Yay Disneyland! I hope your waitlist comes through. In case it doesn't, did you listen to the DL 7 in 7 they did on the podcast not too long ago? Some of the resorts they reviewed sounded really great! If we didn't have Wyndham to stay at, we would probably find ourselves staying at one of those on our next trip to DL.
We stayed at the Tropicana Inn across from the park on Harbor Boulevard twice. It was actually a nice little hotel and we had no problems there. The second time though we stayed there for 1 night at the end of our
ABD trip and 3 nights at the Grand Californian. There's nothing like a direct comparison to bum you out! That's why if we can't stay at the VGC the whole trip, we'd really like to stay there LAST.
I will check out that 7 in 7. You can't beat the Tropicana for location, but room size will also factor into the equation with my mom along.
Woo hoo! Funny you write that, but I am also going to squeeze Disneyland into our AZ trip this spring break! Well, I haven't told Kurt yet, just my mom... it'll be like a surprise for Cap't Killjoy. Or he can stay with my step-dad Cap't Kill-joy Senior.
Course that all depends if I can get any sort of decent plane tickets into Pheonix for Spring Break since it's also Easter Week this year! Fingers crossed... I'm already looking.
We will be staying at the riff-raff hotels on Harbor! They are closer then the one we could afford anyways (Which is Paradise Pier).
Awesome. We considered Easter break, but in the end decided that the lower crowds of President's Week are better. Plus the points are much less for the VGC (31 points of a 1-bedroom mid-week in February, or 62 points a night at Easter. We only have 160 points, so I wouldn't even have enough points for 3 nights at Easter!) I have 52 leftover points from this year, so 93 points for February was doable but pushing the boundaries.
The real killer bit of not being able to use the DVC points is the extra cost. The fact is, the cost of the DVC points are factored into my annual vacation budget. If we can't use them for the trip, we still have to PAY for them. Therefore, those 3 nights hotel are completely adding on costs to our vacation budget. So even at $150 a night we are adding $450 to the trip costs, and its already a pretty pricey trip.
Cali sounds good! I hope to get my kids there while they're still kids but I just dread the flight. A 6 hour drive might not be bad though
I would also suggest logging into the DVC member site a lot and searching for your dates. The system will check for waitlists as a batch job so if you can snag someone's cancellation before the batch runs you get the room. Maybe you can piece something together that way.
I've been checking a couple times a day, but of course nothing yet. It seems like I would have to get pretty lucky to stumble on a cancelation that way without logging on every hour on the hour.
I am so disappointed with not getting the VGC, even though I knew all along there was a chance of this happening. I feel like such a whiny babyhead about this, I am so lucky just to be able to do trips like this. I can't even really focus on alternative options yet for the trip.