Which Hotel Would You Choose?

[Luv Bunnies]

We're going for three nights in November, the weekend before Thanksgiving. The crew is DH, myself, DS22 and DS19. I currently have two hotel options:

Camelot: Family suite with a king bed in one room and two queens in the other. We have stayed in this room type before and enjoyed it.

Pros: Short walk to the parks; boys get their own room and beds; dining table and kitchen area are nice to have.

Cons: Only one bathroom; parking can be tight and we want to arrive and park by noon on our first day.

Anaheim Hotel (formerly Anaheim Plaza): Two connecting rooms with two queens each. We stayed at this hotel several years ago and it was just OK, but we might be willing to give it another try due to the recent renovations.

Pros: Boys get their own room and beds; two bathrooms; large parking lot might give us a better chance of being allowed to park before check in time.

Cons: Slightly longer walk to the parks than Camelot; last stay here wasn't the greatest (no promise the renovations corrected everything).

The difference in price between the two places is about one dollar, so cost is not a factor. Neither place offers free breakfast. One charges $10 per day for parking and the other charges $15 (not a deciding factor for us).

So, should we give the Anaheim another chance and have a bit more space and two bathrooms? Or should we go with the tried and true Camelot but only have one bathroom?

 

[tnzzz]

I would only do Anaheim if you're guaranteed a renovated room. We were there in June and they hadn't started renovating the rooms. I am not picky about much, except overall cleanliness, and our room fell below my standards. Mostly because of the carpet and the strong smell of mildew.

 

[WDWOswald]

From what I've read, I would avoid both of those hotels. Have you checked out the Park Vue? Or perhaps a hotel that is a longer walk but much higher quality? Why only two hotel options?

 

[Luv Bunnies]

From what I've read, I would avoid both of those hotels. Have you checked out the Park Vue? Or perhaps a hotel that is a longer walk but much higher quality? Why only two hotel options?

I won't ever stay at the Park Vue again. They overbilled me once and it was a very unpleasant situation. The manager wouldn't even give me the courtesy of discussing the bill with me. Every time I called and asked to speak with a manager regarding a bill, he was "in a meeting."

I narrowed down my hotel choices because we need either a suite or two rooms. With two tall adult boys, we need more than two beds and they're too tall for the bunk beds that many hotels have. I've also heard them complain too many times about sofa beds, so I'm trying to get each of them a real bed. I'm also trying to keep the cost down, hence those two hotel choices.

 

[Wahlee]

Did you look at Desert Inn and Suites? They're usually affordable and have many room options with 4 beds.

 

[onlyoneash]

I won't ever stay at the Park Vue again. They overbilled me once and it was a very unpleasant situation. The manager wouldn't even give me the courtesy of discussing the bill with me. Every time I called and asked to speak with a manager regarding a bill, he was "in a meeting."

Oh no! I'm staying here next month, I hope this is a one time thing and not standard practice.

 

[Lm3js]

We have similar needs and ended up at the Residence Inn (Conference) which is a little further than Harbor hotels, but still walkable. It is supposedly new/renovated and has good reviews. You might be able to get a 2 room suite there rather inexpensively. We are in a King Suite/sofa bed (my kids aren't quite as old as yours). RI has free breakfast and kitchen so you can make your own food if desired. I have heard good things about Embassy suites as well a little further down but you would need to Uber or drive to DL.

 

[tarheelalum]

The Anaheim Hotel/Plaza really seems kind of run down. Lots of people complain about it and I think they charge a resort fee as well. I've honestly never heard a good word about it so I wouldn't stay there. I don't know anything about the other hotel you mentioned. I suggest you might want to consider other properties. How about the Hojo?

 

[minnieralyks]

double post.

 

[minnieralyks]

We're going for three nights in November, the weekend before Thanksgiving. The crew is DH, myself, DS22 and DS19. I currently have two hotel options:

Camelot: Family suite with a king bed in one room and two queens in the other. We have stayed in this room type before and enjoyed it.

Pros: Short walk to the parks; boys get their own room and beds; dining table and kitchen area are nice to have.

Cons: Only one bathroom; parking can be tight and we want to arrive and park by noon on our first day.

Anaheim Hotel (formerly Anaheim Plaza): Two connecting rooms with two queens each. We stayed at this hotel several years ago and it was just OK, but we might be willing to give it another try due to the recent renovations.

Pros: Boys get their own room and beds; two bathrooms; large parking lot might give us a better chance of being allowed to park before check in time.

Cons: Slightly longer walk to the parks than Camelot; last stay here wasn't the greatest (no promise the renovations corrected everything).

The difference in price between the two places is about one dollar, so cost is not a factor. Neither place offers free breakfast. One charges $10 per day for parking and the other charges $15 (not a deciding factor for us).

So, should we give the Anaheim another chance and have a bit more space and two bathrooms? Or should we go with the tried and true Camelot but only have one bathroom?

Camelot all the way. We've stayed in both (pre-renovations at the Plaza) and much prefer Camelot. Nice, short walk. Clean rooms. Next to McDonald's for a quick breakfast. We've stayed in the Family Suite a couple times before and enjoyed the extra space. While there is only one bathroom, it wasn't too much of a hassle when we split showers up (half night/half morning).

If you get there early, I'm sure they'll be able to accommodate your parking.

 

[DisneySuiteFreak]

We stayed here when it was the Anaheim Plaza back in 1997. It was rather run down and somewhat sketchy at the time. We recently gave it a 2nd chance and stayed there again since they have new owners. It's now called the Anaheim Hotel. It seems much better now. We don't know if we had recently renovated rooms, however we had no problems at all. My husband, who didn't like it in 1997, enjoyed it so much in March of this year that we stayed there again last week. It's definitely an older hotel, and you can see there are several layers of paint in some areas of the rooms, etc, but it was clean, comfortable, the pool was clean, there were maintenance people around the grounds working even at 1:00am, which was nice to see since it's a smaller hotel. The staff was very professional and accommodating. The Pizza place came in handy for some healthy meals and they now offer room service and have breakfast available for purchase too. The vibe is really nice. They are definitely going for that vintage vibe as they play old school jazz standards in the lobby and have redesigned the entire lobby/bar area with a mid century modern vibe.
Hopefully they will soon redo the rooms with a similar vibe. One of the BEST things about the hotel is the HUGE Olympic sized pool - the only one in the area that I know of. It's clean! I wish they kept it open later though... These were taken with my cell phone... The pictures here are of the ground floor rooms with 2 double beds in the 500 building. We stayed there again a week ago (July 24-27) on the 2nd floor of the 500 building and had slightly different upgraded decor (which I should have taken pictures of, but didn't) and 2 Queen beds. (We like our own space when traveling LOL.) This hotel/motel is perfect if you just need a place to sleep after doing Disneyland all day, and is an easy 10 minute walk from the hotel to the security checkpoint at Disneyland. Photobucket is not letting me embed my pics without paying them $500 a year (which is not going to happen, LOL, they're on drugs!) so here's a link to my free Flikr album where you can see pics of the room we stayed in in March. https://flic.kr/s/aHsm5DzwEJ If you are an annual passholder, they now offer AP discounts as well. Call if you can't get it online.

 

[lcp9]

We have similar needs and ended up at the Residence Inn (Conference) which is a little further than Harbor hotels, but still walkable. It is supposedly new/renovated and has good reviews. You might be able to get a 2 room suite there rather inexpensively. We are in a King Suite/sofa bed (my kids aren't quite as old as yours). RI has free breakfast and kitchen so you can make your own food if desired. I have heard good things about Embassy suites as well a little further down but you would need to Uber or drive to DL.

We have stayed at both RI, and the one by the conference center is super nice, plus the breakfast is a full breakfast. We also get grocery delivery and bring stuff into the parks b/c we have the full kitchen/fridge (our kids are little and need milk/snacks.) Anyway, I don't know what OP's budget is, but the RI is definitely worth the extra walk. With 3 little kids, our walk was maybe 12 minutes at most?

 

[Rabb it]

I stayed at Anaheim Plaza at least three times before I moved to So Cal, it's not the fanciest place but the price was right. I don't really care where I stay though, other than over night I don't plan on spending a lot of time inside the hotel.

 

[Lm3js]

We have stayed at both RI, and the one by the conference center is super nice, plus the breakfast is a full breakfast. We also get grocery delivery and bring stuff into the parks b/c we have the full kitchen/fridge (our kids are little and need milk/snacks.) Anyway, I don't know what OP's budget is, but the RI is definitely worth the extra walk. With 3 little kids, our walk was maybe 12 minutes at most?

Thank you so much for this reply. Makes me feel good about my choice since this is our first time staying here. Can't wait.