My AKL CL review cont...
The bad:
The resort is dark. The only time I felt the sun was at the pool or parking lot. We go to FL for the sun, and I really missed it.
Our thermostat. Let me start by saying I normally get the best sleep of my life when I’m at WDW. A solid, unmoving 8 hours. It’s heaven. But my first 3 nights here, I barely got 4 (if that), because the room felt like a sauna by early, early morning. Even though I had planned a pretty relaxed trip, by the end of night 3, I had cancelled plans, my body was breaking down, and I was in tears. I was ready to checkout. I was actually longing for my last stay at All Star Sports if you can believe it. Anyway, the CL staff sent maintenance to our room twice and thermostat was overridden to 65 degrees on the 2nd visit. That helped, but not much. Day 4 we asked for a fan and kept the balcony door open when we slept. That did the trick, I finally slept through the night.
I don’t know what was going on with thermostat, but it would never get down to the set temp, even if we were in the room for hours. My husband is very sensitive to cold, and normally wears sweats to bed when traveling. He stays at hotels a lot because of work and the typical 68 degree room is freezing to him. However, those 3 nights, he was wearing shorts and a T-shirt to bed. He’s convinced the displayed temperature was nowhere near the actual temperature. I have to agree. What makes absolutely no sense to me is the fact that nights 4-6 we had the balcony door open a good two feet. Overnight lows averaged 50 degrees for those nights. The room was cool, but the displayed temp never dipped below 66. How is that possible?
(Btw, in case you missed it, Disney did compensate us nicely for our thermostat troubles.)
Morning coffee on the balcony. I know this has been talked about before but I’m reiterating. If you ever fantasized about taking your coffee while sitting on your balcony for sunrise and gazing at the animals, then don’t. It probably won’t happen. I believe I only spotted animals on 2 out of 6 mornings. And I’m not even talking about early morning, just morning. Change that fantasy to a glass of wine on the balcony at around 5 o’clock. Animals everywhere thanks to the Wanyama Safari.
The noise. It can be loud. I’m very quiet by nature, so the drum cafes, the primal parades, and the Boma opening ceremony were an unwelcome shock to my senses.
Activities calendar. I carved out 1 full day and 2 half days to take advantage of the resort activities. I designed my day around the times listed on the January calendar. Unfortunately, they changed the schedule in February and by then, Sanaa, Jiko, and Boma were pretty booked up and I wasn’t having much luck changing things around to fit the new schedule. So I kept what I had and hoped the February schedule was an aberration, it wasn’t. But since I checked in March 1st there was no way to know that. This is just a long winded way of warning you that if the resort activities (and ADRs) are important to you, and if your dates are flexible, then you may want to schedule your trip later in the month. That way you’ll have a chance of seeing the schedule before your departure.
DSS. I was immediately impressed because I received a call from them the day after I booked. However, it went downhill after that. Before our trip, I contacted them a few times about ADRs, FP, and booking a massage. Every time I called I was on hold. My last call, my hold time was nearly 20 minutes. I found it was much easier just to call the normal reservation line. I saw no benefit on contacting DSS. Btw, these calls were placed before the new CL extra FP thing was even introduced.
Tip: order more well done than rare, the brioche bun doesn’t stand up well to the extra juices from a rarer burger.
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