Magical Gatherings and DVC

[David in Manassas]

If I'm using points to book 2 or 3 rooms at OKW for a family get together, are we eligible for the Magic Gathering benefits (i.e. opportunities to purchase special dinner packages, lagoon cruises etc.)?

Thanks,

David

PS - Thanks to all who replied to my bedding question...

 

[Happy Birthday Cat]

I have been told that Magical Gatherings does apply to DVC guests. I sent away for the planning info for next Thaksgiving.

HBC

 

[dianeschlicht]

I was able to get a Magical Gatherings number when I booked for a group of 11 at OKW for next October. I haven't gotten the planning stuff in the mail yet, but I do have the program downloaded. Trouble is, I can't figure it out!

 

[zulaya]

Another yes that we can use MG as DVCers on points. I am hoping to use it next December.

Diane, the program puts a little Tink lantern on your desktop or toolbar at the bottom of your screen. There is a Help section on the disneyworld.com website and in the program for setup.

Good luck. And if anyone receives the planning packet, please let me know what you get in it.

 

[wdwstar]

i am still waiting on my family to give me the finale dates to book our magical gatherings for christmas,i have down loaded the mg to, and you can only do so much until you get a mg #. i have read on this bored that someone called ms and booked with points for their mg trip, i will be making mine in jan. in the meantime if you find out anything please post

 

[soccermother]

We are DVCers, just back from VWL. We were able to book the magical gatherings safari dinner at Animal Kingdom but it took literally 2 hours on the phone to do it. By the way, the safari dinner was awesome--highly recommend it. It included front row seats for the parade, special safari ride (I think it was longer) with no wait, really good and interesting food (served family style) in portions far greater than we could eat, and there were almost no children so my kids had the characters all to themselves. When we left the dinner it was 7:15pm (park closed at 5:00) and it was a cool experience just walking out through the deserted night.

 

[wdwstar]

i was on the dvc website, and they do mention the magical gatherings, but they also direct you to the disney website for furthur info

 

[dianeschlicht]

We got our MG number when I booked, but it still is difficult to figure out. I sent invitations out, but only one person actually received them! Looks to me like it isn't compatible with certain servers.

 

[zulaya]

I wonder too if some people's spam filters think the invites are spam. I sent an invite to FIL twice and he still never received it. And it was a hotmail account.

I think they still have some work to do with this.

I would like them to allow you to add restaurants to your Favorites and allow your party to vote on restaurants as well. Eating is a huge part of our vacations. Right now it's just attractions, but hopefully they can improve.

 

[wdwstar]

i had downloaded the mg and sent invites to all my family, they all also downloaded the program, but my sil is having a hard time finding it/ opening it. i did all the voting and that is about all you can really do, i know there is a section to add your mg # , but family still waiting on the exact dates, one wants to do a 3 day cruise /4 day land, one dont know what days yet because of work, one cant go, said no moeny, but their buying big $$$ items, that they dont need, and my parents, its a surprise, urgh, i didnt think it was going to be easy, but i also didnt think it was going to be this hard, especially we were going to treat our family by using our points. i guess it will be more points for us then

 

[dianeschlicht]

Originally posted by wdwstar
i had downloaded the mg and sent invites to all my family, they all also downloaded the program, but my sil is having a hard time finding it/ opening it. i did all the voting and that is about all you can really do, i know there is a section to add your mg # , but family still waiting on the exact dates, one wants to do a 3 day cruise /4 day land, one dont know what days yet because of work, one cant go, said no moeny, but their buying big $$$ items, that they dont need, and my parents, its a surprise, urgh, i didnt think it was going to be easy, but i also didnt think it was going to be this hard, especially we were going to treat our family by using our points. i guess it will be more points for us then

The program does make more sense when you have a MG number and can do a triop set up.

 

[ceejay13]

We have had a trip for 11 of us in January for quite some time. I did call a few weeks ago and got the MG number and we are doing the Epcot Storybook Dinner on January 12th. We tried for the breakfast but it is only offered on certain days and it didn't work for the day we wanted. As far as the trip planner, the only useful thing I have used it for is making an itinerary. I did put all of our reservations numbers, priority seatings, etc. in the planner and send it out last weekend. It's cute as you a Tinkerbell header and footer but other than that my group has had trouble, as well. If they sing on using my logon and password then they don't have any trouble, but haven't been able to using their own. I also was told that any priority seatings need to also be made using the MG phone line. For DVC members this is extremely time consuming. It took over an hour to make the Epcot dinner reservations and when I called for a Whispering Canyon ressie last weekend, it took over 30". Both time the CMs have been very apologetic, in fact last weekend the CM I spoke to was a long time DVC member, retired and gone to work for Disney part time. They have made it somewhat complicated for us DVCers to make the MG events as the CMs are forced to go through a different avenue anytime we call to add something to our itinerary. The first time I called, the CM gave me his experience on two of the MG events as they had CM previews. So I heard the details of the both the Epcot event and the fireworks cruise. They have sent me out a printed copy of an itinerary also, by mail. I do think they have a ways to go to get all the bugs worked out. If the 2 CMs I spoke to hadn't been so nice and talkative I could have easily gotten pretty frustrated.