SeaSpray
Disney World fan since 1976
- Joined
- Jan 11, 2001
- Messages
- 15,143
DH and I just got back late last night (actually it was early this morning!) from WDW and the Polynesian LVC. 
This was our best and favorite trip to WDW besides our very first onsite trip when our boys were younger, and it was our BEST time ever at the Polynesian resort!!! 
I am exhausted and DH and I took a ton of pictures, and I'll start to post them either tonight or tomorrow morning, but I just wanted to get this thread started.
We met MANY wonderful DIS families on this trip: Chamonix and her family, DisneyFan67 and his family, ADP and his family, LukenDC, and ConcKahuna, just to name a few.
We felt as if we were chatting with old friends, right from the moment we met each of these people. 
We saw TheRobbs and his family again, and FINALLY got to meet Tikiman and his family! 
There were many other DIS people too, and I apologise for not remembering the screen names but that's because they said they mainly lurk on the DIS. Hello to Lori and the other South Shore Ladies!! 
We were on the same flights as them, although we hadn't yet met them on the way down to Florida; on the flight back last night they were in the row right in front of us! And then there was the other very nice woman I spoke to, I can't remember her name, but we met on Saturday night on the beach at the Polynesian, right before Wishes started. She was VERY nice and so was her family. Anyway, suffice it to say that literally EVERYONE we met during this trip was SO nice and friendly, and it really made the trip a very, very special one for DH and I. I will be going into greater detail on my web site, I'll be creating a separate page specifically to show the pictures of all the fun we had together with all of the great people we met on this trip! Oh, and Chamonix and I DID end up on the third floor, in rooms right next to each other!!! 
Ok, so back to the Polynesian resort! We noticed a few differences right off the bat; we heard the music to Wishes louder than ever, from our balcony on the third floor. The speakers on the beach were GREAT, and we heard beautiful Hawaiian/Polynesian music wherever we walked on the grounds of the resort. Apparently they've just finished installing new speakers within the past month, and they sounded GREAT.
Another thing we noticed was that EVERY SINGLE tiki torch was lit, every single night. On our last stay, we noticed that a couple of them weren't lit, but this time, they were all in full blaze, and it creates such a beautiful, tropical, relaxing ambiance...
The pool was GREAT! We swam yesterday morning from 9am until noon, and it was not crowded. It did get more crowded later in the afternoons, but honestly it never appeared to me to be *too* crowded. But hey, that can personal opinion; what I find to be not too crowded, someone else can think is crowded. There are several small wooden "buildings" that hold piles of clean fresh towels, located around the perimeter of the pool, and right next to each one of those is another wood receptacle to hold the used towels. I took more pictures on this trip than I have on any other trip, and eventually I WILL get them posted! lol And I finally went down the slide of the volcano pool. It was fun!!!!
They've added some swings-for-2 on the beach, facing the lagoon, along with the hammocks. There were plenty of chaise lounges along the beach, too. We never had trouble finding a table with an umbrella over near the pool bar to put our towels and other items, while we swam.
We saw more wildlife during this trip than we have on previous stays; on Sunday morning I woke up, walked out onto the balcony and after admiring the castle and the rest of the lagoon for a few minutes I looked down and saw a bunny rabbit nibbling some leaves on the ground right below me, as well as ducks and a few pelicans. We saw a lot of butterflies, too, as well as the geckos which was actually get a kick out of, and we photographed all of these.
As we walked around every day I looked for trash and overflowing trash cans but never found them. I had my camera ready, I was going to take pictures of trash if I saw it, but I didn't. I DID however take tons of pictures of the grounds, and you'll be able to see how great everything looked.
Housekeeping was fine; by the time we returned to our room each day (usually after lunch) our room was all done, and when we returned in the evenings, turndown had been completed; beds turned down, chocolates in place, and the lighting was soft. VERY inviting, along a long, fun-filled day.
We stopped by the concierge desk and picked up a list of the DVDs they have for the concierge guests to borrow; we signed out "National Treasure" and "Pirates 2". On our last day we dropped them off at the concierge desk.
Surprisingly, on this trip I got very few pictures of the concierge offerings because every morning we had breakfast at the Kona Cafe (the Kona coffee press pot is awesome!! and yes, I have pictures of that! LOL), we always were out for lunch, and we were out for dinner, although we did stop in one night for a quick bite when our dinner ADR was later in the evening. We never did see any of the dessert offerings, but I did get a picture of the wines they offered, as well as the cordials. I think we stopped in the lounge one morning and snapped pictures of the breakfast offerings.
What else...what else....
Oh yeah! We had a couple of "special moments" on this trip including receiving the "Year of a Million Dreams" blue Mickey ears hats, but they're unrelated to the resort, so I'll post about those on my web page.
Oh and one last thing.... the scent of the Great Ceremonial House is as wonderful as ever! Every single time we stepped inside, I couldn't resist taking a deep breath.....
That's it for now, if anyone has any questions I'd be happy to try and answer them...and in the meantime I'll try and work on getting some pictures up!
P.S. There was one particular concierge desk CM who was extremely friendly, always greeted us by name and with a smile and an "Aloha!", and who always seemed eager to help us with any questions we had, and also to help us with the changes in our ADRs that we wanted. Hi WES!!!
P.P.S. We upgraded our 2-day tickets to Park Hoppers and now we're planning our next trip for next May, and we'll definitely be staying at the Polynesian!!! On this trip, we decided that there's really no other resort that suits us as well, and that we feel more comfortable at. This isn't to say that I won't stay at other resorts on other trips if I go with friends, but as for family trips and "DH and I" trips, it's only the Polynesian from now on!
P.P.P.S. I JUST added (8/12/07) the pictures from the tiki party that many of us DISers attended. To see the page, go to my web page, then click the link for "Disney Vacations", and it's the first section of that page. Enjoy
This was our best and favorite trip to WDW besides our very first onsite trip when our boys were younger, and it was our BEST time ever at the Polynesian resort!!! I am exhausted and DH and I took a ton of pictures, and I'll start to post them either tonight or tomorrow morning, but I just wanted to get this thread started.
We met MANY wonderful DIS families on this trip: Chamonix and her family, DisneyFan67 and his family, ADP and his family, LukenDC, and ConcKahuna, just to name a few.
We felt as if we were chatting with old friends, right from the moment we met each of these people. We saw TheRobbs and his family again, and FINALLY got to meet Tikiman and his family! There were many other DIS people too, and I apologise for not remembering the screen names but that's because they said they mainly lurk on the DIS. Hello to Lori and the other South Shore Ladies!! We were on the same flights as them, although we hadn't yet met them on the way down to Florida; on the flight back last night they were in the row right in front of us! And then there was the other very nice woman I spoke to, I can't remember her name, but we met on Saturday night on the beach at the Polynesian, right before Wishes started. She was VERY nice and so was her family. Anyway, suffice it to say that literally EVERYONE we met during this trip was SO nice and friendly, and it really made the trip a very, very special one for DH and I. I will be going into greater detail on my web site, I'll be creating a separate page specifically to show the pictures of all the fun we had together with all of the great people we met on this trip! Oh, and Chamonix and I DID end up on the third floor, in rooms right next to each other!!! Ok, so back to the Polynesian resort! We noticed a few differences right off the bat; we heard the music to Wishes louder than ever, from our balcony on the third floor. The speakers on the beach were GREAT, and we heard beautiful Hawaiian/Polynesian music wherever we walked on the grounds of the resort. Apparently they've just finished installing new speakers within the past month, and they sounded GREAT.
Another thing we noticed was that EVERY SINGLE tiki torch was lit, every single night. On our last stay, we noticed that a couple of them weren't lit, but this time, they were all in full blaze, and it creates such a beautiful, tropical, relaxing ambiance...
The pool was GREAT! We swam yesterday morning from 9am until noon, and it was not crowded. It did get more crowded later in the afternoons, but honestly it never appeared to me to be *too* crowded. But hey, that can personal opinion; what I find to be not too crowded, someone else can think is crowded. There are several small wooden "buildings" that hold piles of clean fresh towels, located around the perimeter of the pool, and right next to each one of those is another wood receptacle to hold the used towels. I took more pictures on this trip than I have on any other trip, and eventually I WILL get them posted! lol And I finally went down the slide of the volcano pool. It was fun!!!!
They've added some swings-for-2 on the beach, facing the lagoon, along with the hammocks. There were plenty of chaise lounges along the beach, too. We never had trouble finding a table with an umbrella over near the pool bar to put our towels and other items, while we swam.
We saw more wildlife during this trip than we have on previous stays; on Sunday morning I woke up, walked out onto the balcony and after admiring the castle and the rest of the lagoon for a few minutes I looked down and saw a bunny rabbit nibbling some leaves on the ground right below me, as well as ducks and a few pelicans. We saw a lot of butterflies, too, as well as the geckos which was actually get a kick out of, and we photographed all of these.
As we walked around every day I looked for trash and overflowing trash cans but never found them. I had my camera ready, I was going to take pictures of trash if I saw it, but I didn't. I DID however take tons of pictures of the grounds, and you'll be able to see how great everything looked.
Housekeeping was fine; by the time we returned to our room each day (usually after lunch) our room was all done, and when we returned in the evenings, turndown had been completed; beds turned down, chocolates in place, and the lighting was soft.
VERY inviting, along a long, fun-filled day. We stopped by the concierge desk and picked up a list of the DVDs they have for the concierge guests to borrow; we signed out "National Treasure" and "Pirates 2". On our last day we dropped them off at the concierge desk.
Surprisingly, on this trip I got very few pictures of the concierge offerings because every morning we had breakfast at the Kona Cafe (the Kona coffee press pot is awesome!! and yes, I have pictures of that! LOL), we always were out for lunch, and we were out for dinner, although we did stop in one night for a quick bite when our dinner ADR was later in the evening. We never did see any of the dessert offerings, but I did get a picture of the wines they offered, as well as the cordials. I think we stopped in the lounge one morning and snapped pictures of the breakfast offerings.
What else...what else....
Oh yeah! We had a couple of "special moments" on this trip including receiving the "Year of a Million Dreams" blue Mickey ears hats, but they're unrelated to the resort, so I'll post about those on my web page.
Oh and one last thing.... the scent of the Great Ceremonial House is as wonderful as ever! Every single time we stepped inside, I couldn't resist taking a deep breath.....
That's it for now, if anyone has any questions I'd be happy to try and answer them...and in the meantime I'll try and work on getting some pictures up!
P.S. There was one particular concierge desk CM who was extremely friendly, always greeted us by name and with a smile and an "Aloha!", and who always seemed eager to help us with any questions we had, and also to help us with the changes in our ADRs that we wanted. Hi WES!!!
P.P.S. We upgraded our 2-day tickets to Park Hoppers and now we're planning our next trip for next May, and we'll definitely be staying at the Polynesian!!!
On this trip, we decided that there's really no other resort that suits us as well, and that we feel more comfortable at. This isn't to say that I won't stay at other resorts on other trips if I go with friends, but as for family trips and "DH and I" trips, it's only the Polynesian from now on! P.P.P.S. I JUST added (8/12/07) the pictures from the tiki party that many of us DISers attended. To see the page, go to my web page, then click the link for "Disney Vacations", and it's the first section of that page. Enjoy
in January-Can't wait! Reading about your trip is great!
Looking at them I can't wait for my families stay in December at the Polyesian and I hope that we have a great time, the way you're family did.
They're the "Pina CoLAVA", and we had them at the Tambu Lounge as well as poolside. 
