Best value resort for 20 month old?

[ctnurse]

What is the best value for ds who will be 20 months old when we visit WDW? I figured we would stay in a value because that suits our needs right now. Any advice would be great. I was thinking either POP or All star movies. Thanks
Melissa

 

[Skroops]

We've been wanting to try POP because of the kiddie pool area with the jets. Our baby (22 months) LOVES those! We stayed at SSR and they had one there and he was having so much fun for hours!
Good luck!

 

[minnie61650]

All Star Movies also has squirt fountains.
The rooms at POP and at the ALL stars are both 260 square feet. They are also laid out the same.

The POP rooms seem smaller because the bed is closer to the door with a bigger gap being between the bathroom wall and the far bed. At AllStars this gap is wider.

http://allearsnet.com/acc/asmv59.jpg
http://allearsnet.com/acc/popcent56.jpg

You will notice in POP pic the bed is closer to the door by looking at how close the headboard is while at Movies you have a little more room.
The beds at POP are Bolted to the floor so you can't move them.
You can move the beds at All Stars so you canpush one the beds against the wall giving you more usuable floor space.
When staying at the All Stars you can use any of the 3 main pools or 3 quiet pools or 3 kiddie pools.

I am 55 years old and travel several times a year. I often stay at 4 star hotels.
So the deluxe resorts do not have anything special for me.
All Star is like being in the heart of the Magic and that is where I want to be.

Here is the map of All Movies.
http://www.wdwinfo.com/resortmaps/allstarmovie.JPG
The Fantasia Buildings are the preferred buildings.
The All Star Movie Fantasia pool has Mickey.
It is a great place to stay .
Preschoolers love it.
It is like being in the middle of a Disney Movie Fantasyland.
All Star Movies has pop up fountains now also.
The buses are wonderful.

Bus rides are quite short from the ALL Stars according to PassPorter.com

All Star Buses-CBR buses---POP buses--PO buses--- Contemporary
MK 20 min---- 20 min-----25min------10 min---20 min(mono)
Epcot 10 min-- 15 min-----20 min------10 min---15 min
MGM 10 min----12 min-----15 min------15 min---20min
AK 10 min------20min-------15 min----15 min---20 min
DTD 15 min----20 min------20 min-----15 min---35 min

It only takes 10 minutes to get to Epcot,MGM and AK from All Stars.
MK is 20 min away. That's the same amount of time it takes on the monorail from the Contemporary.

The All Star resorts have 1960 rooms each.
Pop has 2,880rooms.
That means more people in the pools,food court and in line waiting for the bus at POP.
When phase 2 of POP is built it will be 2 bus stops at POP and the 2 POPs will have the same # of rooms as the 3 All Stars.

Also All Star is closer to the main road to get to parks and thats why bus rides are shorter from there than from POP.

A WORD ABOUT BUS SHARING:

It is usually just our stop and maybe one more on the way to the parks. On the way back sometimes its all 3 but often Sports and Music share and Movies has it's own bus back.

I guess some people who stay at POP see all 3 All Star names on the return sign of our bus stop when they head to the POP bus stop and think All Stars also has 3 stops on the way to the park.
(Even when we stop at another AS resort to load up it has not taken more than 5 minutes and we are on our way!)

I have visited WDW more than a dozen times with the 1st time in Oct. 1971. It was brand new. I've stayed at FW, Disney Inn, a few the of Hotels on hotel Blvd., CBR and the towers at the Contemporary. I got to see the MK from my balcony at the Contemporary and I'm happy I got to experience it once. I just prefer the All Star Resorts.
The theaming is pure Disney.
My last 4 visits have been at The All Stars and this fall when we take dd,dsil, and our grandson age 3 we are staying at the All Stars Music. I thought about AKL and even though we can well afford AKL I just wanted Alex to experience the Disney Magic at the All Stars on his first visit.
Where else can one find Donald Duck or Mickey Mouse at the pool?
Have a great time at Disney!
Linda

 

[DisneyMom5]

Contrary to many older reports, we did not find that the air conditioning turned off on its own at any time during our stay at Pop (8/05). It was always icy cold when we got back from the parks, and stayed cool all night.

There are 3 pools at Pop, besides the kiddie pool and pop jets, and we never found any of them to be crowded.
The food court was only crowded at the expected times, i.e. everyone wants to sleep in and have breakfast before the parks (9am), everyone decided to eat dinner after returning from the fireworks (9:30 pm). If you go off times, it was quite empty.

My kid's loved the kiddie pool at pop. I haven't been to All Stars, but Pop was really fun for my little ones.

 

[henrylovespooh]

We love All Star Movies. The theming is great for kids. On our last trip, our kids were 2 and 3, and we were in the Toy Story section. They loved it. Next time we're hoping to try for 101 Dalmations. There is a cute kiddie pool and now I hear they have the pop up jets that kids like. Also a nice playground for kids, even little ones. My 2 year old daughter was mesmerized by the window of the store that faces the area where buses pull it. It has a huge poster of lots of Disney characters and she would point to them and call them by name.

I never found it noisy at all, which was also nice when it was time to put the kids to bed.

 

[debbiedoo]

I am going to to say the All Star Movies --- just the icons alone will light up her eyes

Kids love this resort--dalmations, buzz, fantasia--who wouldn't

 

[cynasiahgodisney]

The best resort for a 20 month old would have to be ALL STAR MOVIE RESORT. Today makes it 2 wks since we been back and I miss it so much. It's really beautiful and they have the cuties kiddie pool which would be absolutely perfect for your child. I would go with All star movie resort.

 

[christianweecare]

I am a daycare center director and this thread made me think of a funny story that one of my mom's told me just this week! This mom is a WDW lover just like me so we share good conversation all the time. She has three little girls (ages 2, 4, & 5). Their family recently returned from a last minute trip to WDW over the Labor Day weekend. In past trips they have stayed at the ASMO with the girls but this time since it was a last minute trip they were booked at CBR. Having stayed there myself many times, I assured Mom that it was a very nice, lovely resort. Upon their return I asked about their trip and about how they had liked CBR. Mom's reply--It was just as you said--a lovely resort--but the girls kept asking- when are we going to the real Disney World? They thought the ASMO was the "real Disney World"! Out of the mouths of babes!