PrincessJo
Married my prince... now I just need a castle...
- Joined
- Feb 15, 2013
- Messages
- 472
I just thought I'd share a few of our thoughts. We were in WDW from Dec. 31 throught Jan. 6. We stayed at the Boardwalk Inn. There were many firsts this time for us:
Jet Blue - This was the first time we had ever flown with Jet Blue. This will also be the LAST time. From the time we booked the flight in April until the day we left, they changed our flight times FOUR times. Fine... we rolled with it. We left Austin about 30 minutes late. Fine... we rolled with it. On the way home was an absolute nightmare. Our flight was scheduled to leave Orlando at 12:18pm. We arrived early and sat at Gate 3 for about 2 hours. Around the time we should have started boarding, they made a gate change. We all walked down to Gate 1... whatever... we rolled with it. Jet Blue never changed the signs at the new gate, so Gate 1 still read "San Juan leaving on time, 1:07pm". Well, yeah, that caused just a BIT of confusion. We left an hour late and when the flight to Austin was supposed to board, the people from San Juan kept trying to get on the plane. It was chaos. I could go into detail, but I'd just rather forget the whole ordeal at this point.
The entire time there were NO announcemtents or ANYTHING. NO updates... NOTHING. NOT IMPRESSED by Jet Blue... AT ALL.
Instead of Jet Blue earning new, loyal customers... they sent us running back to United. So much for that.
The Boardwalk Inn - Also... not imressed at all. We were in a standard room that overlooked the "quiet" pool. Quiet? Not so much. We hated the long, winding and confusing hallways. Lots of stairways that went to different places, elevators that went to different places... lots of confused guests lost in the halls. It took us a few days to figure out what stairs went where and what elevators to take to get where we wanted to go. We ended up giving out WAY more directions that we cared too. We felt like hotel employees... I think we earned at least one free night.
Our flight landed at 8pm but by 1am our bags still hadn't arrived. We called at about 2 am and said please bring them, cuz well, all of our stuff is in them and we kinda need to get ready for bed. Our bags arrived at 3am. This had never happened to us before.
We were missing the in-room dining menu, so on our way back up to our room, we requested one at the front desk. We wanted to wait there for it, but they insisted that they'd bring it right up. It arrived about an hour and a half later. Not sure why such a simple request took so long.
Be Our Guest (Jan 2) - We got in line about 11am for lunch. We were at the table with food at about 11:40pm. My family just did NOT understand what all the hype is about. We ordered 2 turkey sandwiches and the ham/cheese. The friendly server brought us 1 turkey, 1 ham/cheese and 1 roast beef. She apologized for the mistake and said she'd bring out another turkey right away... 5 minutes passed... 15 minutes passed... 30 minutes passed... so hubby ended up sharing mine and my son's lunch. After 2 attempts we finally got a manager who could refund the cost of the turkey sandwich back on to our giftcard.
The food was meh. The 3 rooms were okay, but we weren't impressed at all. I would much rather have had the lobster roll from Columbia Harbor House. Oh well... we'll know next time.
Magic Bands - All of our magic bands worked perfectly. No issues at all getting in/out of our room and no issues at all with using it for FP+. We also used it for a few purchases. This was a wonderful surprise.
FP+ - We LOVED FP+. It worked perfectly. We would schedule our 3 for the day and fill in the time between our FPs riding the other rides. We slept until 8 or 9 am and then went to the park to use the FPs we had. We'd go back to the room or somewhere else for the peak times and then waited until the evening to go back and ride everything else. We never waiting more than 30 minutes for anything. This worked fine for us. After Wishes, we only waited 10 minutes for most things. Now after using the bands and FP+, I still don't understand all of the doom and gloom... and we were even there during one of the busiest weeks of the year.
MDE - it was slow as expected, but we had no issues changing our FPs and seeing our itinerary.
2 Highlights for us:
Hoop Dee Doo (Jan 2) - We had never done this before and we LOVED it. We were in the front right next to the stage and we had a wonderful time. My DH and DS poo-pooed this the whole time leading up to it and then apologized to me afterwards. They were so glad I had made them go
Tomorrowland Terrace Fireworks Dessert party (Jan 5) - Worth. Every. Penny. All of those poor people... wall-to-wall people down below all on top of each other waiting for the parade and for Wishes. I'd pay that money again in a hearbeat to have access to yummy desserts, my own table and a great view of the fireworks.
Overall we had a great week. Sure it was crowded, but we didn't think it was THAT big a deal. They were manageable every single day. Dec. 31 we walked up to Planet Hollywood at 11pm and we had a table within 5 minutes. We ordered sliders, got our New Year's hat and horn from our server and rang in the New Year with New Yorkers in Times Square. It was nice.
A few bumps here and there, but every time we go we learn more and the next vacation is even better.
I'm short on quite a few details, but I think I hit the highlights. Let me know if you have any specific questions. I'd say take everything you read here with a grain of salt... but I can offer my own opinion on things How WE visit the parks and what WE like to do pertains to MY FAMILY only... I do not even think for a moment what that works for us and what we like is true for every single person out there.
Jet Blue - This was the first time we had ever flown with Jet Blue. This will also be the LAST time. From the time we booked the flight in April until the day we left, they changed our flight times FOUR times. Fine... we rolled with it. We left Austin about 30 minutes late. Fine... we rolled with it. On the way home was an absolute nightmare. Our flight was scheduled to leave Orlando at 12:18pm. We arrived early and sat at Gate 3 for about 2 hours. Around the time we should have started boarding, they made a gate change. We all walked down to Gate 1... whatever... we rolled with it. Jet Blue never changed the signs at the new gate, so Gate 1 still read "San Juan leaving on time, 1:07pm". Well, yeah, that caused just a BIT of confusion. We left an hour late and when the flight to Austin was supposed to board, the people from San Juan kept trying to get on the plane. It was chaos. I could go into detail, but I'd just rather forget the whole ordeal at this point.
The entire time there were NO announcemtents or ANYTHING. NO updates... NOTHING. NOT IMPRESSED by Jet Blue... AT ALL.
Instead of Jet Blue earning new, loyal customers... they sent us running back to United. So much for that.
The Boardwalk Inn - Also... not imressed at all. We were in a standard room that overlooked the "quiet" pool. Quiet? Not so much. We hated the long, winding and confusing hallways. Lots of stairways that went to different places, elevators that went to different places... lots of confused guests lost in the halls. It took us a few days to figure out what stairs went where and what elevators to take to get where we wanted to go. We ended up giving out WAY more directions that we cared too. We felt like hotel employees... I think we earned at least one free night.
Our flight landed at 8pm but by 1am our bags still hadn't arrived. We called at about 2 am and said please bring them, cuz well, all of our stuff is in them and we kinda need to get ready for bed. Our bags arrived at 3am. This had never happened to us before.
We were missing the in-room dining menu, so on our way back up to our room, we requested one at the front desk. We wanted to wait there for it, but they insisted that they'd bring it right up. It arrived about an hour and a half later. Not sure why such a simple request took so long.
Be Our Guest (Jan 2) - We got in line about 11am for lunch. We were at the table with food at about 11:40pm. My family just did NOT understand what all the hype is about. We ordered 2 turkey sandwiches and the ham/cheese. The friendly server brought us 1 turkey, 1 ham/cheese and 1 roast beef. She apologized for the mistake and said she'd bring out another turkey right away... 5 minutes passed... 15 minutes passed... 30 minutes passed... so hubby ended up sharing mine and my son's lunch. After 2 attempts we finally got a manager who could refund the cost of the turkey sandwich back on to our giftcard.
The food was meh. The 3 rooms were okay, but we weren't impressed at all. I would much rather have had the lobster roll from Columbia Harbor House. Oh well... we'll know next time.
Magic Bands - All of our magic bands worked perfectly. No issues at all getting in/out of our room and no issues at all with using it for FP+. We also used it for a few purchases. This was a wonderful surprise.
FP+ - We LOVED FP+. It worked perfectly. We would schedule our 3 for the day and fill in the time between our FPs riding the other rides. We slept until 8 or 9 am and then went to the park to use the FPs we had. We'd go back to the room or somewhere else for the peak times and then waited until the evening to go back and ride everything else. We never waiting more than 30 minutes for anything. This worked fine for us. After Wishes, we only waited 10 minutes for most things. Now after using the bands and FP+, I still don't understand all of the doom and gloom... and we were even there during one of the busiest weeks of the year.
MDE - it was slow as expected, but we had no issues changing our FPs and seeing our itinerary.
2 Highlights for us:
Hoop Dee Doo (Jan 2) - We had never done this before and we LOVED it. We were in the front right next to the stage and we had a wonderful time. My DH and DS poo-pooed this the whole time leading up to it and then apologized to me afterwards. They were so glad I had made them go
Tomorrowland Terrace Fireworks Dessert party (Jan 5) - Worth. Every. Penny. All of those poor people... wall-to-wall people down below all on top of each other waiting for the parade and for Wishes. I'd pay that money again in a hearbeat to have access to yummy desserts, my own table and a great view of the fireworks.
Overall we had a great week. Sure it was crowded, but we didn't think it was THAT big a deal. They were manageable every single day. Dec. 31 we walked up to Planet Hollywood at 11pm and we had a table within 5 minutes. We ordered sliders, got our New Year's hat and horn from our server and rang in the New Year with New Yorkers in Times Square. It was nice.
A few bumps here and there, but every time we go we learn more and the next vacation is even better.
I'm short on quite a few details, but I think I hit the highlights. Let me know if you have any specific questions. I'd say take everything you read here with a grain of salt... but I can offer my own opinion on things
How WE visit the parks and what WE like to do pertains to MY FAMILY only... I do not even think for a moment what that works for us and what we like is true for every single person out there.
