Do you use points to stay weekends?

[lat]

I sort of screwed up our reservations for this past Xmas/New Year for the family. Aside from other factors, one of the reasons I rented out our own reservations at the Boardwalk was because I did not want to move while I had a hard time swallowing the high weekend pts during the holiday season. We ended up staying at Swan which I really regretted. Every time I went by BWV, I felt bad and wish I had kept the rooms for ourselves.

Now come the upcoming April, we are staying at WLV and currently have a reservation for a 2-br for 5 nights with a member discount cash reservation for the 6th night. The last night would have cost me 75 pts.

I feel that even with the member discount, the room will still come to almost $600 and it could be for 2 rooms at another resort, probably with concierge service with the AP rate. While I still don't want to move.

I know there are many people who stay through the weekends while there are a bunch of you who don't. Do you feel it is a real let down to move out of the 2-br and go somewhere else?

Do you just bite the bullet and stay through the weekends? Does a night really make that much difference to pay to the hilt?

I got a really bad flu while at Disney during this past trip and missed out on NYE completely at Epcot. I am thinking about going again next year, but looking at the NYE, a weekend night, a 2-br is 106pts!!!

How do you justify this or do you just move out?

We used to try to go to Universal for the weekends. But my kids are still too young and when we stayed there during the Xmas time at Portofino, all of us wanted to go back to Disney!!!!

 

[Happy Birthday Cat]

We purchased enough points so that we could stay on weekends but we usually have two weekends to cover in a one week trip so we stay one weekend at a DVC resort and we move over to the Hard Rock Hotel for the other weekend at the end of our DVC stay (sometimes the other way around). Our kids are older so they really look forward to it.

HBC

 

[Chuck S]

We stay through weekends on points, and added on enough points for that reason.

We normally have 2 trips per year of 9 or 10 nights per stay, and the trips will include 1 weekend per stay.

 

[goofy4dvc]

We stay through the week-ends. On our next trip, we will check in on Saturday and check out on Sunday of the following week, so we will have 3 week-end nights. We don't like to unpack, pack, move and unpack again, so we stay put. Bought enough points to be able to do that.

 

[DisneyHumbug]

I hate moving and have decided that Sun - Thurs is too short of a trip. So we bite the bullet and stay at least one weekend night. Next trip will be Sat - Fri. My DD is still in high school and so we are locked into school holidays which translates into higher points.

 

[DebbieB]

6 of my 8 DVC stays have been Saturday to Friday, so only 1 weekend night. In 2002 at BWV, I could not get decent airfare on Saturday so I booked Friday night at an AP rate at the Boardwalk Inn. Last year at OKW, I was running short on points and I really wanted 7 nights, so I booked Friday & Saturday nights member cash discount. I decided to do boardwalk view next December at BWV, instead of our usual standard view, so I have OKW reserved in May for Sunday to Friday, I may add a cash night.

I think if you are going to move, I would book the non-DVC rooms first, then move to DVC. It would be too hard to move the other way.

 

[Nick@ VB+OKW]

Most of our 2-3 trips per yr are 6 day trips, so that includes 1 weekend day. In the 5 years we have been members we have never moved to avoid the weekend.

 

[inky dinky doo]

I prefer to think of it as a 10-day (or whatever) trip rather than weekdays vs. weekends. We usually check in on Saturday and stay nine nights, which includes three weekend nights. I bought my points to enjoy them, and that's what I do. Besides, I hate moving in and out, although I know there are those who enjoy hopping around.

I agree with Debbie, though. If I were going to move, I'd rather be somewhere else at the beginning of my stay than at the end. For me, it would be very hard to go from DVC to something else.

Pat

286 days and counting . . . again!

 

[rsschneck]

We travel from the West Coast and it seems the best airfare is usually Saturday through Saturday. I don't like the hassle of moving, so we are sucking up the weekend points.

Now our August trip we are providing a 6 night stay for us and my sister's family and we are splitting the cost of the first Saturday night. The points were 64 for the one night. We decided to use 61 of those points for a 6 night stay in a studio the week before Christmas 2004. Better use of OUR points and AP's. My sister can either help pay for one night or arrive one day after us.

Weekends are tougher to pay those points, but I just look at the weekly average.

 

[eva]

We usually stay 6 to 7 nights at a time. We normally consider the total points for the entire stay. I try not to break it down by day. We hate moving during our stay. The only time that we don't stay over weekends is if we are staying over 2 weeks. Then sometimes we go to the beach over the weekend that lands in the middle. We hate moving so much that we have rented a 2-bedroom for the entire week this May even though it will only be DH and myself the first 3 nights.

 

[pmcpmc]

three weeks but use a studio.

 

[sandieb]

We stay on the weekends, but the trip we are planning in May would have had two weekends...ouch. It was 72 points for the 2 bedroom villa at the BCV = 288 points for 4 nights. I couldn't bring myself to spend so many points, so we cancelled the first Friday night. We are actually spending so many points on this trip that we are staying in Fort Wilderness in our camper in October...that will be a real change from the Beach Club.

It is hard when we travel during the school year - the kids can't really miss more than a week of school. It is tempting to add a weekend to each end of the week to lengthen the trip. Just takes a heap of points. Sandie

 

[AnnaS]

We also stay for the week-ends. Sun. - Thurs. is too short for one stay. This coming August we will be at OKW for 6 nights (2 BDRM - son might bring a friend or two) and then we are spending 4 nights at BCV (1BDRM) and the week-end is still in there. Because of the packing and moving, I have been debating wether to stay put at OKW for 10 nights. I want to switch since I have not stayed at BCV yet, hopefully my family will still agree.

 

[paults]

We will only use pts for 1 wkend nt unless the pts need to be used.

We stay at Por,S/D or another onsite resort on Fir/Sat and move on Sun to the BWV for 5 nts. Sunday is our no park day so moving is no problem.

Now our April trip 2004 was changed from(5 nt ) 2 bedroom to a (9 nt )studio ,3nts at OKW and 6 nts at BWV. had to use the pts so we did the weekend thing.

We like to see the other resorts at Disney so we will always do 2 nts on cash.

 

[VMS]

I guess we are in the minority. We do not have a ton of points (200). Our first trip was to HH, and we loved it, so we have been going there every year. We try to do WDW every other year, so it has been working out pointwise. We drive to HH, and only have a week off, so the 5 nights works fine there. For WDW, my kids are getting older, and like to do a few days at the rides at Universal, so we stay on the grounds there first for a few days that include the weekend days. That way we get the front of the line access. The key is to stay at Universal first, since it would be a letdown going from the 2 bedroom at the VWL to a Universal hotel room!

 

[lenshanem]

Normally, no. But I do have oen trip planned for next year that we had soem extra poinst left over so I added a Friday night onto it.

 

[PamOKW]

I considere joining DVC as how I'm going to vacation at WDW. So, I book my trips and use points -- weekend days or not. I agree that looking at the "total" split by the number of days can make it easier to swallow than the day by day amounts.

 

[luv2vacation]

I agree with PamOKW. We just split the total amount of points by the number of nights and we are happy. Same way if someone is going with us we just let the knkow the total amount of points for the entire stay.

 

[Laurabearz]

We were lucky to get a reservation at HH for this June, but the point cost for a 2 bedroom on Saturday night was more points than we had.... so I booked Monday-Friday.... and was happy about it... UNTIL I checked airfare.... WHOA very high... Sooooo I am calling MS on Monday to book the Saturday night on cash. (do we get AP discounts at HH)

I guess you can say, we are spending money, to save money.

With that said, we have moved a couple of times during WDW stays, but only for longer trips... then we will do something like the higher point BCV or BWV Sunday-Thursday, then move to OKW for Friday- Tuesday... or something like that....

 

[Richyams]

Another one who feels moving is just too much trouble. You look at the cost per night average of the stay. I couldn't be bothered to move just to save some points.