SeaSpray
Disney World fan since 1976
- Joined
- Jan 11, 2001
- Messages
- 15,143
The start of my review:
First of all, I definitely did the "Polynesian Pout" last night as we walked out the front doors of the GCH. Did not want to leave. lol
Had a wonderful, warm welcome from the concierge CMs upon arrival. We checked out of the Wilderness Lodge then took the boat to the Magic Kingdom, then took the resorts boat to the Polynesian. We were hot and sweaty by the time we got to the Hawaii building, and the cold orange guava juice really hit the spot! We decided to just walk to the Hawaii building from the marina because it was so close. Initially I thought about heading to the valet area so we could get the golf cart ride, but decided not to.
We were checking in before lunch and our room was not ready yet, but that was fine with us since we had a PS for the Sci-Fi Dine In at MGM. We checked in, and the CM gave us a small card with the concierge's direct phone number on it so we could call and find out when our room would be ready. Oh, and we were greeted quite warmly, and immediately had leis around our necks
We even got to choose what color we wanted; DH and DSs chose all white, I chose the dark pink.
After lunch we went back to the Hawaii building and found out our room number. We were on the third floor, room number 3517, which is the second from the last, on the lagoon side of the third floor. A little bit of a walk, but boy was that view worth it! What a view. I can't wait until I post the pictures I took from our balcony. It was a perfect view of everything in the lagoon, with Cinderella's castle dead center, with absolutely no obstruction. I don't think there could be any better view than this!
Our room was in excellent shape. I saw no wear and tear at all. Our housekeeper did a very good job each day. We didn't get towel animals except for a small bird in the bathroom which held a brand new toothbrush and a small tube of toothpaste that they left for our use. The lack of towel animals was a non-issue for us.
Later that day, there was a knock on the door. A CM delivered a chocolate postcard with a color picture of the Polynesian resort on it! It came with a card, from the concierge staff, welcoming us to the resort. It's the same exact chocolate postcard that I have seen on Tikiman's site, and it was fun and exciting to get one ourselves!
On our anniversary, the concierge staff left a personalized, autographed picture of Jasmine and Alladin, for us. That was a very nice thought, and we appreciated it.
On the night of our anniversary I had pre-planned via the concierge staff to have the wedding cake that I ordered from the Grand Floridian bakery to be delivered to us at 'Ohana after dinner. This came off perfectly! It was a surprise for my DH. He was shocked when he saw our server walking towards us carrying the cake. He said "What is this, looks like our server has a cake for someone". I looked up and saw OUR cake being placed in the center of our table. Then the server annouced to everyone that it was our anniversary and they all applauded. It was a wonderful ending to our anniversary dinner! And I was relieved that my little surprise was handled so well by the concierge staff.
On our last full night at the resort, we got stuck in a downpour at the Magic Kingdom and by the time we got back to the Hawaii building, we were soaking wet and had missed our PS for Boma. On the way through the GCH I had stopped at the Kona Cafe to see if we could get a PS there for that night. It was a Saturday night and I could see that there were many people waiting for the Kona Cafe and 'Ohana. The CM told me that they were booked solid for that evening. I told her we were staying at the concierge building and asked if they would be able to help us with this. She said she didn't know. We went back to our building and walked over to the concierge CM desk area and a very nice male CM (looked like he could've been a model on the cover of GQ magazine! lol) helped us out. We explained the situation, and when I asked him if there was any way we could get into the Kona Cafe that night even though they were booked solid, he said "ABSOLUTELY!". He typed a few things in on his computer, asked us how many people were in our party (we were a part of 6 that night since we were meeting friends for dinner) and he printed out a slip of paper for us. He told us to make sure that we took that paper with us when we checked in at the Cafe. We even got to pick the exact time that we wanted to dine that night. When we checked in we had a very small wait, maybe 5-10 minutes. This is another example of why we really loved our Polynesian concierge experience
**...to be continued...**
Continuation:
Prior to our trip I had contacted the concierge pre-planning office and asked to have 4 of the gold Mickey ears hats embroidered with our names on them, and placed in our room. About a week or so before our trip, Disney World ran out of the gold ears, so I wasn't sure if concierge would be able to do this for me or not. When we checked into the Wilderness Lodge (also concierge), the hats were not there, and they weren't there on the second or third days, either. At this point, we had seen the gold ears in the parks, so I wanted to find out if concierge had ever gotten them or not. We asked the WL concierge CMs to please find out for us, because if concierge had not gotten them, we wanted to then get them ourselves, in one of the parks. WL concierge did finally get back to us and told us that they DID get the gold ears for us, and that they'd be placed in our room at the Polynesian. Sure enough, when we got to our room at the Polynesian, on our first day there, the gold Mickey ears were set up for us on the pillows on the daybed. And they were actually embroidered rather nicely, with thick black lettering, which is different than the thinner tan thread that they use in the parks. So this was another thing that concierge did for me, as a pre-trip request.
On our last day I called the concierge desk and was able to get a late check-out. The usual check out time is 11am, and late check out is 1pm. Also, it was wonderful to have the concierge lounge to relax in and have some last minute sodas and snacks before heading to the airport.
As for the Polynesian resort in general:
The view of the fireworks from the pool is AMAZING! We loved swimming at night and being able to see the fireworks go off over the castle. The lifeguards at the pool seemed to be doing a great job. There were 3 lifeguards on duty each day. Two of them would be seated on the high lifeguard chairs, and the third one would walk around the perimeter of the pool, and appeared to be looking down at the bottom of the pool.
The lobby is gorgeous. The sound of the water fall is very relaxing and soothing, especially when coming in from outside on a hot day. We saw CMs teaching guests how to use those soft white balls on a rope, and another time I saw CMs teaching guests how to string flowers to make a lei.
First of all, I definitely did the "Polynesian Pout" last night as we walked out the front doors of the GCH. Did not want to leave. lol
Had a wonderful, warm welcome from the concierge CMs upon arrival. We checked out of the Wilderness Lodge then took the boat to the Magic Kingdom, then took the resorts boat to the Polynesian. We were hot and sweaty by the time we got to the Hawaii building, and the cold orange guava juice really hit the spot! We decided to just walk to the Hawaii building from the marina because it was so close. Initially I thought about heading to the valet area so we could get the golf cart ride, but decided not to.
We were checking in before lunch and our room was not ready yet, but that was fine with us since we had a PS for the Sci-Fi Dine In at MGM. We checked in, and the CM gave us a small card with the concierge's direct phone number on it so we could call and find out when our room would be ready. Oh, and we were greeted quite warmly, and immediately had leis around our necks
We even got to choose what color we wanted; DH and DSs chose all white, I chose the dark pink. After lunch we went back to the Hawaii building and found out our room number. We were on the third floor, room number 3517, which is the second from the last, on the lagoon side of the third floor. A little bit of a walk, but boy was that view worth it! What a view. I can't wait until I post the pictures I took from our balcony. It was a perfect view of everything in the lagoon, with Cinderella's castle dead center, with absolutely no obstruction. I don't think there could be any better view than this!
Our room was in excellent shape. I saw no wear and tear at all. Our housekeeper did a very good job each day. We didn't get towel animals except for a small bird in the bathroom which held a brand new toothbrush and a small tube of toothpaste that they left for our use. The lack of towel animals was a non-issue for us.
Later that day, there was a knock on the door. A CM delivered a chocolate postcard with a color picture of the Polynesian resort on it! It came with a card, from the concierge staff, welcoming us to the resort. It's the same exact chocolate postcard that I have seen on Tikiman's site, and it was fun and exciting to get one ourselves!
On our anniversary, the concierge staff left a personalized, autographed picture of Jasmine and Alladin, for us. That was a very nice thought, and we appreciated it.
On the night of our anniversary I had pre-planned via the concierge staff to have the wedding cake that I ordered from the Grand Floridian bakery to be delivered to us at 'Ohana after dinner. This came off perfectly! It was a surprise for my DH. He was shocked when he saw our server walking towards us carrying the cake. He said "What is this, looks like our server has a cake for someone". I looked up and saw OUR cake being placed in the center of our table.
Then the server annouced to everyone that it was our anniversary and they all applauded. It was a wonderful ending to our anniversary dinner! And I was relieved that my little surprise was handled so well by the concierge staff. On our last full night at the resort, we got stuck in a downpour at the Magic Kingdom and by the time we got back to the Hawaii building, we were soaking wet and had missed our PS for Boma. On the way through the GCH I had stopped at the Kona Cafe to see if we could get a PS there for that night. It was a Saturday night and I could see that there were many people waiting for the Kona Cafe and 'Ohana. The CM told me that they were booked solid for that evening. I told her we were staying at the concierge building and asked if they would be able to help us with this. She said she didn't know. We went back to our building and walked over to the concierge CM desk area and a very nice male CM (looked like he could've been a model on the cover of GQ magazine! lol) helped us out. We explained the situation, and when I asked him if there was any way we could get into the Kona Cafe that night even though they were booked solid, he said "ABSOLUTELY!". He typed a few things in on his computer, asked us how many people were in our party (we were a part of 6 that night since we were meeting friends for dinner) and he printed out a slip of paper for us. He told us to make sure that we took that paper with us when we checked in at the Cafe. We even got to pick the exact time that we wanted to dine that night. When we checked in we had a very small wait, maybe 5-10 minutes. This is another example of why we really loved our Polynesian concierge experience
**...to be continued...**
Continuation:
Prior to our trip I had contacted the concierge pre-planning office and asked to have 4 of the gold Mickey ears hats embroidered with our names on them, and placed in our room. About a week or so before our trip, Disney World ran out of the gold ears, so I wasn't sure if concierge would be able to do this for me or not. When we checked into the Wilderness Lodge (also concierge), the hats were not there, and they weren't there on the second or third days, either. At this point, we had seen the gold ears in the parks, so I wanted to find out if concierge had ever gotten them or not. We asked the WL concierge CMs to please find out for us, because if concierge had not gotten them, we wanted to then get them ourselves, in one of the parks. WL concierge did finally get back to us and told us that they DID get the gold ears for us, and that they'd be placed in our room at the Polynesian. Sure enough, when we got to our room at the Polynesian, on our first day there, the gold Mickey ears were set up for us on the pillows on the daybed. And they were actually embroidered rather nicely, with thick black lettering, which is different than the thinner tan thread that they use in the parks.
So this was another thing that concierge did for me, as a pre-trip request.On our last day I called the concierge desk and was able to get a late check-out. The usual check out time is 11am, and late check out is 1pm. Also, it was wonderful to have the concierge lounge to relax in and have some last minute sodas and snacks before heading to the airport.
As for the Polynesian resort in general:
The view of the fireworks from the pool is AMAZING! We loved swimming at night and being able to see the fireworks go off over the castle. The lifeguards at the pool seemed to be doing a great job. There were 3 lifeguards on duty each day. Two of them would be seated on the high lifeguard chairs, and the third one would walk around the perimeter of the pool, and appeared to be looking down at the bottom of the pool.
The lobby is gorgeous. The sound of the water fall is very relaxing and soothing, especially when coming in from outside on a hot day. We saw CMs teaching guests how to use those soft white balls on a rope, and another time I saw CMs teaching guests how to string flowers to make a lei.
Sounds like a truly magical trip so far. I have found the Polynesian IPO staff to be amazing with all my pre-trip requests, and it was wonderful how they secured you an ADR at Kona Cafe at such short notice. They certainly work some magic 
