Booking a cabana for arrival day...good or bad idea?

[Octoberbaby]

We are booked at the YC late summer, and our flights are booked as well. The airline has modified our flight and it now arrives at MCO at 8:30am, which is earlier than we prefer, but we will now have a little extra time on our arrival day. I am thinking of booking a cabana by the pool since our room will probably not be ready and we will not necessarily feel like going straight to the parks. I figure we should be at our resort by 10am which is when the cabana would also be ready. Is this a solid plan or should I reconsider?
Edit: our flight arrives at 8:30 am, not 7am.

 

[crazylady]

Sounds like a great idea to me. I would need a nap!

 

[gottalovepluto]

We are booked at the YC late summer, and our flights are booked as well. The airline has modified our flight and it now arrives at MCO at 7am, which is earlier than we prefer, but we will now have a little extra time on our arrival day. I am thinking of booking a cabana by the pool since our room will probably not be ready and we will not necessarily feel like going straight to the parks. I figure we should be at our resort by 10am which is when the cabana would also be ready. Is this a solid plan or should I reconsider?

I wouldn’t unless you can cancel up until your flight leaves for FL. Some airlines are getting crazy with schedule changes, this could be your last or one of many or your day to fly could come and you’ll get one of those lovely “your flight was cancelled, we’ll see you in a couple days” notices. Would suck to lose your cabana money on top of that.

 

[Marthasor]

I wouldn’t unless you can cancel up until your flight leaves for FL. Some airlines are getting crazy with schedule changes, this could be your last or one of many or your day to fly could come and you’ll get one of those lovely “your flight was cancelled, we’ll see you in a couple days” notices. Would suck to lose your cabana money on top of that.

I agree with this as this very scenario happened to me just a few weeks ago. My flight was canceled about 4 hours before take-off and the airline re-booked me on a flight two days later. It took me 6 hours to get through to WDW to deal with my hotel reservation. If your flight is canceled or delayed, you could be out a lot of money. I would consider simply hanging out at the pool, asking if a cabana is available when you arrive or even asking if they have a room ready.

 

[GADisneyDad14]

While flight delays are certainly a risk in the equation, we’ve done a cabana on arrival day several times before (at YC, FWIW) and wouldn’t hesitate to do it again. It’s a risk I’m willing to take. In full disclosure I’m coming from a major hub where the flights are roughly every hour over a dozen times a day and major flight delays are rare. If I was flying a greater distance with an airline or route with more of a history of delays I might feel differently.

 

[Octoberbaby]

While flight delays are certainly a risk in the equation, we’ve done a cabana on arrival day several times before (at YC, FWIW) and wouldn’t hesitate to do it again. It’s a risk I’m willing to take. In full disclosure I’m coming from a major hub where the flights are roughly every hour over a dozen times a day and major flight delays are rare. If I was flying a greater distance with an airline or route with more of a history of delays I might feel differently.

We will be flying out of Atlanta with Southwest. The flight is an 1.5 hour flight, and usually Southwest is ok. Our last flight with Southwest was delayed about six hours, and was a disaster. They did give us a $300 voucher for the trouble, but I would much rather our flight leave/arrive on time, lol.

 

[CynBeth]

I would not take the chance we have been on SW our last few trips either to Disney or elsewhere with early flight times and had a delay for a few hours either going or coming back due to a mechanical issue and one time years ago for many hours due to a bad storm. One tip is when doing the check-in online we select as our only preference early arrival. Sometimes that has worked but if by the time we got to whatever the hotel is and did not get the room is ready text have gone to the front desk and either it was ready and did not get the text or usually were able to find a room for us that was available which could have been a different one than what was assigned that might have just been cleaned.

 

[Narcoossee11]

I think your risk is the cost of the cabana.
GREAT idea and plan if all goes well. Relax till your room is ready.
BUT
TERRIBLE ( costly) if day of travel plans fall apart.

It comes down to your wallet.
.