Update: Resort change!!! Second guessing myself about our Christmas resort choice....

[discookiemonsta]

UPDATE: So I was home, bored and decided to check availability for our dates for AoA. (has not been showing any availability for the LM section for a while now...) It showed up with LM availability so something told me to call, just to see.

The CM I got was very helpful and nice. He said that my reservation was under a pin and that he hadn't seen that pin work for quite a while, especially for my dates as well as for AoA, BUT he said he would check anyway. Within in a second, he said, "Oh, wow, it is available with your pin!!! That is unbelievable, especially for your dates! Would you like to book it?"

YES PLEASE!!! I decided it was a a sign, lol...now we are booked at the LM section at AoA and I'm trying to keep it a surprise for my girls!!!

I'm so excited!!!


Some background info:
We are a family of four (2 adults, 2 kids ages 6 and 9) We have been to WDW numerous time and have stayed at POR and POP a few times. Our trip is booked for this Christmas, December 13th -27th.

We were able to book with Free Dining using a pin. We have never stayed as long as 2 weeks, but in order to get FD (and the fact that we couldn't go any earlier than the 13th due to school schedules) we decided to fullfill our dream of spending Christmas at Disney. Originally my dream was to stay at AoA in the Little Mermaid section since we have two little girls, who would love it.

When I concluded that we would be spending more money than planned, I decided to book ASMovies, which was cheaper than POP and AoA. (and as much as we loved POP, I thought it would be fun to stay somewhere 'new')

Of course now the pin has long expired and I am of course second guessing myself about staying at ASMo. What else is there to do with two more months to wait and all of my ADR's booked?

My thoughts on AoA:

I love the look of the outside areas, but since we will be there in December we won't be using the pool anyway.

Even though the LM rooms look adorable and girly, I am not a big fan of them. The bathrooms look beautiful though.

The foodcourt choices do not appeal to us at all, but then again, we love the POP foodcourt and we could always walk over there to eat.

It's a large resort and the LM rooms are the furthest away.

It would be incredibly crowded/busy since it's a new resort or will every resort be incredibly crowded/busy since we will be there over Christmas?

My thoughts on ASMo:

It is a smaller resort, which would eliminate a lot of walking at the end of a long day at the parks. This would also mean less people at the resort and the food court.

Food Courts - we're pretty happy with the ASMo foodcourt choices, but we would also be able to walk over to the other two AS foodcourts.

Never having stayed at ASMo, it would be 'new' to us!

Then there is the dreaded thought of having to share a bus with the other AS resorts. I know that this does not happen all the time and especially during busier times, each resort has their own bus, but do all of my dates fall under that 'busier' category?

Since we will be there for 2 weeks, we will have plenty of time to go over to AoA to check out the new resort.

Ugh, it's just so frustrating going over every detail in my mind....did I make the wrong decision???

 

[JennyDrake]

EVERY resort is going to be crowded. At this point and at the risk of sounding harsh, I would say just be glad you have a ressie. Just go and enjoy yourself!

 

[MMS1125]

honestly I wouldn't count the pool out for December. We were there for some of your same dates last year and it was high 80's low 90's some days so you might see a warm day here or there.

If you are unsure about ASMo it would be worth staying somewhere that would make you excited and happy to stay there. You don't want to be there for 2 weeks and not be excited about your resort.

You can call reservations and a supervisor should be able to look at your expired pin code and if there's availability at AoA or PoP they should be able to move you

 

[discookiemonsta]

EVERY resort is going to be crowded. At this point and at the risk of sounding harsh, I would say just be glad you have a ressie. Just go and enjoy yourself!

Oh, I am very grateful that we are even able to spend Christmas at Disney! I know that no resort will be 100% perfect. I guess I am just second guessing myself since we've never stayed there. I did the same thing before our first POP stay and then we ended up loving it!

Thank you for your response!

 

[scullyh]

I could have written this myself in reverse - we usually stay at movies and want to try pop but are scared too - add in art of animation and my list is almost identical to yours - best of luck!

 

[Ali]

I don't think the All stars are that much smaller that AoA or Pop. I think it you truly want to change you could probably call them and change resorts if they have availability. Of course, I could also be wrong.

I've been over to visit the AoA several times now, and I agree with you on the food court, we didn't enjoy it. It is too foreign for our picky crew. Even the french fries and macaroni were wrong. Love walking around there and enjoying the atmosphere.

We swim in December usually. The water is nice and you bring lots of towels to wrap up in for the walk.

You will have a great time wherever you end up!

 

[ashleyasiegel]

We have stayed at all of the All Star Resorts and love them all! The bus situation never bugged me. We normally go during the slow time (end of Jan/beginning of Feb or Sept) and the only time they shared was during the middle of the day or DTD. Now at the end of the night we would always hop in shortest line for all stars and just walk back to movies instead of waiting several busses. Movies was our favorite so I believe you will have a great time.

We are staying at Pop this december for almost the same dates as you and I am nervous I won't like it as well. We stayed there for 2 nights in 2009 and it just seemed so much bigger/busier. We are giving it another chance though and I am sure it will be okay

Have a great trip!

 

[smidgy]

I think you will be VERY happy with movies. sic emovies is usually blocked out of so many discounts, I think you are lucky to get it.
usuallyit's like 5% off or something like that. the girls wil love it..
we ahve stayed at all 23 all star resorts and I don't really remember sharing buses. i do remember that I loved it that you had an option if you wanted. (music is in the middle. so if you are witing at the park for a movies bus and a music one pulls up, just jump on that!

 

[discookiemonsta]

I'm so glad to have gotten a few more responses - thank you

I think it's always scary trying out a different resort. When we went from POR to POP, I was so scared we would hate it, but we ended up loving it. I would have booked POP again had it not been for having to extend our vacation to get FD and raising the cost of our whole package. So, trying to cut as many costs as possible, I picked the cheapest accomodations, ASMo. I really do like the look of the rooms at ASMo and my girls would be happy staying anywhere in that resort (except the Mighty Ducks section). One of my girls is madly in love with staying at ASMo and the other one is incredibly upset that we didn't get a LM room at the "NEW" hotel, but then again I just feel like ASMo will be new to all of us as well.

I have high hopes that there is an amazing bounceback offer that I could book for next year for AoA at a warmer time when we could take full advantage of the pool etc.

As of right now, as much as I am itching to call Disney to see about changing resorts, I'm telling myself to leave it at ASMo. We never spend that much time at the resort anyway and will definitely make time to make a trip over to AoA to explore it!

 

[RhettsMom]

Have you considered looking into doing a split stay? Maybe stay one week at ASMovies and one week at AoA? That is, assuming there is still availability. For a two week trip, it might be fun to have a change of scenery halfway through.

 

[discookiemonsta]

Have you considered looking into doing a split stay? Maybe stay one week at ASMovies and one week at AoA? That is, assuming there is still availability. For a two week trip, it might be fun to have a change of scenery halfway through.

If it weren't for the Free Dining that we got, I would have considered doing a split stay! A little late now, but now that you've mentioned a split stay, it occurs to me we could have done 1 week at AoA with our free dining pin and then could have done 1 week at ASMo with the GP free dining offer. (Both my pin and the GP offer have both expired already) Ah well, that genious thought had not even occured to me until just now. Our park tickets would have been a little pricier, but overall it would have been fun. Oh well, something to consider for our next trip!

 

[TSM]

We stayed last year at movies and really liked it but just did a week stay in Sept at AoA in the LM and loved it.It was less than 5 min walk to busses from our room(building 9)and bus service was excellent. Food court was awesome and everything just felt so "Disney" and also felt so brand new and clean.If free dining was available there I would switch if not I would stay at movies.

 

[Melissabo]

I really think the Allstars sharing buses thing gets way over blown. They only share when it is really slow and we never waited more than 5 min for a bus from anywhere. Even when they did share it literally is two minutes to drop off or pick up another resort and they are right in a row.

I was so anxious over buses when we were planning our trip to ASmovies and it was for nothing. I wouldn't hesitate to stay there again.

 

[discookiemonsta]

So I called, just out of curiousity, and there is absolutely no availability in the LM section at AoA - that's a shocker, but for $70 more dollars I could switch to Pop Century....ah, decisions, decisions....lol

 

[ADisneyQueen]

I've been to POP, ASM, and have walked over to AOA. With your kids' ages, I think they would like the theming at ASM better than POP. Would you feel disappointed if you walked over to AOA and wished you were staying there? I like POP b/c of the lakeview and we enjoyed eating at AOA a few times just for something different.
It sounds like a hard decision.

 

[discookiemonsta]

I've been to POP, ASM, and have walked over to AOA. With your kids' ages, I think they would like the theming at ASM better than POP. Would you feel disappointed if you walked over to AOA and wished you were staying there? I like POP b/c of the lakeview and we enjoyed eating at AOA a few times just for something different.
It sounds like a hard decision.

I think there may be a twinge of disappointment if we walked over to AoA and wished we were staying there. I think it's more the exitement of a new resort though! We go to Disney all the time so I know we will have more than one opportunity to stay at AoA and I think it would be much more fun for my girls to stay there during the warmer months when we could take full advantage of the pool/outdoor areas. IF this was a once in a lifetime trip, I certainly would be kicking myself right about now, but we do go to Disney once a year, so I'm hoping for a great bounceback offer to book AoA before we leave. That will give us something exciting to look forward to!!!

It is a hard desicion. I've asked my husband about it and he's happy with us trying out ASMo, so I think since there is no availability at AoA anyway, we will just say with ASMo.

 

[deserrai]

I personally love ASMovies and my 3 year old girl adores it. I don't really think you can go wrong. We are staying in the LM rooms at AoA for this next trip just because they are new and we want to see them, but after that, I will be happy to go back to Movies.

 

[JennyDrake]

I don't think the All stars are that much smaller that AoA or Pop. QUOTE]

I don't know about AoA but Pop has 1,000 more guests than AS, "cause it has the extra floor on each building.

 

[JennyDrake]

Room numbers trivia--AS have 1920 rooms each (but some have been converted to family suites now); Pop has 2880 rooms and AoA 2,000 suites + 864 rooms (If I read it correctly).

 

[discookiemonsta]

From what I have read and understood is that all three AS resorts (Movies/Music and Sports) added together equal the size of POP, so that is why I was thinking that ASMo would be a lot smaller than what we are used to staying at POP, which would be a positive for us! Don't quote me though...english IS my second language so I may have misread/misunderstood about the resort sizes