Is It Worth It To Do 5 Days Vs 4?

ybeshsm77

Earning My Ears
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Oct 11, 2011
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We will be going the last week of August, starting Sunday August 24th. Two adults and two kids ages 7 and 11. We are going to stay at Portofino Bay. We want to do at least 4 days, with 3 days of single park tickets. Contemplating doing 5 days. We would get there on a Sunday and leave on a Friday. So an extra day at universal will cost us an extra $476-includes 200 budget for food, extra day of dog in kennel, and also parking fee for hotel. I have the money for it but is it worth an extra day. Will we be bored with parks? I also really want more time to relax at the resort too. If we did stay an extra day should we keep the 3 day park tickets and enjoy an extra day exclusively at the resort and city walk? It is only 40 something dollars more to add on 4 day tickets instead of 3 days. I have been saving a long time-2 years for this vacation. I have a savings account exclusively devoted to this trip. Even if I spend an extra 500, I have enough money left over to get new carpet in our living room this fall and extra money to put toward another trip down the road. I just want to justify the extra day. We did Disney a couple of years ago and I really wish we had stayed a few extra days. We had the money to do it then too. I just don't want to regret this like I did last time. What is the best option?
 
Check out what your prices would be like if you got the $199 power pass(only $3 more expensive than the 4 day park to park ticket) which will give you AP rates on your hotel. Use the code aph in the code box. It might make enough savings that that last day's cost will disappear.

The AP room rate now becomes $194/night inside of $224/night.

Only one person in the room needs the AP.

It will be very hot at that time and spending lots of time on the water rides and at the pool will be a necessity.
 
In February, we stayed at Portofino from Sunday to Thursday and I could have easily stayed another day. I wanted to go see the other resorts and we never got around to it and the kids wanted more pool time than they got. So an extra day would have been perfect for us (and I remember thinking that on the last day!) With the heat in August, extra day will also be nice.

Have fun planning :goodvibes
 
Check out what your prices would be like if you got the $199 power pass(only $3 more expensive than the 4 day park to park ticket) which will give you AP rates on your hotel. Use the code aph in the code box. It might make enough savings that that last day's cost will disappear. The AP room rate now becomes $194/night inside of $224/night. Only one person in the room needs the AP. It will be very hot at that time and spending lots of time on the water rides and at the pool will be a necessity.

What Damo said

Plenty to do not to get board.

You stated originally you wanted 3 days SINGLE park tickets. If you buy single park tickets you will not be able to ride one of the new Harry Potter rides (Hogwarts Express). We always get park to park tickets because the parks are literally next to each other (less the a 5 min walk). It's nice to hit our favorite rides one the last days of our trip with having to stick in one park.
 

I also second park to park tickets. We haven't done them at Disney since our first trip because we find it too time consuming to switch parks, but we had them for Universal and loved them. With the parks side by side, it just worked so well to switch back and forth quickly. It's like walking from Adventure-land to Tomorrow-land. They are that close.

We found them very useful on one of the days that a bad storm was forecasted for the afternoon. Having the park to park, made it possible to fit all the coasters into our trip despite the weather. We were able to do outdoor attractions at both parks in the morning, and then when the rain started, we were able to switch to doing indoor attractions at both parks in the afternoon. It worked out great.

I actually think we went to both parks all 3 days of our trip for one reason or another. We never really planned to do that. It just happened. I only got the park to park as a safety because I wasn't sure if we'd need it, and I never planned to really use it, except maybe the last day to catch missed attractions, but I'm really glad we had it now because we did use it so much.

As far as how many day. We did 3 days and didn't see everything, but they weren't full days due to a medical emergency. We ended up needing to leave early one day, and arrived late on another. We still spent a good about 8 hrs each of those days, so probably about comparable to the average tourist who doesn't commando tour like we do. I think we could have fit everything I originally wanted to see (about 80% of the parks) in in 2.5 days if we had actually been there each day for the whole day open to close. We also had EP though, so that sped things up considerably, and crowds were only at moderate level to begin with.

I'd guess if you wanted to see everything 3 days is about right, with EP touring opening to closing, you could do it in close to 2 days commando style. Of course, that's not including the new HP section. I'd say HP fans could add a day alone just to see both HP lands. I know we spent a good half to 3/4 a day or more in HP land alone, 3 or 4 hours one day, another 3-4 hours another day.

We could have easily spent a fourth day hitting the rest of the shows we missed and repeating our favorite attractions. I also would have liked to have spent a day just at the resort - pool hopping or watching the Hawaiian show if we had had time. I could have spent some time shopping and eating in CityWalk as well.
 
Buying the Power Pass level of annual pass would give you park to park access and save you on your resort costs as well. The Power Pass does have blackout dates, but the dates you are going are not among those days that are blacked out. It costs $199. It would bring down the cost of a PBH room from $221 to $194 a night also.

Like damo said, only one person in the room needs an ap for the resort discount, but if you all got them you could all go to the parks for 5 days.

And to ride the Hogwarts Express, you need park to park tickets, which annual passes are, and you could ride it every day if you wanted to with ap's.

If you stayed for 5 days, you could do early entry in the mornings, ride the rides until it got too hot, go back to resort to swim, then go back to parks in afternoon. And you can pool hop if you wanted to- it is encouraged at Universal resorts!

That is for sure what I would do-
Hope you have fun!
 
The current hotel promotion at Universal hotels is giving 10% off if you stay three nights and 20% if you stay four nights (during that week - which is also when we are going).

I've been assuming that :

A) You can't combine this discount with an AP discount (it says no combining on the AP discount page)

B) The AP discount wouldn't be better than 20%

Can any of you who have been recommending an AP to the OP let me know if either of these assumptions are mistaken?
 
what are your dates?

Not sure whether you mean me or the OP...so I'll answer both.

The OP is arriving August 24. I am arriving August 21.

I'm currently paying $896.40 for four nights, standard room, at RPH. (Two weekday nights, two weekend nights, at 20% discount). I'm looking to confirm that buying a Power Pass AP wouldn't be a better deal for us.

I've Googled around trying to find out what the AP hotel discount is, but from what I can tell it is variable.
 
Not sure whether you mean me or the OP...so I'll answer both.

The OP is arriving August 24. I am arriving August 21.

I'm currently paying $896.40 for four nights, standard room, at RPH. (Two weekday nights, two weekend nights, at 20% discount). I'm looking to confirm that buying a Power Pass AP wouldn't be a better deal for us.

I've Googled around trying to find out what the AP hotel discount is, but from what I can tell it is variable.

With the AP, it would be $794 before taxes.

http://www.loewshotels.com/en/booki...25/2014&rooms=1&sr=p&code=aph&iata=&na=1&nk=0


You can check the AP rates yourself by putting APH in the code box as I did in the link above.
 
The public offer is $796.80 before taxes.

So a Power Pass will not save the OP (or me) anything on the hotel room (well, $2.80...which is about how much more the AP would cost than the 3-day ticket).

Keep an eye on Orbitz, Travelocity and CheapTickets. They often have 20-25% discount codes that end up being a lot cheaper than booking through Universal directly. I got 25% off the new Cabana Bay Tower suites for the end I August when there were no AP rates available through Loews. Just sign up for their emails and they will send you the codes when they are available. The only catch is that you have to pay in full up front, but you can also cancel if you need to.
 
The public offer is $796.80 before taxes.

So a Power Pass will not save the OP (or me) anything on the hotel room (well, $2.80...which is about how much more the AP would cost than the 3-day ticket).

I thought you said you were paying $894. That is a difference of $102.

When I plug in your dates, the stay more save more rate is $896.40 and the AP rate is $794.26
 
But with the power pass, you can visit park to park for 365 days, and with a three day ticket.....

So if OP wanted to go to parks for 5 days and the longest ticket sold is a 4 day ticket, then a power pass would for sure make sense.
 
We're going down for a week in August.

We considered getting a Power Pass, however...

1. The discount on rooms was essentially identical to what was already being offered to the general public.

2. Black out dates for the Power Pass can apparently change without notice, depending on how busy the parks become (especially after the new Harry Potter expansion opens).

It would really suck to get a Power Pass, and then not be able to use it on our trip.

We opted to get Three Park Unlimited Tickets instead. They cost the same as the Power Pass, but are only good for 14 days (we don't need more). On the other hand, they are good for both Universal parks and the Wet and Wild park, too.

For the OP's needs, though, the 4 day park-to-park ticket might be best. I really wouldn't recommend single day tickets at all, with the Hogwart's Express between parks being a ride in of itself.

And no... it's highly unlikely you'll get bored, in just four days.
 
We're going down for a week in August.

We considered getting a Power Pass, however...

1. The discount on rooms was essentially identical to what was already being offered to the general public.

2. Black out dates for the Power Pass can apparently change without notice, depending on how busy the parks become (especially after the new Harry Potter expansion opens).

It would really suck to get a Power Pass, and then not be able to use it on our trip.

We opted to get Three Park Unlimited Tickets instead. They cost the same as the Power Pass, but are only good for 14 days (we don't need more). On the other hand, they are good for both Universal parks and the Wet and Wild park, too.

For the OP's needs, though, the 4 day park-to-park ticket might be best. I really wouldn't recommend single day tickets at all, with the Hogwart's Express between parks being a ride in of itself.

And no... it's highly unlikely you'll get bored, in just four days.

Wait, what? We have 6 nights booked at RPR for the 18th to the 24th and were planning on buying the Power Passes because we may take a May 2015 trip to DW for SWW and wanted to sneak in a few days at Universal on that trip, too. They can change the black out days with no notice? I could buy the passes and not be able to use them in 3 months? Have they ever just changed the dates like that out of nowhere? :eek:
 
Wait, what? We have 6 nights booked at RPR for the 18th to the 24th and were planning on buying the Power Passes because we may take a May 2015 trip to DW for SWW and wanted to sneak in a few days at Universal on that trip, too. They can change the black out days with no notice? I could buy the passes and not be able to use them in 3 months? Have they ever just changed the dates like that out of nowhere? :eek:

if you plan your trip for june, you'll only be able to do ioa with power passes.

black out dates will happen per park as you can see on the chart.

you could buy one preferred annual pass and use that for discounted tickets for your upcoming planned vacation.

can't say if black out dates change for the year once they have been posted.
i've been renewing my preferred pass for years and it isn't effected by black out dates.

hopefully someone will post to answer that portion of your question.
 
if you plan your trip for june, you'll only be able to do ioa with power passes.

black out dates will happen per park as you can see on the chart.

you could buy one preferred annual pass and use that for discounted tickets for your upcoming planned vacation.

can't say if black out dates change for the year once they have been posted.
i've been renewing my preferred pass for years and it isn't effected by black out dates.

hopefully someone will post to answer that portion of your question.

Sorry, we are going August 18th to the 24th, which aren't blacked out now. May isn't blacked out for this year, so was pretty sure it wouldn't be for next year.
 
Black out dates are set at the beginning of each year.

When looking at APH rates and comparing them to Stay More Save More...remember that the longer you stay, the lower your rate. So someone staying 5 days is going to get a much better rate than someone staying 3 days. A person staying 5 days will get a rate quite similar to the AP rate, depending on time of year.
 
Black out dates are set at the beginning of each year.

When looking at APH rates and comparing them to Stay More Save More...remember that the longer you stay, the lower your rate. So someone staying 5 days is going to get a much better rate than someone staying 3 days. A person staying 5 days will get a rate quite similar to the AP rate, depending on time of year.

Oh good! Thanks! I didn't want to believe that they would just change the black-out dates after they were set.

I already compared the 2 pricing scenarios and it is cheaper to go with the Stay More Save More rates for my trip. I just want the APs because of next year's trip. I will be getting a Preferred Pass for the food/merchandise discounts and free parking next year if we don't stay on-site.
 





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