How important are 60 day FP and bus transportation to you?

[minerva78]

I have narrowed down 2 hotels for a possible visit in July: Doubletree Suites at Disney Springs and Embassy Suites LBV South. Although the Doubletree is "offsite" it really has the perks of being onsite because it is at DS, you are able to book FP 60 days out and continuous bus transportation.

For the 9 days we are going, spending 6 days in the parks, when I calculate the differences in parking and breakfast cost, Embassy Suites is overall $210 cheaper. I like Embassy Suites because it appears a bit more quiet, the breakfast, the evening reception, and I just love Embassy Suites hotels in general. The pool is lacking, but my girls are not strong swimmers and just are happy to have any pool. I have heard the drive to the parks is fairly straightforward.

Doubletree Suites does provide continuous transportation, which in one way is nice if you are unfamiliar with the parks, but part of me would rather drive to go and leave exactly when I want to without waiting for a bus. It seems to be more "Disney" which may be nice for my girls, but mom and dad are liking to looks of Embassy Suites at the end of each day!

I was just about to commit to Embassy Suites until I remembered the 60 day FP perk. Have many of you had difficulty getting rides at 30 days out? We are planning to go to EP and AK twice (not for rides, but work/research purposes) but I may consider adding a 2nd MK day for the rides. And I'm just curious how many of you actually prefer driving over bus transportation. Maybe I'm being naive by wanting to drive for our first family visit, lol. Or if you've stayed at both resorts and just have an opinion about something else.

 

[katallo]

We always rent a car so I can't address that. As far as Fast passes are concerned, for us it's not a big deal. We have found when we stay on site and make fast passes 60 days in advance our plans usually change when we get there. I feel as if we over plan. So when our plans change we go or the site and change the fast passes and usually get most of them.

Staying offsite is never a problem and we really enjoy having the extra space. We stayed at Doubletree in Lakepoint Avista and really enjoyed it.

 

[HopperFan]

Stayed at both many times, both are some of my favorites in the area.

First, Doubletree Suites IS ON SITE / ON PROPERTY. The land is on Disney property and owned by Disney. The hotel itself leases the land. I think the addition of the Disney Springs hotels to perks makes sense since they are on Disney property and they fill a hotel void that Disney appears to have no interest in filling anymore. If one does not have a car these would be the only hotels I would consider because of their shuttle.

I have stayed more at ES LBV South since it has opened than Doubletree because (1) the rates are often lower (2) I drive and it is literally 10-15 minutes tops to get to park parking lots (3) the hot breakfast buffet (even with the free breakfast we get at Doubletree we stopped going because the space is simply too small and we always had to wait to get in). (4) When we use points the ES is much fewer. AND you can add the manager's reception, large open atrium with plenty of seating for everything.

I love the ability to walk to Disney Springs from Doubletree if that is in the plan, I like the wall of windows in both the living and bedrooms making it sunny (sometimes we have to take in room day breaks), I like having a table with chairs instead of a desk.

Embassy has the bathroom in between the living and bedroom, so those sleeping or sitting in living room don't have to go through the bedroom to get to the bathroom. Embassy parking is much less than Doubletree. Grocery right across the street (with normal prices) to easily pick up things.

Pools, I would consider them equal. We actually enjoy the ES, it's classic, nice furniture, nice hot tub, never crowded and relaxing. We always use it on trips. Doubltree we have often skipped the pool altogether. It's fine but on those trips I take that extra time and spend at DS since we are right there.

Hotel to hotel, I give Embassy the edge.
Location aka "in the bubble" "walkable to DS" and "shuttle" I give Doubletree the edge.


How important are 60 day FP and bus transportation to you?
To answer your question - neither are important to me.
Other than FoP, SDD and 7DMT nothing is hard to get.
I've gotten all by checking ongoing before trip.
I've gotten SDD and 7DMT the day of.
We roll our FP+ all day long and rarely have to do SB.
That includes trips we book FP+ each day on arrival.
I have a car, it is faster and more efficient than the bus.
BUT if you don't have an AP you'll have to add parking fee, is that included in your savings?

 

[minerva78]

Stayed at both many times, both are some of my favorites in the area.

First, Doubletree Suites IS ON SITE / ON PROPERTY. The land is on Disney property and owned by Disney. The hotel itself leases the land. I think the addition of the Disney Springs hotels to perks makes sense since they are on Disney property and they fill a hotel void that Disney appears to have no interest in filling anymore. If one does not have a car these would be the only hotels I would consider.

I have stayed more at ES LBV South since it has opened than Doubletree because (1) the rates are often lower (2) I drive and it is literally 10-15 minutes tops to get to park parking lots (3) the hot breakfast buffet (even with the free breakfast we get at Doubletree we stopped going because the space is simply too small and we always had to wait to get in). When we use points the ES is much fewer.

I love the ability to walk to Disney Springs from Doubletree if that is in the plan, I like the wall of windows in both the living and bedrooms making it sunny (sometimes we have to take in room day breaks), I like having a table with chairs instead of a desk.

Embassy has the bathroom in between the living and bedroom, so those sleeping or sitting in living room don't have to go through the bedroom to get to the bathroom. Embassy parking is much less than Doubletree. Grocery right across the street (with normal prices) to easily pick up things.

Pools, I would consider them equal. We actually enjoy the ES, it's classic, nice furniture, nice hot tub, never crowded and relaxing. We always use it on trips. Doubltree we have often skipped the pool altogether. It's fine but on those trips I take that extra time and spend at DS since we are right there.


How important are 60 day FP and bus transportation to you?
To answer your question - neither are important to me.
Other than FoP, SDD and 7DMT nothing is hard to get.
I've gotten all by checking ongoing before trip.
I've gotten SDD and 7DMT the day of.
I have a car, it is faster and more efficient than the bus.
BUT if you don't have an AP you'll have to add parking fee, is that included in your savings?

Yeah, I took the parking situations into account with my totals. Doubletree has higher parking fees (we would be driving and need overnight parking) and I'd have to pay a little extra to upgrade to the full breakfast, while Embassy Suites has a full breakfast and lower parking fees, but I'd have to pay $25 to park at the parks. Ironically, it all ended up being a wash because just the ES rate on its own was about $200 less than the discounted Doubletree rate. But I am a slightly neurotic planner, so I had to do the calculations to get the full picture, lol.

I am glad you like Embassy Suites LBV. And it's good to know you prefer driving to the busses. I am also a slightly neurotic control freak, and I thought a 15 minute drive in my own car, on my own time, with just my own family would be preferable. But so many people swear they would never drive on vacation. In my last job I used to often drive 2 to 4 hours to unfamiliar places within the same work day with no problems. I don't see how this would be so much worse.

A good breakfast buffet is KEY for DH. I didn't realize the bathroom was set up like that at ES. That seems so much convenient. I definitely like the window in the living room at Doubletree a lot, but I guess it's probably not a dealbreaker. Or the FP. Either one sounds like a good option, I think I may be leaning to ES still though.

 

[bigbabyblues]

They aren't that important to us. We were originally booked offsite for our trip last June. It was our first offsite stay out of 11 trips. I made FP at 60 days, etc. Then my FIL had a horrible accident 5 days before we were supposed to leave and we chose to delay our trip until he had had the last of 4 surgeries and we were sure he was going to survive. We rebooked our trip 12 days out and got all of the FP we originally had, including FoP and 7DMT except Peter Pan.

We stopped using the buses several trips ago.

 

[Klayfish]

Neither are important to me at all.

With the possible exception of FoP, I can get a FP+ for literally any attraction on property same day, so the 60 day thing has very little value to me.

Bus transportation is a matter of personal taste and how much you want to drive. I love to drive, and we love the freedom having our car affords us. I've said it many times, it would probably be a deal breaker if we had to use the WDW buses. I can't imagine having to rely on them. Never.

 

[minerva78]

Neither are important to me at all.

With the possible exception of FoP, I can get a FP+ for literally any attraction on property same day, so the 60 day thing has very little value to me.

Bus transportation is a matter of personal taste and how much you want to drive. I love to drive, and we love the freedom having our car affords us. I've said it many times, it would probably be a deal breaker if we had to use the WDW buses. I can't imagine having to rely on them. Never.

I feel a bit the same about the busses. I love to drive and hate the idea of relying on waiting for a bus all the time. Unless something has changed (which it could have) I don't think staying at Doubletree would get us the same free parking at the theme parks that Disney onsite guests get. If I wanted to bypass the busses, I assume we'd have to pay $25 to park at the theme parks - but if that is not true someone let me know! It already costs $22 a night to park at Doubletree, so there is no way we'd also add $25 to that to bypass the buses, no thank you.

 

[mckennarose]

I was just about to commit to Embassy Suites until I remembered the 60 day FP perk. Have many of you had difficulty getting rides at 30 days out? We are planning to go to EP and AK twice (not for rides, but work/research purposes) but I may consider adding a 2nd MK day for the rides. And I'm just curious how many of you actually prefer driving over bus transportation. Maybe I'm being naive by wanting to drive for our first family visit, lol. Or if you've stayed at both resorts and just have an opinion about something else.

I can't comment on the busy-ness of summer because the last time I did a July trip was 24 years ago! But we are frequent offsiters and have had good results on booking FP+ at 30 days or less.

We've had no trouble getting 7DMT, Soarin', TT, or the other headliners (with the exception of FOP and the new TS land rides, which I honestly haven't tried to get yet) at 30 days. BUT.. we don't go during the peak of summer. This past September DH and I got a same day 9am FP for FOP at 6 am! We also rode it again at park close, with a 45 minute + wait, so totally do-able for us. DD and her hubby also got a same day FP for FOP in October just by refreshing. So the 60 mark doesn't mean a whole lot to me.

For transportation; I've mentioned several times on here that we frequently travel with our DVC owning family and we ALWAYS make it to the parks or back to our resort far before they do, as they are using Disney transportation. We've had to wait for them many, many times as their buses or the monorail were delayed. Driving around WDW has never been an issue for us, as it's really easy and usually takes less than 15 minutes to get to any of the parks or DS for us. My DSIL, who is a DVC owner, prefers to drive over Disney transportation all the time.

 

[HopperFan]

I feel a bit the same about the busses. I love to drive and hate the idea of relying on waiting for a bus all the time. Unless something has changed (which it could have) I don't think staying at Doubletree would get us the same free parking at the theme parks that Disney onsite guests get. If I wanted to bypass the busses, I assume we'd have to pay $25 to park at the theme parks - but if that is not true someone let me know! It already costs $22 a night to park at Doubletree, so there is no way we'd also add $25 to that to bypass the buses, no thank you.

No free parking at theme parks for Disney Springs hotels.

 

[disneysteve]

Neither of those "perks" matter to us.

We hate Disney buses and really won't use them even when we have stayed onsite. We GREATLY prefer to drive everywhere we go ourselves.

And we don't book FPs that far in advance. Heck, sometimes we haven't even booked our trip 60 days in advance. And we don't know which park we will be in which day until the day before usually. It depends on the weather and how we're feeling and what else is happening. Sometimes we grab some FPs 30 days out but we may or may not actually use them. We don't plan our trip around the FPs. And no, we don't generally make ADRs either.

These are 2 of many reasons why we stay offsite. We just don't care about many of the big onsite "perks".

 

[disneysteve]

I've said it many times, it would probably be a deal breaker if we had to use the WDW buses. I can't imagine having to rely on them. Never.

It's so nice to hear someone else say this. I've said many times that I would rather stay home than go to WDW and have to depend on the buses to get around. That is a total deal breaker for me. Although now there is also Uber but that obviously adds another cost to the trip.

 

[Klayfish]

I feel a bit the same about the busses. I love to drive and hate the idea of relying on waiting for a bus all the time. Unless something has changed (which it could have) I don't think staying at Doubletree would get us the same free parking at the theme parks that Disney onsite guests get. If I wanted to bypass the busses, I assume we'd have to pay $25 to park at the theme parks - but if that is not true someone let me know! It already costs $22 a night to park at Doubletree, so there is no way we'd also add $25 to that to bypass the buses, no thank you.

What about the option of renting a townhouse? They will all have free parking, have far more space than a small hotel room, still be close to WDW, and probably cost less than the hotel.

Yes, I know many people see the buses as one of the biggest perks to staying on property, and I respect that. It's just not for me.

 

[HopperFan]

Yes, I know many people see the buses as one of the biggest perks to staying on property, and I respect that. It's just not for me.

I don't hate them and when they fall in to Designated Driver category they can be a plus .... but when I stay on property I probably drive everywhere more than I ride the buses. It saves TONS of time to drive and I can often park closer to the gates than the bus drops off (except MK).

 

[kathy884]

I have a bit of a bean counter personality and the premium for properties that offer the 60 day FP and Disney transportation just don't cut it for me (but I'm not as into onsite Disney as many. My personality with looking at Disney food prices and other activity costs are such that I never felt what some say is Disney Magic staying onsite). I have only stayed on property when DH had a seminar and had his company pay for lodging and I have in that case, sometimes done and extra day or two at the convention rate to stay longer. Other than that I am a hard core off site visitor as I perceive that as a better value.

On my next trip I don't feel like driving and will do uber and lyft instead of a rental car (have usually done rental cars in the past). Uber / Lyft are game changers that make offsite a viable option even without a rental car in my humble opinion.