It’s taken me a little while, but I want to post my thoughts/reviews of our stay at the GF from April 16 – 21.
As you may recall from my initial posts on this thread, we were originally booked to stay at the BC for this trip but changed to the GF at exactly four weeks out when we learned that a significant portion of SAB was going to be closed during our stay
. (NB, from what I understand the work on SAB ended up being finished before we got there so everyone staying at the BC can thank me for that – because that’s exactly the kind of luck we have.
But we still have no regrets at all about the switch).
We arrived at the GF around 11 a.m. via DME and were greeted by a CM with a clipboard. This happened when we stayed there last time because we were in Sugarloaf, but since we were booked with a standard gardenview room this time, I had a momentary flicker of excitement thinking we’d been upgraded
but instead she just escorted us to the next available CM at the check-in counter, Peter from the U.K. Oh well, no upgrade but it was still a nice, friendly way to arrive.
Peter was “earning his ears” and was very friendly and thorough. I asked if he could see which building we were assigned to and he said Sago Cay. I had suspected that we might end up here because I’d noted, “away from construction” on our reservation, but I wasn’t thrilled about this because I was unsure of what the garden views would be like. I asked if there was any chance we could get a room in Boca Chica instead. Peter immediately got on the phone with the room assignor and got it settled. He even asked if we preferred a ground or high floor. I said anything above the ground floor was fine and we ended up with a fifth floor dormer room. Last time we stayed at the GF we asked to be switched out of the dormer room we were assigned too (oh gosh, I’m sounding a bit like a diva here, I promise I’m not
) but this time I decided to roll with it. I was thrilled that our room was ready, even with my requested change.
Once we were checked in we headed over to our room. We couldn’t quite figure how to get to the main door of Boca Chica, not wanting to cut through the pool deck with our luggage, so we went allll the way around to the left (towards Narcoosseee’s) and went in. After a couple of trips in and out of the building we figured out the shortcuts
. Our room was a couple of doors down from the elevator, which was very handy. I found the dormer room to be quite charming and was glad we didn’t switch. It was nice to try something different and I didn’t end up missing the couch like I thought I would. We moved the bench from the end of the bed over between the chair and the TV stand and that allowed us a place to store our miscellany, which is basically all we use the couch for anyway.
The view from our balcony was stunning
– we were right over the courtyard pool and had a nice view of Sugarloaf and the main building as well. We freshened up, took some pictures and got ready to head off to Epcot. As we went to store our documents and valuables in the safe, we noticed that the lock bar was popped out and we weren’t able to reset the safe with a code. We called maintenance and they told us we had to be in the room for the repair and it could be an hour or two. Now here’s where I have a beef with Disney resorts in general, I just hate that when you call down for something you’re really talking to a call center, not someone on site. I had DH hand me the phone and asked to speak to a manager, as I didn’t think it was right that we’d have to sit in our room for an hour or two waiting for what was probably a simple repair. The CM was, quite frankly, pretty rude to me and said she’d have someone call me back (which never happened)
. At this point I told DH to take a walk down to the lobby and talk to someone there. Within a few minutes he texted me that they were sending someone right up and within like a minute there was a knock on the door. The very nice CM from maintenance did a quick reset and we were good to go! All this happened before DH could even get back to the room. He was so impressed that he stopped in the lobby on the way out and relayed his thanks to the General Manager.
With that settled we decided to walk to the TTC via the Poly. This was our first view of the construction going on. To be honest, I was sad to see the state of our beloved GF to Poly path
. It’s obvious they put a lot of landscaping effort around the construction walls but it just isn’t the same and I fear it never will be. We did the GF to Poly walk a couple of times for the Monorail. I never did time it to see if it’s faster/longer/the same as taking the Monorail to the TTC and waiting for the switch, but we like walking and it feels like we’re making progress because we’re always moving. I don’t find the transportation from GF to Epcot to be ideal (I feel like there should be a faster way), it’s one of my negatives about the resort.
When we came back to the room the first night, DD was delighted to find that her bed had been turned down and her beloved chocolates were awaiting!
I didn’t realize that they offered automatic turndown service in the standard rooms so that was a treat. I was less than delighted to realize that the movies on the beach had been moved to the courtyard smack below our window
. At this point I was thanking goodness that we were on the highest floor possible because I could hear the noise in our room and I imagine it was worse on the ground floor. I was a bit tense at this point but it turned out to be the only night it was an issue because the other nights of the trip we didn’t come back to the room until the movie was over anyway.
After being up since 3 a.m. I practically fell into bed and fell sound asleep until an awful noise woke me up at 4 a.m. It must’ve been really loud because I had earplugs in and I heard it through them (I routinely sleep with earplugs in hotels to drown out the little, unfamiliar noises). Turns out it was the mini fridge vibrating like crazy and making really loud noises. DH reached behind the dresser and unplugged it, then set off to get some ice for the juice we had in there (probably could’ve just left it but in my delirious state I insisted the poor guy find ice). We didn’t plan to use the fridge much so we ended up leaving it unplugged for the rest of the trip. I did notice some other noises coming from that same wall and I’m not sure if it was our neighbor’s fridge or some sort of piping back there (sometimes it sounded like water). It was not enough to keep me awake so I eventually was able to let it fade into the background
.
I wish we’d had a chance to take advantage of more dining options at the GF, but since this was a last minute change our dining plans had already been set in stone for months and I was hesitant to change things around. I did switch our YSH dinner to Citricos and I’m so glad I did. Citricos was fantastic – the food and service was top-notch and I’d say the atmosphere is among my favorite of the signatures. The only other GF eatery we went to was Gasparilla’s. The food was pretty good although I’m half and half on the seating area. I found it a little too chilly due to the high speed ceiling fans above and with the arcade games right nearby, it’s not all that relaxing. The outdoor seating area is lovely though.
We didn’t do a ton of pool time on this trip due to schedules and weather. We spent a couple of late afternoons at the courtyard pool, which is just beautiful and relaxing (once the games end by about 5:30 – not a fan of the loud games). The feature pool was not looking all that enticing to us with all the walls around so we didn’t end up over there except one evening to take pictures.
The lobby is just a wonderful place to sit and relax, take in the music and to people watch. I love the variety of shops there too.
I covered a little bit about transportation above, but other than my Epcot complaints, I found the transportation ran pretty well. I loved the quick boat ride from MK – usually we took the Monorail to MK and the boat coming home. Bus service was better than I remember although I will admit we took cabs a couple of times – one morning when running late for DHS and coming back from Epcot in a downpour (we were back by France so we scooted out the back and got a cab from the BC). But all in all, the waits for the buses were not long at all.
I found the CMs at the GF to be very friendly and helpful
. I’ll share one vignette as an example – one day when we were coming back to our room DD realized that she’d lost the backing off of one of the pins attached to her camera case strap. She started to get a little upset and we were looking all over the path trying to find it. One of the CMs on a golf cart saw us and stopped the cart to get out and looked too. Of course the backing was lost who knows how long ago so we couldn’t find it. The CM said if we went to any shop he was sure they’d give us a replacement backing. (We ended up buying the brass “locking” backs the next day.) On our last day we were coming back to our room and the same driver saw us – he stopped and asked if we’d been able to get DD a new back. How nice is that? I was shocked that he remembered and it was a really nice touch.
To be honest, the last time we stayed at the GF we had a string of really poor CM interactions. It really left us with a not-so-great impression of the resort and I wasn’t sure if we’d stay there again. I’m so very glad we gave GF another shot because our experience was really night and day from last time!
I think that about covers it – if you have any questions let me know and thank you to everyone on this thread for answering all my last minute questions and just generally being a great group to talk to!
High five on the 
I love the 6 ft. section in the GF courtyard pool, we often hang out there until we are pruney.
Great news!!!!!!!!
.
. And of course one has to plan a stay at a Disney resort since we'll be right there 
....and what better way to start off the vacation than at the GF 
. Not only is it very loud in there, but those games take up alot of space that could be used for seating. Glad you had a great trip 
I have two days, haven't even gotten the suitcases out yet.
I will also be checking out those DVC GF villas 
Thanks so much for the video. Showed it too DH and he said, oh they are coming along.
All good, I make little sense anyway 
I remember when they built the Wedding Chapel and that changed things. However it isn't an issue at all any more. We can get used to almost anything 
Our other favorite night time stroll is around the Boardwalk when we stay at the BC. It is so relaxing after a nice dinner. Amazing how much trips change when your children are grown up.
