The Blonde Diaries

Free Dining and WDW Booking Update

When we left off yesterday I had 3 choices to choose from. A quick recap: keep ressie as is at All Star Movies (Standard Room, 8 day hopper tickets, free dining plan), Upgrade ressie at All Star Movies (Preferred Room, 8 day hopper tickets, free dining plan), or Upgrade to Caribbean Beach Resort (Standard Room, 8 day park hopper tickets, free dining plan). The first choice would save $700, second choice would save $500, and the third would cost $700 more.

I was really nervous about what I might find out when I called this morning to change my existing reservations to apply the code for free dining. I had heard about what a mess Monday with the Disney Visa Holders was but knew it would be worse with it opening up to the general public. Boy was I right! I set my alarm for 5:45am and promptly jumped out of bed and logged onto DIS Boards and Sunshine Rewards Forums to see if there were any new updates to this promotion. I also happened to pull up the WDW website and see the advertisement for the promotion I wanted to book before 6 am when the phone lines opened. So curious me went ahead and clicked on it and found I could book online! YES!!! So I started booking a new reservation while I was trying to dial Disney. In the 10 minutes I spend dialing and either getting cut off or hearing all circuits are busy I had a reservation in for free dining meeting option #2 above. Option #1 was not available and after a long talk and sleeping on option #3 Mike and I decided against it. Once again frugalness has come over me and I happily agreed with what Mike and I discussed and had no issues giving up CBR. Plus upgrading to a preferred room was not that big of a deal cost wise and its covered in our earnings as well.
So if you are trying to book and getting busy signals or don’t feel like waiting book online! It saved me mucho time and frustration and now I just have to call later today when everything has died down and cancel the first reservation I made in March. Now I get to really plan out what we are going to see and do and will have a little cushion money wise.