Planning & Budget for Oct 2010 Trip

[MNTwinsMom]

OK all you DLR fans, I need your help. . .

I've looked over most of the GREAT info you have posted on your board and now need some specific advice.

DH, DS8, DS8 and myself are planning a trip to DLR October 19-24. Dates are not flexible because we're planning around a school break. DH and I have been to DL once before DCA opened, but my twin sons have never been to California. We had an incredible '09 trip to WDW that confirmed my children have inherited my love for all things Disney so now we want to explore DL together!

So, here's my questions:

1) What will the crowds be like late October?

2) What's a reasonable budget? We don't need to stay onsite, but do want to be within close walking distance because I'd like to avoid renting a car. We're not big eaters and do not need to do a character meal. We're fine with breakfast at the hotel, one meal at the parks and snacks to fill in the rest. A hotel with a free breakfast would be a bonus. I'm thinking we'll buy the 4-day hoppers. Airfare will be approx. $300/person in to LAX.

3) Will the Trick or Treat Party be going on when we're there? If so, will that effect the World of Color shows? It's my understanding the party is at DCA, so if they close early there would be no nightime entertainment unless we buy the hard ticket for the party, right?

We'll also have Give-a-Day vouchers to use in whatever way helps us the most.

Thanks so much for all your help!

 

[DmaxHawk]

OK all you DLR fans, I need your help. . .

I've looked over most of the GREAT info you have posted on your board and now need some specific advice.

DH, DS8, DS8 and myself are planning a trip to DLR October 19-24. Dates are not flexible because we're planning around a school break. DH and I have been to DL once before DCA opened, but my twin sons have never been to California. We had an incredible '09 trip to WDW that confirmed my children have inherited my love for all things Disney so now we want to explore DL together!

So, here's my questions:

1) What will the crowds be like late October?

2) What's a reasonable budget? We don't need to stay onsite, but do want to be within close walking distance because I'd like to avoid renting a car. We're not big eaters and do not need to do a character meal. We're fine with breakfast at the hotel, one meal at the parks and snacks to fill in the rest. A hotel with a free breakfast would be a bonus. I'm thinking we'll buy the 4-day hoppers. Airfare will be approx. $300/person in to LAX.

3) Will the Trick or Treat Party be going on when we're there? If so, will that effect the World of Color shows? It's my understanding the party is at DCA, so if they close early there would be no nightime entertainment unless we buy the hard ticket for the party, right?

We'll also have Give-a-Day vouchers to use in whatever way helps us the most.

Thanks so much for all your help!

Well I'm not an expert but I will try to answer the questions I can.

1. If you're going in late October, the park may be crowded since its lcose to Halloween especially during or close to the weekends. During the week days, I estimate the crowds will be lowers since some of the older kids will be in school (I see no school break around that time).

2. If you don't plan to stay on site, research the hotels in that area that would suit you. I know Holiday Inns offer breakfast. The HOJO is also a favorite on this site. Most have a shuttle to and from the park.

And I'm not sure on your third question, hope this helps.

 

[Vala]

The Trick or Treat Party should be going on 23rd and 24th going from the historical dates, possibly the 22nd too.

What's going on with World of Color during the parties is a good question. I must admit I don't really expect the show to be running during the parties, but I may be wrong. I am sure they'll announce more details closer to the date.

 

[Brady's Mom]

Schools in UT will most likely have Oct. 14-18 off for UEA (Utah Educator's Association Convention), so with your dates you will probably miss most of Utah families that descend on DLR for UEA. We actually call it Utah Escapes to Anaheim since that is what seems to happen.

It would be great if you could miss Utah fall breaks and Arizona fall breaks since those 2 states seem to generate some pretty high weekend crowds in Oct.

 

[sasywtch]

Best Western Park Place Inn directly at the walk light (can't get any closer other than GC Hotel) has a cold breakfast which is nothing fancy but ok.....cereals, muffins, bagels, toast, donuts, juice, coffee, hot chocolate, bananas, apples. A couple of the other hotels at the crosswalk offer cold breakfast but I'm not familiar with them. Candy Cane Inn has breakfast, a little further down. Fairfield Inn doesn't offer breakfast, has McD's in their parking lot for a quick grab and go. (prices higher than normal McD's).

We paid $120 with tax for the BWPPI for 4 of us which I didn't think was bad. I figured 4 x $8 for breakfast so took $32 off 120 and it was $88 for the room. It's so easy to go back and swim, order pizza, get an ice cream, get a sub (hoagie, whatever it's called in your area), relax and go back to DL/DCA.
Garden Walk is also around the corner, our plan is to hit that up this time on our first night for Bubba Gumps.

We are counter service eaters. It's about $8 for a burger/fries and $3 for a soda. our money usually goes for all the snacks during the day (frozen bananas, dole whips, churros, chocolate covered strawberries----can you tell that's what I look forward to????).

Our budget would look something like this:
We drive so whatever your cost to/from airport
Motel with breakfast 5 nights @120 $600
Lunch for 4 4 days at $11 or 12 pp $200
Dinner for 4 4 days at $11 or 12 pp $200
Snacks $80 a day x 4 days $320 (we love our snacks)
We don't buy souviners any more

Dinner the first night usually Rainforest, ESPN, etc x 4 $80
(this year it may be Bubba Gumps)

Lunch for checkout day $40

$1440 of us without the price of gas/airline tix/cost to/from airport.
Tickets (last time they were $200 x 4) $800

 

[MNTwinsMom]

Best Western Park Place Inn directly at the walk light (can't get any closer other than GC Hotel) has a cold breakfast which is nothing fancy but ok.....cereals, muffins, bagels, toast, donuts, juice, coffee, hot chocolate, bananas, apples. A couple of the other hotels at the crosswalk offer cold breakfast but I'm not familiar with them. Candy Cane Inn has breakfast, a little further down. Fairfield Inn doesn't offer breakfast, has McD's in their parking lot for a quick grab and go. (prices higher than normal McD's).

We paid $120 with tax for the BWPPI for 4 of us which I didn't think was bad. I figured 4 x $8 for breakfast so took $32 off 120 and it was $88 for the room. It's so easy to go back and swim, order pizza, get an ice cream, get a sub (hoagie, whatever it's called in your area), relax and go back to DL/DCA.
Garden Walk is also around the corner, our plan is to hit that up this time on our first night for Bubba Gumps.

We are counter service eaters. It's about $8 for a burger/fries and $3 for a soda. our money usually goes for all the snacks during the day (frozen bananas, dole whips, churros, chocolate covered strawberries----can you tell that's what I look forward to????).

Our budget would look something like this:
We drive so whatever your cost to/from airport
Motel with breakfast 5 nights @120 $600
Lunch for 4 4 days at $11 or 12 pp $200
Dinner for 4 4 days at $11 or 12 pp $200
Snacks $80 a day x 4 days $320 (we love our snacks)
We don't buy souviners any more

Dinner the first night usually Rainforest, ESPN, etc x 4 $80
(this year it may be Bubba Gumps)

Lunch for checkout day $40

$1440 of us without the price of gas/airline tix/cost to/from airport.
Tickets (last time they were $200 x 4) $800

Thanks! This gives me a great place to start. I appreciate the first hand report on the Best Western since it seems the most convenient. Your family eats much like ours (we also love our snacks ), so your budget numbers are very helpful.

Enjoy your next vacation.

Thank you to all the other posters as well for taking the time to help us out.

 

[wildfan1473]

OK all you DLR fans, I need your help. . .

I've looked over most of the GREAT info you have posted on your board and now need some specific advice.

DH, DS8, DS8 and myself are planning a trip to DLR October 19-24. Dates are not flexible because we're planning around a school break. DH and I have been to DL once before DCA opened, but my twin sons have never been to California. We had an incredible '09 trip to WDW that confirmed my children have inherited my love for all things Disney so now we want to explore DL together!

So, here's my questions:

1) What will the crowds be like late October?

2) What's a reasonable budget? We don't need to stay onsite, but do want to be within close walking distance because I'd like to avoid renting a car. We're not big eaters and do not need to do a character meal. We're fine with breakfast at the hotel, one meal at the parks and snacks to fill in the rest. A hotel with a free breakfast would be a bonus. I'm thinking we'll buy the 4-day hoppers. Airfare will be approx. $300/person in to LAX.

3) Will the Trick or Treat Party be going on when we're there? If so, will that effect the World of Color shows? It's my understanding the party is at DCA, so if they close early there would be no nightime entertainment unless we buy the hard ticket for the party, right?

We'll also have Give-a-Day vouchers to use in whatever way helps us the most.

Thanks so much for all your help!

Hi MNTwinsMom! A fellow Minnesotan here!

We just got back from our trip to Anaheim to visit my parents over Easter. We stayed at the Staybridge Suites about a mile from the parks. It had a continental breakfast daily, including eggs and either bacon or sausage, and a managers reception on T-W-TH evenings, with beer and wine. I wouldn't recommend walking it, we used the Anaheim Resort Transit bus, and it was wonderful. We only spent 2 days in the park, so we got 1-day passes each day we went, but you can buy 3 and 5 and other multi-day passes. It was $4/day for adults and $1/day for the kids for the 1-day passes. Park hours were 8 am - midnight, and the bus ran every 20 minutes from 6:20 am to 12:30 am. We only had our stop, the Convention Center, GardenWalk, Disney and the Comfort Inn. There was around 16 different routes, most of which stopped at Disney and/or GardenWalk, so you could pretty much get anywhere, including Angels Stadium, Honda Center, Amtrak Station, Crystal Cathedral, and the Block at Orange.

 

[pdxJolene]

This is what I did and it worked out great... First I decided what hotel(s) I wanted to stay in and priced all of those seperatly and with airfare or tickets on a ton of different websites (disney, cotsco, AAA, expedia, travelocity, etc...) I didn't use any of the bidding sites... I found a pretty big price difference. For example if I used Disney.com and got my hotel for 4 nights plus 3 day PH's it was about $800. 1 airline ticket from PDX to LAX was $300, making that $1400 for two people. On expedia I got the same hotel and flight as a package for $650, and then used lastminutetravel.com to get 4 day PH's for $310 for both of them. I saved almost $500 buying my hotel and PH's seperate. SO, I guess what I'm trying to say is price ALL your options & packages.

 

[wvnative]

I'm researching ours as well looking for the best deal. Thus far, my best price for the quick weekend we are doing (16-17) is through SW airlines. The flights alone were 348 for the two of us. I can add the Carousel to that price for an additional $56 or the Fairfield for $52. I think not having to spend $30 on breakfast is worth the extra $4. haha

I plan to get our park tickets from lastminutetravel.com.

With just one night in the parks this trip, I think we'll opt out of the trick or treat stuff if it's going on.

So we're looking at:
flight and hotel for two (1 nt) 402
shuttle to/from airport for 2 36
plus whatever we spend on food.