How I Booked A Disney Vacation With Points and Miles

I love vacations and would spend all my money on travel if I could. My husband and I have reached a compromise: I have a yearly vacation budget. We can take one vacation to use the entire budget, or I can be smarter and stretch the budget into more vacations.

In 2021, we decided to take our kids to Disney World for the first time. In April, they would turn four and seven, and who wouldn’t want to go to Disney World for their birthday?

If you have ever researched the cost of a Disney vacation then you know they are not cheap. I know people who have saved for years to take their families to Disney World. I was determined not to be one of those people.

In 2020, I started learning how to use points and miles for vacations. I was determined to find a way to use points and miles to save money on a trip to Disney World. 

BLUF: I learned how to use points for a long weekend trip to Disney World in 2021. I ended up taking my family to Disney every year for five years.Yep, you read that correctly.  I used points and miles to take my family to Disney (or Universal Studios) five years in a row. 

How To Use Points and Miles For Disney World

In this article, I will explain how I booked our flights, hotel, and used points to save on the Disney tickets.  Anyone can do what I did, and it would be easy to scale for more people or a longer vacation. 

I find Disney exhausting, so long weekend trips work better for our family. I also don’t want to use an entire week of valuable PTO on an exhausting family trip versus a vacation.

How I Booked Flights To Disney With Points

In 2021, I was still new to the world of points and miles. I did not understand all the ways to use points and miles for the best value. When booking our flights to Orlando, I made a rookie mistake.  I booked our round-trip flights from DFW to Orlando through the Chase travel portal.

The flight cost 19,000 Chase Ultimate Rewards. This next part is the painful part. The round-trip total savings were $300. At this point in my travel hacking journey, free was free. I had no concept of value per point.

I now know that Chase Ultimate Rewards are a very valuable points currency. I could have gotten more than $300 value from 19,000 Ultimate Rewards Points.  Oh well, live and learn. That was a mistake that I haven’t made again.

Day 1: Travel day

We arrived in Orlando before check-in time. Everyone was starving. Pizza is usually a hit with our kids, so we found NYPD Pizza Lake Cay. We sat at a table outside so the kids could burn off some of the energy bottled up from the flight. The pizza was good, but I can’t say I would intentionally return when visiting Orlando.

How I Used Points For A Hotel Near Disney World

I earned Marriott Bonvoy points from business trips when I stayed at Marriott hotels. I booked the Marriott Grand Vista for 115,500 points for three nights. The room we got was a two-bedroom with a living area and a kitchen. This was the perfect setup for our family.

Many people only want to stay on the property when they go to Disney. They seem to think staying on property gives them more of the Disney experience. I’ve never stayed on property, but I’ve been to Disney four times. I think I’ve gotten plenty of the Disney experience.

Marriott Grand Vista is a timeshare property. They tried to talk us into a timeshare presentation, and we considered attending, but we were only there for three nights and did not have time for the presentation.

After we checked into the hotel, we explored the Marriott Grand Vista property. It was only mid-April, and maybe I’m a little bit of a wimp when it comes to cold water.  The resort-style pool looked great, but I didn’t spend much time in the water.

The kids didn’t care about the water temperature, but they weren’t the strongest swimmers. The whole family didn’t last all that long in the pool. If you’re at this property during warm weather, I highly recommend taking a day off from theme parks. Taking a day off to recharge between days at the theme parks would make the entire experience much more enjoyable.

How To Use Points for Disney Tickets  

Disney tickets are CRAZY expensive. When buying tickets you need to decide if you want to spend most of your time at Disney in line or if you want to spend even more money to get a Fast Pass, Genie, or whatever it’s called this year. Then there is the expensive parking, food, souvenirs, and all the things that will take your money while you are in the park. Overall, it is a crazy expensive trip. 

There are a few ways to use points to cover the expense of the park tickets and help lessen the blow to the vacation budget. 

I’ve only used the method that results in the fewest points needed. Get ready to learn how to save boatloads of money.     

I buy Disney tickets through the Undercover Tourist website using my Capital One Card (Venture or Venture X). Using the Capital One card is the key to this method. Purchases coded as “travel” can be erased at one point per $.01. For example, if you spend $1000 on Disney tickets, “erase” the cost of the tickets with 100,000 Capital One Miles. 

If you buy tickets directly from Disney, they will code as “entertainment,” and then you cannot erase the cost with Capital One Miles.  That would be a costly mistake.

I have used Undercover Tourist five times. It is a legitimate site and the cheapest way to get tickets for Universal Studios or Disney World/Disneyland.

Did I enjoy using many points to erase the cost of my tickets? HECK NO. I had to weigh my options and determine if I wanted to drain my vacation budget for Disney tickets or use points so my family could afford another vacation. The only way to make another vacation happen was to not pay out of pocket for Disney tickets.

This is probably a good time to call out that although it might feel fun to be a points millionaire, the smarter practice is to earn and burn.  Points and miles often face surprise devaluations.  I had the Capital One Miles (points) available and no other specific use in mind so might as well get free Disney tickets.

Don’t worry if you don’t have the exact number of points needed to erase the entire cost of Disney tickets.  You can use whatever points you have and only erase part of the cost.

Day 2: The Magic Kingdom

The first part we explored was Magic Kingdom. I am not someone who is at the park for the rope drop, but my kids wake up no later than 7 AM. Once they were awake, we ate breakfast in our room and headed to the parks for this trip. I did buy the Lightning Lane, but unfortunately, I hadn’t done enough research about how to use it. I don’t think we got value for our money, mostly because I didn’t know what I was doing.

Our kids were four and seven, and the seven-year-old was probably big enough that he didn’t need the double stroller. It was totally worth the money. He wedged his way into that stroller, and he was happy. Because of the double stroller, we could see more of the park, ride more rides, and hear less whining, a win-win.

I’m sure most people expect the souvenirs at a Disney theme park to be overpriced. I discovered the balloons are very overpriced. Normally, if we had paid for the flights and hotel, I would’ve disappointed my children and told them no when they asked for $20 balloons. Because we only paid $5.60 per person for our flights, got the hotel completely for free, and used points for the park tickets, I let them get the overpriced balloons.  Don’t worry, my Mom of the year status was short lived.

I did not anticipate the balloons would still be inflated 2 days after we purchased them. I did not enjoy disappointing the kids by not letting them take the balloons on the flight home. Parenting Tip: Make sure to secretly deflate the balloons the night before you leave.

Day 3: Disney’s Hollywood Studios

The next park we visited was Disney’s Hollywood Studios. Again, we did not participate in the rope-dropping, and I struggled with lightning lanes.

The part of Hollywood Studios we were looking forward to most was the Star Wars area.

I’d read so much about this weird milk drink. Although it was overpriced and had a long line, I had to try it. Was it worth it? Nope.  One and done experience for us.

With kids this young, even though we had a double stroller, I think it would probably be smarter to have a day off between the theme parks. Honestly, I don’t know how people visit Disney for an entire week, visit every park, and take no days off. I would be completely exhagusted.

Day 4: Travel Day

After two very long, tiring, hot, and sweaty days at Magic Kingdom and Hollywood Studios, it was time to head home. We had time after checking out of the hotel and before heading to the airport, so we took the kids to Andretti‘s Indoor Go Kart. To help the kids burn off some energy before the flight, we played bowling with them, and it was a blast.

Final Thoughts About Disney During Covid

You may be shocked that we went to Orlando for only three nights. As I said, I don’t know how people can spend an entire week at Disney. I am not a Disney fanatic, but I am a parent who wants my kids to experience Disney. Over the years, with the help of points and miles, I planned to make return visits to Disney. 

I am writing this article five years after our first trip, and we ended up returning to a Disney park the next five years, and never for more than four nights.  My kids have zero complaints, and I am proud to have survived all the trips.  I think at this point, I am ready to retire from Disney and Universal Studios trips.  I have more than met my parenting quota, and there are so many other places I want to take the kids. 

Thanks for reading, friends. Happy Travels!