I've died and gone to heaven! AKL and Portofino Bay

[Gail from Nova Scotia]

Just returned from a week in Orlando( Dec 23-30)

Cast members

Me 43 family physician, obsessive-compulsive
Hubby 50 general surgeon and hard to impress
DD 14 Wants to be a vet, gregarious and outgoing
DD 12 Shy and sweet and gentle
My Mom 67 Will try anything once!


AKL is FABULOUS!! Run, don't walk to go there. We stayed in 2 savannah view rooms 2307 and 2309. Both the bellhop and housekeeper said it was one of the best viewing rooms and it really was! It is located on Kudu Trail, halfway up the U shape of the building.
The rooms are beautifully themed- my mom had a room with 2 queens and we had the adjoining room with a queen and bunkbeds.
Mom's room seemed much brighter than ours. I think the bunk beds give the illusion of less room and height.
A topic of discussion that keeps coming up is " how dark the rooms are". Well, I think it is directly related to AGE!! My mom and husband found the rooms too dark to read in and they actually bought themselves "itty-bitty night lights"!! For us YOUNGER, non visually challenged persons, the room was fine!!
There is very little drawer space. We ended up with clothes everywhere. I'm not sure but I think we had one less "armoire" than other rooms because of the connecting door. I could be wrong though.
The bathroom area is spacious.
The lobby is AWESOME!
TIP #1 Take the lobby tour. Daily at 3:30 PM. We just happened to return from the parks as a tour was starting and we all learned really neat things and noticed things that we had walked past on previous days. They tell you where the hidden Mickey is!!!
BOMA is a lovely restaurant. Even though we never get our money's worth at buffets ( we all have small appetites and never go back for seconds. Our kids eat like birds.) we felt BOMA was good value for money.
TIP #2 Everybody talks about the Zebra Domes (they are very good) but I loved the passion fruit tarts.
JIKO was good but different. If you don't have an adventuresome palate I would stay away. We love different types of food so were very happy. Our 12 year old DD ended up with PB & J for XMAS dinner!!! They have great wines and a huge selection.
ANIMAL VIEWING was AWESOME. We were on the second floor so were just above eye level with the animals. We were diractly in front of a feeding trough as well so the animals were there at feeding time. I loved the giraffes and the gemsbok. The kids actually TURNED THE TV OFF to sit on the balcony and watch for the animals!! This alone was worth the price of the hotel room!!!
We rated this hotel a 96 out of 100!! My husband is very very hard to impress and he loved it.

PORTOFINO BAY

Beautiful Hotel! Huge rooms, bright airy and spacious. Bathroom bigger than some hotel rooms. I had booked online with Hotel Kingdom.com. There was a bit of a SNAFU at check-in. They had no record of us at Portofino Bay but were expecting us at HRH. Anyway, it was no problem to give us rooms and we were upgraded from garden view to bay view. Unfortunately, there is no balcony and you can't open the windows. I think we noticed this because we had spent so much time on the balcony at AKL. Also, they need to wash the walls. Full of marks from luggage.
Having front of the line access is almost sinful!! We all loved it but felt so guilty walking by all those people who had been waiting in line. MIB was a 60 minute wail and we did it twice in 20 minutes!!
We enjoyed Universal much more than IOA. We aren't into roller coasters and the kids are too old for Seussland, although we loved The Cat in the Hat ride. IOA is full of those carnival games and seems a bit tacky. JRPA was also fun.
Universal was great. Enjoyed all the rides and the surprise hit was "The Gruesome Horror Make Up Show". Very funny (remember we are doctors so nothing grosses us out!).

All in all a great week. Thanks to all for all their help in planning this trip.

PS. The trip highlights were Discovery Cove and La Nouba. We still have smiles on our faces from our dolphin interaction. See my report on the Seaworld/ Discovery Cove page.

Any questions? I'll be glad to help If I can

Gail

 

[kaybird]

Gail,

What a great trip report! Thanks for sharing with us, AKL sounds better and better, keep thinking we don't need to stay there since we live on a farm, but it just sounds so cool we
may have to change our minds!

Thanks for the report! Glad you had a great trip!

k

 

[pumba]

a joy it must be to sit out on the balcony and watch the animals.......YES to be able to turn off a television set......you are right that alone would be worth it all.....Thanks so much for your great report

 

[nativetxn]

Your enthusiasm is contagious, I'm sitting here just smiling away as I read this

Thanks for the great descriptions of AKL it certainly sounds like a great resort. I'd like to stay there someday.

Thanks for taking the time to post this.

Katholyn

 

[kathymc]

Glad to hear you had a wonderful time and that you enjoyed your hotels. We went to Boma and walked around the AKL and saw lots of animals and loved the lobby. We always visit IOA and Universal and hopefully will stay at Portifino on our next rip.

thanks for posting

 

[swankybeth]

Thanks for posting your reviews. We stayed at AKL last June and you brought back memories of our trip.

 

[cottontail]

Hi Gail:

That must have been quite nice to be at wdw at xmas. We are from Canada too, Ontario and will be driving to wdw in april (24 long hours) but will split into two days.
Anyways I have adult size children and was wondering whether to book the queen with bunkbed room, do you remember if the bunkbeds are long enough for adults, or should I get the two queens and I sleep with daughter and hubby sleep with son, as I do not think they have rollaways?
Did you send in a request for those rooms or did you luck out with them. I love animals and can't wait to stay there, in fact I am thinking of booking three nights instead of two, and then we move on to the dolphin. Thanks,

Deb.
P.S. Don't you just love that exchange rate.

 

[Gail from Nova Scotia]

Hi Cottontail,

You will love AKL. I'll try to answer your questions in order!
1. When I booked I asked for the second floor only.
2. The bunk beds will be fine if your children are shorter than 5"8". One night, our daughter wanted to sleep with her grandmother in the adjoining room and I ended up sleeping in the bunk bed and it was fine.
3.Stay 3 nights! On mousesavers there is a code for Canadians only. Try it for a good rate.
And yes I LOOOVE our dollar...I plan on sitting down with a stiff drink when I get the VISA bill!!
Have a great holiday,


Gail




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