The Resort Life

While my Disney Vacation was awesome in almost every respect, Disney and I did have a small clash.  At the end of this post I will share the letter I wrote to Disney after the Day 2 Monofail incident, which garnered positive results; but I’ve done a lot of thinking about how and why that happened.

First, there is no disputing that Disney had conflicting information.  Even they acknowledge that.  I “travel well.”  I have stayed in lots of hotels.  I know the ins and outs of flying in the post-9/11 world.  I can figure out a bus schedule and a subway system.  But the sad fact is that I am just not well-suited to a resort-style vacation.  The very notion runs contrary to my personality type.  I like doing things myself.  I like being ABLE to do things for myself.  I do not like creating work for other people, even if it’s their job.  I like planning things.  I like details.  I like getting them right.

And so I planned.  We sat in the airport in Binghamton planning our days at Disney.  When necessary, I looked something up.  They have a great web site and a WONDERFUL app that lets you plan everything, make dining reservations, FastPass+ reservations, etc.  They encourage it!

But it’s a RESORT.  Literally every employee you see is paid to help you and do things FOR you!  But they aren’t mind readers.  Had I gone to the front desk/concierge with our ideas and “must-sees” they would have fallen all over themselves to help us plan our day(s).  I would have been presented with the weekly pamphlet detailing park hours and monorail hours of operation and never have even seen the web site with the conflicting information.

It simply didn’t occur to me to ask.

Next time will be different.

My letter:

———-
Hello,
My Family is having generally wonderful time on our vacation.  Thank you!  It has not been without its specific frustrations, however.  This morning did not get off to a good start.  We had 8:40am breakfast reservations at Be Our Guest in the Magic Kingdom.  We are staying in the Contemporary Resort.  Your web site states: “The Walt Disney World Monorail System operates from one hour prior to earliest park opening until one hour after latest park closing.” (
https://disneyworld.disney.go.com/guest-services/monorail-transportation/ ) Planning on that, we were up in plenty of time, descended to the fourth floor at 8:00, only to be greeted by a guard, a locked gate, and a sign indicating that the Monorail runs from 8:30am.  Given that the Magic Kingdom opened at 8:00am today, we expected that the Monorail would have been operating since 7:00am (per the web site).
The guard was helpful in that he directed us to the bus terminal.  So we went to the bus terminal.  By 8:30, no bus for the Magic Kingdom had arrived, so we went back inside and joined the line for the Monorail.  We didn’t get to Be Our Guest until 9:00 or so.  (They took very good care of us!)
I am not writing for myself.  I am writing for the next person who takes your published information at its word and makes plans based on them.  Please either update your web site to reflect actual operation of the Monorail, or update the service to bring it in line with what is published.  I hope you’ll agree that’s a reasonable request!
Sincerely,
Romeyn Prescott
Potsdam, NY
PS: I have since learned there is a walkway from CR to MK.  We will be investigating that, weather permitting.

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