Is Land/Sea package a good deal?

[carlamom]

I can stay at the Swan/Dolphin with a teacher discount- would that be better(cheaper) than going with Disney's land /sea package?Is there an advantage to getting the package? I'm thinking about going to 1 park, cruise 4 days,back to parks for 2 days. Would I still be able to use transportation to the port?

 

[my3kids]

I would do it on my own. That gives you flexibility in the pricing the land part of your stay. Swan/Dolphin was offering a $99 cruise special, but that might have expired. The $129 teacher's rate will certainly be less than what they would charge on the Land/Sea package. You can than also get whatever room on the ship you want. You could go to a lower category and save money or a suite and splurge. With the package the room category on the ship determines the room at WDW.

Have fun.

 

[Girls Scout Leader]

Shop-Shop-Shop...it's a saving of planning, because it's done for you. But not $$.. I saved over $200 per person just by putting out own package together. The 7 L&S features a more expencive resort, so the Swan rates will decrease your expenses right there. And try Happy Limo for transfering rates. Try booking your own airfare, too. If you still like the L & S package, great! But just don't go into blindly.

 

[CSX2]

I agree. Run your different options or have a TA do it for you. We have done the 7 Day L/S and also the 4 day cruise with separate WDW planning. Even when we did the L/S package we still did air separately (wanted non-stops which DCL didn't offer) and got a rental car vice DCL transfers (got a good deal on a full size and liked having the flexibility during the WDW part of our stay). The next trip we did everything separately because we wanted to go to WDW after the cruise and the 7 day L/S works the other way around.

When we did the L/S we upgraded to the Swan for $99 (from CBR) for the entire 3 night stay and thought it was well worth it. Loved that resort!

Also, remember that the L/S package includes LOS park hopper passes when you are comparing prices.

Have a great trip!

 

[RIDISNEYLOVERS]

We already booked our 7 day land / sea vacation. (3 nights on land, 4 nights on the Wonder 11.03.02)

Is it possible to have our TA split the package up and get a better rate without sacrificing the staterooms on the cruise and the Contemporary Tower for the land portion of the vacation?

We also have the Contemporary booked separately for 3 nights after the cruise as well under the military (my dad was in the military and is now retired) The length of stay passes can also be purchased with a military discount - so that seems like there can be savings there as well.

Please let me know you opinons and if this 7 day land / sea package can be split up.

Thanks for your help and input.

Lisa

 

[erikthewise]

Like all Disney packages, the Land/Sea package is a package of convenience which does not compete well with booking components separately. When you book the package, you are locked into a price which by default contains overpriced transportation and insurance. You can't take advantage of special rates that come along later on either your WDW resort on the cruise itself.

Lisa, I think you need to discuss that with your TA, ASAP. But my guess is that you can get your full deposit back on the package as long as you're not within 30 days, and then rebook land and sea separately.

 

[NewtoWDW]

I booked the land/sea package and I thought it was a really good deal. I checked with many travel agents and cruising companys and found the best deal through an online service. We are going the 3rd week in April so it is a more expensive time. We are staying at the CBR and in a category 9 stateroom. For our family of 4 we got a rate of $2715. Keep in mind that it includes all the park passes, not just for the major ones but, all the small ones as well.... We got one quote through a local travel agency of $6200 for the exact same thing!!!! So it really pays to shop around! We did book our own air though as it was much less expensive that way. Good luck and Happy Shopping

 

[Parrotheader]

If I had had more time to do some extensive research I probably could have beaten the price on our 4-day land, 3-day sea deal by a respectable amount. But since I was also booking early, an early booking discount helped make the decision to just go with my TAs price a little easier. And since we were getting a great deal on airfare and rental car (which I booked myself) I felt like it all balanced out pretty well.

I did do some poking around initially and tried to set it up where I could stay on site at the same class hotel (we're doing the 'moderate' Port Orleans) for the same time duration and then book the cruise separately in the same class cabin. But once you started adding in all the costs for park tickets and ground transfers (in our case we just decided to go with a rental car for the whole time since it was only slightly more) it ended up being pretty close to what I was getting through early booking for the traditional package. A little more in some cases, a little less with other sources.

I'll be honest, if saving every little penny was my main concern (and believe me, I DO want to save my money whenever possible) then I would be hard pressed to go with DCL given some of the phenomenal deals you can get with other cruise lines right now. However, this will be our only big vacation (that we have to pay for anyway) this year and as such, I don't mind plunking down the extra dough for Disney because I know from past experience that Disney is almost always worth the extra money. I've been dying to get back to DW and my wife has been wanting to go on a cruise (our first.) This seemed to be a great prearranged compromise and the price was fairly reasonable with early booking. Plus, since the cruise was Disney, we're assuming that the quality will be a given and not totally unknown. We barely made the cutoff too because the price we were quoted spiked several hundred dollars the next week and was quoted at almost $800 more than we paid before it finally sold out.