Hi there,
A few days ago we booked up a 10 night stay at the Polynesian for what we thought will be our dream honeymoon, paying the extra money for a CL LV room (which I guess puts us in Hawaii).
Then yesterday we discovered the terrible news regarding all the contruction next to the Hawaii beach, and the possibility that the main pool will be closed, and there being disruption around the CRH.
Today we just don't know what to do. Should we save money and downgrade to a CL GV room (as you can watch the wishes fireworks from the CL Lounge anyway)? Or should we just change hotels and go the GF?
To further complicate matters we booked on the last day that you could receive free disney dining plans. Which means (and has been confirmed by our travel agent) that if we do change to the GF we will effectively be making a new booking and such will now have to pay for the disney dining plans!
We're kind of in a tricky situation here. It's our honeymoon, which we have saved long and hard for, and supposed to be one the most magical experiences of our lives. The Polynesian was hands down our first choice. But with all this construction and the probability that the main pool will be closed (!) we're really deflated about the whole idea of staying at the Poly now.
Does anyone have any thoughts / advice on our situation??
First, regarding the discount you booked under. In my experience all of the PP are correct. If you booked under a discount you can change your reservation and still use that discount, even though there cannot be any new bookings under that discount. last year we changed our GV Poly to GV CL Poly 3 weeks prior to the stay using the room only discount code we had booked under, and we were debating changing resorts, which we could have done under the same room only discount.
Second, regarding the construction at the resort. We were there 10/12-10/20 this year in a MKV CL room, and at that point the construction didn't bother us. The view wasn't perfect, like it has been in the past, but it was do-able. They put the yellow barriers up while we were there and started to take down the palm trees on sunset point, just for your reference. Now, based on the pictures I am seeing on here and tikimans facebook, I would probably think twice about staying lagoon view or MKV CL. That amount of dirt piles, machinery, and just general "ugliness" don't fit with the expensive view you are paying for. Personally I feel the rooms should be deeply discounted (like 50% or more) to justify the actual view you get, even though you do still see the castle in the distance. So since they don't do that, we won't stay in those rooms. If you decide on the Poly and CL is the most important for you, I would stay GV CL to save money and watch wished from the lounge. If you decide on the Poly and the view is most important, I would stay LV or MKV and request to be on the other side of the resort (sorry, blanking on the building name right now). I, personally, would stay GV CL. However, we never get the dining plan so we don't take that into consideration. In fact, we booked another stay Feb 1-9 2014 and initially booked LV CL, and changed it to GV CL based on the construction and price. With the 35% RO discount and GV instead of LV, we saved a lot of money.
Third, the pool. That's a tough one, and just a personal decision. If you'll be there in the really hot months, and think you'll swim, you might want to just stay at the GF. I know I would probably not bother with a shuttle to another pool. It's easy to run down from your room to swim, and back up if you forget something. It becomes a PITA if you have to walk 10 min or take a shuttle with all of your stuff, and repeat it for anything else you may have forgotten. There is another pool, which is fine, but it is essentially just a pool with no real theming, just nice gardens around it. It isn't zero entry, isn't that big, and has no slide, etc. (if you care). SInce we'll be there in Feb, when we likely wouldn't swim if the pool is closed, we decided to just not worry about it. If it would have been summer we would have chosen another resort (we have 2 kids who love to swim).
If they start tons of work on the grand ceremonial house in addition to everything else, i would just bail. I mean, one can only put up with so much when paying as much as they cahrge for the Poly. Having said that, I found out that my DH, who isn't a disney nut like I am but who likes to take vacations there, thinks staying at the Poly is a priority just based on conveneince with the monorail to both the MK and Epcot directly. He says if we have the club lounge, can see wishes, and have the monorail access he doesn't really care about the rest. It's worth it to not have to fold our strollers for the busses to MK and Epcot, and to have the direct monorail to both.
So that's just my take. If I had it my way, they wouldn't be building the obstructions to Hawaii and we would be staying LV CL in February.
Sorry you are having to deal with it, especially for your honeymoon. 
