NVDISFamily
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Apr 16, 2022
Sorry for the delay in posting this, work and life has kept us busy for the past few weeks. We had our first trip to Florida with our DVC points in June 2023. Our first stay was in 2022 for a few nights renting points to stay at SSR studio to check out WDW and “kick the tires” on the various DVC resorts we were considering. Overall, we had a great time, learned a few lessons for our future trips, and we are so glad we have taken this journey into DVC membership.
We had our first “welcome home” trip to Disneyland at the Grand Cal in the spring of 2023 -(https://www.disboards.com/threads/our-california-welcome-home-trip-plus-a-detour-to-knotts.3917243/).
First Resort – Kidani Village (AKV) Grand Villa and 1BR
AKV is a magical resort. Family loved the animals, the lobby in both Kidani and Jambo house, the food, etc. A big plus for some of the teenagers in the group was the better than average community room at Kidani and the pool at Kidani. It was ranked by most of the younger kids and teenagers as the resort they would like to return to for future family reunions.
Renting a car and being able to drive up to our area’s elevator made the long walks of the hallway manageable.
The grand villa at Kidani has amazing storage everywhere.
Our room request was not granted, and we were at the very end of the hallway on the Zazu elevator side. It was a nice view, beautiful room, and we also appreciated having no neighbors. With that said, that walk sucked and even the younger ones didn’t like it. It did have the advantage of increasing our step count. For future trips to Kidani, I think I’ll request everyone in our party to be near a specific elevator and not on the same floor if this will get us a bit closer to the lobby. The elevators seem to be very quick and efficient at Kidani.
A less major issue but I’ll post it here, the lobby and Jambo and the better gift shop are amazing. It sucks you must make that trade off, but you do.
Overall, we loved the grand villa at Kidani and the 2 on-suite bathrooms in the guest rooms are a huge plus. The pool received high marks from the family on the Kidani side. For most of the family, they liked the Kidani rooms more due to the extra bathrooms in the 1 and 2BR units.
We already have a grand villa on Jambo side for next summer to let us try that side and make the comparison.
We had our first “welcome home” trip to Disneyland at the Grand Cal in the spring of 2023 -(https://www.disboards.com/threads/our-california-welcome-home-trip-plus-a-detour-to-knotts.3917243/).
First Resort – Kidani Village (AKV) Grand Villa and 1BR
AKV is a magical resort. Family loved the animals, the lobby in both Kidani and Jambo house, the food, etc. A big plus for some of the teenagers in the group was the better than average community room at Kidani and the pool at Kidani. It was ranked by most of the younger kids and teenagers as the resort they would like to return to for future family reunions.
Renting a car and being able to drive up to our area’s elevator made the long walks of the hallway manageable.
The grand villa at Kidani has amazing storage everywhere.
Our room request was not granted, and we were at the very end of the hallway on the Zazu elevator side. It was a nice view, beautiful room, and we also appreciated having no neighbors. With that said, that walk sucked and even the younger ones didn’t like it. It did have the advantage of increasing our step count. For future trips to Kidani, I think I’ll request everyone in our party to be near a specific elevator and not on the same floor if this will get us a bit closer to the lobby. The elevators seem to be very quick and efficient at Kidani.
A less major issue but I’ll post it here, the lobby and Jambo and the better gift shop are amazing. It sucks you must make that trade off, but you do.
Overall, we loved the grand villa at Kidani and the 2 on-suite bathrooms in the guest rooms are a huge plus. The pool received high marks from the family on the Kidani side. For most of the family, they liked the Kidani rooms more due to the extra bathrooms in the 1 and 2BR units.
We already have a grand villa on Jambo side for next summer to let us try that side and make the comparison.