Coronado Springs

Coronado Springs Resort is a moderate level resort located in the lower end of the Walt Disney Resort complex. It's main theming is colonial Spanish and native Mexican decor. It has brightly colored rocks, cactus, and great stamped concrete paths that with coyote, horse shoe, and a grand Mayan pyramid next to a pool. Basically it was a Howard Johnson's with Disney theming, not over the top fancy, but there was no mold growing in the showers either (unlike my last experience in the Port Orleans Riverside). They didn't have an accessible room that slept three so they comped us the adjoining room which was really nice for my son who had an earlier bedtime than my wife and I (also I didn't have to watch any Disney JR).

 A little warning is this place is spread out. I mean that it was a mile from my room (building 6) to the main building were the restaurants, store, and other amenities were. We had an entire lake between us and the main building. This wasn't all bad because we were at one of the first bus stops going to the parks (first on, first off), and we got to avoid the conventioneers that had a tendency to drink to much and have some colorful language around small children (really you can't see the 3,4, and 6 year old in front of you while you are talking about how wasted you got last night? Oh yeah this is a family vacation destination so you do need to watch your language and subjects on the bus.). All in all the positives outweighed the negatives and I would stay there again.

The rooms were a good size and my wheelchair could navigate easily in both rooms. The bathrooms had a built in shower seat, and a raised toilet with grab bars. The beds were comfortable and at a good transfer height. We didn't have a super amount of theming in the rooms which was nice after a day in the parks. If you are looking to dive into nonstop Disney this isn't the place. If you are staying for an extended amount of time they have laundry facilities located on property (bring quarters), and a small fridge in the room for keeping juice, fruit, or pastries for breakfast in. There is room service but it is not the best. We ordered a pizza after one long day in the park and were brought a sparsely cheesed tortilla with a small amount of spaghetti sauce on it (worst pizza I have ever eaten). We did eat it because after 45 minutes and being hungry how can you not.

 The main pool has a cool Mayan pyramid with a water slide that they show movies at during the evening. It has a nice little snack bar that closes around 9 or 10 p.m. (depending on the night). I have been told that they are going to be adding pool lifts sometime next year to all of the property's pools to assist wheelchair bound folks like myself . One last feature was that they had a designated bus line for Coronado Springs that didn't stop at any other resort. You still had to wait for the bus at times but it was a shorter trip to and from the the parks than if you would have been stopping at several hotels.

On the whole when my family goes back I believe we may try to stay at one of the deluxe resorts only for the ease of transportation with a little kid. But if you do not have that issue I recommend the Coronado Springs Resort as a good base of operations.

Blog sites and discussion boards

It is obvious that as a blogger I may have some insight that others do not when they are planning a trip. This was the main basis when I started this blog so many years ago. I have had readers contact me and given me wonderful things and places to research and blog about.

But even I have my limits on what I know about travel. When I am planning a trip I also look to the internet discussion boards, and travel bloggers. These are great places to gain insight on Disney Cruise and a visit to Walt Disney World. I would be a fool not to visit WDW Prep, Disney on Wheels, and Disney Food Blog. These are run by people who have been to WDW many, many times and offer tips I just don't have. I highly recommend them as a great place to gain ideas on what attractions to hit first, what is the must-have salty snack and a variety of things I just don't have the space here to blog about. They, however, do and have blogged about them so if you are going, be sure look them over. They all have wonderful pictures, and as a photographer, that always makes the site better in my opinion. Here is what I like and look for on these blogs.places. 

WDW Prepschool: This site is crammed full of useful information to assist "clever people" with their vacation planning. It has great tips, wonderful trivia to keep you and your family interested in the parks, schedules, and a ton of what I think of as inside information. I thought I knew a lot about Disney but she makes me feel like I have just seen the tip of the Disney iceberg. Facebook her for updates and tips. 

Disney on Wheels: I am in a wheelchair so I feel that this site has some great tips for getting around the park, finding the appropriate place to queue for a ride, best spots for parades and fireworks, and also food. She too has many pictures of the Disney parks, and cruise ships that she has been on that give details that the Disney site may not cover in enough depth for those of us with mobility issues. I recommend liking this page to keep apprised of what is going on with the Disney machine.

Disney Food Blog: This is a great site. It is written by folks who are extremely knowledgeable about the food and has tons of great pictures that are guaranteed to make you hungry. They also have super tips for picky eaters, and for folks who may be on the adventurous side of the food spectrum. If you are planning a Disney trip, make sure to Facebook this blog for gastronomical updates.

As for discussion boards I really like Frommers, DISboard, Cruise Critic, and of course Trip Advisor. Here you can post and get recent info from recent travelers and travel professionals alike. They also might have insiders that will give their opinions. This will make your knowledge more well-rounded than simply reading your guidebooks (which I recommend too), or going in totally fresh to an area you may not know or knew a LONG time ago (this I don't recommend at all).

DISboard: They know everything, I swear it. Their members post videos, discuss past/present/or future trips in as much detail as you want. If it is Disney travel check this site out.

Frommer's or Fodor's: These guys actually wrote the book on traveling so their discussion boards are filled with people who have a ton of information as well as questions. A great place to post questions and maybe help out a new friend with their query.

Cruise Critic: I go here to hear what other people's experiences on certain cruises were. I also like it because you can get very specific answers from people that may have just returned from their cruise (such as room size, cleanliness, and whether they dock or moor).

TripAdvisor: This is the site I go to to see if I have to worry about creepy crawlers in the mattress, or mold growing in the shower. Sure you can't please everyone but you CAN please a large percentage of us.

We as a travel community, both able-bodied and mobility impaired, must use all the tools at our disposal if we want to make our travels successful and enjoyable. To ignore any knowledge or experience is just foolish. To all those bloggers and travel board posters out there, I would like to send my own personal thanks for making my travels smoother. 

Disney Holiday Events on land or at sea.

On occasion when we travel to one of the Disney resorts it happens to coincide with a holiday. We have been to Disneyland during the Christmas season (usually between Thanksgiving and Christmas) when they bring out the winter holiday theming. 

However this is the first time that we will be traveling there during the fall close to the Halloween holiday. Because of this and the fact my son is 4 years old we have decided to take advantage of Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party. This is essentially an after park hours special event that has spooky theming, special fireworks, and what I think is the coolest feature your ability to dress in costume and trick or treat in WDW. This is not a cheap outing and you really need to address whether or not it is appropriate for your group. In our case it is. Not only do we have a young child who likes to dress up, but my wife and I are extreme Halloween fans ("I am the pumpkin king!").

So we were all set for this special treat, when the Disney Cruise Line gave us an extra surprise. Because we are sailing The Disney Dream in between September 22 and October 31 they are going to be holding special Halloween events. The pirate party will be replaced by a Halloween party hosted by Jack Skelington and Sally (complete with meet and greets), there will also be kids club events, as well as some spooky fun for us adults. Now for those of you who are wondering about the other ships, they will also be getting some holiday fun although no specifics have been announced as of this date. 

The official announcement also hinted at winter holiday events that will be taking place during those holiday time periods so take heart you travelers going in November through January.

More to come soon.

Walt Disney World Vacation Planning: our splurge and how to make it fit in the budget.

Be it add ons, extras, up sells, impulse buys,or plain old splurges when you are on vacation chances are that you will want to get, do, or experience something that isn't on your original budget. When my family goes on vacation, even when we are on a shoestring budget, we like to pick one thing that is a splurge. This can be dining at a specific restaurant, picking out a cool art piece to hang at home, a massage at the spa, a special t-shirt, or buying pictures to remind us how much fun we had. This may mean that you get creative and use your AAA card to get that 15% off, Study the Fodors, or Frommers discussion boards (or the DISboards) for advice or deals, pick up one of those coupon books (you know the ones that your kid's school sells every year) that are filled with discounts, or "pre-purchase" a spur of the moment t-shirt or parade vendor item from the Disney Store or online so that you get it for less than at the park (this is great for younger kids who are not totally aware of how purchasing works).

On our upcoming Walt Disney World trip my wife and I decided that we wanted pictures of all of us together (as you might guess we don't have may of these because someone always has to hold the camera). She did some web research and discovered that WDW offers deals on photo packages, if you pre-purchase them before arriving at the resort. This is great for us as we can just enjoy walking around the park and getting posed and candid shots done without the bother of lugging a camera around and having to ask someone to snap the picture. This picture package will allow us to have pictures done through out the the resort and get them placed on a CD for ease of use. We absolutely loved this idea and snapped at the chance to get memories of what will be our biggest trip as a family. You will need to check in the Disney website to see what pricing, but if you feel like me, in the long run the memories you will share will be priceless to you and your family.

Disney's free dining plan

When I first heard about the Disney dining plan I looked into it and couldn't see any benefits to it. You don't get a discount on food. You pay for a set amount of food upfront. And I couldn't see paying for food I might not eat. So we had ruled it out, but when my new WDW travel agent talked to my wife about it, she looked into it again. We scavenged other blogs, discussion forums, and even the Disney webpage. What we found out was amazing. If you do your research, and travel during off peak times, and are very lucky, the dining plan could cover your food.....for FREE! Take a minute to let that sink in. I couldn't believe it at first. I thought "well they must limit your choices". Nope. "You must have to eat quick service only (Disney speak for fast food)" Nope. They will pay for a snack, a quick service, and a sit down meal per day per person. AND you have a refillable cup that you refill at designated places. FANTASTIC!!

 

The catch is you must purchase it at the time you book your travel package. If you book out as far as my wife and I do, they may not have it available. Also it is not a guarantee that if they did it the last five years they will do it again. You gotta buy it on faith and hope like heck they do it again, and rebook your package with the free meal plan. If you are good at researching, and pick your times judiciously, with a bit of luck you can get the meal plan free. It is saving us over a thousand dollars for eight days in Walt Disney World.

I would probably not do this while visiting Disneyland because there are cheaper eats within walking distance. But when you are enjoying the bubble of WDW, I think it is a great move.

Checking out where you will check into.

I have learned the hard way that you must research the hotel that you are going to stay in. I have stayed at a Best Western in Anaheim that gave me an upside down lunch tray with lawn chair legs for a shower bench. It made all the water puddle on the floor and into the towels (could have been shocking for my wife when she used the hair dryer). Another experience was in Florida where we stayed at the Disney Port Orleans Riverside after our cruise disembarked. We discovered mold in the shower (lots of it), the hardest bed I have ever tried to sleep on and a questionable cleaning job (run a vacuum), plus no room service put me on edge. What I am saying is that just not all accessible rooms are created equal, and along those lines not all moderate rooms are equal either.

Our trip to Walt Disney World Resort in 2013 is over a year away and we are already scouring the Internet to figure out which place is best for me, my wife and our son (who will be 4). There are many great sites like Frommer's, Fodor's, and Trip Advisor that offer an unbiased review of the hotel. This is great because you get a ton of opinions. However you have to read the reviews because some of the complaints can be just nit picky little things like "the sheets were to rough", "I didn't like the soap", or "I had a pool view from my room that didn't look like the brochure". There can be serious ones like " we found cigarettes on the headboard under the pillows" and "there is old in the corner of the bathroom" which any reasonable hotel should want to correct right away.

We are weighing out several hotels on property for their location to the parks we really want to visit, reviews from independent sources, and information we have gotten from our travel agency. The front runners are the Animal Kingdom Lodge, The Beach Club, and The Polynesian. All of these have different ammenities that we may want to have access to. They are all located at different points of the resort so that we can have a home base near the parks that we may spend the most of our time at. As we get closer to the travel date the rates for next year will come out and there may be additional hotels we will look into with better rates. It is important to look ahead so that you do not get overwhelmed when you have to book. There is nothing worse than going into something blindly, as it can have a very negative effect on you vacation overall. I will revisit this as we get closer and review in depth each of our choices.