Just back, pros and cons from frequent visitors.

[eeyoresmom]

Hi everyone. We got back a few days ago from a 9 night stay, Feb 12-21. We stayed 5 nights at BLT followed by 4 nights at AKV Jambo House. We have been over 40 times and this is our opinion of either new experiences or things that have changed:
CONS:
-TOTWL at BLT. Glad we did it once, but probably wont again. Not a lounge experience at all, toddlers swinging around bar stools, kids over tired and crying. The view of the fireworks is good, but not at all a substitute for seeing them at MK.
-LM ride. OK, but nothing special. I think the crowds will die down in a year or so.
-new bakery in France. Sorry, it may be more efficient, but it has lost its charm and food is not as good.
- Test Track! We will only fastpass this from now on. The whole experience leading up to the ride is OK once, but I can not imagine doing that over and over. Plus, the wait time posted was 20 mi and we were in there an hour.
-Crowds. We have never experienced such crowds. I think it was actually worse the few days we were there before President's Day, than the days following.
-Weather. Was all over the place. Hot, freezing cold, windy. Glad I packed mittens.
PROS:
-Jambo House AKV.Perfect amount of activity and relaxation for us.
-not having a dining plan.We felt so free from rushing to adr's. We still ate at 4 ts places and we saved so much money.
- MK. As disenchanted as I was with the crowds, I am always blown away with how over the top magical it is.
- Customer service was as usual, superb.
- Figuring out that 9 nights is perfect for us. Lots of relaxation time and just about ready to go home at the end.

Again, these are our opinions. Some of the things on our con list can not be helped and most are highly subjective. Just thought I would share our thoughts as we get so much assistance from these boards.

 

[stitchfriend]

Glad you had a nice trip. May I ask what 4 TS restaurants u ate at? Trying to decide if we can go without dining plan for a family of 4.

 

[magicbob]

This might be a little but can you still get pastries, etc. at the new French bakery with DDP snack credits or is this now only a QS meal?

 

[eeyoresmom]

We ate at Via Napoli ( we had an ADR for that), The Fountain, Boma ( got a 5:05 pm reservation around 2 pm that same day) and ESPN Club. You can still make adr's even if you have no dining plan. We actually had a few more adr's but cancelled them because we didn't want to rush to get to them. As far as the French bakery, I am pretty sure you can still use snack credits but wasnt paying too much attention since we didn't have a DDP.

 

[Brian_WDW74]

Per the Looking for the Live Report and Just Back Threads? sticky thread, I have moved this thread to the Trip Reports board.

 

[lostatdisney]

PROS:
-not having a dining plan.We felt so free from rushing to adr's. We still ate at 4 ts places and we saved so much money.

I'm glad to hear that about the dining plan. I debated it over and over for our upcoming trip, and I finally decided the dining plan would be much more expensive - and more restrictive - than doing our own thing. We are fine with counter service the majority of the time, but we do have a few reservations for table service meals. But we almost never get dessert, are happy with counter service, and we really aren't huge eaters, so the dining plan doesn't make sense for us.

Thanks for your assessment of what's new at WDW!