We called a few times to check on the room, not that we weren't perfectly content at the pool but I was curious! Finally about 3:10 it was ready. Room 1504. Beautiful. I was apparently neighbors with Steve although we didn't realize until we got home. Anyway, lovely view of the castle. There are some palm trees between you and the lagoon and while it is possible to stand so that the trees block your view, it is also possible to stand so that the trees perfectly frame the castle. That's where I stood. For a really LONG time. Then I opened the sliding glass door, stepped outside of the patio and got that choked up feeling again. I can't imagine that there is a better view in all Disney World. I sat on a chair with my daughter in my lap just thinking about how fortunate we are.
Back in the room we encountered two problems that I'll tell you about, not because they were indicative in any way of our stay, but just to illustrate how quickly the staff worked to correct these problems.
First, when we took off our shoes it became obvious why we had to wait for the room. The carpets had just been shampooed. While it was nice to know that they were clean, they were also very wet. Not so comfy. I immediately informed the concierge desk. She asked what my plans for the evening were, and I told her we needed to get dressed for an early dinner at Chef Mickey's. She said they would not disturb us while we dressed, but as soon as we were leaving the room to let her know and housekeeping had some type of carpet blow dryer and they would dry the carpet. Well, I was a little suspicious as to whether or not it would be dry. But, when we returned after dinner - the carpet passed the bare foot test with flying colors! The rest or the week there was no dampness or musty smell, so I do believe it was wet from shampooing.
The other problem we had was when the luggage was brought to us. The two bags that were supposed to go in cold storage had not. They were as warm as everything else. When we pointed this out to the bellman, he immediately called the desk and asked for a manager. They offered first to pay for the items, but I wasn't really happy with that as I had taken time to make the stop so that I would have the food for the kids. So they offered to replace the items. This I thought was very fair. I sent the bellman with the two bags and the receipt. Again when we returned from dinner. All was fixed. All the items had been replaced and were in the fridge. My not so trusting husband suggested that maybe they had put the same items back in our fridge. But, ahh, no, I, the observant shopper had noticed the exact weight of my cold cuts (they had been way off the pound I had asked for) these in fact were different.
So the moral of these stories are, mistakes or problems can happen anywhere. I found the Polynesian staff very eager to fix our problems and to make sure we were happy. The other part of that is not to overreact and let yourself become to upset. If you have a problem, explain calmly what is wrong, and don't let a problem ruin your good time.
Back to the good time. We took the monorail over to Chef Mickey's for dinner. My husband liked this because usually from our BCV we must bus and monorail for our traditional 1st night dinner. At the Contemporary I worked hard at ushering my family through their great shops while we bought just the autograph books and pens. We were at Chef Mickey's for opening, had our picture taken and were soon in our seats in the main room. My birthday was not for a few days, but concierge had it noted on most of our dining PS so I was to enjoy MANY birthday celebrations. At CM the gave me a special placemat and birthday cupcake had the characters all come over to wish me happy birthday before the big song/celebration/napkin waving thing they do. The kids really enjoyed all this and of course they enjoyed seeing all their old friends (aka the characters) again. This is just such a great, fun place to begin a Disney vacation with kids. It really puts you in the LETS HAVE BIG FUN mood.
So with our big fun mood we decided to go to the MK. We took the walking path over to work off some of the food we had just eaten. This was the first time we had walked from the CR to MK. It is a pretty short enjoyable walk, even with full bellies, humid night and 2 kids! Hey we're in Disney World remember!!!
Here is one of the many times I wish I had jotted notes, I can't quite remember all we did there. We started with Goofy's Barnstormer, because the kids had promised Goofy (at Chef Mickey's) that we would. It's just zippy enough to ease everyone into roller coaster mood. And I do remember what we did last before we left the park. Mickey's Philharmagic. It was our first time. Magic is right. It was great! I loved it, the kids loved it, my DH and I loved the kids loving it. We decided to end on that high note and got out right before the parade started. That is somewhat like escaping. It was getting VERY crowded along main street. We were happy to get back to our room, especially when we discovered that all of our earlier problems had been fixed. Kids went right to sleep and DH and I watched the fireworks from the patio.
Wishes is soo beautiful. It was funny, a few times people started to clap like it was over, then it just kept going. But when it really was the end, you knew. Wow.
Time for a few sweet dreams before MK EE!
Tammy
Back in the room we encountered two problems that I'll tell you about, not because they were indicative in any way of our stay, but just to illustrate how quickly the staff worked to correct these problems.
First, when we took off our shoes it became obvious why we had to wait for the room. The carpets had just been shampooed. While it was nice to know that they were clean, they were also very wet. Not so comfy. I immediately informed the concierge desk. She asked what my plans for the evening were, and I told her we needed to get dressed for an early dinner at Chef Mickey's. She said they would not disturb us while we dressed, but as soon as we were leaving the room to let her know and housekeeping had some type of carpet blow dryer and they would dry the carpet. Well, I was a little suspicious as to whether or not it would be dry. But, when we returned after dinner - the carpet passed the bare foot test with flying colors! The rest or the week there was no dampness or musty smell, so I do believe it was wet from shampooing.
The other problem we had was when the luggage was brought to us. The two bags that were supposed to go in cold storage had not. They were as warm as everything else. When we pointed this out to the bellman, he immediately called the desk and asked for a manager. They offered first to pay for the items, but I wasn't really happy with that as I had taken time to make the stop so that I would have the food for the kids. So they offered to replace the items. This I thought was very fair. I sent the bellman with the two bags and the receipt. Again when we returned from dinner. All was fixed. All the items had been replaced and were in the fridge. My not so trusting husband suggested that maybe they had put the same items back in our fridge. But, ahh, no, I, the observant shopper had noticed the exact weight of my cold cuts (they had been way off the pound I had asked for) these in fact were different.
So the moral of these stories are, mistakes or problems can happen anywhere. I found the Polynesian staff very eager to fix our problems and to make sure we were happy. The other part of that is not to overreact and let yourself become to upset. If you have a problem, explain calmly what is wrong, and don't let a problem ruin your good time.
Back to the good time. We took the monorail over to Chef Mickey's for dinner. My husband liked this because usually from our BCV we must bus and monorail for our traditional 1st night dinner. At the Contemporary I worked hard at ushering my family through their great shops while we bought just the autograph books and pens. We were at Chef Mickey's for opening, had our picture taken and were soon in our seats in the main room. My birthday was not for a few days, but concierge had it noted on most of our dining PS so I was to enjoy MANY birthday celebrations. At CM the gave me a special placemat and birthday cupcake had the characters all come over to wish me happy birthday before the big song/celebration/napkin waving thing they do. The kids really enjoyed all this and of course they enjoyed seeing all their old friends (aka the characters) again. This is just such a great, fun place to begin a Disney vacation with kids. It really puts you in the LETS HAVE BIG FUN mood.
So with our big fun mood we decided to go to the MK. We took the walking path over to work off some of the food we had just eaten. This was the first time we had walked from the CR to MK. It is a pretty short enjoyable walk, even with full bellies, humid night and 2 kids! Hey we're in Disney World remember!!!
Here is one of the many times I wish I had jotted notes, I can't quite remember all we did there. We started with Goofy's Barnstormer, because the kids had promised Goofy (at Chef Mickey's) that we would. It's just zippy enough to ease everyone into roller coaster mood. And I do remember what we did last before we left the park. Mickey's Philharmagic. It was our first time. Magic is right. It was great! I loved it, the kids loved it, my DH and I loved the kids loving it. We decided to end on that high note and got out right before the parade started. That is somewhat like escaping. It was getting VERY crowded along main street. We were happy to get back to our room, especially when we discovered that all of our earlier problems had been fixed. Kids went right to sleep and DH and I watched the fireworks from the patio.
Wishes is soo beautiful. It was funny, a few times people started to clap like it was over, then it just kept going. But when it really was the end, you knew. Wow.
Time for a few sweet dreams before MK EE!
Tammy
