The we loooooove Bonnet Creek thread part2

[nilseks]

I know milk and some other stuff are available at the onsite shop. Honestly, the selection is extremely limited and expensive and generally not worth it. The Hess station may also have some stuff, but again, overpriced and not necessarily worth it.

Depending upon what you are wanting, if you don't want to make a store run, You might want to look at one of the grocery delivery services such as Garden Grocer. I don't know if they can do alcohol though.

Personally, I like making a run by the Walmart the day I arrive to grab some things when I fly in. It doesn't take that long and that way I can get all the items I need and the exact brands or sizes that I want instead of relying on a limited selection available at most small convenience shops. (Bonus: the Walmart has a Liquor store at the front, so I can also grab some rum or other tasty adult beverage so I can save some money at the pool bar.)

Thanks DCTooTall! Appreciate the info. We have used GardenGrocer in the past and liked them. Just figured since we'll have a car this time I would try to pick up a few things, but I guess you can't have it both ways. I'm thrifty so I don't want to spend a ton on groceries.

Can you give me the general location of this Walmart? I know there are a few in the area; I'd prefer to hit the closest one so I can zip in and out.

 

[Miz Diz]

Which towers have been Refurbished or at least got new sofas? I need to request a tower. I was thinking 2 or 5. I know if our room has a torn sofa or the room is in bad shape, my dh will never stay offsite again. my friend told me to request tower 6, but i would love to try for a fireworks view. Our trips are overlapping by 2 days. She said she always stays in 6.

 

[DCTooTall]

For people who stay off site....what are your park plans like? Do you go every day? Is there any reason to do park hoppers?

Honestly, I think from a park touring standpoint, Everybody tours the parks in their own way. That won't change much on a personal level between staying onsite and offsite.

Ultimately I think there are only 2 factors from offsite that could change a person's personal preferences on how they tour the parks. 1. Since you are offsite, You can't take advantage of EMH, so it's a non-factor for you. [some people only get park-hoppers so they can take advantage of EMH, then park-hop to a less crowded non-EMH park during the day]. and 2., Since it's much less expensive to stay offsite compared to onsite, you may be able to afford a longer trip and more time around the parks.

So the question on if there is any reason to do parkhoppers, it really comes down to a personal preference. If the only reason you did parkhoppers was so that you could take advantage of EMH while enjoying the day in a non-EMH less crowded park.... Then no. You probably don't need Park-hoppers. If you are someone who enjoys park hopping, then staying onsite of offsite isn't going to change that. Then you have the whole fact that if you are lengthening your trip from what you normally stay onsite, Parkhoppers may be worthwhile for you since you can spend the extra days going back and hitting favorites in the different parks or things you missed on your first go-round in the park.

Thanks DCTooTall! Appreciate the info. We have used GardenGrocer in the past and liked them. Just figured since we'll have a car this time I would try to pick up a few things, but I guess you can't have it both ways. I'm thrifty so I don't want to spend a ton on groceries.

Can you give me the general location of this Walmart? I know there are a few in the area; I'd prefer to hit the closest one so I can zip in and out.

I think I remember the Walmart directions from the resort were added to the first post awhile ago.

My personal favorite is the one off 535.... it's also the easiest to swing by on your way to the resort from the airport (if you take the southern airport route)

 

[Bellamouse]

For people who stay off site....what are your park plans like? Do you go every day? Is there any reason to do park hoppers?

This seemed like an odd question to me (not being critical of you - it just made me scratch my head) - I couldn't figure out what where someone stayed had to do with park hoppers or not?

Someone else kind of answered that question for me, but as someone who has stayed off property on all trips but one, how we tour has nothing to do with where we stay.

We buy 10 day non expiring tickets, not tickets specifically for one trip, so for us, each day is worth about $40 (roughly). Also, we are just two adults with no kids, so there is no way we would spend an entire day at MK, and no way we would waste the extra half day doing nothing when the tickets cost us $40 each.

I say $40 because our 10 day non expiring, park hopper WPF&M tickets were about 600 each. Because we use our WPF&M just for water parks, and spend a whole day there, we count them as another day. So 10 park days and 6 waterpark days is 16 days that never expire.

So we try to maximize our value for that $80 or so dollars we spend for park admission each day, and go half days to different parks. We also don't much care for DHS so only spend a half day there. We can also finish AK in about a half day so we would go to another park that day as well.

For us, it would be a big waste to spend $80 to spend only a half day at a park. So park hoppers are a must.

Because we go from 9 am to 9 pm every day at the parks, with no break in the afternoon, we don't need EMH. We wouldn't go much earlier than 9 anyway (heck, it's vacation - I don't want to get up that early!) and after 12 hours in the parks, I'm dead and want a dip in the hot tub back at the hotel before bed. So 9 pm is plenty late enough for us. So we don't need late EMH either.

I can totally see though how other people do things differently, but for us, it makes zero difference whether we stay onsite or offsite - we always tour the same way.

We stayed onsite once and actually didn't much care for it - only because we didn't feel we got a good value for what we paid (and we were on an airline discount but it still wasn't what I would call "cheap", and we thought it was still too much compared to what you got). But I digress....

We also do a water park only day, a day "off" - maybe hang at the hotel, DTD, whatever, and some trips we do Universal. So not all our days are spent in Disney parks. So out of a typical 7 day trip, we use 4 Disney days and 1 waterpark day (from our tickets). So our tickets last us at least 2 trips and then some. We still have 3 waterpark visits on our old tickets from 3 trips ago.... Love the non-expiring tickets!

 

[katallo]

Which towers have been Refurbished or at least got new sofas? I need to request a tower. I was thinking 2 or 5. I know if our room has a torn sofa or the room is in bad shape, my dh will never stay offsite again. my friend told me to request tower 6, but i would love to try for a fireworks view. Our trips are overlapping by 2 days. She said she always stays in 6.

When we were there a few months ago, management said Tower 3 was the final tower to be refurbished and it was in progress. That being said, we have stayed in Tower 1 and 2 and had a nice lake/fireworks view. Last trip, we were in Tower 4 and had a terrible sofa. Our friends were also in 4 and their sofa was worse than ours. Management did tell us that the new sofas were in transit, so that problem should certainly be solved by now. Hope this helps. I understand about your DH. Mine was not happy with the sofa when we checked in, but we had to live with it

 

[Chelley00]

I can totally see though how other people do things differently, but for us, it makes zero difference whether we stay onsite or offsite - we always tour the same way.

Same here. We've stayed offsite in houses and we've stayed onsite, and I still plan my days exactly the same way. If I build in a break, we take it no matter where we are. Then there are days where we are in the parks from sunup to sundown.

And we've NEVER had park hoppers. If we spend half a day in a park and we are done, we leave and swim in the pool or go to bed early, we don't go back to a different park.

 

[osugal]

We were planning to go back to WDW next year again and stay club level deluxe. We love staying CL so that means we must stay deluxe. It's a huge expense for the trip but I justify that we don't go every year. And, I really like being on property, park hopping etc.

Since seeing all of the pictures of BC I'm seriously considering switching. Still being so close to WDW and having all of that beautiful space...for so much less expense! Having a kitchen and laundry facilities would be wonderful. It's so appealing to me.

The only thing I'm worried about is that I'll miss being able to just go back and forth from the parks as easily. I know they have shuttles but it sounds like most suggest driving. We usually stay at BCR and we can walk to Epcot in 5 minutes so we would often just go there for dinner if we wanted to.

Do most of you go to the parks less when staying at BC rather than staying on site? I can't see much reason to do park hoppers since it will be less convenient to go to more than one a day. Not that it's a big deal....just trying to process how much this would change our park plans.

 

[Chelley00]

I posted just above you, but I think we might spend a little more time in the parks when we stay offsite. We just get there, park, spend our day, eat dinner and then sometimes stay for fireworks, sometimes not. We definitely don't do less.

 

[DCTooTall]

The only thing I'm worried about is that I'll miss being able to just go back and forth from the parks as easily. I know they have shuttles but it sounds like most suggest driving. We usually stay at BCR and we can walk to Epcot in 5 minutes so we would often just go there for dinner if we wanted to.

Do most of you go to the parks less when staying at BC rather than staying on site? I can't see much reason to do park hoppers since it will be less convenient to go to more than one a day. Not that it's a big deal....just trying to process how much this would change our park plans.

It's no more inconvenient to do park-hoppers when staying offsite than onsite.

If you take the Wyndham Shuttle to the parks, There is nothing preventing you from using Disney Transportation once at the parks to hop from one location to another. You can then catch the Wyndham Shuttle at your new park to get back to the resort without needing to go back to the one you started at.

If you drive, again, you can use Disney Transportation to park hop, Or you can even just use your car to park-hop. Driving can actually be quicker since you don't need to worry about waiting for the next Disney bus, and if you show your parking receipt from the first park to the 2nd's parking gates, you don't need to pay to park again. ("free" hopping for your car. )

 

[osugal]

That makes sense - thanks everyone. I guess the reason I thought it would change things is just feeling like the parks aren't as convenient. I think of staying on-site as being able to conveniently go back and forth between the hotels and parks as often as you want. When I think of being off-site I would think that you would leave once for the day and stay as long as possible....then return for the evening. I'm probably being too narrow-minded in my view of it. That's probably because the other time I stayed off-site it wasn't nearly as close as BC.

Thanks for the replies!

 

[DCTooTall]

That makes sense - thanks everyone. I guess the reason I thought it would change things is just feeling like the parks aren't as convenient. I think of staying on-site as being able to conveniently go back and forth between the hotels and parks as often as you want. When I think of being off-site I would think that you would leave once for the day and stay as long as possible....then return for the evening. I'm probably being too narrow-minded in my view of it. That's probably because the other time I stayed off-site it wasn't nearly as close as BC.

Thanks for the replies!

Totally understandable.

Just think of it this way.... Wyndham Bonnet Creek is closer to the parks than some of the DTD area resorts (and definitely more convenient to the major thoroughfares). It's practically next to CBR (Separated by a fence, drainage ditch/creek, Some Trees, and a roadway)

 

[kleldridge]

We were planning to go back to WDW next year again and stay club level deluxe. We love staying CL so that means we must stay deluxe. It's a huge expense for the trip but I justify that we don't go every year. And, I really like being on property, park hopping etc.

Since seeing all of the pictures of BC I'm seriously considering switching. Still being so close to WDW and having all of that beautiful space...for so much less expense! Having a kitchen and laundry facilities would be wonderful. It's so appealing to me.

The only thing I'm worried about is that I'll miss being able to just go back and forth from the parks as easily. I know they have shuttles but it sounds like most suggest driving. We usually stay at BCR and we can walk to Epcot in 5 minutes so we would often just go there for dinner if we wanted to.

Do most of you go to the parks less when staying at BC rather than staying on site? I can't see much reason to do park hoppers since it will be less convenient to go to more than one a day. Not that it's a big deal....just trying to process how much this would change our park plans.

We have a car with us each time we have been. So, we were already in the habit of hopping in the car instead of waiting (sometimes too long) for a bus. Staying at WBC just makes it easier to get "home." When we stayed at the cramped moderates, it would take just as long to get back to the room. We sometimes stayed at the parks longer just because the room was uncomfortable to hang out in. Not a problem at WBC!

Also, you can easily rationalize going to WDW every year because you save so much $ on the room, it's like getting to go once for free!

 

[dizneechic]

We were planning to go back to WDW next year again and stay club level deluxe. We love staying CL so that means we must stay deluxe. It's a huge expense for the trip but I justify that we don't go every year. And, I really like being on property, park hopping etc.

Since seeing all of the pictures of BC I'm seriously considering switching. Still being so close to WDW and having all of that beautiful space...for so much less expense! Having a kitchen and laundry facilities would be wonderful. It's so appealing to me.

The only thing I'm worried about is that I'll miss being able to just go back and forth from the parks as easily. I know they have shuttles but it sounds like most suggest driving. We usually stay at BCR and we can walk to Epcot in 5 minutes so we would often just go there for dinner if we wanted to.

Do most of you go to the parks less when staying at BC rather than staying on site? I can't see much reason to do park hoppers since it will be less convenient to go to more than one a day. Not that it's a big deal....just trying to process how much this would change our park plans.

We're a family of 5 so pretty much forced into a Deluxe or value suite (no thank you!), and also only do club level onsite. We're Poly folk though. For us CL meant space to spread out because in the rooms were on top of one another, and breakfast in the lounge was heaven - so simple, ready when we were (got us to the parks quickly).

At Bonnet Creek we missed watching Wishes from the lounge the most, everything else was worth the exchange/savings. We spent on our week at BC what 2 nights Poly CL cost us - 'nuff said!

We did visit the parks a little differently, but really it didn't effect our touring that much. We always had our own car regardless of onsite or off, so drove everywhere (except to MK of course, LOL!) when at the Poly. We would typically hit our park of choice for rope drop and go until mid afternoon. If onsite we would go somewhere for dinner (typically had ADR's on the loop) and then back to the resort to relax for a few, change into jammies and watch wishes from the lounge with drinks/desserts and then straight to bed. When at BC we hit our park of choice at RD, stay till mid afternoon, and then we would either hit the resort for a few and then drive and park at the boardwalk and check out things there and stroll into EPCOT though IG for a bite/illuminations or we would relax in the room, cook dinner and enjoy the resort. We missed our nightly wishes, but it made the one time we did CM then walked to MK for ELP and Wishes that much more special (my kids had never seen wishes from in the parks!).

Regarding hoppers, you can always add them if/when you decide you need them. It costs the same to do it now or on the last day, so you don't need to have the expense until your SURE you need it. We tend to hop regardless of on or off site because we like to wind down our evenings with a little stroll and sights. Then again we've been to the parks often enough that we don't feel compelled to go go go all the time, that's what our mornings are for!

 

[armmom]

We are going on our 1st vacation in 8 years with our 3 DS and are staying at WBC. We are booked through VS but I was wondering what tower do we request? Do we want a fireworks or a pool veiw? We will be in the park for 3 days but 2 days we want to hang around the pool. This trip is really special to us. Our middle son is in REMISSION!!!!!!! And we need a smooth and fun time!!!Would love some feedback as to what would be a great tower and view!!! LOVE THIS THREAD!!!!

 

[cherylsmike]

Hey Cheryl long time no see There are 3 of us in the AVC staying at WBC this August. A cruise in April I have one booked in April too for 4 days on the Wonder, but will be cancelling because I want a 7 day on the Fantasy in 2014 when the dates come out
I just wanted to give you a big Ol'Queenie hug

warning please excuse our reunion

Queenie!!! If 3 AVC'ers are here than I must be in the right place! I am just getting my feet weet with a 3 day. My motion sickness can be really bad. What better way to test it than a boat ride with Mickey. Maybe I will join you on the Fantasy if this little boat ride is as wonderful as it sounds.

I was hoping to upgrade from Art of Animation to Riverside for this trip. And I think I am going to really miss it. But I will not miss the beds that were a little to hard. Your trip is so close. Your going to give me the Queenie report, right! You must be so excitied. I'm so excited for you!

I love your countdown "Shut up and Have Fun!" classic AVC!

 

[Disfan15]

Can they take any requests at check in for Wyndham Bonnet Creek?
Also what is the best building and view? Won't lake view be loud from the pools nearby?

 

[nancy155]

I cannot believe how quickly the time is flying by! We leave four weeks from today. At this time in one month we will be getting our rental from the airport and headed to Publix on our way to WBC!!!!!

 

[kleldridge]

Just checked into a presidential suite. Having stayed at WBC 3 other times, I must say I was thoroughly impeessed. Didn't get to check in early but busied ourselves at Epcot. Love the extra space and memories in the presidential!

 

[nancy155]

Just checked into a presidential suite. Having stayed at WBC 3 other times, I must say I was thoroughly impeessed. Didn't get to check in early but busied ourselves at Epcot. Love the extra space and memories in the presidential!

Here's to hoping you and yours have a perfect vacation!

 

[ibob52]

Can they take any requests at check in for Wyndham Bonnet Creek?
Also what is the best building and view? Won't lake view be loud from the pools nearby?

Yes they will consider requests / preferences at check in.

Sometime's LUCK and time of arrival can be a important factor in what you can negotiate with the front desk.
I arrived @ 7pm on Saturday
the line was short at that time (not so @ 4pm *insert patience*)

So I was able to discuss @ check in *my preference* (if available) = Building 6 / High Floor / Lake view ...
after they checked the system ... I was offered a few different options (low floor / parking lot view / etc) ...
I was able to chose ... Building 4 / 9th Floor / Lake View.

The pool area activities with *microphone* usage (Karaoke - Games - etc) are quite loud (while on the balcolny)
with the sliding Glass Door shut = room was quiet.
Much lower floors of same building I would not ... think so.

From my observance of WBC (layout) ... IIRC
Not all ... Lake / pool view rooms ... are in Buildings
that are directly behind / near a pool.

The actual noise from the pool area was not noticable (High Floor)
during normal use ... but with the organized activities = it can be loud (microphone).

Depending on the room location in the building ... one end of the same building
may not have the same experience as the other end of same building.

I had the Best vacation ever ~ WBC