Born 2B a Princess
Where's my tiara?!?!
- Joined
- Apr 21, 2007
Barbados and Our Room
Before I forget I did take some pictures of Caribbean Cay, the island in the lake at CBR, but I dont have access to them right now. We went for a walk on the island one morning but never went back to it there wasnt enough time to do everything! It was lovely and had some quiet nooks that would have been great for reading, napping, or spending quiet time together. We just never had the chance to do that.
As you may recall, I was disappointed not to get either of the villages I had requested, but we ended up really liking Barbados and were very happy with it. In fact, when we stay at CBR again well request Barbados.
The walk to OPR was short and Barbados seemed to have fewer guests staying there than some of the other villages. In fact, there were a lot of empty rooms in our building while we were there. The beach had a volleyball net and childrens play structure, a few hammocks, and plenty of chairs.
Our beach (which we never did have the opportunity to use)
The quiet pool was a great place for Minnie to work on summer homework/reading assignments (and take periodic breaks to jump in the pool to cool off!). There were always tables, chairs, umbrellas, and lounge chairs available at the quiet pools. We used the quiet pool more than we used the main pool.
Our village quiet pool:
When we got to our rooms that first night, I was very happy that we had a corner room and Grandma and Papas room was right next to ours.
We really liked the extra light we got during the day
but on the flip side, it seemed like a lot of light leaked in to the room through those two windows at night. The blinds and curtains did a fairly good job of blocking the light at night, but we still had light leakage around the edges of the blinds and curtains. It wasnt enough to keep us awake or wake us up in the morning, but it was noticeable to me (10 years of living in Alaska with massive amounts of sunlight in the summer sensitizes a person to that kind of thing, LOL). We had a parking lot view which didnt bother us at all because there were so many trees and shrubs around the building that they provided nice screening (although not complete) of the parking lot. In fact, our room was around the corner from the stairs down to the parking lot and we were able to park our car right at the bottom of the stairs for most of the trip (all but the first night). That was really convenient for my morning jaunts to OPR to refill my mug and grab a chocolate croissant, and for the days we ended up driving ourselves to the parks instead of taking the bus.
The view from our corner:
We were happy with the room itself, too. We didnt think the size difference would be very noticeable compared to our room at POP on our last trip, but it really was a noticeable difference!
Even though we were in that room for eight days, it didnt feel cramped or crowded (other than when Minnie and Tinkerbell complained at night about having to share a bed) and there was plenty of storage room. The table and chairs in the corner were nice particularly since we had a corner room with two windows so we had extra light during the day. We used the corner table as a staging area for getting our park bag ready each day and the girls used it to dump whatever they happened to have in their hands at any given moment. 
The night table between the beds had a deep open space under the drawer and it easily held our extra case of water until we needed to put it in the fridge. The TV cabinet had four drawers that were fairly good sized. Minnie used two, Tinkerbell used one, and DH used one plus the shelf above the closet rod in the bathroom area. The fridge is also in the TV cabinet and we never had problems with the temperature of the fridge (thats been a complaint of some guests at CBR but the solution is to open the cabinet door, pull the fridge out from the back of the cabinet a bit, and leave the cabinet door open during the day). The fridge was definitely big enough -- we had fruit, milk, cream cheese, bagels, bottled water, and soda in there and there was definitely enough space for everything. The TV was a good size.
There was a padded bench with a wide, deep drawer underneath and thats where I kept my clothes. It was a good sized drawer and I was able to fit everything in without any trouble at all. We kept our box of groceries on the bench. Above the bench was a shelf with some pegs where we hung our beach towels to dry and DH kept his baseball caps on the shelf.
A favorite feature was the double vanity in the bathroom area and the curtained off changing area. That made a huge difference when all four of us were trying to get ready to go!!
The closet rod held lots of clothes and DH used the shelf above it for some of his things. I also used that shelf for storage. I liked the open storage areas under the sinks having that extra storage space helped keep the vanity area relatively tidy. The bathroom itself wasnt any bigger than the bathroom at POP (at least I didnt think so), but I liked that the shower curtain rod was bent away so that it didnt feel like the shower curtain was going to attack me in the shower. LOL I also liked the retractable clothesline for hanging things to dry. I wish the rooms had under-bed storage for suitcases, but we were able to put the suitcases in a couple of corners so they were out of the way.
We had no problems at all with keeping the room at a comfortable temperature and also liked the ceiling fan.
When we checked in we had a towel animal (a bunny) waiting for us on the night stand (cant find the picture right now). We received towel animals two other mornings (although we werent exactly sure what animals they were one was a bird not sure what the other was!). We didnt have any problems at all with Mousekeeping.
The theming was nice, with subtle Disney touches (Nemo, Dory, Crush).
The bedding:
The wallpaper border:
The room (sorry, I didnt take many pictures of the room!)
The bus stop was a hop, step and a jump from our building (Barbados 14) it took just a minute or two to walk there. We loved that the bus stops were covered and had seating, unlike POP. The overhead fans were a nice touch and the framed posters with information about that particular island/village were fun to read. Most of the time we waited less than 10 minutes for a bus (both leaving CBR to go to the parks, and returning to CBR from the parks), and often the buses were pulling up just as we got to the bus stop or a few minutes after. We never had to stand on the buses -- in fact, I can only think of two bus rides where people had to stand. Once we waited 20 minutes for a bus and a CM called to find out where the bus was and then kept us posted on when it would arrive. There were also a couple of times when we were the only family on the bus coming back from the parks and so the driver asked which village we were in and went directly there, not stopping in the others. We appreciated that! None of the bus rides were long.
A couple of pictures from the bus stop (I know I took a couple other pictures at the bus stop but Ill have to find them):
All in all, we really liked CBR and I was happy that my spur-of-the-moment, unresearched decision to stay at CBR turned out so well!
In fact, my parents liked CBR so much that they arent interested in trying any of the other resorts (although were staying at ASMo for our weekend trip in October thats just because there werent any rooms with double beds available at CBR when were going to be there bummer!).
Up Next: Day 1 in the Parks Epcot and MK, and Dinner at Ohana
Before I forget I did take some pictures of Caribbean Cay, the island in the lake at CBR, but I dont have access to them right now. We went for a walk on the island one morning but never went back to it there wasnt enough time to do everything! It was lovely and had some quiet nooks that would have been great for reading, napping, or spending quiet time together. We just never had the chance to do that.
As you may recall, I was disappointed not to get either of the villages I had requested, but we ended up really liking Barbados and were very happy with it. In fact, when we stay at CBR again well request Barbados.
The walk to OPR was short and Barbados seemed to have fewer guests staying there than some of the other villages. In fact, there were a lot of empty rooms in our building while we were there. The beach had a volleyball net and childrens play structure, a few hammocks, and plenty of chairs. Our beach (which we never did have the opportunity to use)
The quiet pool was a great place for Minnie to work on summer homework/reading assignments (and take periodic breaks to jump in the pool to cool off!). There were always tables, chairs, umbrellas, and lounge chairs available at the quiet pools. We used the quiet pool more than we used the main pool.
Our village quiet pool:
When we got to our rooms that first night, I was very happy that we had a corner room and Grandma and Papas room was right next to ours.
We really liked the extra light we got during the day
but on the flip side, it seemed like a lot of light leaked in to the room through those two windows at night. The blinds and curtains did a fairly good job of blocking the light at night, but we still had light leakage around the edges of the blinds and curtains. It wasnt enough to keep us awake or wake us up in the morning, but it was noticeable to me (10 years of living in Alaska with massive amounts of sunlight in the summer sensitizes a person to that kind of thing, LOL). We had a parking lot view which didnt bother us at all because there were so many trees and shrubs around the building that they provided nice screening (although not complete) of the parking lot. In fact, our room was around the corner from the stairs down to the parking lot and we were able to park our car right at the bottom of the stairs for most of the trip (all but the first night). That was really convenient for my morning jaunts to OPR to refill my mug and grab a chocolate croissant, and for the days we ended up driving ourselves to the parks instead of taking the bus.The view from our corner:
We were happy with the room itself, too. We didnt think the size difference would be very noticeable compared to our room at POP on our last trip, but it really was a noticeable difference!
Even though we were in that room for eight days, it didnt feel cramped or crowded (other than when Minnie and Tinkerbell complained at night about having to share a bed) and there was plenty of storage room. The table and chairs in the corner were nice particularly since we had a corner room with two windows so we had extra light during the day. We used the corner table as a staging area for getting our park bag ready each day and the girls used it to dump whatever they happened to have in their hands at any given moment. The night table between the beds had a deep open space under the drawer and it easily held our extra case of water until we needed to put it in the fridge. The TV cabinet had four drawers that were fairly good sized. Minnie used two, Tinkerbell used one, and DH used one plus the shelf above the closet rod in the bathroom area. The fridge is also in the TV cabinet and we never had problems with the temperature of the fridge (thats been a complaint of some guests at CBR but the solution is to open the cabinet door, pull the fridge out from the back of the cabinet a bit, and leave the cabinet door open during the day). The fridge was definitely big enough -- we had fruit, milk, cream cheese, bagels, bottled water, and soda in there and there was definitely enough space for everything. The TV was a good size.There was a padded bench with a wide, deep drawer underneath and thats where I kept my clothes. It was a good sized drawer and I was able to fit everything in without any trouble at all. We kept our box of groceries on the bench. Above the bench was a shelf with some pegs where we hung our beach towels to dry and DH kept his baseball caps on the shelf.
A favorite feature was the double vanity in the bathroom area and the curtained off changing area. That made a huge difference when all four of us were trying to get ready to go!!
The closet rod held lots of clothes and DH used the shelf above it for some of his things. I also used that shelf for storage. I liked the open storage areas under the sinks having that extra storage space helped keep the vanity area relatively tidy. The bathroom itself wasnt any bigger than the bathroom at POP (at least I didnt think so), but I liked that the shower curtain rod was bent away so that it didnt feel like the shower curtain was going to attack me in the shower. LOL I also liked the retractable clothesline for hanging things to dry. I wish the rooms had under-bed storage for suitcases, but we were able to put the suitcases in a couple of corners so they were out of the way.We had no problems at all with keeping the room at a comfortable temperature and also liked the ceiling fan.
When we checked in we had a towel animal (a bunny) waiting for us on the night stand (cant find the picture right now). We received towel animals two other mornings (although we werent exactly sure what animals they were one was a bird not sure what the other was!). We didnt have any problems at all with Mousekeeping.
The theming was nice, with subtle Disney touches (Nemo, Dory, Crush).
The bedding:
The wallpaper border:
The room (sorry, I didnt take many pictures of the room!)
The bus stop was a hop, step and a jump from our building (Barbados 14) it took just a minute or two to walk there. We loved that the bus stops were covered and had seating, unlike POP. The overhead fans were a nice touch and the framed posters with information about that particular island/village were fun to read. Most of the time we waited less than 10 minutes for a bus (both leaving CBR to go to the parks, and returning to CBR from the parks), and often the buses were pulling up just as we got to the bus stop or a few minutes after. We never had to stand on the buses -- in fact, I can only think of two bus rides where people had to stand. Once we waited 20 minutes for a bus and a CM called to find out where the bus was and then kept us posted on when it would arrive. There were also a couple of times when we were the only family on the bus coming back from the parks and so the driver asked which village we were in and went directly there, not stopping in the others. We appreciated that! None of the bus rides were long.
A couple of pictures from the bus stop (I know I took a couple other pictures at the bus stop but Ill have to find them):
All in all, we really liked CBR and I was happy that my spur-of-the-moment, unresearched decision to stay at CBR turned out so well!
In fact, my parents liked CBR so much that they arent interested in trying any of the other resorts (although were staying at ASMo for our weekend trip in October thats just because there werent any rooms with double beds available at CBR when were going to be there bummer!). Up Next: Day 1 in the Parks Epcot and MK, and Dinner at Ohana
The pool is part of the reason we chose CBR for Labor Day weekend. I plan on a nice relaxing weekend with lots of pool usage. DH and I will be on the lookout for that hot tub. That will be nice. Thanks for telling us about it.
, and were at the bus stop at 7:50 am
only 5 minutes late. Not bad! 
Grandma and Papa werent exactly sure why I was so excited so I had to quickly explain it to them, and then they were really excited, too. (On our last trip we had several dream opportunities, including being the family onscreen at LMA!) I thought it was really neat that my parents got to have such a magical 
thing happen on their first morning ever in WDW. So we went through the turnstile and had some Photopass pictures taken (Im still waiting on my Photopass CD then Ill be able to post some of those pix) and had the chance to talk with the CM and a few others. TInkerbell asked her to sign her autograph book and the CM thought that was so sweet. She gave us a form that served as a FP to any one ride that we wanted to use it on, so we were excited about that. It felt a little strange to have everyone outside the turnstiles watching us and wondering why we were inside and they were not. LOL When it was time, the CM introduced us to the waiting crowd and we helped with the countdown
and then we quickly made our way to the roped off areas for the rides. Unfortunately, being the family of the day didnt get us behind the rope any sooner. Oh well! 
and so they decided to ride MS instead. Good thing The Plan was with me it doesnt like deviations! Since Grandma and I werent going to ride MS (she doesnt like rides much and Im claustrophic), Im glad they went ahead and rode it. The posted wait time was 10 minutes but they walked right on. They rode the green side and they all liked it but said they wouldnt stand in a long line for it and it wasn't a "must do" for them. We met them right outside TT at 9:30 just as it was opening, where we were able to talk Grandma into riding with us (I forgot about the jerky and bumpy parts
sorry Grandma 
!). The posted wait time was 10 minutes but we walked right on. I kept telling Grandma that it wasnt a jerky, bumpy ride
and then when the ride started I quickly remembered how wrong I was and I spent most of the ride turned around in my seat (she was in the back seat with Papa), apologizing for forgetting how jerky and bumpy the ride was! LOL Everyone but Grandma loved the ride. 
Grandma swore she would never ride it again and we were all a bit worried that we wouldnt be able to get her on another ride the rest of the day. Did she ride anything else? Youll have to wait and see! 
Not knowing what to expect and since it was hot outside -- he drank it down in one gulp!
But they're usually good girls and can get along pretty well. For a few nights during our trip, though, Minnie and I shared a bed and DH and Tinkerbell shared a bed because the girls were picking at each other so much and complaining about having to share a bed. It was easier to split them up than continue to listen to it! 
But in general, they get along really well.
