You mean I DO get to go to WDW in 2014?? - Link to TR in post #523

[Captain_Oblivious]

Never stayed at CSR before, but I know there's a sizable contingent on the boards who love it!

 

[eandesmom]

I'm here!

So our ADR window opened up while we were up at my folks over Thanksgiving. I should have been up at 3AM that morning, but I forgot and didnt take care of it until around 8AM my time. We wanted to try BOG and so that was the first reservation that I tried for. I got it but there was only one time slot available, so I nabbed it. And this was using my 7 day advance reservations for our last night (which we strategically planned to get the most out of our 180 day window). We also got Le Cellier and a few others. Here are how the plans have worked out so far.

I totally spaced on our May ADR's too, think I was 2 days late

The plans look good, nice and easy. I miss Sanaa, Jeff and I tried to get the boys over there on our last night but they were dead set on Olivia's. We really really liked BOG and had the best CM of our trip, just a wonderful evening.

Go to sleep the night before we fly!

More rides![/B] Hopefully they will have worked out the glitch with the Premier Passports and we can actually book FP+ online by the time the trip rolls around. Besides the fact that I had so many F&W events to get to, we didnt do nearly enough rides last trip. I plan to change that this trip.

Good goals! I am sure you will be fine on the MB's, they seem to be working well for everyone, I didn't have any issues at all with my PAP but I know the Premier can be funky so I'll be interested to see how that goes. Have you tried to link your AP to your band yet? You'll need to do that to make the FP selections.

Once you get your AP linked to your band, any band assigned to you should work actually, it's just a matter of collecting colors. Which yes, is wasteful. And is supposed to stop at some point but isn't. We had a total of 18 bands sent to us for our trip. They were not sent 2 day air though and we didn't get any flash drives so I guess that is something but wow, the packaging is crazy!

I agree, with a flight that early you'll want to be ready 2 days before. I despise early flights!

Pool and Spa...those are on my agenda for May! Pool for sure at least but oh I'd love the spa.

Our flight leaves at 6:30AM which is really early for us. I need to make sure that we are all packed two days before we want to leave because I am not pulling another all nighter this time!

I was able to find out that the American ticket counters at LAX open at 4:00AM, so no problem on the outgoing flight. Hopefully well be there at the airport rested and packed, waiting at the gate at 5:30AM, ready to board the plane. Theyll serve us breakfast on the plane.

Are you flying first class? It is so much nicer to have them serve you food than to carry it on. I hate holding the food and waiting until we get high enough to use the tray table. Sometimes it is better food options to carry on but it depends on the airline. I haven't flown American in years, probably decades and have them for my red eye in May so that will be interesting.

CSR looks HUGE! I have heard nothing but good things about the Pepper Market. Would you just leave the bags with Bell services and then call for them after you eat? I do like the look of the Cabana rooms much more.

 

[scottny]

Okay I can do without the message about the bands. LOL. Thanks for posting.
Casitas 3 was wonderful. Bus stop 2 is behind them. It was perfect for us when we stayed there.
Only one night I would pack a carry on with stuff for that night only so I don’t have to touch the luggage.
Sounds good so far.

 

[franandaj]

Good start to your trip. I didn't know about the alligator.

Thanks! I only found out about him in the last couple pages of the CSR thread and it was mostly 2008 information. It has pretty much been dormant since then with occasional post.

Okay. We stayed at the Cabana section. CSR is a big resort and our room felt like it was quite far away from the facilities. Good idea to hit Peppers before the room.

Thanks for the confirmation. We did the same thing when we stayed at OKW. I realized as we started to head out to our room that Fran was tired and cranky and wouldn't leave once we got there, so we headed back to the restaurant and got dinner. This resort seems equally as spread out, so live and learn.

Besides in looking at our flights, we'll get breakfast on the flight to Dallas, arrive in time for lunch, which will be from an airport QS place. Our flight to MCO leaves at 2PM and arrives at 5:30 so I doubt we'll get a proper meal, probably just a snack. We will probably be starved by the time we get to the resort and with a long travel day like that dinner and bed will be just the ticket!

Hope you have a safe flight

Thanks! and

Not stayed at the resort but it looks really nice! We went to see it once and really liked it. I was impressed with the Pepper market. Lol the resident Gator! Sometimes SSR has these cute otters. Such a lovely vision in the morning. I was thinking about the MB's it might have made more sense for Disney to theme them by resort.

It's just one night, so we'll probably mostly crash and tour in the morning. We have wanted to stay there for a while, too bad it's not longer, but we did the same with OKW (except we left at the crack of dawn). At least here we will plan a leisurely departure and check out the place.

Glad i'm not the only one who thought the packaging was so wasteful!

The resort is SO BIG! I requested Casitas too and we got building 5....doesn't look too far away but it's FAR! Trust me, it was exhausting after a long day at the parks. If you can get the first building that would be great!

Well the good news is that we won't have to come back after the parks, but after a long flight, so I hope that night we don't have too far to go. We'll have to go back in the morning because I will want breakfast before we take off, although if I know us we will be having lunch for breakfast!

With that early start, it would make sense to stay at an airport hotel the night before. I had not appreciated how big the resort is. I love the photos of the rooms.

Corinna

I would LOVE to do an airport hotel kind of thing, but Fran hates to be away from the cats that long. The times we did a park and fly we never got there until like 12 midnight, so it almost didn't make sense.

I was so excited to see your plans for the next trip. I religously follow all your reports. I am so excited that I am back in planning mode again finally. It has been way too long since I had a trip on the horizon but now I am at the 7 month mark for our August trip and am playing the waiting game as I check in constantly on the DVC site to try and get just what I want. I look at it as a challenge. I think the planning is so fun and obviously we think alike because your detailed plans are right up my alley. It keeps me from depression to plan my next trip! I am planning to do my first trip report this time and have started typing all of the back story/plans into a word document. I thought about doing a pretrip report but it is still so far out. I guess I could just start the report like you did but I don't have a cult following like you! Anyway I am always excited to hear about the adventures of you and Fran! (My 5 year old who is watching me just insisted I add that smiley face ....)

I think you should do a TR, and you can start the PTR anytime you want! I always do mine in Word and then copy and paste them on the DIS that way I can work on it as I have time and post when I am able. The main thing is people want pictures! Most folks are more apt to follow a TR when you have pictures and if you want Jenny to follow, you need to have pictures of your family! She likes to know who the people are. I like pictures of anything! Food, resort, people, attractions, but mostly the food, resort and parks and attractions, I like to see the people, but if that's all there is I get bored because I like to learn about new things that I didn't know about, games, sights, tasty treats....I would read your TR!

They can miss a little.

Your plans look great and CSR looks huge. The Cabana rooms look a little more up to date decor wise.

I hope you sleep the night before, that's a dang early flight.

I looked at the pepper Market menu on Allears; nice selection.

Resort alligator? No thanks! I don't do scales and nails and tails. Scares the bejeezus out of me.

I would love to do Corinna's idea of the airport hotel, but Fran would never go for it, especially since we have the road trip a couple weeks earlier. I just need to make sure we are packed Monday and we don't go to bed Monday night if we aren't packed! We don't go to band if we aren't packed!

Never stayed at CSR before, but I know there's a sizable contingent on the boards who love it!

I hope that we like it as much as they do!

I'm here!

I totally spaced on our May ADR's too, think I was 2 days late

The plans look good, nice and easy. I miss Sanaa, Jeff and I tried to get the boys over there on our last night but they were dead set on Olivia's. We really really liked BOG and had the best CM of our trip, just a wonderful evening.

Nice to hear another good review of BoG! I can't wait to go back to Sanaa, I loved it on our Jan/Feb trip!

Good goals! I am sure you will be fine on the MB's, they seem to be working well for everyone, I didn't have any issues at all with my PAP but I know the Premier can be funky so I'll be interested to see how that goes. Have you tried to link your AP to your band yet? You'll need to do that to make the FP selections.

Once you get your AP linked to your band, any band assigned to you should work actually, it's just a matter of collecting colors. Which yes, is wasteful. And is supposed to stop at some point but isn't. We had a total of 18 bands sent to us for our trip. They were not sent 2 day air though and we didn't get any flash drives so I guess that is something but wow, the packaging is crazy!

I had linked our APs to our MDE account for the last trip, but they were having issues. I was really happy when I signed into MDE a month or two ago and it offered me to make FP+ reservations. I'm hoping that when the end of March comes along it won't be a problem!

I agree, with a flight that early you'll want to be ready 2 days before. I despise early flights!

Pool and Spa...those are on my agenda for May! Pool for sure at least but oh I'd love the spa.

Are you flying first class? It is so much nicer to have them serve you food than to carry it on. I hate holding the food and waiting until we get high enough to use the tray table. Sometimes it is better food options to carry on but it depends on the airline. I haven't flown American in years, probably decades and have them for my red eye in May so that will be interesting.

I would love to do some spa time, but that might have to spontaneous based on what is going on during SWW. Yes we are flying FC, so they feed us and usually the food is actually pretty decent. I am so used to eating food in my lap that I wouldn't even wait for the ability to use the tray table. We have drive through food more often than I care to admit.

CSR looks HUGE! I have heard nothing but good things about the Pepper Market. Would you just leave the bags with Bell services and then call for them after you eat? I do like the look of the Cabana rooms much more.

I know! It looks bigger than SSR! I never thought of leaving the bags with Bell services! Brilliant! We will do that, and then call for them at the room because it is a real pain with two scooters to push all our carry ons.

Okay I can do without the message about the bands. LOL. Thanks for posting.
Casitas 3 was wonderful. Bus stop 2 is behind them. It was perfect for us when we stayed there.
Only one night I would pack a carry on with stuff for that night only so I don’t have to touch the luggage.
Sounds good so far.

I need to much cra...err precious items to put them in a carry on, but I will pack all the stuff for the first night in one suitcase so we only have to open one of them. I have to wear new clothes the next day. Otherwise I feel...dirty.

 

[franandaj]

We interrupt your WDW PTR for a brief DLR PTR….

I’m sure anyone who isn’t reading this PTR (meaning my 3D friends) thinks that we are crazy for buying into a timeshare ½ an hour away from our house. But back in the day, they used to have a Food and Wine Festival and I really wanted to be able to stay “in” the magic for the festival. However, expansions occurred and stuff happened and now we just have a whole lot of points at the DLR when we don’t realistically stay there as often as we intended.

But it has allowed us to do some crazy things like rent out the 3 bedroom Grand Villa the night before our concert band played in DCA, at “no cost” so to speak, and let 10 friends stay there with us. It also lets us book a few nights here and there to just “enjoy the parks” without having to drive home and pretend we are tourists. Well I book these “weekday weekends” often (at least once a year in the off season) and we have one coming up in less than a month. I finalized all the details recently and thought I would share them with you and figured that I would post a full report of said trip once we get back.

It’s too short a trip to give you live updates, but I will bring my computer along and keep up with the banter if I can. After all we are “on call” and if something happens with the buildings, we need to have access to all the resources that we have at home to fix whatever emergency might come up. For instance as I write this, a tenant called a couple days ago to say she has no hot water. Turns out the thermocoupler on her water heater went bad and it can only be ordered from the manufacturer. They are sending one, but in the meantime she has no hot water until they send the new thermocoupler. Luckily the unit next door is vacant so she can go over there to take a shower. It’s the little things.

So back to the plans…we check in to a one bedroom Villa on Wednesday, February 5. The villas are usually not ready until 4PM but you never know, so we will head out to Anaheim after noon and check into the resort.















I think we might be able to arrange an upgrade to include access to the concierge lounge through a CM friend, so we’ll hang out there eating finger sandwiches, fruit, uncrustables and chocolate covered strawberries until the room is ready. We’ll unpack and get the room set for our two nights, which includes disinfecting the Jacuzzi tub.

Steakhouse 55 at the Disneyland Hotel has a new Chef and we are very interested in checking out the new menu, so we have a reservation for 6:30PM.



We will enjoy checking out the new menu and whatever they have to offer. And I’m sure by the time we’re done with dinner, we’ll be ready for bed.

The next morning we are looking forward to a bit of sleeping in, but if we do get to use the lounge we need to be there before 10AM for breakfast. After that Fran plans on heading back to the room with her book to relax while I have a visit to the Mandara spa planned. That will keep me busy until sometime after noon, but not too much. At that point we have the rest of the day to do as we please.



We can hit the parks, ride some rides, do some shopping, get something to eat. We should definitely go back to the lounge before 4PM when they put away the chocolate covered strawberries. Other than that we can do what we want. Hang out in our swanky room enjoying the Jacuzzi tub, or go to the parks or whatever. We looked over the menus of various restaurants and the one that sounds like the best menu and most fun for dinner is Trader Sams. We can just snack on appetizers and have some fun drinks. Here are some photos from our last visit there. It’s been a while, so we are due to go back.













I’m sure we’ll stumble back to our room after this and get a good night’s sleep!

We check out of the hotel on Friday and we plan on taking what’s left of this day to get on some rides. After a couple days of R&R we should be up for a few rides. Definitely RSR, CA Screamin’, I think the HM will be open in it’s regular glory, and POTC is a must. I’d like to try the other side of the Matterhorn. We did the left side in September with PIO and I’d like to try it on the right side see how different that is.

I think if we get on that many different rides, that will be sufficient for me. And then we will go home and collapse.

 

[ACDSNY]

Enjoy are VGC/DL escape next month, your plans sound great.

 

[Paula Sedley-Burke]

Great Feb getaway! I don't think it's crazy to have points 30 minutes from your house I think it's ideal! Lovely for a short break exactly what you are doing! Otherwise you never get around to doing it. Let's face it we all need that down time away from our environment where we can just truly relax.

Nightmare re constant demands of tenants. I bet it's never ending and you are always 'on duty'.

I am excited by these PTR because never stayed at these villas so it's very interesting to me. The shower in the 1 br looks nice. Is that an accessible room? If not it's still got a nice accessible shower like at VGF. The shower there is good enough for me to not want an accessible room but I may miss the grab rails so we will see.

I see you disinfect the jacuzzi what a good idea. Pam was talking of this also. One of my concerns after getting many infections is picking something up. Perhaps you would be so kind in your TR if you get time to let me know the best way of doing this. Not knowing American products which is the best to buy in Walmart etc. i have see n Clorox we use that in our studio. Would this work?

Yum re Steakhouse 55 can't wait for meat food porn!

Shame they don't have F & W anymore! I don't know why it was quite basic but I just adored the Matterhorn!

 

[jedijill]

yay! Can't wait to hear all about your DL trip. I don't think its silly to have points at VGC either...tons of people in Colorado have timeshares or cabins in the mountains!

Jill in CO

 

[Leshaface]

I still haven't been able to get over to Steakhouse 55. Looking forward to hearing what you think about the new chef and the menu!

Yay for Trader Sams!

I'm shocked you like the Matterhorn. Even after the refurb, it's still way to rickety for me!

 

[Captain_Oblivious]

Cool! A getaway to DL sounds awesome. Given my love for the Wilderness Lodge, it's not too much of a stretch to say I love the Grand Californian too! Or at least, I'm sure I would if I got the chance to see it.

 

[eandesmom]

Nice to hear another good review of BoG! I can't wait to go back to Sanaa, I loved it on our Jan/Feb trip!

Ask for Abby (Abigail), she was amazing! Used to be at Artist's Point. LOVED her!

I had linked our APs to our MDE account for the last trip, but they were having issues. I was really happy when I signed into MDE a month or two ago and it offered me to make FP+ reservations. I'm hoping that when the end of March comes along it won't be a problem!

If you log in and it shows your AP as active under the bands and cards section, you will be fine!

I would love to do some spa time, but that might have to spontaneous based on what is going on during SWW. Yes we are flying FC, so they feed us and usually the food is actually pretty decent. I am so used to eating food in my lap that I wouldn't even wait for the ability to use the tray table. We have drive through food more often than I care to admit.

I swear it's almost easier in the car than it seems to be for me on an airplane.

I know! It looks bigger than SSR! I never thought of leaving the bags with Bell services! Brilliant! We will do that, and then call for them at the room because it is a real pain with two scooters to push all our carry ons.

Even without scooters it's a pain! I used them for our groceries in Dec...granted I couldn't really carry 16 target bags plus a half case of beer by myself and even with Jeff helping it was like...Bell Services please!

We interrupt your WDW PTR for a brief DLR PTR….

I’m sure anyone who isn’t reading this PTR (meaning my 3D friends) thinks that we are crazy for buying into a timeshare ½ an hour away from our house. But back in the day, they used to have a Food and Wine Festival and I really wanted to be able to stay “in” the magic for the festival. However, expansions occurred and stuff happened and now we just have a whole lot of points at the DLR when we don’t realistically stay there as often as we intended.

I was so excited in 2010 when our DCA trip included F&W. Boy was I sorely disappointing to see what F&W at DCA looked like compared to WDW! I'd sure love to have some of those GCV points right now...we are hoping to get 3 nights for marathon weekend right at the 7m mark. I looked today at 9:06am EST and the first night of the booking window was gone which makes me quite nervous fur us. We are still 13 days out but...it's going to be interesting! Hopefully the fact that we are booking 3 nights separately may actually help our chances if we do have to waitlist but we will see. Part of me wants to know if it's already booked up as it may well be and part of me doesn't!

It’s too short a trip to give you live updates, but I will bring my computer along and keep up with the banter if I can. After all we are “on call” and if something happens with the buildings, we need to have access to all the resources that we have at home to fix whatever emergency might come up. For instance as I write this, a tenant called a couple days ago to say she has no hot water. Turns out the thermocoupler on her water heater went bad and it can only be ordered from the manufacturer. They are sending one, but in the meantime she has no hot water until they send the new thermocoupler. Luckily the unit next door is vacant so she can go over there to take a shower. It’s the little things.

Hot water is not a little thing! thank goodness she has that as an option.

I think we might be able to arrange an upgrade to include access to the concierge lounge through a CM friend, so we’ll hang out there eating finger sandwiches, fruit, uncrustables and chocolate covered strawberries until the room is ready. We’ll unpack and get the room set for our two nights, which includes disinfecting the Jacuzzi tub.

I find it fascinating how many folks do that with the tubs. I can honestly say I've never used them in the villas and can't recall if the kids have. We have one at home I never use and it's a pain to clean so it's kind of like why deal with it on vacation if I hate cleaning the one I have? LOL! Pathetic huh.

Steakhouse 55 at the Disneyland Hotel has a new Chef and we are very interested in checking out the new menu, so we have a reservation for 6:30PM.

I don't see us going here in April but for Marathon weekend you never know so I will look forward to your review.

The next morning we are looking forward to a bit of sleeping in, but if we do get to use the lounge we need to be there before 10AM for breakfast. After that Fran plans on heading back to the room with her book to relax while I have a visit to the Mandara spa planned. That will keep me busy until sometime after noon, but not too much. At that point we have the rest of the day to do as we please.

Ah, Mandara! I love the one in WDW, really hope to visit one again soon! Again, likely not in April but maybe May, either in WDW or their Hawaii one depending on when the next work trip is.

We can hit the parks, ride some rides, do some shopping, get something to eat. We should definitely go back to the lounge before 4PM when they put away the chocolate covered strawberries. Other than that we can do what we want. Hang out in our swanky room enjoying the Jacuzzi tub, or go to the parks or whatever. We looked over the menus of various restaurants and the one that sounds like the best menu and most fun for dinner is Trader Sams. We can just snack on appetizers and have some fun drinks. Here are some photos from our last visit there. It’s been a while, so we are due to go back.

We check out of the hotel on Friday and we plan on taking what’s left of this day to get on some rides. After a couple days of R&R we should be up for a few rides. Definitely RSR, CA Screamin’, I think the HM will be open in it’s regular glory, and POTC is a must. I’d like to try the other side of the Matterhorn. We did the left side in September with PIO and I’d like to try it on the right side see how different that is.

Trader Sam's looks great, I think we are going to try it around 7pm before it goes adult only. Thinking an hour might be enough...? I am so excited for the Matterhorn it's a bit silly!

Nice to be able to go straight home and recover from your vacation!

 

[dolphingirl47]

I love your plans for Disneyland. I can't wait to read your report about Steakhouse 55. We love this place and I am curious about the new menu. We also love Trader Sam's. We only ever have been for drinks, but are planning to check it out for appetizers on our next trip.

Corinna

 

[rentayenta]

Can't wait to hear all about dinner at Steakhouse 55. I don't see any cocktails in the Trader Sam photos but the munchies look so good.

 

[PrincessInOz]

Have fun with the staycation. Looking forward to the Steakhouse food porn.

 

[franandaj]

Oh my god! I responded to all of you I even had pictures of the cocktails for Jenny and the DIS ate my update! I'll have to get to back to everyone on the weekend as we have a big day tomorrow and no time, but hopefully over the weekend I can respond as I meant to tonight and show Jenny that we did have a cocktail in that picture! It just wasn't like you think it would be!

 

[rentayenta]

Oh my god! I responded to all of you I even had pictures of the cocktails for Jenny and the DIS ate my update! I'll have to get to back to everyone on the weekend as we have a big day tomorrow and no time, but hopefully over the weekend I can respond as I meant to tonight and show Jenny that we did have a cocktail in that picture! It just wasn't like you think it would be!

Was it the fun drink that makes the statues come alive? You sound so busy. No hurry, we're patient. Sorry your update got eaten. That's super frustrating.

 

[dgbg100106]

I hate when the DIS eats my posts....

Have a great weekend. and enjoy!

Look forward to the pictures.

 

[PrincessInOz]

Dang!

The DIS ate a picture of cocktail drinks??




Personally, I would have sipped the cocktail drinks.



Hope real life isn't too stressful. We'll be here when you have time.

 

[scottny]

Getaways are always fun. it sounds great.

 

[mvf-m11c]

Very nice plans for your trip next month. I will look forward to your update at Steakhouse 55.