OFFICIAL April 2012 DISers! 2 months and counting!

[Dan1]

yay! He says that he messed up some of the formulas that predict the park hours and that post-Easter April should drop a little bit once the crowd calendar is re-run.

Yeah Yeah Yeah

We used to only be able to go when the kids were out of school. Now that DD is no longer in school she and I purposely plan our father / daughter WDW trip for when the weather is typically nice and the crowds not likely to be high. Hence the reason why we are going last week of April & first week of May.

Whew!
Dan

 

[HalloweenNut]

WOW! So glad to hear that there might be a correction in the crowd calendar! I was really surprised and worried that we were going to be in trouble, especially given that I had picked our dates (April 22-29) based on the lower post-Easter/Spring Break crowds. Now I can relax and get back to planning.

 

[momtwoboys]

I don't care what the crowd levels are anymore...we just can't wait for April in Disney! We were there last year during the week leading up to Easter and honestly?? It was FINE! We got to each park and opening and no problem seeing/doing anything we wanted The weather was beautiful and we had so much fun! This year we are going a bit later than Easter so I'm expecting another wonderful trip see everyone there

 

[wdwgirl03]

I don't care what the crowd levels are anymore...we just can't wait for April in Disney! We were there last year during the week leading up to Easter and honestly?? It was FINE! We got to each park and opening and no problem seeing/doing anything we wanted The weather was beautiful and we had so much fun! This year we are going a bit later than Easter so I'm expecting another wonderful trip see everyone there

I agree! It's been a while since we've actually been over Easter (but I've been there the last two years over spring break) and I know it's manageable. I can't wait because it's going to be my first time staying at the Boardwalk and I also love the Flower and Garden Festival!

 

[lamb616]

just got the notification that the crowd levels were changed again. for my week (15th) they seem to have all gone up 1 (from the original #). Instead of 5-6s, it's all 6-7s. Better than 9s for sure, but still higher than I would like (when I first planned it months and months ago, they were 3s and 4s. Makes me worry what they will be up to be by the time the trip rolls around). I may have to reconsider this trip.

 

[HalloweenNut]

Good news! I just got a message from TouringPlans with Crowd Tracker updates and it seems they have fixed the program and adjusted crowd level numbers. That's a big relief to say the least! We're going from April 22-29 and the overall crowd levels have now gone back to what they were before the glitch. Most parks are now around the 4-7 mark. We certainly weren't going to cancel our trip but the higher crowds would have been a disappointment since we picked that time of year on purpose with the hopes of avoiding the worst.

 

[Dan1]

Good news! I just got a message from TouringPlans with Crowd Tracker updates and it seems they have fixed the program and adjusted crowd level numbers. That's a big relief to say the least! We're going from April 22-29 and the overall crowd levels have now gone back to what they were before the glitch. Most parks are now around the 4-7 mark. We certainly weren't going to cancel our trip but the higher crowds would have been a disappointment since we picked that time of year on purpose with the hopes of avoiding the worst.

Great to hear..........thanks for the update.

April 22nd week is our first week there so I'm a little relieved.

Dan

 

[scott2997]

Like some people have said already....

No matter what the crowd level is - if you have a touring plan, you can still accomplish a lot!

We always go the week before Easter each year due to our Spring Break dates. Yes, it's crowded - but we have a plan for each day and do our best to stick to it. We still manage to get a lot done. Even with 9.5-10 crowd levels!

 

[Princesca]

Yep! Got my email alert today too, thank heaven. Everything is back in the range I wanted.

I know you can accomplish a lot with a TP, but I would still rather not go to WDW with crowd levels in the 9s and 10s.

 

[momtwoboys]

How are you getting updates? I belong to TP too what am I missing?

 

[DaveinFallsChurch]

How are you getting updates? I belong to TP too what am I missing?

Within the Crowd Calendar section, you can click on the Crowd Tracker tab and custom create a calendar that will track chosen dates and send email updates to you if there are any changes to the crowd levels.

 

[angierae]

In other good news, if you're flying around Easter, Southwest just opened up a bunch of flights at far more reasonable prices than I've been seeing for the times we needed. The four of us can now fly round trip for $1506, when the cheapest I was seeing last week was closer to $3000.

(It could be even cheaper, but my husband hates layovers, so we're taking the $50 more expensive flight home.)

We're going to book tomorrow, I think, because I suspect these seats won't last long. It's going to involve shuffling our ADR's (again) since we'll be leaving too early on Saturday to make our Brown Derby lunch reservation, but we'll be getting in much earlier than I'd hoped the previous Saturday, so I'll cope.

 

[ddluvsdisney]

I don't care what the crowd levels are anymore...we just can't wait for April in Disney! We were there last year during the week leading up to Easter and honestly?? It was FINE! We got to each park and opening and no problem seeing/doing anything we wanted The weather was beautiful and we had so much fun! This year we are going a bit later than Easter so I'm expecting another wonderful trip see everyone there

We rarely base trips on the crowd calendar. Kinda hard to do when you're a teacher and have kids in school.
April is a beautiful time to go- LOVE the weather!!! We can't wait either.

 

[momtwoboys]

Agree! I am not a school teacher, but I do teach Dance and we follow the school calendar. Plus my kids are a bit older now and we decided not to take them out of school once older DS went into middle school. Too much anxiety and stress is put on them for missing homework/test/ and other assignments. The kicker for us now is that while we planned on April vacation, with a few days tacked on to get great airfare....our school district announced last week that they are taking AWAY our April vacation! Our airfare is already booked on Jetblue (August 16th I did that) and our room at AKL is booked with DVC points to stay in a studio. OMG! My kids are now really freaking out about missing. I will not cancel! The absences will be excused because we were already booked, but really this stinks. I wonder how many other areas will have their Spring vacation taken away due to that Halloween Snowstorm??

 

[DaveinFallsChurch]

Disney added room-only discount dates starting from April 13th on their special offers section of their website! Up to 30% depending on the resort.

 

[Princesca]

Yep! I got an email from SWV telling me that there was a discount released and automatically applied to my reservations. Yay Though I guess this makes it unlikely that we'll get any kind of better discount. I think for Values it was about 10%.

 

[DaveinFallsChurch]

Just called WDW and applied the new spring discount to our trip in April and saved 20% for our stay at Poly!

Princesca, I agree with you. It looks less likely that a better deal will come about, especially since the percentage of the discounts seem to be less than previous offers. I spent some time last night doing the math, and a free dining would save us a bit more than this new spring room discount. Oh well, not going to get too greedy - very happy that we got this discount! Love it when things start coming together!

 

[204charity]

Disney added room-only discount dates starting from April 13th on their special offers section of their website! Up to 30% depending on the resort.

Our trip is already paid for in full. Do you think we will get the discount in the form of a refund or does it only apply for reservations with deposits-only paid?

 

[DaveinFallsChurch]

Our trip is already paid for in full. Do you think we will get the discount in the form of a refund or does it only apply for reservations with deposits-only paid?

I'm not 100% sure, but my understanding is that you should be able to apply the discount and get a refund (Someone else can correct me if I'm wrong). It's worth a call to WDW to see if you can get that refund. Looking at your ticker, it looks like you're going to the same resort on the exact same date as I am, so there shouldn't be any restrictions. Good luck!

Edited: I've been reading up on previous posts on this subject, and it looks like you get a refund after deducting a "penalty fee" for the price reduction - in 2010 it was $50.

 

[HalloweenNut]

I saw the special in an email from MouseSavers so I right away contacted our travel agent. We've only put down a deposit with the balance owing in March so she's already applied the discount. Was so happy to see the discount. Like you said free dining would be great but so is this! Counting the days.

(looks like we're another Poly group)