After our experience on our Christmas trip. We may never go back to Disneyworld !

[HOOSIERDAD]

Because I think we just had the perfect trip! My family has gone to DW every year since 2005 but never around the holidays. We were celebrating our anniversary & my kids b-days. Everywhere we went we were told "happy birthday or anniversary" . Every CM we encountered was over the top nice & or helpful. Every waiter or waitress gave us all extra desserts at dinner & all were attentive & friendly. Our waiter at Cinderella's Royal Table Dinner was amazing. HE was funny & charming & even in character. He even asked if i wanted another steak?! I said sure & not 5 min later he was back with another hot steak! My kids are now 14 & 10 but they still seem to love Disneyworld as much as when they were younger. We stayed at Port Orleans French Quarter Dec 18th thru the 25th with free dining(had a pin code). The weather was amazing -sunny & low to mid 80's. We got to do & see lots of different things this times including Characterpalloza, the Osbourne lights, the Chrismas parade & fireworks. (Used fastpass plus for the parade & fireworks((highly recommended-so nice having a big open area to yourself especially during the busy holidays)). Kids loved the comedy warehouse the frozen holiday spetacular. Just wanted to let everyone know that the magic is still alive & better than ever in my & my family's mind. (hmmm we've never done New Years Eve either. maybe?!)

 

[SeilerBird]

Thanks for the great trip report. I love Disney too and I am sick of threads by people complaining about FP. How refreshing.

 

[skriegerjr]

I'm confused, why would that experience make you feel like never going back to WDW?

 

[HOOSIERDAD]

Because I don't think that we will ever be able to top it!

 

[WhispyPixie]

PREFACE: We are die-hard Disney fans. twenty-something trips over 20years. We love it and no matter the experience would most likely go again. In fact we are..in May..lol

With that said.....We also went over the Christmas holidays. The weather was amazing! We had been before during that time and expected the crowds to be just what we got. The FP+ was good and we were quite fortunate in getting to do the things that were high on our list.

There were times and people that I felt the "magic" wasn't as abundant as it has been in years past. Most of it was not rudeness (excluding the parking-lot attendants, they are not only clueless but abrupt, uninformed and lacking any smiles whatsoever) but more over cast members not being helpful. Many times when we would ask questions about things, we got a patent answer of, "I don't know" with no help or even an attempt to find the answer. Now, before people start attacking, I KNOW we were there during a busy time and I realize that they are tired in the midst of chaotic people and children. Just made me a little sad. Not a day passed that there wasn't at least one less than magical cast member.

On the other hand we encountered some very magical ones as well!

 

[SeilerBird]

I'm confused, why would that experience make you feel like never going back to WDW?

Too much fun.

 

[SillySallySews]

I totally understand this feeling! Our last Disney trip was last summer. I spent a lot of time on these boards before we left trying to figure out how the new FP+ system worked. I honestly expected our entire trip to be horrible based on everything I read here about MDE, FP+, rude CMs, food gone downhill, rides breaking down, etc. Maybe I just had low expectations, but that was our best trip yet! We loved FP+ and because of it we finally got on TSMM for the first time (sorry, I think there is some kind of drinking game going on for whenever someone mention this here, but it's the truth!), no problems booking SDMT or A&E, and MDE and magic bands worked great before and during the trip. Aladdin rode the carpets with us, Mickey grabbed our daughters and led them around during the little parade at Ohana, Jake gave my daughter the surprise of her life at DHS and created a memory I'm sure she'll never forget, and we also loved the FP+ viewing areas for the parades and Wishes. We had one less than stellar meal at 1900PF with rushed characters and a rude server, we got stuck on POTC once but only for about three minutes, and it did rain a lot while we were there and was of course ungodly hot because it was June. But none of that ruined our vacation. The magic was still there for us too. We're going again in May this year and can't wait.

 

[helenm29]

Yes, it is nice to hear something positive! I have a question for you though...how was it using the "bracelets" while you were there? was it inconvenient at all?

 

[HOOSIERDAD]

I read alot of reviews about poor CM's as well & was a little worried since we were going during a fairly crowded & hectic time. I was worried that they would not appreciate having to work on Christmas eve & Christmas. But all of the workers that we encountered were actually more friendly if that's possible.Seriously considering New Years Eve now!!! i was afraid that the warm weather might not put us in the Christmas spirit but with all the decorations & music everywhere that was not a problem. We had never done the dining plan before & loved it!! Would never pay for it mind you but when its free sign me up!(btw i know it's not truely free!) We did AK & DD on Christmas day so the crowds were not much of an issue. BTW we went to Wolfgang pucks for dinner on Christmas & used our last 4 credits-would have been over $100.00 out of pocket & that was just our COUNTER SERVICE credits!

 

[bumbershoot]

Every waiter or waitress gave us all extra desserts at dinner ....even asked if i wanted another steak?! I said sure & not 5 min later he was back with another hot steak!

That's awesome for you but incredibly unlikely to happen for others. Best to not expect such things.

 

[minniemous]

 

[HOOSIERDAD]

We had no issues with using the magic bands at all except the first 3 days we went to the parks my wife's would not work(she had similair problems last october during the testing phase.) on the 3rd day the cm asked if she had used hand lotion that morning , to which she replied "yes". He said the lotion sometimes interferes with the finger scan. She held off on the hand lotion until entering the parks the rest of the trip & had no further issues. I've haven't heard anyone else say anything about "lotion interference" though?!