Disneyworld Hopper Passes

[Mccree]

My family is heading to Disneyworld in May and we are wondering where the best place is to buy the hopper passess. We have looked online but some of the sites seem alittle shady and we do not want to get scammed.

So for those that have gone in the past, where did you buy your hopper passes?

[Sliver]

We did Disneyland last May and I think we got a pretty good deal for the whole package including hotel, flights and hopper passes from WestJet Vacations.

[Biff]

I would highly recommend grabbing a copy of the UNOFFICIAl guide to Disneyworld. It is published annually and is available at all major bookstores. Amongst a huge array of extremely practical and useful information, ticket purchasing is covered fairly extensively. We were in Florida last summer for two weeks. The Unofficial guide was immensely useful.

[macker]

Check mousesavers, the DIS boards but iirc the best deals were with :
ARES Travel, Disney's online site, or Getaway tickets. We went with Disney's online site as you didn't have to stand in line at the gate to convert the tickets over. I think it was $5 or $10 extra but it made the process easier and I would rather deal direct for the minimal savings...buy before you go and you will save roughly $250 per adult ticket on a 5 day pass.

[Bend it like Bourgeois]

Originally Posted by Biff

I would highly recommend grabbing a copy of the UNOFFICIAl guide to Disneyworld. It is published annually and is available at all major bookstores. Amongst a huge array of extremely practical and useful information, ticket purchasing is covered fairly extensively. We were in Florida last summer for two weeks. The Unofficial guide was immensely useful.

Seconded. It's gold for everything from deals to which lines are shortest. I think one of the sites in there is mousesavers.com

Keep in mind if you buy them at AMA, or anywhere other than Disney and then go to change tickets you will not get full value. Whatever discount or commission was paid you'll have to top up as well.

Just an FYI: you get free entry on your birthday. Just sign up on the Disneyland website.

[Rutuu]

Buying at those booths is kind of a frowned upon by a lot of people, but they actually might fill your needs better. They are actually reputable enough as well that you won't get ripped off.

I find the hopper passes TOO much for what you need. Aka (1 day Magic Kingdom, 1 day EPCOT, 1/2 day Animal Kingdom, 1/2 day MGM and 1 day Typhoon Lagoon). That's 5 days of Disney!...although I think the passes only come in 3 or 7 days.

...anyway that is my experience the two times I've gone.

[Sidney Crosby's Hat]

Might not be a concern of yours, but I went to Disneyland 4 years ago and found that this was extremely useful in terms of figuring out how to minimize wait times, which rides you can actually obtain more than one FASTPASS at a time for (and when to get them), etc. Got the 90-day one for $15. Money well spent.

I only went for one day though so it was in my interest to maximize my time spent there.

http://www.ridemax.com/

[Mccree]

Thanks for all the suggestions.

I am travelling with my two kids ages 5 and 3 along with my wife. We are there for 10 days and were thinking a a 7 day hopper pass. Is that too much to do?

[Biff]

There is never too much Disney. In practical terms, having more days available is simply going to be buying you that much more flexibility. If it's too hot, or you're all too tired, you can beg off early and, maybe, go back later in the day. Lesser days can make people try to do the Disney marathon each day and just end up exhausted and miserable. Also, in my experience, the additional days cost virtually nothing once you get past 5 or 6. Get as many days as you can....and meter the daily dose of Disney to fit your family's needs.

[Mccree]

That mousesavers site has alot of information. I was under the impression that there were only "hopper" passes but there seems to be an option to buy the "base ticket" which allows you one park a day. This option could save us about 300.

Is the ability to hop around worth 300?

[RinkRat13]

PMed you!

[getbak]

As others have said, go to Mousesavers.com to look for ticket deals. Anyone they recommend will be reputable. It's also a good resource for other Disney saving tips.

With kids that age, more days is better. If you're there for 10 days, you might as well get the 10 day hoppers (there's less than $10 difference between the 7 and 10 day tickets).

You can also save some money by getting the non-hopper tickets if you don't plan on visiting more than one park in a given day.

Keep in mind that Disney World is huge (twice the size of Manhattan island), and it takes a minimum of a half hour to get from one park to another. To get from Animal Kingdom to the Magic Kingdom would probably be close to an hour.

The good thing about having a hopper pass is that you can do one park in the morning, go back to the hotel for a couple of hours in the afternoon, then head to another park in the evening, but with kids that are that young, those really long days might burn them out.

[Biff]

As mentioned earlier, my family are avid Disneyites. Unlike Disneyland, where we park-hop all the time, in Disneyworld we never hopped at all. Distance between parks was a factor. Also, we used the Unofficial guide to pick the optimal park to visit each day and stayed, or returned to, that same park.

[Sample00]

when we owned the travel agency, we used Fun Sun vacations to book all of our clients to Disney. They are kind of the tour company experts when it comes to all things Disney.
We found the Park Hopper passes to be good value and you are also able to purchase them in CAD funds for what they sold for in USD.

[dj_patm]

Man, I got so screwed.
I didn't check any online offers or anything on my trip so I payed full price for Hotel in LA and Vegas and my Disneyland tickets.

[Sample00]

Originally Posted by dj_patm

Man, I got so screwed.
I didn't check any online offers or anything on my trip so I payed full price for Hotel in LA and Vegas and my Disneyland tickets.

Let CP be your source for just about everything!

[FanIn80]

Whoa. OK, am I the only one who glanced at the thread title and thought Denis Hopper died?

[Mccree]

Lots of great stuff here. What are peoples thought on the Character Meals?

[Scoopdogg]

Character meals are great for the kids. Its a little expensive buy my daughter absolutely loved it. I'm sure I'll be doing it again someday.