When I was planning this trip of course I cam here for advice and I also looked at the map. I wanted something centrally located and clean. Alot of people liked Tokelau. So I requested that building, 3rd floor. We also wanted garden view and a non smoking building. When we got there we were SOOOOOO impressed with the place. I can see now how come people come back year after year. My BF said it was his favorite hotel at Disney but he hadn't gone to Disney since he was 3 so his opinion was moot. But, me, having gone several times since I was little...I have to say it was my favorite too. SOOOO romantic like everyone says and very chill. Great drinks, great atmosphere, great food. And we loved the monorail for so many reasons.
Anyway, when we got to the front desk they told us we were in Tokelau 3rd floor! We were very excited because that's exactly what we wanted. When we got to the room, the first thing I thought was, "wow, was there a dog in here that was just in the pool?". I didn't like the smell at all. This of course dampened my view of the place pretty fast. This room however, facing the Quiet pool had a nice view of the castle and it was a great location. Anyway, I called to get them to freshen up the room and they brought in an ionizer thingy. (A big metal machine that is supposed to clear the air). They asked us the leave the room for 45 minutes which was fine because we needed to eat anyway so we went to Captain Cooks. When we came back the guy and the machine were gone and it still smelled. So I called them again and said "I hate to be this kind of person, but do all the rooms smell like this?" They said "OH, you STILL smell something?". I said yes and they came back with room deotorizer spray which they sprayed directly into the air conditioning vent for several seconds. So now the room smelled like room deotorizer and wet dog.
I decided to brush it off and hoped that when we got back from Epcot that day (our first park day) that all smells were gone. Well after a full day, while riding back on the monorail I decided that I didn't want to stay in that room because the back of my throat was ithching from the moldyness earlier, so we went to the front desk. I told her I thought the room was moldy and she said "NO PROBLEM, don't feel bad we'll give you another room!"
She ended up giving up Rarotonga facing the quiet pool right on the end of the building. GREAT ROOM! NO SMELL! AND I CAN NOW SEE SPACE MOUNTAIN which was pretty cool. To be honest the view of Magic Kingdom was not on our list of things we needed from our room. We probably spend about 10 full minutes out of the whole trip, out on our balcony! I mainly just wanted non smoking, non smelling and non parking lot and that's exaclty what we got out of Rarotonga. What a great building!!! I would HIGHLY recomend that building to anyone wanting a garden view. I have tons of pics that I will post today and send along a link here.
Anyway, my assesment of Poly is that it is a GREAT, WONDERFULL resort. My two complaints: the smell in the first room and also I noticed on the last few days of our stay the same sheet with a hole in it was on our bed. Did they change the sheets every day?, obviously not, because we saw that same sheet with the hole in the exact same spot on our bed those last few days. If you are going to stay there and want a garden view, ask for a building that was more recently renovated. I didn't go into other building's ROOMS (because the halls don't smell at all anywhere), but I never ventured INTO other rooms so my following opinion is just an opinion and a guess.... so it is my guess that the more recently renovated rooms don't have that musty smell. I know that Rarotonga was on that list of more recently renovated and therefore that's why I'm guessing that it didn't smell like the other room we were in at first. Also, if anyone is thinking of going next year, I would say wait untill the building you want is renovated. I know they are doing these renovations starting next year and if I were to go back, which I plan to do, I would wait for a nice new renovation of the room. But as far as we were concerned, Rarotonga was excellent and there was no smells at all. Wait untill you see these pics! You're all going to want to go back!!
