WWYD...adding Universal and IOA to my budget Disney trip??!!

[Mom3girls]

WYD?? I have found a great deal on a 6 night vacation to Beach Club with YES tickets. My hubby has been saying for a few years he wants to go to Universal and IOA. We have three DD's ages 14, 12,and 11. To go to those two parks we would have to rent a car and drive back and forth. Do you think we could do both parks in one day or would we need two days? It's $675 for us to add 2 day park access plus rent a car. And that's not including the fast pass equivalent that they have there.

Not sure what to do...I know NOTHING about those two parks and it's killing me to add that into the million things I want to do at Disney. If we do 2days there I'm also gonna have to add one one more night to our trip so we could do everything we want to do. WWYD

 

[Sarah&Ryan]

I think you possibly can if you are willing to spend one night at one of Universals resorts. Universal resort guests get front of the line passes so you can by pass all the long lines! We did this 2 years ago with our 3 boys and it was soooo worth it! I dont know if you can skip the lines for the new Harry Potter rides though....anyone know?

 

[pezaddict231]

I haven't been to universal in years but this is what we plan to do. Fly in Friday, rent a car and stay at PBH, I'm a AAA member and got a good rate on the hotel. By staying at Universal you get FOL (Front of the Line) access and you get early admission to WWOHP. So that Friday we will arrive late AM in Orlando and try to do as much as we can with FOL in US. Next AM, check out of PBH, go to WWHOP and IOA. Drive to Disney with rental car, check in at YC and drop off rental car at the Dolphin.

PBH is actually cheaper per night than our room at YC, so it makes more sense to stay there with the extra night and there are extra benefits to doing so like FOL. For tickets, you do get a small discount if you buy through AAA, it's not much but it's better than nothing. I've also seen 3 day tickets for sale at Costco, but we only want to do two days.

 

[pezaddict231]

I think you possibly can if you are willing to spend one night at one of Universals resorts. Universal resort guests get front of the line passes so you can by pass all the long lines! We did this 2 years ago with our 3 boys and it was soooo worth it! I dont know if you can skip the lines for the new Harry Potter rides though....anyone know?

You can't skip the line for HP rides, but you get early admission into the area which seems to make a huge difference, and then you can use FOL for almost everything else. . I think just HP and Rip Rocket Coaster are excluded.

 

[Mom3girls]

Silly question...what's PBH?

 

[mrsklamc]

We tried to do this a few years ago and ended up regretting it. We wished we had just stuck with Disney.

To be fair, I will say I went in 2000 and thought Universal was awesome. But in 2007 we tried to pack in both parks in one day, were totally harassed by their credit card people and then their timeshare people, and just wished, all in all, that we hadn't tried to add one more thing to a crazy busy trip.

 

[Marionnette]

Silly question...what's PBH?

PBH = Portofino Bay Hotel
It's the most expensive of the three onsite hotels at Universal.

As to doing Universal in one day, my opinion is no with one exception. That would be IF you stayed onsite, got FOTL and early admission into HP and then stayed until the very close of the parks. But if you stay onsite at Universal, it's better to use that onsite stay to your advantage by using that FOTL on both your arrival and departure days.

If you plan to stay at Disney and commute to Universal for two days, my answer is a resounding NO! Spending close to $700 for two days there is just off the chart for me. I'll bet that by the time you pay for the rental car and the parking costs for two days, you could stay at Royal Pacific for a night.

 

[Mom3girls]

I just checked into adding a night to beginning of our trip at Hard Rock Hotel so that we can get early entry at HP and FOTL on both days. For the room and passes for two days it will run us $1000! Will be giving hubby all the info when he gets home from work. Hoping that since this Universal and IOA is all his idea he will go for it. I'm afraid to add this expense, disney expense and airfare together!!!! KWIM???!!!

 

[cheshireqt]

Staying one night at a Universal hotel gives you front of line access (FOTL) for 2 days (check in and check out days). FOTL does not work for Forbidden Journey, Olivanders experience, Rip Ride Rocket and Petradon Flyers - which your girls are to old for anyway). You do get early access to Harry Potter area, including FJ and Olivander and unlimited FOTL for all other rides in both parks, including 2 rides in the Harry Potter area - which are Flight of the Hippogriff and the Dragon coaster. It is a great idea! If you want to do it a bit cheaper you could stay at a partner hotel and FOTL will be good once per ride with same caveats.
I think you will want 2 days to do both parks. If Disney is your primary point of interest, maybe do Universal first and then transfer over to Disney?

 

[cheshireqt]

I just checked into adding a night to beginning of our trip at Hard Rock Hotel so that we can get early entry at HP and FOTL on both days. For the room and passes for two days it will run us $1000! Will be giving hubby all the info when he gets home from work. Hoping that since this Universal and IOA is all his idea he will go for it. I'm afraid to add this expense, disney expense and airfare together!!!! KWIM???!!!

You will have a wonderful vacation!
Sorry thought I read all the posts before posting but missed this one in my excitement to offer some "valuable" advice.

 

[shellbelle]

Staying one night at a Universal hotel gives you front of line access (FOTL) for 2 days (check in and check out days). FOTL does not work for Forbidden Journey, Olivanders experience, Rip Ride Rocket and Petradon Flyers - which your girls are to old for anyway). You do get early access to Harry Potter area, including FJ and Olivander and unlimited FOTL for all other rides in both parks, including 2 rides in the Harry Potter area - which are Flight of the Hippogriff and the Dragon coaster. It is a great idea! If you want to do it a bit cheaper you could stay at a partner hotel and FOTL will be good once per ride with same caveats.
I think you will want 2 days to do both parks. If Disney is your primary point of interest, maybe do Universal first and then transfer over to Disney?

Are you saying that if you stay at a partner hotel you get FOTL access once per ride? I did not know this.

 

[Darcy03231]

Having done several split trips, I recommend staying on-site for the unlimited express pass perk, especially if you're going during a busy time of year. It will save you lots of time and you will easily be able to do both parks in two days, and maybe have time to redo your favorites.

I would suggest doing US/IOA at the end of your trip. I learned this the hard way. I did it at the beginning for the first split trip we did. All I heard for the remainder of the time we were at WDW was "these rides are lame", "I hate waiting in line", "these lines are too long", "why can't we go back to US/IOA", "this sucks (courtesy of the 14 y.o. at the time)". The lines really weren't that long - I think the longest we waited was 20-25 minutes and we used fast passes on every ride that offered them.

Since my kids are all older and we've done multiple trips to WDW our trips now are split with more time at US/IOA and a couple of days at WDW. We do the WDW days first and then to over to US/IOA for the remainder of the trip.