Just back from Nick Hotel

[sherril]

Just back from the Nick Hotel. Heres the good and the bad. The good is the rooms are great size and laid out great. We were 5 and we were very comfortable. We were in Room 726, bunk beds and king bed, it was great. The housekeeping was fantastic. The pools are alot of fun, even for the adults. My husband and I enjoyed the slides as much as the kids. the kids absolutely loved it, they said they preferred the Nick Hotel to the Grand Floridian, our previous hotel. We only stayed 3 nights, but that was enough, in fact 2 nights would have been better.
Now the bad, the food is absolutley disgusting, the buffets are practically ineatable, and extremely expensive. Don't waste your money, if you have a car, go out for food. They do have an A&W, and Pizza Hut, they were fine.
The pools are closed quite often. If it rains for 20 minutes, they close the pool for two hours, just be prepared. Also, the slides are only open until 7 PM.
Also, the place is extremely loud and can be over stimulating. The music is extrememely loud and its on all day, and the slides and water make alot of noise. Just be prepared if your little ones are sensitive to noise.
Like I said earlier, its fine for a day or two, but I don't think I could have lasted there a week.

 

[DisneyMomx7]

We stayed two nights and that was just the right amount of time. Agree with everything you said. Rooms were great for family of 5, housekeeping was good, and food was awful. ONly decent food we had there was A&W and then we went to downtown DIsney after one night and one breakfast buffet. THe kids absolutely loved it though we and thought it was easier to do than a waterpark withkids our kids' ages.

 

[DISFANSHAN]

Thanks for the info. We are going in 3 weeks and staying there for 2 nights and then switching to Vistana Villages.

One question: do they have height requirements for the slides?

Thanks!

 

[DisneyMomx7]

I don't rememer there being a height requirement for the slides. DS is only 391/2" and he was able to go on everything. I did make him wear a life jacket though.

 

[Gillian]

Thanks for the report! Still not sure if we will stick with our fort wilderness reservation whe whole time and just go to the water parks or try the Nick hotel 1-2 nights.

DisneyMomx7, how old are your kids?

 

[DisneyMomx7]

My kids are 7 1/2, 6 and just turned 5. They LOVED the Nick Hotel. We only stayed for two nights but they had a ball especially with the "Nick" activities. We did go to TL when we went over to WDW (stayed at the GF) and found the surf pool a little too rough for the kids.

 

[Gillian]

My almost 5 year old is the one who wants to go to the Nick hotel! Well, I'll wait a while and see if there are any deals.

I think I live near you. Are you in Mercer county?

 

[leight]

Thanks! WE're going next weekend for dd's 8th bday! We're only going for two nites- Sat after dh's work we'll drive from Tampa to Orlando- so we can easily eat dinner out. I plan to bring my small toaster for waffle sticks for Sun am- we plan to spend most of Sun in the pool and doing Nick activities. Lunch we'll probably do A&W/pizzahut. I plan to do DTD or universal's city walk movie/meal deal for dinner sunday nite.

Monday morning we will be doing the Character breakfast- but that's free so at least I'll get my $'s worth

Then we check out after the character breakfast and spend the day at Seaworld(leftover passes) so we can always subsidize the lousy breakfast with a big lunch at Sharks!

 

[RichNKatHolly]

Thanks for the review. We are doing one night in December. DH5 is soooo excited about it. I think we can handle the noise for one day, and I was planning DTD for dinner. Glad to hear we are on the right track!

 

[cammie810]

Hi we are going in a week! Are there coffee makers in the rooms? We have a two bedroom suite. Also, how little are the fridges? We are hoping to do breakfast in the room to save some $$$. Thanks in advance for answering. Amy

 

[LisaRay]

Well I am scared to type this! We were at the nick hotel in July and when we returned I did not do a review as we just didn't care for it at all and I didn't want to get flamed. It seems like bad reviews are flamed an awful lot and so I thought I would just keep my thoughts to myself.

However, I guess I am feeling a little more brave since someone else has mentioned the noise levels and such.

1st let me say that we have stayed at HIFS in the past before it was a nick hotel. We had stayed for a week in Jan. one year and a week in July on a different year. Both times we had really good rates. Paying $75 a night in Jan. and I think it was $89 in July.
So this July we were going to Clearwater Beach for a week but it was also the week of my sons b-day and he is always talking about the Nick hotel so I thought we would drive out of our way just a little and take him there as a surprise. With vacation days already alotted for we only had one night that we could stay and we also had Priority Club points to spare so we got our night for free.

We arrived at noon and didn't expect a room to be ready and once we saw the crowd we knew there was no way it would be ready!! Check in took one hour!!! And that was in the priority check in line! There were ALOT of angry people and some being very vocal about it! To be completly honest it took 55 minutes since we pulled in at exactly 12 on the button and got back in our car to drive to our room area at 12:55!
Good news is after a VERY long wait the room was ready. Weird thing is that it is the EXACT same room we stayed in before!

We look out at the pool and WOW is it packed!! I can't describe it but the pool sign said the capacity was 100 people and it was definatly double! You couldn't swim in the pool is was just bumper to bumper. Reminded me of trying to get out of MK after spectro! You just stood in the water but no room to safely swim around. And then the noise! they never shut if off the music or turn it down a little and it is so loud you can't hear yourself think. The other thing that we found so loud and eventually drove me nuts was the lifeguards whistles. These people just constantly blew these things non stop. But there were so many kids and such noise that the kids didn't realize who they were blowing it at so the lifeguards just had to keep on blowing!! That got old real fast.

Ok some good stuff was yes the rooms are nice and clean. We had 2 light bulbs burnt out, the arm of the sofa was litterally hanging off, and the safe was locked up so that we couldn't put our stuff in it! I will say that with one phone call they came and fixed all of these things VERY FAST!! We couldnt' believe how fast!

For dinner that evening since we only had one night we had planned on eating at the hotel so the kids could spend as much time as possible at the pool. However, we were all ready to leave and go eat somewhere else for some quiet. Even my DD. The kids wanted pizza though and so we were going to just eat at the pizza hut at the hotel but since I needed to make a run to the drugstore we left to find pizza elsewhere. Turns out we just went to the pizza hut down the road and ate in. It was nice and quiet in there! Ahhhhhhhhhhh!

The character breakfast the next morning for sons b-day was awful!! The food was cold not warm but cold! The place was packed but it was busy so we couldn't figure out why it was so cold!! When even the kids complain about the food being cold you know it is bad!! That was the biggest waste of $60 ever! I told my DH that we have paid $80 for a character breakfast at disney and never felt ripped off before like we did here! Yuck!

My DH and I said we were glad it was only for one night as we were SO ready to get out of there. Too much noise and such. So I know I have probably made alot of people upset with my review and maybe not because hopefully by know we all know that everyone has their own opinion of everything. But we have always liked this place as HIFS but to me it just seemed they smacked some nick characters up everywhere and put some playground/water equipment in to the side of the pool area and then charged double. (and this is coming from people who got the room for free with points!) We were not impressed and that also includes my DD who loved our previous stays here. My son however seemed to like the pool but was not interested in the slide areas at all. So he was just happy swimming in the same pool that we swam in when it was HIFS. He just wanted to swim in the main pool areas. Well he can do that anywhere! Now that he is home he talks about how great it was and we just laugh because he just swam in the plain basic pool and that was it!!
I will say that I wish I could get a room set up like that at disney for a nice price but that will never happen.

I am glad we gave it a try as I had been so curious about it and really like staying onsite at disney so had wanted to try it without taking any disney time away from us. Oh, and thats something else I should mention we are not disney deluxe people either! We have stayed at a deluxe once on a business trip and that was 5 years ago! But we don't expect all quiet and calm at our hotels all the time! Our last 2 trips were at Pop where it is nice and croweded and noisy! LOL And we will be back for our 3rd stay at Pop in 2 months!!

 

[LisaRay]

ok, I just want to say I am sorry my post was that long!! I had no idea it was going to be that long and when I saw it i was very embarrassed!!


SORRY!

 

[leight]

Lisaray- thanks for the review. I anticipate everything you are saying... however I am going mid-september when the crowd should be considerably less- so hopefully my 2 dds will get to enjoy the pool.

Question- is there a coffeepot or toaster in the kitchenette? Is the refridge dorm size- or big enough to hold some drinks and breakfast foods? We do get the charachter breakfast for free on Monday- but we will be doing it purely for the characters- so if they have cold cereal that will suffice!

 

[LisaRay]

leight: Thanks for not flaming me! here is some info for you.
I can't answer your question about the toaster and coffee pot as we were only there the one night and we had the character breakfast plus we don't drink coffee.

The fridge is not a full size it is a small one but not the smallest they make. Whenever we have gotten one at disney they are the smallest I have seen but these are a little bigger then that. It should be big enough for what you need it for. We used ours for some sodas.

Also my advice for hot food would be to go at a very busy time of morning but then again you may have more of a wait with the characters. If you are getting the free character breakfast everyday though you might be able to convince the kids to not sit and wait on each character everyday. We had to wait awhile for them all. But if I were going on more then one morning I would just see the ones that make it to us by the time we are done eating. And then the next day maybe you can see the others. Also Spongbob doesn't go around the room he stays put and you go to him. But we noticed he wasn't out all the time. When we got there he was not out and when we got done getting a pic with him he went back in. So when you see him you might want to go grab your pic with him before he disappears! And yes I am sure the pool crowds will be much less in Sept.! My DH and I kept thinking that some of those people at the pool should leave and go to the parks!! LOL!

 

[leight]

Lisaray- thanks for the quick reply back! Not too worried about the food at the Character breakfast at all- I'll be bringing some muffins,cereal, & waffle sticks for Sunday morning so I don't have to pay for a lousy buffet. We're only going for 2 nites so the only breakfast will be that Monday when it's free. I'll probably go around 8am-so hopefully it won't be too bad so I can get pics w/ Spongebob and my little one can see Dora. the food isn't as important- I can force DH to grab something back in the room before checkout!

We're looking forward to it purely as a fun time for the kids-and simply since we will have our own bed/tv in the suite!

 

[DisneyMomx7]

My almost 5 year old is the one who wants to go to the Nick hotel! Well, I'll wait a while and see if there are any deals.

I think I live near you. Are you in Mercer county?

Yes we're in Mercer County! Small world. My 5 year old LOVED the Nick Hotel. The only deal I got was a AAA discount, but hey every little bit helps.

 

[leight]

Robyn- do you recall if there are coffee makers or a toaster in the suite?

 

[taylor1293]

Robyn- do you recall if there are coffee makers or a toaster in the suite?

We've stayed there several times when it was HIFS. There is no toaster but there is a coffee maker.

http://www.nickhotel.com/sleep_2bdrm.jsp

Teresa

 

[leight]

Thanks! I'll bring my little toaster myself then. Only an hour away so I don't mind having a few extras in the trunk of the car!

 

[disneyfan3]

Lisaray:
Thank you for your honest report about the nick hotel. We are going Oct 6 the day after the halloween party. It will only be for one night so I think I can survive it. How late does the noise go on in the pool area? Did you have a problem sleeping? My son is 9 so he is almost out of the spongebob and the others. I have a feeling this will be our only trip considering the cost and the noise that I am anticipating. If the prices are starting this high when they have just opened you know they will go up so we are going to hurry up and go.
The reason you probably won't get flamed for your report is because it isn't a "disney hotel"......most people just have normal reactions to hotels that aren't on disney property.
I appreciate your heads up on the place. Don't worry about ruining someones vacation...now I know what to watch out for.
Thanks again...