Curious About Cost for Disney Sea Trip

[have2getaway]

I have heard it can be less expensive to visit Disney Sea and Disneyland Paris. We spent 8k on a trip for 5 to Disney World so just curious how a trip to either of these parks would compare in cost from those who have been to both (DW & DS) or (DW & DLP)? I'm assuming the air transportation is where we would see the biggest difference. Our airfare to Disney Workd was slightly under $1,000.

 

[Karin1984]

It can be, if you would just go to Disneyland. In slow season Disneyland Paris is 2 days minimum for both parks and as I understand for Tokyo it's 3 days minimum (but also to do with the daily crowds of the 2 Tokyo parks). I don't think either Disney Tokyo or Disneyland Paris is a vacation destination on its own, like WDW can be.

However, when you are flying such a long distance, you will probably want to spend time to see Paris/France/Europe/Tokyo/Japan in general. Especially when travelling with children to another country, it's a perfect opportunity to show them what's beyond the borders of their own lives.

There are a lot of variables to consider, are your children under or over 12 years old and do you need to travel in school vacations? This can influence your air fare immensely. I suggest to play around with websites like Skyscanner to see what your airfare will be. Same for the parks, go to the websites of Disneyland Paris or Disneyland Tokyo and play around with dates etc. Approx. 1EUR = $1, 120 JPY = $1

But depending on the season, I don't think you will find roundtrip tickets in Economy for less than $600 per person. Which leaves you about $1,000 per person, which is plenty if you would only do Disney. But if you would want to stay longer than a week, and you take also other hotels, sightseeing, food & drink, tours, transportation, hidden costs (like passports), into consideration, I'm not sure if you can do it for 8k.

This would be a good time to look if you have credit card rewards you can use on intercontinental flights. This is usually better value than using them on domestic flights.

Have fun researching!

 

[wanderlust7]

Under $1000 plane tickets to Orlando for 5? That's a great price. We paid about $350/person last time from San Francisco area to Orlando. Our flights to Tokyo were $1100/person - early summer and adding a stopover (+$100/person). I may have been able to do slightly better but I was fixated on the United flights that were non-stop all segments.

Our total for our family of 4 for the Japan part of the trip (flights, hotels, food, activities, souvenirs, etc) was just a tad under $10K for 11 nights. This included 1 night at MiraCosta, 1 night at Tokyo Disneyland Hotel (cheapest option for both), 3 nights at the Sheraton Tokyo Bay (on the monorail line), 4 nights in Tokyo, and 2 nights at a ryokan in Nikko.

Of course this is all highly dependent on the exchange rate. It averaged about 105 yen when we were there, but some of the hotels were paid earlier when the exchange rate was better.

Park tickets are definitely cheaper. 4 day ticket is 22,400 yen (or $200 at today's exchange rate of 112), compared to WDW is about $340 for non park hoppers. I found the food at TDR a little cheaper than at WDW and better quality. Also, no tipping in Japan! So that makes a big difference at the sit down places.

However, when you are flying such a long distance, you will probably want to spend time to see Paris/France/Europe/Tokyo/Japan in general. Especially when travelling with children to another country, it's a perfect opportunity to show them what's beyond the borders of their own lives.

Totally agree with this! We had an awesome trip. WDW is great too and I want to go again, but it's just a different type of trip.

Happy planning!

 

[Nomarian]

I agree with everyone else that the cost depends on a lot of factors. We did Disneyland Paris about 1 1/2 years ago. I got the airfare free since I travel for work so much, so we splurged and stayed at the Disneyland hotel in front of the park for 3 days. After that, we spent another 3 days in Paris exploring. I would probably say that it did not seem much more than WDW in the states, but you need to watch the exchange rate also. Where do you normally stay at WDW and where do you normally eat?

 

[have2getaway]

Our most recent trip we stayed at the Polynesian and had the deluxe dining plan so ate at many signature restaurants, but we both decided we didn't care to eat at that many sit down restaraunts on our next trip. We did enjoy the resort.

 

[wanderlust7]

The rates for the Tokyo Disneyland Resort hotels are fixed and don't get discounted. Here's the price list so you can compare to what you spent on the Polynesian.

http://www.disneyhotels.jp/pdf/pricelist_2016.pdf?_ga=1.53367016.1798901758.1481560783

 

[have2getaway]

The rates for the Tokyo Disneyland Resort hotels are fixed and don't get discounted. Here's the price list so you can compare to what you spent on the Polynesian.

http://www.disneyhotels.jp/pdf/pricelist_2016.pdf?_ga=1.53367016.1798901758.1481560783

Thank you! I'm assuming these rates in yen are per night?

 

[wanderlust7]

Thank you! I'm assuming these rates in yen are per night?

Yes per night and include tax.

 

[have2getaway]

It can be, if you would just go to Disneyland. In slow season Disneyland Paris is 2 days minimum for both parks and as I understand for Tokyo it's 3 days minimum (but also to do with the daily crowds of the 2 Tokyo parks). I don't think either Disney Tokyo or Disneyland Paris is a vacation destination on its own, like WDW can be.

However, when you are flying such a long distance, you will probably want to spend time to see Paris/France/Europe/Tokyo/Japan in general. Especially when travelling with children to another country, it's a perfect opportunity to show them what's beyond the borders of their own lives.

There are a lot of variables to consider, are your children under or over 12 years old and do you need to travel in school vacations? This can influence your air fare immensely. I suggest to play around with websites like Skyscanner to see what your airfare will be. Same for the parks, go to the websites of Disneyland Paris or Disneyland Tokyo and play around with dates etc. Approx. 1EUR = $1, 120 JPY = $1

But depending on the season, I don't think you will find roundtrip tickets in Economy for less than $600 per person. Which leaves you about $1,000 per person, which is plenty if you would only do Disney. But if you would want to stay longer than a week, and you take also other hotels, sightseeing, food & drink, tours, transportation, hidden costs (like passports), into consideration, I'm not sure if you can do it for 8k.

This would be a good time to look if you have credit card rewards you can use on intercontinental flights. This is usually better value than using them on domestic flights.

Have fun researching!

Our oldest son is 15 and we have triplet boys who are 7. We pulled them out of school for our last trip. It was harder for our older son so that would be a consideration; I was hoping not to do that again. Is Christmas time equally as busy at Disneyland Paris and Disney Sea as it is at WDW? What is considered the off-season? My biggest concern with Tokyo is the language barrier, added to the fact that our younger sons have speech delays, but Disney Sea is still very enticing. I took French and have been to Paris and stayed with a French family as part of an exchange so I would definitely be more comfortable there. I would love for them to see the historical places I went to years ago (Versailles, Mont St. Michelle). I wouldn't even know where to start in Japan?

 

[Karin1984]

You went with 5 of your family to WDW, but this will be 6 people? You, your S.O, 15-year old and 7-yeard old triplets. I'm not an expert on hotel rooms, but that can be more complicated.

I completely understand the language problem, I'm also a bit hesitant about my own upcoming Asia trip, I'm sure that with miming we will get by. Please be aware that sometimes in France and DLP you can come across people & CM who do not speak English, so speaking a bit of French can come in handy.

I don't know about Disney Sea yet, but what I read best for Tokyo parks are January, April/May (but avoid Golden Week), Summer could be doable, but the weather is hot. And with researching your trip, just start with reading about Tokyo, get a travel guide and you will find places to start. Or with tdrexplorer.com it's a great place to start for the Tokyo parks and when to travel.

Paris is my homepark and during (national) holidays it can be incredibly busy, but I don't think as bad as WDW or Tokyo. Low season here is basically avoid French holidays and school vacations. https://www.schoolholidayseurope.eu/france.html But as it's very easy for other European countries to go to DLP sometimes non-French holidays can be busy as well. During St. Patrick's day and the Welsh Festival the entire UK comes over.

But if I may put a new idea in your head What about Disneyland Hong Kong? From what I've read it rarely gets busy (exclude Chinese New Year and holidays, but as these are different from most western countries, it's easier to find off-season). It's a one/two day park, it's a former British colony and more people speak English than in other regions of Asia. Plus it's loaded with culture and history.

 

[wanderlust7]

Is Christmas time equally as busy at Disneyland Paris and Disney Sea as it is at WDW? What is considered the off-season? My biggest concern with Tokyo is the language burier, added to the fact that our younger sons have speech delays, but Disney Sea is still very enticing.

The Disney hotels are at top pricing for Christmas week, so I think that's pretty telling how busy it is. Here are a couple of crowd calendars. First one is in Japanese, decipherable using google translate.
http://www15.plala.or.jp/gcap/disney/
http://tdrnavi.jp/forecast/disneyland?lang=en

We're tied to the school calendar as well. We went in early June as soon as the kids got out of school. The Disney hotels on weekdays were value pricing. The crowd level on the weekdays felt okay. We went to Tokyo Disneyland on a Sunday and it was definitely more crowded but still manageable. Thinking back to when we went to WDW in early April before Easter (which was late that year), I think WDW felt more crowded.

One of the nice things about TDR is that the Japanese people are very polite and orderly. For parades, everyone sits except the people at the very back, so we just sat down about 15 minutes before several rows back and didn't have a problem seeing.

The weather was humid and a bit hot if the sun was out, think temperature was about 80 degrees F. Not bad at all and this is coming from a spoiled Californian weather wise. Not sure when your kids get out of school, but I would be more worried with late June since that's when the rainy season starts.

As for the language barriers, it wasn't that big of a deal. In tourist areas, if the employee can't understand you, they can usually find someone who can. Or for simple things, they remember a few English words along with hand gestures, it works out. I basically got along with only arigato (thank you - though arigatou gozaimasu would be more polite) and sumimasen (sorry/excuse me).

Most restaurant have pictures in the menus you can point to. The menus at TDR have English. At counter service restaurants, if the menu is on a board, the CM will pull out a menu you can point to if they're not sure they understood you correctly or if they want to ask you about an option for the meal sets.

Good luck deciding Japan or France, I don't think you can go wrong either way.

 

[Nomarian]

Karin, we are kind of in the same boat. My oldest son is 15 and my youngest is 12. I took them to Paris and London a few years ago because I wanted them to start experiencing other cultures. I was a little worried about Paris since we don't speak French, but a few weeks of learning some basic phrases before going really helped. I am now in the middle of planning for Tokyo and we will be there for about 11 days. We plan on going in late May, which is a very slow time for Tokyo Disneyland and we plan to be there on weekdays which is even slower. We are leaving right after our kids get out of school. The kids already have apps loaded on their phones to learn some basic phrases.

As for the cost, we are staying much longer in Japan that we would for WDW, but I am finding the cost to be either the same or less thanks to a decent exchange rate currently. You will run into an issue that I did is that most hotel occupancy limits are 3 per room. I found a few hotels that will do 4 which helped a lot, but that was one of big issues so far. That and the fact of actually booking something through the website was a little rough at first.

I think planning any trip is stressful, especially international ones. Just breath and start with one part of the trip and build it out from there. You can either start with the hotel or the dates. I did the dates, because as everyone has noted, it can be very crowded and I worked our trip around the slow times of the year. Hope that helps you out a bit.

 

[have2getaway]

January would be the time we would most likely go. Thank you to all for the very helpful feedback.

Karin, to be honest, I never even considered Hong Kong, but I guess I should take a look. My coworker has traveled to China several times for our institution and I'm sure she would be a good resource for me. Something about Disney Sea just really intrigued me. My family really loved Epcot and so I thought they would enjoy this as well. France was a natural consideration because of familiarity, but also because our boys are VERY into castles and keep asking us to take them to one. It's not easy to find a Medieval castle in the US. Anyway, I'm so glad to hear all of the suggestions and encouragement because I was ready to just do the easy thing and plan another trip to WDW out of fear of spending a lot of money on something that may or may not be a hit.

 

[have2getaway]

Karin, we are kind of in the same boat. My oldest son is 15 and my youngest is 12. I took them to Paris and London a few years ago because I wanted them to start experiencing other cultures. I was a little worried about Paris since we don't speak French, but a few weeks of learning some basic phrases before going really helped. I am now in the middle of planning for Tokyo and we will be there for about 11 days. We plan on going in late May, which is a very slow time for Tokyo Disneyland and we plan to be there on weekdays which is even slower. We are leaving right after our kids get out of school. The kids already have apps loaded on their phones to learn some basic phrases.

As for the cost, we are staying much longer in Japan that we would for WDW, but I am finding the cost to be either the same or less thanks to a decent exchange rate currently. You will run into an issue that I did is that most hotel occupancy limits are 3 per room. I found a few hotels that will do 4 which helped a lot, but that was one of big issues so far. That and the fact of actually booking something through the website was a little rough at first.

I think planning any trip is stressful, especially international ones. Just breath and start with one part of the trip and build it out from there. You can either start with the hotel or the dates. I did the dates, because as everyone has noted, it can be very crowded and I worked our trip around the slow times of the year. Hope that helps you out a bit.

Thank you! I wondered if we would have difficulty finding rooms for a party of 6. I was a bit confused about the option for a younger child to 'share' a bed. Our triplets are just 7 and would be 8 when we travel so I guess I was under the impression that we could all fit in one room. Is that incorrect?

 

[have2getaway]

The Disney hotels are at top pricing for Christmas week, so I think that's pretty telling how busy it is. Here are a couple of crowd calendars. First one is in Japanese, decipherable using google translate.
http://www15.plala.or.jp/gcap/disney/
http://tdrnavi.jp/forecast/disneyland?lang=en

We're tied to the school calendar as well. We went in early June as soon as the kids got out of school. The Disney hotels on weekdays were value pricing. The crowd level on the weekdays felt okay. We went to Tokyo Disneyland on a Sunday and it was definitely more crowded but still manageable. Thinking back to when we went to WDW in early April before Easter (which was late that year), I think WDW felt more crowded.

One of the nice things about TDR is that the Japanese people are very polite and orderly. For parades, everyone sits except the people at the very back, so we just sat down about 15 minutes before several rows back and didn't have a problem seeing.

The weather was humid and a bit hot if the sun was out, think temperature was about 80 degrees F. Not bad at all and this is coming from a spoiled Californian weather wise. Not sure when your kids get out of school, but I would be more worried with late June since that's when the rainy season starts.

As for the language barriers, it wasn't that big of a deal. In tourist areas, if the employee can't understand you, they can usually find someone who can. Or for simple things, they remember a few English words along with hand gestures, it works out. I basically got along with only arigato (thank you - though arigatou gozaimasu would be more polite) and sumimasen (sorry/excuse me).

Most restaurant have pictures in the menus you can point to. The menus at TDR have English. At counter service restaurants, if the menu is on a board, the CM will pull out a menu you can point to if they're not sure they understood you correctly or if they want to ask you about an option for the meal sets.

Good luck deciding Japan or France, I don't think you can go wrong either way.

Is TDR considered the premier resort? Overall, did you enjoy Tokyo Disneyland better than WDW?

 

[wanderlust7]

Is TDR considered the premier resort? Overall, did you enjoy Tokyo Disneyland better than WDW?

Hmm...I think DisneySea is generally considered to be the best Disney park in the world. Tokyo Disneyland is similar to Magic Kingdom and Disneyland in California, Pooh's Hunny Hunt and Monsters, Inc are the two bigger differences.

As to whether we enjoyed TDR or WDW better...we all got some sort of noro-like bug the second week of our WDW trip. Not fun. So the Japan trip was definitely better for us - everyone stayed healthy!

But that aside, I enjoyed both for different reasons.

WDW is very immersive with so much to do - from the parks, to the water parks, to mini golf, etc. We stayed onsite and didn't leave "The World" the entire 2 weeks except for a couple of grocery runs. The most memorable things for me weren't so much the parks or the big ticket rides (which were great), but the other things like doing the Phineas and Ferb game at Epcot with DS, or taking the boat from Contemporary to Fort Wilderness to see Hoop-Dee-Doo.

TDR isn't really like that. It's more like California - 2 parks, a few hotels, a shopping area. But going to TDR is also about going to Japan and experiencing a different culture. DH and I really like Japanese food, so that was a big draw as well. I also like that it's a really safe country with great customer service everywhere (not just at Disney).

 

[wanderlust7]

Thank you! I wondered if we would have difficulty finding rooms for a party of 6. I was a bit confused about the option for a younger child to 'share' a bed. Our triplets are just 7 and would be 8 when we travel so I guess I was under the impression that we could all fit in one room. Is that incorrect?

The Disney hotels policy is under age 12 can bedshare, so you can just get a triple room (i.e. 3 beds). The Sheraton and Hilton Tokyo Bay also have larger rooms that you can all fit into.

The problem is finding hotels in Tokyo proper that will fit 6 since the hotel rooms in the city are typically smaller. I had a hard enough time finding one that will fit 4 and figuring out the bed sharing policies. It's very likely you'll have to do 2 hotel rooms. Or rent an apartment through VRBO or AirBnB - though there were some posts recently about if that was legal.

 

[jamarmiller]

I just spent the last three days here ( Tuesday Wednesday Thursday ) . It's my 7th time visiting over the last 16 years and it is most likely my last . At the moment I can't ever see myself going back .

The Park was guesstimated to be 49 percent full on those crappy crowd calendar sites listed above , which I guess means at least three hour waits for rides and 1 hour and a half wait for stuff like popcorn . So if that's your thing , then you might enjoy it. For my kids , wife , and I , it is not

It's just become way too crowded and is now just one massive disappointment for my wife and kids . Plus with shanghai being opened now it's actually easier , quicker , and cheaper for us to fly out of the country ( we live in Japan most of the year ) and go to the china ( or even Hong Kong ) resort.

I'll never waiste my time or money on this place again .

A little sad because they are beautiful parks .

The problem is not only are most days crazy busy as stated above but for someone who is from Florida ( me ) the weather in Japan sucks 70 percent of the time . So if you do manage to get lucky and find a day that has decent crowd levels, you still have a 70 % chance of getting ****ty weather .

Never again .

 

[rkold]

Just to warn you now, depending on where you are from, Tokyo in January is COLD! I've been to Japan in January and February and while I've enjoyed my trips it seemed really cold and yes, I am from the NorthEast so I should be used to the cold, but I guess because I was outside touring so much it was harder.

Christmas itself is not a holiday in Japan, but New Years is and there are a lot of holidays in late December around New Years and post New Years making it an expensive and crowded time. I also personally find New Years really hard as a tourist because so many things close for 3-4 days. I've only been to Japan once for New Years, and I'm not willing to go back unless I am actually living there.

I went to Tokyo DisneySea once in '09 in October. It was insanely crowded. Everything had 2+ hour lines and I was pretty miserable. It's a beautiful park, but I'd rather be out being touristy than paying money to walk around a theme park. I go to a theme park for rides and attractions, not to admire the scenery. Yes, while doing my rides and attractions I love a good atmosphere, but that is not enough on its own.

We are going to try Tokyo Disney again in June. All the crowd calendar sites claim it should not be so bad for our dates. I'm planning to stay on property so we can park hop because I know we can't make a day of DisneySea because my daughter is under 117 cm which means: Indiana Jones, Raging Spirits, and Journey to the Center of the Earth are no goes. She didn't enjoy WDW!Tower of Terror so that is also a no go.

We went to Tokyo for 10 days last June post school. I think we paid about 2k for airfare (like a previous poster I only want direct flights, and I specifically wanted JAL or ANA. I prefer Japanese airlines), another $400 for rail passes, maybe $100 for other train/subway/bus trips. (At the time my daughter was under 6 so she was free on public transportation. However I did buy her a rail pass, so we could reserve seats on the shinkansen. I was not going to have her sit on my lap for 2+ hours!) I splurged $450 for 1 night at the Tokyo Station Hotel, which is amazing and might have rooms for a family of 6, but it will cost you a lot. (I would also check other luxury hotels or ryokans since they are more likely to have rooms that fit more people.) We then spent a little under $400 for 2 nights in Hakone. $574 for 4 nights in Kyoto, $250 for 1 night special package for Osaka Universal, and about $500 for 3 more nights in Tokyo for a grand total of: 2174. The Tokyo Station was the only hotel I stayed on par with the Poly. So 4674, plus meals, activities outside of Universal, and lots of souvenirs. This was for 1 adult and 1 child at the end of June. I find WDW is cheaper, but we are DVC owners and I never do a meal plan because it's so not worth it for how we eat. We usually stay at the Poly or VGF. Hope this helps!

 

[AquaDame]

I just spent the last three days here ( Tuesday Wednesday Thursday ) . It's my 7th time visiting over the last 16 years and it is most likely my last . At the moment I can't ever see myself going back .

The Park was guesstimated to be 49 percent full on those crappy crowd calendar sites listed above , which I guess means at least three hour waits for rides and 1 hour and a half wait for stuff like popcorn . So if that's your thing , then you might enjoy it. For my kids , wife , and I , it is not

It's just become way too crowded and is now just one massive disappointment for my wife and kids . Plus with shanghai being opened now it's actually easier , quicker , and cheaper for us to fly out of the country ( we live in Japan most of the year ) and go to the china ( or even Hong Kong ) resort.

I'll never waiste my time or money on this place again .

A little sad because they are beautiful parks .

The problem is not only are most days crazy busy as stated above but for someone who is from Florida ( me ) the weather in Japan sucks 70 percent of the time . So if you do manage to get lucky and find a day that has decent crowd levels, you still have a 70 % chance of getting ****ty weather .

Never again .

The crowd calendar says Tues 83, Wed 48, Thurs 67... was it different before you left? I'm also curious what the discount for students is and if that drew the crowds in, I hadn't noticed that before. I'm so sorry you had a bad trip. Shanghai also gets bad weather... Florida really is pretty special in its location but as someone from a more temperate climate I find Florida unbearable for several months of the year. I could never live there. My husband is excited that he won't melt at this park....