Crowne Plaza Universal opinions

[G's mommy]

Can anyone give me some insight to Crowne Plaza Universal? How close to Universal? Rooms? Pool area? Transportation to park?

Thanks

 

[tazz23]

We stayed there last year over christmas and it's a beautiful, clean hotel. Staff were really friendly and helpful.
We got upgraded to the executive level which is one of the floors near the top of the hotel and had a stunning view over orlando. The room we got was big and clean but I am not sure if this is different in standard rooms? There is one big pool, that was nearly always empty (but it was christmas and very cold!).
Its a short (2 minute?) walk to international drive and they have free shuttles to disney, universal and seaworld. We only used the disney shuttle (which strangely only takes you to epcot) but on our epcot day, it was very good- It picked us up at 8.15 so we arrived at about 8.45 in time for opening. It then picked us up about 30 minutes after closing. We didn't visit universal on this trip.. but I would say it was only 5 minutes drive away. HTH!

 

[stwyatt]

we stayed there in november. got a great rate of 57/nt. thru hotwire. the first part of our trip we stayed at royal pacific resort. the best way i can describe the hotel is that it seems brand new, is very compact and easy to get in and out. has a business atmosphere. it was every bit as nice as royal pacific--if you take away all the amenities,theming,etc that makes rpr a resort and not just a hotel. obviously we liked rpr more, it's onsite and unbelievably themed. but the crowne plaza is a very nice hotel--not a resort. it is 1 easy mile south of us/ioa on universal blvd. that road is not nearly as busy as int'l dr so you can get to the parks fast and easy. i don't know about the transportation--we thought about using it to seaworld but didn't like the return times. the actual rooms may be larger than rpr, they are accessed as wings from a central atrium with glass elevators. the rooms have nintendo64 but i think you had to pay for it. the pool is large nice, but just a pool--no theming. we go to orlando once every 5yrs so we want a special place to stay. we have decided that next time we will only stay onsite. as nice as crowne plaza was, it did not have any "magic" that you get by staying onsite--even if it is 100 or more /nt extra. hope that helps

 

[G's mommy]

Thanks for the info! We were basically just looking for the nicest place we could get for under $100 a night. We will be there Feb 20th - 24th, this is more of a peak time for Disney and Universal with Presidents day vacations. We were able to get $96 through Hotwire, so I was happy. We go to Orlando atleast twice a year, but have always done Disney (normally stay on-site).

 

[Motherfletcher]

Sign up for their Priority Club. Even though we stay there from Hotwire they have alway given us Club access. We have also received Jr. Suite upgrades.

 

[Suzyq9241]

We stayed 11/18 and 11/19 had a great time there.... The bed... man oh man the bed.... great... there is a tgif not too far from there which is in great walking distance also fish bones is there which is another resturant. We drove our selves to universal it is too far to walk it about 1-2 miles away from there. But the pool was good.... We went to the bar area to have a drink and my dh said that the bar was too quite not too many people.. until the night of the 11/19 when the big football game was over... rice and someone else ( i can't remember) than we had some noise.... til like 4 am... but other than that the crowne plaza was great.

 

[horseshowmom]

We stayed 11/18 and 11/19 had a great time there.... The bed... man oh man the bed.... great... there is a tgif not too far from there which is in great walking distance also fish bones is there which is another resturant. We drove our selves to universal it is too far to walk it about 1-2 miles away from there. But the pool was good.... We went to the bar area to have a drink and my dh said that the bar was too quite not too many people.. until the night of the 11/19 when the big football game was over... rice and someone else ( i can't remember) than we had some noise.... til like 4 am... but other than that the crowne plaza was great.

We were at Embassy Suites Jamaican Court that weekend. Were you out at all that Saturday night? I have never in my life seen traffic like that, and things were pretty wild. We also had the noise that night. It was our last night, but the only night that we had any problems. We'll make sure we're never in town on that football weekend again. (The front desk guy at our hotel said it took him 3 hours to get to work, and he just lived out past Universal! )

 

[G's mommy]

I just received an email from Hotwire notifying me that they have reduced the star rating for the Crowne Plaza Universal from 3.5 to 3.0. Should I be concerned? I have the option to cancel or take $100 in hotwiredollars for a future purchase.

 

[stwyatt]

the only reason i can think why they would reduce the rating would be because of some amenity that it may no longer have. the hotel to me looked almost brand new--just as nice as an onsite, but without any of the resort type amenities or ambience that you get with those. i know when i was deciding which hotel to book i would fret over every little thing that i read. but i had 2 books(wdw&orlando for dummies, unofficial guide to wdw), as well as a lot of perfect posts on trip advisor that gave crowne plaza glowing reviews. and i was just there 2.5 months ago. so if you're staying offsite, want a no frills but very nice hotel, i don't know how you could go wrong. maybe hotwire figured out how easy it was to know which hotel you were selecting when you were looking for crowne plaza

 

[G's mommy]

Thanks, I think I'm sticking with it and taking the $100 in hotwire bucks which I will definitely use in the next few months.