I want to preface this with I’m not being paid or sponsored to make this post. Although I would love to be sponsored by Disney because I mean who wouldn’t. All opinions are my own.
For Cameron’s second birthday, we had lots of different celebrations because family was in and out of town and we wanted to celebrate with everyone. One such celebration was that we treated myself, my mom, and Cameron to a weekend stay at a Disney resort when some out of town family was coming to visit Disney for the Columbus Day weekend.
Now due to pricing and timing, we knew deluxe resorts were way out of the question. A few moderate resorts were reasonably priced, but knowing we wouldn’t be spending a lot of time in the room we weren’t completely sold on them. Then a Florida resident/annual pass holder offer popped up for our dates and a value resort opened up and I knew that was probably the best route to take. Granted the resort was still close to 200 a night, with it being a holiday weekend and all, we still made it out pretty well for a 3 night stay on property. We ended up staying at all-star movies, in a preferred room in the 101 Dalmatians section. Here are some pros and cons and findings from our stay.
Let’s start with the room. Now as a value resort we knew the room wasn’t going to be huge or super fancy. But I was delightfully surprised that ever since they refurbished the value resorts the rooms were nicer than expected. Laminate floors, better lighting, and a Murphy bed to get more space within the room were really nice. It helped in the morning when we were trying to get ready. I also enjoyed the space of the room as a whole because we brought Cameron’s pack n play and we had plenty of room to set it up and have space to walk around. The beds were comfy, pillows great, AC worked wonderfully, so all in all a good room to be in. My two biggest issues with the room were the coffee maker and the bathtub. The coffee maker was a small single cup maker which just for me being spoiled with a full pot grinding beans coffee maker didn’t exactly cut it. The coffee just wasn’t as strong as I would have hoped. But we made due, and just grabbed more coffee inside the parks. The bathtub situation wasn’t completely horrible either. It’s just that it had a sliding door instead of a shower curtain. And while it looks nicer, probably easier to clean, and sleeker it just was harder to bathe Cameron because the door only stops halfway so you’re either stuck between the toilet and the bathtub or you’re far away from the faucet. But once again we made due for our short stay.
Amenities, while the value resort may not have as many as some deluxe and moderate resorts, for our length of stay we had just what we needed. We never really ate in the food court, but they seemed to have some decent options. I did try mobile ordering for the first time at the food court, and my experience with that wasn’t terrible but I think it could have been better. I don’t know if they were overly busy, or if the person working mobile order wasn’t paying attention, but I feel like we waited a lot longer than we probably should have from the time I clicked the “I’m here” button on my app to when the food was actually ready for us to pick up. We weren’t in any rush as we were just going back to the room to eat, but it still was a bit of a let down to still have to wait around at the window. The only other amenity we really experienced was the kiddie pool/interactive splash pad area. Cameron had the best time playing there and meeting some other kiddos. Luckily we had no issues getting her away when it was time to go.
It was so great to take Disney transportation while we were there. So nice to park the car at the resort and then not have to drive again until we left. The biggest con I found was that we had to share a bus with some of the other all-star resorts. This wasn’t every occasion, like early in the morning, or to certain parks, but in the middle of the day, or to places like Disney springs, we did find ourselves sharing a bus with the all-star music resort which made for busier busses in the middle of the day and more stops before being dropped off or picked up.
All in all I think it was a great resort stay. Being a value resort I knew we wouldn’t be getting a super fancy stay, but having a kiddo and only being there for a few nights and mostly using it for sleeping it definitely did the job. I would definitely stay there again if it came to it!
The first night, once we checked in, we got ready for drinks and dinner. We had drinks at the Dahlia lounge in the new tower of the hotel. I had an amazing sangria-tini and then a strawberry hard cider. My husband had an old fashioned that he said was quite good. The views from this lounge, being on the 16th floor were just wonderful. Now the weather was being it’s typical Florida summertime weather so we were dealing with clouds and rain, but still being able to see for miles was amazing.
