- Joined
- Jul 3, 2014
Like any neurotic planner, I've been listening to podcasts and YouTube videos to help prepare for my family's first time to Disney World and our first stay at the Poly (CL Theme Park View AAHHH EXCITED) and one of the podcasts (Main Street Magic) just did their trip report on Poly CL and kind of ripped it apart. They slammed the cast members, the service, the availability of food, the food offerings themselves, the lack of seating at 7am (she said people were sitting on the floor eating), the fact that drinks weren't readily available and the overall lack of value for the money spent.
I've read mostly good things, in this forum in particular, from repeat stays with consistent reviews but I'm not sure how recent those stays were, so this is kind of worrying me - has anyone seen issues with what they mentioned as far as service issues (she mentioned she sat at a table and watched cast members asking other guests what they wanted to drink and not asking her), going at 5pm and having to stand because there are no seats available, having to ask for soda, and water, overcooked and under seasoned "dinner" items and "bad" breakfast items?? They basically said, save your money, and bring your own bagels, beer and wine - it's the same thing as Club Level at Poly and they would not recommend it. Has anything started to slip?? Is this the case?? Give it to me straight guys (even though I want to secretly be reassured) are we walking into a bad CL experience?
We just spent a week at Poly CL. We’ve had a few trips there per year since 2013 or 2014, and we’ve stayed at all of the others over that time as well.
With nearly every CL, with the exception of maybe WL, AKL, and maybe GF RPC, spend enough time in the lounges and you will inevitably find a moment where things get crowded and tables are hard to come by. Is it like that all of the time? No. Does it happen? Yes. At Poly, breakfasts can be busy, but it tends to ebb and flow. In the evenings - especially if the pool is closed for storms - you’ll see the lounge crowd swell. There are other moments over the course of the day where the lounge is just about the most peaceful place in all of WDW with arguably the best view of any lounge. If I’m not mistaken Poly CL has the largest guest room count of the other CLs, so you have that as well.
But I could say the same thing for many others as well. BWI CL is nearly universally praised around here, but the one time we stayed there (Feb 2018) we experienced quite crowded lounge conditions over a few services - one evening we couldn’t find a spot at all and DW and I walked back to our rooms somewhat put out at the whole thing. I know it’s not like that all of the time, we just happened to hit a bad moment.
I personally love Poly CL. Does it have flaws like they all do, yup. Most of it is what you make of it and what you want our of a CL and/or resort experience.
I can’t speak for podcast reviews of resorts - not my cup of tea to watch them. I find people on sites like this more knowledgeable and more of a similar mindset to WDW resort expectations, or at least they provide enough info for me to be able to judge if I might see things the same way.
Plus at the end of the day it’s all so subjective anyway. It may or may not suit you, but hard to really know until you experience it personally.
Anyways, happy to answer any questions about Poly CL or our recent stay. You must have picked Poly and Poly CL initially for a reason. Unless you’ve come to the conclusion that Poly just isn’t the resort for you, I’d stay the course.
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. I wouldn’t even know that they do contact anyone if not for these boards! It really doesn’t matter, and I’m sure it is just random or some computer issue, but sometimes it’s difficult not to be annoyed or take it personally after reading what some other people get 
. They really should get their act together and treat every reservation the same, at least have consistency within each resort, but I don’t see that ever happening.
