I love credit cards so much! v3.0 (see first page for add'l details)

[Alexle2007]

Does anyone have any guesses on when/if the SW free change window will be back? I'd love to update to a later return flight on 8/3 but I'm trying to decide if it's worth the extra points. If it was free then I'd go ahead and change. I think I might have just missed one that ended recently, unfortunately. TIA!

I would just check daily. It seems to come and go quite frequently. And, yes, it just ended.

 

[hlhlaw07]

Well I just cancelled our SW flights to New Orleans for next week. We were kinda borderline whether we were really wanting to travel on a plane with small kids right now, but the Military made it a non-decision for us they haven’t lifted travel restrictions outside of the local area yet and everything indicates they will not for a while. I can’t even say I’m sad. It would have been great to see family, but it is easier to make peace with the decision when it is made for you, I think.

We have a 150 mile radius that we can travel within. Since we are in Rhode Island, that radius includes Cape Cod. So we rented a townhouse with a private beach and a pool because I need to get these kids out of the house for something fun!

One day I will get to use my newly earned companion pass. Hopefully for our October Disney trip...

 

[Babars_Wife]

we are in Rhode Island, that radius includes Cape Cod. So we rented a townhouse with a private beach and a pool because I need to get these kids out of the house for something fun!

I can’t find any availability like this! I’ve been looking like crazy in the cape cod area. Do you have a link to where you’re staying? Or is that creepy. Kind of creepy.... but I’m desperate!

 

[hlhlaw07]

I can’t find any availability like this! I’ve been looking like crazy in the cape cod area. Do you have a link to where you’re staying? Or is that creepy. Kind of creepy.... but I’m desperate!

Sure! It’s through red jacket resorts. They have a few different locations on the Cape. The one called red jacket resort was mostly hotel rooms (they had family suites but they weren’t available for the dates I was looking at) but their green harbor resort had townhouses (we got one of the two bedrooms) with private beach, pool, and mini golf. I think the only two that are open right now are the red and green one, but the others are about to reopen. All the reviews on TA are pretty positive. Tried to find an air bnb on the beach or with a pool and couldn’t find anything that wasn’t insanely expensive.
https://redjacketresorts.com/resorts/green-harbor-resort

 

[disfanforlife]

@snugglebug @mhartman09 @georgina

I had an epiphany and deleted all my park reservations. I then reassigned my extra AP voucher to my daughter. Went into park reservations and was able to get all 7 nights!!!

Then put my AP voucher back in my own name. Now it says 'nontransferable' but that shouldn't be a problem as it's for me anyway. Took screen shots just in case.

As you can see, I'll do anything to avoid that IT possibly 2 hour call.

I have AP vouchers for me and my DH and 2 resort stays booked and was only able to get 5 days of park reservations. I am not even sure if we will go on either trip. But I guess I am going to have to call.

 

[SouthFayetteFan]

So I’ve been somewhat absent lately and for good reason. I was very busy leading up to my trip to Captiva. We’re about midway through the week so I figured I’ll do a nice little update post while I wait for dinner to be ready.

The two weeks leading up to our trip were crazy at work. Perhaps I compounded that by scheduling a work related round of golf each Monday. Soooo worth it though as the weather each of those Mondays was amazing.

Thursday we went to pick up our big van. There were only 6 of us making the full drive from Pittsburgh (picking up my sister at Florida airport along the way to make us a total of 7). We rented a 12 passenger van though to bring all the beach stuff, luggage, and all dry grocery goods to expedite our grocery visit.





Once we got some seats out there was ample room for all of the gear and to seat 7 comfortably. My dad and I would be alternating the driving duties - Staying south of Savannah on Friday night. Our day 1 drive was delayed a bit by a 2 hour dead stop for a bad accident in West Virginia. That was a tad frustrating - they shut down the interstate to investigate and clean up.

So instead of getting our hotel at 8, it was 10pm. (Glad we abandoned the idea of going to Jacksonville on day 1)! People told us we should take pictures of the sights in Savannah so I did...




Yes - there it is. Beautiful “Savannah” This is the Fairfield at Richmond Hill to be exact.

I’m not one for touring “cities” so no loss there in my mind. Saturday morning we got back on the road quickly. No Fairfield breakfast due to COVID - oh well. We crossed into Florida within a couple of hours and were met by the “COVID-19 Checkpoint” on I-95. It flowed pretty smoothly, maybe a 15 min delay overall. They asked us where we from, and then they waved us through. I assume if we were from NY/NJ they might have sent us over to the other tent I picture below:





We took the path through Orlando - it was fun but also a little sad to drive by all the major parks and realize it’s all a shell of itself right now. We made it to Walmart by the Sanibel causeway by 4:30. A few of us ran in for all the perishable goods.

Normally on a Sanibel/Captiva trip we’d only eat out once or twice anyways. It’s such a hassle to get cleaned up and leave the house (which is 30 minutes from most restaurants anyways) so we prepare meals at the beach house. This trip is 100% distanced so all meals at the house. We made an extensive list of groceries ahead of time to ensure no issues and we conquered Walmart quickly.

And by 6:00 all of my cares floated away as we crossed the Causeway!



So we left the house at 7:30am Friday and arrived at our house in Captiva by 7pm Saturday. Quite a journey... it was ok. Flying is WAY better but this will have to do for now.

I’ll share some beach pictures in my next update but for now it’s Taco Tuesday!!!

 

[Haley R]

So our APs expired 6/20. Dh chatted with disney awhile ago saying we were wanting to get a refund for all of the days we weren’t using instead of the extension and they said that was fine. They mentioned they weren’t sure when refunds would be given. Then I realized we purchased them from sams club. I’m not sure how disney will refund us since we didn’t buy the APs from them. I sent an email Friday and haven’t heard back. With everything else going on I’m not sure when I’ll hear back but we’d like the refund. I honestly don’t have the time to call right now though

 

[afan]

I got my Citi Premier in the mail today and hadn't known it was a mastercard, I figured like everything else I seem to get it was a visa. And I think the last Citi card I had was a visa.

So, does this mean I can pay my mortgage on plastiq cause it's an actual mastercard? I can't remember how that all went and since I had no plans for a mc any time soon I skimmed it all. I'm ok with the fees simply because it makes it so much easier to hit the msr.

ETA I looked and made my July mortgage payment and had fee free dollars still

 

[Judique]

Sure! It’s through red jacket resorts. They have a few different locations on the Cape. The one called red jacket resort was mostly hotel rooms (they had family suites but they weren’t available for the dates I was looking at) but their green harbor resort had townhouses (we got one of the two bedrooms) with private beach, pool, and mini golf. I think the only two that are open right now are the red and green one, but the others are about to reopen. All the reviews on TA are pretty positive. Tried to find an air bnb on the beach or with a pool and couldn’t find anything that wasn’t insanely expensive.
https://redjacketresorts.com/resorts/green-harbor-resort

I've stayed at Riviera Beach many years ago, and used to eat at Skipper's Chowder house. Riviera Beach is a Red Jacket also but just hotel rooms when I stayed.

I still have a good friend who lives over off Bearses Way near the Cape cod Mall and family had a house in Dennis.

Love the Cape and used to go often but the summer goes so fast! And I don't do winter in New England. Got to get back soon..

 

[mmmears]

I'd also say standardized test scores will normalize, but honestly who knows what will happen with standardized testing in four years.

This. We have high schools near us that hand out easy As, and ones that only hand out a couple per class. Grades vary so much from one school to another so standardized tests really do play an important part in leveling the playing field and giving kids an additional opportunity to show what they know. I know many colleges are making it optional this year because the tests keep getting cancelled, but in general they offer some additional information that is useful. For example, DD's HS was a hard grader with very high average SAT/ACT scores while the easy one that some of her friends went to (also private) showed that their GPAs didn't tell the whole story since their SAT scores were just average. A friend whose son went there and did very well on his APs and his SATs said that the colleges knew that his GPA was suspect but the tests gave him the chance to prove that he really did learn the material. I'm not "all in" for testing, but there are some good reasons it exists.

 

[hlhlaw07]

I've stayed at Riviera Beach many years ago, and used to eat at Skipper's Chowder house. Riviera Beach is a Red Jacket also but just hotel rooms when I stayed.

I still have a good friend who lives over off Bearses Way near the Cape cod Mall and family had a house in Dennis.

Love the Cape and used to go often but the summer goes so fast! And I don't do winter in New England. Got to get back soon..

We’ve only been in New England for a year as of next week. It was definitely a long winter!

 

[Judique]

So our APs expired 6/20. Dh chatted with disney awhile ago saying we were wanting to get a refund for all of the days we weren’t using instead of the extension and they said that was fine. They mentioned they weren’t sure when refunds would be given. Then I realized we purchased them from sams club. I’m not sure how disney will refund us since we didn’t buy the APs from them. I sent an email Friday and haven’t heard back. With everything else going on I’m not sure when I’ll hear back but we’d like the refund. I honestly don’t have the time to call right now though

I didn't purchase from Disney either but I upgraded using gift cards, and I requested a refund long ago.

I was told I would probably get a mailed check or possibly a gift card. Told them I was fine with a gift card but we will see what I get. It's Disney money for me however it comes. They said I would get a call to verify when the time came.

 

[Haley R]

I didn't purchase from Disney either but I upgraded using gift cards, and I requested a refund long ago.

I was told I would probably get a mailed check or possibly a gift card. Told them I was fine with a gift card but we will see what I get. It's Disney money for me however it comes. They said I would get a call to verify when the time came.

I guess we’ll just keep waiting and see. I’d rather not get a gift card because I don’t see us going to Disney for awhile but that might be all they can do since we didn’t buy from them

 

[NowIsTheTime]

My Shades of Green is in the system today. I was able to add it, but then had to log into P2's MDE to add guests (he's lead on the reservation). Got myself added, but I can't get the kids added. So, I can make park reservations for 2 of us, but not 4 of us.

I really do not want to call Disney. I'm trying to get a chat window to see if they can do anything, but in the meantime has anyone had this issue and know a workaround?

I had the exact same experience today. I have not figured out a solution, but I did contact Shades of Green to add the children's names on the hotel reservation to see if that helps. Have you found a solution?

 

[snugglebug]

I had the exact same experience today. I have not figured out a solution, but I did contact Shades of Green to add the children's names on the hotel reservation to see if that helps. Have you found a solution?

I used Disney chat feature and had it fixed pretty quickly. It took longer to get a chat window. Click around as if you are making a Disney reservation and you should get the Fairy Godmother chat popup. The link on the contact page tends to be disabled due to waits, but my wait was only about 5 minutes. He told me to logout and back in and it should be fixed, but I didn't need to. I had my husband's MDE in one browser and mine in another, I hopped over to mine and did my park reservation.

 

[NowIsTheTime]

Thank you for replying. I'll keep trying.

 

[SouthFayetteFan]

So I promised a further update. Beach distancing vacation has been a success. We did have an annoying family (loud music, crying kids, etc) about 50 feet from us on Monday. But Sunday and today were excellent.

We’ve gotten a nice bike ride in each morning (we rent from Finnimore’s for the week). And then it’s off to the beach for 6-7 hrs w/ a break back at the house for lunch and then some pool time before dinner.

SUNDAY: - each side of our tent




TUESDAY: - Each side and a view of the Gulf






Today the water was the clearest it’s been. We’ve been shelling a lot (my mom will probably take home 50 lbs of shells lol), but today I found some real gems on the sandbar.

(For reference, the big one is almost as big as my fist).

Lastly, I’ll leave you with a few images of subset the other night (pics taken from an absolute desolate beach):






3 more days of paradise and then hopefully a fun and uneventful drive home. Hope you enjoyed an update. I LOVE Sanibel and Captiva. So relaxing...

 

[Judique]

@SouthFayetteFan

Beautiful!

Are those yellow posts enclosing a turtle nest in your first picture? Or is it something else?

 

[disfanforlife]

So I promised a further update. Beach distancing vacation has been a success. We did have an annoying family (loud music, crying kids, etc) about 50 feet from us on Monday. But Sunday and today were excellent.

We’ve gotten a nice bike ride in each morning (we rent from Finnimore’s for the week). And then it’s off to the beach for 6-7 hrs w/ a break back at the house for lunch and then some pool time before dinner.

SUNDAY: - each side of our tent
View attachment 503674

View attachment 503677

TUESDAY: - Each side and a view of the Gulf
View attachment 503681

View attachment 503682

View attachment 503683

Today the water was the clearest it’s been. We’ve been shelling a lot (my mom will probably take home 50 lbs of shells lol), but today I found some real gems on the sandbar.
View attachment 503685
(For reference, the big one is almost as big as my fist).

Lastly, I’ll leave you with a few images of subset the other night (pics taken from an absolute desolate beach):
View attachment 503688

View attachment 503689

View attachment 503690

3 more days of paradise and then hopefully a fun and uneventful drive home. Hope you enjoyed an update. I LOVE Sanibel and Captiva. So relaxing...

Beautiful pictures! So glad you are having a nice trip!

 

[SouthFayetteFan]

@SouthFayetteFan

Beautiful!

Are those yellow posts enclosing a turtle nest in your first picture? Or is it something else?

Yeah - there are a lot of turtle nests across the beach right now. They put up 2 new ones yesterday.