Split stay question

[ericar]

Hi
I read about people doing split stays all of the time. How do you get your luggage from resort to resort?
Is there a charge for this? Is it practical to do 7 nights at 7 different resorts?

Thanks

 

[dina444444]

Disney bell services will transfer your luggage for you. You just call when your just about ready to leave your room and tell them you need the bags transfer to x resort. At the new resort the bags are usually ready in the early evening and you either call when you get to your room or stop by bell services in the lobby to start the delivery process. There’s no charge, only costs what you typically tip for a bag x2 (pickup/drop off). That’s a lot of moving though to be at a different resort each night.

 

[kniquy]

Hi
I read about people doing split stays all of the time. How do you get your luggage from resort to resort?
Is there a charge for this? Is it practical to do 7 nights at 7 different resorts?

Thanks

Bell services will move your luggage. You can either bring it down to them or if you call they will come up to your room. You just tell them where you are moving to and with Disney magic they will be at your new resort. As for cost - it is nice to tip for each bag when they pick up and then also nice to tip when you have the bags delivered to your room at the new resort.

If you have a car on property - then just pack up the car and check into your new resort.

Moving can be pretty seamless if you just have bags picked up in the morning, you head off to a park and then just go to your new resort in the afternoon/evening or whenever you get your room ready text.

As for 7 resorts in 7 days -- not sure why anyone would want to do this. You would be homeless daily from 11am until 4pm. But as a challenge i guess one could do it.

Most people with a week long stay would split into 2 resorts. It is nice to make it almost feel like 2 vacations in one, but staying put for a length of stay has its benefits too -- no packing and unpacking to do.

 

[APiratesLifeForMe2]

I will echo what others have said regarding the luggage but also add that you will need to physically go to the front desk at every resort every day to make sure they manually check you out of the room. We have done a few split stays but the biggest issue is the computer systems won't check you into the new room unless someone manually goes in and checks you out of the first resort/room. I am sure there is some time during the day that the system automatically checks you out but it's never happened to us and we typically are at the new resort before 1pm. Either resort can do this for you so whatever fits into your schedule best. It won't matter if you do online check-in or not, they always need to manually check you out. Every trip I keep hoping they will have a more advanced system that eliminates this step but it has yet to happen and it might get annoying to do 7 days in a row since you might have a line at every front desk.

 

[ericar]

Thanks for all of the answers.

 

[nates]

In November we did 5 resorts in 6 nights with 9 people including littles. Bell services handled everything very efficiently and not a bag was misplaced.
One thing I haven't seen mentioned is that they can handle any refrigerated items you may have as well - just be sure to have it packed up and ready and let them know.
We mixed it up between taking the luggage with us during check out and having bell services come get them, no issues with that either.
The main reason we did so many splits was to not only try different resorts but to utilize any transportation other than buses. 5 kids under the age of 7 at the end of a long park day and the last thing we all want is to wait 15 minutes for a bus. We were able to get BLT for MK days, BC and BW for Epcot and HS days then AKL at the end.
One regret we had - in order to save money on our flights we did two large checked suitcases and 7 backpacks... we won't be doing that again... We'll focus on minimizing the total number of bags.
Keep in mind what others have mentioned, during the day you won't have a place to go if you need to nap or change. For our swim days we took the gear with us to the parks and used the shower areas of the pools to change.
One potential benefit is if you will be using the dining plan. With these being separate reservations you will have the option to buy for some days and not for others. There is a strategy to buy the deluxe plan and stretch it 2 or even 3 days to save some money, but we haven't attempted this yet.
Oh and the mugs... if you book the dining plan for your entire stay you will have the option to get refillable mugs at every resort. We literally could have walked out of there with 48 mugs! We only used about a dozen but I do regret not grabbing a few of the Christmas mugs for office gifts
It really did make the trip seem longer and everyone had a blast. Good luck if you go through with it and enjoy!

 

[Alexander]

7 resorts in 7 days? Holy cow, no way! We do split stays in the summer, but no less than 5 nights per resort.

 

[Deb & Bill]

The only reason to do seven resorts in seven days would be because you decided to take this trip a few weeks before and it was the best you could cobble together at the last minute. And then i would question my sanity about even doing it. It would be horrible.

 

[DSLRuser]

3 day minimum per resort for us when doing a split stay....being homeless from 11am to 4pm is a hassle with how we do disney. those are key "resort hours" for us.

 

[igrsod]

Since buying DVC last year, we have done 3 trips... all split stays for various reasons. Anyways, the way we did it was to take an Uber/Lyft with our luggage to the new resort on change day. Our choice of park that day is always the one closest to that new resort. So once we arrive, we drop our bags off and head off to the parks, when we return that night our room is ready and sometimes they even have put our bags in our room for us. Easy and not too expensive. Most trips have been in the $8 range. Probably cheaper than 2x the tips and the reassurance that the bags are not lost in the process.

 

[blueant315]

We planned a split stay for our Dec 2018 at AKL and BLT, but added an extra night at POFQ once flights were released. This was a 10 day stay and the third hotel was a bit too much for our family of four, which includes a 2 and 4 year old. If you travel extremely light, I could see how it could be both doable and tolerable - but it's definitely something that does not appeal to me with small children. If you have much luggage, the bell tips will really add up as well. The main perk of split stays for us is moving closer to each park and doing the dining plan for only a portion of your visit. We had our arrival day at POFQ with no dining plan and no park, then we transferred to AKL for 3 days with the dining plan, then transferred to BLT for 5 nights without the dining plan. I loved that small taste of the dining plan and we were able to book all of our character meals during this time to make it worth the money. Then we utilized the kitchenette in BLT once the dining plan was over to make a lot of our meals and have some healthier choices - it was a great mix for us and I would gladly do a split stay again if we do another long trip (though 10 days was definitely too long for us).

 

[Liv&Leah]

We have done 2 split stays. I liked being able to experience multiple resorts. I didn’t like having to strategically pack everything and repack it. I have small children so it might be better with older children or just adults.