I'm a POP devotee, but they are booked as of now...2nd choice?

[AmyMac1109]

Ok -- last question, lol.

There are family suites available at AoA for our dates. That would give us a skyliner resort but it would mean the "kids" would be sharing a suite. They are 2 DSs (27, 30), one DS's wife(30), one DS's gf. (28) I've never been in the suites, but I see they do have 2 full bathrooms.

Is this too small for 4 adults?

I think the math would add up for it to be a comparable price for what we've already booked. We'd need to add 2 adult park hoppers to one room price, but I think my math works out.

Size-wise, they're fine. But as PPs mentioned, sleeping arrangements might cause some tension. All that being said, I cannot justify the cost of a family suite at AoA when a nice moderate (PO or CBR) is the same or (usually) cheaper. I wouldn't downgrade, even for an extra bathroom.

Edited to add: I realize now that you mean to get one AoA suite or two POR rooms for the kids, so I'm sure AoA would probably work out to be a little bit cheaper (maybe $160/night). But I'd still go POR because the adults might want some privacy. Whoever as the pullout or table bed at AoA will have no privacy the entirety of the trip.

 

[sipnride]

Re Dolphin/Swan I suggest calling and asking. I'm not a big fan but given your preferences this is the best choice if you can land it. If not I'm gonna make a pitch for Coronado because it really is a great resort and honestly the bus situation is not bad there at all. I've stated this elsewhere but a lot of guests aren't going to the parks so you're going to get a bus that you can actually board in a reasonable amount of time and it's unlikely to by crowded.

 

[leeniewdw]

I want to thank everyone so much for helping me. I finally decided to scratch the AoA suites (I've got 1 DS who'd be fine, the other, likely a pain about it) and then get some input about CSR vs POR however, CSR is no longer available. So, POR it is!

I opted for a preferred room which gets us closest to the main building and we ended up with a $70 credit from our Dec reservations at POP (price diff plus removal of G+). We will have to buy G+ each day, so I think that'll be an additional $50 charge (guessing $20/day for G+) for each room when all is said and done.

Having moved these 3 reservations twice, I'm not sure I'll bother if POP becomes available -- but I will definitely miss the skyliner! (who am I kidding, if they become available, it'll be cheaper and we'll have the skyliner, so I'll probs do it haha)

 

[fla4fun]

I don't know about too small, but I don't want to settle the who gets the bedroom and who gets the pullout argument

The Murphy bed is actually more comfortable than the regular bed, in my opinion. The mattress on the regular bed was so firm it was like a brick. So you could have two in the bedroom and two on the Murphy and avoid the pullout sofa altogether.

As to the original question, my first choice after Pop is usually All Star Movie or Music, since they have done the room refurbishment. The interior is almost identical to Pop other than cosmetic theming, and usually if I am looking for a Pop room, I am on a tighter budget. However, my favorite moderate is PO and I like several of the deluxes, especially CR, WL, YC, BC, and BW, so I do stay at other resorts. It just depends on whether I want to save money by staying at All Star or spend more by staying at PO, since it’s bus transport to the parks from either.

 

[DizneyFamof4]

We are with you, once the skyliner came to POP it was a game changer and we will be there again in 5 days. As you can see in our signature, we really like staying at POR also, great themed resort and very enjoyable to walk around. Our family has no issue with the size of the resort and we do not spend extra $$ for preferred building and you do not need to take a bus to get around the resort, at most it's a 10 minute walk from the back of the resort to the front. Plus, it's a very scenic walk Great FC and we really like Boatwrights TS, plus boat to DS and carriage rides, it's a great resort.

 

[leeniewdw]

Wanted to post a final update on this. After NO POP rooms showing on my 'several times a day checking', last night POP did show up for our dates. I quickly called and the CM said there were 4 rooms currently showing (2 standard, 2 preferred), and we were able to get all 3 of our reservations moved from POR to POP. I know I was kind of obsessing about the skyliner, but we really do love it for easy transport to HS and EP and (as of now) our EP day is the Marathon Sunday and felt like the Skyliner to IG would just be so much easier.

So we're moved back to POP and we also saved a large amount ($400 for each of our 3 reservations) which is also lovely. I was even able to move our standard room to a preferred online later last night (I called when having to do 3 because I thought it would be easier/faster to confirm that they had more than 1 room available).

Thanks again for everyone's input and help!

Now to just pray we don't get weird winter weather that impacts our departure from RDU in January, since we already had a hurricane force us to reschedule from Nov . We have pretty poor luck with vacations and weather, we were scheduled to be in Yellowstone just a few days after the massive June flooding (we had to scramble and extend our Tetons accommodations). We were in Yosemite when there was the Rim Fire that prevented us from going to the High Country/Tioga road. We were at Sperry Backcountry Chalet in Glacier the night a fire started that impacted our ability to hike our intended route out, but rather more than double the miles to the other side of the park (a few weeks later Sperry burned). My sister says she never wants me to go anywhere before she does in case a natural disaster occurs, lol.

 

[bffdisney]

OP I'm SO glad it worked out! I was invested!! haha

 

[RoseGold]

Not the outcome I expected, but a pretty magical one!

 

[leeniewdw]

This is a 2+ week delay to the wrap up of my saga. Our trip was great. Reminder: DH and I, late 50s, DS+Wife (30), DS+longtime GF (late 20s). None of the "kids" had been since they were in middle school, while DH and I have managed a few long weekends since 2018.

While normally we don't care about Preferred or Pool over Standard, I obviously ended up with whatever came available, which was Preferred. After that I never looked again, we were already getting back around $400 per room/package having moved from POR to POP. We ended up in Building 1 and it was perfect. So close that anyone could walk back and forth if they forgot something, or into the Food Court if they needed a water bottle or whatever. We would "meet up" at the tables by the Pedals Bar before heading off to the park.

I think they really enjoyed the Skyliner and it's convenience. We never rope dropped (DH and I probably would have, but we did have late nights each night and it was probably wise to just re-group around 10am each morning, no one was in a rush or grumpy!). We never waited more than 1 or 2 groups to get on the skyliner, most times walked right on.

We had a LONG wait for a bus from AK to MK on our first night -- the kids wanted to ride Thunder Mtn before it closed (we had MK AH tickets but that was after the closure), so we literally just rode the bus from AK to MK, rode BTMR and then grabbed some food before exiting the park. But I think we waited > 30 minutes for the bus. After that they joked "do we have to ride a buuuussss" when discussing the plans for the day. So the skyliner was a hit.

We pretty much stuck together (which kind of surprised me but with all the LLs and ILLs and whatnot, I guess it's not surprising), but we did decide to meet IN EPCOT one late afternoon which allowed everyone to decide how to spend their time (resting, in France having Champagne, sitting at the pool) and the Skyliner made that easy to manage.

Anyway -- our trip was great, weather was perfect and too bad we can't afford to do this every year with 6 adults, lol!

Thanks for everyone's input and thoughts! We got back and the next day were at Pre-Op appts for my DH's knee replacement which took place a week after we got back. Another reason getting this trip rescheduled for these dates was important -- no idea when he'd feel up to walking 10 miles a day in the parks.

 

[DizneyFamof4]

This is a 2+ week delay to the wrap up of my saga. Our trip was great. Reminder: DH and I, late 50s, DS+Wife (30), DS+longtime GF (late 20s). None of the "kids" had been since they were in middle school, while DH and I have managed a few long weekends since 2018.

While normally we don't care about Preferred or Pool over Standard, I obviously ended up with whatever came available, which was Preferred. After that I never looked again, we were already getting back around $400 per room/package having moved from POR to POP. We ended up in Building 1 and it was perfect. So close that anyone could walk back and forth if they forgot something, or into the Food Court if they needed a water bottle or whatever. We would "meet up" at the tables by the Pedals Bar before heading off to the park.

I think they really enjoyed the Skyliner and it's convenience. We never rope dropped (DH and I probably would have, but we did have late nights each night and it was probably wise to just re-group around 10am each morning, no one was in a rush or grumpy!). We never waited more than 1 or 2 groups to get on the skyliner, most times walked right on.

We had a LONG wait for a bus from AK to MK on our first night -- the kids wanted to ride Thunder Mtn before it closed (we had MK AH tickets but that was after the closure), so we literally just rode the bus from AK to MK, rode BTMR and then grabbed some food before exiting the park. But I think we waited > 30 minutes for the bus. After that they joked "do we have to ride a buuuussss" when discussing the plans for the day. So the skyliner was a hit.

We pretty much stuck together (which kind of surprised me but with all the LLs and ILLs and whatnot, I guess it's not surprising), but we did decide to meet IN EPCOT one late afternoon which allowed everyone to decide how to spend their time (resting, in France having Champagne, sitting at the pool) and the Skyliner made that easy to manage.

Anyway -- our trip was great, weather was perfect and too bad we can't afford to do this every year with 6 adults, lol!

Thanks for everyone's input and thoughts! We got back and the next day were at Pre-Op appts for my DH's knee replacement which took place a week after we got back. Another reason getting this trip rescheduled for these dates was important -- no idea when he'd feel up to walking 10 miles a day in the parks.

Sounds like a great trip We will be back at POP in March, the cost and skyliner, to me, works out great. We used to mainly stay at Mods and some deluxes but we cannot find the worth in doing that, unless it's a split stay. We never have any problem with the room size. I will say that the park-to-park buses will have more times where you wait longer, especially if the park you're leaving is right around closing time, because they will dispatch more buses to the resorts.