To the point no pictures report

[Disneytam]

My husband and I just returned from a week Disney trip Sept.23-30 or the week of rain trip. The past year I found so much info from everyone's trip reports so I wanted to give back but I'm not a big picture taker hence the trip name. Short background this was a trip for my husbands birthday and we stayed at the BWI club level. This was also our second trip this year after an 8 year break and our second trip without any kids.

Boardwalk Inn CL- I can not say enough about the CL staff at the BWI! Anita, Jackie, Lynn and all the rest of the staff were just wonderful to us and made our stay so special. If we wanted a beer at another time other then between 5 and 7 it was no problem we just had to ask. We flew Southwest and did not buy the boarding pass add on and we were doing a food demo at the time that I had to get my boarding passes. I don't have a smart phone so I asked if they could print my boarding pass at one o'clock the day before and it was no problem. I just gave them the info. and stopped in later in the day and they had the boarding passes for me and they were in the B category so I was really happy with that. We even asked for a tour of the Steeplechase suite and since it was empty that was no problem. What a stunning suite of rooms! My husband proudly wore his birthday button and the Cm constantly wished him happy birthday.

A short note about the food offerings. We had breakfast almost every morning at the lounge and had lunch in whatever park we were in. Then we would stop in and have a drink and app. before dinner. On a couple of occasions we didn't have dinner but just ate at the lounge and it was more than enough. The beer on offering was Sam Adams Oktoberfest, Heineken' Yuengling (sp?) and Bud Light. The soda they had out was Coke, Diet Coke, Sprite , Diet Sprite and Ginger Ale. They also had three wines one of which was a Chardonnay but sorry I can't remember the other two. Everything was self serve.

I had read so much about grumpy CM in the parks but I never saw anyone in a bad mood and with the weather being so lousy I couldn't blame them if they had been a little crabby.

Memory Makers- We didn't do this partly because we had heard a lot of commits about there not being many photo guys around. Maybe Disney was reading the dis boards because we saw MM photo people everywhere at all the parks. Even in places that you would not expect to see them. For example I saw one taking photo's of children playing the drums at AK and standing outside of the Hollywood brown derby. We even saw them at DTD! So if you were worried that you wouldn't get enough photo's I think you will be pleasantly surprised.

DTD- Oh my! We braved this one evening and that was enough for me. I felt like a herd of cattle being hustled through panel gates and walls. Almost to the point of being scary! We had great fun at Splitsville bowling but until they get done with the construction I would recommend staying away. It was a Thursday night when we ventured out to DTD and if it's more crowded on a weekend then I would totally avoid it.

Time for bed so I'll do more later but if anyone has any questions ask away.

 

[Pattil1960]

Isn't Boardwalk wonderful! Did you have a chance to meet Nico at the bus stop? He was one of the bright spots He had all the answers about how to get where, and he even went to lost and found to try to find my lanyard-that my husband used and lost! I am sorry that the weather did not cooperate with your trip.

 

[Disneytam]

DVC tour- When we checked into our room at the BWI there was a package laying on one of the beds from DVC. It had a small print and a letter offering us $100 Disney gift card if we would take a tour of the Saratoga Springs resort and listen to a sales pitch. $100 per hour no problem sign me up. A van was sent to our hotel to pick us up and we arrived at the Saratoga springs resort and sat through an hour sales pitch and were shown a GF mock up room. It was interesting but we really aren't interested in purchasing and I thought the salesman was pushy and condescending. I don't think I would have bought a used car from him let alone invest in real estate. After the tour he asked to see the letter again and asked for my magic band because they were also giving us each 3 free anytime fp. Great! When he came back I had to ask twice for my letter back and he did finally return it but it seemed a little odd to me. When we were returned to our hotel I stopped at the CL desk and asked them to apply the card to my balance and was told that it was only a $50 gift card. It was to late to do anything about it that day but the next morning I walked down to the boardwalk show room and spoke to a wonderful vacation club cast member there named Todd who quickly got it straightened out. But I had to show my letter again and was then given another $50 GC. I know it wasn't a big deal but it left a bad taste in my mouth over the whole situation because I know that the first salesman was well aware that he was only giving me a $50 GC. When he asked what had sent us for the tour in the first place and I told him about the offer for $100 he didn't believe me and asked to see the letter and then left the room for a few minutes to have someone else look at it. Just a strange turn of events.

Magic Band- This worked very well for us and we didn't have any major problems only having a blue mickey once or twice. We used all three FP every day and had the extra FP from the DVC tour so 4 a day was enough for us. The only real wait was once for splash mountain with the fastpass we had almost a 25 min. wait.

Tours- We did both the free Ballyhoo (sp?) tour at the BW and the behind the seeds tour at the land and really enjoyed both. During the Ballyhoo tour one couple just left halfway through which I thought was kind of rude but they missed out on the free ice cream down on the boardwalk at the end of the tour.