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"There is more treasure in books than in all the p
- Joined
- Jul 4, 2006
- Messages
- 3,528
Sadly, I realized that I did not have my camera battery charger on the first day of our trip and I had to order a new one (thank you Amazon Prime!). All my early pictures are on DH's laptop, but I do have a few.
This was our first trip to BWV and I was a little nervous that I would not like it that well and regret making the reservation, but thanks to all the information gleaned from the Dis, I knew ahead of time that I needed to request a boardwalk view, that I should valet park, and that I should use bell services rather than face the halls and luggage myself!
We stayed in Gainesville the night before and arrived at Boardwalk around 9am with plans for DH and DS10 to hit SWW while DD8 and I went to the MK. Valet and bell services were very efficient and helpful. We had a GREAT CM at check-in, they oohed and aahed over the kids being so excited, and gave them balloons, pirate tattoos, and 1st Visit to Boardwalk buttons. The kids were psyched! Our room was not ready, but I did not expect it to be, so we hit the parks as planned and met back at Boardwalk at 4pm to get in the room and change for dinner at Le Cellier.
(One note - SWW was MUCH more crowded this year with the dates in June. We've done it every year and have never experienced the craziness that we saw this year.)
When we got our room assignment we were in 4007. We prepared to brave the hallways and I was laughing so hard I was almost crying by the time we got to our room because it was at the veeeeerrryy end of the hall!
Thank goodness I did not have DH carry the luggage himself! The walk was totally worth it because we had an incredible, incredible view. The room was in pretty good shape, and it was clean, but it was by far the smallest DVC studio (we've been in studios everywhere but BCV), the tv was really strangely tiny, and there was no DVD player! (and please explain the miniscule balconies when they knew the view was going to be such a draw). Still - it was worth it for the VIEW! Did I mention the VIEW? 
Oh my gosh. I wanted to sleep with the curtains open. I really could have slept in a shoebox and been happy with that view.
We got in a zone of going to the parks early each morning. (And let me tell you, the sunrise from the VIEW - AMAZING). Then, we'd come back to the BW to swim from about 2-4pm, change for dinner, and go to dinner. I made lots of dinner reservations at EPCOT and MGM, so that I could take advantage of walking. Our one bit of trouble came with trying to get to Artist Point at WL. The bus took over an hour, and we literally had to run to get on a ferry because we were running so late.
We spent 4 out of our 6 nights back at the Boardwalk enjoying the night-time entertainment. We love going to DTD every night, and the boardwalk at night was like a little mini-version of DTD. I think night at BW was by far my favorite thing about BWV.
We spent much more time at EPCOT than we would have normally, and less time at AK because the bus service to and from AK was abysmal - stopping everywhere on God's green earth - but were staying in AKV next month so it was fine. In general, I found the back entrance to be really great - especially in the evenings. The only time I was frustrated was the one day we did rope drop at EPCOT - by the time we got to Soarin there was a 65 minute wait - seriously, and fastpasses were for two hours later. That was not cool.
I think they could give a little more of a head start to the rope drop folks to even out the distance - especially since nothing in the WS is even open that early.
The pool was cute and fun, and the waterslide was really long but not too fast. The pool was always crowded. We did have a really hard time finding pool chairs near the pool every single day - the way they designed it only allows about 30 chairs to actually have pool visibility
- which is really necessary if you have kids swimming. So, we were divided on the pool ratings - my kids gave it and A++++ and I gave it more of a B- because of the chair issues.
We had one small problem, we did laundry on the last night and the front loading machine broke and spun our clothes for over an hour. It would not shut off or unlock. The front desk called engineering, and eventually he just had to manually pry it open and flood the room. This made the laundry that we started at 9pm not get finished until 12:30am. 
Oh well.
I did have one observation, and that is that out of every DVC property I've stayed in and every non-DVC Disney resort, I have never seen room service trays and trash left in the hallway the way it was left out at BWV. It was really nasty. I know the trash is the guest's fault, but it still needs to be dealt with somehow (maybe charge the rooms for trash removal). Every morning, there would be at least 5-10 trays of leftover food and lots of trash bags/pizza boxes just sitting out in the hallway in front of doors and every afternoon, they'd still be there, and every night, they'd still be there. It looked like they cleared them once, overnight, and that was it. It does not seem like it would be that hard to send someone with a cart to clear the halls of old food 3X a day (after breakfast, lunch, and dinner). The carpets in the halls were really stained, and as a Florida native, old sitting food just makes me think of cockroaches - both things could be easily avoided by just having someone pick up food and trash during the day.
In the end, we really liked BWV and it is the one non-home DVC resort (other than VB of course!) that I can see us returning to on a regular basis. DS10 absolutely loved it and rates it as his favorite resort of all-time. The view was just so great, and the boardwalk at night was heavenly, and the location made evening dinners at EPCOT a joy. The CMs were very friendly, and we got trash and towel service right on time. Luckily, my work schedule means I have to travel at the start of June and end of July - so the seven-month window will probably work out for us and allow us to visit every few trips. I can see why BWV has so many fans. You certianly feel like you are living inside of a theme park. It's a magical place.
Here are the few pictures I have so far:
Stitch and DD8 brave the creeeeeeepy chairs
Entertainers - Carlo was the kid's favorite
Illuminations from the balcony. Wow.
Shuttle launch from the balcony. Wow. Wow.
This was our first trip to BWV and I was a little nervous that I would not like it that well and regret making the reservation, but thanks to all the information gleaned from the Dis, I knew ahead of time that I needed to request a boardwalk view, that I should valet park, and that I should use bell services rather than face the halls and luggage myself!
We stayed in Gainesville the night before and arrived at Boardwalk around 9am with plans for DH and DS10 to hit SWW while DD8 and I went to the MK. Valet and bell services were very efficient and helpful. We had a GREAT CM at check-in, they oohed and aahed over the kids being so excited, and gave them balloons, pirate tattoos, and 1st Visit to Boardwalk buttons. The kids were psyched! Our room was not ready, but I did not expect it to be, so we hit the parks as planned and met back at Boardwalk at 4pm to get in the room and change for dinner at Le Cellier.
(One note - SWW was MUCH more crowded this year with the dates in June. We've done it every year and have never experienced the craziness that we saw this year.)
When we got our room assignment we were in 4007. We prepared to brave the hallways and I was laughing so hard I was almost crying by the time we got to our room because it was at the veeeeerrryy end of the hall!
Thank goodness I did not have DH carry the luggage himself! The walk was totally worth it because we had an incredible, incredible view. The room was in pretty good shape, and it was clean, but it was by far the smallest DVC studio (we've been in studios everywhere but BCV), the tv was really strangely tiny, and there was no DVD player! (and please explain the miniscule balconies when they knew the view was going to be such a draw). Still - it was worth it for the VIEW! Did I mention the VIEW? Oh my gosh. I wanted to sleep with the curtains open. I really could have slept in a shoebox and been happy with that view. We got in a zone of going to the parks early each morning. (And let me tell you, the sunrise from the VIEW - AMAZING). Then, we'd come back to the BW to swim from about 2-4pm, change for dinner, and go to dinner. I made lots of dinner reservations at EPCOT and MGM, so that I could take advantage of walking. Our one bit of trouble came with trying to get to Artist Point at WL. The bus took over an hour, and we literally had to run to get on a ferry because we were running so late.
We spent 4 out of our 6 nights back at the Boardwalk enjoying the night-time entertainment. We love going to DTD every night, and the boardwalk at night was like a little mini-version of DTD. I think night at BW was by far my favorite thing about BWV.We spent much more time at EPCOT than we would have normally, and less time at AK because the bus service to and from AK was abysmal - stopping everywhere on God's green earth - but were staying in AKV next month so it was fine. In general, I found the back entrance to be really great - especially in the evenings. The only time I was frustrated was the one day we did rope drop at EPCOT - by the time we got to Soarin there was a 65 minute wait - seriously, and fastpasses were for two hours later. That was not cool.
I think they could give a little more of a head start to the rope drop folks to even out the distance - especially since nothing in the WS is even open that early. The pool was cute and fun, and the waterslide was really long but not too fast. The pool was always crowded. We did have a really hard time finding pool chairs near the pool every single day - the way they designed it only allows about 30 chairs to actually have pool visibility
- which is really necessary if you have kids swimming. So, we were divided on the pool ratings - my kids gave it and A++++ and I gave it more of a B- because of the chair issues.We had one small problem, we did laundry on the last night and the front loading machine broke and spun our clothes for over an hour. It would not shut off or unlock. The front desk called engineering, and eventually he just had to manually pry it open and flood the room. This made the laundry that we started at 9pm not get finished until 12:30am.
Oh well.I did have one observation, and that is that out of every DVC property I've stayed in and every non-DVC Disney resort, I have never seen room service trays and trash left in the hallway the way it was left out at BWV. It was really nasty. I know the trash is the guest's fault, but it still needs to be dealt with somehow (maybe charge the rooms for trash removal). Every morning, there would be at least 5-10 trays of leftover food and lots of trash bags/pizza boxes just sitting out in the hallway in front of doors and every afternoon, they'd still be there, and every night, they'd still be there. It looked like they cleared them once, overnight, and that was it. It does not seem like it would be that hard to send someone with a cart to clear the halls of old food 3X a day (after breakfast, lunch, and dinner). The carpets in the halls were really stained, and as a Florida native, old sitting food just makes me think of cockroaches - both things could be easily avoided by just having someone pick up food and trash during the day.
In the end, we really liked BWV and it is the one non-home DVC resort (other than VB of course!) that I can see us returning to on a regular basis. DS10 absolutely loved it and rates it as his favorite resort of all-time. The view was just so great, and the boardwalk at night was heavenly, and the location made evening dinners at EPCOT a joy. The CMs were very friendly, and we got trash and towel service right on time. Luckily, my work schedule means I have to travel at the start of June and end of July - so the seven-month window will probably work out for us and allow us to visit every few trips. I can see why BWV has so many fans. You certianly feel like you are living inside of a theme park. It's a magical place.
Here are the few pictures I have so far:
Stitch and DD8 brave the creeeeeeepy chairs
Entertainers - Carlo was the kid's favorite
Illuminations from the balcony. Wow.
Shuttle launch from the balcony. Wow. Wow.
one day....
