the Legend
Master of Attractions and TourGuide Hopeful!
- Joined
- Jun 2, 2001
- Messages
- 347
The Pre-Trip Planning or 'Episode One - Attack of the Phones'The Cast
Master Jedi Rob aka the Legend - Thats me. 36 year old Systems Analyst, WDW veteran of sorts and major financier of this trip.
Padwan Learner Lance aka my baby Brother - A 30 year old Student of the World. This will be his first time to WDW and I am hoping to turn him to the D-Side of the Force (Disney that is!) 
The Dates
- 20 Sep - 24 Sep: Wilderness Lodge, Walt Disney World
- 24 Sep - 28 Sep: Animal Kingdom Lodge, Walt Disney World
- 28 Sep - 01 Oct: Royal Pacific Resort, Universal Orlando
- 01 Oct - 05 Oct: Grand Californian at Disneyland Resort
My Brother could only make the trip between his College terms, so we initially aimed for April but that came and went quickly. We rescheduled for July but we wisely heeded the warning of professional tour guide, Michael Hewell and aimed for late September. United and our national carrier, Air New Zealand, were doing packages from New Zealand to most US major centres including Orlando so it seemed like a great time to go.
With 9/11 paranoia dancing in our heads, we set a date of Fri 20th September. We wanted a week at WDW, a few nights at Universal Orlando. Research revealled alot of new Coasters (We're big Coaster fans!) on the West Coast, so we decided to spend some time in Los Angeles. WL and AKL were already slated for our WDW stay, so it only made sense to stay at their West Coast cousin, the Grand Californian at Disneyland Resort. A rental car was a given for both Orlando and Los Angeles. There was much off-site shopping and visiting to be done plus we use the rental car as our primary Resort-to-Park transportation.
Its all about the 'Big 3', baby!I hit the Net hard looking for all the information I could. From what I gathered, Amex, Disney Club (DC) and Annual Passes (AP) were the 'Big 3' to have for any WDW trip. Using my Amex, I secured our flights through my Travel Agent. That involved flying Air New Zealand to LA and transferring to United inside the US. I was an Air New Zealand Air Points member already so I was looking forward to those apples! I joined Disney Club using my Amex which I then used to buy a Premium AP with DC discount for me
I decided not to buy Lances tickets until we had decided how we would spend our days in Orlando.
DC gave me access to National Rental Car. I joined the Emerald Club, Nationals loyalty program, for free using the fee waiver from DC. The Application form allowed me to link an Air Points/Miles program but did not support Air New Zealand, only United. So I joined Uniteds Mileage Plus Program, which was also free, and booked cars for Orlando and LA using Emerald Aisle (EA). DC also gave me a voucher for a free weekend day and a code which gave a 20% discount on all rentals! DC sent me an Premium AP voucher which was fine as we settled with 4 nights at WL and 4 nights at AKL. Through constant monitoring of the DIS and MouseSavers, I managed to secure Fall AP rates for both resorts . I also managed to book the Grand Californian using the Fall Fantasy package thru DC which essentially was a pay for 3 nights, get the 4th night free deal. This applied to Rooms and tickets so a great bonus for us. So after all was said and done the 'Big 3' had secured the following:- Air New Zealand/United Package to Orlando via LA departing New Zealand Fri September 20 and returning Sat October 5 (2 x $1025.00 = $2050.00 saving over $500.00)
- Disney Club Membership ($59.95 international membership fee)
- Premium Annual Pass ($485.97 including DC discount and international P&P saving over $20.00)
- Nationals Emerald Club Membership (Free using DC Fee waiver saving $50.00)
- Uniteds Mileage Plus Program (Free. Applied On-line)
- National rental car for duration of the Orlando stay. (Fullsize thru EA: 11 nights for $502.98 includes LDW coverage saving over $180.00)
- 4 nights for 2 at the WL Courtyard view. ($662.00 using AP Fall discount saving over $300)
- 4 nights for 2 at the AKL Savannah view. ($728.00 using AP Fall discount saving over $350)
- National rental car for duration of the Los Angeles stay. (Fullsize thru EA: 4 nights for $198.00 includes LDW coverage saving just under $100)
- 4 nights for 2 at the Grand Californian Downtown Disney view includes tickets (using DC Fall Fantasy Package $1055.00. Rack rate for this room is over $250/night so with the extras and tickets, this is an excellent deal)
- All charges were to my Amex, which has a double points program in place until May 2003.
- over $1500 in savings off the rack rate
- over 10000 Amex reward points
- over 4500 United Air Miles
- over 25000 Air New Zealand Air Points
Are you ready for some Football?We have always had a secret desire to see a live Football game but for one reason or another, it had never been affordable or practical ... until now. Lance and I are big football fans since we were first exposed to it in 1985. We play in a local league (Football in New Zealand? Yes but it is a novelty sport in our Rugby-mad Nation!) and I have been a Dolphins fan since I can remember (blame that on Dan Marino, I couldve watched him and the Marks Brothers hookup all day!) Checking the dates, we had two options. The Jets @ Dolphins on a Sunday or the Rams @ Tampa on Monday Night. To make a long story short, we went with the Monday Night game at Tampa because there was too much work required to make the Miami trip a reality (but one day it will be mine!)
OK lets get some tickets for this thing! Note to self: Wake up at 3am Tuesday Morning New Zealand Time on a particular day and get tickets on-line through Ticketmaster. Well you know what happened? Someone forgot to get up and the game was sold out in 15 minutes! Boo hoo!
I turned to E-bay and sure enough a few seats in the Clouds became available. I placed a bid on two tickets in the top tier of Raymond James Stadium getting into a conversation with one of the sellers. Well, after he heard our story and that this would be our first football game, he closed the auction and sold us the tickets right there and then. Yahoo! 
Paid the man via Amex and received the tickets two days after payment. Sure, we had reservations but the guy had a proven track record on E-Bay and the service was fast and very efficient. As it turns out the Game was one of the many highlights on this trip but more on that later!
How the Men in Black became the Men in RedThere are many ways to secure discounts at Universal (I am hoping you see that I never pay rack for anything if I can help it). There is the Entertainment book, Universal Fan Club Membership, Universal Annual Pass etc. What did we settle for? A Package deal through Loews. The Package was $99 per person per night including tickets meaning essentially we paying $99/day for the Room and $99/day for 2 multi-park tickets. Yikes! Thats not a good deal , I hear you shout. Well it stemed from a misunderstanding about Loews and the other Universal Programs. To safeguard our Loews First benefits, we booked the Loews Package. If you think in terms of single day tickets, there is some saving however I didnt so we lost money here
I was glad to find that the tickets they issue you were in fact 7-day passes and not length of stay passes as I had first anticipated. Even with free access to Citywalk venues to sweeten the deal, I should have upgraded to an AP because we were only at Universal for 3 nights and would not get full use of the extra days on the pass On the upside, I joined Loews First Program on-line to receive our complimentary paper, welcome gift and class upgrade. Although we were not upgraded, we got the Water view room I requested with no change in the price (essentially a view upgrade for free
). I included the Loews First number in my reservation and I am glad to report that everything went without a hitch. I will be looking for a better way of doing this next year.- 3 nights for 2 at the RPR Water view including 7-day unlimited access tickets to Universal and IOA (2 people x $99.00 x 3 nights= $594.00)
I'm Planned out but wait ... theres more!It was about this time we sat down and worked our days out. What shows, parades and parks we wanted to see, what restaurants we wanted to dine at, what days had late nights or early mornings etc. After much thought, we dropped Seaworld but kept Busch Gardens, after all we would be there for the game so planned to do Busch Gardens and go directly to Raymond James. In LA, we planned to visit Knotts Berry Farm and Six Flags Magic Mountain outside of Disneyland Resort. Since all three of these had no major programs associated with them besides Annual Passes (NB Six Flags has an Amex deal, kids go free with Adults who pay using Amex but this was not applicable to us!), we decided to WOULD pay rack
(however as the story goes, you'll see we didn't! ). 
Are we there yet?After many phone calls and countless hours on the Net, the majority of the bookings were done. Most of the items were paid in advance to save the hassle of carrying large amounts of currency overseas. All that was left was to get this show on the road and as you can guess the 20th couldnt get here fast enough ...
What now for our travellers? Read in the next installment of 'The Legend returns: Day 1 - Welcome to the Wilderness Lodge!'
