Pop Century Review for 10/22-10/29...Long

[nwdisgal]

I always cringe when healthy folks complain about people on the ECVs because I believe in karma and the fact that whatever you throw out there comes back to you, most of the time ten fold. I don't use the ECVs as a rule but I did have to get one once. You do have to wait in line like everyone else and you don't get the best seats at shows at all. My 80yo father gets one when I take him and believe me, he'd much rather be able to walk and gets embarassed and nervous because of people like you who stare and complain while he's trying to get on the buses.

Yes, and there are also lots of people with conditions such as chronic heart disease and other related ailments requiring assistance that don't necessarily present a physically visible impairment.

 

[mattsdragon]

We stayed at POP a year ago and had a great time, we tried to book it for our honeymoon and ended up having to stay at All-Star Music. We were very disappointed in ASM and still talk about how much we liked POP.

From check-in until we left, everything was better about POP. Our clerk was amazing. She was friendly, knowlegable, and sincere. The rooms are nicer, I appreciate having a door to actually swing shut in the bathroom rather than a pocket door. The noise wasn't better or worse than at ASM, we were on the 3rd floor (80's building) and yes, you can hear things rolling, but as long as you aren't facing a pool, it's not too bad.

The bus service absolutely BLEW AWAY the busses at ASM. We never had to wait more than 20 minutes for anything, while we had to wait up to an hour on occasion for them at AllStar.

We found the food court to be better supplied for the ala carte items at POP, whereas at ASM, there were a lot of empty ice chests.

Oh, and the only problem I have with the wheelchair bound is that they get head of the line for rides and busses. They should have to wait for a certain amount of time before they actually can board anything (like if a ride wait is 45 minutes, then they should wait at least 30 minutes instead of going in backwards and jumping in the first available. . .it might deter the fakers).

If we hadn't joined DVC, we would be going to POP everytime, since military members can't actually get rooms at Shades Of Green with all the civilian employees taking them.

 

[Msslaydbug]

WOW - I am sorry you had such a bad time at Pop. I have to say we had a problem when booking our resort the first time . We thought we had 2 rooms at a diffrent resort and it ended up only being 1 reserved. Sooo we ended up at Pop. I was mortified and even cried !

We had a GREAT time when we there. I was So suprised that our family loved it !

I will tell you right up front I am a "hotel snob" when it comes to where I will stay when I go on vacation - ANYWHERE !. I have to have the room so quit at home and in a hotel that I could hear a pin drop - LOL. I did not have 1 problem with POP. Yes sometimes you could hear a toilet flush (and yes I read the reports on these boards and was listening to what I could hear) but it wasn't any louder than any other hotel I have stayed in.

We always rent a car when we go to WDW no matter where we are staying. I agree that the lines at POP looked terrible and was so thankful to be able to walk right to our car and hop in !

I don't like POp's food court but that is more because of the food. I am a pretty picky eater and didn't like anything in the food court.

Hope you like where you stay next time better !

 

[LuluLovesDisney]

I went with realistic expectations and I knew it would be more like a motel then a hotel. That being said-we will never stay there again.

When we arrived we were put in the one building I absolutely did not want (the 90's) I mentioned that we had requeted either the 50's or the 70's and the girl checking us in asked if I had guaranteed those requests. I looked very kindly at her and told her that she knew as well as I did that there was no guarantee of anything but I politley asked her to do what she could. She was able to get us two adjoining rooms in the 50's after about 1/2 an hour.

The good: The mousekeeping service was great. We had a towel animal everyday and my dd was just thrilled with them. The rooms were cleaned quite well and we never had any problem with the room not being done if we wanted to go back for a nap. The pools were also nice. They do not turn on the flowers in the Hippy Pool until 11 a.m. for some reason. The hotel did a good job communicating with us during the hurricane and they only closed everything down for 1/2 a day.

The bad: It is absolutely true...the walls are paper thin and it is ridiculous how bad it is. We were people who said "who cares about the room it is just a place to rest your head". Only problem with that is the rooms are so badly insulated that the little sleep we got was bad sleep at best and by the end of the week we were totally sleep deprived. How bad was it you may wonder? Well we heard someone in another room peeing and I kid you not we heard every little last drop of it. EWWWW!!!! Also there is the CONSTANT noise of suitcases being rolled outside your room at all hours. It is concrete so you hear everything. I pity anyone who has a baby next door to them. We had one for a few nights. Not at all the baby's fault, just a baby being a baby but we heard every gurgle, coo and cry that baby made.

The ugly: We had done ME and getting to the hotel was fine but the bus service from Pop to anywhere convinced us that we will be getting a rental car next time. One morning we waited 40 minutes to get a bus to MK. It was around the park opening so I don't know why they would not plan for more busses to be running. We were always waiting for busses and more times then not we stood for the ride. Keep in mind that you are going at highway speeds and if the bus slams on its brakes and if you are standing you will go flying. This happened on a bus from AK back to Pop and we were lucky enough not to be standing but an awful lot of people fell on us.
I kid you not when I say that the we waited more for the busses then we did for any ride we went on.

Overall I was not impressed with Pop. It was true that the lines in the food court were huge! Also, they are still not very well versed in what you can an can't get on the Dining Plan. One woman working in the back told me to ignore the cashiers because they didn't know what they were talking about...nice!

One side note...not Disney's fault just an observation. There were people riding those scooters EVERYWHERE! 99% of the time we had to wait for 1 or 2 scooters to board the bus. Dh noticed that it seemed like a convenient way to go. You never have to wait in line you just drive up and you are on the next bus that comes. At the shows that we saw the scooters were always in the best seats. Overall we just saw an awful lot of people who looked like they would have been fine without one. Please keep in mind I have no gripe what so ever for people who are truly handicapped it is the people taking advantage of it that just really annoy me. The same people you would see walking around in the restaurants later in the day. You could also tell the people who typically have a scooter or wheelchair because they knew how to drive the darn things. My mom almost got run over by a lady who could not figure out who to drive her scooter.

So take what you will from my review. I am just one person out of many and maybe we just got some exceptionally noisy rooms. I just know that I would not chance it again because in the end even though not a lot of time was spent in our room it is still very important to get a good nights sleep.

I agree with the wall-thinness part. I also heard the bathroom activities of my neighbors. I cannot understand why the designers didn't insulate the walls a little better. Pop Century would have much more repeat business if they didn't have this problem. They definitely should have thought of this.

As for lines, I arrived at 6 am and no one was there at all, so I can't complain.

I also did not eat at the food court, since we were in the parks all day.

 

[Pats Dragon]

Sorry that you didn't like POP. It is my favorite!

My sister has advanced cancer and is renting an ECV for the first time. She will walk around restaurants but will be exhausted even sitting up in the ECV.

Sometimes kids throw up from eating bad food or too much food and it isn't the parents fault!

 

[Gagebre]

We stayed our last two trips at POFQ and we waited several times 45 minutes (or a little longer a few times) for busses to different parks. Also I have always had excellent customer service at Pop but horrible service at ASMo. I really think it just depends on who is helping you and how good they are at their job. As to the ECV situation, I use to feel that some people took advantage of these but now have a different view about this. My sister has MS but you would not be able to tell unless she was having a really bad day. She would be unable to enjoy DW without an ECV.

 

[mommyoeo]

I have never, ever gotten the impression that anyone was taking advantage of having a wheel chair! That sounds utterly rediculous to me! There are way too many illnesses, complications and such that go unseen but are horribly FELT.

We traveled on the Pop bus a few times and yes, we did get to the front of the line. Did we beat anyone who was left standing onto any ride in the park? Of course not, because it takes us longer to go anywhere!

Were our lines shorter? Yep, usually. But then we waited for several "trains" or whatever like everyone else. We never walked right on. And the new rides are built with lines that allow the chairs to go in the stand-by lines with everyone else. Only the old rides had seperate lines, but even then there was still a wait, just as if we'd been in the stand-by line.

My mother absolutley did not know how to drive her ECV when she rented it. She injured her back almost a month before we were to go on the trip, and it very nearly stopped her from going. She had to learn, and the worst part is people jumping in front of her, thinking she could make the machine stop in an instant and defy the laws of motion. Her inexperience was because her injury was new, not because she was a fake.

I know you said that you are not talking about the poeple who really need the chairs... but I just to wanted to say that I really believe people are not taking advantage of it. Even if there were dishonest people, the "perks" are just not worth it. When all is said and done, I believe we all do about the same stuff in the parks at the end of the day

As for Pop, we never heard a peep and it was PACKED! I guess it depends on the room. Some must be built better than others.

We loved it from start to finish. The CMs at check in, the servers in lines, mousekeeping, luggage check.

I'm sorry your experience wasn't so great.

We can't wait to go back to Pop!!!

Other than the water moccasins, it was perfect...

 

[Forever a Princess]

I am so sorry that you did not like the Pop. Hearing your neighbor eliminating waste is not cool.

A little bit on the ECV thing. I injured my hip two years ago. Smack dab prior to a Disney trip and we still wanted to go.
Yep I'm young.
Yep I looked entirely normal.
I could walk on the hip for about 5-10 mintues at a time. Say from the lobby of a restarurant to the table.
I did not want to inconvenience guests so we broke apart/rebuilt the ECV from the trunk of the car. We did not take the bus system.
ECV's are harder to use then they look. You have to be constantly attentive to those around you.
I waited in line for my turn just like everyone else. One example is that we waited 40 mintues for the Train at AK to get to Rafiki's Planet Watch.

I thank God that my hip is better and that I only had to use the ECV once.

 

[kessieann]

Trust me I went really wanting to like POP. I had hoped my experience would be very different then reviews I had read seeing that opinions are so arbitrary. It just wasn't for us.

As for the scooters...I am totally aware of the fact that people can have disabilities that are not obvious. I am even more sensitive to that fact because my dad was in a wheelchair the year before he passed away. I know what hell he went through. I would wait an hour for someone to board a bus and not complain once if it was for a legitimate handicap. However, my original comment was based on fact by things we both overheard and saw that not all usage was legit. I certainly am not trying to downplay anyone's disability or need for a scooter

 

[TDC Nala]

Are people renting scooters just so they can get on the bus first? It seems kind of labor intensive to be hauled up the ramp and strapped in on every bus ride you want to take, then have to wait for the driver to unstrap you and lower you back down when you get where you're going. It's much easier to jump onto the bus and jump off. As the scooter riders have mentioned, they don't get to go first in line for rides and they don't always get the good seats at shows. If anybody out there is thinking of renting the scooter for the advantange, take notice it probably isn't worth it.

 

[vanyel]

I believe most people are legitamate that rent scooters/wheelchairs but I witnessed a misuse several years ago. We kept seeing a large family with one member in a wheelchair at Epcot. They seemed like they were passing everyone up in all the lines (I don't know if that's different know or not). The problem was that the person riding in the wheelchair varied and as we saw this, we listened to their conversation. This was a scam for this family as they were using this to get on the rides ahead of others.

I don't believe too many families would go to this length but I saw this one! My feelings is that people who this will get their just "reward" someday so I tried not to let it irritate me too much!

Thanks for your review on POP. We had considered it for our last trip, for a few days before moving to AKL but decided to just stay at CSR without moving. I'm really glad we did, especially after reading review like yours.

 

[JennyDrake]

When we arrived we were put in the one building I absolutely did not want (the 90's) I mentioned that we had requeted either the 50's or the 70's and the girl checking us in asked if I had guaranteed those requests. I looked very kindly at her and told her that she knew as well as I did that there was no guarantee of anything but I politley asked her to do what she could. She was able to get us two adjoining rooms in the 50's after about 1/2 an hour.

I'm sorry you had such a bad experience! We stayed there in April and had a good visit. May I ask which floor you stayed on?

 

[gigi1313]

When we arrived we were put in the one building I absolutely did not want (the 90's) I mentioned that we had requeted either the 50's or the 70's and the girl checking us in asked if I had guaranteed those requests. I looked very kindly at her and told her that she knew as well as I did that there was no guarantee of anything but I politley asked her to do what she could. She was able to get us two adjoining rooms in the 50's after about 1/2 an hour.

i bet those 90s rooms were as quiet as a tomb and you would have loved them!

totally j/k!

 

[#1DizGal]

I just got back a few weeks ago, and was in the 90s section, top floor, parking lot view - at my request. LOVED it! It was a quick hop-skip-and-jump thru the parking lot to get to the bus depot and food court. I'd do it again with no hesitation! No noise problems, and very few people in the computer pool.

 

[stemikger]

That's unfortunate that you didn't like my favoriate resort in Disney. I stayed there two years in a row and I never heard my neighbors. Maybe it depends on how light of a sleeper you are. By the time we got back to our room, we all just slept like babies and the noise was never an issue.

Also, please don't assume that all because you see people in and our of those electronic wheelcheers means they are able to walk the parks. Some people have conditions that are not apparent by looking at them.

So I would thank your lucky stars that you are not one of them and try not to judge people because you have to wait for a bus. I much rather wait for a bus then be in a wheelchair for any reason.

 

[boomhauer]

I can agree with several of the OP's points. The bus service at Pop is a joke. The lines are way too long. The lines at the food court are also way too long. Bad setup. They need more cashiers.

One thing I don't agree with is the noise level. I just don't see how this bothers some so much. I've stayed in the 50's, 70's and 80's. I didn't lose sleep one night due to noise in the rooms next door. As for the luggage rolling, that happens at every Disney Resort I've stayed at. Just never bothered me.

My biggest gripe with Pop is simply that it just doesn't feel very Disney to me.

 

[huey578]

I just received a Pop survey postcard in the mail. Has anyone gotten one of these?

 

[IzzysMom]

I'm sorry your stay was bad - We've never stayed at Pop but we are thinking about it for Feb.

About the ECV's - get used to them. The population is aging and more and more people will be using them to get around - bad knees, bad hips and bad backs.

 

[#1DizGal]

huey578 - I just received the survey card yesterday. The Disney resorts seem to be pretty consistent in sending these to me after my stays.

 

[CheshireVal]

I used to be one of those people who rolled her eyes at all the scooters... I really resented them for making me wait to get on the bus. I even started a few threads about them! (Which drew many flames my way).

However... over the summer my aunt (who is also a Disney-holic) was diagnosed with Stage 4 breast cancer. We are all (me, DH, my mom, brother, my aunt, cousins and their kids) are going on a big "magical gathering" over Christmas... it will probably be my aunt's last trip ever. And, since she will be taking her last dose of chemo the day before our trip, she will be using an ECV because the chemo makes her so weak.

So... I kind of feel like what goes around comes around. I won't complain about ECVs anymore.

And, yes, we will be staying at Pop!