I booked our family at the imperial palms and my SIL booked her family at royal palms and if things work as planed her son will book his fam at royal palms also. I looked that the maps and imperial and royal look to share the same parking lots. Can anyone tell me if they share the same checkin desk? Share the same express market and main pool? It looks like we will be staying across the parking lot from each other, am I correct in that assumption? Also any feed back on the place, is the shuttle really that much of a pain to get to the world center? I don't mind shelling out a few bucks for a cab, can I get liqured up and take a cab from the hotel to my villa? Are there cabs waiting? I'd assume so as I'd expect it to be like any other Marriott hotel. I know there are a few of yeahs that have been here, Dick Taylor, I'd really like your feed back on this if you'd be so kind. How is the golf course there? I have not played hawks yet and plan to. What about fishing the ponds on the course? Anyone done that? How did you do? Thanks in advance for any info .
The check-in is at the clubhouse building next to the Royal Palms pool area. As you saw on the maps, the two resorts are adjacent and share many of the facilities. I'd note, though, that there's a smallish pool at the south end of the Imperial Palms buildings. The larger pool area that serves Royal Palms is a short walk across the street from Imperial Palms. The Imperial Palms parking lot, though, is right in front of the buildings. Parking for Royal Palms is spread out through that section with parking spaces in front of each building, with over-flow parking across the street from the buildings. The marketplace store is a very small "marketplace express" and is located in the same building where you check in. I like the regular Marriott Marketplace stores but this one wasn't very impressive. Fortunately, the hotel has a bunch of shops - it's about a half to three-quarters of a mile from the furthest Royal Palms building to the front entrance to the hotel (about a 0.3 to 0.4 of a mile from Imperial Palms). Though IP and RP are in the same neighborhood and separated by the access road, RP is the much larger of the two. That means that a couple of the buildings are direct across from IP and the other buildings are a bit further away but it's only a quarter to a third of a mile from IP to the furthest RP building. I didn't use the shuttle when I stayed at Sabal Palms (a much closer walk to hotel services). But I did walk between the three timeshare resorts and the hotel and thought that the walk from IP/RP to the hotel was pretty easy. There were cabs lined up near the hotel's entrance during the day (I'm not sure whether they're there during the evening but I'd suspect so). There are several nice restaurants at the hotel, a bar in the lobby and a bar outside by the big pool complex. I'd think that even if you SIL's son had to book into Sabal Palms it would work out well for your group but Royal Palms would obviously keep everybody in the same general area. It should be a good time. The golf clubhouse is near the hotel's front entrance. I haven't played there but thought that the course looked okay (I'm used to a mix of flat and hills holes so this mostly flat course looked sort of easy). I'd be surprised if they let you on the course to try fishing the water hazards - I'd be surprised if they stock fish in them, too. But it might be worth asking. Dick Taylor
We stayed at Royal Palms the week between Christmas and New Years in 2010 and took the shuttle over to the World Center. So easy- just stopped into the RP lobby and asked to take the shuttle. We didn't have to wait long and it worked the same way on the way back.
