This is an entry for “split stay” in our Disneyland 101 Glossary: Disneyland Resort definitions in under 101 words, from Mouse Brief. For advice from our own split stay experience, keep reading after the entry.
“Split-stay” is a term some guests use to describe staying at more than one hotel over the course of a Disneyland vacation. An example of a split stay would be a one week vacation where you stayed at Pixar Place Hotel for Sunday through Wednesday night and then moved over to Disneyland Hotel for Thursday through Saturday night. A split stay can involve all Disneyland Resort Hotels, all off-site hotels (like Good Neighbor Hotels) or Disneyland Resort hotels and off-site hotels. You may want to consider a split stay in order to experience more hotels or save money.
Thank you for reading this entry about split stays at Disneyland Resort. For more Disney definitions under 101 words, please explore our Disneyland 101 Glossary.
We have a comparison chart of the Disneyland Resort Hotels here. We alay offer advice for how to choose one here and for how to make the most of your stay here. For our comprehensive guide to picking a hotel at or near Disneyland Resort, see Staying Near Disneyland: Book the Best Hotel for You.
And, for more on split stays, keep reading.
Tips for Split Stays at Disneyland Resort
We want to share a few quick tips for split stays at Disneyland Resort. Remember, a split stay simply means you are staying at more than one hotel (or other type of accommodation) during a single Disneyland visit. Perhaps you are switching from the dynamic Pixar Place Hotel to the soaring Disney’s Grand Californian Hotel and Spa. Or maybe you are splitting your time between the iconic Disneyland Hotel and a convenient and (more) budget friendly hotel on Harbor Boulevard. These trips even work if you are doing something like splitting your time between a beach hotel and a Disneyland Resort stay.
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Let’s look at our tips for split stays at Disneyland Resort
Make Good Use of Bell Services
We think the biggest hassle of a split stay is moving your stuff from one location to another. Fortunately, hotel bell services significantly eases the burden. At Disneyland Resort Hotels, bell services will move and hold your luggage for you. They have even accommodated us when we had food items that needed refrigeration.
All of this is very important on transition days. If you are moving from one hotel to another, you will probably need to check-out of one room before your next room is ready. Bell services at most hotel around Disneyland Resort will hold you luggage when you have no room. In our experience, Disneyland Resort Hotels and some other area hotels will even hold perishable items and those that need refrigeration.
If you are staying at two (or three) Disneyland Resort Hotels, the news gets even better: Disneyland Resort Hotels bell services have routinely transported luggage between Disney owned hotels.
This last service is not available when moving between an off-site hotel and a Disneyland Resort Hotel, but it has been offered to guests moving between Disneyland Resort Hotels. We suggest calling your hotel ahead of your stay to make sure this service is available, but Disneyland Resort has traditionally offered to move guest luggage between Disneyland Resort Hotels.
Pack Strategically for Your Disneyland Split Stay
Of course, you will need to get that luggage packed-up yourself, so we suggest taking this into consideration when planning a split stay.
First, look at the amount of luggage you plan to take on your vacation, and think about how you will feel about packing this all up mid-trip. We have done a split stay with young children, and we enjoyed it. However, we would really recommend thinking about your own situation in advance. If you are traveling with very young children, you may need to take into account diapers, folding cribs and the reality that your kids will not be much help when you are packing (even though they have a lot of stuff). Is this worth it for you?
If your answer is still yes, then pack strategically. Perhaps you will decide to “live out of a suitcase” for the first part of your stay and not fully unpack. If this is the case, we suggest making use of a laundry bag for easily packing soiled clothes. Alternatively, you could use packing cubes and keep clean and dirty clothing separate in your bag.
Here is the laundry bag we use and recommend. For a better deal, you can often find that laundry bag bundled with a packing cube and pouch, and here is a link for that.
Use Packing Cubes
Actually, we think packing cubes are helpful also if you do decide to move your items into hotel drawers or closets. We like to keep our clothing bundled inside the cubes and place the cubes into hotel drawers unzipped. This keeps our clothing organized and easy to access during our stay. If we are moving from one spot to another, we can also easily zip these cubes closed and toss them back in our luggage. We like our Eagle Creek packing cubes like these. We also use garment folders like the one included in this nice set.
Often, we even pre-plan our outfits and bundle outfits into cubes organized by the days we plan to wear them. When we do this, we unpack just the outfits we plan to wear—and the other things we need—for a particular portion of our trip. We leave everything else in our suitcases and tuck those suitcases out of the way. This approach is kind of similar to what we shared in our How We Get to Disneyland In Time for Opening (aka Rope Drop)
Consider Your Split Stay Transition Day
We have written quite a bit about how we like to schedule non-park-days into our Disneyland Resort visits. We will not reiterate that all here, but you can read about it in our article Maximize Value: Take a Rest Day at Disneyland.
As you plan your split stay, consider how you are going to make time for the packing and the transition. Perhaps you will return from the theme parks on one day and pack that evening. You could then check-out and take your luggage to bell services before heading to the parks.
We prefer to realize maximize our time in Disneyland Park and Disney California Adventure Park and focus our park days on the parks. For this reason, we do our transitions on non-park days. Remember, you have access to your Disneyland Resort Hotel amenities all day on check-in and check-out days. On your transition day, you can pack-up, check-out, leave your luggage with bell services and spend the day at the pool. This is how we prefer to handle split stays.
End Your Disneyland Split Stay with the Show Stopper
I am a big fan of the Great British Bake-off (aka Great British Baking Show). In that competition, the last baking challenge on any given weekend is also the most elaborate: the “Show Stopper.” If you are doing a split stay, we recommend that you finish strong with your own show stopper hotel.
What we mean is, pick the hotel that excites you most and place it last in your stay. It’s so much better to move from a perfectly nice hotel to a great one. When you do it the other way, what formerly felt perfectly nice can look dingy. And if you have young kids, you probably want to avoid a situation where they keep asking you when they can go back to the good pool.
Of course this approach does not always work out. We ignored our own advice once when we got a much better price on our hotel stay by switching the dates around. You will have to make your own calculations. Still, when conditions allow it, put the show stopper last.
Thanks for reading this entry for “split stay” in our Disneyland 101 Glossary.
For more tips and Disney definitions under 101 words, please visit our Disneyland 101 Glossary. And for help planning your trip, please explore our free and complete Step-by-Step Disneyland Prep, that includes guidance on choosing your hotel or hotels with Staying Near Disneyland: Book the Best Hotel for You. Thanks again for reading.