Nov Trip..How much harder can this get?

[SaraJR]

It is not a customer service issue. When something goes on sale, or has a time frame where it becomes available, if you don't jump on that offer right away and you miss out it is no ones fault but your own. To me it is no different than going to the doughnut shop at 3 pm on Saturday and expecting them to have the same amount of doughnuts available as they did when they open. Or going out at noon on Black Friday and being ticked that the sale items are all gone. If you feel it is inconvenient to be there when the item is first offered, then that is your choice.

couldnt agree more! really good example with the black friday comparison

 

[alopez926]

As the OP of this thread, I can honestly say I've read all of your responses and I've appreciated all the great advice and encouragement. I've also enjoyed some of the commentary that had nothing to do with my original post but that's why I love the DIS...you never know where a thread will take you!

As an update, I've had great success over the past 5 days stalking MDE for 7DMT fast passes. As of today, I've gotten 6 of 8 in overlapping time frames and if I don't get the other 2, I won't be too disappointed. I'm glad the first-timers will be able to ride without having to wait 75 minutes and my daughter and I will ride during evening EMH or we'll skip it as we've ridden it before. We will do A&E at rope drop and we'll probably go to MSEP and Wishes if the spirit moves us--but not planning for those.

I am officially done planning this behemoth of a trip, and I'm so happy it's over. It has been a rough ride, but I'm happy to be "pencils down" and now on to enjoying the anticipation of our first ever trip to Disney with our whole family.

Cheers everyone and thanks again

 

[Mambo Junkie]

We are going 11/7-11/12 and I haven't even begun to plan. We confirmed doing this just 10 days ago. Everything is still refundable in case plans change, but I have a room (ASMu) and airfare (SWA). I haven't bought park tickets yet; that will have to wait until after 9/16 when the credit card cycle changes, LOL! Heck, I haven't even checked park hours yet! I am not worrying about FP+. If I can get them, I will. If not? Oh well. I am SO GLAD that we have been to WDW so many times, that HAVING to get a certain ride is pretty much irrelevant. Actually, with all this preplanning, Disney is becoming irrelevant. I just can't work myself up to playing the game, throwing myself into the rat race yet. I know I might regret this, but I just can't make myself want to do all the preplanning that's necessary. It's not fun anymore. I know, by not entering the fray, that I might be "dooming" our vacation to secondary experiences, but I just can't care enough. Planning isn't fun anymore. I miss the old fast pass system.

We went last December and I played the midnight/60 and 180+ 10 game, but I hated it and I felt locked in. This time I'm only reserving 1 day and the rest we're going to just go and see how it falls. If it's miserable, we'll just leave. We can enjoy the resort, go to another park, whatever. Planning is not fun for us, and the results of planning is not fun.

 

[Egdisney]

we went on our 1st trip in October 2013 my family of 6 and my parents. It is so flipping hard to try to get things planned for that large of a group, trying to figure out how to make everyone happy and then to add to it I spent hours reading about paper fast pass only to have fastpass plus added to my trip in what I'm pretty sure was less than 60 days. It all ended fairly well, but I hope not to plan a trip for that large of a group again. My dad and husband didn't love it, my husband says he won't go back(he's not very fun). My mom and I made a spur of the moment decision to go in November last week and so far planning has been a breeze! I hope to be able to take each kid individually sometime. Wished we lived closer so travel wasn't such a pain.

 

[LadyDiznee123]

This is an interesting thread.

I have had little to no problems booking FP's or ADR's. The CM and I did indeed have to go through every date of my stay for a BOG reservation but then on my final day there was a spot available. The only thing I could not book for was a desert party which I realized was a mistake for me anyway. We did a bit of searching for Teppan Edo but I still got a date and time that I wanted.

I have gotten every FP that I wanted. I haven't compared the entire thread, but are each of us doing something differently??? Unfortunately I can't recall which day and time that I made these calls. They could have been during a weekday at the office or on the weekend.

Note: My visit is in late Oct (Oct 28th) and I booked the fast passes about 2 weeks ago.

 

[wdw4rfam]

I will agree with you and we DID get everything we wanted. This was far more stressful than planning a vacation should be this year. We are planning a universal vacation next year instead just to take a break and hope they fix all of this mess. We will be back because we love Disney, but need a break after all of this.

 

[LadyDiznee123]

I don't mean to flame anyone or be disrespectful but we have only had 1 problem booking things for November 2015 and it was a BOG dinner (which we got eventually with the help of DVC member services). We arrive 11/5 and leave 11/15.

For rooms: we booked 1 week at BCV using DVC points in December 2014, added on 2 nights at Boardwalk in January 2015 (not surprisingly BCV was booked because of F&W as per usual), and added on a last minute night at Dolphin when our flights got changed in August 2015.

For food: we got BOG dinner in May 2015 (this required being on the phone for about 45 min but we got it at the 18+10 window). Once I booked our FPs earlier this month, I made the rest of our ADRs without a problem: Sanaa, Spice Road Table, and Brown Derby.

For FP+s: I got online when our window opened and booked everything, including multiple 7DMT rides, multiple TSMM rides, multiple Test Track rides. Just this morning I changed some EPCOT FPs around to match the end of our VIP tour so we got one more Test Track ride. Again no issues for either me +DH or the 2 of us+2 others.

We've been using FP+ since they rolled out a few years ago: I think our first trip with them was F&W 2013 (BCV was an early test resort) and have used them on subsequent trips. We've never had problems with them and we love being able to sleep in and not rush for rope drop just to ride or get legacy FPs.

I too have not had a problem. This is an interesting thread.

I have had little to no problems booking FP's or ADR's. The CM and I did indeed have to go through every date of my stay for a BOG reservation but then on my final day there was a spot available. The only thing I could not book for was a desert party which I realized was a mistake for me anyway. We did a bit of searching for Teppan Edo but I still got a date and time that I wanted.

I have gotten every FP that I wanted. I haven't compared the entire thread, but are each of us doing something differently??? Unfortunately I can't recall which day and time that I made these calls. They could have been during a weekday at the office or on the weekend.

Note: My visit is in late Oct (Oct 28th) and I booked the fast passes about 2 weeks ago.

 

[LadyDiznee123]

I will agree with you and we DID get everything we wanted. This was far more stressful than planning a vacation should be this year. We are planning a universal vacation next year instead just to take a break and hope they fix all of this mess. We will be back because we love Disney, but need a break after all of this.

Maybe it wasnt as stressful for me because this is my first SOLO trip. At the end of the day if I could not get what I wanted I wouldn't stress it very much. But most of us on these boards have family and plans for what you'd all like to do together. For me, if I can't do A,B or C.... I'll D, E or F and be happy with it. But I understand that that's not the case for everybody.

 

[LadyDiznee123]

As the OP of this thread, I can honestly say I've read all of your responses and I've appreciated all the great advice and encouragement. I've also enjoyed some of the commentary that had nothing to do with my original post but that's why I love the DIS...you never know where a thread will take you!

As an update, I've had great success over the past 5 days stalking MDE for 7DMT fast passes. As of today, I've gotten 6 of 8 in overlapping time frames and if I don't get the other 2, I won't be too disappointed. I'm glad the first-timers will be able to ride without having to wait 75 minutes and my daughter and I will ride during evening EMH or we'll skip it as we've ridden it before. We will do A&E at rope drop and we'll probably go to MSEP and Wishes if the spirit moves us--bot not planning for those.

I am officially done planning this behemoth of a trip, and I'm so happy it's over. It has been a rough ride, but I'm happy to be "pencils down" and now on to enjoying the anticipation of our first ever trip to Disney with our whole family.

Cheers everyone and thanks again

Good for you! Glad it has worked out!

 

[wdw4rfam]

Maybe it wasnt as stressful for me because this is my first SOLO trip. At the end of the day if I could not get what I wanted I wouldn't stress it very much. But most of us on these boards have family and plans for what you'd all like to do together. For me, if I can't do A,B or C.... I'll D, E or F and be happy with it. But I understand that that's not the case for everybody.

Yes, and we have the opposite situation, as this will probably be the last time my DD goes with us for a while, because he and her BF are planning on moving in together. It's his first time going and she has always wanted to stay at CBR, and they really wanted BOG and CRT. My youngest DD has her Anna dress ready to meet her, so that was her # 1 priority, so this was a stress plan from the beginning. Couldnt get CBR the day free dining opened ( did get it months later). The ADRS I had no problems, but hearing everyone's stories the week before had me stressed. Fp's I didn't have any trouble either. All this stress was my fault, for trying to expect perfection. But I know I need a break next year, to just go on vacation plan - free.

 

[LadyDiznee123]

Yes, and we have the opposite situation, as this will probably be the last time my DD goes with us for a while, because he and her BF are planning on moving in together. It's his first time going and she has always wanted to stay at CBR, and they really wanted BOG and CRT. My youngest DD has her Anna dress ready to meet her, so that was her # 1 priority, so this was a stress plan from the beginning. Couldnt get CBR the day free dining opened ( did get it months later). The ADRS I had no problems, but hearing everyone's stories the week before had me stressed. Fp's I didn't have any trouble either. All this stress was my fault, for trying to expect perfection. But I know I need a break next year, to just go on vacation plan - free.

Don't forget that there are plenty of Disney Nerds that go plan-free. Some guy posted earlier in the year that they were just going to go and even not even plan which park they were going to... just getting on the first bus that arrives. But that's a bit too extreme for me!

Anyway, hope you enjoy your spell away from Disney.