How to book a split stay?

[Cin]

So in booking a split stay do you use WDW travel or a travel agency? And then for a 8 night stay do you book two 4 night trips back to back? How does this work? I was planning on a 4 night package with room and tickets for 7 nights, then a 4 night room only stay at another resort. But how does Disney tie these together? And then what about making dining reservations? We are not using the dining plan, just paying out of pocket. Is split stay a hassle or worth it to you? We are trying to budget so I thought a value for 4 nights then a moderate the last 4 nights. How does this work? And if free dining comes out can we add it on for the entire stay or only the 4 nights that we got the park tickets with, even though we got 7 day tickets and 8 total nights stay? DO I need a travel agent or is this something I can handle myself without hassle? How does this all work?

 

[Kim1964]

You can do it all yourself. We do split stays every year and I always book them myself. For the time of year we go (mid August), it has been less expensive for me to make two room only reservations, and buy my park tickets from undercovertourist. We don't use the Disney Dining Plan, and have found it less expensive for us to eat offsite (we always rent a car).

If you want to book a room and ticket package, you'd do just what you said and put the tickets on the first part of the stay, but they'd be good for the rest of the nights (though you'd either have to carry two sets of KTTW cards or have the tickets moved to the cards for the 2nd hotel). If you want to add free dining, I think that has to run with the room that has the tickets with it, but I've never had free dining so I'm not 100% sure.

 

[Sue M]

So in booking a split stay do you use WDW travel or a travel agency? And then for a 8 night stay do you book two 4 night trips back to back? How does this work? I was planning on a 4 night package with room and tickets for 7 nights, then a 4 night room only stay at another resort. But how does Disney tie these together? And then what about making dining reservations? We are not using the dining plan, just paying out of pocket. Is split stay a hassle or worth it to you? We are trying to budget so I thought a value for 4 nights then a moderate the last 4 nights. How does this work? And if free dining comes out can we add it on for the entire stay or only the 4 nights that we got the park tickets with, even though we got 7 day tickets and 8 total nights stay? DO I need a travel agent or is this something I can handle myself without hassle? How does this all work?

Yes, you've got it right. You can book by phoning Disney directly. You would book a package with room 4 days, and park tickets for 7 or 8 days. I always book lenght of stay, depending on when our arrival & departure times are- will go to a park on those days. And there's not much dif. in cost between a 7 & 8 day ticket.
Then a room only for second resort.
If free dining does come out, you'd have to put it on your first res, because that promo needs to incl. at least a 2 day park ticket.
You can ask to have your reservations linked.

For making your ADRs it's not a problem. If you do it online, just put in your first resort conf #- it's good for 10 days of dining booking.

We enjoy split stays, it's almost like having 2 vacays. Disney will move your luggage to next resort for you, you'd just have to arrange with Bell Services. I'm not sure at the Values if they will come to your room to pick up your luggage, or if you have to get it to the Lobby Bell Service Desk yourself.
Then you'd just go off to the parks, and when you're ready take the bus to your new resort for check in.

I prefer to just take a cab in the morning with my luggage to new resort. I find this easier.

 

[CluelessDisFan]

I'm also wondering this same this and we want to use free dining. I don't see how it would help a budget tho, bc you'd have to pay for your memory package 2x. I'm thinking of just booking the mod for the entire 8 nights we're going in September. Especially after reading some of the value reviews.

 

[LisaNJ25]

I'm also wondering this same this and we want to use free dining. I don't see how it would help a budget tho, bc you'd have to pay for your memory package 2x. I'm thinking of just booking the mod for the entire 8 nights we're going in September. Especially after reading some of the value reviews.

If your doing free dinning stick with the same resort the whole time..

 

[winterman]

2 years ago we booked a 10 night stay (in Sept/Oct) for the ASMu. Then free dining was offered so I called Disney and they switched me to FD package. Then I got a 40% pin. Since I really didn't want to be on the DDP the whole time, I called again and changed the FD package to the first 5 nights and added room only at POFQ for the last 5 nights. I had already paid the deposit for the package but I had to pay a separate deposit for the room only portion (the cost of one night).

If you do a split stay with dining in only one part, make sure that you have the dining and tickets attached to the first place you stay. That way you can continue to use the park tickets while you are at the 2nd resort. (Get them for as many days as you want.)

If you decide to go with FD for your entire vacation, don't bother with the split stay. As others have said, you would have to buy tickets with each package and that would be a lot of money spent unnecessarily.

I like to check out the WDW web site to get prices for what I want, then I call and make the arrangements on the phone. You do not need a travel agent.

 

[Haperian]

The way we do it is book two separate packages, I believe Disney will work with you to avoid moving you around.