USA 2013

[Brad2912]

Stayed in the Super 8 just down the road from Disneyland. If your looking for a bed & not planning on spending days in the motel room - it's good for what you pay.

[Reanimated35]

Knotts - definately.As for Super 8, they're like out Budget chain here I believe, not the best, but better than camping.From memory I stayed at Holiday Inn and it was quite good. ~$120/night

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

In all honesty, any accommodation around Disneyland will be ok if you're on a budget, but i'd recommend looking towards the higher end properties and trying to find a budget deal with them. We actually found one of the cheapest places (that wasn't just a motel) was Knott's BF hotel, which was a great place to stay and not far from most Anaheim attractions.If you're just looking for a bed, comfort inn's and the like are good too.I guess the biggest problem you're going to have is that you're going in their summer season - it will be great that a lot of their summer attractions will be open for you, but we've literally just returned, and the queues were quite busy.... Summer is just going to be murder.

[westical]

The Best Westerns around Disneyland are a good mixture of value/comfort.

[JacobSibbald]

We stayed at the Holiday Inn just down the road from Bubba Gumps and to your right, it was fantastic for such a cheap cost.

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

On my first USA trip, we stayed at Stovall's Best Western Pavillions - and had good access to almost everything. This time around, the 'Disney' part of our trip we stayed at the Worldmark on Anaheim as a family member is an owner there.

[Bmull19]

We stayed at Howard Johnson. Not the friendliest of staff, but it had good facilities and was next to the diners and only a 5 minute walk from the Disney entrance.

[joz]

If you stay on Habout Blvd or anywhere around there you're pretty much going to be OK, they're all pretty good hotels and only a short walk from the park. In that context I'd also like to say that te Marriott across the road is also good. Plus there's a McDonalds between you and the front gate.

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

No matter where you stay, if you're in the area and at a halfway decent place, they'll have an agreement with Anaheim Resort Transit (ART) and you'll be able to catch an ART bus pretty much all day.

[cadboy]

Soo It looks like we will have 2 and 3/4 days in Orlando. We definitely want to go to universal. Would 1 day be enough to get everything done in the whole of universal if we had the express pass?

Also on the other 1 and 3/4 days would it be worth getting a Disneyworld Hopper to get as much done as possible across the parks (keeping in mind they are open really late) if we have spent 3.5 days at the Disneyland Resort earlier in the trip?

Or should I venture down to Busch Gardens for 1 day and spend the other 3/4 of day enjoying Orlando.

What would you recommend?

Thanks.

[rappa]

In my opinion that's no where near enough time for Disney World. Hell I think 3.5 days would be pushing it. Unless there is something you really want to see I would suggest investing your time in Universal, Sea World and Wet n Wild and skipping Disney altogether. If anything, spend 1 day at Epcot as that is really the unique offering.

[joz]

If you follow all the game plan guides out there and go on a mission first thing in the morning then park hop, it's possible to tick off a majority of major rides at two Disney parks, and maybe get a bit done at a 3rd on the other day, and you could probably skip Magic Kingdom quite happily if you've been at Disneyland recently. It just comes down to if you can enjoy visiting a theme park without any spontaneity and having your day being a quest to be as efficient as possible. I think there's a time and place for it, but to be honest if you think it's likely you'll return then just go to Busch Gardens and save Disney till you can spend time to do it properly. If you're not coming back, and you don't mind visiting theme parks like a soldier on a mission then try and get as much as you can done at the non Magic Kingdom parks. Depending on the crowds you'll have a good chance of knocking out most of the 'E-Ticket' rides.

[cadboy]

Soo We are spending 5 days in anahiem. Would you recommend spending more than 3 days at Disneyland/CA because if not the Southern Californai CityPASS looks like a good option? That said though we are going to Universal Orlando later in the trip.

We are also going to SFMM and SFGreatAventure which should be amazing especially with full Throtle opening soon. Since we are going in peak times a flash pass is a must because we want to get everything done at each park in a day. Is Platinium worth the premium over Gold?

Finally, does anyone have transport suggestions from NYC to SFGA. NJ Transist seems like a good choice but their earliest service arrives after 11am aparently.

Thanks for the tips guys.

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

We used the SoCal city pass to do universal, sea world and disney. In 3 days you can accomplish most major things but you will miss a bit here and there. You have to be efficient about when you start the disney ticket off, because otherwise you won't get a chance at fantasmic, fireworks and world of colour, which in my opinion are all well worth it. If you have to choose - ditch the fireworks. I found it better to do the fireworks and then go to the later showing of fantasmic as there were less crowds, but it's still disastrously hard to manage everything in 3 days.

The only reason I got everything done was because my Wife ended up in a wheelchair on day 3, and the backdoor wheelchair access sped things up considerably.

I honestly believed we would need 4 days there, with park hopping - and again the only reason we didn't was because of the wheelchair - go for 3, but keep your options open for a 4th day in case you do feel the need or desire to go back one more day. It also depends on the season, and what days you go (their operational hours vary from day to day).

As for six flags flash pass - go platinum. the additional benefits - queue once, ride twice, and very minimal wait times meant most of the time if we selected our next ride as we boarded the last, it would be ready for the next one by the time we made our way to it - so essentially little to no waiting time - but be prepared - it allows you to jump a considerable amount of the queue, but you will still queue with the masses - it's not a 'front of the line' pass. It's just like Q4U except the devices are a little bigger... but platinum was well worth it - including the 'pay extra' upgrades for X2 and whatever else they have on the list at the time. no matter what you have got to do a full-service flash pass, because every day is peak season at SFMM - mainly because they run the rides like DW do - low capacity, low staffing, high queue, and don't care.

Seems a pity rather that you'll spend more money at a park like that - they don't seem to deserve it - but it's the only way to get the park done in a day.