ROYAL PACIFIC RESORT INFO...FAQ and more......

[pcstang]

I have been daydreaming about these - have never had them, only have seen them on here. But, my arrival day plan is nachos by the pool. Hoping the weather cooperates!! 24 days and counting!!!

We check in the same day. Doing SF this time but I'm sure we will end up at RPR at some point.

 

[cmarsh31]

I made my reservation for 2 nights on the web, using the APH code. When I called to extend by one night that night was showing available for the APH rate. The operator said the only way to extend the reservation was to cancel it, credit me the 1 night deposit, then open a new reservation and take a new 1 night deposit. I asked him to verify the rate before canceling, and he found that he couldn't book the APH for all 3 nights. He told me to go to the web and reserve the room as a single night, but to be advised that I may be asked to switch rooms after the second night. His only suggestion for avoiding the move was to rebook at the higher rate for all three nights.

So, long story short, I have 1 reservation for 2 nights, with 1 night paid, and 1 reservation for 1 night, with 1 night paid. Does it make sense to try and call to have the two reservations combined? I'm not concerned with getting any of my deposits back (the hotel would end up getting the money anyway), but I would love to avoid switching rooms/

We had the same mess last month. We were only waking up and going to the airport (plus we had a car) so I figured it was no big deal to pack up the day before and move our stuff. However, at check-in we lucked out and she was able to put us in the same room for all 3 nights. I just stopped at the front desk the 2nd morning to check out/in before we hit the parks.

 

[babesboo99]

Got back from vacation about a week ago and all I have to say is it was wonderful staying at RPR. We arrived about 1am and all the rooms were booked up so we had to wait in the lobby or in the car that wasn't a problem since we went and looked around and rested for a bit. Come 6am we checked in got our EP and went off to the parks for the day RPR said they will text when room was ready and it was ready very fast. Once we got the text we went back to the room brought all our luggage in and went back to the park, the staff is amazing in all the help we had when we had questions on the bill. we had $200 taken out of our acct and I wondered why so I went to check in and asked and they said it was for incidentals in case we charged something back to the room I must have told the check in lady it was ok it was early and maybe I was a little tired so we said ok and left it. And we loved it we charged everything to the room with no problems and my husband and I will do that from now on makes it so much easier for everything. And our favorite place to eat was at the Bula Bar by the pool we LOVED the Nachos we ate there everyday for the price you can't go wrong at all. We also ate at Emerils and loved it there as well the food and staff were terrific. In fact everyone at the hotel including restaurants and hotel etc were fantastic. My husband was 50/50 on the hotel because of the price but after we got there he said the price is worth all of it the perks are amazing and the place is beautiful and staff were kind and helpful. We will not stay anywhere else we love having the EP very much first time having it and we will always have it now, came in very handy for Kong and others. We walked a few times which was not long at all but we preferred the boat ride more relaxing and met nice people everything was so close to each other nothing is very far. The room was perfect we had a view of the walkway and waterway for the boats and we also had a view of the Hulk and we loved the new shower so much so when we got to Disney we said we missed RPR showers. I would like to thank everyone for their advice we had a wonderful time and now we know we are always going to stay at RPR such a beautiful place with wonderful people.

 

[macraven]

Happy to read your experience was great!


Now you know why so many love the hotel and parks

 

[Mom3girls]

I can't wait to show my teens and my Mother RPR in mid December!!! I know we will have a blast either way but really want the weather to cooperate so that we can enjoy the Bula Bar and the pool area. All of the workers/bartenders were super and the food and drinks were great

 

[kittylady1972]

So great to read such a wonderful report! We are heading to RPR in just over a week and I am surprising my kids with our stay there. I'm only sad we will only be there for ONE night but the rest of our trip is at WDW with family and at Disney resorts. We have ONE day (Saturday) planned to do both parks and since we were just there for a few days back in June we are okay just doing some favorite rides.

This will be the second Universal Resort for us and hopefully in another two years we'll be back again to try another one. Unless we like this one SO much we just come back here. Portofino Bay was also lovely in June!

 

[schumigirl]

Got back from vacation about a week ago and all I have to say is it was wonderful staying at RPR. We arrived about 1am and all the rooms were booked up so we had to wait in the lobby or in the car that wasn't a problem since we went and looked around and rested for a bit. Come 6am we checked in got our EP and went off to the parks for the day RPR said they will text when room was ready and it was ready very fast. Once we got the text we went back to the room brought all our luggage in and went back to the park, the staff is amazing in all the help we had when we had questions on the bill. we had $200 taken out of our acct and I wondered why so I went to check in and asked and they said it was for incidentals in case we charged something back to the room I must have told the check in lady it was ok it was early and maybe I was a little tired so we said ok and left it. And we loved it we charged everything to the room with no problems and my husband and I will do that from now on makes it so much easier for everything. And our favorite place to eat was at the Bula Bar by the pool we LOVED the Nachos we ate there everyday for the price you can't go wrong at all. We also ate at Emerils and loved it there as well the food and staff were terrific. In fact everyone at the hotel including restaurants and hotel etc were fantastic. My husband was 50/50 on the hotel because of the price but after we got there he said the price is worth all of it the perks are amazing and the place is beautiful and staff were kind and helpful. We will not stay anywhere else we love having the EP very much first time having it and we will always have it now, came in very handy for Kong and others. We walked a few times which was not long at all but we preferred the boat ride more relaxing and met nice people everything was so close to each other nothing is very far. The room was perfect we had a view of the walkway and waterway for the boats and we also had a view of the Hulk and we loved the new shower so much so when we got to Disney we said we missed RPR showers. I would like to thank everyone for their advice we had a wonderful time and now we know we are always going to stay at RPR such a beautiful place with wonderful people.

Glad to hear your trip was such a success........and glad your husband was so happy with the hotel too.......makes a difference.......

Nice to know that's your hotel of choice now.......it really is beautiful..........and so glad you came back to tell us about your trip.........

 

[jpkkld]

I can't believe I actually have a question that hasn't been answered here. This thread is amazing!

We "had to" upgrade to Club level to get EP for our 3-night stay Thanksgiving week (Originally booked SF, panicked 3 days ago when I learned there are no EPs there!). We've never done Club level before, and we're definitely looking forward to it!

I read somewhere that when the parks open at 7 (early entry), the club lounge also opens early at 6:30. Do they extend the dessert hour when the parks close at 9 p.m.? With the crowds I'm expecting, I'd like to maximize our evenings in the park, but DD is excited about coming back to the dessert spread. With the parks closing at 9 next week, I anticipate compromises will need to be made.

 

[schumigirl]

I've never heard of the Club Lounge staying open later when parks are open later........maybe someone else knows differently of course, but not in our experience.

Hope you enjoy your stay at RPR..........

 

[macraven]

Jpkkid you did not have to do club at rpr for the ep passes

Any room at the hotel allows you the free ep perk

 

[macraven]

When you check in at rpr, he club schedule should be in your packet

If not, just ask in the club lounge for the food offering time periods

When I stayed club, time periods were listed for the daily offerings.

 

[jpkkld]

I've never heard of the Club Lounge staying open later when parks are open later.

When you check in at rpr, he club schedule should be in your packet

If not, just ask in the club lounge for the food offering time periods

When I stayed club, time periods were listed for the daily offerings.

Thank you! That's what I figured, but it's good to know they'll list the times for us.

Jpkkid you did not have to do club at rpr for the ep passes

Any room at the hotel allows you the free ep perk

I agree, in most cases, this would be true. But 8 days before a trip during a holiday week isn't a great time to be checking for room availability. We had the option of club level at RPR or standard at PBH, both for pretty close to $300/night. The extra $100 per night at RPR is a good deal for both EP and club food offerings, so that one won. I was just glad there were still rooms available!

Thank you both for your help!

 

[Charade67]

Please forgive me, but I need to vent. I have been really excited about planning a Universal Vacation for my 50th birthday next year. I thought that the last school day before winter break would be Friday, 12/15. I just learned that next year it will be Wednesday, 12/20. My birthday is 12/16. I can now forget about being at the parks on my actual birthday. I might be able to take my daughter out of school early, but I'm afraid they will schedule mid-terms those last 3 days.
I'm off to go get some cheese to go with my whine

 

[macraven]

That is devastating


I hope someway things will work out where the special trip can happen


Pass the cheese as I know how bad you feel
A 50 th birthday needs to be celebrated in style

 

[ruthies12]

All right, I put off posting since I've been back to give it more thought before saying bad things but I have to say it- I did not like RPR. I'm sorry if that offends anybody.

We flew in late on a Thursday night beginning of November and drove to Holiday Inn across the street from Universal. The hotel was fine, nothing special but it's a Holiday Inn so I wasn't expecting it to be lol. That Friday we walked over and did Harry Potter stuff all day, glad we did it that day cause that was definitely the least busy of the 3 days we were there. On Saturday morning we drove over to RPR and checked in.

First off, moving hotels was a bigger pain in the $%@ than I had figured it would be. I think had it just been us adults it wouldn't have been a big deal, but with a 13 year old and a 7 year old who had "stuff" everywhere it was a big pain, plus we had groceries that we had picked up from Walgreen's that were a pain to move. Overall, too much hassle and not worth the money we saved, wouldn't do it again. If I went back I'd just stay at the holiday inn and pay for one day of express passes.

RPR is a pretty hotel overall, but I didn't like the rooms, the bathroom was awkward with the glass door and I guess I'm just not a fan of the modern décor. The boats were okay and security was nice. After doing the boats the first day we walked the second day cause it was faster. I found the pathway to be nice.

Early entry is not a perk. Getting up early to find the line for Gringotts all the way out of Diagon Alley? Not a perk in my opinion. We didn't want to wait that long for Gringotts, thankfully we had ridden it the previous day with little wait, so we decided to go out and hop on the train and see if we could be over at journey early enough to not have a long line. got to the outside of the train station at 8:45 to see people all around it in an arc with team members holding them away from the entrance. Knowing we were going to have to all converge into a single line to enter, I thought this isn't going to be good. Well we all stood there and waited and waited and 9 am came and went and still we were waiting. Finally they announced at 9:05 that the train was having difficulties and they didn't know when it would be opening. Okay, stuff happens and rides go down, I get that. But it was a really, really big disappointment that we got up early on our last day at US to do more Harry potter stuff before leaving only to not get to do anything at all. Maybe if the parks had more stuff open for early entry then gringott's wouldn't be mobbed. Opening an hour early but only having the one ride open just doesn't spread crowds and they have too many hotels for it to not be crowded, at least when they are booked up like they were that Saturday.

EP was good, though I felt bad about cutting in front of everyone. EP did allow us to do every ride in both parks and now that I've done the rest of Universal I can honestly say I would not go back if it weren't for the wizarding world and me being a big HP fan. It's probably just because I don't really like any of the movies that they have depicted in their rides, so it's probably just a me thing. I'm sure if I were more of a superhero fan or comic book fan then I would like the rides more. I have to say that their characters really don't have the timelessness of Disney's characters though, their barney and feivel area are a bit laughable and I had to laugh at the whole Jimmy Fallon ride thing they are building cause I had to ask my sister who that was.

But my biggest complaint was the bula bar at the hotel. It was 8 at night and I took the kids down to let them swim a bit and I went to the bar to get a drink. First of all I could barely breath cause the bar was packed with all the people smoking. But then I ordered the big bula and I watched the bartender making it. She filled a glass with ice to the top, as much ice as it would hold. Then she poured a tiny bit of rum in it. Then she filled it the rest of the way with mix. Then she handed me a bill for $17!! She was kind enough to inform me that gratuity was already added to the bill, which is good for her since I would not have tipped that pour at all had it been my choice. Then she informs that the price includes the souvenir glass. I informed her that I could not take said glass with me in my luggage and didn't want it. She said oh well, same price for the first drink whether you want the glass or not, but refills are 10 bucks. I asked her if the refill could have less ice in it and she said yes but she'd have to put more mix in it, not more rum. Obviously I didn't get another one. I sipped on the straw for 2 seconds, which is how long it took me to finish the drink, and I left the glass of ice on the bar.

I have a trip booked at Fort Wilderness campground for next October and I did upgrade mine and dd's tickets to annual passes because it was pretty cheap to do it and we have 2 extra days in our trip next year so it will be worth it to go back to see the harry potter stuff one more time. Overall our trip was great, but I definitely enjoyed our stay at Pop Century more than RPR. Pop's food court and being able to feed the kids quickly and easily and their much friendlier bartenders with much better, cheaper drinks were more to my liking. I hope I'm not giving the impression that I'm a big drinker cause I'm really not, but paying for one tiny drink more than I would have to pay for an entire bottle of rum just really did not sit well with me. But even that might not have bothered me so much if the bartender had been friendlier/nicer. Or if I hadn't been standing in a cloud of smoke.

Sorry to be a Debbie downer. I went into the trip really excited to stay at RPR and it just didn't meet my expectations at all. Maybe my expectations were too high.

 

[ruthies12]

I have to add that check in at RPR was a pain too. We got there early to get our express passes, and then headed to the park for the day. We got a text mid-day that our room was ready but when we got back to the hotel we had to go back to the desk to get room keys and our room number. Had to wait in line both times.

In contrast, I had done online check in at Pop, and the day we were to check in there I got a text with our room number mid-day. We parked the car and walked with our luggage straight to our room with our magicband letting us in the door. It was so much nicer than having to go to the front desk and wait in line, especially having to wait in line twice like at RPR.

 

[macraven]

When people checkin to the hotel, they are issued room keys for all on their reservation

Can't make your ep card without them

At rpr you go to the right of the lobby check in counter to the kiosk to create the photo ID card

Once a room has been assigned, the room card is coded so the guest can go directly to the room and by pass going to the lobby

 

[Roxyfire]

When people checkin to the hotel, they are issued room keys for all on their reservation

Can't make your ep card without them

Could be that they had to print new cards for them for some reason? I know I had to return to the front desk at PBH for a new key later in the day. But they had said they would try to accommodate my room requests to, which was very nice of them. Different hotels though, could be different procedure.

 

[ruthies12]

When people checkin to the hotel, they are issued room keys for all on their reservation

Can't make your ep card without them

At rpr you go to the right of the lobby check in counter to the kiosk to create the photo ID card

Once a room has been assigned, the room card is coded so the guest can go directly to the room and by pass going to the lobby

Not in our case, we were given room keys to make our express passes with but told we had to come back to the desk for our actual room keys. We had to turn in our original room keys and we received all new ones to get into our room. Not sure if our case as different for some reason or just a fluke, but it was definitely a pain.

 

[Charade67]

That is devastating


I hope someway things will work out where the special trip can happen


Pass the cheese as I know how bad you feel
A 50 th birthday needs to be celebrated in style

Thanks macraven. I was chatting with a school counselor today and mentioned my situation. She says it should be no problem for my daughter to take her mid-terms a couple of days early next year and she can skip the last few days before winter break. She said students do it all the time, we just need to go through the proper channels and get permission first.