Walt Disney World: Disney's Polynesian Villas - Deluxe Studio w/ Roll-In Shower

Date of Visit: November 15-21, 2016

We picked Disney's Polynesian for this trip because it was on the monorail and thus would be easy to get over to the Contemporary for the Destination D event. In the end, it really wasn't all that convenient for that as we really aren't fans of the ramps up to the monorail at the Transportation & Ticket Center and Magic Kingdom in the first place and then found we really hate the setup for the station at the Contemporary and to some extent also the Polynesian (not enough elevators for the traffic in the Great Ceremonial House at peak times). For the most part, we just used the ferry boat from the Ticket & Transportation Center to get to the Magic Kingdom and then walked to the Contemporary, but we found the Resort Monorail was the only option to get to the morning sessions.

Despite not being a fan of the monorail, the Polynesian is now our favorite DVC resort (at least when it's just us and we can do a studio). If we do Destination D again, we probably would stay somewhere else and do the bus to the Magic Kingdom and then walk to Contemporary, but for regular Walt Disney World trips the Polynesian works because as long as we weren't going to the Magic Kingdom before park opening we found the ferry to be an option, especially since we were in Pago Pago, which is the closest building to the Ticket & Transportation Center. While Epcot is still only accessible by Monorail from the Polynesian, we avoid having to go up the ramp at the Transportation & Ticket Center by usually starting our day with Toy Story Mania at Hollywood Studios and then taking the boat to Epcot and at Epcot the Monorail station has an elevator along with much lower grade ramps, so we only have to deal with the steep ramp going down once.

The main reason we are a huge fan of the Polynesian is that the doors are set almost like the ones that we love on the Disney Cruise ships. The door doesn't automatically open when you unlock it with your Magicband, but it does once you push it slightly and when you pull it slightly to leave. There is also a button inside, which I assume is supposed to activate it open to leave, but Mik was quickly disappointed that it did absolutely nothing when he pushed it. We didn't get around to asking about it, but it was either broken or it could be something that you have to ask to be activated for your stay.

We also mostly really liked the layout of the studio. It is nice how the studios here have a bathroom as well as another room with a second sink and shower. As just two people, we don't need that extra area to get ready, but it was nice to have roll-in shower in the main bathroom and still also have a regular shower for me to use instead of having to use the roll-in shower, which is often not that great of an experience.

Mik particularly liked the bathroom layout as he quickly discovered he could easily roll up next to the toilet to park his chair. He also found the space easy for going to the bathroom on his own, which isn't always the case for him in "accessible" hotel bathrooms.

We also liked the bed that folds down from below the TV as I used that and Mik used the queen bed, so we didn't have to deal with the fold out couch and always had plenty of floor space to maneuver around.

The only problem we had with the room was the kitchen area. It was not at all designed to be accessible. For the most that didn't matter to us, but the microwave is even higher than a regular home kitchen that has one mounted above a stove that even I almost couldn't use it at all. This was extremely disappointing to us in that the first time (and possibly only other time) we've done a DVC studio was the only time Mik has ever been able to use a hotel microwave because it was below the counter.

Overall, though, we really enjoy the room and the resort location. The only other thing that we didn't like was that the beverage and food options for grab and go are extremely limited, especially compared to what we got used to from the cafeteria option on our last trip when we paid to stay at a value resort, but it was also more limited than we have found at the other DVC resorts shops in terms of beverages and grocery type items. However, you can't beat that the Polynesian Resort has Dole Whips, so it's sort of a wash.

Destination Info:
Disney's Polynesian Village Resort
1600 Seven Seas Drive

Lake Buena Vista, Florida 32830-8423

Walt Disney World: Animal Kingdom Villas - Kidani Village Accessible 2-Bedroom Lock Off Villa

Date of Visit: January 2-9, 2016

Since we usually aren't into planning our WDW trips that far in advance, we've only stayed at our home resort one other time, which was when we did Club Level for the WDW Marathon. Even 11 months out, I couldn't get Club Level this time, but definitely not bad to have Animal Kingdom as our home resort and being able to easily get a Savannah View, which everyone loved and more than makes up for the drawbacks of this resort.

The 2-Bedroom Lock Off is a Studio and 1-Bedroom Villa combined. Both the Studio and the Master Bathroom of the 1-Bedroom part have accessible bathrooms.

The Studio bathroom had a tub. There was no shower chair, but usually you can request one if needed for this type of room.

The Master bathroom had a roll in shower as well as a whirlpool tub. It was also very spacious, so Mik enjoyed just claiming this as his room to hang out in. Best of all, this roll in shower was properly designed and did not flood the bathroom, which was our one complaint when we stayed at the Jambo House.

The 1-Bedroom also has a bathroom when you first enter that has a roll under sink, but no grab bars or extra space, so not exactly what we would consider accessible. However, it is definitely convenient to have that extra bathroom.

The kitchen area is decent accessibility wise, although it really is limited on the counter space. We didn't end up caring to cook at all this trip, though, so that wasn't a real issue.

The living room area was a good area for us all to hang out in (and for Mom to take over and work while we were in the parks). While for Mik the door entry style to the balcony is easier to use, the sliding door style with the lip does make more sense with the living room furniture setup.

The Studio made a good bedroom for the 3 adults and 1-year-old that used it, although it is the same too crowded style that is why we have never done a studio with Mik again (It's the space that ends up in the accessible bathroom that makes an accessible studio too crowded to comfortably stay in for us). It also would've been crowded for them if it wasn't part of a 2-Bedroom Lock Off because the only reason it really worked was that they put the crib in front of the door to the room and we all just used the 1-Bedroom entrance.

The Master Bedroom has a king sized bed and plenty of space to be comfortable accessibility wise.

Of course, the best part of the Villa is the balcony and being able to see various animals throughout the day. It really is what makes staying at the Animal Kingdom Villas so enjoyable. Otherwise, it's kind of an undesirable resort in that other resorts are closer to the parks (our favorite being the Boardwalk and other ones on the lake with Hollywood Studios and Epcot). Also, now that we've stayed at both Kidani and Jambo, we'd definitely prefer to be at Jambo (and not just because we had Club Level there that time).

Main thing I didn't like about this stay was that we were at Kidani Village and the quick service restaurant is over at Jambo House, which really isn't that far away but just enough to be mostly inconvenient. It wasn't that big a deal this trip because we did end up spending a lot of time in the parks and at least for breakfast they had some hot sandwiches and oatmeal in the little store at Kidani. However, definitely makes me not consider this as a place to stay in planning future trips when it's just us because we've often relied on the quick service places at the resorts for meals, especially dinner.

Destination Info:
Disney's Animal Kingdom Villas - Kidani Village
3701 Osceola Parkway
Lake Buena Vista, FL 32830-8410

Disney's PCH Grill Beach Side Bonfire Dinner Buffet

 Date of Visit: October 21, 2015

With so many different things we love and always new things to try at the various quick service places around the parks, we very rarely do any table service restaurants at the Disney parks. We also usually end up grabbing dinner at the hotel (or making in our room when at DVC resort), though, because Mik tends to prefer to just do the parks in the morning/early afternoon. Since this hotel doesn't have a quick service option, we decided it was a good time to splurge and do a more table service dinner for once.

Mik tried the fish tacos, mac and cheese, fried chicken, deviled eggs, and shrimp alfredo pasta. He enjoyed everything, but his favorite was the fried chicken.

For dessert, he had to have the pumpkin cheesecake, which he said was the same or similar to the one he enjoyed at the French Market the day before. He also tried the vanilla bean dessert filled ice cream cone. His favorite thing, though, was dipping the house-made marshmallows (strawberry and plain) in the warm chocolate sauce from the S'more Bar.

While it is much pricier than what we tend to spend on a single meal at Disney, it was an enjoyable experience and it was worth doing. Mik particularly enjoyed that he could have just a little of a lot of different things. He also liked that it was one of the few buffet opportunities that did not include characters, which he's not a fan of. Only thing we didn't like was the carpet was very thick making it take a lot of effort to roll him through the seating area, which is why I only took him to see the buffet options once and on the way out he noticed he missed some things he would've gotten if it was easier to take him back to look.

Destination Info:
Disney's PCH Grill
Paradise Pier Hotel
1313 South Harbor Boulevard
Anaheim, CA 92802

Hyatt Place Anaheim Resort/Convention Center: ADA King w/ Roll-In Shower

Date of Visit: August 10-17, 2015

The ADA King room with roll-in shower was mostly as we've come to expect a Hyatt Place room to be like. You have the king bed and then the fold out sofa bed in the sitting room like area. The one thing, though, is only has one television. Not really a big deal, but even a standard room at most Hyatt Places we've stayed at have the bed and the sofa area a little more separate and a TV in each area. Of course, the specialty room upgrade did sort of spoil us last time.

One major issue with the room was the bathroom. Sure, it has the accessible features one would expect, but it's very poorly laid out with the toilet behind the door. This means you have to roll the chair into the shower and then close the door to be able to put the chair next to the toilet and transfer. If I remember correctly, the specialty room we had last time actually had a pocket door for the bathroom, so really annoys us that this hotel does have some well designed accessible bathrooms and then also one of the worst we've ever encountered.

About the only part of the bathroom Mik actually liked was the sink area as it was very easy to roll up to and use.

  
The shower was to some extent one of the best we've encountered while also being one of the worst. The good thing was it was well designed in that the water stayed in the shower and drained well. It was bad in that it did not have anywhere to set the soap. Putting the shampoo and conditioner on the ground isn't a big deal, but a soap bar turns into a mushy mess at best or gets stuck to ground at worst. Also, it does not have a seat. Now that doesn't mean they don't have them, as when we stayed in the room with a tub they had left a tub seat. We didn't ask because Mik preferred to just be on the ground anyways.

The toilet and the door situation was what really made the bathroom an issue. That and the fact the toilet seats pop off very easily, but we had the same problem last time, although this time it happened way more often.

Overall the room was comfortable and the front desk staff are friendly and helpful. I definitely will not be choosing a roll-in shower at this particular Hyatt Place again, though, as the awkward layout got annoying. Also, next time I will be complaining if we get such poor cleaning service again (room wasn't cleaned when we returned after 4:30 p.m. and items weren't restocked multiple days even when they did get around to cleaning it).

Read our more detailed review of Hyatt Place Anaheim Resort/Convention Center here.

Destination Info:
Hyatt Place Anaheim Resort/Convention Center

2035 S. Harbor Blvd.

Anaheim, CA 92802

Hyatt Place Anaheim Resort/Convention Center

Date of Visit: May 16-24, 2015

When we lived in AZ we used to always use Mom's Hyatt points and stay at the Hyatt Regency Orange Country. Now that we have to fly we've tried out the Hilton and a Best Western since those are close enough to walk to the parks from. Last D23 Expo the Hilton worked awesome, but we wiped out Mom's points there and they seem to take longer to earn enough for stays compared to Hyatt, which is why she focuses on earning Hyatt points. Thus, we were very excited to see that Hyatt now had one at the convention center when looking at options for the D23 Expo this summer. Being able to use Hyatt points for the hotel also made it feasible to add a May trip this year and make even more use of our Premier annual passes.

I messed up on dates when booking the hotel, so I ended up with three separate reservations including two different ADA room types and one night that didn't let me choose an ADA room. Totally my fault in that I accidentally booked the dates I was originally planning the trip, but had actually ended up with an extra day on both ends in order to use mom's airline miles for the trip (yes, I even had finished booking that before the hotel). Thus, I was totally okay with our first night being in a non-ADA room as long as we were then moved to what I reserved the rest of the trip. However, the guy at check in talked with his manager and found an ADA room that we could use the whole stay if we just waited a few hours for it to be ready.

We ended up with a tub instead of roll-in shower as I mainly booked, but it had a shower seat and it was better than having to change rooms. Really just the extra space for wheelchair and grab bar is why we need the ADA rooms, although when possible the roll-in showers are convenient.

We ended up in what they called a King specialty room. I have no idea what that means, but we're assuming that is about it having bunk beds in the area with the corner sofa bed. Not having to pull out the sofa and still have two beds (well, actually three, but we only used two) was very convenient.

We have long loved Hyatt Places for not only the cheaper point cost, but it being like two rooms with the sitting area and the bed/beds area. This one worked out even better than the others we've stayed at because it really is two rooms with sliding doors that close between the two areas. This might also be a specialty room feature.

Another nice feature is that the blinds are controlled with a remote, which is something I've always wanted for home and now Mik understands why I think it'd be awesome. Of course, he also enjoyed that we each had a TV and it was DirecTV so he knew the channel numbers for his sports and other favs, which was a real treat for him now that we can't have DirecTV and we axed the not as good more expensive Comcast.

Overall we really enjoyed our stay at the Hyatt Place Anaheim Resort/Convention Center. The staff was always very friendly, attentive, and welcoming. And we actually did have to interact with them several times because our keycard kept getting demagnetized the first two days and we also mistakenly were charged for parking. The breakfast was as expected, although with food being one of Mik's favorite parts of Disney we mostly skipped it.

As much as we love this place, it's borderline far to walk to parks. Totally will be great for D23 Expo and would stay for other future trips, but the Hyatt House under construction even closer to Disneyland is an extremely appealing option once it opens this December. It'll probably be more points, but weighing that with being closer and having a kitchen may make it our pick for Disneyland when we can't use DVC for Grand Californian. Until then, though, the Hyatt Place is enjoyable and makes it possible we may be able to do Disneyland not just every other year for the Expo again, especially if we can snag mileage award tickets to/from Orange County with mom's miles, which doesn't seem to be easy without planning way in advance (6-9 months) and/or being extremely flexible (ex. flying up to Seattle to get to D.C. and 3 hour layovers). 

Hint/Shoutout to Mom: Keep traveling for work and racking up the American miles and Hyatt points, please. We love them almost as much as you!

Destination Info:
Hyatt Place Anaheim Resort/Convention Center

2035 S. Harbor Blvd.

Anaheim, CA 92802

Shenandoah National Park: Skyland Resort

Date of Visit: May 12-14, 2015

We stayed on the lower level of the Laurel building at Skyland Resort. I had booked an accessible preferred room (it’s the only type that was available at least at the time when I clicked to show accessible only). The website didn’t give any specifics of what accessible meant like I’m used to seeing when booking on places like Hyatt and choosing between tub or roll-in shower, so honestly all I was going for was making sure we didn’t end up on the second floor when it clearly said that no buildings had elevators.

At first when we drove up to the building we were confused that the second floor is actually level with the parking and our room was down a level.

There is a ramp to the far right of the building that leads down to that level, which I only noticed after going down the stairs to scope out the room.

The room did not have an accessible bathroom, but considering Mik would have gone with camping in a tent here if they had electricity roughing it without an accessible bathroom was fine.

The only real accessibility issue with the room for us was that it had a raised threshold. It seems that the rooms on the upper level are actual more level with the hallway, which also makes us wonder if there are any actual accessible rooms in the sense we think of normally on that level.

One night we ate in the dining room. Well, actually we ended up eating in the taproom with the dining room menu because the lift down to the dining room was broken. It was still enjoyable, but it would have been nice to have the view you get down in the dining room.

Also, note that there is a path up to the dining room building from the lodging buildings. However, it very clearly says it’s not accessible. You can go on the road for a more accessible path grade wise, but it’s still going up a hill and quite a long way around.

Of course, Dad decided that we should just do it anyway and pushed Mik up it when we went to eat at the dining room. Yeah, it really is very steep and it is especially not safe to go back down. Thus, Dad went and got the truck to go back to the room after dinner.

Overall we enjoyed staying at Skyland Resort. The view from the balcony was good, except that at night it kind of ruins the whole feel of being in a national park when you really notice that civilization is right out there with all the lights.

Destination Info:
Skyland Resort
miles 41.7 and 42.5 on Skyline Drive
Shenandoah National Park, VA

Disney's Saratoga Springs Resort - Grandstand 1 Bedroom Villa

Date of Visit: March 7-9, 2014

Last year for this exact same weekend (first of Flower & Garden Festival) we stayed at the Saratoga Springs resort in an accessible studio.  This year again we ended up at the Saratoga Springs because we were not planning to go this year and booked even closer to last minute.  We did not even try for an accessible studio since we found it too small last time and booking only a week in advance ended up with a regular one bedroom.  It ended up being a much better experience, except that we could not use our annual passes on our magic bands because I accidentally linked this reservation to my account and the last reservation with the magic bands was linked to mom's and you cannot have them linked again through another email address (at least not easily).

The first thing that made this stay at Saratoga Springs better than last year is that we could control the thermostat in the room.  That was the biggest thing that made me leery of even trying a larger room at Saratoga Springs.  I don't know if they got rid of them everywhere or just certain areas of the resort do not have them, but glad we could override it and it made for a much more comfortable experience.  Although, instead we noticed the fans in the bathroom go on by motion sensors and that's a little annoying and energy wasteful seeming.

While we did not have an accessible room, we have done regular one bedrooms before and they have always been spacious enough.  Only thing that Mik really could use is bars in the bathroom, but since this trip was just only one full day here he did not spend much time in the room by himself to really need that this trip.

 
We did notice it would not have been navigable in his power chair, but the foyer area when you enter the room is still spacious enough to just park it there when you come in and be out of the way.

Again, we found the fold out couch to be annoying.  It is extremely hard to get out.  I do not remember that being hard at Animal Kingdom Lodge a few months back, so maybe it is more of an older resort issue or just our luck at Saratoga Springs.  At least with the one bedroom, you have more space overall and it did not seem crowded to have it out the whole time.

One of the things I liked best about being in the Grandstand area of Saratoga Springs is that it is the first spot the buses stop on the way through Saratoga Springs.  Last time we were at the Springs and when going to the parks first thing in the morning, we often had to wait for another bus to come because the bus would be full by the time it came to us and they could not accommodate a wheelchair.  That was not an issue at the Grandstand, although it is possible it could be later in the day when the buses are full coming back and it seemed few if anyone ever got off when I did at the Grandstand.

Destination Info:

Disney's Saratoga Springs
1960 Broadway
Lake Buena Vista, Florida 32830