We got back on Thursday 8/26 from 7 nights at the Poly CL. We enjoyed our trip thoroughly and spent a lot of time at the lounge (will post more on that). Here are some pics of the the Hawaii building:
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Sorry that they are a bit out of order. We originally had a GV room, and the view from that room is shown in the second picture (view pool construction). That was the entire view, head on. There really was nothing else to be seen except that. Dh requested a room change and after being told no at every turn, finally a leader came and said he could change us the following day. The remaining pictures (minus the last pic) are what the view was from the "new" room that we moved to. Not a whole lot better! They were there m-f 9-5 and as you can see, those cherry pickers spanned the whole length of the building. So if you had a GV you were looking at the second pic I posted, and if you had lagoon view or theme park view you had a view of cherry pickers and on some days your patio was covered in either a tarp, a worker, or equipment and was not able to be used at all. Let me say now that we did not pay full rack rate because we had the "magical deal," but I was brokenhearted for other people who may have paid full price.
The last pic is from the stairwell of the lounge. Every morning during breakfast the cherry pickers were all the way up in front of the lounge windows- sometimes all the windows- with men sanding. The noise was really extreme and a pretty miserable way to start the day.
I think the pics speak for themselves so I will not belabor that disaster. On to the good! The lounge staff were mostly great. Irv is awesome. The breakfast seems the same as it was in 2010 (in a good way). I was quite worried about the evening offerings but they were completely fine. They kept the evening apps replenished and the food really was pretty good. Wine was out and self-serve between 5 and 10, which we really enjoyed! the staff were great about keeping tables clean and getting people all sorts of things that were not out. We have had hit-or-miss experiences with my dh's gluten intolerance at some of the lounges but the one chef at poly (who was there most of the week) was great.
Of note was the fact that they barely dim the lights at all in the lounge now during fireworks and while the music is piped it, it is so quiet that you can barely hear it. Viewing from the beach would be a much better choice, or from your patio or balcony if you are on that side of the building. The bungalows do not impede on the fireworks viewing at all.
If anyone has any questions I would be happy to try to answer! Overall we did have a great vacation.