MarkMichaels
Mouseketeer
- Joined
- Jan 17, 2001
- Messages
- 244
Just a few quick notes about our trip to DW and UF in July.
We started out with 2 nights at the Dolphin on a teacher discount to see how we liked it. Great hotel, great value, not as much Disney magic, but it was well worth the money. I would compare the Swan/Dolphin directly with RPR. Both great values and very nice hotels. We then stayed 2 nights at my favorite hotel, the Poly. I really only mention this because the Poly and Disney Deluxes often get compared to RPR, HR, and PBH, and I would usually disagree with that comparison. But, this time I really thought about it, and especially for the price, the Poly did not meet my expectations when I compared it PBH, where we spent the last 5 nights of our vacation. The Poly has great big rooms and fabulous themeing. I do like the size and layout of the Poly better than PBH, we stayed club at both and that could really be a hike at PBH. But, the Poly, at $500+++ a night for club is overpriced and we'll probably skip that hotel for a while. I had never noticed before that the Poly has no Pool service. We had spotty pool service at PBH, but that was more weather related. I still love the Poly, but PBH got the easy nod this time as a better hotel and better value. PBH easily has the best club level of any of the Universal hotels or the Poly. Location isn't great, unless your room is close, but the staff is aces. The staff always made small talk with us, actually seemed to care about us, and really made us feel at home.
We were in Orlando the 10-20 of July and the parks had pretty good crowds. We saw lots of the Brazilian tour groups, their numbers were amazing, we had never ran into groups like that before. On a good note, we had a couple of great conversations with the kids in those groups and found them all to be very courteous. A couple of the kids in those groups told us the new "in" thing was to give your child a trip to Orlando for their 15th birthday, kind of like how we celebrate sweet 16's here. With FOTL, no group really matters at Universal.
The Simpsons ride is great. I bet we rode that 15 times and I laughed every time.
We also had the opportunity to see the BMG. Now, I won't spoil it for anyone else, but we didn't care for it. As a matter of fact, I left in the middle and pulled my wife out a few minutes later. We were in row B (6 rows back, 2 behind the wet zone) and were the lucky ones to get covered in some sort of banana crap. They did give us free shirts to wear home that night, and offered to reimburse our dry cleaning. When dry cleaning failed, I made several calls and finally ended up getting my wifes and my ticket refunded as well as a $150 clothing allowance for our ruined clothes (I was in a Tommy Bahama silk shirt). We did not request a refund for our kids tickets as they did stay for the whole show. Seemed like I had to press pretty hard for 2 days to get that handled, its exactly what I had asked for at the time it happened. We might be a little biased on the show because of this, but my kids didn't care for it either, there was some humor but not enough for the cost of that show. The folks next to us were laughing their heads off, maybe they had a few more to drink than I did going into that show.
As always, we really enjoyed our stay at Universal and can't wait to go back. The only negative I have about PBH is the bar situation. Yes, we like to have a few cocktails during the afternoon at the pool. Unfortunately, the way the PBH is laid out, when thunder rolls in and they close the pool deck, they also close the only open bar on property. You can still buy a beer, but mixed or blended drinks are done. The forecast was 100% rain one day so they never even opened the bar or pizza place by the pool. Several of us were in the pool until after 3 when the thunder finally started to roll in and they closed down. It was quite a hike to the other pizza place by the lake to get a soda or beer or something to eat. They really need to rethink the pool bar and perhaps exlude it from being part of the pool deck like HRH does with its pool bar.
Any questions, I'll try and answer the best I can.
Mark
We started out with 2 nights at the Dolphin on a teacher discount to see how we liked it. Great hotel, great value, not as much Disney magic, but it was well worth the money. I would compare the Swan/Dolphin directly with RPR. Both great values and very nice hotels. We then stayed 2 nights at my favorite hotel, the Poly. I really only mention this because the Poly and Disney Deluxes often get compared to RPR, HR, and PBH, and I would usually disagree with that comparison. But, this time I really thought about it, and especially for the price, the Poly did not meet my expectations when I compared it PBH, where we spent the last 5 nights of our vacation. The Poly has great big rooms and fabulous themeing. I do like the size and layout of the Poly better than PBH, we stayed club at both and that could really be a hike at PBH. But, the Poly, at $500+++ a night for club is overpriced and we'll probably skip that hotel for a while. I had never noticed before that the Poly has no Pool service. We had spotty pool service at PBH, but that was more weather related. I still love the Poly, but PBH got the easy nod this time as a better hotel and better value. PBH easily has the best club level of any of the Universal hotels or the Poly. Location isn't great, unless your room is close, but the staff is aces. The staff always made small talk with us, actually seemed to care about us, and really made us feel at home.
We were in Orlando the 10-20 of July and the parks had pretty good crowds. We saw lots of the Brazilian tour groups, their numbers were amazing, we had never ran into groups like that before. On a good note, we had a couple of great conversations with the kids in those groups and found them all to be very courteous. A couple of the kids in those groups told us the new "in" thing was to give your child a trip to Orlando for their 15th birthday, kind of like how we celebrate sweet 16's here. With FOTL, no group really matters at Universal.
The Simpsons ride is great. I bet we rode that 15 times and I laughed every time.
We also had the opportunity to see the BMG. Now, I won't spoil it for anyone else, but we didn't care for it. As a matter of fact, I left in the middle and pulled my wife out a few minutes later. We were in row B (6 rows back, 2 behind the wet zone) and were the lucky ones to get covered in some sort of banana crap. They did give us free shirts to wear home that night, and offered to reimburse our dry cleaning. When dry cleaning failed, I made several calls and finally ended up getting my wifes and my ticket refunded as well as a $150 clothing allowance for our ruined clothes (I was in a Tommy Bahama silk shirt). We did not request a refund for our kids tickets as they did stay for the whole show. Seemed like I had to press pretty hard for 2 days to get that handled, its exactly what I had asked for at the time it happened. We might be a little biased on the show because of this, but my kids didn't care for it either, there was some humor but not enough for the cost of that show. The folks next to us were laughing their heads off, maybe they had a few more to drink than I did going into that show.
As always, we really enjoyed our stay at Universal and can't wait to go back. The only negative I have about PBH is the bar situation. Yes, we like to have a few cocktails during the afternoon at the pool. Unfortunately, the way the PBH is laid out, when thunder rolls in and they close the pool deck, they also close the only open bar on property. You can still buy a beer, but mixed or blended drinks are done. The forecast was 100% rain one day so they never even opened the bar or pizza place by the pool. Several of us were in the pool until after 3 when the thunder finally started to roll in and they closed down. It was quite a hike to the other pizza place by the lake to get a soda or beer or something to eat. They really need to rethink the pool bar and perhaps exlude it from being part of the pool deck like HRH does with its pool bar.
Any questions, I'll try and answer the best I can.
Mark
