Priceline

[ilovevacation]

Hi ! I was wondering if anyone has named your own price on priceline for disneyland area hotel. I would love to do it, but I am concerned that not all of the options would be walkable. It's just my husband and I going in February and i was lookingin the 3-4 stars region. On priceline, I chose the disneyland/anaheim area. Anyone have any previous experience or recommendations? Thank you so much in advance!

 

[tarheelalum]

I've booked many Disneyland trips through priceline and hotwire without any issues. I use a forum called better bidding that can pretty much tell you what hotel you are going to get by the description of the hotel. You can also see what other hotels people have gotten recently through their forum. You can save a lot of money booking through priceline. I usually can get a 4 star hotel for the price of a two star. But if you need some special arrangements like you are bringing big dogs with you or you need bunk beds in the room, priceline is not the way to go.

 

[DDhunter]

I have used Priceline 4 times for Disneyland trips. All 4 times the hotel was not walking distance, IMO. Once I got the Holiday Inn (on Manchester I think), twice I got the Anaheim Marriott Suites, which is quite a ways down on South Harbor (closer to Angel's stadium than Disneyland) and once got Ramada Northgate (South Harbor and Ball area), it was very last minute and it was only a 2 star.

We used the shuttle for the Marriott Suite one night, which was a horrible experience (had to wait over an hour for the shuttle that night and then had to stand for the trip back). We drove the next day and when we got back to the hotel, there were no parking spaces.

I guess "walking distance" is a subjective thing but at the end of a long day at Disneyland anything over a mile is just too far in my book. So I won't use a blind auction for Disneyland anymore, walking distance is too big of a deal to me.

 

[mikana876]

We did it once and did NOT get a hotel within walking distance. For that reason we just booked the BWPPI this time.

 

[Newsiemj]

We have Pricelined it several times. You will not always get walking distance, but everything we have gotten has been on the ART route and we never had issues. I agree with a PP about doing research on better bidding before you try!

 

[ilovevacation]

Thank you everyone for all of your help. Matt and I are trying to figure out if a decreased price is worth a shuttle/ART ride. Or...are we willing to just pay a little more for a little less of a stay and have a sure thing. My overall goals are walking distance (1 mi or less) and free breakfast. Thanks!!!

 

[zanzibar138]

I used Priceline for two of my hotels on our August/September trip. I had Motel 6 Maingate booked as a back up. Ended up with Red Lion for about the same price, and Marriott Suites for a little less.

As the PP mentioned, you can use sites like better bidding to try and work out which hotel you will get. Otherwise, just look at the Priceline map for the Disneyland area, and decide whether you'd be happy with any hotel in that area. The higher star hotels are generally further away from the parks anyway if that's what you're after, and they're relatively easy to figure out on Priceline because there are only a few of them. The really close hotels on Harbor are only 2-3 stars. FWIW, I was able to figure out I'd be getting the Marriott Suites, but not the Red Lion. They tricked me there though - I bid for a 3 star hotel and they 'upgraded' me to the Red Lion which is a 3 1/2 star.

I'm a fit, healthy solo traveller, so I'll be happy to walk 20 minutes or more. Also, these hotels are just for a couple of nights at the beginning and end of my trip. If you have young kids or elderly people in your party, or have some health issues that might be an issue for walking, I wouldn't suggest using any of those mystery hotel sites (unless you're willing to put a lot of research into figuring out which hotel you're getting).