DemonLlama
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Jun 27, 2000
- Messages
- 4,021
Our report this Christmas Eve with our second WL experience:
The Christmas decorations seemed a little more sparse, but this is going on memory from 4 years ago on our first trip. The tree is still beautiful, and is one that you should sit in the lobby and appreciate. The teepees, shields, canoes, and such are fun to discover in a comfy chair. It is still a lovely place to be at Christmas time. The music wasn't the regular Lodge mix, but all Christmas music.
We arrived at noon and our check in was quick, maybe 10 minutes total. They had a couple of choices already available for our woods view bunk bed room, either 3rd floor at the otter pond, 6th floor solid balcony but farther back over the service area rather than the pond. Since DD is too short to see over the solid balcony, and we wanted a true woods feel, we went with the 3rd floor. The castle was visible between the trees, and we watched Wishes from there several nights. On our last morning we were treated with two playing otters in the pond. The view was very pretty, and offered a private, secluded feeling. We love the theming of the resort, so this view was perfect. We had a courtyard view on trip #1 and would choose Woods view again over it. We were in room #3024.
Bags showed up in about 10 minutes and then we went down to Roaring Forks for lunch and our refillable mugs. Then we napped to get ready for MVMCP. The screaming toddler in 3026 woke us just before our wake up call. She was at it for about half an hour, so I was a bit worried that this was going to be a problem with our room. We had a connecting door to 3026, so that added to the ability to hear the screaming. However, we never heard this again, so they either checked out or this was a one time melt down.
The drawers are a bit small and tend to roll out and in loudly, since we heard these occasionally from the other room and I became very aware of how much noise we must have been making opening and shutting them. There are the four drawers under the TV, the closet, and three smaller drawers under the ice bucket and glasses. Between this we were just able to unpack and store all our clothes.
Housekeeping was ok, although we didn't get fresh glasses replaced a couple of days, and nearly ran out of shampoo since it wasn't replaced one day. We used the extra blanket in the closet one night, and it was removed and never replaced. But when we called for an extra pillow they brought one right up, and when we thought the remote had been taken out with the sheets, someone quickly found us another one that worked with our TV. The hair dryer went out, and someone replaced it shortly after we called.
The pool was nice, the slide just the right size for DD, age 9. We only swam once this trip, since we had some cold days mixed in.
The mercantile had a nice selection of things. I bought a turtleneck one afternoon and was told that while they could not send something up to my room (since we were on the way out) they would hold it in the back to pick up on our way back in. We didn't get back from MK until after 11:00 that night, so I went in the next day. The woman didn't seem to know about "holding things in the back" and when she went to check she said she couldn't find anything with my name or room number on it. I had to explain several times what the woman had told me the night before, produce the receipt, and wait about 20 minutes before she found it. Won't try that again.
We enjoyed the ferry service, time to soak it in and relax. If you are in a big hurry, be sure to leave early. Some times we went straight to the MK, and other times we went to FW first, but I'm not sure if you can tell when they pull up. The bus service was fine, with a shared bus to MGM with the Grand Floridian, and shared with Fort Wilderness stop for another park, although I can't remember if that was Epcot or AK. The Downtown Disney bus came at 8:30, so we arrived in plenty of time before the shops opened on our shopping day.
We only ate at Roaring Forks at the Lodge, and enjoyed the cheeseburgers, chili cheese dogs, and grilled chicked sandwiches. We usually ordered these without fries since we had chips and preferred eating in our room, but you have to know you can do this, since the menu doesn't show you this cheaper option.
Hmm, I'm trying to think of anything else to report. We had both kids' caricatures done by two different artists at the Lodge on two different evenings and this was fun to watch. The singers in the lobby were nice, and the fireplace is wonderful. I miss the woodhouse, smoky smell from 4 years ago.
Guess that's all that is coming to me at the moment. Feel free to ask any questions!
The Christmas decorations seemed a little more sparse, but this is going on memory from 4 years ago on our first trip. The tree is still beautiful, and is one that you should sit in the lobby and appreciate. The teepees, shields, canoes, and such are fun to discover in a comfy chair. It is still a lovely place to be at Christmas time. The music wasn't the regular Lodge mix, but all Christmas music.
We arrived at noon and our check in was quick, maybe 10 minutes total. They had a couple of choices already available for our woods view bunk bed room, either 3rd floor at the otter pond, 6th floor solid balcony but farther back over the service area rather than the pond. Since DD is too short to see over the solid balcony, and we wanted a true woods feel, we went with the 3rd floor. The castle was visible between the trees, and we watched Wishes from there several nights. On our last morning we were treated with two playing otters in the pond. The view was very pretty, and offered a private, secluded feeling. We love the theming of the resort, so this view was perfect. We had a courtyard view on trip #1 and would choose Woods view again over it. We were in room #3024.
Bags showed up in about 10 minutes and then we went down to Roaring Forks for lunch and our refillable mugs. Then we napped to get ready for MVMCP. The screaming toddler in 3026 woke us just before our wake up call. She was at it for about half an hour, so I was a bit worried that this was going to be a problem with our room. We had a connecting door to 3026, so that added to the ability to hear the screaming. However, we never heard this again, so they either checked out or this was a one time melt down.
The drawers are a bit small and tend to roll out and in loudly, since we heard these occasionally from the other room and I became very aware of how much noise we must have been making opening and shutting them. There are the four drawers under the TV, the closet, and three smaller drawers under the ice bucket and glasses. Between this we were just able to unpack and store all our clothes.
Housekeeping was ok, although we didn't get fresh glasses replaced a couple of days, and nearly ran out of shampoo since it wasn't replaced one day. We used the extra blanket in the closet one night, and it was removed and never replaced. But when we called for an extra pillow they brought one right up, and when we thought the remote had been taken out with the sheets, someone quickly found us another one that worked with our TV. The hair dryer went out, and someone replaced it shortly after we called.
The pool was nice, the slide just the right size for DD, age 9. We only swam once this trip, since we had some cold days mixed in.
The mercantile had a nice selection of things. I bought a turtleneck one afternoon and was told that while they could not send something up to my room (since we were on the way out) they would hold it in the back to pick up on our way back in. We didn't get back from MK until after 11:00 that night, so I went in the next day. The woman didn't seem to know about "holding things in the back" and when she went to check she said she couldn't find anything with my name or room number on it. I had to explain several times what the woman had told me the night before, produce the receipt, and wait about 20 minutes before she found it. Won't try that again.
We enjoyed the ferry service, time to soak it in and relax. If you are in a big hurry, be sure to leave early. Some times we went straight to the MK, and other times we went to FW first, but I'm not sure if you can tell when they pull up. The bus service was fine, with a shared bus to MGM with the Grand Floridian, and shared with Fort Wilderness stop for another park, although I can't remember if that was Epcot or AK. The Downtown Disney bus came at 8:30, so we arrived in plenty of time before the shops opened on our shopping day.
We only ate at Roaring Forks at the Lodge, and enjoyed the cheeseburgers, chili cheese dogs, and grilled chicked sandwiches. We usually ordered these without fries since we had chips and preferred eating in our room, but you have to know you can do this, since the menu doesn't show you this cheaper option.
Hmm, I'm trying to think of anything else to report. We had both kids' caricatures done by two different artists at the Lodge on two different evenings and this was fun to watch. The singers in the lobby were nice, and the fireplace is wonderful. I miss the woodhouse, smoky smell from 4 years ago.
Guess that's all that is coming to me at the moment. Feel free to ask any questions!
