Category — p. News and Changes

Crack commenter DisneyDiningAgent just reported here three changes to the Tomorrowland Terrace Fireworks Dessert Party:

• The booking window for the Tomorrowland Terrace Fireworks Dessert Party now goes out 180 days
• The cancellation policy is now five days
• The name on the reservation needs to match the credit card, and be the same as one of the people who shows at the party.

I’m not that keen on this party for first-time visitors–the site is too off-center.  But those interested in it and used to the old, much shorter booking window may be glad to hear that they can now book the Tomorrowland Terrace Fireworks Dessert Party 180 days ahead!

This was officially confirmed on 10/2!

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So last weekend I raced off to Walt Disney World to be a tester of MagicBands and FastPass+–both part of the emerging MyMagic+ offering at Walt Disney World.

FastPass+, which permits you—well, for now, those of you in the test–to reserve times to visit rides up to 60 days ahead, is the heart of MyMagic+, and what I was really interested in testing.

The short version is that my test went fine, (the photos on this page are from that visit–rides that I saw using FastPass+) but I’m still not sure how all this will shake out for typical first-time visitors to Walt Disney World who may never return. (A more detailed moment-by-moment “trip report” is here.)

I already knew going in that there would remain several key questions that won’t be fully answered until full roll out of the program—and maybe not even until a while after that:

• How many “headliner” Fastpass+ per day can people get?  Will this vary for on and off-site hotels, and, for on-site visitors, by hotel class?  In the test, all on-site hotels are treated the same, and you can get three headliners a day.  Will that stay the same? See the excerpt above from the The Unofficial Guide to Walt Disney World 2014 (click it to enlarge it) for some speculation that it might not.
• Will the parks still be relatively un-crowded at opening? I can think of three or four reasons why they might stay that way, and three or four why they might not.  This is partly a technical question (how many FastPass+ windows will be offered at 9a) and partly behavioral—how many people will grab those slots, and having grabbed them, get out of bed in time to use them?

To these open questions—which the test couldn’t answer and I didn’t expect it to—a third question emerged that I should have thought of before, which is how many people will actually reserve Fastpass+ anyway?

This is important, as it has implications for how many regular Fastpasses will be available to be pulled on the day of visit.  (Based on Disney’s current terms of service, at full rollout you’ll be able to use one or the other, but not both.  During the test so far, you’ve been able to use both, though this could change at any time.)

I started thinking of this because of Steve Russo’s recent post on MousePlanet, which quotes an inside source– “Admiral Boom,” no less!–as follows:

“The premise is that we can take some percentage of the FastPasses available in the parks and turn them over to the vacation planners, to be used as a perk for pre-planning one’s stay (and/or for staying on property).

The goal is to minimize the impact of doing that to the already successful, current program. In the end, one will still be able to walk into a park and get FastPasses, just like we can today…

By the way, we don’t expect pre-arranged FastPasses to be a major item. Studies have shown us that the majority of our guests don’t want to pre-plan their vacations to that level.”

If this holds up—especially the last point–FastPass+ may have a smaller impact on visits than many of us have been thinking.

But maybe not.  It’s a matter of headliner capacity.  If relatively few use Fastpass+, but all of them book headliners, it may be that you can get a Fastpass on the day of visit for Mickey’s PhilharMagic…but not for the headliners.

There’s still no official word on the general release of FastPass+ to everybody.

One of the questions I did expect to be able to test last weekend was how well the system worked.  For me, it largely worked fine, but not perfectly.  I was able to make multiple changes, some on the fly, and most—but not all—MagicBand FastPass+ readers worked.

The fact that they didn’t all work tells me there’s still bugs to be fixed…which tells me that FastPass+ won’t be fully rolled out for everyone probably until 2014.

Multiple reports have been coming in that visitors to the test resorts are now able to book FastPass+ for visits beginning in November.  That’s a good sign.

And on Tuesday, Disney CEO Bob Iger at the Goldman Sachs Communacopia Conference said that Fastpass+ will be “fully rolled out fairly soon…”

I’m trying to not read too much into the word “soon….”

Meanwhile, a more detailed moment-by-moment “trip report” is here.

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Disney World rides can close for re-dos at any time, but the winter “ride closure season” from early January though mid-February is the most predictable time for Disney World rides to close for rehab and refurbishment.

Splash Mountain is the major attraction that most commonly closes in this period, with closures of a week, a month (most common) and several months.

So far–in great news–it looks like Splash Mountain will only close for a few days in 2016. A couple of other great rides are closed around the same time, however.

Here’s what we currently (think we) know about 2016 Disney World winter ride closures:

Magic Kingdom:

• Splash Mountain closed January 6 – January 10
• Liberty Belle Riverboat closed January 18 – 22
• Space Mountain closed January 11 – 15
• Buzz Lightyear Space Ranger Spin closed January 15 – February 11

Animal Kingdom – no known closings

Disney’s Hollywood Studios – no known closings

Epcot – no known closings

I’ll add more winter ride closures as they are announced…

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DISNEY RESORTS TO BE ADDED TO FASTPASS+ TESTING

As predicted by the “Mysterious A” on this site almost a month ago, reported on disboards.com a couple of days ago and other sites since, and confirmed by Kerri, one of my twitter followers who got FastPass+ for Coronado Springs for an October 31 arrival date, the number of resorts in the current FastPass+ test will be hugely expanded over the next month or so.

Below are resorts already in the test, and after that the arrival dates on which others will be added.

No one knows for sure if the test will continue after the announced end date of October 31.  Most expect it to do so; others think it will be on hold after 10/31 until after the Christmas/New Years holiday weeks.

Me?  Well, on September 12, Jay Rasulo, Disney CFO, said this at the Bank of America Merrill Lynch 2013 Media, Communications & Entertainment Conference:

“…By the end of the first quarter of fiscal 2014 we will have substantial [Fastpass+] coverage of our resort guests…” (p10)

Disney’s first fiscal quarter end is at the end of December 2014, so I find it hard to interpret Rasulo’s comments as supporting any other interpretation than that FastPass+ availability will continue after 10/31 at most or all of the resorts in, or entering, the test.

That is, I think FastPass+ will continue to be largely available to Walt Disney World resort hotel guests after October 31st.

And for everybody else?  Well, here’s what Jay said about that, continuing the same answer quoted above: “and ultimately all guests who visit the property…”  So everybody else is still in the “ultimately someday” category.

RESORTS ALREADY IN THE TEST

• Disney’s Animal Kingdom Lodge – Jambo House
• Disney’s Animal Kingdom Villas – Jambo House
• Disney’s Art of Animation Resort
• Disney’s Beach Club Resort
• Disney’s Beach Club Villas
• Disney’s Contemporary Resort
• Disney’s Polynesian Resort
• Disney’s Pop Century Resort
• Disney’s Port Orleans Resort – Riverside
• Disney’s Yacht Club Resort

RESORTS TO BE ADDED, BY ARRIVAL DATE

September 30

• Disney’s Animal Kingdom Lodge – Kidani Village
• Disney’s All-Star Movies Resort
• Bay Lake Tower at Disney’s Contemporary Resort
• Disney’s Grand Floridian Resort and Spa
• Disney’s Port Orleans Resort – French Quarter

October 7

• Disney’s All-Star Sports Resort
• Disney’s BoardWalk Inn
• Disney’s BoardWalk Villas
• Disney’s Caribbean Beach Resort

October 14

• Disney’s All-Star Music Resort
• Disney’s Coronado Springs Resort
• Disney’s Old Key West Resort
• Disney’s Wilderness Lodge
• Villas at Disney’s Wilderness Lodge

October 21

• Disney’s Fort Wilderness Resort and Campground
• Disney’s Saratoga Springs Resort and Spa

October 23

• The Villas at Disney’s Grand Floridian Resort and Spa

For more on Fastpass+, see this and this.

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There’s two Disney World deals that expire today–a free dining deal, and a room rate deal.

Details are here.

If you want one of these deals, act quickly!

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(For the first page of this review of Disney’s Polynesian Village Resort, click here.)

Update April 2016: All major major construction at the Polynesian as part of its multi-year refurb is now complete.

While construction will continue on the east side of the Polynesian Resort into 2016, the major construction that affected everyone is now complete.

Specifically, here’s what’s done:

• Refurbs of the standard rooms
• The redo of the entrance to the main services building, the Great Ceremonial House
• The redo of the lobby and fountain
• The addition of Trader Sam’s
• The refurb of the main Lava Pool
• Construction of bungalows in Seven Seas Lagoon and re-opening of the beaches near here and the pool
• DVC refurbs of the old Rapa Nui and Tahiti, now Pago Pago and Moorea

What remains to be completed is

• Completing the DVC refurb of Tokelau–which looked almost done during my late April 2015 visit (e.g. the pictures were hung on the walls)
• Completing various pathway redos
• Most significantly, re-doing the smaller pool, the East Pool.

So pretty much everything I know about the big picture of what’s going on at the Polynesian comes from my bud Steve’s Tikiman Pages website dedicated to the Polynesian and his Facebook page, or our email exchanges. For the latest, check his sites.

It remains to be seen how much of a mess the East Pool refurb will make of the east side of the resort. Sometimes Disney will close rooms facing the refurb.  If it does so, then all are fine.

But until we know

• For standard rooms, avoid the east side longhouses Raratonga, Niue, Samoa, and south facing rooms in Hawaii (see the map, click it to enlarge it)
• If you are getting a DVC studio, avoid Tokelau (the un-named building on the east side of the East Pool on the map)

None of the construction that’s left is a big enough deal to suggest that the Polynesian is a bad choice for first time families who can afford it. Just avoid the east side!!

TOPICS IN THIS REVIEW OF DISNEY’S POLYNESIAN VILLAGE RESORT:

• Overview of Disney’s Polynesian Village Resort
• Photo Tour of a Standard Room at Disney’s Polynesian Village Resort
• Amenities at Disney’s Polynesian Village Resort
• Dining at Disney’s Polynesian Village Resort
• The Pools at Disney’s Polynesian Village Resort
• Accommodations at Disney’s Polynesian Village Resort
• The Disney Vacation Club at Disney’s Polynesian Village Resort
• Photo Tour of a Studio at Disney’s Polynesian Village Resort
• Renovation and Construction at Disney’s Polynesian Village Resort

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