Best resort for 6 year old...?

[Mintycake]

We are planning our trip for December 2016 (I know so far away...). We are looking at the following 3 resorts and not sure which one would be the best for our family.

Deluxe: Beach Club - because of proximity to Epcot and HS, Cape Cay restaurant, and the onsite kids club. Also great pool but not sure if we'll be using it much if the weather in December is chilly.

Moderate: Port Orleans Riverside - because of price, theming, pirate adventure, and nice pool. As well as Boathouse restaurant and good food options onsite (and possibly booking a princess room). A friend who has been also recommended the Caribbean Beach resort but it looks like that resort is huge and spread out and I hear busses are a problem there.

Value: Pop Century: Due to price, dedicated bus service to the parks, and have heard about good food court onsite. Worried though about noise and overcrowding.

Another main concern for all resorts is relying on Disney transportation. I'm open to using Uber since I've heard that works quite well.
TIA!

 

[EmilyS90]

We stayed at POR Royal Rooms in May and really enjoyed it. It's an absolutely gorgeous resort. My daughter had turned 5 on our trip, and she loved having a princess room. But honestly, we easily could have done without it. We just liked the bonus of being close to the main building and pool, but you can get a preferred room for that.
Transportation however, was a little bit of a challenge sometimes. Getting to the parks was no problem! But if we left at park close, the lines for POR were crazy. We did end up taking the POFQ bus and walking back to our resort a couple times. It's not super far or anything, and it's a pretty walk, but it's a bit tiring after already walking all over the parks. If you don't plan on staying until close, it's really not bad at all.

So there's my two cents. I will say that we visited Beach Club so my daughter could go to the kids club and we could have a date night, and it's an absolutely gorgeous resort. Definitely on our list for the future. Also, she absolutely loved the kids club and didn't want to leave when we came to pick her up lol.

 

[Mintycake]

Thanks Emily! did you go for rope drop in the parks? Our plan is to do the parks early, then after lunch go back to the room/pool to relax for a break and then come back around 4pm. This is another concern about proximity to parks and the Disney transportation system.

 

[mom2AidanAndEli]

I know you didn't ask for other suggestions but.....

Have you thought about POFQ? Bus transportation is wonderful there, it's small, quiet, relaxed. Every room is close to transportation and food court. And you can walk down to POR if you want to take a look around and even use their pool as well or go to Boatwrights. They're sister resorts so amenities are open to guests at either resort.

For Values, I actually prefer the All Stars--we've stayed at Movies and Sports and enjoyed them both. Don't stress about the transportation. The shared buses you'll hear about are really a non-issue. They occasionally share, but not at the park open/close times. And each resort is so much smaller than Pop. Pop's food court is loud, chaotic, and the bus lines at the parks always seem long. Movies is great for little ones who will get to see the icons of some of their favorites! If you're not planning on spending a lot of time at the resort, I say a value is just fine--save the money and use it on something fun!

 

[Mintycake]

Thank you mom2AidanAndEli! We looked at POFQ but they do not have availability for the dates we are travelling.
We'll look into the All Stars for price. We are not planning to spend too much time at the resorts except for afternoon breaks and we always appreciate saving $. Main concern was transportation.

 

[EmilyS90]

Thanks Emily! did you go for rope drop in the parks? Our plan is to do the parks early, then after lunch go back to the room/pool to relax for a break and then come back around 4pm. This is another concern about proximity to parks and the Disney transportation system.

We did rope drop about 3 times during the trip. We found it pretty easy to get a bus there in time. We never did any midday breaks, but I don't think you would be spending a lot of time on transportation. I think the most time we spent on a bus was about 15 minutes? There was a chart I found a while ago that has the minutes to each park from each resort by bus, if I find it I'll post it!

 

[SweetMissy]

We like Pop Century, I prefer the theming of Movies more though. The only overcrowding you'll get is around meal times in the food court (that's probably every single resort), but the rest of the resort is perfect. I personally would pick the theming of a value than a deluxe/moderate resort. We stayed at AKL and it was a beautiful resort but lacked the Disney feel that you definitely get from the values.