Been seeing all the posts about 50th anniversary and was thinking about taking a quick weekend trip down to hopefully see 50th/Food + Wine/christmas party. When I looked at the crowd calendars, the crowds look in the 2 - 4 range, but when I check for hotels almost all of the $/$$ hotels seemed to already be fully booked for the weekends. Does this seem normal to people? I’m tempted to try and find another hotel offsite or maybe pay up for a nicer hotel as a holiday treat for myself, but if the hotels are already this full I’m worried that the parks are gonna be just as busy
I would keep an eye on Priceline/Hotwire for any hidden deals. They bulk purchase rooms so they will sometimes have some even when Disney is sold out on their site.
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Yup. Inventory has been very tight for months for that time frame.
I noticed that when I look for 1 night, nothing comes up but anything more and I get at least a handful of options
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I have actually seen that as well now you mention it. Seems like for whatever reason they are trying to discourage single-night stays.
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I am doing a one night stay Friday night and everything has been booked for a few weeks I think there was a Florida resident hotel offer that went out?
I’m going to Tampa for work and the trip was on and off again, so when I noticed the hotels were booked, I booked a room at the Swan directly with Marriott that was free cancellation in case the trip didn’t happen. On Friday, it was decided it was on. I had my travel agent check if anything else was available and there was nothing else.
I looked again and the only way I was able to find anything under $225 that went over a weekend was by adding a few dates on either side, which wasn’t too bad. Was able to find a weekend room at the Dolphin which I may go for, but their site hasn’t updated since fastpass+ was ended so I can’t really tell if I am missing out on any benefits by staying there - anyone know?
You cannot charge to the room and no DME. You will have deluxe evening hours if you are there
No Magical Express (and their site helpfully points out that no one will get this benefit in 2022)
I booked a grossly overpriced night at Swan yesterday for the end of a November trip. As the OP pointed out, there’s no availability at the Disney hotels for the timeframe. I have been searching for at least a month. I’ve never stayed at a non-Disney hotel, so it didn’t even occur to me I won’t be able to take ME back to the airport. Uber it is then. (I think I booked a night at Swan. No confirmation from them yet and it’s been 24 hours. And they haven’t taken the $$ out of my account. Hopefully, there’s no mishap as I have already changed my flight. 
)
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thank you so much for this! I got so used to EMH and FP+ that it’s weird to try and learn a new system!
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Swan/Dolphin no longer use WDW buses, they use Mears charter buses. They now drop off at the charter bus locations, which isn’t much of a problem at AK. For MK, they have to drop off at TTC.
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You can walk to the YC and when TP timed the buses to TTC vs BW the Swan/Dolphin were faster I believe.
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The buses run every 20-25 minutes according to the Marriott site.
You should see it in your Marriott account? Also they started emailing me about paying to upgrade my room after a few days and sent me an email a week ahead of time with Disney specific items.
This is my first non-package booking so I’ve been nervous as well.
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Yes, that’s been a thing now for a while.
They use some algorithm for booking to try and avoid orphan nights, where there is no availability either side. That in turn means it discourages single night bookings.
You could always call and book, if you have the time.,
Yes, and the BW buses run about every 20 minutes but if you add the walk you are adding more time, plus the walk from the buses vs. the ferry/monorail from the TTC. It was a timed trial. Of course on any given day you could wait an hour for a bus at any resort.
The advantage of course is the ability to walk to two parks.
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I called about the confirmation and first the CM said it was so busy they can’t send confirmations right now. Later on she said since it’s coming directly from Swan it could take up to 72 hours. I asked if it was unusual they hadn’t charged me yet. She said that could also take 72 hours. Sounds crazy to me, but what do you do? She saw the reservation on their end, so all I can do is trust what she told me. 
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Are they filling resorts to full capacity?
That I can’t answer. But as to what they are showing as available it’s quite limited
One CM on the phone told me they weren’t full to capacity… but who knows.
Just to add— I was looking at GF possibly for next Fall And it shows no availability over a year out. Doesn’t make sense.