The New and Updated Port Orleans Riverside FAQ Thread for 2008 --- NOW CLOSED

[redhead09]

So, I know POR has an ATM.....can anyone tell me if it's a Chase ATM?
I know the parks ATM's are Chase, I am hoping that POR's are too!

Also, has anyone used their Chase card - and I assume the fee is waived?

 

[sarbah77]

So, I know POR has an ATM.....can anyone tell me if it's a Chase ATM?
I know the parks ATM's are Chase, I am hoping that POR's are too!

Also, has anyone used their Chase card - and I assume the fee is waived?

It's a Chase ATM. My friend has a Chase debit card that she uses there!

Just back, btw. Ended up in building 15 with a parking lot view. SO close to the main bus stop though!

 

[redhead09]

It's a Chase ATM. My friend has a Chase debit card that she uses there!

Just back, btw. Ended up in building 15 with a parking lot view. SO close to the main bus stop though!

Thanks!!! Good to know - just in case
Hey, a parking lot view is AOK with me.....Don't expect to spend too many daylight hours there . hope you had fun!

 

[lucas]

What time do the boats start running to DTD?

 

[sarbah77]

Thanks!!! Good to know - just in case
Hey, a parking lot view is AOK with me.....Don't expect to spend too many daylight hours there . hope you had fun!

Had a GREAT time. It was hot hot hot but the crowds were light and extremely mellow. The parking lot view was fine - we weren't there a lot and the AC would block out any potential noise we had. Mousekeeping was fine.

I had lunch at the resort for the first time ever... and had a YUMMY roast beef and blue cheese sandwich. I had one of their yogurt parfaits for breakfast yesterday... and the dessert counter is TO DIE FOR. Thursday night, I got a super-yummy piece of chocolate cake (with a fudgey frosting). Friday lunch, my friend and I split a piece of carrot cake (with cream cheese frosting!) and one of the personal apple pies, which was still warm - heavenly!

Concierge was friendly and helpful. The online check-in meant I walked up to a counter, showed ID, picked up my paperwork, and was on my way super-quick.

And they have some of the Halloween stuff in the resort hotel. I was all set.

(my non-resort meals were FABULOUS, the waitstaff was exceptionally cheerful, and it was an all around top notch trip... it was a last minute-ish planned trip, for my friend's birthday which is today though we went home yesterday and before my major knee surgery in a few weeks.)

 

[andrewilley]

What time do the boats start running to DTD?

10am.

Andre

 

[duffy]

but the more I read the more questions I have!!!

We're staying in a standard view room at POR from 10/10 to 10/17 - 8 people in 2 rooms...

Rm. 1

Me
My BF
BF's BFF since Jr. HS (my co-worker and neighbor D - 1st trip ever to WDW)
My DD #3 (7) - we're looking to stay in AB for the trundles.

Rm. 2

My BFF
Her DH
My DD #1 (14)
My DD #2 (11)

Joining us for our trip are also:

SIL, Darling Niece (turning 6 in WDW), SIL's Mom - they have a separate reservation and are staying at POFQ
My Mom - has her own reservation; arriving on 10/13; staying at POR

Now for my questions:

1) Given that it's a standard view room, what are the odds of my getting one of my first choice buildings in AB (14, 15, 18, or 27) if I put in a room request with my online check-in? Are these mostly water views? The resort is huge and it is Columbus Day weekend when we arrive, but I REALLY don't want to get stuck in the back 40 between the North and West depots. D has mobility issues (nothing major but he's a BIG guy who is not in the best shape and is starting to have early size-related health issues; one of the reasons for including him on this trip was to give him a fitness goal of "getting ready for Disney") and when you combine that with "childhood dream coming true" giddiness, I hate to think about how he'll hold up with a long walk after a potentially crowded bus.

2) Given that two of my kids are staying with BFF in her room, do they have connecting rooms with two double beds in each? For TRUE POR fanatics - know the room numbers for connecting rooms with two double beds in each in buildings 14, 15, 18 or 27?

3) Let's say there's nothing else available but rooms nowhere near my older girls in the buildings furthest from the pool and food court; if I keep politely pestering the front desk (I am a master of the polite pester) would they move us? What would be the best hour for polite pestering? I usually try to time it for after check-out at 11 but before check-in at 3.

4) I'm assuming that since we are all staying at the same resort, it wouldn't be a HUGE deal if any of the DD's had "sleepovers" with SIL in POFQ or with my mom in her room, would it? DN is an only child and she and DD #3 swear they will have "sleep-overs every night". My BFF and her DH will be celebrating their 4th wedding anniversay while we are there and after my mom comes I figure they could have some privacy - the girls and I were in the wedding party and we're glad to share in celebrating their anniversay but they should have "alone time"

5) How much are the "mommy beverages" in the River Roost or at the pool bars? SIL and I are looking forward to kicking back on vacation since we don't usually get a chance to at home - one of us always has a long drive with at least one kid in the car.

6) Would a twin-sized air-mattress fit in the rooms? If we brought one, would Mousekeeping turn us in to the front desk if it's not deflated every morning? This is really regarding SIL in POFQ - SIL had a traumatic split and DN has only recently started sleeping in her own bed. DN insists that she is "sleeping by herself at Disney" but SIL is caught between possibly setting back her progress OR sharing a bed with HER mom (which she does not want to do). LIKEWISE if we could use an air-mattress for DD #3, we could look into staying in one of the mansion rooms (the elevator would be good for D and my mom will undoubtedly want one of those - her idea of "roughing it" is no room service)

7) When does the campfire start for the "winter season"? Will we be there for it in October? Do they still do it and do they do it every night or just some nights? If they have the campfire, do they have s'mores? We LOVE s'mores!

8) The carriage rides in FW become "spooky" for the Halloween season - do they do this at POR too? We were going to stay at FW (before free dining came along and we upgraded) and the big girls were really looking forward to the spooky carriage ride but I don't want to make a special trip over there just for that.

9) I want to arrange a "Happy Birthday" wake-up call for DN on her birthday - do I have a choice of characters or is it usually just Mickey? She's not a huge phone kid so if it's not someone she REALLY wants to talk to she'll refuse to get on the phone

Thanks for any and all help you can give me with this!

I can't help much, but when I looked up drinks at the River Roost on the dining info, I only got "price varies". But I'd imagine that they are similar in price to the Muddy Rivers menu, which I have copied and pasted here:

Frozen Specialty Drinks - Choose from Pina CoLAVA or Orange Dream $7.50, and Mango Margarita $10.25. - $7.50
Non-Alcoholic Specialty Drinks - Choose from Sour Apple Freeze, Lava Smoothie, and Orange Freeze. Priced $3.99 to $4.29 - $3.99
On the Rocks Specialty Drinks - Choose from Poolside Lemonade $7.25, Captain's Mai Tai $8.25, and the Ultimate Long Island Iced Tea $9.25. - $7.25
Selection of Beer & Wine - 16oz draft beer $4.50, Bottle/can beer $4.75-$7.75, and Wine: Pinot grigio, Chardonnay, Merlot, White zinfandel, and Shiraz $6.10
Selection of Soda & Water - Soft drinks $2.09, Rockstar energy drink $3.79 and Evian bottled water $3.25. - $2.09

 

[twoplustwins]

"Every time you pluralize a word by adding an apostrophe and an "s", God kills a kitten.

Please, think of the kittens. "


That is too funny!

 

[duffy]

Thanks!

Every time I think of changing my picture, someone posts something like this, so I decide to keep it.

Little by little, we can conquer improper use of apostrophes. There is a cure.

 

[Pixiedust34]

"Every time you pluralize a word by adding an apostrophe and an "s", God kills a kitten.

Please, think of the kittens. "


That is too funny!

Thanks!

Every time I think of changing my picture, someone posts something like this, so I decide to keep it.

Little by little, we can conquer improper use of apostrophes. There is a cure.

Have you seen this website?

http://www.apostropheabuse.com/

You'll love it!

To keep my post on topic...........I read on TMFL email loop that POR is replacing the trundle mattresses with cheaper (read: thinner) mattresses due to spilling and other damage. Can anyone confirm this?

 

[Calgary DISHeads]

Thanks!

Every time I think of changing my picture, someone posts something like this, so I decide to keep it.

Little by little, we can conquer improper use of apostrophes. There is a cure.

I'm going to add this to my auto signature at work (I won't or I'll get fired) but it's a great thought Love it!

 

[andrewilley]

but the more I read the more questions I have!!!

I missed this one last time, probably as I would have been jet-lagged and planned to come back to it later! LOL

A few quick answers:

Most AB rooms are not water view (maybe 25% max are water view?)

There are plenty of connecting rooms that have two double beds in each room. You will not be guaranteed a connecting room though, unless the second room is occupied by minors only.

Building requests are a bit hit-or-miss at the moment, especially at busy times, and you are very unlikely to get both a building request and a connecting room unless you're very lucky. Asking at the front desk (be polite and work with them!) can help though, especially if you check in nice and early but are prepapred to wait until later in the day for rooms to become available. They may need to get a supervisor to check this for you though, as many of the Front Desk staff only seem to have access to current Ready Rooms on their screens.

Once you've got your rooms, there will be no problems with the kids swapping around as they want.

For bar snack and drink details, see the lists on my website, such as the River Roost or Muddy Rivers pages.

I rather doubt a twin air matress would fit in the room, but you could try.

The campfire usually starts at the end of October on selected nights (Sunday and Thursday last year) and yes you can buy smores there.

POR carriage rides don't usually become 'Spooky', although there may be some halloween stuff done around the resort by housekeeping (but nothing much official, not like Xmas for example).

Ask at the front desk about birthday phone calls, I had one from Goofy. They will almost certainly arrange for a card to be sent to the room too.


Phew...

Andre

 

[sarbah77]

Our room - 1502 - was a connecting room. Sometimes, I don't understand, since it was two of us, in a room for 5, that connected. I kept wondering "man, there's got to be some family that wants this."

I will say, though, that we did run the AC all the time and aside from an exuberant child one night, having the connecting room (that we didn't want) wasn't as noisy as we feared!

 

[lucas]

The campfire usually starts at the end of October on selected nights (Sunday and Thursday last year) and yes you can buy smores there.

Andre

Ohhhhh, campfires! That is what I meant when I previously asked about movies at night - but I was confused. I thought I had heard about something at night!

Can you print Southwest boarding passes at POR? If so, where?
Or, what about at Guest Services in the parks - do they do it there?



BTW, love love love your website. It is fantastic!

 

[bolgers love wdw]

We just got back from our first stay at POR!!!

We absolutely LOVED this resort!!!

We did a split stay between POR and the Polynesian and we wish we would have never left POR!! My husband has been going to Disney for 33 years now and only stayed at the Poly until our honeymoon in 2004. I made him try some other resorts and he is so happy that I did! We LOVE the WL, but to save some money this year we decided to try the moderates and we really love them!! We tried CBR in May and loved it...so we decided for this trip to try POR and loved it even more!!! It was an excellent stay and now our only problem is where to decide to stay for our trip in May!!!

 

[Calgary DISHeads]

We just got back from our first stay at POR!!!

We absolutely LOVED this resort!!!

We did a split stay between POR and the Polynesian and we wish we would have never left POR!! My husband has been going to Disney for 33 years now and only stayed at the Poly until our honeymoon in 2004. I made him try some other resorts and he is so happy that I did! We LOVE the WL, but to save some money this year we decided to try the moderates and we really love them!! We tried CBR in May and loved it...so we decided for this trip to try POR and loved it even more!!! It was an excellent stay and now our only problem is where to decide to stay for our trip in May!!!

That is great to hear. We have stayed all the way from value to deluxe like many out there and have no issues with any level - a bed is a bed. We really enjoyed Pop Century and really loved the Poly, the Poly mainly due to the location. This is our first time at POR and are really looking forward to it. I'm a stressor about where our room is - I like being central to all things - and this can make or break a vacation for me, especially since we are there for two weeks, but hopefully it will all work out.

 

[sweetmonkey]

We are going Oct 24-31 and traveling with my inlaws (mid & late 50's) and our 2 kids (DD 4 and DS 8months). We will have some mobility issues (DMIL had achiles tendon surgery and has mobility issues as do I from various injuries in an accident) but get around pretty well if we take it somewhat easy and can avoid stairs. Would we need to go through disability services to get our rooms reasonably close if we want to stay in the mansions? I am planning to fax the requests over again 5 days before arrival.

Really I don't care about being close to the dining hall as much as being close to the bus stop. We requested connecting rooms since we have small children but it will be fine if that isn't possible. Really my worst fear is a second story AB room way out in the boonies! MIL is not a "woodsy" kind of person, definitely more "southern belle." We might never hear the end of it if we had to walk far to get to our 'backwoods' cottage - even at Disney World!!!

 

[Yarna]

I got our travel documents, Magical Express passport, etc in the mail today. Disney is rapidly approaching!!

 

[SoosieQ]

We just came back yesterday from 9-nights at Port Orleans- French Quarter. I have to say that I have a new favorite moderate resort (the previous favorite was POR). I just loved staying at this resort. We were in building 4, 3rd floor (both requested). The food court was great, the pool area was great and the 1 bus stop was great! Our only complaint was that the elevator was quite a walk from our room. Which wasn't too bad in the morning as we could walk down the stairs but in the evening coming back it was a little tougher. . If my friend hadn't had knee surgery a couple of weeks ago we could have walked up the stairs no problem.

 

[Calgary DISHeads]

We just came back yesterday from 9-nights at Port Orleans- French Quarter. I have to say that I have a new favorite moderate resort (the previous favorite was POR). I just loved staying at this resort. We were in building 4, 3rd floor (both requested). The food court was great, the pool area was great and the 1 bus stop was great! Our only complaint was that the elevator was quite a walk from our room. Which wasn't too bad in the morning as we could walk down the stairs but in the evening coming back it was a little tougher. . If my friend hadn't had knee surgery a couple of weeks ago we could have walked up the stairs no problem.

What this made your new favorite over POR?