An Overplanner Takes on WDW – Feb 2019 PTR now with bonus Aug trip (New TR linked 9/2))

[missangelalexis]

Joining in!

I am sure you have your hands full with triplet girls! But this will be an exciting first trip for them!

Despite the CRT hiccup, I'm glad you got everything you wanted! TP reservation finder is awesome, hopefully they will find something for the time you want!

 

[TheOneWithTheTriplets]

Just a note - no boat to Disney Springs from Boardwalk - only POR, OKW, and SSR.

Oops, I meant bus. Thanks!

 

[amazingact21]

Glad you were able to get CRT, but it is a bummer that a computer glitch caused you to lose your 11:45 slot.

 

[StarWarsMomofGirls!]

Glad to hear you got at least something for CRT! Even if it is a little later than you wanted. It gives you the choice to keep the overall plans. Bummer about the glitch in the system. I am starting to stress about fast pass day and getting Slinky dog & FOP so early in the week.

I know what ou mean about the park hours... They seem very generic at this point. Not unusual for this time of year though. It is kind of nice when the park closes at 8:00, you can see the night shows a little easier. Extending the hours is good and bad. The more the extend the hours the more people they are expecting.

 

[TheOneWithTheTriplets]

Well, that was stressful!

I got a notification on the TP reservation finder for a 1:20pm CRT on our preferred day, which is at least an hour better than where I landed. You'd think I was told I had 5 minutes to claim a trip to the Bahamas or something. I jumped on, got it booked, and now my hands are honest-to-god still shaking from the adrenaline.

I still have it searching for something earlier, but 1:20 will be much more tolerable for my whole crew: yay!! Definitely not having that third cup of coffee, though.

 

[joules12]

Well, that was stressful!

I got a notification on the TP reservation finder for a 1:20pm CRT on our preferred day, which is at least an hour better than where I landed. You'd think I was told I had 5 minutes to claim a trip to the Bahamas or something. I jumped on, got it booked, and now my hands are honest-to-god still shaking from the adrenaline.

I still have it searching for something earlier, but 1:20 will be much more tolerable for my whole crew: yay!! Definitely not having that third cup of coffee, though.

Haha!!! That's awesome! (Much improved already and you're not even quite a week out from ADR day! Woot!)

 

[StarWarsMomofGirls!]

I got a notification on the TP reservation finder for a 1:20pm CRT on our preferred day, which is at least an hour better than where I landed. You'd think I was told I had 5 minutes to claim a trip to the Bahamas or something. I jumped on, got it booked, and now my hands are honest-to-god still shaking from the adrenaline.

It is a strange adrenaline rush for sure! Yeah on a better time! I bet people will drop more reservations, similar to us, as we figure out our plans better.

 

[cadien]

My husband keeps pointing out (reasonably) that we should swap two of our days park-wise to better fit what we have time for but I got all the ADRs we wanted and can't face the idea of trying to change them.

 

[StarWarsMomofGirls!]

My husband keeps pointing out (reasonably) that we should swap two of our days park-wise to better fit what we have time for but I got all the ADRs we wanted and can't face the idea of trying to change them.

Stupid ADR's always make it hard to switch things... Have you looked to see if you can swap the ADR's?

It is why I try to have a fairly good idea of what we want to do by ADR time. But you just never know what is going to come up!

 

[TheOneWithTheTriplets]

My husband keeps pointing out (reasonably) that we should swap two of our days park-wise to better fit what we have time for but I got all the ADRs we wanted and can't face the idea of trying to change them.

What if you start trying to collect the ADRs you would need to swap under his account? Keep yours, but try to do the TP reservation finder for his. You have a few months before FPs. If you manage to get everything you want in his account, use those ADRs as your base on FP day. If not, then go with your original plan for park days.

 

[cadien]

What if you start trying to collect the ADRs you would need to swap under his account? Keep yours, but try to do the TP reservation finder for his. You have a few months before FPs. If you manage to get everything you want in his account, use those ADRs as your base on FP day. If not, then go with your original plan for park days.

I didn't realize that was an option. I'll try that. Thanks!

 

[TheOneWithTheTriplets]

I didn't realize that was an option. I'll try that. Thanks!

Did you list your husband on your reservations? If so, you'll have to remove him. You can just change the drop down from his name to "Select Guest" and it'll let you book it without having guests listed. Once he's not listed on your ADRs, he can book ones at the same time on his account. He would follow the same method of only listing himself and having the other guests just say "select guest". It'll still let both of you keep them for the right number of people, even if you don't have the names of the people specified on the reservation.

 

[TheOneWithTheTriplets]

So, I *might* have gotten a 12:05 CRT for my preferred day. Got the TP notification, onto the site, and the banner said:

Dining Currently Unavailable
At this time, new dining reservations cannot be made online; however, you may book by phone by calling (407) 939-1947. We apologize for any inconvenience as we work to improve your future experience.

Being at work, I wasn't going to sit on hold with dining right then, so I figured I'd try the site anyway. It let me search, pick the time, book, everything. I have a confirmation email and it's showing up in the My Reservations section on MDE.

I'm not sure if I trust it, though. If they site claimed dining was unavailable, am I going to get an email in 24 hours telling me it was an error and they cancelled it?

 

[missangelalexis]

I would say if you got a confirmation email that you should be ok. Maybe try calling just to confirm that they have the res on file??

 

[TheOneWithTheTriplets]

I would say if you got a confirmation email that you should be ok. Maybe try calling just to confirm that they have the res on file??

The automated call in system took the confirm number and read me back the correct day/time/party size. I'm going to assume that I just got lucky and was able to book after the system was back online but before they removed the banner from their site. Yay!!

 

[StarWarsMomofGirls!]

So, I *might* have gotten a 12:05 CRT for my preferred day. Got the TP notification, onto the site, and the banner said:

Dining Currently Unavailable
At this time, new dining reservations cannot be made online; however, you may book by phone by calling (407) 939-1947. We apologize for any inconvenience as we work to improve your future experience.

Being at work, I wasn't going to sit on hold with dining right then, so I figured I'd try the site anyway. It let me search, pick the time, book, everything. I have a confirmation email and it's showing up in the My Reservations section on MDE.

I'm not sure if I trust it, though. If they site claimed dining was unavailable, am I going to get an email in 24 hours telling me it was an error and they cancelled it?

YEAH!!!!!! I saw that notice today. I forget what I even went online for but I saw that. Glad to hear you got a 12:05! Awsome!

 

[joules12]

The automated call in system took the confirm number and read me back the correct day/time/party size. I'm going to assume that I just got lucky and was able to book after the system was back online but before they removed the banner from their site. Yay!!

I think you're good to go!!! Amazing! I figured you'd likely get a better time eventually, but probably not until after FP selection day when everyone starts shifting their plans. So awesome to have things settled out already!

 

[TheOneWithTheTriplets]

How and When to Narrow Down ADRs

So, I’ve gone a little nuts since ADR day. It all started when I couldn’t get the CRT that I wanted. I made a few backup ADRs in case I wanted to swap my MK days, which would also necessitate swapping my EP days. At that point, I started questioning whether we might want to swap our HS days but wouldn’t be able to because the reservations were unavailable. And the spiral just continued…

Here’s what things look like on this side of the rabbit hole:

2/26/19 MK
CP 10:30
CRT 12:05
CRT 1:20 (this one I’m definitely cancelling; I have it listed on the cancelled ADR thread in case someone wants it)

2/27/19 EP
Garden Grill 11:50
Askershus 12:15
Askershus 5:15

2/28/19 MK
BoG 8:10
BoG 11:35
BoG 12:35
‘Ohana 4:15

3/1/19 AK
Tusker 12:05

3/2/19
Trattoria 8:45
H&V with F! 12:00

3/3/19 MK
CP 10:30
CRT 12:00

3/4/19 EP
GG 11:45
Ask 12:25
Ask 5:25

3/5/19 H&V
Trattoria 12:00
H&V 12:00

3/6/19
BoG 8:00
BoG 12:00

Now, I’m nowhere near insane enough to keep all of those ADRs, but I keep hedging on whether to cancel now and essentially lock down a day to day plan. I’m pretty sure I want it to go like this:

CRT (night show) -> GG (RD) -> BoG lunch, Ohana dinner (RD) -> Tusker (RD & night) -> Trattoria (night) -> CP (neither) -> Ask dinner (night) -> H&V (RD) -> BoG PPO (pre RD)

Pros: This doesn’t have any back-to-back days of princess meals in a row or furry character meals in a row. I’m getting my MK late night out of the way early, so we can move it to my 3rd MK day if something happens and we don’t make it the first night. I’ve got us leaving parks early the days before our MK and AK early mornings, as those will require the earliest wake ups for travel.

Cons: While I’m less worried about the EP and HS RDs since we’re walking in from Boardwalk, it is moderately concerning that these two RDs occur after late nights the night before. Also, this plan doesn’t get us the F! dining package, as our H&V day is our RD, not our late night there. It seems like we’ll be able to get into F! as long as we show up 30 minutes early, but we may not get the best seats.

In order to address either of those cons, I end up creating a different problem for myself somewhere else. For instance, if we swap the two HS days, then my two Fab 5 meals are on back to back days. Plus, that would mean RDing TSL, walking back to our resort for the princess breakfast, and then walking back to HS. That seems like a whole lot of walking when we could just do the breakfast on our late entrance morning before heading into the park.

In terms of late nights into early morning, any attempt that I’d make to get myself an earlier bedtime the night before an HS or EP day comes at the cost of having a late night before an early MK or AK day. Of the two, I’d much rather pad the MK and AK days since we’re relying on Disney bus transport for those parks. If need be, I can pull my half asleep kids out of bed at 8am, toss them in the strollers, have them eat on the way to EP or HS, and still make RD. There’s NO WAY I can RD MK or AK with that timing.

It would seem that I can lock down my dates and eliminate quite a few extra ADRs. I’m still not sure about lunch vs dinner at Askershus, and I think I’ll keep the various BoGs until I know a) if they mess with park hours on one of my days and b) how my fastpasses land. Even with keeping those extras, I would still be clearing up a bunch of reservations to make them available to someone else.

Except, what if I’m wrong? What if things go horribly wrong on FP day or they change which days have EMH or something else completely messes up my strategy? What if I want to change things but I can’t get back ADRs that I’ve subsequently dropped? Why oh why does Disney let me plan this stuff 6 months out, despite the fact that they will change park hours and showtimes a mere weeks before we travel?

So, if you would, can you all please kindly talk me into cancelling at least most of my duplicate ADRs? Because, even if the park hours change, I’m not going to want to have back to back princess meals, nor will I want to be out Illuminations the night before a BoG PPO. Or, heck, take a look at what I’ve got and show me a better line up that I’m missing. With all of the factors that I’m trying to take into account (start and end at MK, visit parks on non-EMH days, don’t stay out late the night before an extra early day, give myself buffer around my RD-to-close AK day, don’t do princess meals back to back, don’t do furry character meals back to back), I think that the above is the best I’m going to do. I’m just not confident enough to start actually using the “cancel” button…

 

[TheOneWithTheTriplets]

YEAH!!!!!!

I think you're good to go!!! Amazing!

I am really excited about having the better time. I didn't want to spend my first full day in Disney trying to convince my kids that I know they're hungry, but, if they could just hang on another hour, it would be worth it. Or, filling them up with snacks so that they didn't actually eat any of their meal come lunchtime.

 

[cmarsh31]

I'll try to help...my rule of thumb with dining is that my family (really my DH, the kids get less miserable when they're hungry) doesn't do well with 2 QS meals in a row. Sometimes I can pull off breakfast & lunch but not every day...and if we have a TS breakfast, DH is going to want dinner too. Since we all know that takes a lot of time & $$, we either have brunch at 11ish or a TS lunch around 1, especially if we want to see a show (or do a dessert party).