Yeah, the "bear face" rooms have balconies that face East and overlook upper silver creek springs (which is a nice view) but then the door end of the room opens up to the lobby, which is an impressive and beautiful view as well. They are only on the fourth and fifth floor, and normally there are a total of 14 of them, but I believe only 8 (the ones toward the North side) are open during the construction.
It sounds like you've convinced yourself of where your next stay will be. However, even if the South Wing were to re-open by the time you visit again, there's no guarantee that 7127 would even be available. There's also the possibility that 7035 might not be available. If it weren't available to you, would you still be happy? In the past, I've had to answer these same questions, although there wasn't any construction going on and the OFC was fully operational.
How's your recovery and how's your dad doing?
Hey kook!
I'm only now thinking about,what if,in regards to the room......without a doubt,my two favorite rooms are a preference. If neither are available......if we could get a room with a pool view that would give us at least a partial view of the lake,that would be just fine too. Under the circumstances,flexibility is a necessity. I do think about BWI CL,but the pull of WL is strong. I do like the feeling of being removed from the crowds and noise. Sheesh,decisions,decisions.
I haven't seen my Dad since my knee replacement on 1/19, but Ed has been going to see him. The staff says he returned from rehab a different person,not as easygoing,which is upsetting to me. It means he isn't happy. It must have been so confusing and scary for him,to be somewhere else for two months and having to use a wheelchair. But Ed says that the longer he's back in his room,the more he's getting back to being himself. I'm getting at least two calls a week,though. He refuses to ask for help and he is falling down transferring from wheelchair to bathroom by himself. Ed had a serious talk with him and I've spoken with him too,so no calls this week,thank goodness.
I'm in week four of recovery. I left physical therapy crying on Wed.,but it was less traumatic today. I actually didn't realize I was crying at the time,but my body reacted before my brain engaged.Getting my knee to bend is beyond excruciating. But we're taking a DCL cruise to Alaska end of May,so I'm determined to not be Miss Wobbles by then. I look at everyday as one day closer to getting better.....popping an OxyCondon before PT helps a little too.....
One big con to me is that you don't control the reservation and you usually can't make any changes or cancel when renting points. Travel insurance would be a benefit, but isn't free, so I assume this cost would be passed on to you?
I knew you'd have great advice
Those ground floor woods view rooms have a nice green construction fence placed right in front of the patios. There is a lot of construction going on right in front of those rooms. I really don't know if they are putting guests in those ground floor rooms. But I wouldn't want to have the view of the construction fence and the noise and dirt from the construction.
Just returned from Princess Half Marathon weekend and spent our first two nights at WL. We've stayed at WL many times and most recently last year in both March and August, so we have basis for comparison.
Wow - that's some construction! We stayed in a courtyard view room and I'll say the construction was obvious and very much present. We faced that scaffolding head on and could see tons of construction workers over on the other side. The lobby (as demonstrated by all the photos others posted) is half boarded up and it does impact the overall atmosphere. The construction on the other side of the resort had a significant impact on the courtyard view - it was essentially a construction view, even though we weren't looking into a pit of dirt - scaffolding and yellow-vested workers were everywhere over there.
Unrelated to the construction (I think), bus service was not great. Buses at every resort are always hit or miss. I don't think any one deluxe resort has bus service that's far superior to the others. The buses were uncrowded (yay!) but arrived infrequently (boo!) We waited for almost an hour for our DHS bus one morning. We were fine because our FP+ were later, but several guests were stressed about dining reservations and FP. Again, this can happen anywhere.
On the bright side, Roaring Forks was never crowded. Never! It was a breeze. The boats were not crowded and we were always able to fit on the first boat that arrived at the dock. Also, our AP rate was very reasonable for a deluxe, considering the season. The low cost and reasonable expectations (based on great info on this thread - thanks to @woodnymph, @WDWKOOK and all contributors!) had much to do with our enjoyment. We regarded this as an alternative to a moderate, given the low cost of WL during construction compared to other deluxe resorts. Also, we intentionally planned our WL stay for the part of the trip we spent in the parks. We spent very little time at the resort and didn't use the pool or anything else. It was very much a place to sleep and grab a quick breakfast before heading out for the entire day (and returning around 10pm each night.)
So we had a great time, but that's very much based on the circumstances above. I was strongly considering a switch to BC for those first two nights, and in retrospect, would have preferred to make that change. But our kids love WL, loved the construction pins, loved the cake I ordered from the CR bakery (which would not have served BC) and were very happy about the choice. So it was all good in the end.
