Help for planning Dec. WDW trip

[rcyannacci]

Greetings all-

It's been a while since I've been back on the boards, so I'm trying to get caught up on the latest changes in terms of discounts, packages, ressies, etc. So if you've got a minute, I've got a few questions.

My husband and I want to plan a trip for mid-Dec., taking advantage of the holiday decorations/events without the holiday rush at the end of the month. We will be staying on-site (but more on that in a minute), we have the Disney Visa card, we love good sit-down restaurants almost as much as the parks, and we plan on going to PI at least twice.

Question 1: Am I correct that scheduling beore 12/20 will be considered value season rates? We are looking at the approx. dates of 12/10-12/17.

Question 2: All of the packages/discounts I've seen so far only extend to the end of November. Should a wait a month or two before booking to see if any Dec. discounts emerge? Is it possible that the pay for 5/stay for 7 days will be continued to Dec.?

Question 3: We are planning on staying at a value resort for the majority of the time (stayed at ASMo previously and enjoyed it), but were considering moving to AKL or WL for the last 2 nights for something special- anyone have experience with this? How did you move? Taxi? Disney busses? We would plan to have the moving day be an out of the parks day and visit DD and tour the X-mas displays at the resorts.

Question 4: Considering our plan to eat out at least twice a day and attend PI twice, should we look at the Visa packages? Last time we went (Aug 2000), I bought everything separately (hotel, tickets, food, etc.) and felt we saved some $. But we do have over $200 in Visa points and could have twice that by Dec. Any suggestions?

Thanks in advance for any suggestions you might have, and I hope I haven't repeated any obvious questions from recent threads.

-Christin

P.S. Anyone else in Texas stunned at how fast it went from pleasant to ridiculously hot? Time to dig in for summer

 

[Nanu57v]

We went the first week of december last year, so maybe I can give you some insite.

Question 1: Yes. Its value season before the 20th for all resorts except FW campsites. There its pre-holiday season.

Question 2: Yes, its possible they'll extend the 7 for 5, they extended the 7 for 4 before, but I wouldn't totally count on it. We went on AP rates.

Question 3: I think its a great idea to switch resorts. I'm seriously contemplating this for our next trip. I like the Poly, but its a bit pricey for us to stay there every night (DH disagrees with me on that thought). I'd like to stay at a mod then switch to Poly. We had a bad experience with a bunch of cheerleaders at ASmu and its scarred us. I've posed the resort switching question before and you can just use disney transportation like you normally would, and the resort will take care of switching your luggage for you. Free, but you should tip them.


Question 4: I can't figure out what PI is. All i can think of is 3.14. Ohhhh, Pleasure Island. Look at the packages, but compare. On our honeymoon it was way cheaper to go with a AAA package, and on our last trip it was like $600 cheaper to book things separately using an AP rate.

Hope that helps.

 

[rcyannacci]

Nanu57v- thanks for the reply and information, especially about the luggage transfer.