We just returned from a WDW/Vero/WDW trip. This was our first time ever staying at Vero. We were in an ocean view studio on the 4th floor of the inn. We also booked my parents in the same room category one night and then a one bedroom another night (couldn't get the same room 2 nights in a row even wait listed). We thought the rooms were a nice size and the one bedroom was great. We will definitely book a one bedroom for our next trip. It looked just like the one bedroom I've seen at Old Key West. We had a perfect view of the ocean. For some reason, outside our room we had a swarm of dragon flies all 5 nights that we were there. They didn't bother us at all, they just flew around constantly except during the thunderstorms.
We had a great time and really enjoyed Vero. We will definitely be staying there again. Our 13 and 17 year old sons really enjoyed the relaxation. Each day we spent time on the beach and at the pool. Twice we ate at the pool snack bar for lunch and the other days we went out or ate food we purchased from Sam's Club (about 15 min away) and Publix. We also ate at Squid Lips (in both Sebastian and Melbourne), Captain Harims, Chucks (in Ft. Pierce) and at Shutters on Monday for the Pirate Night dinner. We enjoyed them all, but would not do the Pirate Party again. We were not seated until an hour past our reservation. It took forever to get our drinks and food and then to get a refill of chicken and macaroni and cheese. The first bowl of mac and cheese was so small that we literally got 3 spoonfuls each. We went to Squid Lips and Captain Harims based on reviews I read on Disboards and from friends. We really liked them. While at Squid Lips in Melbourne, we saw that they had a groupon and were able to save about $30 that night. We also were able to buy another groupon and use it in Sebastian. We liked the Squid Lips in Melbourne better than the one in Sebastian. It had a larger menu and we thought the restaurant there was nicer. We went to the one in Melbourne thinking it was closer to where we would need to be for the turtle walk we had reserved in Melbourne, but it was actually farther than the Sebastian Squid Lips would have been to the sanctuary.
We did the turtle walk in Melbourne on 7/29 through the Sea Turtle Conservatory. They were right that the mosquitos were bad at night on the beach. We really loaded up on bug spray and long sleeves but my poor husband and 17 year old still ended up with about 50 bites each. We had to stop for Benadryl Spray on the way back. We enjoyed the seminar on turtles and waited patiently a few hours for the turtle scouts to report a turtle sighting, but unfortunately not a single turtle showed up by 11:30 and we left. We saw a family with two young girls the next day at Vero that had also been on the turtle walk and they said that they had stayed until 1 AM and still did not have a turtle sighting. We were told by the head guide that only one other night the entire summer didn't have a turtle sighting.
Last Sunday we went to Cocoa Beach. Our boys had taken surf lessons at Typhoon Lagoon in June and we were so impressed with the Ron Jon surf school that did the lessons, that we signed them up for ocean lessons. They enjoyed the 2 hour lesson and then we went and had lunch at Grills. We looked longingly at the Dream and later went to the jetty park to watch 4 ships including the Dream set sail.
Our boys jet skied a few times at Vero and enjoyed that. I was glad that we didn't sign them up for the surf lessons there because the waves broke at the shore line and they wouldn't have been able to do much surfing. We went fishing one night at a park near the resort and within minutes caught a big catfish but the bugs were very bad again even with bug spray, so we left within a half hour. One night we did the camp fire/s'mores and enjoyed that. We saw a nice big snake slithering along the path and due to the low lighting (because of turtles) my younger son and husband nearly stepped on it. I am not a snake lover so I made sure to shine my phone light on the path as we walked at night from then on. Our boys worked out in the gym several times and were able to get in the work outs they usually do with their football teams.
We checked in about 2PM last Saturday and our room wasn't ready until 4 so we went to Sam's Club and stocked up on lunch meat, bread, breakfast items, snacks, and a beach umbrella. It was cheaper to buy one there and give it to my parents to take back to their vacation home in Clearwater than it was to rent one for 5 days. The breeze and ocean temperature was nice, but we were hot when we were not under the umbrella. It stormed each day, but not for long. We didn't know we would have beach towels issued so we brought our own and only used them in Cocoa. It was nice to be able to turn them in for clean ones whenever we wanted them. We had been on the dining plan at the Beach Club before Vero and the cashier said when we redeemed them that we could use them at Vero too since we were continuing on a Disney vacation and back on the dining plan at WDW. We asked the person at the snack bar at Vero if that was true and she said yes and that they should work and if not she would reset them. Our sons only drank water so they never used their mugs for soda, but my husband and I used them when we had lunch there twice. We didn't even redeem the new set of mugs we could have received when we returned to WDW. The original ones were set through 8/22 for some reason by the lady at the Beach Club. We thought the Vero pool snack bar food prices were decent for the offerings and found that it was nice to just be able to eat and not have to leave the property and find lunch elsewhere. We had a laundry room around the corner from our room with 3 washers and 6 dryers. We did laundry a couple of times and found them to be empty most of the time.
Overall we were very glad we finally vacationed in Vero and really cannot wait to return.
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