April 2012: NY & Orlando - Take 2

[Toy Story]

Just wondered if you've looked at the Affinia Manhattan. We are looking at this as it seems reasonably price for big rooms and the location sounds great. Someone else may have stayed there and might be able to give a report on it.

I love that pic with the balloons also. I'm going to try and take something similar.

Thanks for the Affinia tip - I will keep my eye on it. I have booked into the Hilton Garden inn in Tribecca wit a rate of just over $300 a night - I will keep looking out for other deals, though we are looking forward to exploring Tribeca and Soho.

There is a discount code on trip advisor for the Double tree it start at $509 a night for your dates the great thing is you can book and not pay at that rate and it soooo worth the money for the location.

Thanks - thisdeal finnishes on the 31/12/11, so I will keep my eye out for a 2012 deal. Though even at $500 a night, over 12 nights that is $6000

Hi Toy Story

We are planning a trip to DL and NY in late April/May and were also looking at Doubletree after reading how great it was from the trip reports on here. I thought I must have been doing something wrong as I was getting those sort of prices too! lol

Will be waiting to see if the rates come down. If anybody has stayed there do you mind me asking what sort of rate you paid?

The other place we are looking at is the Affinia Dumont.

Look forward to reading about your plans

Another Affinia recommendation.... i will have to sign up for their deals.

Toy Story - $700 a night for the DoubleTree is NUTS! I know location is everything; but it really isn't worth that much.

FYI - In 2007, I paid $299 a night for a 1-bedroom at the Doubletree. I know that it was quite a few years ago, but really....the cost of living has NOT gone up that much in NYC.

This is exactly how I felt about the Beacon Hotel - must be all the Australian tourists upping the price

 

[Toy Story]

We're spending 4 nights at Universal (HP) and then 10 nights at hopefully POR. We stayed at POFQ last time, and really enjoyed it, so wanted to try POR this time.

hoe are your Universal plans going? I am a Universal novice ant trying to figure out if I should wait until they release a package or book something now

 

[Toy Story]

Have you planned anymore yet?

We have made some more New York plans... we have stuck up a list of New York to-do's and adding as we find things.

I have booked a Foods of New York walking tour of Greenwich Village for the Easter Saturday (they were great, I emailed them about booking so far in advance and they opened the booking date up). This tour was highly recommended by a friend.

I have also sorted out the boring stuff like travel insurance, and we have started doing some Disney planning but I will start a whole new post for this.

 

[Toy Story]

With the April 2012 calendar out and about a month before dinning plans can be made we have started to plan our Disney days

Our plans are:
Day 1
Drive from Universal to Port Orleans Riverside, via Super Target.
Check in and make our way to Downtown Disney.
Lunch: Earl of Sandwich
Dinner: ?

Day 2
Magic Kingdom - first day tradition (if we do it twice does that make it a tradition?)
Lunch: ?
Dinner: ?

Day 3
Epcot
Lunch: Sunshine Seasons
Dinner: Tuttu-Italia or Akershus Royal Banquet Hall

Day 4
Disney Hollywood Studios - a mad dash for TSM, then PM extra magic hours
Lunch: Sci-Fi Dine In
Dinner: Brown Derby - Fantasmic Package

Day 5
Day off - clothes washing, Downtown Disney
Breakfast: 1900 Parkfare
Lunch: POR (and maybe over to French Quater for beingets)
Dinner:?

Day 6
Magic Kingdom - DD's birthday
Lunch:
Dinner: Ohana (another "tradition" she had her birthday dinner here last time)

Day 7
Animal Kingdom
Lunch: ?
Dinner: ?

Day 8
Epcot
Lunch: ?
Dinner: Tuttu-Italia or Akershus Royal Banquet Hall

Day 9
Check out too early to do anything at Disney

 

[dabecs]

I have booked a Foods of New York walking tour of Greenwich Village for the Easter Saturday (they were great, I emailed them about booking so far in advance and they opened the booking date up). This tour was highly recommended by a friend.

The food tour looks great! I'll look forward to hearing how it goes - would definitely be something I would be interested in!

 

[Mum from oz]

Wow, I have just caught up on all your planning. It is really starting to come along now. I love the photo of the girls with their balloons. We had some last year and I don't even remember what we did with them at the end, great idea about giving them to another child though!

Your Disney days are looking pretty good, love the "via Super Target" we went there every few days when we were there. They sell everything.

 

[Princessbec]

Ooh thanks for the heads up on the April calendar being out, I wasn't going to check until next week.

Eek at the prices in NY, totally nuts!

 

[Toy Story]

One of the other main reasons we are returning to Orlando is a visit to Harry Potter. It opened about four weeks after we were there last year.

Today I booked four nights at Portifino Bay, to make the most of the early park access and express pass. To be honest we really do only want to see the WWoHP, but have decided to get three day passes, so our plan is:

Day 1: Fly NY to Orlando, afternoon at Universal Studios
Day 2: Full day at Islands of Adventure
Day 3: Shopping day at the Outlets
Day 4: (My Birthday) Early entry to WWoHP, breakfast at the three Broom Sticks. Leave the park and visit vintage clothes - antique stores/galleries in Orlando. Return to the park in the evening for our last Butterbeer.
Day 5: Becomes Day 1 of Disney.

Day 4 is a Thursday, so I think that will rule out some of the flea markets that sell vintage. If anyone wants to recommend any stores it would be appreciated.

 

[Toy Story]

Ok, I did the sums, and realised that with the table meals we had planned and needing to buy other meals along the way it was in our $ interest to add the dining plan to our booking.

So this morning with an hour long phone call to WDW, I dropped the AAA discount and added the tickets and dining plan.

We are going to add Sanaa on our check in day, with our families in the Aussie thread recommending it we thought we should try it out.

 

[Toy Story]

Ok, I am home from work today and thought I would just do a quick check on the Doubletree Guest Suites price - well it has dropped! A two bedroom suite with a sofa-bed is now only $6 difference to what I have booked. Has anyone's children stayed in the sofa-bed? Is it ok?

After practising with the dining reservations on the weekend we are going to drop the Brown Derby Fantasmic Package and do the Mama Melrose one instead. I had not realised Disney's idea of dinner meant eating between 2and 5pm for this plan - there was no way we could eat a three course meal in the afternoon (especially if the day is as hot as when we were there last April ). This has left an extra credit, we are thinking of adding dinner at Crystal Palace.

Would love your thoughts on changing to Doubletree, I will book through Hilton so I don't have to pay upfront, keeping options open for other deals.

 

[Jade+3]

Just caught up on all your plans. Have you considered Radio City Apartments? We stayed there last month and loved it. My only complaint was the slow elevator, however we were able to take the stairs from our 4th floor room.

 

[WAMUMOF4]

Ok, I am home from work today and thought I would just do a quick check on the Doubletree Guest Suites price - well it has dropped! A two bedroom suite with a sofa-bed is now only $6 difference to what I have booked. Has anyone's children stayed in the sofa-bed? Is it ok?

After practising with the dining reservations on the weekend we are going to drop the Brown Derby Fantasmic Package and do the Mama Melrose one instead. I had not realised Disney's idea of dinner meant eating between 2and 5pm for this plan - there was no way we could eat a three course meal in the afternoon (especially if the day is as hot as when we were there last April ). This has left an extra credit, we are thinking of adding dinner at Crystal Palace.

Would love your thoughts on changing to Doubletree, I will book through Hilton so I don't have to pay upfront, keeping options open for other deals.

DS14 and DS16 slept on the sofa bed together and their were no complaints from them at all just checked with them and they said it was the best sofa bed they slept on for the whole trip.

 

[Toy Story]

Just caught up on all your plans. Have you considered Radio City Apartments? We stayed there last month and loved it. My only complaint was the slow elevator, however we were able to take the stairs from our 4th floor room.

Hi, I did get a quote from Radio City Apartments, it was for over $4100.

DS14 and DS16 slept on the sofa bed together and their were no complaints from them at all just checked with them and they said it was the best sofa bed they slept on for the whole trip.

Thanks for asking them, it was your trip report that reminded me to check the Doubletree again.

I have booked Doubletree, the price has gone down from $500 when I was first looking to $302 a night. DD is very excited as she wanted to stay in Times Square. I have told her that next time we will stay in Tribeca/Soho to experience a different area.

 

[PrincessInOz]

Good things come to those who wait. Glad that the Doubletree came down to a more "affordable" level.....by NYC standards.

 

[Toy Story]

Today we hit 180 days out, so tonight I will be making our dining reservations. I am going to try and do online reservations first,then I will call for any I am not sure about.

Last time I made all the reservations over the phone, and we seemed to end up a lot of 5.30 dinners - it was the same day that all the dining reservations moved back to being 180 days our for everyone, so the phone lines were chaotic. I was grateful to get any reservations.

In other news I read that the Thunder Mountain ride will be undergoing refurbishment while we on our trip This was one of our favourite rides last time, we rode it about four times in one afternoon.

 

[Toy Story]

Reservations are made!

Day 1: Dinner at Sanaa
Day 2: Dinner at Crystal Palace
Day 3: Dinner at Akershus Royal Table
Day 4: Fantasmic Lunch Package at Mama Melrose and Supper at Sci-Fi
Day 5: Breakfast at 1900 Park Fare
Day 6: Dinner at Ohana
Day 7: Lunch at Tusker House
Day 8: Dinner at Chef de France

I had to call Disney Dining to make the Fantasmic Package as the reservations for April were not showing. I also wanted to book Tutto Italia for our final dinner, but as it is closed until early April they are not taking bookings yet. As this was my partners only choice for dining I had not made back-up plans, he suggested one of the Mexican restaurants - but I was thinking we would go there for a counter service lunch. We decided on Chef de France, and I will keep checking back about making the Tutto reservation.

 

[arje]

hoe are your Universal plans going? I am a Universal novice ant trying to figure out if I should wait until they release a package or book something now

I'm catching up and realised you asked this question about a month ago (sorry ). We're in the process of booking things now and just trying to work through airfares with the TA in the states, hopefully it's now sorted. We have booked the 4 night Harry Potter at Universal, that was our intention anyway. We have only stayed on site before and would not even bother going anywhere else, so this was a no brainer for us. Booking packages or not for there I don't think is an issue (unless you want HP) because you book at the onsite hotels and order the tickets at the same time anyway, like Disney.

 

[Mum from oz]

Your dining ressies look great. I have to start looking at mine soon. I have to wait until park hours come out in November then I can start planning. I am thinking of booking a Fantasmic package this time. Last time we got really crappy seats.

 

[Toy Story]

I have just booked out New York to Orlando flight. The flight time I had wanted to book with Delta (other internal flights are with them) was no longer available, so I booked with Continental.

We flew with them last time, and the 10am out of Newark means not leaving to early or arriving to late. The other bonus is they may have DD's favourite snack: Baby Carrots -

I will be going back over everyone's trip reports now to look at hotel transfers. We were not happy with our Newark to NY taxi experience last time, we thought the hotel shuttle bus thing was ok - but I have no ideas who it was through as the hotel booked it.

 

[PrincessInOz]

Love your ADRs.

I can't help you with the transfers to NY airports. I usually avoid flying out of NYC....I fly in, drive out and then catch a flight out from somewhere else!