We are a Disney fanatic family. We live in the Orlando area so it's only a 40 min drive for us to get to the parks. We are going this weekend as a matter of fact!! Woohoo! We get our season tickets each yr. and we make the most of the money spent. Yes it is expensive but if you know what you are doing and the ways to play the game...you can definitely cut part of the cost out. For example...buy one bottle of water and just refill it from the water fountains. Yes that may sound cheap to some of you but if you are one to complain about the cost, then figure out ways to get back some of that expense. There are things you can do with the food...burgers for example have two patties in most of the food places now (for whatever reason) so purchase a burger and fries meal and then get an extra bun...use the second patty for that bun and go put the condiments on it. This is good for kids. Or cut one burger in half and split it between two children. If you need extra fries get an order of fries separately.
If you are a Florida Resident and have seasonal tickets...then you know that the seasonal tickets do not include parking...which is ridiculous because FL residents should get the best of everything...WE LIVE HERE!...anyway...do what we did... we got 3 seasonal tickets for our family. We knew we would go a LOT with these tickets (which we do) so for, $120 which I believe was the cost, we upgraded one of our tickets to an annual which DOES include parking. Now we save that money each time we go because we upgraded ONE ticket. At the time of this past upgrade parking was $12 per visit. If we went 10 times this yr and we did, that 120$ was paid for. Now if I am not mistaken parking is either at or going to $15. We plan to get our tickets again for 2010 before these expire and again it will be paid for.
So all it takes is a little thinking outside the box. You can save money, you just gotta figure out how.
Disney is a big money hungry place, sadly. Mr. Disney rolls over in his grave everyday I'm afraid. But aside from all the lines and the really hot weather (which we don't go in the summer time because of the heat) we LOVE Disney and always will. Personally for me, I may be above the 100 visits count. Born and raised here. Hope I never have to leave.
