By Guest Blogger Jamie P.

Ok, a slight change of pace. For this review I need to tell it more as a story, so come with me, if you will, back into the mists of time. Well maybe a few months, and with a memory like mine that really is the mists of time. The point of all this will, of course, be revealed. I digress.

September 2010, Sarah and I finally made the jump after many years of consideration and finally joined up for the DVC. We were staying at Saratoga Springs, and that is where the open house is based so we figured what the heck, let’s go see what it’s all about. At least we get free ice cream, right?

It turns out the ice cream was the thing we left without, having signed up we left and experienced a massive case of ‘oh my god have we done the right thing?’. Anyway, we enjoyed the remainder of our holiday and came home safe in the knowledge that next year we would be making a return, this time staying on points for the first time. Incidentally the remainder of the vacation was great, as they pretty much always are, and we found ourselves making the long journey home with lots of plans for how the next vacation would pan out.

After the post vacation blues had passed, the piles of laundry folded and put away, the photos collected and the suitcases put back in the loft, we did what we always do. We got the whiteboard out. This is pretty much where our planning process begins. The spaces are left blank when we wipe out the past itinerary, and we start working on the next one. We agreed that we would love to do Christmas again, so we planned on early December, following Thanksgiving. This was enough to get us underway with the planning process. We totalled our points and figured we would love to stay at the Boardwalk Inn, so we pencilled it in on the board, planning what we would do and when. What park, where to eat. This would be the first time in a while we were not staying on a dining plan so we factored in plenty of junk food, counter service and off site dining. We even figured we could get away without having a car for the entire time, staying at Boardwalk would allow us to walk between EPCOT, DHS, MK via the monorail from EPCOT, the actual Boardwalk and its surrounding hotels.

The plan was to watch the flight costs and probably book the whole thing at the last moment to try and get a cheap deal, so Sarah kept a daily watch on the Virgin website and we explored various alternative methods of arrival including flying to Atlanta and driving down (which was ruled out, after consulting Google Earth.) Then, one rainy afternoon in May, some six whole months before our planned departure, and at least five months before our planned booking time, I had a thought. ‘shall we check availability?’ I asked. You know, just in case… WOW!

Absolutely nothing at Boardwalk. Only Saratoga Springs was even vaguely available. We would have to split our stay between three resorts and over use our points borrowing from next year. The situation this put us in was that we would have to book our flights there and then (luckily they were quite cheap at that point) but we would need to book our hotels then also, including the three different locations. Following the phone conversation with the friendly booking agent we looked at each other with the familiar excitement etched on our faces, and then both looked at the white board, realising all our plans were in tatters. The whole thing has had to change completely, which is ok because that’s what we normally do throughout the year, but never quite so drastically. We have been advised by our friendly booking agent that when we move all we need to do is call reception, tell them we are moving, where to and how many bags we have to move. We leave those bags in our room, then turn up at the next resort and check in, where we will be given our bags. Easy as really easy pie.

So coming back to the moral of the story, if you want to stay on points, you need to book it early. If you do book early then you can change it later, but if you book late and there is no availability then you simply aren’t going to get anything. Remember you can book eleven months out at your home resort. I hope this little journey through the winter months has helped you, and if you are planning staying on points and you are inside your booking window, BOOK NOW!