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Who is the travel party? My husband (36, we will call him Dad) and I (37, call me Pops) are taking our 7-year-old daughter (call her Belle) to Walt Disney World and staying at Art of Animation.
What were the dates of your trip? Thursday October 3 to Sunday October 6. Our schools were off, and we decided to take advantage of it.
How are you arriving at WDW? We are flying in and will take an Uber to our resort.
How many times have you been to WDW? If more than once, how often do you go? This is our 3rd trip, but the first with our daughter.
How often do you vacation in general and where do you like to go? Because my daughter is in school, we are tied to that schedule. We try to take one weeklong vacation during summer break at the beach and other shorter trips as we can.
Where do you live? We own our home in a suburb of a large NE city.
What do you do for a living? I am a SAHP, my husband is a marketing executive.
How are you paying for this trip? We book and pay using a credit card and plan to pay the balance over 4 months.
How far ahead did you book and plan? This was a relatively spur of the moment trip; we decided to go 2 weeks ahead of time.
Did you consider a Disney Dining Plan? We loved the DDP on our previous trips, but because we were going to a Halloween party (candy for dinner!) and wanted to make the most of the limited time of our short trip, we opted to pay out of pocket and stick to quick service meals.
Did you have a budget in mind as you planned and/or for your expenses while your vacationed? We made our budget as we went along.
Pre-arrival: Two weeks before our trip, we looked at our calendars and saw this would be a good time to squeeze in a fun, short trip to Florida. Even though school had already started, our daughter is just in first grade and wouldn’t have a lot of homework over the weekend due that Monday. We also saw that we could attend a Halloween party the first night of our trip and managed to buy three tickets for that before they sold out. The price for 2 adults and 1 child was $169 each ($507). We were surprised that there wasn’t a “child” ticket for the party, but at least we did not get the most expensive tickets that were for the last dates of October. The prices went from $119 in early August all the way to $199 for weekend dates closer to Halloween. To prepare for the party, I purchased some matching t-shirts from an Etsy vendor right away so we would have them in time for our trip ($40). I was surprised how inexpensive this was compared to buying the shirts in the park.
We also had to plan the rest of our park tickets and find a place to stay. We got super lucky and managed to snag a last-minute DVC rental for our dates. Our three-night stay at Saratoga Springs in a one-bedroom cost a total of $750.
We planned to enter Magic Kingdom at 4pm on Thursday because party entrance begins before the official party start time of 7pm. That saved us from needing to buy park admission for one day of our trip. We purchased 2 adult and 1 child 2-day one park tickets for Friday and Saturday from Disney.com at $306.65 per adult, $297.20/child ($910.50). We considered adding park hopping, but we figured we would not want to hop on Saturday after going to the party the night before. More than that, it would have added another $70 to each ticket, so an extra $210 for two days. (Ed. Note: discounts for multi-day tickets do not kick in until you purchase 3 or more park days). That made our total for tickets $1417.50. That is actually more expensive than if we had skipped the party and just gotten 3 day one-park tickets ($1333.77) or but less than 3-day park-hoppers ($1573.77) from Disney.com. We could have saved a little more money than that for 3-day tickets using the TouringPlans Least Expensive Ticket Calculator.
Because we knew we would spend our two park days at Epcot and Hollywood Studios, we purchased Single Pass LL for Guardians ($57 for 3) and Rise ($75 for 3), and Lightning Lane Multipass for the Epcot day ($63 for 3). We booked these at the 7-day mark.
Last but not least, we needed to book our flights to Orlando. Our round-trip fare was $275 each in economy. To save money, we only checked one bag, which we pre-paid for at $50.
Total pre-trip spending: $3331.50
Day one: Today was our travel day and we caught an early flight. We took an Uber to the airport instead of driving and paying for parking. This was somewhat less expensive than parking which is $60 per 24 hours and at least drops us at the departures terminal. My credit card offers a $15 month Uber credit which I used on this trip ($35, including tip).
We did not eat breakfast, but I packed a bag of dried fruit for our daughter to snack on at the airport and on the plane. At the airport the Dad and Pops needed a coffee badly. We stopped at Starbucks and got 2 grande PSLs because are basic that way and a bottle of water for Belle ($17).
After a quick 2 hours in the air, we arrived at MCO’s beautiful Terminal C. It was noon and we were starting to get hungry. We picked up our one checked bag and hailed an Uber which got us to Saratoga Springs by 1:00 ($50, including tip). We got very lucky, and our room was ready for us when we arrived, which meant we did not need to store our bags while we waited. Online check-in let us go straight to our room to drop our bags and finally get some lunch! We could have walked to Disney Springs for food, but we were ravenous and headed to the much closer Artist’s Palette. The adults got a plant-based gyro ($10.99), chicken Caesar ($11.99), and an order of the house-made chips ($4.99). Belle got a mac and cheese kids’ meal ($7.29) ($35.26). I brought refillable water bottles with us from home so we were not paying $3.75 every time someone wanted a bottled water. Because we have full-sized fridge in the room, I bought a large bottle of OJ ($8) to take back to the room. We knew we would be getting dinner and candy at the Magic Kingdom during the party.
By this time, it was 2pm. Properly fed after having been on the go since 6am, we headed to our villa to freshen up, rest for a moment and get ready for the Halloween party. We took the Disney bus ($0) to Magic Kingdom and were inside the park by 4:30.
At the party, Belle talked us into buying the party-exclusive mouse ears ($34.99) and the Candy Corn Soft-serve Sundae ($7.79). We really need to keep that kid off Instagram. I insisted that dinner could not be solely sugar-based, and we were starting to get hangry by 7pm. At Cosmic Ray’s we got a burger ($13.79), sandwich ($12.99), and a kid’s meal ($7.29).
Total day one: $172.11
Day two: We stayed through the end of the party and got back to our room after midnight. That meant sleeping in until a relatively leisurely 8am. We snacked on some party chocolate and the adults took advantage of the in-room coffee maker. Belle had some OJ.
Today we are going to Epcot. Because we bought Lightning Lane ahead of time, we aren’t concerned with missing early morning here. We took Disney transportation from Saratoga Springs. We had an early lunch at Connections Eatery with a seared tuna salad ($12.99), black bean burger ($13.49), and a kid’s meal ($8.49). For dinner, we grazed the Food and Wine booths including a couple of cocktails for the parents ($75).
Total day two: $109.97
Day three: This is our last full day at WDW. Today we are going to Hollywood Studios. As resort guests, we get early entry and will use this time for Slinky Dog Dash instead of purchasing LL Multi-pass. Because we did not want to waste precious morning time during Early Entry, the parents did not get our Starbucks until 9am ($15). We had early lunch at Docking Bay 7 – pork ribs ($16.99), falafel ($13.29), a kid’s meal ($9.49), and 2 beers ($29).
Belle is a huge Star Wars fan (we really have called her Rey in this story). We got lucky and avoided purchasing a light saber but couldn’t get out without the Grogu 10” Squishmallows plush ($22.99).
We had dinner at PizzeRizzo because sometimes kids only want bad pizza. Our pepperoni pizza ($11.79), plant-based sandwich ($10.79), and kids pizza meal ($7.59) provided little satisfaction to anyone but Belle. After barely touching our cardboard pizza/sandwich, the adults split French fries with cheese sauce ($5.99)and Belle got a “Wookie Cookie” ($6.79) from Backlot Express.
It was a full day, and we took the bus back to our hotel knowing we had to head home tomorrow.
Total day three: $149.71
Day four: It’s time to head home. Luckily our flight isn’t too early so we can get one last taste of Disney magic for breakfast (see what I did there). We have a character meal at Cape May Café. It would be much more convenient to Uber between the resorts to get there, but we opt to use Disney transportation. Being at a resort served by the Skyliner would have made this much easier. We took a Disney bus to Hollywood Studios and a Friendship boat to the Beach Club. Breakfast came to ($161.20). Not wanting to spend an hour again on Disney transportation, we took an Uber back to the resort ($30). It was finally time to end our trip. We Ubered to the airport ($50), got on our flight, and one last Uber home ($50).
Total day four: $291.20
What do you think of this family’s budget? Did anything surprise you? Would you do things differently? Talk about it (respectfully!) in the comments.
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