Final Vistana Questions - need help!

[Jim from Jersey]

After compiling a ton of info off this site regarding the Vistana (not the village), I still have a few questions remaining and hope someone can help. The group of us consists of my wife and I (30"s), 22 month old, and in-laws (mid 70's).

1) Due to a back injury, my mother-in-law does not tolerate stairs to well and sometimes has trouble walking long distances. Plus with the baby, stairs and long distances become an issue also. What would be your best opinion for a request for a certain section at the vistana? (re: pools, lobby, restaurant, elevator, etc.) NOTE: We have a Saturday check in if it matters.

2) Can you request houskeeping for the week?

3) Do all rooms have the couch bed? We have a 2 room villa secured, but the baby goes to sleep early and may have to sleep in one of the rooms by herself as to not be woken up. My wife an I may have to use the couch bed. Again, is this a given or should we make sure in a request.

4)Given my group, is there anything else you think I should request.

We will be arriving on Oct 2nd so I do not have much more time to contemplate these things. Thanks for your help........ J from J

 

[erinch]

Jim--
re the baby--
when we had a "sensitive sleeper" of that age we put the porta-crib in the second bath and shared the master bath facilities after bedtime. That kept the beds free (the couchbed is not that comfortable.)

Will you have a car? IMO the restaurants at the Vistana are not that great and rather overpriced, but the onsite Pizza Hut will deliver (more $$ than regular Pizza Hut). There are many good/popular chain-type restaurants close by. We discovered the Bennigans has excellent happy hour deals, and was pretty empty in the early evening.

 

[laurabelle]

I've only stayed there once, at the end of July. I had a Saturday check in too and had signed up for Diamond Lane online and requested Cascades and got it. My building had an elevator, so that would help your mil. It was an easy walk to the Cascades Pool and the Super Pool but you can easily drive to the pools too. Yes, I highly recommend having a car. We either ate in the villa, the parks or offsite. We brought our own snacks to the pool. Bought frozen drinks by the pool twice, @ $5 each, not too much alcohol in them. Our unit had a sofa bed, don't know if they all do . You can call in your requests and have any other questions answered too. We enjoyed our stay there. Have fun!

 

[monarchsfan16]

1) Cascades has elevators. However if they can't do that request maybe request to be on the first floor. You park right in front of your unit so it will be a very short walk. Anything at Vistana is reachable by car, if you just play around with where you park, if the long distance is really a big issue. We had to deal with it with my grammy.
2) I don't know whether housekeeping is available for the week, but you can certainly ask. If it is available it will be an extra charge for sure. Otherwise you just get a midweek cleaning (vacuum, dishes, etc).
3) All 2 bedrooms have at least one sofa bed. Our 2 bedroom in Courts had 2 sofa beds, one was in a loft area. All 2 bedrooms have full living rooms.

 

[laurabelle]

Whoops, forgot to adress the housekeeping question too. If you're doing it as an exchange (even through skyauction) housekeeping comes through on the 3rd day of your stay to do a light cleaning. We had stuff all over the place (not dirty, just messy) and they didn't touch it. I forgot that they were coming by and only really noticed that they made the bed more neatly and gave us more towels. We always took our trash out in the morning and cleaned up the kitchen before we left for the day so that was already done by us. You can pay for daily housekeeping, not sure how much that is though.

 

[Wishing on a star]

Contact the Diamond Lane check-in ASAP (if you have not already) and be VERY specific about your request... I understand that, for the very reasons you mention, they will try to honor request for first floor. When we made our exchange, RCI asked us if we had that concern so they could address it up front.

If you have a Loft or a Lock-off (lock-offs are very hard to get!) that would give you the extra space you need for the baby to sleep while you still have your own bedroom and the main living area

Good Luck!

 

[mog]

Originally posted by laurabelle
I've only stayed there once, at the end of July. I had a Saturday check in too and had signed up for Diamond Lane online and requested Cascades and got it. :

Boy, now I'm confused! We were having a family reunion and had requested our units to be together (one Friday check in and one Saturday check in). They basically told me that all Friday check ins are in Spas and all Saturday check ins are in Courts - they said there were no exceptions and that is why they couldn't put us together. But you had a Friday check in, requested Cascades and got it!!!??? If I had known that I would have argued a little harder. Not that I necessarily wanted any particular section but we really wanted to be near each other!!

Oh well, we had a great time anyway.

 

[Wishing on a star]

Sending you a PM!

 

[26555]

Originally posted by Wishing on a star
Sending you a PM!

Hmmmm, wouldn't happen to be about how to get Cascades with a Fri checkin would it? Is there a secret? I have Fri checking but from what 'mog' says I'll be happy in the Spas section.

 

[mog]

Originally posted by 26555
Hmmmm, wouldn't happen to be about how to get Cascades with a Fri checkin would it? Is there a secret? I have Fri checking but from what 'mog' says I'll be happy in the Spas section.

Actually the PM was to me and I'm the one who was told I had to be in Spas with a Friday check-in!!
So unfortunately I don't know any secrets, but to reassure everyone that I was extremely worried after reading some of the reports on here about the "older" sections and we were very pleasantly surprised. The unit we were in was fine - I had no problems with bugs, dirt or anything!
My parents' unit in the Courts section was obviously a little older than ours, but on the inside was also fine.
I'm sure there are some units that might not be as nice as others, but I wouldn't write off an entire section. If you get into a "bad" unit, I would just insist to be moved to another unit, even if it is in that same "older" section.
I hope this at least reassures some of you who may end up in the Courts or Spas sections!