Portofino or Royal Pacific?

[Evanna]

We are taking our first trip to Orlando with our kids (12 and 9) and will be staying at Universal for a week. I am trying to chose between the Portofino Hotel and the Royal Pacific Hotel. We plan to spend a bit of time relaxing at the pools and hope to go back and forth to the parks during the day.

How would you compare the two hotels? It looks like the Portofino rooms are larger than the Royal Pacific rooms. What are the pools, restaurants, and proximity to the parks like for each hotel? How about the overall atmosphere?

 

[Disneyhappy]

We are taking our first trip to Orlando with our kids (12 and 9) and will be staying at Universal for a week. I am trying to chose between the Portofino Hotel and the Royal Pacific Hotel. We plan to spend a bit of time relaxing at the pools and hope to go back and forth to the parks during the day.

How would you compare the two hotels? It looks like the Portofino rooms are larger than the Royal Pacific rooms. What are the pools, restaurants, and proximity to the parks like for each hotel? How about the overall atmosphere?

Both are deluxes, but PBH is Universal's high end deluxe and RPR is the low end deluxe. The differences between high and low end are very subtle. RPR has smaller rooms but is a closer walk to the parks than PBH which, to me personally, is the only drawback to PBH - and that drawback is very minor. PBH like RPR will have a water taxi to Citiwalk where you gain access to the parks as well as a bus shuttle to the parks. Both have great pools. We always stayed at RPR club level for years. Last year DH and I went by ourselves for our 20th anniversay to PBH and fell in love. We switched our family trip one month later from RPR to PBH and have returned 2 more times since! You can't go wrong with either resort. PBH will cost more. Perhaps for a week's stay, I would go with the resort that has the larger rooms at PBH. You will be able to use any of the pools at the three resorts no matter where you stay. Either choice will be great! Good Luck!

 

[rpbert1]

All the resorts are excellent. We have always stayed at RPR as we love the themeing, although we did a split with PB in 2007, we had a few issues with things that happened and they moved us back to RPR.
We are staying at RPR in July, had 2 stays booked for July, but have just cancelled our stay on 21st July and booked PB again, it is a beautiful resort and they have a beach pool and a lovely Villa pool, you will not be disappointed with whichever one you pick

 

[minniejack]

I've only stayed at the PBH for one reason--we love the baths in the deluxe rooms. They have a bath and shower. I take disinfectant wipes with me (I'm weird like that) to make sure the tub is super clean and then soak with scented salts that I bring with me--aahhh...

 

[macraven]

no matter where you stay on site, you can pool hop to any of the other 2 hotels.
towels and pool toys are available at all the pools.
you only need to show your hotel room key for the above.

rph does not have a slide but hrh and pbh do.