Something that the My Disney Experience reservation system presently lacks is the ability to quickly see what dates are available by month. Instead, you must input a set of dates, and then click to find out whether or not there are openings for those specific dates. If not, you keep putting in more dates until you find the ones your want. This is particularly time consuming for peak times. Oh the tedium.
There is better way
There’s a road less traveled way to figure out these dates. You might say it’s a hack, but to me it is brilliance. And it works for many resorts at Disney World except for the campsites. So instead of getting a note that says “modify your dates” and playing an hour-long guessing game, you can get this calendar instead.
The dates with no prices in the picture above are the ones that are filled up. Notice the expected unavailable dates – Labor Day, Halloween, and every weekend in October. These prices shown are what Google picks up from the various third-party sites, such as Hotwire. These sites have their own allotment with constantly-changes prices, but availability is well aligned with Disney. But more on that in a moment.
Step One – Google Search
These instructions are for a laptop browser (I used Chrome). However, it works similarly on mobile devices. Let’s give it a try. First of all, open your Google search tool and type in “disney’s Fort Wilderness cabins.”
Step twO – Click on book a room
Next, you will click on “Book a Room.” This does not mean that you are actually booking a room, but this takes you to closer to the gold – the calendars.
Steps three and four – click on check-in date
Make sure that the tab at the top is on “prices.” And finally, click on the actual date for check-in.
Voila! There is the calendar – Next steps
You can scroll through for different dates, and compare these to the prices you’ll get directly through Disney or your travel agent. While these calendars show you availability, there are some advantages and disadvantages to booking through the third-party websites. Sometimes they will be significantly discounted – under $300. But, other times the discounts are not as much as a Disney special or other discounts (such as AP) that you may have.
You won’t be able to do package deals, and it may be more difficult to request a specific cabin location. However, you will be able to manually link the reservation up to your My Disney Experience, and are eligible for the 180-day ADRs, 60 day FastPasses and Magical Express.
if only we could do this for campsites!
All in all, whether you are using a travel agent, booking through Disney, or a third-party site, this method is the easiest way I’ve found to watch availability for the cabins, as well as price trends. I’m not sure why the Disney site does not provide a calendar system within its own interface, but it sure would be helpful.
