WrestleMania 31 won’t take over Levi’s® Stadium in Santa Clara, Calif., until March 2015, but for those lucky members of the WWE Universe who’ve secured their Show of Show tickets via purchasing the exclusive Travel Packages, The Road to WrestleMania has already begun.

The WrestleMania Travel Packages — currently on sale at WrestleManiaTravel.com — aren’t just a means of getting first crack at the highly coveted tickets to The Grandest Stage of Them All, either. They’ve also helped create lasting friendships, WWE fans explained.

“I’ve met so many people from all over the world and we’re all there for the same reason,” said Hal Dworkis, of Bronx, N.Y. “They’re people I still keep in contact with me today, and we’re all making plans for things we can do next year. To me, that’s the best part.”

Building life-long friendships with fellow sports-entertainment diehards, however, is just one notable perk. According to repeat purchasers who attended WrestleMania events prior to buying Travel Packages, purchasing the packages eases WrestleMania travel planning all around.

Visit WrestleManiaTravel.com |  See photos from last year’s Axxess

“I’d been going since WrestleMania X-Seven and I got tired of trying to pay for a ticket through Ticketmaster or StubHub,” said Kerry Morris, of Chicago. “The Travel Packages just make life so much easier, honestly.”

The sentiment isn’t uncommon. Dworkis praised how centrally located his hotel was this year for WrestleMania 30 in New Orleans. “Where WWE put us with the hotel, everything was in walking distance, everything was close by,” he said.

Given the immense popularity of WrestleMania, which “Forbes” magazine recently named one of the world’s most valuable sports brands, securing hotel rooms near the host venue isn’t always easy. Trudy Carlton, of Mechanicsville, Va., can relate. When she attended her first WrestleMania in 2005, she had to change her hotel multiple times during the week. That experience is what made her consider purchasing a Travel Package. Since then, she’s attended every WrestleMania, each time with a Travel Package.

“We traveled to a lot of places for WrestleMania and it’s always been awesome,” said Carlton, who attends annually with her daughter and granddaughter. “We’ve always been very pleased.”

In addition to tickets to The Show of Shows, all WrestleMania 31 Travel Packages include tickets for fan Axxess, the WWE Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony and the Monday Night Raw after WrestleMania, as well as hotel accommodations and round-trip rail transportation the day of WrestleMania. Certain packages, such as the California Dreamin’ Package, included extra niceties, like a “Taste of the Valley” experience at a California vineyard with WWE Legends and an exclusive reception with Superstars and Divas prior to the Hall of Fame ceremony.

Beyond WrestleMania itself, the Hall of Fame reception is Morris’ favorite event of the week.

“It’s very classy and very well done, especially last year,” Morris said. “It’s a small group of us, very intimate, but it was a nice, upscale spread, a few Superstars were hanging out and taking photos with us. It was just really nice.”

As far as Dworkis is concerned, the Travel Packages are as close to an all-encompassing WrestleMania experience as you can get.

“It’s pretty much everything in one package,” he said. “I don’t have to fight to buy tickets. Everything’s much easier, much simpler. It’s all right there.”