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Ice

Coffee is for Closers
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Jan 5, 2018
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Hate to make a whole thread about this but

Anyone have any idea when the January 2020 hotel bookings will be available? I have no idea what their typical course is for releasing available dates.
 
Hate to make a whole thread about this but

Anyone have any idea when the January 2020 hotel bookings will be available? I have no idea what their typical course is for releasing available dates.
Usually around June. What time in Jan? If your arrival is in Dec and goes into Jan you can book now.
 
Usually around June. What time in Jan? If your arrival is in Dec and goes into Jan you can book now.
Most likely later in Jan. Trying to get in lower attendance times, Christmas crowd is too strong in December
 
Ive already seen an increase in bookings for Dec 2019. I can not wait for star wars to open.....already planning to be there opening day. What would really be nice is a preview like they did for Pandora. We rode FOP over a dozen times and river journey about 5 in one afternoon about a week before the official opening. You could spend as much time as you wanted in the queue exploring and there was never a wait.
 
I see late January into February as one of the best times of the year to go as far as crowds go. Regardless it's packed, but the weather is usually perfect that time anyway.
 
I just made a bunch of FP and ADRs for the end of the month, things you cant easliy do other times of the year. Do your research and avoid the large events at WWoS and Marathon Weekend as well as any holidays kids would be out of school.
 
Dates for my Feb trip didn't show up until last June.

That being said, if you're new at this, look into an agent. They're free and the one I used has been great for keeping me up to date and handeling the details.
 
Dates for my Feb trip didn't show up until last June.

That being said, if you're new at this, look into an agent. They're free and the one I used has been great for keeping me up to date and handeling the details.
Yes, agents stay on top of discounts and things like that, they also know tips, tricks and shortcuts that make your vacation even more magical!
 
As others have said, it's typically late June when bookings appear online. You may have luck calling them and asking if you can do bookings over the phone, since you are well inside the normal 499 day window for making reservations, especially if you are looking for certain packages. The last week of January is normally a great time to visit, but do take caution to avoid the marathon and MLK weekend, which are surprisingly crowded times for January.
 
Yeah I'm rather apprehensive to an agent. I'm a proud control freak, and I spend unreasonable amounts of time planning my trips to maximize what I get out of every dollar.
 
I never have trouble planning my own trips. I highly recommend touringplans.com.

Their crowd calendar is particularly useful.
Did you see the TP snafu last week.....where the planners were predicting crowds of 2-3 and people were emailed at the last minute saying they had chenged to 8-9? Sadly with the ever increasing number of events the TP historical data is getting less accurate.

As far as using a travel agent, they can plan as much or as little as you want. I know a guy.......that for some clients books every part of their trip from room, to FP+ to dining times and they just go with it. Others that he books the resort portion and they do all the day by day planning. Some booking are somewhere inbetween. No matter how you do it there should be no additional cost to you over booking it yourself on Disney dot com. Some plusses of using a TA though, most have a wide network of friends in the industry and many times get tips when discounts or price hikes are coming so they can be ahead of the game and ready and many times already up booking and making changes to pre existing reservations before most people even wake up and see theres a new discont out. A good TAs services also dont stop when your vacation begins, they are only a phone call or text message away from any info you need or questions you have. Also dont confuse AAA, Costco, Expedia, or any of those online big box travel websites. They book anything anywhere whether they have and knoledge of the destination or not. Book with someone that travels to Disney often and knows the parks. Theres plenty of those travel agents out there so why not use a expert on your destination.
 
Yes, they dramatically increased the estimates for this past week, which is when we were there. According to the blog, it was based on Disney’s decision last year to cut staffing in January, I imagine in response to lower crowd predictions. It is worth noting that Touring Plans estimates wait times, not crowd levels. The two are related, but may not be the same.

As it happens, the parks didn’t feel worse than normal, so it didn’t really effect our trip. I was still able to get almost every FastPass I wanted, and we never had more than a 20 minute wait.
 
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