My how things have changed since last we spoke.
In my previous update, I had added a night on property at the beginning of our off-site stay. This afforded me 2 days of EMH, and 2 days of FP+ bookings.
I was happy with that. I felt good about it. Life was even nifty, as I am occasionally inclined to muse.
And then I got an email.
It was my afore mention lawyer friend who now expressed concern that a one night stay, while sounding good on paper, would lend itself to frustration when those operations commenced.
For countless hours I sat and pondered that one night stay. I slid it bouncing haphazard about my brain as if it were bowling ball rambling around a hockey rink. What time we would arrive? What time we would have to check out? What we would be doing the first day? What would be doing the second day? Where would we eat? How much of the resort we would experience? How much of the resort we would NOT experience? I sat and watched the variables enact a multitude of possibilities, and none ended to my satisfaction.
In the end, I was forced to admit that the advice was sound and that I would need to add a second night to make the stay worthwhile or abandon the idea altogether.
The only way to work in another night, to my thinking, was to add it at the beginning of the trip. So add it I did.
Our new itinerary had us arriving Saturday, enjoying us some resort time, hitting the parks on Sunday, then checking out on Monday. I was again happy with that and remained hopeful that a discount code would arrive to help with the expenditures.
As the original reservation stood, I was paying the rack rate of $360, plus taxes for a total of $810. I was happy to be on site. I was happy to be at the Lodge. I was happy to have some time to get to enjoy the place. I was not fully thrilled with the cost, but was resigned to do it either way, sacrificing some table dining to achieve it. (Killing out 2 table service ADR’s and leaving us with 3 total.)
Then came the discounts earlier this week.
I called Disney Travel Co again and found, much to my joy, that there was indeed a discount for our dates. They did not have any standard view rooms available but they did have a woods view room and I rebooked at $252 per night which brought my total after tax price tag to $567.
This was FANTASTIC. I was beyond thrilled to not only have a booking onsite, in a deluxe resort for the first two nights, but also a price that was not nearly as insane. I congratulated myself on my good fortune and as far as I was concerned the matter was wholly settled.
And then I got en email.
Same friend, different topic.
This time, it contained a link to a thread on the Discount Codes and Rates section of the Resort Board, and an encouragement to check it out.
So check it out I did.
And that’s when the grand and glorious Disney Fuzzy Math kicked in.
Here is the skinny.
Orbitz is offering the 30% discount as well. HOWEVER, they also have a discount code (“discover” if you are interested) which gives you an additional 20% off of the discounted rate.
What does all of this mean?
It means Bubba booked 3 nights, that’s what it means.
Orbitz DID have standard view rooms available which it offered up for $240. With the discount coded added, the dropped the price to $192.64 per night. ($675.45 total with taxes and fees for three nights.)
For the STINKING WILDERNESS LODGE!
So in Disney Fuzzy Math, I was originally going spend $810 for two nights on site. It was already in the books. It was already budgeted. Therefore, it made absolute sense to me to spend $675.45 for three. I am spending $135 less, and I am getting one night more.
AND one more EMH.
BLISS!
Now this is not without some inconvenience.
First, when booking through Orbitz, you cannot add your kids at the time of booking or you will be charged extra. (Orbitz treats every guest as an adult regardless of age, so the Disney surcharge for more than 2 adults per room kicks in.) Instead, you book as 2 adults then call and have Orbitz add them to the reservation.
Next, your ADR’s in My Disney Experience, though linked to your Credit Card, are also linked to your resort reservation. If you just go and outright cancel it, you will lose the ADR’s you have. (A couple of folks on the thread experienced this.) I spoke with a Disney Travel rep and she confirmed this for me and told me how to remedy this situation.
First, you need to have BOTH reservations linked into My Disney Experience. After about 30 min, you can use the Resort Reservation Code from Orbitz (which is NOT the Orbitz locator code, but is further down in the email) to pull the reservation up in
MDE. Once you have it in, you will have to update the names of everyone on the reservation.
Then, once that is done, you will need to call Disney Dining and have them re-associate your ADR’s with the new reservation ID.
You will then need to cancel your original reservation. (I am well within the refund window.) Disney will refund it within 10 days and then the credit card has an additional 30 days to post it to your account. (Depending on when your statement closes, it may take up to 2 billing cycles to see it…I explained it further on the discount thread if you need those details.)
Once that reservation is gone, you will need to go in and re-customize your Magic Bands. (And if you had FP+ reservations, which at this point I do not, you would have to re-do them as well.)
At the end of the day, I’m willing to do the grunt work to save the cash and add a night. Being a room only reservation, it was not as burdensome as it might have been with a package deal.
One note – Orbitz bookings do not qualify you for the Dining Plan so if that is part of your “must have” column, this will not work for you.
I have also changed our park ticket slightly.
I added Sat as a park day.
The plan is this – Arrive mid-morning, enjoy the pool a bit, then head to Epcot to use FP+ for some headliners, stroll World Showcase a bit and catch Illuminations.
I am so happy, I just farted out half liter of Pixie Dust.
Well, that about sums this installment up. Hope life is treating you all grandly and that you have a great weekend!
Oh, and lest I be accused of not sharing,
here is the link to the post on the Discounts board.
from what I've seen so far in my WDW forays, staying onsite really is a requirement at this point for anyone hoping to ride the headliners. If the goal was to put more heads in beds, mission accomplished, Mouse.
DH often reminds me...we are barely in the room while we are there. We tend to be park commando's. I as still trying to find a way to add a night on one end of our trip to visit Harry's world, (blastfamy I know) but I would like to do it one time and stay off site that night.
!
I have a lot to live up to to fill an entire year! 
