We are back from our 14 night stay at WBC. It was our first time staying somewhere other than onsite or in a rental house. Thought I'd do a quick run down of our thoughts:
1. We booked with Vacation Upgrades in March for a 3 bedroom deluxe. I'd love to say it was a smooth transaction, but because we ended up with 3 different owners and 5 different reservations, we ended up not really knowing if we had a place to stay for our entire trip until the DAY we checked in. That was very stressful. VS kept saying everything was okay, but we didn't get confirmation of it, or even an email. WBC said we were checking out on the 21st until we actually got there to check in and only then did they say the 27th. Everything ended up being just fine, but driving to Florida with only half your vacation set in stone is nerve wracking.
2. Check in was easy. We got there around 6:30pm and were second in line. We went to the parking pass desk and she asked me if I was married. I said yes, but that my husband hadn't come. She immediately dismissed me and turned her attention to my mom, asking if she was married. Once she got the story that my step-dad was at home too, she gave us our pass, her spiel about building locations and where to watch fireworks and sent us on our way like we were worthless. We didn't receive any calls, and never was asked to fill out paperwork with our income level or anything.
3. I called and requested a Tower of Terror view (it's my favorite) and was given the "it can't be guaranteed" speech which was fine. We were assigned Tower 4, Room 864. We knew walking in we were going to have a parking lot view and I was a little disappointed, but didn't realize this was what we would see from our balcony
Wishes
This is from my phone, I don't have the good camera uploaded just yet, but this is Illuminations to the left and Wishes to the right
and from the bedrooms, the Characters in Flight balloon
4. We did have the new blue couch (so hard!) but still had a brown chair with a little peeling at the end of the arm rest. The only other thing we noticed was a broken tile in the master bathroom shower. Other than that, everything was in good condition, other than the microwave, which worked, but the table didn't rotate and we had an incident with burned popcorn.
5. Elevator service was great. We never waited.
6. We liked Tower 4. Close to the parking garage, our view was great, but it was really noisy. We could hear the busses coming and going, and the bedrooms faced the maintenance building so we would hear pounding a few early mornings.
7. The back bedrooms would always be chilly, but the master bedroom stayed pretty warm. We used the override every day, more for the "drown out the noise" factor than anything.
8. We came back one evening hoping to order a pizza from La Cucina, but they were closed. The little restaurant in the main building by the pool had closed at 6pm too. It was a little disappointing not to find anything on property to eat at 7pm. We ordered Chinese instead.
9. We never heard our neighbors, which was nice
10. One day someone in our hallway apparently had someone sick in their room, as when we left that morning, there was a pile of bedding thrown in front of their door with vomit stains all over it, and a bag of trash full of vomit beside it. It sat there for THREE days. So nasty.
11. We spent one entire day pool hopping, and the kids decided they actually like pool at building 4 the best because it was warmer than the rest.
12. My mom used the shuttles a few times when we had other things going on. One day they waited for over 40 minutes from the time the schedule said there would be a bus. A gentleman in a
scooter had been waiting even longer because they couldn't find a bus that could accommodate him. He even went inside to ask for a manager and still had to wait.
13. Driving everywhere was really easy, not much traffic, and really didn't take that much time. I really missed having a bus going to MK just because of the ferry/monorail to the park factor, but it really wasn't that big of a deal. The close access to I-4 made getting to US/IOA, Seaworld etc very easy.
14. We ordered groceries from Garden Grocer and they were up to our room not very long after I got the text they had been delivered. I also had to have a package delivered via UPS and was notified as soon as it arrived.
We really liked WBC, and kept talking about how nice it was to have our own space, kitchen, 2 bathrooms, washer and dryer. Our last trip was at the Poly, and honestly, we liked WBC better, especially for such a long trip.
