Category — w. Most Recent Stuff

DISNEY WORLD NEXT WEEK: AUGUST 3, 2013 TO AUGUST 11, 2013

The material below details operating hours, Extra Magic Hours, parades, and fireworks.

The same stuff is in the table, but organized by park, not by topic.

(And for more on July 2013 at Walt Disney World, see this, and more on August, this.)

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FREE DINING AND ROOM RATE DEALS AT DISNEY WORLD

As predicted, Walt Disney World has released fall 2013 deals for free dining and for room-only discount rates.

Disney’s page on the free dining deal at Disney World is here, and its page on the room-only discount is here.

The specifics are pretty much as predicted, but I don’t have all the details yet.  I’ll add to and correct this page as they emerge.

FREE DISNEY WORLD DINING DEAL SPECIFICS

Free Dining is available only for limited dates:

• September 29 to October 2, 2013
• October 18 to November 2, 2013
• November 11 to November 23, 2013
• December 12 to December 22, 2013

…and excluded from the deal are the following resorts:

• Campsites
• 3-Bedroom Villas
• Disney’s Art of Animation Resort
• Disney’s All-Star Movies Resort
• Disney’s Port Orleans Resort – French Quarter
• The Villas at Disney’s Grand Floridian Resort & Spa

Value resort guests are eligible for the “quick-service” dining plan for free, and moderate and deluxe resorts guests for the regular dining plan for free.

While this deal needs to be booked by September 15, availability is limited. So act now!

ROOM ONLY DISCOUNTS AT DISNEY WORLD DEAL SPECIFICS

There’s two room only deals, one covering stays from September 29 through November 9, and the second covering stays from November 10 through 22 (November 25th at the deluxes and DVC properties) , and then November 30 through December 23.  The first needs to be booked by September 15, and the second by November 3.

Moreover, beyond the slightly different deluxe dates noted above, Family Suites at Art of Animation are included only September 29 to October 5, 2013, October 20 to November 2, 2013, November 10 to November 22, 2013 and December 15 to December 23, 2013.

Exclusion details are still coming out, but Campsites, Standard Little Mermaid Rooms at Art of Animation, and DVC at the Grand Floridian are excluded.

Typically, eligible deluxe and DVC rooms will see 30% discounts, moderates 20% discounts and values 15% discounts.

For the first page of this review of Disney’s All-Star Music Resort, click here.

ACCOMMODATIONS AT DISNEY’S ALL-STAR MUSIC RESORT

Disney’s All-Star Music Resort is one of 5 value resorts at Walt Disney World:

• Disney’s All-Star Sports Resort, opened in April 1994
• Disney’s All-Star Music Resort, opened in November 1994
• Disney’s All-Star Movies Resort, opened in January 1999
• Disney’s Pop Century Resort, opened in December 2003
• Disney’s Art of Animation Resort, opened in May 2012

Among the five, for most first-time visitors who may never return, Art of Animation is the best choice, followed by Pop Century. All-Star Music comes in last among the values.

Two value resorts also have six-person family suites–

• The Family Suites at Disney’s Art of Animation Resort
• The Family Suites at Disney’s All-Star Music Resort

–and for family suites, too, for most families, Art of Animation is the best choice, although in some circumstances those at Music are the better choice.

Among the five value resorts, for standard four person rooms Art of Animation rooms are the most expensive, and next Pop Century.  Standard rooms at all the All-Stars have the same, lowest pricing, on average $45 less per night than Pop Century, and $90 less per night than Art of Animation. Family suites at All-Star Music are much less expensive than Family Suites at Art of Animation, on average $185 per night less.

All-Star Music completed a room refurb project in 2021, replacing in its standard rooms the old full beds with queen beds, and adding coffeemakers to the rooms.

All-Star Music Family Suites were also renovated, switching to much more comfortable fold-down queen beds in the living room area, and re-shaping the second bath and kitchenette area so that the second bath now works as a private master bath.

Standard Four Person Room

Four person room sizes are similar across all five value resorts.  Art of Animation has the best theming, and All-Stars Sports and Music the weakest (unless your family particularly resonates with the depicted themes at these two).

Until recently, all four person value resort standard rooms offered two full beds (the beds at Music are shown above), but you will now find queen beds in Pop Century, All-Star Movies, All-Star Music, and in refurbed rooms in All-Star Sports.

Above is the floor plan of a refurbed standard four person room at All-Star Music. There’s a full photo tour of a standard room at All-Star Music here.

There’s two price classes of four person rooms here–preferred rooms and standard rooms. Preferred rooms are closer to the main pool and the central services in and bus stop outside Melody Hall.

Family Suite, Living Room Side

Family Suites at All-Star Music accommodate six in a space twice the size of a standard four person room.  Half the space is a living area and bath that includes two fold-down queen beds–one behind the couch, and a second behind the table.

The other half of the All-Star Music Family Suite space includes a kitchenette and a master bedroom with a queen bed with a private bath. The floor plan above is out of date, but gives a sense of the proportions of the spaces.

Family Suites are available in the Calypso and Jazz areas of All-Star Music. A detailed review of an All-Star Music Family Suite begins here.

THE THEMED AREAS AT DISNEY’S ALL-STAR MUSIC RESORT

Disney’s All-Star Music Resort officially pays homage to “classic music genres—including Broadway show tunes, calypso, country, jazz and rock n’ roll…Guest rooms are divided into 5 pairs of 3-story buildings—each bright, whimsical pair is themed after one of the featured music genres and decorated with massive musical instruments.”

Disney’s All-Star Music Resort has 1604 rooms in ten identical three-story buildings, all with elevators.

These buildings are in five areas, each themed with external decorations and structures about a different musical genre:

• Buildings 1 and 10, Calypso
• Buildings 2 and 9, the Jazz Inn
• Buildings 3 and 4, the Rock Inn
• Buildings 5 and 6, Country Fair
• Buildings 7 and 8, Broadway Hotel

The buildings don’t distinctly draw fans of their genres.  Line dancing does not spontaneously break out at Country Fair, nor is there the equivalent of the Notting Hill Carnival at Calypso.

Rather, the distinction among these areas is the tradeoff of distance from the main services at Melody Hall versus peace and serenity.

Calypso is closest to the main services, and is thus sold as “preferred” rooms.

It offers both standard rooms and family suites. I don’t recommend Calypso for two reasons:

1. Unless your family has mobility issues, the nearness to Melody Hall isn’t worth the extra money
2. About a third of the rooms in each building face the main pool, and hence suffer from noise issues

All-Star Music (and the other values) is often dinged for being “too large and spread-out.” This is an inaccurate criticism, as each of the values fits into a much smaller footprint than any of the three larger moderates, leading to much less walking than at the moderates.

Moreover, All-Star Music has a particularly compact and charming layout.

The Country Fair area is the most distant from Melody Hall–see the map. It and the rest of the building areas other than Calypso are symmetrically built around the lovely walkway from Melody Hall to Country Fair, and equally surround the smaller Piano Pool.

This design leads to a more understandable layout, and also yields a strong central axis to the resort that makes it feel more coherent than the other All-Stars.

The Jazz Inn is the first set of buildings along this axis after Calypso.

It combines the loveliness of its courtyard, nearness to Melody Hall, and distance from pool noise into the better choice among the two preferred areas here. Like Calypso, you’ll find both standard rooms and family suites here.

After the Jazz Inn, you’ll see the Rock Inn on your right.

Rock Inn guitars.

On your left is the Broadway Hotel.

It has a charming little garden right at the edge of the parking lot.

Country Fair is ahead…

…with a large cactus-garden area separating its two buildings…

…and banjos.

The symmetry of these three sets of buildings around the Piano Pool makes them about equally preferable. Country Inn feels more remote–particularly its woods-facing rooms in the back–but the rooms in Rock Inn and Broadway Hotel nearest to the parking lots are only a little bit closer to Melody Hall. The Rock Inn parking lot can be subject to noise from youth groups that stage here, making Broadway Hotel a better choice than it.

Because of the family suites, All-Star Music can hold a slightly smaller number of people than the other two All-Stars.  This can make it a tad less crowded.

Moreover, its lower kid-appeal, and higher adult-appeal, can make it a tiny bit less noisy and boisterous than the other All-Stars.

Among the All-Stars, Music’s strength for first time family visitors is the availability of family suites.

Its negatives compared to the other values include less broadly interesting theming and sometimes inconvenient transportation.

PHOTO TOUR OF A STANDARD ROOM AT DISNEY’S ALL-STAR MUSIC RESORT

This review continues here.

MATERIAL IN THIS REVIEW OF DISNEY’S ALL-STAR MUSIC RESORT

• Overview of All-Star Music
• Accommodations and Theming at All-Star Music
• Photo Tour of a Standard Room at All-Star Music
• The Family Suites at All-Star Music
• Amenities at All-Star Music
• The Pools at All-Star Music

OTHER KEY PAGES FOR WHERE TO STAY AT DISNEY WORLD

• Where to stay–the Basics
• Where first-timers should stay
• Reviews of all the Disney World resorts, based on my 150+ stays in them

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DISNEY WORLD CROWDS FROM LATER DECEMBER 2013 TO EARLY JANUARY 2014

Disney World usually sees its highest crowds and prices of the year in the later third of December and the beginning of January, in the week that includes Christmas, and the next week that includes New Year’s Eve.

This is for a pretty basic reason: kids are out of school these weeks.

However, not every school district has the same break schedule.

In 2013/2014, more kids are out Christmas week than New Year’s week, but there’s still plenty enough on break New Year’s week to wildly crowd the parks…

SCHOOL BREAKS AND DISNEY WORLD CROWDS [Read more →]

It’s been widely rumored that free dining would open up today for Disney Visa cardholders.

No dice.

I am however sticking to both my forecast here (note the words “typically” and “might” and “early August”) and to the warning here.

Update July 21, 2014: the Armed Forces Salute has been renewed for another year!

GREAT DEALS FOR MILITARY FAMILIES AT WALT DISNEY WORLD

As reported by my friend Steve, Disney World has launched a new version of the Armed Forces Salute for most nights from September 29, 2013 through September 27, 2014.

As in past versions of this offering, there’s two parts–you can use either or both.  One is highly discounted four day tickets, and the other is discounts of 20% to 40% off of Disney World hotels.

There’s a lot of complexities and fine print to this offer (and the fine print varies between Disney World and Disneyland), of which the following are most important for Walt Disney World visitors:

• The offers, are for active duty members, reservists, National Guard members, and career retirees. Almost all vets who don’t also fit into one of those categories aren’t eligible
• You can get a maximum of 6 tickets–unless your immediate family–think member, spouse and kids–is larger
• The member or spouse with proper military ID needs to be there in person to either check in to the room or activate the tickets (both if you are using both)
• So long as the deal is activated by the right person, the other people benefiting from it can be anyone–your non-military family can use tix which your eligible uncle buys for you, so long as he is at Disney World in person to activate them
• There are ineligible dates both for the room deal and for the tickets.

You can book the room discounts for eligible dates now, but the tickets won’t be available until mid-August–and of course can’t be used until September 29.

Disney’s similar FY13 deal is still available for use until late September 2013.  See this.

For much more detail on the offers and their specifics and rules, see Steve’s stuff and its links beginning here.

For more on military families at Walt Disney World, see this.

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