We’ve Arrived at Disney Lookout Cay at Lighthouse Point!

[john1012a]

I don’t know if you saw but apparently the flies from the island are following guests to the ship so pool deck food is also covered in them. Some reports say flies in Cabanas as well.

There’s no way flies are going back to the ship….it’s too far away!

 

[CampbellzSoup]

There’s no way flies are going back to the ship….it’s too far away!

https://twitter.com/x/status/1800261249722208624

 

[Love4Eeyore]

I waited until dinner on the ship to eat. The flies are a massive issue and nasty to see climbing all over the food.

 

[sabrecmc]

The flies are a deal-breaker for me, especially for what looks like a nice beach and not much else that I would want to spend a lot of time at. I live on the Florida gulf coast, so we have nice beaches here, and that's not a huge draw for us. The uniqueness of Disney and Castaway Cay is a big deal. It's my happy place. This...does not look like a happy place, lol. I'm sorry, but the flies are just gross. Our cruise to this port isn't until May 2025, so I'm going to see how Disney deals with these issues, but I'm not dealing with a bunch of walking in the hot sun with my 76 year old mom just to get to a nice beach with fly-covered food. Yes, we could stay on the ship, but the point of choosing this itinerary was because the Magic stopped at both places. Sorry to be so negative. I'm just disappointed. Definitely not what I was hoping to see, as I was very excited at the concept art (obviously, since I booked the cruise specifically for this).

 

[Love4Eeyore]

The beach, while pretty, is not nearly as nice as Castaway. DM is a very active 70 and struggled as much as DS8 on the walk back. No option was given to us for a ride. We will be avioding any future cruises that come here.

 

[jimmymc]

Does anyone know if flies are an issue on Princess Cay? It's only two miles from Lookout Cay.

 

[Love4Eeyore]

Does anyone know if flies are an issue on Princess Cay? It's only two miles from Lookout Cay.

That's a great question! I'm wondering too. They had a ship there at the same time.

 

[Mags2002]

The beach, while pretty, is not nearly as nice as Castaway. DM is a very active 70 and struggled as much as DS8 on the walk back. No option was given to us for a ride. We will be avioding any future cruises that come here.

You can get a golf cart back now

 

[Love4Eeyore]

You can get a golf cart back now

We'll try on the next stop but it certainly wasn't available to us on that first stop. Only to those with cabanas and mobility issues. They would just zoom on by us. No cold towels were offered on the way back either! At the end of a long, hot, sunny day, with that walk, they should be handed out in abundance! It was bad.

 

[RedHead0186]

I’m happy we really “get you” people who have different opinions are terrible. Who’s saying it’s suppose to be Castaway? We’re comparing it the only other output Disney has offered in terms of island. So thankful we have you to tell me what the island is suppose to be.

That's exactly my point. People comparing it to Castaway, saying it doesn't look like Castaway, doesn't feel Disney, etc. and that Disney "missed the mark." Except that Disney wasn't trying to make it look like Castaway Cay, so they didn't "miss the mark" on it looking like Castaway because that was never the intent. There's a lot of people here who didn't seem to know/remember that.

 

[Mags2002]

We'll try on the next stop but it certainly wasn't available to us on that first stop. Only to those with cabanas and mobility issues. They would just zoom on by us. No cold towels were offered on the way back either! At the end of a long, hot, sunny day, with that walk, they should be handed out in abundance! It was bad.

They were handing out cold towels and water half way down the pier.
Also once the golf carts are driving they won’t stop for you. You have to get on at the island

 

[dreamer17555]

Just curious- How much did the Disney port stop (because it's not a private island) cost DCL?

 

[kathi]

My understanding is that when they opened WDW, they had to regularly fumigate the entire area with thick clouds of pesticides and they still use a decent amount of chemical pesticides to this day. I would be curious to hear how they manage Castaway Cay but I’m guessing it is not all natural either.

It sounds like Disney made a lot of commitments about minimizing environmental impact so I’m not extremely optimistic about how they will keep insects to a minimum, especially when they can easily migrate south from the other parts of the island. If the ship is easy enough to access, I would be willing to return to the ship for meals if it means keeping protecting the local ecosystem, but I am also curious/concerned what situation is with biting insects, need to remember to pack my own bug spray, I guess.

I have no idea how they meet their corporate health standards (which they must have) with all those flies. And I don't buy "they didn't know till the first cruise", if they didn't know they did a terrible job of project management and planning. The workers must have had meals for YEARS during construction - and there had to be flies. They have experience with bugs from Castaway and even WDW in Florida. It's just so unsanitary and any restaurant in the US would be shut down until the problem can be solved. (I'll be there on Saturday and Monday - so can report back if they have come up with a fix or if we end up eating power bars on the island.)

 

[disdreaming2]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1800261249722208624

Oh HELL NO!!! DISNEY NEEDS TO SHUT THIS TRAIN WRECK DOWN NOW! Flies on the food on the island! Flies now infesting the ship too! I would expect that on a booze cruise in Mexico or some small island. WOW!

 

[disdreaming2]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1800202594318794844

 

[Mags2002]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1800202594318794844

View attachment 867527

I’ll just add that this is not what the majority of people were doing at all!

 

[disdreaming2]

I’ll just add that this is not what the majority of people were doing at all!

Well that's good to hear! Unfortunately I think there are way too many issues for Lookout Cay for Disney to address all at once. I have confidence that given some time they will address all of the concerns. I do however feel sorry for anyone currently on vacation there. That sucks to spend so much money on a vacation to have it ruined in different ways. There is a serious disconnect with what Disney thinks the customer wants and what we actually want. *certainly not flies - sorry I couldn't resist. But in all seriousness just look at the current fall out on the Fort Wilderness DVC designs and even more on the New Polynesian DVC designs. Many people are voicing their opinions on them - and they are not good. I wish Disney would say: This is what we are thinking of doing. Have input from actual guests and strongly consider changes before rolling out these huge projects. I would have told them there is no way I am riding a tram for nearly 20 minutes and walking 10-15 minutes on top of that to get to a beach. There is beaches all over Florida. Give me some compelling reason to part with thousands of dollars to book a cruise to a fly infested island to learn about "Bahamian Culture". I'd rather just fly from Florida to somehwere in the Bahamas and have a leisurely vacation without the hassles and actually experience the culture and fly-less food. But that's just me.

 

[dreamer17555]

I’ll just add that this is not what the majority of people were doing at all!

Except it appears that is also what some people are doing in the background. I get you want to defend DCL and you clearly are passionate for the company and clearly love your job but you have said things like- no kids had meltdowns crossing the pier (blogger posted about her child having a meltdown crossing the pier), that DCL didn't know about the flies (other CMs that live on the island are not saying the same, and the presence of the spinner things paints a different picture) tons of available chairs at dining locations (multiple reports from different sources say differently)...

But has it occured that DCL should have known about these issues? They should have spent the money to run test sailings with only CMs before rolling this out to the media? That they are a company with deep pockets and have amazingly smart people working for them so they know that a bunch of chairs behind sand dunes are not going to be popular location, they can bring in food and see how bad the insect problem is, that they know how many guests are on their ship and that they generally like to eat lunch around the same timeframe, they can look at the pier and know it's not going to be a popular optic?

Some of this was preventable but Disney did not want to spend the money on it. And now some kind CM in guest services is likely having to hear over and over again about flies everywhere because Disney did not want to spend the money and take the time to do things right. How is that okay? That instead of investing the proper funds and time they will let their CMs be their shield and they get the direct brunt of complaints?

 

[klbrow11]

Okay I was super excited for the new island. I am way less excited now. So I live near some beautiful beaches in FL with water that almost looks this amazing. Just got back from our local state park and they have a tram to the beach. To walk there is about the same distance as this pier. If the local state park saw a need to transport people the same distance in the FL heat and humidity it makes me a little shocked that disney thought this would be okay. The walk alone is rough but no shade or benches? Nothing. Eek. I can walk it but to be honest I do not want to. I didnt pay thousands of dollars to have to walk with my beach stuff that far to then get a tram. Its just not well thought out which is disappointing.

As for the flies we deal with them here and I wont eat outside if they are around. There really is no excuse. I do not care how new this island is its unacceptable. At the very least make these at home fly traps. They may not be pretty but they work.

My hubby said the tops of the buildings look like pringles and tacos and now I cant unsee it. The whole place just looks uninspired. Just my personal opinion.

 

[AZMermaid]

I’ll just add that this is not what the majority of people were doing at all!

Would you eat the burger in the video posted?