Disney's Art of Animation Resort Info Thread! Mouseketeers welcome!

[NE Goofy]

We're staying in a Lion King room. Can I request a lake view room? Thanks

 

[mom2cgj]

We're staying in a Lion King room. Can I request a lake view room? Thanks

Yes. I called and added a lake view request to our LK reservation. The CM specified bldg 6, lake view. We don't go for a month, so I can't say if we got our request!

 

[smidgy]

I always go to www.allears.net and pre look or print the menu out. I hate not having an idea before I go somewhere. Basically I already knew what I'd order before I went. So I only looked at the menus to make sure what I thought I wanted was offered.

thanks bookgirl! (ps, we LOVE to read!)... we love allearsnet, and for table service, ussually know ahead of time exactly what we are going to order.

but for counter service, there are so many choices. I've printed all the menus out in the fast, and gets to be a pretty bulky folder! but maybe I'll do that just for the resort food court again.

 

[disneyholic family]

We're staying in a Lion King room. Can I request a lake view room? Thanks

I requested lake view and got it but its only a request - not a guarantee
The lion king suite was awesome by the way!!!

 

[coinkc]

Just booked a stay in a Cars Suite! We are SOOOO excited!!!!

We were at WDW last summer and walked around the AoA Resort but only the Nemo section was open. Talk about amazing! My 5 year old nephew can recite the entire Cars movie so he is going to FLIP when he sees the resort. We are going to tell him and his 6 year old brother on New Year's Eve that not only are they going to WDW but myself and his favorite cousin (my daughter) are going with them!

Can't wait!!!!!

 

[whodat985]

172 days until ill be staying in lm

 

[trish4bruce]

Are there standard rooms in the Lion king section? My daughter loves Lion King but with only the two of us going I cannot justify the price of a suite.

 

[EpcotBill]

Are there standard rooms in the Lion king section? My daughter loves Lion King but with only the two of us going I cannot justify the price of a suite.

No, standard rooms are only in Little Mermaid.

 

[NE Goofy]

I requested lake view and got it but its only a request - not a guarantee
The lion king suite was awesome by the way!!!

Another question. Could you see the Epcot fireworks from your room? Thanks

 

[parkers218]

Weare just back from a 9 night stay in the LM section. I'm glad we stayed, but won't do it again. It was gorgeous there, but I miss being able to request a room close to the main building and bus stop at Pop. And we won't want to pay for a suite just to be closer.

We requested building 7 in the end closest to Lion King. That's what we got, it actually backfired. To get to that end of the building you have to walk back to the Ursula statue, then back out. There is no walkway out other than by the statue. Not a huge difference, until you do that after walking the parks all day and then all the way back to that section. The vegetation was lovely, but I value my feet more.

The food court never really grabbed me either. We never really found anything we just loved. The "make your own pasta" was good, but not worth staying there to get again. The lines moved SO slow. And I really don't like their overhead menus. Every time I was studying the options, the page would change and I'd have to stand there and wait for it to get back to the page I was reading. Although Pop could be the same way on that by now, but it's more frusrating when it's all new and you really want to study the options.

Absolutely gorgeous surroundings. But back to Pop I will go.

We just left AOA and are now at Beach Club. We walked over the bridge to POP a few times while there and POP has that same over head scrolling menu :/ BTW we loved the AOA resort. If you have little kids its definitely worth it! They wanted to stay.. Only the description of the Beach Club pool cheered them up lol

 

[GetGlowing]

Handicapped Lion King Suite with roll-in shower

We stayed two nights at AoA last weekend (seems like forever ago already!). We were not impressed by the bus service and used our car for Epcot after waiting in the bus line for a while and hearing that the folks in the front of the long and snaking line had been waiting 45 minutes (after a bus had just left). It was a good move. I'm glad we had the option as we were trying to make an ADR. Then leaving the MK after MVMCP, the AoA bus line was really, really long with no bus in sight. Since the Pop queue is right next to the AoA queue, and there were three Pop buses stacked to load, we hopped into the line for that resort and rode their bus back. The walk over the bridge was an easy one, and it beat standing in the AoA line not knowing when the next bus would come.

Other than the buses, it was a nice stay and I like the food court options, even though we only had one lunch there and one morning ran over for some breakfast items.

Below are some photos from our Handicapped Accessible Lion King Suite. From comparing this suite to photos/videos I've seen of standard suites, the layout is a little different. I realize I didn't get great photos of the living/entryway area, sorry about that!

Room #6629 Lion King, Building 6, 2nd floor

Our HA suite had a roll-in shower in the master bedroom, while the other bathroom had a standard bathtub/shower combo. When you enter the suite, the "guest" bath is to your immediate left, and the living area with sleeper sofa and tv is to your right (and I have no photo of that tv area). Walking straight ahead, you enter the kitchenette area (to your left) with the table/bed. Directly across from the kitchenette is the doorway into the master bedroom (to your right). The master bedroom has the queen bed, tv and dresser, lowered closet bar, and safe. The bathroom is very large to allow for maneuvering a wheelchair, and there are grab bars around the toilet. The shower is a roll-in shower with no lip or threshold to worry about. There is a fold-down shower seat, as well as a hand-shower and a regular shower head at standard height. The hand-held is not adjustable.

If you have any questions about the HA suite, send me a PM and I will try to answer them!

The sofabed faces the door as you enter the suite.

Bathroom #1 ("guest bathroom")

Bathroom #1 ("guest bathroom")

Bathroom #1 ("guest bathroom")

Bathroom #1 ("guest bathroom")

Kitchenette - next to table/bed, faces doorway to master bedroom

Table/bed, next to the kitchenette

Artwork on the table/bed. You can see the handles you use to pull down the bed. It's very easy to operate, and it's comfortable to sleep on.

Here is the table folded down into the bed, which is very comfortable. There is a dimmer switch for the built-in lights on top of the headboard when the bed is open. Pillows and extra blankets are in one of the drawers.

From from the front door area toward the table/bed area. Hi Mom!

Queen bed in the master bedroom

Entertainment center and drawers in master bedroom

Handicapped accessible bath with roll-in shower

Handicapped accessible bath with roll-in shower

Handicapped roll-in shower with hand-held sprayer and nice showerhead. You can see the shower seat is down here.

I have a video of the suite, too, but apparently I can't share it from Picasa so I will have to upload to YouTube and will post the link when that's done.

We really enjoyed AoA even though we were there for just a couple days. The size of the suite was great for 4 adults, and would have been fine for 6 I think. It sure beat a standard hotel room! The two baths and separate bedroom offer a lot of privacy and options for sleeping / getting showered and ready. I would definitely go back to this resort, especially when traveling with another couple, extended family, or when I just wanted some extra space without booking a full villa.

 

[jennab]

Ok I posted this in the regular board about resorts but then found this group so maybe you can help!

We are trying to plan a trip to Disney in the beginning of February and are figuring out where to stay. Originally it was going to be me, DH, DS (1yr), and my parents. We were thinking either a FW cabin or family suite at AoA. However, now my sister and her DD (2yrs) might be coming. It would be nice to all stay together but not sure what we would do for sleeping arrangements so the kids will actually fall asleep! So my question is - does Disney offer room dividers for a fee or is there a way we could hang something between the living and dining room area at AoA? My thought was my sister and her DD could sleep on the murphy bed, however I'm not sure that a 2yr old would fall asleep if she could see all of us in the living room! My DS would be in the bedroom so no worries there Thanks in advance for your help

 

[tink2044]

 

[bookgirl]

Ok I posted this in the regular board about resorts but then found this group so maybe you can help!

We are trying to plan a trip to Disney in the beginning of February and are figuring out where to stay. Originally it was going to be me, DH, DS (1yr), and my parents. We were thinking either a FW cabin or family suite at AoA. However, now my sister and her DD (2yrs) might be coming. It would be nice to all stay together but not sure what we would do for sleeping arrangements so the kids will actually fall asleep! So my question is - does Disney offer room dividers for a fee or is there a way we could hang something between the living and dining room area at AoA? My thought was my sister and her DD could sleep on the murphy bed, however I'm not sure that a 2yr old would fall asleep if she could see all of us in the living room! My DS would be in the bedroom so no worries there Thanks in advance for your help

how heavy does she sleep? when my nephews were toddlers they slept heavy enough for me to put them to bed one place then move them later. If she is a heavy sleeper, then put both toddlers to bed in the master room then move the little girl to the murphy once everyone else is ready to go to bed. That way you could do either the AoA or FW.

Just ask for pack and play AND bed rails that way she would be safe in the queen bed by herself. YOu might even be able to set up two pnp's in the master.

 

[jennab]

Thank you! I was thinking about that too (having her fall asleep in the master). She sleeps in a regular bed at home so I don't think we would need bed rails. I do worry about her whining when she goes to bed and waking the 1 year old though! I would think after a day at Disney she would be really tired though

 

[lovingeire]

Thank you! I was thinking about that too (having her fall asleep in the master). She sleeps in a regular bed at home so I don't think we would need bed rails. I do worry about her whining when she goes to bed and waking the 1 year old though! I would think after a day at Disney she would be really tired though

Our two year old just ended up sleeping in a pack n play in the master. He can climb in & out and sleeps in a regular bed at home, but it was nice to have a place he could sleep on his own while we hung out in the living area.

Also, if necessary you could put two pack n plays in the master. We had ours by the bathroom, but you could put one by the window it would just be a wee bit tight. And if she's a good sleeper she could fall asleep in the bed & then be moved out to the sleeping areas.

 

[pookie10]

We booked a lion king room for march 4th - march 8th for our very first trip! Super excited!!

is it warm enough to swim in early march?

 

[ChancesAre]

We just returned from LM rooms in Building 8 and here's my two cents on some of the issues regarding the rooms/buildings. Our group consisted of me and DH and two grown sons (19).

Size of rooms - When we first opened the door, we gasped at how small the beds and the room looked. Actually sat and contemplated whether to spend extra $$ to get a suite, but decided against it. It ended up that the size of the room was plenty big enough, and so were the beds. We had four large suitcases (didn't unpack) and there was plenty of room to live out of all of them during the stay.

Theming - Adorable.

Room - Clean and fresh. Was actually nicer than a refurbished room that we stayed in at CBR not too long ago.

Walk to main building - I timed it. It's 6 minutes and 10 seconds at a leisurely pace. Is it too far? That's subjective. But we only filled our refillable mugs once during our stay. The walk is beautifully landscaped.

Building 8 - It's as though the architects tried to figure out just how far they could make a person walk to get to their room. We were on the 4th floor at a corner, so going to the elevators at the middle of the building from the parking lot would mean backtracking, so we chose to climb the stairs each time. Even the walking path to get to the stairs didn't lead straight to the stairs, you had to go around some landscaping. My boys ended up hopping through the landscaping a few times, even though I scolded them not to do so.

On-line check-in - Didn't see that it saved us much time. In fact, probably cost us some time because we were not given our pin code (something you need for purchases over $50) nor our parking tag, so I ended up having to go back two different times to take care of these items.

Temperature - This was a big concern to me. I was happy to find that our thingy-ma-jig would go down to 65, so a big thank you to whoever stayed there before us and got that rigged! However...the sensors were ridiculous. We would wake up in the middle of the night sweating profusely. I would dance a jig in front of the sensor and it would crank back up. Not that big of a deal, but a little bit of a hassle.

Fridge - We kept the door to the cabinet open and had no issues with the coldness of it.

Shower - Really nice water pressure.

Toilet - Powerful. Thank goodness, with three grown men.

Sink area - Very efficiently laid out. Curtain came in handy.

Nightstand - Too small!

Question: Why not put ceiling fans in these rooms? It can't be that expensive, and it would help with the temperature problem.

Will we stay there again? No. We only stayed there because we were traveling with our son, daughter-in-law, and grandson, so we took one for the team.

Were we happy with our stay? I'll put it this way: We were not unhappy with our stay. It was just nice enough to keep us happy. We all liked it better than CBR, a moderate.

 

[jenseib]

pin code? Is that new? I have never heard of needing one, nor been asked for one.

 

[ChancesAre]

pin code? Is that new? I have never heard of needing one, nor been asked for one.

I think it is new because I heard it explained at least five or six times to different people using their room key to charge with, so it's not something that's old news to most. You just pick a 4-digit number to plug in on the keypad if your purchase with your room key is more than $50.