EXPIRED: Part ONE of 2015 CLUB LEVEL (CL) INFORMATION and HELP Thread DO NOT POST HERE!!!

[Babsy]

That's disappointing about the gift, but no turn down is inexcusable, like others have said . Glad you had a nice surprise at BWI.



Glad you enjoyed BWI CL. We've never stayed at BWI, but it's on my list to try (specifically CL) as I've read a lot of positive things about it .

Yes, I think that you would enjoy BWI CL! The CMs are especially nice there. The lounge is sort of small, but we found it to be friendly and cosy. Perhaps we were lucky, but EVERYONE was always having a good time there, both guests and CMs.

 

[mickeynut1]

They only thing that did bother me at AKL were the room service trays left outside in the hall. Those seemed to sit there a LONG time and only get picked up once a day. Not sure who is/was responsible for the trays but some were putting of some interesting smells after a few hours!

Liz

I agree, it isn't appealing to walk down a hall seeing/smelling trays that have been sitting there for a long period of time .

I think people just put them out and expect them to be picked up by maids.

I think you're right .

Yes, I think that you would enjoy BWI CL! The CMs are especially nice there. The lounge is sort of small, but we found it to be friendly and cosy. Perhaps we were lucky, but EVERYONE was always having a good time there, both guests and CMs.

Glad to hear this . Most CL reviews (IMO) have about the same amount of good and bad reviews, but anything I've read about BWI CL seems to be more positive than negative .

 

[Bree]

Guests are supposed to call room service to come retrieve the trays. I think people just put them out and expect them to be picked up by maids.

I have ordered room service from many hotels and on cruises for years. I never knew I could call and have them picked up. Lesson taught to me today

I have never put them out in the hall. I always stacked everything up nicely and found a spot to put it in our room and had the maid service take care of it the next day.

 

[mickeyluv'r]

What about the beach club market place, can you get ice cream bars there? How early do they open? Thank you for your help.

One thing about the Marketplace, it can be slow. If you are going early in the AM, and you don't need to go through the counter area, then it probably won't be too bad.

In short though, we found CL to be a big advantage over non-CL - especially at BC/YC - mostly because we could avoid the marketplace, and that saves us precious MORNING time.

The BIG advantage of ALL CL's, IMO, is avoiding what we call food court rush hour each morning.

In terms of park touring the difference can be considerable. When A&E were still at Epcot, the line grew to over 2+hours in mere minutes after the park opened. (that's on the extreme end of things).

That said, we too love

 

[pixarmom]

Another plug for BWI CL! As Babsy mentioned, everyone seems happy there - but not fake happy. The BWI CL CMs seem to get along well with each other and there is a genuine quality to most of them - we like that.

 

[mickeyluv'r]

Oh I love the idea of giving each CL guest a Mickey Nalgene bottle at check-in! That would definitely go a long way to making it easier to transition away from bottled water to water dispensers/pitchers!

I generally think, as a whole, that people are more liberal at taking bottles of waters than cokes or beers. And there's not a good solution yet for communal beer and coke unless they add some taps and coke dispensers to CL. And actually, a coke dispenser would be a good idea!!!

Universal has the new Coke dispensers in their parks, and they are SUPER. We refilled our WATER bottles very easily! No need to contaminate anything. I also appreciate the wide array of drinks they serve! I'd love if WDW's parks added them!

Typically, we refill our water bottles multiple times, but not soda cans or the juice boxes in the CL's.
Though I am a bit odd -most my non-water drinks are half water/carbonated water or more, especially with juice.

We try to write names on bottles, but after a full day of refills, I'm done re-using.

If we wanted to refill my beverage for a week, we'd get refillable mugs.

Then again, If ever I DO take a soda from the lounge- it is usually with the intention of drinking it past 10pm, so if the CL's went to dispensers for non-alcohol, 24hour access would be important.

 

[mom2randj]

Am I fooling myself that we can have an excellent first time CL stay at the Poly this October if we are staying GV?? We were aware of the possible construction when we booked, but after reading all the posts from avid CL fans, we decided to give it a try. Although I prefer not to see construction, I am hoping that the GV rooms set back a bit from the east pool. Am I wrong?? Also, we love the atmosphere of the resort itself and were hoping the CL experience as a whole would outweigh the potential of seeing a bit of the east pool construction. For instance, hanging out in the lounge, having an occasional beer, being located just steps from the lava pool. Please tell me, am I making a huge mistake keeping our GV reservations or can we still have an excellent Club level stay despite the view?

 

[Ferrentinos]

Am I fooling myself that we can have an excellent first time CL stay at the Poly this October if we are staying GV?? We were aware of the possible construction when we booked, but after reading all the posts from avid CL fans, we decided to give it a try. Although I prefer not to see construction, I am hoping that the GV rooms set back a bit from the east pool. Am I wrong?? Also, we love the atmosphere of the resort itself and were hoping the CL experience as a whole would outweigh the potential of seeing a bit of the east pool construction. For instance, hanging out in the lounge, having an occasional beer, being located just steps from the lava poo. Please tell me, am I making a huge mistake keeping our GV reservations or can we still have an excellent Club level stay despite the view?

I don't think that you're making a mistake! The view from the lounge will not be affected at all and that is what we love most about our CL stays at Poly! We are doing GV there in July and are slightly nervous about the construction, but we also know that all of the positives are outweighing those concerns. We can't wait to be back!!!

 

[mickeyluv'r]

Am I fooling myself that we can have an excellent first time CL stay at the Poly this October if we are staying GV?? We were aware of the possible construction when we booked, but after reading all the posts from avid CL fans, we decided to give it a try. Although I prefer not to see construction, I am hoping that the GV rooms set back a bit from the east pool. Am I wrong?? Also, we love the atmosphere of the resort itself and were hoping the CL experience as a whole would outweigh the potential of seeing a bit of the east pool construction. For instance, hanging out in the lounge, having an occasional beer, being located just steps from the lava poo. Please tell me, am I making a huge mistake keeping our GV reservations or can we still have an excellent Club level stay despite the view?

I think you can have a great time staying there. I could!

I should say, for us, the view from our room isn't all that important. I'm happy at the lounges with no view, but of all views, we most appreciate lounge views. The view from the Poly lounge is excellent!

if there was any downside, IMO to the Poly Garden view, it was the combination of too much (in room) brown decor/no sunlight. We like BC/YC/BWK/CR standard view better - because our rooms there were brighter.

When it comes to construction, Disney usually go to big lengths to cover it up. You may hear a little noise in the middle of the day.

If we do manage to see anything, I find it kind of interesting. It's a rare opportunity to see outside the bubble.

 

[TigrLvsPooh]

Am I fooling myself that we can have an excellent first time CL stay at the Poly this October if we are staying GV?? We were aware of the possible construction when we booked, but after reading all the posts from avid CL fans, we decided to give it a try. Although I prefer not to see construction, I am hoping that the GV rooms set back a bit from the east pool. Am I wrong?? Also, we love the atmosphere of the resort itself and were hoping the CL experience as a whole would outweigh the potential of seeing a bit of the east pool construction. For instance, hanging out in the lounge, having an occasional beer, being located just steps from the lava pool. Please tell me, am I making a huge mistake keeping our GV reservations or can we still have an excellent Club level stay despite the view?

Here is our Poly CL GV room view of the pool the last time we stayed there:

 

[TigrLvsPooh]

Actually here's a better view, this shows the depth of distance from Hawaii to the pool area:

 

[princess Maxwell]

stayed recently, construction isn't bad,but still not worth the stay. the pool was really nice. the magicband setup is futile because its too high for short people or kids to reach. they should have set it up like grand floridian has it. Club level is so scaled back compare to years ago.

 

[lala5176]

Can I call IPO and have them schedule an appointment at Bibbidy Bobbidi Boutique or should I do it myself?

 

[Babsy]

Can I call IPO and have them schedule an appointment at Bibbidy Bobbidi Boutique or should I do it myself?

I would do it myself. By the time you have asked IPO to do it, you could have done it yourself. Very little advantage to using IPO, IME.

 

[lala5176]

Yes, I kind of feel this way about dining reservations too. I was thinking they may have better luck finding the day and time I'm looking for but I can always call back.
Thanks

 

[Babsy]

Yes, I kind of feel this way about dining reservations too. I was thinking they may have better luck finding the day and time I'm looking for but I can always call back.
Thanks

If you are having trouble getting the time you want, having them try too may help. I have just found that I am usually more successful at getting my own reservations than IPO are. But, it never hurts to have someone else trying on your behalf if you are having difficulty.

 

[BlueSkies]

Turndown service is part of the extra cost of the room and is advertised on Disney's website. I agree it IS almost criminal not receive it. I'm really sorry you didn't and hope you mentioned this to someone.

We were RPC deluxe king second floor for 10 days. We had turndown and chocolates between 3 and 4 pm each afternoon. The first night we didn't realize how early mousekeeping came and DH walked her tip down the hall to her when we got back to the room. He came back beaming with delight and with a hand full of chocolates! We got extra chocolates every night.

While I think this location is horrible in relation to the lounge, it did have the spectacular. I will never book this category again because of the chance to get the second floor since I think the lounge is such a big part of RPC. It SHOULD have its own category!

I've stayed in 5 club levels (assuming SL at GF is its own) and I would rate AKL and SL slightly above RPC. Ambiance aside, (RPC wins hands down there!) having the staff on the same floor gave me a more personalized feeling. I loved being greeted by name and AKL especially would always inquire about our plans and make suggestions to make them more magical. I would even rate food offerings better at AKL since a chef made them in front of you at his cooking station in the evenings! DH said if AKL was on the Monorail he would happily stay there every time.

We are trying to fit an anniversary weekend trip in July between weddings, graduations and DHs work travel. Originally DH specifically asked for SL because of the proximity to the pool and of course the Monorail. However, with the reduced Monorail hours, he is leaning back to AKL now. He's worse than me about changing his mind!

Hope everyone has a great day and happy planning!

Liz

Thanks for sharing your thoughts Liz...

We stayed club level in march at the CR and never got turn down service. They upgraded us so I didn't even know about it. Would have been fun though.

What a nice upgrade!

Guests are supposed to call room service to come retrieve the trays. I think people just put them out and expect them to be picked up by maids.

I never knew this! We always kept our tray in the room to be taken away by maid service same a Bree....Always something new to learn around here!

I have ordered room service from many hotels and on cruises for years. I never knew I could call and have them picked up. Lesson taught to me today

I have never put them out in the hall. I always stacked everything up nicely and found a spot to put it in our room and had the maid service take care of it the next day.

Am I fooling myself that we can have an excellent first time CL stay at the Poly this October if we are staying GV?? We were aware of the possible construction when we booked, but after reading all the posts from avid CL fans, we decided to give it a try. Although I prefer not to see construction, I am hoping that the GV rooms set back a bit from the east pool. Am I wrong?? Also, we love the atmosphere of the resort itself and were hoping the CL experience as a whole would outweigh the potential of seeing a bit of the east pool construction. For instance, hanging out in the lounge, having an occasional beer, being located just steps from the lava pool. Please tell me, am I making a huge mistake keeping our GV reservations or can we still have an excellent Club level stay despite the view?

Given the view from the Poly lounge..and the distance of the quiet pool from the CL GV rooms..I definitely would not let this deter me from staying GV CL at all..We stayed CL there just this past winter..when the resort was in full construction mode and thoroughly enjoyed our stay....The only issue we encountered was the closing of some of the walk ways...but even that was not such a big deal.. I am betting that you will have wonderful stay!

I don't think that you're making a mistake! our CL The view from the lounge will not be affected at all and that is what we love most about stays at Poly! We are doing GV there in July and are slightly nervous about the construction, but we also know that all of the positives are outweighing those concerns. We can't wait to be back!!!

I totally agree...

Can I call IPO and have them schedule an appointment at Bibbidy Bobbidi Boutique or should I do it myself?

We generally have IPO book everything for us..ADRs...so nice not to have to get up early to get this done...as well as activites like golf, cabanas, tours and such..Its pretty convenient to just shoot them an email letting them know what you would like booked...Just a nice convenience IMO...Hope that no matter how you book that you get the availability that you are looking for!

Erika Thanks for posting those Poly pics...If I was planning on staying there during the quiet pool rehab those would definitely put my mind at ease.... The pool really is a good distance from the Hawaii building...and with all of those trees..I am thinking that they will pretty much block most of what will be going on....

 

[lala5176]

If you are having trouble getting the time you want, having them try too may help. I have just found that I am usually more successful at getting my own reservations than IPO are. But, it never hurts to have someone else trying on your behalf if you are having difficulty.

True. Two heads are better than one. I will have them try also. Thanks!

 

[lala5176]

We generally have IPO book everything for us..ADRs...so nice not to have to get up early to get this done...as well as activites like golf, cabanas, tours and such..Its pretty convenient to just shoot them an email letting them know what you would like booked...Just a nice convenience IMO...Hope that no matter how you book that you get the availability that you are looking for!

Thank You. I think I will have them try also. Doesn't hurt. My husband is always saying that I don't utilize IPO enough so her goes nothing

 

[mickeynut1]

Another plug for BWI CL! As Babsy mentioned, everyone seems happy there - but not fake happy. The BWI CL CMs seem to get along well with each other and there is a genuine quality to most of them - we like that.

Thanks .