It seemed a long time coming, but we finally booked! For the past few weeks I've been checking the Disney website for prices and umming and ahhing over which resort to stay at. We've watched no end of You Tube videos and after getting some advice from friendly Dibbers, we finally narrowed it down to POR and OKW. When I read on the Dibb that Virgin Holidays had exclusive pre-booking for the dining plan offer, Paul and I popped into the Virgin store in our local Tesco. We received two quotes, one for POR and one for a studio at Old Key West. However she then said it was an extra £1300 to upgrade to a 1 bed villa at OKW. Thus making our POR decision final! Their prices were astronomical and was around £2000 more than Disney had quoted us after we'd added flights on. They also said there were no 11:35am flights from Gatwick on our chosen dates and also said she couldn't apply the 7% frequent flying club discount for some reason. I knew straight away that they couldn't do anything for us. So it was back to the drawing board... or rather Disney's website; obsessively getting quotes every day! We watched more videos on POR and were getting excited about staying there.
All the hype on the Dibb and amongst a few of my friends over the dining plan offer was crazy, and I was about to go to bed at half past midnight on Wednesday night when I noticed a thread on the Dibb "Free Dining is up on WDW website!" No one had expected it until Thursday morning, so ignoring the clock, I fired up the laptop and Paul and I sat for the next half an hour looking at prices. We priced up the difference between POR and a 1 bedroom villa at OKW and it was too expensive for our budget unfortunately. Virgin actually weren't that overpriced after all as it was an extra £1386! OUCH! We only paid £800 extra in August 2013 for our November 2014 trip. However OKW still isn't available as I write this and there are many people, no doubt in a queue on the phone to Disney now, trying to pre register for a room. No doubt in the coming months they will have more availability and the price may drop for the 1 beds. Who knows.
I continued to scroll down and discovered that Animal Kingdom Lodge was actually only £210 more than it would be to book POR and upgrade to the DDP. This sent my mind into overdrive. After finally deciding on POR, I never considered for a second the AKL would be in our budget, so I was laying awake until gone 2am thinking about which resort to stay in! I liked the thought of being able to catch a boat to Disney Springs from POR, how we used to when we stayed at OKW last time, and having use of 6 pools at Port Orleans was appealing. The only thing I didn't like about it was the lack of storage space, and we would have to take one of those canvas folding shelves to hang in the wardrobe to unpack clothing for four of us. Animal Kingdom Lodge looked more roomy and is also one of my dream resorts! I've always wanted to stay there. Using Disney transport from there though worries me. I heard it can take up to an hour to get to DS on a bus! What to do... Such a dilemma.
Thursday morning soon arrived and as soon as the kids went to school I was back on the laptop again, this time on the Dibb. I asked for advice: POR vs AKL and everyone that replied said they would stay in Animal Kingdom Lodge. I looked at a few more videos and decided that it did look perfect, and at that price it would be wrong to turn it down. Paul was working, so we didn't have time to talk about it properly during the day but last night we sat and watched some more videos and vlogs on AKL (and the restaurants!)and came to the decision that we would definitely stay there.
So last night after I put Amelia to bed, Oliver went on his Xbox upstairs and Paul and I sat down and booked! I'm so excited! We're going to keep it a secret from the kids again, although I think we will tell them a the week before we leave this time so we have a bit of a countdown. This will be the first holiday we've ever been on with just the four of us too! In 2012 my parents and sister came with us, and our last trip in 2014, Paul's Brother and his girlfriend and daughter came with us. I'm really looking forward to spending time together as a family. Let's just hope we don't fall out, as we're all in the same room this time! There's no escape!
So here's the details:
2 adults and 2 children aged 17 and 7
Animal Kingdom Lodge standard room. (I will need to call and request bunk beds in the room but will leave it a week or so until the phone lines have calmed down a bit).
Disney tickets (14 days for the price of 7)
Free Disney Dining Plan
- 1 waiter service meal
- 1 self-service meal
- 2 selected snacks
- Refillable resort mug
Free Memory Maker and magical extras!
I'm loving the fact that the dining plan has changed to include 2 snacks instead of a QS dessert, as we rarely ate them on our last trip and only took them because we had to! More often than not, they were put in the fridge and there they stayed until we checked out! Having said that, we ended up with 22 unused snack credits last time... so will we have 44 left over next time? We will see! I think we need to start eating more! More cinnamon rolls you say? Haha! Amelia's classmates may be getting lots of Goofy candy brought back!
Also, I managed to remember to book via Quidco and got 3% cashback which tracked within an hour. £128! Ca-ching! It's the first time i've used it for a big purchase so that was a nice little extra! Saying that, I have £139 tracked now, but it says I have only earned £0.05p. Some of the transactions date back to August 2015, so I'm not sure what i'm doing wrong. I don't want to transfer it to my bank yet or anything. I just want it all to show on there. Anyone know how it works?
So all I can do now is wait for the flights to be released in November! That time is going to drag!
In other news... Check out the Disney stuff I picked up in Primark last week! There were some lovely bits in there. Unfortunately our store didn't have any of the jewellery I was after, but I managed to pick up a Hakuna Matata T-shirt, a scarf, colour changing umbrella, two pairs of flip flops and a cute pencil case. I also got Amelia a little Ariel purse for her birthday.
It was mine and Amelia's birthdays on Sunday. She is now a big girl at aged 6 and received enough Lego friends sets to open up her own shop! I got some lovely bits too; lots of Cath Kidston stuff, which I love, and also some Disney themed goodies!
The make-up bag will come in handy next year so I'm saving that!
One of my presents from my Sister was a trip to the Emma Bridgewater factory for a tour, afternoon tea and studio decorating time. I've been collecting EB china for just over a year now and it's a massive passion of mine. I mainly collect pinks, but now that we've decided on AKL, I may have to buy Paul and I some Disney planning mugs
These are special edition mugs and £10 from each sale goes to TUSK to support their wildlife protection, community development and education programmes in Africa. I'm off to the factory on 29th April and cannot wait!
Well that's all from me for now! I'll be back with more planning updates over the coming weeks and months! Let the planning commence!
THINGS TO DO:
Book accommodation CHECK!
Purchase Ultimate tickets CHECK!
Book memory maker CHECK!
Request bunk beds in the room
Renew Oliver and Amelia's passports
Book Flights
Book airport hotel
Book ADR's (5th April 2017)
Book MNSSHP tickets
Book Fast Pass+ (3rd August 2017)
Book travel insurance
Estas
Book Magical Express
PLAN PLAN PLAN!
