Trip Report With a little bit of Pixie Dust...we made it to Batuu!

Hi all, super excited (and nervous) to be doing my first (pre) trip report!
I absolutely love reading others trip reports on here and with the help and encouragement of @Darstarr decided to give it a go!
This trip took some serious magic to come to fruition, and makes looking forward to it all the sweeter. Fun fact, this trip was arranged with a 2 week time window, as explained below.

I apologize ahead of time for the long winded explanation of how it is we will be traveling to Galaxy's Edge, but here it is!

Some back story to this unexpected trip, (and to explain the pixie dust part). We were at Disney in December of 18, and did not think we would make it back this year as my daughter will be getting married this October. But, we are annual passholders and I heard there would be an AP preview for GE, reportedly for people who have activated AP's. (This is where the pixie dust will come into play).
I started following the blogs much more closely. Why the blogs? Because we rarely to never get any communication from AP or DVC and no matter how many times I've chatted with their IT department has it been resolved.
And, sure enough the day the registration opened I didn't get an email from Disney, but got a notice from one of the blogs I follow.

So I jump on the link and there were all kinds of spots available, and I got my husband and I a slot to see GE and make a lightsaber! So exciting!
Now is where it starts to get more complicated. My 19 year old son who previously wasn't sure he wanted to go, now said he would love to go once he realized we were going. :confused:
So I start reading comments from several people who had been able to get a reservation, that they were able to buy an AP that morning and use it (unactivated) to register for the GE preview. (It wouldn't have mattered one way or the other, but I thought my sons AP was renewable but it had expired).

I go onto the website to try to buy a pass. But the pass would not stay in my cart. I call Disney and some how end up with a pleasant reservation lady who says it's true, you can buy a pass and link it for the preview. (She actually put me on hold and checked and said reservations were still available for GE, let's do this)!

So, she takes my credit card info for $950 (we're DVC), and then neither of us can link it to my account and I end being transferred to the AP IT people. They finally get it linked and, you guessed it, the reservations were now closed because at that point I had been on the phone 2 separate times, once for 1 hour 15 min, and the second 1 hour and 48 min (no joke). So at that point I figure we're not going if we can't all go and I (naively) ask them to refund the cost of the AP and cancel it. (They misinterpreted what I said and thought I asked for their first born). So, apparently this isn't done and I get told because we're DVC I have to talk to them. That lady at DVC thought I asked for 2 of her children and said I needed to talk to guest services. She in turn thought I was speaking a foreign language because she said if I wasn't currently on property she couldn't help me. So guess who she transfers me to, yep, back to the AP people. :banghead:

But, this is where the magic starts, I'm talking to the AP lady and she says "honey I can't find you in our system at all", of course you can't, almost came out of my mouth. But then, she realized I paid full price and she is the lady you pay payments to for your AP. She asks if I can wait on hold she thinks she can throw some magic my way, and I thought are you serious?! I am now an hour into my 3rd phone call of the day, I am not going anywhere if you can help me! She connects me to guess who, yep, the AP IT people! Aggggghh. But things started to look brighter, because THIS lady told me she couldn't return my money, but could "escalate" our situation to the escalation team, but she couldn't guarantee the outcome.

And now I will apologize again for the incredibly long wind up to the resolution, but we waited for over a week and when I finally had given up that anything positive was going to come of this, I got an email from Hope. That was the name on the email, no lie, and their solution was to add my son to our reservation, and so we are headed to Batuu with less than 2 weeks to plan/schedule etc!

Now, who will be coming along. My son S who started all of the drama.
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And my husband G and me! Missing this trip is my daughter and her fiance.
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We will be there Aug 18-21, with our GE preview day on Monday morning. With such late notice, the only place I could find to use our DVC points was at Saratoga Springs. The Tree Houses no less! I have never stayed there before but from the sounds of it we will have plenty of room to spread out!
We are ridiculously excited to have this impromptu trip and can't wait to get there!
 
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youngdeb

Active Member
Great report! Looks like you had a great time! How did you find transporting the lightsabers on the plane? Did you just take them carry on?
 

MickeyCB

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Great report! Looks like you had a great time! How did you find transporting the lightsabers on the plane? Did you just take them carry on?
Thank you for following. It was great fun!
I had a hard sided suitcase full of bubble wrap, etc. that we thought we would use. But, when they were given the padded bags at Savi's my son and husband decided to carry them on. My husband took the hilt off and sent it in the suitcase because he was afraid it could snap at the juncture of tube and hilt. My son took his on board in one piece. The airline attendant helped put them in the overhead bin, he actually seemed worried they would get smashed and he waited till other people put their bags in, then put the sabers in length wise.
 

MickeyCB

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Thank you for sharing your adventure. I had fun following along.
Thank you very much for following along!
Great TR--thanks for sharing!!:) I just love last minute trips myself!!
Thanks for following!
That is the first last minute trip we have every done. Ridiculous planner that I am, I found it strangely relaxing to realize a lot of things were out of my control and to just go with it!
 

MickeyCB

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
In case anyone is still following out there, I just wanted to vent my spleen to someone.
In the beginning of my trip report I wrote about how I make a Disney calendar each year from our trip photos. I absolutely love that thing. (I've even used that as my excuse for needing to book a trip at least once every year)! ;)
And I don't store them away, I hang them up and change the months to enjoy the old pictures. (Who needs a digital photo frame)?!
This is a few of them, sorry it's a poor quality photo.
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Well, today I'm getting my pics together to make my 2020 calendar and the PP web site has completely changed. You can no longer edit your pics on there and they have handed the production of their photo products off to some other vendor.
I go on their new vendor web site EZ Prints (my bum), and they no longer offer a calendar as a product.

(I called a Disney CM to see if there is a way to edit the photos. He said you can edit with an Iphone or a Mac product only, on the MDE but it doesn't save it. (You have to download your changes). And he said that feature may be going away also.
He also was aware of the calendar issue and said "they are trying to get the upper level Disney people to bring back some of the features".

I tried to call EZ Print and there was a recording, "this is Ez Print, leave a message"! :mad:

I get the PP with our AP, but if I was someone who paid the $199 fee, I would be squawking! (More)!

I went ahead and made a calendar on Shutterfly today. Hopefully it will be somewhat similar in appearance and quality to my previous ones.

Ok, sorry rant over.

Oh and one more little tidbit. I see on the TR's here a lot of people saying their ride photos aren't showing up. My haunted mansion one didn't from our recent trip, and when I called to have them find it (another) CM told me something odd. She said that some of them are in some kind of "quality check queue" and that's why they don't get released. No idea what she was talking about, or if it was legit, but, if you want your ride photos you can give them a call and they will "release" them.

Ok, now I'm really done.
 

riverside

Well-Known Member
I used to make a calendar every year for different people that came on the trips with me. I loved them. That's a shame that they no longer offer them.
 

MickeyCB

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
I used to make a calendar every year for different people that came on the trips with me. I loved them. That's a shame that they no longer offer them.
They are fun to have and be able to look at all year long.
The Disney CM said that EZ Print might be adding additional products in the future so if you do decide to make another calendar I would look there first.
 

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