First trip without our son in the party.

[sachilles]

Long story short, my wife has a milestone birthday in October. We've been to Disney several times with our now 9 year old son. We really enjoy it.
Enough so, that we are going to take our first childless trip, for a quick 4 day visit.
With the Marriott/SPG merger, I had a gazillion marriott points. I was able to transfer enough points to SPG to book the Swan for the length of our stay.....we've never stayed there, we've always stayed on Disney owned properties. We've wanted to stay at Boardwalk, but haven't managed to make it happen yet. So I think Swan is a good option. We also figure it's a bit of a try out to see if it has the "Disney Feel" for trips when our son is along. I have enough points that this good be a real money saver in the future if we like it. I also have platinum status, so I believe some upgrades are likely.
I also have enough flight miles that the tickets are free.
So we are leaving early AM on a Thursday. Arrive at MCO at 10:30am, and leave on Sunday on a 7:30 pm flight.
We plan to visit as a family in February, if schedules work out.

So help me fact check and sanity check my ideas for the trip.
First, we think an annual pass for my wife and myself makes sense, given a second visit is planned for the spring. We figure the spring trip would be about 7 days. So 7 day plus a 3 or 4 day park hopper ticket, I think it makes sense. We always do photopass as well, so that figures in. Any real issue with us having annual passes, but not doing it for the kiddo? Basically making sure there isn't a pit fall with fast passes if we book a February trip, and our son gets a 7 day ticket and we use annual passes.

Airport transportation to and from Swan. What are good options? I understand MDE is not available for Swan. I think Lyft(Minnie Van) and Uber might be good choices. I don't need to cheap out, but certainly don't need a stretched limo for the occasion.

We will have 2 full days, and 2 partial days. We want to take the time to do things that we don't normally do when our son is along. So all the E-ticket rides are not our prime targets. We want to stroll around world showcase, shop, take in the shows. Sit and eat.

We'll hit Disney Springs, Epcot and Animal Kingdom. We'll skip Hollywood studios, as we'll want to do that with our son to see the new toystory land. Unsure if we'll go to magic kingdom, but think we might finish a day there for fireworks.
What are folks recommendations for sites, shows and people watching?
Only two requests from the Birthday girl is Dinner in Italy, and go up in the tethered balloon at Disney springs.
Any restaurant suggestions that doesn't focus on chicken nuggets or cheeseburgers are also welcomed.
It's food and wine festival time. It also looks like the halloween party happens while we are there, shutting down magic kingdom early. We've done the party in california, and it was very cool, but not sure we'd do it on this trip, especially without a little trick or treater in our party.
Again we've been there several times, but for kid centric trips, revolving around fast passes to all the popular rides. This time we want to slow down, enjoy the details, and eat and drink until they have to cart us out in a wheelbarrow.
Trip is October 18-21 if it makes a difference.

Thank you

 

[lborne]

Walking around World Showcase was the first thing we did on our first kid-less trip. And you are going for food and wine which will be great. Or if you want a full meal, Marrakesh is one of our favorites to do sans kids and they usually have a belly dancer show around 11:30. Otherwise, you can find some amazing sandwiches in France at Les Halles Boulangerie Patisserie - sometimes I just get cheese and a baguette and wine and I'm good.

Also, we like to do the parks in the morning and have lunch at one of the better places, or go around to different resorts or Disney Springs for lunch and to shop or just look around, then back to the home resort to hang out by the pool or take a "nap", or as I call it, "Extra Magic Hours", (more like minutes, but then actually do take a nap so we can stay out late), then back to the parks as it is a different experience at night. Finally, around 9 or so we head out to more resorts for drinks. The monorail bar crawl is great.

One of our all time favorite things to do, and I talk it up a lot, is visit the AKL in the evening to see the animals, look at the authentic African art on every floor, take in the mini Martin and Osa Johnson museum, have a drink and hummus at Victoria Falls and finally see the animals again using the night vision goggles (ask at the front desk for times).

Just enjoy the freedom of being able to do whatever you like. Have fun.

 

[georgina]

DH and I went in October for our 30th anniversary. I rented DVC points for a Boardwalk studio, and we enjoyed a leisurely trip with F&W (no Halloween party for us either). We went to Jellyrolls on the Boardwalk, and ended up staying longer than we expected because we had such a great time.

We did the Highway in the Sky dine around (goes around to the monorail resorts) for our anniversary and enjoyed it, but it is pricey.

When I stay offsite solo I have used Lyft from the airport. Usually we rent a car when DH and I go together. (This was before Disney started the resort parking fees)

There won't be any problem if you have APs and your son doesn't.

 

[sachilles]

The idea we came up with this morning, is instead of drink your way around the world, consume our way. We won't have the endurance or recovery time to have a drink at every spot.....but I think we can manage to Drink OR Eat something at every spot. There are only so many meal times on this short trip, so I'm not sure it's practical.
I'm curious to see how much "time" we have when we aren't criss crossing the park chasing fast pass windows or short lines.

We are really debating whether we hit the magic kingdom at all. Sort of seems sacrilegious not to, but I'm not sure it fits in.
I did wonder if we are in the magic kingdom before the published start time for of the halloween party starts, if we can still hang out. Obviously no attractions or anything that requires a scan.
I like the idea of the monorail dine around. Fireworks at the magic kingdom is the real draw for us. What do they typically do schedule wise for fireworks on the halloween party nights? I'm thinking we could watch from the poly beach or something.

 

[georgina]

The food and wine drinks are small, which made many of them seem like they were not a good value. You can get food at the booths and split it. We were there for a week and I think we had at least 4 lunches and 4 dinners just from the food booths.

I haven't seen a schedule for the Halloween party fireworks yet.

 

[sachilles]

The food and wine drinks are small, which made many of them seem like they were not a good value. You can get food at the booths and split it. We were there for a week and I think we had at least 4 lunches and 4 dinners just from the food booths.

I haven't seen a schedule for the Halloween party fireworks yet.

Looking just now, I found a schedule for the fireworks. It looks like the halloween fireworks at 10:15 on the Thursday and Friday of our stay. Wondered about watching them from Poly or Contemporary with a beverage in hand, and maybe see the water parade as well.

 

[bryanb]

Hi @sachilles

Great call on booking the Swan with your Marriott points right now! If you're using points, I would definitely reserve your spring trip at the Swan/Dolphin as soon as possible in the next 6 days! You can always cancel if you decide that the Swan isn't right for your family.

As you may know, starting in August, all SPG and Marriott hotels will be reclassified into a new awards chart. About 70% of the hotels will require the same number of points or fewer, but 30% of the hotels will become more expensive. The Swan/Dolphin are in the more expensive group.

The Swan and Dolphin currently require 36,000 Marriott Points (equal to 12,000 Starpoints) per night... which is an amazing deal. Starting in August, booking on points will require 50,000 Points per night (39% more expensive).

For a complete award chart here's a link: https://points-redemption.marriott.com/category-change

Have a great trip!

 

[sachilles]

Hi @sachilles

Great call on booking the Swan with your Marriott points right now! If you're using points, I would definitely reserve your spring trip at the Swan/Dolphin as soon as possible in the next 6 days! You can always cancel if you decide that the Swan isn't right for your family.

As you may know, starting in August, all SPG and Marriott hotels will be reclassified into a new awards chart. About 70% of the hotels will require the same number of points or fewer, but 30% of the hotels will become more expensive. The Swan/Dolphin are in the more expensive group.

The Swan and Dolphin currently require 36,000 Marriott Points (equal to 12,000 Starpoints) per night... which is an amazing deal. Starting in August, booking on points will require 50,000 Points per night (39% more expensive).

For a complete award chart here's a link: https://points-redemption.marriott.com/category-change

Have a great trip!

Very good suggestion. Any idea if I modify the reservation at a later date, that they'll not re-book at the higher rate? Work schedules, School schedule and state hockey tournament schedule are the all the variables, and it will be a total punt to guess what dates will work.

 

[bryanb]

Very good suggestion. Any idea if I modify the reservation at a later date, that they'll not re-book at the higher rate? Work schedules, School schedule and state hockey tournament schedule are the all the variables, and it will be a total punt to guess what dates will work.

You're probably right. If you make modifications, my guess is they won't let you keep the old rate. I'm personally thinking about setting two different reservations for 2019, and hopefully one of them will be okay.

 

[Wild4Walt]

You'll be at the Swan so a nighttime walk around Boardwalk is always fun. Jellyrolls (dueling pianos ) is a blast. For something a bit more quiet - try the Bellevue room at BWI. It's a smallish bar that plays old time radio shows ( like the Shadow and Abbott and Costello ) - drinks are tasty. They have a beautiful porch outside that is wonderfully relaxing in nice weather. I think they also still have a Wyland Gallery there that is just fun to walk through. I'm sure with smaller one's you probably haven't been through. I can't afford anything in there, but I always appreciate the fun, tropical themed artwork within.