just returned from AKL my thoughts...

[ruttie]

We liked the Lodge had a great stay there but we realized that it was not the best fit for us... we are a family of 4 2 boys 5 &7 and while we liked the lodge we much preferred WL for our needs
here our our comparisons
AKL great theming
WL great theming
(WL wins a bit... for us the Wilderness lodge just seemed cozier had a more lodgey feel)

animals
well AKL certianly had this.. we had a savanna room 2306 we saw giraffe, cattle, ostrich, boars, numerous deer, acouple of beasts of some sort..etc... lots of birds form our balcony GREAT SPOT if you want to see GIRAFFE we saw them in the AM right outside or balcony and every evening also Usually 3 and they would pick on the ostrich quite a but my kids loved seeing the giraffe shove the big bird out of its way... also there was a great overlook just a few doors down form our room that allowed us to see the other side of the savana and see zebra and all the other stuff we missed...

service
our room was always clean but we just did not get the personal attention we felt we got at WL they seemd to pamper you more. no towel animals. AKL is considered to be a deluxe hotel and i really felt like i got no better service etc than when i stay at Port Orleans..
WL definetly makes you feel pamperd and has an elegant feel to it...

Food
my kids found the AKL food a bit to seasoned and they are not picky eaters I will say i liked the selection at MARAS much better than at WL but the food was the same and the long walk to MARAS was a huge turn off...

pool
my kids LOVED The slide at AKL and it was easy for us to sit and watch them go to teh slide (unlike contemprary that you loose sight of them for aminute and it is so high)
the slide at AKL seems to be one of there favs now right up there with Ol Man Island...
but if i had smaller kids i would be a bit upset the kiddie pool was very small i mean tiny I am glad my kids are 5 & 7... and can swim..
WL has a HUGE kidde pool compared to AKL the slide is smaller but it is also easy to see the kids as they make there way to the top ... but AKL was not tthis great spectacular pool i expected..
AKL simbas kids club was very nice they issue you beeper which i really like and it seemed very organized teh room was also twice as large as WL and had more to do and a better theme/atmosphere My kids really loved the kids club here and they paid special attention to them ....Mommie also enjoyed the SPA at AKL where i had a really good aromatharopy massage!!

kids activities in the lodge
my kids loved the medallion rubbings and the cookie decorating and the night vision goggles

transportation
well i hated it at AKL we had our own car but the walk to our car was a long one so we just said the heck with it and took the bus but even though we never waited more than 15 20 miutes for a bus it was still a long wait/ride and even longer walk to teh buses at the parks and at the lodge.... WL wins for its boat to MK and to contemporary where you could catch teh monorail....
overall we had a great time at AKL and are glad we stayed but we will prob not stay there again.. it was a very large resort and did not have the persaonl feel that we like. we felt like we were walking a longgggg way to everything. We also had a great rate so i cannot complain and it was worth it to try it out and see of we would like it.. but i would hesitate to pay reg price for this lodge it is advertised as a deluxe but i did not see anything that was spectacular to make it that way...
we had a great trip even though it RAINED most of the time and my kids LOVED the pirate "cruise" even though they had to stay and o it on dry land...
any questions fire away....

 

[Harambe]

I'm glad you at least tried AKL, and now you know it's just not a good fit for your family. I appreciate the fact that you didn't just say AKL stunk - it just isn't your first pick.

That's how we feel about GF - I know others love it, but it just wasn't for us. And as far as WL goes, we vacation in Maine every year, and WL doesn't have the exotic appeal of AKL for us. Again, just our opinion.

Thanks for your diplomatic review!

 

[PamNC]

We think AKL is so beautiful and I know we would enjoy the animals. But, the reason we haven't tried it is because it seems so far-removed. If we're staying deluxe, we want the convenience of a deluxe. Our goal is at some point to do a quickie weekend trip and stay at AKL IF they are offering a nice AP rate in concierge. That way we can try the Sunrise Safari. Otherwise, I wouldn't stay there for our week long visits. I want to be truly in the middle of the magic.

Case in point - we'll be at the Beach Club 7/2-7/9. Can't beat that location. Unless you're at a monorail resort of course. We like to flip between a monorail resort and an Epcot resort. You get two totally different vacations. Did WL once, we weren't overly impressed. The boat transportation was so slow and the rooms were small and dark. Not a horrible experience, but not a "I have to go back" feeling either.

PamNC

 

[puffkin]

Thanks for the review.

We really enjoyed the AKL and found it to be wonderfully themed, down to the tiniest details. I do have to disagree about the AKL not being worth the tag of a "DELUXE" resort. The animals alone make this resort Deluxe. Where else can you go and have zebras, giraffes and other animals right outside your balcony (except maybe an african lodge, which is out of the question for most people). I think that is worth the price alone, because you are paying for more than a room, you are paying for an experience.

I do agree about the pool. I was expecting something spectacular, but I found the pool to be merely ok. The slide was ok. We were there in December though, so we didn't do much swimming. I can imagine that pool would get packed though in warmer weather, and there isn't a quiet pool at the resort to ease the crowds. I thought the Volcano pool was much better at the Poly.

Thanks again for the great review.

 

[YCFAN]

I feel just like Pam. I love location when it comes to my resort but I still have the urge to want to try AKL. That's why for our next trip we're staying 7 nights at YC (location, location, location) and then transferring over to AKL for the final 3 nights. We're saving AK for the time we're at AKL and are hoping that will work out with also hanging around the resort.

 

[BostonRob]

Just want to add a thought about the pools at AKL. The kiddie pool there is tiny, but I'm not sure who it's for. We saw it and walked right by. My 2 year old daughter had a blast in the main pool. These zero entry pools are perfect for little kids - I think they make kiddie pools obsolete.

 

[WDW LifeLong Fan]

Thanks for your thoughtful review.

 

[Carolinagirl1063]

My family LOVES the AKL! We were booked in the Boardwalk for our July trip, I thought it would be a nice change for the family.....my 4 y/o just about had a melt down. She holds firm that it is not WDW unless you are sleeping with giraffes! I have since changed our booking to AKL. To each their own I suppose! Every family should stay where they are the happiest. I am booking a meal at WL to give my daughter a chance to look around and see if she is interested. Thanks for your review!

 

[ksoehrlein]

Just saw the Great Hotels episode about AKL, and DH and I are dying to try it. But even as we watched the show, I told him that if we stayed there, it would be a very different kind of WDW vacation than usual, with more time spent at the resort & AK and much less time at MK (it's just too darn far away). We'll probably do it when our kids are a little older, especially if they show an interest in zoology.

 

[tigerlilly]

Thank you for the wonderful review. We have been debating between the AKL and the WL. I have changed our reservations no less then 3 times lol. Right now we are holding a reservation for 9 nights at the AKL.
We live less then 2 hours from Yosemite and one hour from the Giant Sequioas so I decided to go with AKL at this point.
I read a lot about the "far removed" feeling of AKL but the only resort I would have to compare it too would be POR (stayed in 99 when it was DxL) and well the bus ride there to MK was pretty long also (especially when you stopped 5 times and had the farthest bus stop from the enterance to Every Park). Am I just wrong here?

 

[puffkin]

One other thing I forgot to mention was the transportation at AKL.

Yes, this park is farthest from MK, but it actually doesn't take as long as everyone thinks. Why? There is only ONE stop at the resort, then straight to the parks. No multiple stops at other resorts or bus stops. We also loved the bus stop here, the best at any of the parks. It is all under a roof (no standing out in the sun like at the values) and it is all under roof from the buidling down to the stop. I would say driving time to be 15 minutes to MK, 10 to MGM and Epcot, and about 3 minutes to Animal Kingdom. It takes 10 minutes just to get through the resort at POR, let alone the time it takes to get to the parks. I think other people tend to forget that. We didn't find this resort to be any more remote than the values, moderates, or WL.

That being said, nothing beats the monorail and we love the Poly, but it did take awhile to get from there to MGM/AK/and Downtown Disney. All the resorts will be convenient to some places, and not so much to others.

 

[ruttie]

thanks for being so kind... I am glad this review was taken the way it was intended to be helpful.. Don't get me wrong my kids LOVED there stay at AKL and we had been wanting to try it to see how we liked it so when at the last minute I decided to switch our WL and Poly ressies to an entire stay at AKL We are very happy we stayed there we now have a good basis for comparisons..
now on to some responses
Transportaion really was not that bad we had our car but elected to do the bus because
1. it was a hike to either car or bus
2. we would be traveling the same distance and figured maybe they had a shortcut
3. heck it is easy to get on off no keys driving parking etc..
we never waited more than 15 minutes and we were happy with the quick straight shot ride to where we needed to go but i juits want everyone to be prepared to WALK!!! I mean we walked alot and with 2 kids at the end of the day it was a hike to the buses at animal kingdom and at epcot specifically then to the room after we got off the bus...
We love walking are avid walkers but it really is a huge lodge...

POOL we were actually very surprised that the pool area was not as crowded as we thought it would be.. kids never had to wait to go down the slide and the lifeguards were very attentive...
another thing i am not sure i mentioned but the spa was great not to pricey and i felt very comfortable there as i am a bit "pooh" sized
Oh yeah the bugs were out in force here.. not mosquitos but something that bit the heck out of me on my legs.. We are floridians so we are use to the bugs but just a freindly reminder the bugs are out in force earlier than usual here..
The other thing i did not mention but will is that we did the pirate cruise at the GF (actually that was the purpose of the whole trip) it was raining and so we called and asked if we could cancel heck we don;t live very far away and the kids really wanted to do a pirate CRUISE!! they said no they had alternative activities planned and we could not cancel so of course we went.. my boys had a great time but it was just not worth it in my opinion they even had lunch sitting on the floor in a crowded kids room...it would have been so much easier for us to rescedule and come back another time for the cruise... we will be scheduling this again so they can do just that...I am hoping disney will reconsider there cancellation policy on teh pirate CRUISE if they cannot actually CRUISE!!!
Again our kids had a blast and if it is raining but not lightning that really is the best time to go.. no lines crowds etc....
oh another positive was that the bed at AKL was very comfortable and for us check in was a breeze no wait at all and teh front desk was very helpful when ever we needed a question answered...