Opinions please, San Francisco v. New York

[mouselike-harrier]

This is our background. DH and I were originally booked on the May 11th San Francisco long weekend, but had to change our plans (before payment in full date). We are now looking to booking 2018. Here's the deal. We've never been to San Francisco and we live in CT, so we've been to New York. However, after looking at the itineraries, I'm changing my mind and leaning toward New York. Looking at San Francisco, other than the VIP tour of the Disney Family museum and photo op at the Yoda Fountain, and grape stomping, I really don't see the Disney difference. While in New York, the Disney Difference is very apparent and we get more bang for our buck. We've never done what is included in the trip. We are limiting ourselves to the long weekend because of budget and because it's a first trip without the kids in a very long time, and our daughter will be home alone (No need to call DCF she will be 18 by then). DH is still leaning toward San Francisco. Opinions please.

 

[calypso726]

This is our background. DH and I were originally booked on the May 11th San Francisco long weekend, but had to change our plans (before payment in full date). We are now looking to booking 2018. Here's the deal. We've never been to San Francisco and we live in CT, so we've been to New York. However, after looking at the itineraries, I'm changing my mind and leaning toward New York. Looking at San Francisco, other than the VIP tour of the Disney Family museum and photo op at the Yoda Fountain, and grape stomping, I really don't see the Disney difference. While in New York, the Disney Difference is very apparent and we get more bang for our buck. We've never done what is included in the trip. We are limiting ourselves to the long weekend because of budget and because it's a first trip without the kids in a very long time, and our daughter will be home alone (No need to call DCF she will be 18 by then). DH is still leaning toward San Francisco. Opinions please.

We have 9 ABDs under our belt. We've done both the San Francisco trip and the NY trip. When the new dates came out I was planning on booking the NY long weekend again in addition to the China trip that we did book. The dates wound up conflicting so we didn't book the NY one but I was planning on it. We will likely do the NY one again at some point. San Francisco was nice but I have never considered booking it a second time. Hopefully that helps.

 

[scottmel]

We took the ABD NYC last summer. To be honest, I booked the trip sort of as an afterthought. Les Miserables was retiring from Broadway and DD17 really really wanted to see this play. We had PLANNED on doing NYC 2017 but bumped it up a year to accomodate the play. Honestly I went into the time expecting to enjoy it. I left the tripLOVING it. As in just beyond what I thought. We arrived 2 days earlier so defiantely had some time on our own.

I HAD booked SF for this summer but it was not grabbing me....DD18 just wasn't that into it either. Cancelled it and planning on booking something else next summer. NYC is our back up to go again. Just really loved it....

 

[mouselike-harrier]

We took the ABD NYC last summer. To be honest, I booked the trip sort of as an afterthought. Les Miserables was retiring from Broadway and DD17 really really wanted to see this play. We had PLANNED on doing NYC 2017 but bumped it up a year to accomodate the play. Honestly I went into the time expecting to enjoy it. I left the tripLOVING it. As in just beyond what I thought. We arrived 2 days earlier so defiantely had some time on our own.

I HAD booked SF for this summer but it was not grabbing me....DD18 just wasn't that into it either. Cancelled it and planning on booking something else next summer. NYC is our back up to go again. Just really loved it....

Thanks for the opinions. This is what my gut feeling is telling me. We also booked SF for this May and had to cancel it. Although we have never been to San Francisco and have been to Manhattan numerous times, NY seems like the better trip. I am really unhappy with the itinerary now for SF. Doesn't seem to have the Disney difference of other trips and I think ABD needs to rework this one. I may need some further ammunition to convince DH though.

 

[scottmel]

Thanks for the opinions. This is what my gut feeling is telling me. We also booked SF for this May and had to cancel it. Although we have never been to San Francisco and have been to Manhattan numerous times, NY seems like the better trip. I am really unhappy with the itinerary now for SF. Doesn't seem to have the Disney difference of other trips and I think ABD needs to rework this one. I may need some further ammunition to convince DH though.

Sure! The San Fran changes to me I didn't like either. Wine stomping in bare feet? No thanks....There were a few changes they made to NYC as well but no enogh to make me not go again. THIS Summer we are going to SoCal for 2 weeks (we did Backstage Magic few years ago and LOVED IT)but this trip is us exploring Cali on our own. Which is why the San Fran thing was fitting so nice. But No Alcatraz? I just felt what they were focusing on in their trip just didn't interest me. Whereas NYC offered so much. the afterhours tenement museum was awesome. Again I was sort of like :Whatever" but it was great. I just went in with ok expectations and loved it.Hope you can convince him!!!!

 

[mouselike-harrier]

Sure! The San Fran changes to me I didn't like either. Wine stomping in bare feet? No thanks....There were a few changes they made to NYC as well but no enogh to make me not go again. THIS Summer we are going to SoCal for 2 weeks (we did Backstage Magic few years ago and LOVED IT)but this trip is us exploring Cali on our own. Which is why the San Fran thing was fitting so nice. But No Alcatraz? I just felt what they were focusing on in their trip just didn't interest me. Whereas NYC offered so much. the afterhours tenement museum was awesome. Again I was sort of like :Whatever" but it was great. I just went in with ok expectations and loved it.Hope you can convince him!!!!

The "photo op" at Yoda fountain did it for me, lame isn't the word. Also I agree, SF with no Alcatraz?! We did Backstage Magic in 2010 with our kids and it was truly an amazing trip. I'll just have to work on DH.

 

[Cousin Orville]

I love both cities and would definitely recommend an OYO trip to SF if you've never been. The Yoda photo op is easily done on your own. It's walkable from the Disney Family museum, but it's nothing special. Too bad they can't arrange anything unique inside Lucasfilm. And as much as I love Lucy and Ethyl in "Italy", I'd pass on the grape stomping. Just give me a day to relax in Napa.

 

[mathgeek]

I was planning to do the SF on my way to Aulani last summer, but I ended up doing SF on my own. Cousin Orville is right...I spent the morning at the Disney Family Museum then walked over to the Lucasfilm campus and found the Yoda statue and went in the lobby for pics. I also had a beautiful walk from there to the Golden Gate bridge with some wonderful pics along the way.

Other than the museum and Lucasfilm the rest of the itinerary just didn't interest me that much. I found my way around town and was able to do other tourist stops that I wanted to see and probably would've had to do on my own anyway. Plus it was a whole lot cheaper to do it on my own too.

 

[sayhello]

I love both cities and would definitely recommend an OYO trip to SF if you've never been. The Yoda photo op is easily done on your own. It's walkable from the Disney Family museum, but it's nothing special. Too bad they can't arrange anything unique inside Lucasfilm. And as much as I love Lucy and Ethyl in "Italy", I'd pass on the grape stomping. Just give me a day to relax in Napa.

I don't know, the grape stomping we did at the winery on Santorini was tremendous fun, and a big hit with our group! Although we did *not* produce that much wine!

Sayhello

 

[met19]

Having been to sf on my own.....I was able to go to WDFM, alcatraz, and Muir Woods. Didn't do napa as I went south on pch1. I would look at the extras ABD does and eval the price vs the return

 

[RebelHawk]

We just got back from the NYC ABD Adult Only trip last week and very much enjoyed it. However I feel that with the massive options for NYC this should be a week long trip and not a long weekend. Now if you are a regular visitor to NYC then maybe a long weekend hitting just the things covered by ABD might be enough. For my wife and I this was our first NYC trip as adults so we needed a few extra days to "see it all". I have linked the trip report I just finished below.

Highlights for sure are the private tour of the New Amsterdam Theatre, front row center for Aladdin and ABD customized Tenement Museum are all things that are doable but hard to replicate without ABD.

https://www.disboards.com/threads/nyc-adult-only-25-28-2017-trip-report.3606573/

 

[mouselike-harrier]

Yup, we both have been to NY several times; we are a train ride away. However, we have never done what is covered in the trip. Read your trip report and sent it to DH. Thanks for doing it, the report was extremely helpful! He is starting to realize that Disney is doing things that are easily duplicated in SF. Keeping my fingers crossed on this one.

 

[drbayside]

DH and I did the San Fran Trip in 2015 - although some of the iternary didn't seem impressive we were impressed. We loved the trip and the guides. We had been to San Fran before several times but ABD made it special and took us to places we never would have gone or done ourselves. We loved biking, walking across the bridge, Disney Family museum, Lucas films, winery, special dinners, Angle Island, The Fairmont Hotel etc... yes we could have done many of these on our own, but the way ABD does it and pampers you is unsurpasseed and like I said earlier we wouldn't have even thought of doing some of it. So glad we did it. The ABD experience was amazing. We actually thought about doing the New York trip - even tho we've been there several times but the iteanrry just didn't seem exciting. However, after experiencing the San Fran trip, we are re-thinking that, not a top priority because we were just in NY again a few months ago and we just haven't had much time. We've been doing a lot of other traveling. We did a Viking River Cruise last year and loved it. We tried to book the ABD river cruise but it had sold out, that why we went with Viking. We are looking forward to ABD Arizona / Utah in Aug.

 

[CrazyZeus1]

We're doing the SF trip this summer and we picked it because 1) It's ABD and everything we've done with ABD has been amazing even if on paper it sounded just "ok". and 2) It's so much easier to do any kind of travel when it's all arranged. ha! Definitely not cheap (but I would say all of the ABDs could be done on your own for much less) but we think of it as paying for convenience and ease in planning/arranging/travel/organzing/etc. Plus we've loved every guide we've had (minus one, but I figure with 20 guides so far, that's not bad. hahah) I keep wanting to do NY as well, and I'm not sure that really interests Hubby who has traveled there a lot for work. I just know we would NEVER go to NY on our own and seems like ABD is the way to see a lot of unique things? Excited about both!