Just thought I'd take a minute to post about our experience since I found the info here to be so helpful when trying to decide where to stay.
We just got back from a week at the BC. Sadly, I can't say that we were all that impressed or even that we would stay there again. It wasn't that we had a truly *bad* experience, it's just that we did not have a *magical*
experience. I felt like we could have been at any nice hotel, anywhere. I don't have a lot of other Disney resorts to compare it to, but as a family, we decided that we would all much prefer to go back to AKL the next time, or spend just a little more, and stay at the Poly.
I wonder if part of the problem is that I grew up going to the beach on the East Coast, lived in New England for several years, and so the theming just didn't seem "exotic" to me. Maybe if I were from say, TX, it would have seemed more exciting??
The pool was huge and pretty neat, but the slide was a disappointment to the kids. We've been at other hotels with better slides, including AKL. Still, the sand in the pool was unique, and the kids particularly loved the sinking sands section. Finding a chair could be a challenge at times, b/c although nobody is supposed to reserve chairs, people do. It was frustrating to see so many chairs without anyone using them, yet have nowhere to sit down!
Mousekeeping was not great, and that is probably my only valid complaint. There was a hair on the lower wall of the shower when we arrived, and it stayed there all week, making me think that the room was definitely not being cleaned thoroughly. (Never fear, I was OCD enough to have brought along my own Clorox wipes though!) We are fairly neat guests, but we tipped generously each day and didn't receive a towel animal in return even once.
One day, through no fault of her own (she had only gone "#1" - sorry to be graphic!), DD flushed the toilet, and it began to overflow. DH managed to get the water turned off, but not before the bathroom was totally flooded and seeping onto the rug. We immediately called housekeeping and engineering and were assured that someone would be up quickly. We had ADRs that evening, and were just about to begin showering, etc, so being able to use the bathroom was pretty important! After 30min, DH went to the front desk and told them about the problem and they were very concerned and promised that someone would be right there. About 30min. later, a guy from engineering arrived and was dismayed to find out that nobody from housekeeping had showed up yet. He immediately called for housekeeping on his radio. He had whatever the problem was, fixed in about 2min. and assured me that housekeeping would be there ASAP. (Remember, water is seeping onto the rug!!)
After another 10min, and a call to the front desk, housekeeping showed up - with a crib! What?? THe CMs seemed to speak no english and seemingly had no idea how to go about cleaning up the water. As I was talking to them, another housekeeper (Supervisor?) happened to walk by and I explained the situation to her. She got things moving at least. However, all that happened was that they got a mop and towels and soaked up the water in the bathroom. No cleaning of the floor, no sucking water out of the rug in front of the vanity, nothing. We were fairly disgusted to to walk on the floor in the bathroom area for the rest of the trip.
No apologies were ever given, although perhaps that is our own fault for not making our unhappiness with the whole situation better known to management.
THe other odd thing was that the hairdryer there kept shutting off. Fortunately, I had brought one from home, b/c every time my daughter tried to use the BC dryer for more than a minute or two, it would shut off, although it did not trigger the "reset" button. And one day, when she was attempting to dry her hair w/ the BC dryer, DH had a battery recharger in the same outlet and it essentially got "fried", although once again, the circuit there never went off. Kind of scary, really.
Meeting Art the greeter was wonderful - he is such a gentleman.
Counter service options are limited to the Marketplace there, and I will say that the food we had was good, but not much of a selection.
Transportation from the BC was okay. It didn't seem nearly as bad as what I read about here. It was great to walk to Epcot, but frustrating to take the boat to MGM. MGM seemed just a bit too far to walk, yet the boat took forever, and it had to stop at the Swan/Dolphin as well. Boat drivers (captains??) were mostly great, joking and chatting. Busdrivers were not all that friendly and mostly seemed annoyed to have to drive anyone anywhere! Definitely not up to Disney standards for CMs!
Anyhow, that's just a quick summary. If you have any questions about the resort, please feel free to ask.
We just got back from a week at the BC. Sadly, I can't say that we were all that impressed or even that we would stay there again. It wasn't that we had a truly *bad* experience, it's just that we did not have a *magical*
experience. I felt like we could have been at any nice hotel, anywhere. I don't have a lot of other Disney resorts to compare it to, but as a family, we decided that we would all much prefer to go back to AKL the next time, or spend just a little more, and stay at the Poly.I wonder if part of the problem is that I grew up going to the beach on the East Coast, lived in New England for several years, and so the theming just didn't seem "exotic" to me. Maybe if I were from say, TX, it would have seemed more exciting??
The pool was huge and pretty neat, but the slide was a disappointment to the kids. We've been at other hotels with better slides, including AKL. Still, the sand in the pool was unique, and the kids particularly loved the sinking sands section. Finding a chair could be a challenge at times, b/c although nobody is supposed to reserve chairs, people do. It was frustrating to see so many chairs without anyone using them, yet have nowhere to sit down!
Mousekeeping was not great, and that is probably my only valid complaint. There was a hair on the lower wall of the shower when we arrived, and it stayed there all week, making me think that the room was definitely not being cleaned thoroughly. (Never fear, I was OCD enough to have brought along my own Clorox wipes though!) We are fairly neat guests, but we tipped generously each day and didn't receive a towel animal in return even once.
One day, through no fault of her own (she had only gone "#1" - sorry to be graphic!), DD flushed the toilet, and it began to overflow. DH managed to get the water turned off, but not before the bathroom was totally flooded and seeping onto the rug. We immediately called housekeeping and engineering and were assured that someone would be up quickly. We had ADRs that evening, and were just about to begin showering, etc, so being able to use the bathroom was pretty important! After 30min, DH went to the front desk and told them about the problem and they were very concerned and promised that someone would be right there. About 30min. later, a guy from engineering arrived and was dismayed to find out that nobody from housekeeping had showed up yet. He immediately called for housekeeping on his radio. He had whatever the problem was, fixed in about 2min. and assured me that housekeeping would be there ASAP. (Remember, water is seeping onto the rug!!)
After another 10min, and a call to the front desk, housekeeping showed up - with a crib! What?? THe CMs seemed to speak no english and seemingly had no idea how to go about cleaning up the water. As I was talking to them, another housekeeper (Supervisor?) happened to walk by and I explained the situation to her. She got things moving at least. However, all that happened was that they got a mop and towels and soaked up the water in the bathroom. No cleaning of the floor, no sucking water out of the rug in front of the vanity, nothing. We were fairly disgusted to to walk on the floor in the bathroom area for the rest of the trip.
No apologies were ever given, although perhaps that is our own fault for not making our unhappiness with the whole situation better known to management. THe other odd thing was that the hairdryer there kept shutting off. Fortunately, I had brought one from home, b/c every time my daughter tried to use the BC dryer for more than a minute or two, it would shut off, although it did not trigger the "reset" button. And one day, when she was attempting to dry her hair w/ the BC dryer, DH had a battery recharger in the same outlet and it essentially got "fried", although once again, the circuit there never went off. Kind of scary, really.
Meeting Art the greeter was wonderful - he is such a gentleman.
Counter service options are limited to the Marketplace there, and I will say that the food we had was good, but not much of a selection.
Transportation from the BC was okay. It didn't seem nearly as bad as what I read about here. It was great to walk to Epcot, but frustrating to take the boat to MGM. MGM seemed just a bit too far to walk, yet the boat took forever, and it had to stop at the Swan/Dolphin as well. Boat drivers (captains??) were mostly great, joking and chatting. Busdrivers were not all that friendly and mostly seemed annoyed to have to drive anyone anywhere! Definitely not up to Disney standards for CMs!
Anyhow, that's just a quick summary. If you have any questions about the resort, please feel free to ask.
Having a counter service eatery isn't that important to us so that doesn't bother me. And the pool - my gosh - you can't beat it. I personally love the theming and find it to be exceptionally magical. But, I'm from the South so it's definitely a different experience for us. 
My big debate last fall was whether to book CR or BC and now you just confirmed that I would have like CR better! (I've been consoling myself by thinking that if we'd been at CR, then I would have wished I had chosen BC.....)
