Amy, and I have always been the type of people who live out of our suitcases on a vacation. Thus, it should come as no surprise that split stays and resort hopping became quite the norm for us after becoming Disney Vacation Club Members.
For those unfamiliar with the term or idea, this means that rather than stay in the same room or resort for an entire vacation, we move around quite a bit. For example, on a recent 8-night trip we, elected to bounce around between the following five resorts:
- Bay Lake Tower at Disney’s Contemporary Resort
- Disney’s Animal Kingdom Villas – Kidani Village
- Disney’s BoardWalk Villas
- Disney’s Saratoga Springs Resort & Spa
- The Villas at Disney’s Grand Floridian Resort & Spa
While this type of trip may not be suitable for everyone, Amy and I enjoy the flexibility it provides, as well as the opportunity to see and experience multiple DVC resorts in a single vacation.
The planning begins at the 11-month mark with a reservation already secured at one of our home resorts. Once our 7-month window opens, a certain obsession takes over leading to daily (…and by daily I mean hourly) searches for availability at other resorts. Typically, these days and rooms become available for smaller one or two-day periods due to other members changing their reservations.
When planning split stays of this type, we have found it best to plan our resort transfers around days that we are prepared to spend entirely in the parks. This allows for an easy process of dropping off our luggage at bell services when departing in the morning and picking it up or having it delivered to our new resort and room after 5 pm when checking in that evening.
Aside from the ability to experience two or more resorts in a single trip, we have also found a few other reasons to consider split stays. Let’s say you really want to stay at a resort that costs too many points for your entire trip. You could book that resort for a few nights along with a more point-friendly resort for the remainder of your stay. Additionally, as DVC members we are all too aware that availability can be competitive. In some cases resort hopping or a split stay may be the only option for experiencing a resort where longer reservations are hard to come by.
My advice: If you think you can manage the logistics of it give it a try! It may be the key to giving you and your family more flexibility when booking your next DVC vacation.
I love split stays- and yes, agree that transfer days are best to be coordinated with park days. We learned that lesson last year… We had a gap in middle of day and without luggage and planning ahead w swim suits, etc- we kinda felt stranded. We are family of four and love the adventure 🙂
We always do split stays. Although I will say you two are better road warriors than our family. We usually do two 4-night stays. Feels like two vacations.
Same here, always do a split stay, usually 4 days over by Magic Kingdom and 3 or 4 days over by Epcot/Hollywood Studios. Love it
I’m the opposite, don’t like split stays. I feel my vacation has to stop and then start over. I stay put.
My feelings exactly. We tried a split stay one time, and I’ll never do it again.
I love split stays, but don’t transfer rooms on a resort day. We also generally have a car, so we throw our luggage in the car as opposed to leaving with Bell Services, this ensures we have it if we need anything. On the next trip we go from BWV to VGF and we’ll go to AK the day we switch, take our luggage with us in the car, then head over to VGF in the afternoon when we’re done at the park.
Love split stays but it’s a totally different ball game if you don’t have a car to keep your luggage.