Your Cheapest trip?

[Look_Its_Nikki]

We have been able to do most of our trips very cheap but our last trip was the cheapest we have ever done.

Here is what we spent. DH and I both have APs (did this on a trip before this trip) And we took our two girls who are under 10.

Gas round trip $90
Hotel for 2 nights $39 Total w/tax = $92
I spent $20 on food/snacks/drinks to take with us before we left
Girls 1 day tickets $68 x 2= 136

We did two meals big lunch at Rain forest $60 (splurge)
And dinner that night at tortila Joes w/birthday coupon we spent $19.99


And that was it. That all we spent. I know us having passes helped so much.
And next time we won’t do more than one dinner if we even do one at all. We are kind of excited to see how cheap we can do it for and still have so much fun

So what is the cheapest you guys have done your trips?

 

[JH87]

Hm I think my last trip with friends was pretty cheap....excluding my purchase of an AP that is!

hotel, split between 3 people: $55 each
My portion of gas money: $30
food was roughly $100 for me alone...wow, do i really eat that much? Well we did buy EVERYTHING there, food, drinks, snacks...nothing was brought from home. So I guess it's not so bad.

So the total that I myself took care of for that trip excluding my AP was just about $200....not bad. It's fun to travel with friends and it saves money! haha...

Ok but including my Premium AP which cost me $359 (I had $100 in Disney gift cards) the total would be $559!!
But really, I don't think of my AP as an expense...it will have paid for itself after my 3rd visit since buying it which will be in June.

 

[chrissiecutie]

We usually go for a week to 10 days to SoCal. Typically we fly down, spend a few nights with family, get a rental car, spend 5-7 nights in a nice hotel, park tickets are for 3-4 days and 2 meals out per day. SO very different from the type of trip you're talking about.

With that said, for a family of 3 for a week to 10 day vacation, we spend about $1500. That includes everything above plus ALL our food/meals and any souvenirs we buy. Not bad for a nice, long vacation!

I'd be curious to see how much other families who take longer vacations spend.

And I just HAVE to ask, OP- what hotel did you stay in for only $39/night?? How was it??

 

[mystic_path]

I think this November's trip is going to be the cheapest. We decided to try flying out of a different airport, and to our surprise was WAY cheaper then what we normally pay. The trick is... We booked through Getawaytoday.com and on certain days of the week they drop their package pricing. Ive been watching that for years. It was always on a Wed. but the last 2 months ive been noticing its been on Thursdays. Also the more people in a room the cheaper your package gets.

For us it's an adults girls trip, this time around and we are all sharing a room. There is 4 of us. We paid $489 with taxes per person for flight and hotel for 10 days at the Tropicana. $218 for 7 day park passes, and $250 for food. So far with taxes included per person we are at $957 per person. However not yet added to the total is a character breakfast, a World of Color dining package, hoping a Fantasmic Dessert package, a day at Universal and have a shopping day, but since im not really a shopper, I can keep my total at about $1500 for everything.

 

[Look_Its_Nikki]

For the hotel I did priceline bidding. It's a nice hotel. Holiday inn on s. Manchester. It's a 3* with no resort fees.

We have gone for longer trips and have spent more. But it's on silly stuff. $12 drink. And getting a $3.50 coke stuff like that. It adds up.
On our last trip we learned that kids meals at the 2 places we ate at in DTD were at least $7 + $3.50 for a drink.

Next time we are staying for 3 days

 

[mystic_path]

For the hotel I did priceline bidding. It's a nice hotel. Holiday inn on s. Manchester. It's a 3* with no resort fees.

We have gone for longer trips and have spent more. But it's on silly stuff. $12 drink. And getting a $3.50 coke stuff like that. It adds up.
On our last trip we learned that kids meals at the 2 places we ate at in DTD were at least $7 + $3.50 for a drink.

Next time we are staying for 3 days

A really good thing to do is bring in drink packets of crystal light, and cool aid. In the park any counter service will give you free ice water, restaurants you go to you can ask for ice water and they wont charge you, and you can switch up flavors. This really saves on money.

 

[clairabell29]

My upcoming trip is by far the cheapest we've ever done. I am taking my niece on a suprise sweet 16 birthday trip. My flight was 165, hers was 139, flying into SNA. RT to and from airport $14/each w/coupon. Then I got the Super 8 on Katella for $46/nt INCLUDING tax. Military 3 day tickets for $96/each. All this is March 12-15 SPRING BREAK. My total for the 3 night 4 day trip is $662. The hotel has free breakfast and I always do PB&J for lunch along with a couple of snacks brought for home. Dinner will run about $10 per night each, but we will probably split a few of those. Granted I'm probably going to increase the cost by upgrading to AP's, but before that it's pretty cheap!

For a longer vacation, that would be last summer mid-august.
6 nights, 7 days family of 4, one under 3 We drove and spent $320 rt in gas (including a drive to San Diego) Hotel (Ramada Maingate) and 6 day park hoppers added up to $838 and a day in Sea World was FREE. I bought $200 in grocieries for our trip and we ate only 4 meals in the park for a total of about $120. So a 7 day vacation ran us just shy of $1500

 

[CrazyDuck]

About $2500 back in 2002 (just me and GF at the time, no kids)
$800 for airfare
$150 for rental car
$500 for 5 nights at Anaheim Hilton
$300 park tickets
$500 Food

 

[DisneyMomma81]

Possibly our most recent visit ~ Thanksgiving weekend last year. It was the 1st time we've driven. *I usually spend $500 in airfare for the 3 of us to fly. My mom came with us so we split gas costs. We had the ent rate *now retro rate* at HoJo @ $59 each night. Wed/Thurs/Fri nights.

Our pricier meals were BB ~ DS & I shared the Monte Cristo & DD had a kids meal *not much more than $38. We did WOC picnics *$45 and DD & I went to Minnie's for brunch *$50, the rest of the time we'd share between the 4 of us 2 adult CS meals, we always drink water. There was no BBB for DD, no F! dessert seating *DD & I did that last July *as well as BBB for her & 2 nights at the DLH for her B-day trip!!*

We've had APs in the past, but again we'd never driven until this last time ~ and it wasn't bad, I'd do it again, however coming home about 1/2 way we had to stop for the night *bad snow storm* we HotWired a nice place for $45 or so.

And just because ~
Here's a foto of my kids taken during our cheapie visit!

 

[PinkBudgie]

Well, my cheapest trip was back in 1987 when I went with my best friend to DL during my first year of college. We went through AAA and got airfare, a cheap motel, and tickets (for I think 3 days) for $222! I don't remember what we spent on food, but it wouldn't have been much because we didn't have alot. Oh yeah, I spent $18 on a big Cheshire Cat.

Of course now we have APs so if you look at the first trip on you took on the AP as the most expensive, the rest are much cheaper!

 

[kkmcan]

In 2009 we drove from Tucson, used our APs and stayed in inlaws free timeshare. We also used $200 in Disney Visa Reward $$ to pay for food. Kids spent $25 of their birthday money to buy souvies.

Gas $150 (gas was higher price then)
Food $50 cash for snacks + $30 for food on the way there and on the way back

Total $230 approx

Another time we drove, stayed at the Anaheim Plaza for 2 nights, did the one day parkhopper (mom bought tickets as a gift for us), Halloween party at the discounted Disney Visa rate $25 ea and used $100 of DVR$ for food.No souvies this time.

2 nights Anaheim Plaza ($59 per night)= 150
Halloween Tickets =100
Gas = 100
Free 1 day parkhoppers = 0
Food used DVR$ =0
Total 350

 

[chrissiecutie]

For the hotel I did priceline bidding. It's a nice hotel. Holiday inn on s. Manchester. It's a 3* with no resort fees.

We have gone for longer trips and have spent more. But it's on silly stuff. $12 drink. And getting a $3.50 coke stuff like that. It adds up.
On our last trip we learned that kids meals at the 2 places we ate at in DTD were at least $7 + $3.50 for a drink.

Next time we are staying for 3 days

Nice! I've always been hesitant to use Priceline but maybe I'll give it a try on our next trip. Especially since HoJo's changed their cancellation policy.

I agree with another poster...I never pay for drinks in the park! As DH puts it, they already have you hostage and now they want you to bend over too!

Ok, seriously...I pack in a cooler full of sodas, juice and snacks. Fruit, applesauce, yogurt and we always ask for a cup full of ice when we order our meals. Works great.

 

[DisneyMomma81]

Nice! I've always been hesitant to use Priceline but maybe I'll give it a try on our next trip.

We Pricelined in the DLR area twice in earlyish 2009 ~ see my post *here* if you'd like to find out how/what I did.

 

[MattsPrincess]

Our first trip, in May 2009. Cost us less than $800 total, lol.

Tickets: we got three day hoppers, DH's was free because of the military promotion they had going that year. also as a part of that, mine was like, $80 or something like that.

Stayed at the Super 8 Disneyland Drive, don't remember how much that was exactly but it was less than 300.

I didn't eat an actual meal the whole time (not to try to save money, just a picky eater), just snacked. I think i bought two mickey pretzels and one boc of popcorn. Dh got two actual meals (a burger at tomorrowland terrace, and one at taste pilots) and then snacked.

Looking back, I can't believe we didn't spend more. It was both of our first time there, you'd think we would have gone crazy buying things, lol. We spent a lot more this past time, almost 2000. Well worth the price increase, imo

 

[Funball]

my cheapest visit to disneyland was the one when i didn't go o DLR

 

[lovedisneyland1]

We got a package through Southwest Airlines for December of 2007. The total for 6 nights at the Disneyland Hotel, 5 day parkhoppers for 2 adults & 1 child, and round trip airfare from Boise was $1000.

 

[chrissiecutie]

We got a package through Southwest Airlines for December of 2007. The total for 6 nights at the Disneyland Hotel, 5 day parkhoppers for 2 adults & 1 child, and round trip airfare from Boise was $1000.

NO WAY!

Ok, that's simply amazing...and a bit unbelievable....awesome job!

 

[lovedisneyland1]

It was pretty amazing! I think it was a glitch in their system. I checked on the same package for some friends the next day and the price more than doubled.

 

[Look_Its_Nikki]

We will be going back to DL in a couple of weeks (DH has to make a trip down there for work so we get to make it a family trip again )

Because he has to go down for work we will get our gas paid for. the most expensive thing will be tix for our DDs. I am thinking about staying one night at the Grand as a specail treat.

Yay to planning cheap trips.

 

[KelliLee702]

So, to keep things on the "Cheap" . . .

Where you cut costs?

Hotel
Travel
Food
Souveniers

We know Park Tickets usually remain pretty constant . . . but . . . where else can you cut costs on your trip?

Lets brainstorm some ideas . . .