Resort Thread Walt Disney World SWAN, DOLPHIN & SWAN RESERVE Resorts

[SteveH]

@Dan Muphy @melking23 @mickey916
Whew glad I'm not going crazy alone

of course now it works... go figure

 

[Lsdolphin]

Can’t remember the code for AP holder and want to book at Dolphin

 

[mickey916]

@Dan Muphy @melking23 @mickey916
Whew glad I'm not going crazy alone

of course now it works... go figure

maybe you have the magic touch cuz everything before your post is still truncated and everything after is fine...

 

[Dan Murphy]

maybe you have the magic touch cuz everything before your post is still truncated and everything after is fine...

 

[Aela]

Quick question. New here.
We’re staying March 17-20, and I checked a number of sites. It looks like the best price is just the standard rate directly from Marriott. I wasn’t sure why people use Priceline unless I’m missing something?

 

[SteveH]

and it's broken again

@Aela sometimes they have better rates sometimes its close to normal. I find that for booking direct the AAA rate is usually the best.

 

[Aela]

and it's broken again

@Aela sometimes they have better rates sometimes its close to normal. I find that for booking direct the AAA rate is usually the best.

Checking for me it looks like Priceline is $50 more then direct with no discount from Marriott.



Yeah I don’t have AAA (though it would be cheap to get through my husbands work). The AAA “discount” is the same as the standard / prepaid rates.

But the teacher discount…. is like $3 off.

 

[mickey916]

Can’t remember the code for AP holder and want to book at Dolphin

QWH

 

[JulieODC]

Thank you!! It’s been happening for a week now - I’m going to cross my fingers that they are prepping place holders for discounted rates. In the meantime, I’ve been booking what I can trying to piece together what we need. (It’s a long story for why I’m doing this now - but we’d love to spend the full time at SR, Swan, or Dolphin instead of so little off property and Swan as originally planned!)

I dealt with this leading up to New Years. They kept showing availability but throwing errors. Then after several days a bunch would become available. Then it looked like sold out (I was doing price matches for multiple dates so had to book on marriot and also on Priceline) I eventually was able to book multiple reservations-I am not sure how many reservations I had, it was a lot as I was running different combination of nights and made a few mistakes on my price matches so had to redo several (this was my first price matching so had to learn some tricks)-all told maybe like 20 reservations. It kept the same pattern for a week or two, Then they had no availability for a couple weeks then restarted this same pattern again, and then a week before I went they dropped prices by like 40% and had availability for several days. So yea…the best I could conclude is that it was a place holder until they were ready to officially release the nights available-for some reason. when I cancelled reservations they would occasionally became available within an hour or two, but most of my cancellations were not available as far as I could tell-in fact the whole room category would show fully booked for several days until the above pattern started again. Occasionally they would remove the refundable options for several days and then bring them back, or block out all queens and have only kings and then switch it again a week later. For a couple days every room was showing 1k plus only one available.

mall of these things happened on both marriot.com -and Priceline though it would s9metimes show up later- with the rooms usually showing available on both sites before they actually became available.

this was different than when Priceline showed 1 available on Priceline with a good VIP deal but was not showing up on marriot. In those cases even when I purchased the last room myself it would stay on Priceline for HOURS-sometimes even into the next day. Out of curiosity I tried to book it again several times using different devices, accounts etc. and it would throw that same type of error until it was finally removed.

Basically, this information doesn’t help any beyond saying that it could mean anything, I bet there will be availability if you keep checking, don’t let the error convince you it will be hard to book a night and commit to a bad deal.

 

[patty57]

A forum tech question here.

Is anybody else getting a truncated width of this thread?

I am Dan.

 

[emcarle27]

My husband suggested Disney as our 1st wedding anniversary trip and of course I'm jumping at the chance.

I'm torn. I formally worked for Marriott and have friends that still work for the company so I have access to the Friends and Family rate which I booked. We've booked the Swan and being so close to epcot/hollywood studios is very appealing.

We'd have to book our tickets separately which is fine.

For those who have stayed at Swan/Dolphin, do you miss the disney theming?

Those who have stayed at Swan, sell me on it please!

 

[PepperjackDragon]

there isn’t really all that much “theme” going on in the Disney room itself. A few small touches here and there perhaps but not a big deal. The real question would be if you would want to upgrade to a monorail hotel. However if you would spend more days at HS and Epcot than MK then the walk and boat is much better. Comparing it to BW and BC, sure there would be a marginal improvement but imo it isn’t worth much. If you could get them for the same or similar rate sure, but definitely not worth a significant price hike imo. What exactly are you imagining will be significantly different? If you are planning to do individually paid alL and G+ everyday of the trip, that might be a boost toward Disney hotels, just to reduce risk of a problem, but if doing a couple days of G+ only I don’t think that a big enough risk to worry about imo.

 

[emcarle27]

there isn’t really all that much “theme” going on in the Disney room itself. A few small touches here and there perhaps but not a big deal. The real question would be if you would want to upgrade to a monorail hotel. However if you would spend more days at HS and Epcot than MK then the walk and boat is much better. Comparing it to BW and BC, sure there would be a marginal improvement but imo it isn’t worth much. If you could get them for the same or similar rate sure, but definitely not worth a significant price hike imo. What exactly are you imagining will be significantly different? If you are planning to do individually paid alL and G+ everyday of the trip, that might be a boost toward Disney hotels, just to reduce risk of a problem, but if doing a couple days of G+ only I don’t think that a big enough risk to worry about imo.

My biggest concern mostly is being able to sync tickets as we plan to utilize Genie+ everyday, but not necessarily the individually paid LL.

The 60 day advance dining reservations still would apply to swan, correct?

 

[gottalovepluto]

My husband suggested Disney as our 1st wedding anniversary trip and of course I'm jumping at the chance.

I'm torn. I formally worked for Marriott and have friends that still work for the company so I have access to the Friends and Family rate which I booked. We've booked the Swan and being so close to epcot/hollywood studios is very appealing.

We'd have to book our tickets separately which is fine.

For those who have stayed at Swan/Dolphin, do you miss the disney theming?

Those who have stayed at Swan, sell me on it please!

Yes I missed the Disney “bubble” being at Swan. Specifically MB charging and using MB for rooms it turned out. But staying at CSR the trip after I stayed Swan and having to take buses to/from the front of EP instead of being just dropped in International Gateway sold me on how great Swolphin is. It’s a hike from the buses, the front entry is still a backed up mess when it’s busy, and then once you enter it’s time to hike through construction corridors to get anywhere At least entering in IG you enter the park and bam! You feel like you’re in EP, not a construction zone.

I would skip Swolphin if I didn’t have a park hopper. Easy access to EP if you’re only going once is kinda pointless. Personally I PH because I love dining in EP so the easy access is huge.

 

[PepperjackDragon]

My biggest concern mostly is being able to sync tickets as we plan to utilize Genie+ everyday, but not necessarily the individually paid LL.

The 60 day advance dining reservations still would apply to swan, correct?

My personal take on this is if I was going with a large group this might be enough to persuade me. with just me and my wife I would just risk it, and if I had an issue would expect to be able to be comped some anytime LL if I had a problem. However I am very comfortable in those types of situations, so I tend to believe that this is really the only issue to decide over.

 

[miadeals]

I have a question about the Signature Suites at the Swan Reserve. Does anyone know if they are all one bedroom, specifically one bedroom separated by a door? The Signature Epcot View Suites do not say they are separated by a door or are one bedroom. The Signature Hollywood Studio View Suites all say they are "one bedroom" and "Living area is separated from bed by privacy wall." They are all listed at 610 sqft. So is this a glitch in the system? When I look at videos on youtube of guests, the Signature Epcot View Suites people post are one bedrooms. It would be nice if they could have taken some pictures and put them on their website.

And which view is better? Epcot or Hollywood Studio?

 

[Dan Murphy]

And which view is better? Epcot or Hollywood Studio?

I do not know the answer to first question, but as to your second, I would prefer Epcot. You can keep an eye on SE till late in the night as well as watch the higher up portion of the fireworks there. The Studios' view will let you see ToT.

 

[pigletto]

My husband suggested Disney as our 1st wedding anniversary trip and of course I'm jumping at the chance.

I'm torn. I formally worked for Marriott and have friends that still work for the company so I have access to the Friends and Family rate which I booked. We've booked the Swan and being so close to epcot/hollywood studios is very appealing.

We'd have to book our tickets separately which is fine.

For those who have stayed at Swan/Dolphin, do you miss the disney theming?

Those who have stayed at Swan, sell me on it please!

I had the same concerns about missing Disney themeing the first time we stayed at the Swan. I didn’t find I missed it at all in reality. We were upgraded to a resort view room with a balcony though. Our first night we sat on our balcony and watched the fireworks at Epcot ( not a perfect view but still good). And walking to two parks was wonderful. We felt so close to the Boardwalk area that it really felt like being at Disney.

We love pool time and the Swan/Dolphin pool area is beautiful. I really did feel like The Swan was a step above the moderates, and for a little bit less money than I would have paid to stay at CBR.

Another huge advantage will be having access to the Deluxe evening hours perk at MK and Epcot.

 

[stitchfan18]

I feel like I remember reading about discounts on connecting rooms in the past… can you still call & book a second connecting room at a discount if booking the first on points? I am debating finally using our Marriott points for the Swolphin, but I would love to get a connecting room for the kids instead of all trying to cram into one room at the Dolphin.

 

[Gitelfor]

I feel like I remember reading about discounts on connecting rooms in the past… can you still call & book a second connecting room at a discount if booking the first on points? I am debating finally using our Marriott points for the Swolphin, but I would love to get a connecting room for the kids instead of all trying to cram into one room at the Dolphin.

It is the Stay Connected offer. Call 888-828-8850 during normal business hours, for further information.

Special offers

Terms & conditions:

• Offer is valid at the Walt Disney World Swan and Dolphin.​
• Discounted rates are per room, per night, based on single/double occupancy and subject to availability at time of booking.​
• A limited number of rooms may be available at these rates and additional restrictions and blackout dates apply.​
• Offer is for individual leisure travel and not valid for guests staying on a negotiated group rate.​
• Second room reservation must be under the same name as the first room and must have the same arrival and departure date.​
• If one room is cancelled, the lower rated CONNECT room must be cancelled. The hotel reserves the right to correct any errors made by guest on cancelling the higher rated room.​
• Basic room rates do not include additional per room per night charges that may be imposed or state/local taxes. The Resort Service Package is charged per room, per night.​
• Marriott reserves the right to discontinue this offer at any time.​
• Void where prohibited by law. Other restrictions may apply.​