SeaSpray
Disney World fan since 1976
- Joined
- Jan 11, 2001
- Messages
- 15,143
Hi everyone 
DH and I just got back late last night. We had another wonderful stay at the Polynesian, I took 388 pictures, which will be up on my web site probably by later tonight. I have to wait until my DH downloads them and resizes them for me.
Concierge - They've redecorated the Hawaii concierge desk area. I took pictures of this area and will post them later. Nice new dispensers for that wonderful orange-guava juice!
Maralyn and Kathy and the rest of the concierge CMs were as friendly and helpful as usual. The desk CMs as well as the lounge CMs were great. 
The new lounge looks great. On our first day the large vase over by the coffee machines was still there but later that night (or the next day. I don't remember) that space had been replaced by a glass-door cooler, and was filled with cans of soda and juice boxes, and boxes of chocolate and white milk.
The new rooms - I have to say that I was very pleasantly surprised to see how much nicer the new furniture looks in person. A lot of the carved detail on the woodwork does not show up in the pictures I've seen. I tried to get some pictures of the detailing, and I hope it shows up well. I like all of the new lamps, especially the table lamp and the floor lamp. Very nice. The rooms, in general, look MUCH nicer in person, than in the pictures, so if you like them in the pictures, you'll LOVE them in person.
We were in room #3503 this time. Very close to the lounge-end of the building. Excellent location and view. I was surprised at how the view differed so much from the view we had from #3517 in July. Both are excellent views, but with my rheumatoid arthritis flaring up on this trip, I was very glad we had the closer room this time. In #3517 we had a perfectly clear view of the castle and were closer to Space Mountain and the Contemporary, but still could see the entire Grand Floridian resort. This time in #3503 we could also see the Wedding Pavilion and the marina. I'm sure we could see some of the marina the last time, I just don't remember it as distinctly as this time. There is a palm tree out on the beach in front of #3503 but it did not obstruct our view in the least. And if you took even a half step in either directly, the palm tree wasn't even in view. Not sure how that tree would effect the view directly below us, though, because our room on the third floor put us *above* the top of the tree.
The grounds - Just as gorgeous as ever. It looks like all of the baby ducks that we saw in July have grown up. We saw lots of tiny salamanders scurrying around. Very cute. We finally made the walk from our room in the Hawaii building over to the TTC to catch the Epcot monorail. A very nice walk. Finally got to see the quiet pool too. Speaking of pools, I LOVE the Volcano pool. A couple of afternoons were spent relaxing there. While the Polynesian has no actual hot tub, the end of the pool with the built-in seating ledge and the water jets and the waterfall from the brook are *very* nice and relaxing. And what a view from that end of the pool; you can see the entire volcano as well as the beach and the Castle.
The Great Ceremonial House - I'm telling you, SOMEONE needs to bottle the scent of this place. I'd buy it! What a clean, refreshing, tropical scent it is... ahh...
I didn't see anything really new in the GCH since our stay in July. But everything was in great shape, well kept, and clean.
Bou-Tiki - Ok...without causing another debate
I have to say this store really and truly is lacking in one area. My DH and I are friends with one of the managers and we spoke with her several times about this. During our July trip and this trip we checked out several of the other deluxe resort shops (including the Grand Floridian) and this is the *only* resort without quality resort logo merchandise. I'm sorry but iron-on's just don't cut it. I like and want logo-embroidered shirts, sweatshirts, women's clothing, men's polo shirts, etc. Every other resort had high-quality resort logo items. Once again we came home with no Polynesian resort logo clothing items. Now, as for the other clothing items in Bou-Tiki, they were very nice. I bought DH a tropical button-down shirt and I bought a peach colored zip-up sweatshirt for myself. Also found my favorite Mickey Mouse socks there, as well as several other Disney logo items. This is a great store overall, they just need to order and stock some better quality resort logo clothing.
Restaurants - We dined at the Kona Cafe (dinner and breakfast), 'Ohana (dinner), and grabbed some cold sandwiches from Captain Cook's on the way to the airport on our last day. Very good food from all 3 places; I'll have more restaurant info eventually when I do a review on the Restaurants Board.
I'll be adding more info, and pictures, later tonight. In the meantime if anyone has questions, I'll try and answer them.
I want to sum this up by saying that we still feel that the Polynesian Resort is the best on Disney property!
DH and I just got back late last night. We had another wonderful stay at the Polynesian, I took 388 pictures, which will be up on my web site probably by later tonight. I have to wait until my DH downloads them and resizes them for me.
Concierge - They've redecorated the Hawaii concierge desk area. I took pictures of this area and will post them later. Nice new dispensers for that wonderful orange-guava juice!
Maralyn and Kathy and the rest of the concierge CMs were as friendly and helpful as usual. The desk CMs as well as the lounge CMs were great. The new lounge looks great. On our first day the large vase over by the coffee machines was still there but later that night (or the next day. I don't remember) that space had been replaced by a glass-door cooler, and was filled with cans of soda and juice boxes, and boxes of chocolate and white milk.
The new rooms - I have to say that I was very pleasantly surprised to see how much nicer the new furniture looks in person. A lot of the carved detail on the woodwork does not show up in the pictures I've seen. I tried to get some pictures of the detailing, and I hope it shows up well. I like all of the new lamps, especially the table lamp and the floor lamp. Very nice. The rooms, in general, look MUCH nicer in person, than in the pictures, so if you like them in the pictures, you'll LOVE them in person.
We were in room #3503 this time. Very close to the lounge-end of the building. Excellent location and view. I was surprised at how the view differed so much from the view we had from #3517 in July. Both are excellent views, but with my rheumatoid arthritis flaring up on this trip, I was very glad we had the closer room this time. In #3517 we had a perfectly clear view of the castle and were closer to Space Mountain and the Contemporary, but still could see the entire Grand Floridian resort. This time in #3503 we could also see the Wedding Pavilion and the marina. I'm sure we could see some of the marina the last time, I just don't remember it as distinctly as this time. There is a palm tree out on the beach in front of #3503 but it did not obstruct our view in the least. And if you took even a half step in either directly, the palm tree wasn't even in view. Not sure how that tree would effect the view directly below us, though, because our room on the third floor put us *above* the top of the tree.
The grounds - Just as gorgeous as ever. It looks like all of the baby ducks that we saw in July have grown up. We saw lots of tiny salamanders scurrying around. Very cute.
We finally made the walk from our room in the Hawaii building over to the TTC to catch the Epcot monorail. A very nice walk. Finally got to see the quiet pool too. Speaking of pools, I LOVE the Volcano pool. A couple of afternoons were spent relaxing there. While the Polynesian has no actual hot tub, the end of the pool with the built-in seating ledge and the water jets and the waterfall from the brook are *very* nice and relaxing. And what a view from that end of the pool; you can see the entire volcano as well as the beach and the Castle. The Great Ceremonial House - I'm telling you, SOMEONE needs to bottle the scent of this place. I'd buy it! What a clean, refreshing, tropical scent it is... ahh...
I didn't see anything really new in the GCH since our stay in July. But everything was in great shape, well kept, and clean. Bou-Tiki - Ok...without causing another debate
I have to say this store really and truly is lacking in one area. My DH and I are friends with one of the managers and we spoke with her several times about this. During our July trip and this trip we checked out several of the other deluxe resort shops (including the Grand Floridian) and this is the *only* resort without quality resort logo merchandise. I'm sorry but iron-on's just don't cut it. I like and want logo-embroidered shirts, sweatshirts, women's clothing, men's polo shirts, etc. Every other resort had high-quality resort logo items. Once again we came home with no Polynesian resort logo clothing items. Now, as for the other clothing items in Bou-Tiki, they were very nice. I bought DH a tropical button-down shirt and I bought a peach colored zip-up sweatshirt for myself. Also found my favorite Mickey Mouse socks there, as well as several other Disney logo items. This is a great store overall, they just need to order and stock some better quality resort logo clothing. Restaurants - We dined at the Kona Cafe (dinner and breakfast), 'Ohana (dinner), and grabbed some cold sandwiches from Captain Cook's on the way to the airport on our last day. Very good food from all 3 places; I'll have more restaurant info eventually when I do a review on the Restaurants Board.
I'll be adding more info, and pictures, later tonight. In the meantime if anyone has questions, I'll try and answer them.
I want to sum this up by saying that we still feel that the Polynesian Resort is the best on Disney property!
I had to take them with no lights on in the room except in the bathroom.
