all on property) ---$500
Souveniers ---$400+
Fantasmic Seating ---$177
Taxi/Shuttle ---$120
Total $3600

Souveniers were high because DH teaches special ed and wears a lot of Disney clothing to work.

It didnt seem that expensive to us, because we paid for it in chunks.

 

[HydroGuy]

Souveniers were high because DH teaches special ed and wears a lot of Disney clothing to work.

Sounds like a work expense to me.

 

[caimakale]

As others have said, a "Good Trip" is subjective to each of us.

The cheapest trip we've ever had (family of 5) was about $1,200 (we had annual passes so this was for hotel & food). Our normal trip costs us between $2,000 & $3,000 (because we already have our park tickets).

Our upcoming trip will be our most expensive, here's the breakdown so far.

Airfare -$1,300
Ground Transportation - $600
One night in San Diego - $300
One night in Hollywood - $670
Seven nights in DL - $3,333
Five PAP's - $2,195
SeaWorld Tickets - $148
USH Tickets - $275
Food (all meals, including 3 character meals and fantasmic dessert) - $1,800
Souveniers - $1,000
Total $11,621

One of the character meals and fantasmic dessert will be for 9 people, not just my family of 5. If I can manage to get into Club 33, then the price of this will go up about another $800 and I'm still undecided about what to do for WoC (meal, picnic, or fastpass).