Dee - you should take a tour of the WL in August. The best way to see it is to take the bus to MK and then get on the boat to WL. You really need to see the lodge from the water. The boat is one of the best things about staying at the WL. Tour the lobby and go up to the fourth floor, which is actually the first balcony level above the lobby. There are lovely sitting areas around the lobby on that level, including a very comfy area with a sofa and fireplace, a huge balcony over the front door - looking at the parking lot, another balcony overlooking the courtyard and Bay Lake, and some displays of artifacts. In fact, there are artifacts hanging around all over the place. Then head off to the villas building and check out the Carolina Pacific room. It has memorabilia from Walt Disney's home, including one of the little railroad cars from the train he had at his California home. That room has the comfiest leather rocking chairs ever and the most whimsical firescreen in all of WDW. DH and I like to lounge around there, and we've even played a few games of Chinese checkers.
Then you can walk down the nature trail to Fort Wilderness and visit the horse stables and just basically check it all out. You can either go back to MK via boat, or hop on an internal bus if you want to see a little more of the campground. It really is an interesting way to spend time when you don't have park tickets.
And you may want to see the Wilderness Lodge before they tear the place up. They are rebuilding my favorite villas pool and adding 24 little cabins along the edge of the lake. The construction work starts oct 26th.
The main building will be unchanged, thank goodness.
-ness! I will say, very selfishly, that DP and I are currently talking about the timing of this at least putting us in a good spot, in that where we are not going away until 4 weeks from tomorrow, Dad should be long home and on his way to recovery, so we should be ok winging our way to WDW and BC!
We did manage to get most everything that we wanted, so we're pretty happy about that. Now, we can focus on planning the offsite/Sea World/Aquatica portion of our trip, and then we'll be all set. 
