Anyone stayed at the Portofino Inn and Suites?

[2grlsmom]

Hi! First trip to DLR coming up in a few weeks and we've decided to stay outside the resort at the Portofino Inn and Suites in a Kids Suite room. Any comments or opinions on this hotel? A
Can anyone offer any close grocery stores, within walking distance maybe to pick up breakfast,snack items? Thanks!

 

[bclydia]

We stayed there in September and thought it was fine. The kids suites are good but our children were very young (1 and 3) and the door between the rooms was a hanging/sliding thing. It didn't give us any privacy or sound barrier. That being said, we thought it would work just fine if our kids had been a little older.
It's still a bit of a hike to the park.
Can't help you on the groceries within walking distance as we had a car.
The hotel was clean and friendly and will certainly be a good place to stay.
Lydia

 

[2grlsmom]

Thanks for the reply! My kids are similar in ages, 4 and 21 months, and I was hoping that the "door" between the 2 rooms would proved a barrier as well as privacy also. Sounds like we might be out of luck. Did you by chance try and put a crib in the room also for your younger one? Im not sure if mine will stay in the bottom bunk or not.
How about the pool? Not too impressive from the pics! Am hoping we won't be spending too much time just hanging out in our room though.
You say it was a bit of a distance from the oark- we have the ART passes- any idea how those are or where the hotel sits on the rotation route?
Thanks for any info you can give! I really appreciate it!
Oh, and did you try to kids eat free at the Jolly Roger inn?

 

[ploeb]

Hi! First trip to DLR coming up in a few weeks and we've decided to stay outside the resort at the Portofino Inn and Suites in a Kids Suite room. Any comments or opinions on this hotel? A
Can anyone offer any close grocery stores, within walking distance maybe to pick up breakfast,snack items? Thanks!

Hey there, yes I have stayed at the PIAS, in a kids suite. Lots of room! The staff is really great and will even pick up goodies for you for a fee
when I stayed there a few years ago we were celebrating my kids birthdays, so I called ahead and arranged for them to have beach buckets filled w/ crayons and Disney color books, apple juices and crackers. I really recommend this place. We did not use the pool at all. Have fun!!!

 

[2grlsmom]

GREAT! Thanks for the info. Do you remember if there were fridge/microwave in the room? Any place to get groceries nearby? And did you by chance take advantage of the kids eat free at the Jolly Roger Inn?
Thanks for the help!

 

[bubblygrl]

Well, you might not like what I have to say, but we did not like this hotel at all! when we checked in we asked for a view so that we could see the fireworks at night, we checked in the carpets were disgusting, with stains everywhere, yes the sheets were clean but YUCK! and the view that we had was a huge palm tree right smack in the middle of the window, so we only saw the fireworks if we stood on our tippy toes to see them out of the top corner of the window!...the jolly rogers restaurant was ok in our opinion, cheap and worth what we paid, the restaurant floors were nasty and it really looked like it needed to be refurbished.....the one cool thing we did like was the mini mart that was across the street as they did have a small refrigerator in the room....hope I didn't burst your bubble!

 

[squidmo]

We stayed in a Portofino Kid's Suite last year, and they do have a small mini-fridge and microwave. Like bclydia mentions, the door between the rooms is a sliding glass door (kind of like a french door). What we did was hang extra blankets over the doors to block the light from our room- it didn't offer any sound privacy, but at least the kids couldn't watch TV when they were supposed to be falling asleep! We did put our younger one in a crib, so I can confirm there is enough room in there. We never tried the free kids meals, or the pool, and we found the walk to be no problem so never used the ART shuttle. Overall I was reasonably satisfied with our stay there, but it wouldn't be our first choice for future stays. We are going to DL again next week, and we will be trying a Marriott Residence Inn Maingate Kids Suite- they have a real room for the kids, a full kitchen, free breakfast, and they will pick up groceries for you! They are more expensive than Portofino, though, which is why we tried Portofino last year.

 

[ChrisMouse]

Hi!

Just learned something cool about grocery stores. Albertsons and Safeway (Vons) deliver for a delivery charge of $9.95. You shop online at either www.albertsons.com or www.safeway.com, build the cart full of all of the items you want, and then choose a delivery window.

We are considering this option, provided we can work out a delivery window that works.

Best of luck!

 

[bumbershoot]

Hi!

Just learned something cool about grocery stores. Albertsons and Safeway (Vons) deliver for a delivery charge of $9.95. You shop online at either www.albertsons.com or www.safeway.com, build the cart full of all of the items you want, and then choose a delivery window.

Even better, if you're serious about a particular delivery window, at least Safeway lets you choose a delivery window at the START of your shopping session, so no one snakes it out from ya while you're shopping.

 

[bclydia]

Well, we weren't too impressed with the Jolly Roger. There wasn't a lot of English spoken here and there was NO deviating from the menu. For example, my kids wanted peanut butter on toast. We couldn't order that at all! What the waitstaff eventually came up with was a peanut butter sandwich that she ordered toasted. It had to be a specific order or it wouldn't work. The food was okay, the portions were huge but I don't think we'd go back.
There was lots of room for Matt's crib and there was a second tv in their half of the room.
We didn't use the pool, so I can't comment. Somehow we never have the time for swimming.
Oh, bring some blanket for the crib. They really didn't have any for it.
HTH!
Lydia
Oh, and I should say that I don't know when the previous poster stayed there but we found our rooms were very clean in September.