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You have so many lodging choices in Orlando it's bewildering. We'll try to help focus your thinking. First, we advise against staying out in town. Yes, you can save money. Disney "resorts" are more expensive. But you don't save that money in the long run. You'll use gas driving back and forth, you'll pay for parking, if you ride the bus or a taxi you'll pay for that, and you'll pay more for park tickets and meals since they won't come as part of a package. And staying on Disney property immerses you in the atmosphere. Especially with kids along, this is a big part of why you come. Room decor, the activities, the ability to quickly and easily move between your room and any of the parks, add a quality to your stay that an off property motel can't match. The corporate sleekness of an offsite hotel is impressive, but it looks like hotels in any other city. Disney "resorts" are unique. The transportation itself is fun. The monorail, water taxiis, horse drawn carriages, etc., do not extend to off property lodging. A final consideration is the guest service desk. Any problem that might arise, no matter how trivial or major, whether it's Disney's fault or not, can be addressed by the Disney guest service representative. Those reps do not have desks in off property lodging. So, yes, it's expensive, but we advise readers to suck it up, plan ahead, budget carefully, and stay at a Disney resort.

Next you need to choose what price level of lodging you want, or you can afford. There are several "value resorts," several "moderate" resorts, and several "deluxe" resorts. But it goes beyond price. These resorts have different styles. Regardless of what you can afford, if you're coming with young kids, we highly recommend one of the Value Resorts. There are five : Music, Sports, Pop Culture, Classic Movies, and Animation. These are themed intensely. Your room, the lobby, restaurants, gift shops, swimming pool, grounds and everything else feature statues, posters, paintings, furniture, fountains, landscaping, back ground music, menu items, and every other imaginable detail wrapped around that theme. For example, the Animation Resort features icons from Cars, Toy Story, Nemo and other beloved Disney animated classics. If your kids are among the millions of devoted fans of those films, they will be in Paradise without even going into the parks, and you can take home photographs of them sitting on, standing next to, or otherwise posing with all the statues and costumed characters. You'll frame those photos and hang them on the wall or display them on the mantle. No matter how expensive the Deluxe Resorts are, they cannot match this. The value resorts have another huge advantage. They are the closest lodging complexes at a reasonabloe cost to the Magic Kingdom, Animal Kingdom and Blizzard Beach. If you're going to spend your week going back and forth between those parks with young kids, cutting the transit time is an important consideration. All of the value resorts have huge swimming pools with slides, waterfalls, fountains and other features. They also have gift shops and cafeteria style food service centers which are great for breakfast and lunch. All Value Resorts are priced alike : about $1000 for a double room for five nights and four days of park passes for two parents and one child.

However, for families with teenagers or couples without children, we suggest moving up to a Moderate Resort. And while there are several excellent choices (Caribbean, Coronado Springs (southwest themed, the third picture at the top of the page) and The Cabins (frontier themed)), we highly recommend Port Orleans Riverside. Over the years, we've stayed at every one of the Disney resorts, and we think Port Oreleans Riverside beats them all. We would rather stay here than any of the Deluxe Resorts. As a matter of fact, we don't understand why this is not one of the Deluxe Resorts. True, the rooms here are not as big. And true, there are certain amenities the Deluxe Resorts offer which Riverside cannot match. But these are countered by other amenities Riverside offers which not even the more expensive resorts have. And beginning in Spring 2012 you'll have the added benefit of brand new rooms, since a massive renovation is occurring during Fall 2011 / Winter 2012. As part of this, wall mounted panorama TVs and all new queen beds will be installed. All Moderate Resorts are priced alike : about $1500 for a double room for five nights and four days of park hopper passes for two parents and one child.

The first reason we love Riverside is the sense of privacy. Yes, there are a few thousand people staying here at any one time. But you stay in smaller units and they're spread over a large area, with the river, canals, an island, ponds, wetlands and dense vegetation giving the illusion of isolation. There is one large community pool with the usual slides and fountains if you're into that sort of thing, but throughout the units are smaller private pools (like the one shown at left) that almost seem like backyard versions. Since most of the kids are at Value Resorts, and the few who are at Riverside gravitate to the large pool on the island for its slides, the neighborhood pools tend to be very quiet and peaceful. You can sit in a chaise lounge and read, or float in the pool in an inner tube or other inflatable. We think this is really important, because it gives you a break from the crowded, hectic pace of the parks. As we mentioned before, we recommend going to the parks in the morning, then spending the heat of the afternoon relaxing back at your lodging before returning to the parks in the evening. These quiet backyard pools are the best at Disney for that.

The second reason we love Riverside is for its recreation options. You can fish in the pond or in the river, mostly for Bass, Perch and Sunfish. You can rent a kayak or canoe and go paddling, or rent a small two person powerboat and go for a cruise. There's the main river and six meandering canals to explore, more than enough to keep you busy. There's a horse drawn carriage to ride around the Riverside trails and over to neighboring resorts. And there are bikes to rent. You can rent a basic bike, a regular bicycle built for two, or one of the four wheeled surry bikes. There's a two person surry, where you and your partner sit side by side on a bench seat and each have your own set of pedals. Or there's a four person surry, with a second bench seat for teenagers or adults, and a raised front seat ahead of the front seat, where kids or dogs could ride if you had any along. You could wander the trails of this resort for a week with a guidebook in your hand just studying the plant life; it's a botanical wonderland with all the subtropical swamp and wetland plants. You could also wander the resort studying the birds, of which there are plenty. And there are lots of frogs, skinks and other reptiles who come up from the water to sun themselves on the sidewalks.

The third reason we love Riverside is the water taxi to Downtown Disney. You just walk to the main lodge, wait 15 minutes for the next one, and enjoy a beautiful ride down the river, which is usually hemmed in by lush subtropical vegetation except for one section where the Saratoga Springs Golf Course runs along the river for a quarter of a mile. The ride takes about 20 minutes, depending on how long you stop at the French Quarter to pick up or drop off passengers. And at Downtown Disney you have 10 restaurants, a dozen gift shops, a circus, an indoor arcade/amusement park, and three locations where live shows or concerts are presented. You could thus return from one of the parks, perhaps take a nap or a dip in the pool, shower and change, then head downtown for dinner. There are some great restaurants down there : Captain Jack's, Fulton's, Ragland Road Irish Pub , The T-Rex Cafe, The Rainforest Cafe, Portabello's, House of Blues , Bongo's Cuban Cafe, Wolfgang Puck , Paradisio 37, Polla Campero, and the Earl of Sandwich . If you're a restaurant lover, Riverside may well prove to be your favorite resort, too.

But the final reason we love Riverside is the great restaurant and cafeteria style food service it offers right on the premises. Breakfast and lunch are served at the food court in the main lodge. You can even pick up a tray of food and take it back to your room. And there's Boatwright's, the best kept restaurant secret on the Disney plantation. You eat dinner with a partially built boat hanging from the celing above you. We'll talk more about this on the Restaurant page, but the point here is that you don't have to go anywhere at all to experience very fine dining in classy surroundings and reasonable prices. We know people who stay at Riverside and eat dinner every night at Boatwright's. They go to a different park each day, stay all day, exhaust themselves, and don't want to go anywhere else once they return to Riverside. So they get back around 6 pm or so, shower and change, eat at Boatwright's, and enjoy an evening walk along the river or through the wetlands to settle their dinners. By the time they amble back to their room, they change and spend an hour or so at the pool. Next morning, they're refreshed and ready to go again.
A different strategy would be to stay at The Cabins. Located in the Wilderness Resort, they have fully equipped kitchens which allow you to fix your own meals. They're more expensive than other moderate resorts, but save money as you avoid restaurant prices. Cabins have the same isolation as Riverside. Deer, ducks and rabbits are ever present. You're on the lake, so you have a water taxi to the Magic Kingdom and you can rent canoes, two person waterboats, and pontoon boats. You can fish in the lake, rent a Segway or bike, or go horseback riding. The Wilderness Resort also offers three night time shows : The Hoop De Doo Musical Review, The Chip n Dale Sing Along, and a Disney movie on a rotating basis. Each cabin has 500 square feet with one bedroom containing a double bed and a bunk bed. In the living room a Murphy Bed could sleep two more. They do have Trails End Restaurant at the lodge, but it's pretty basic. Service is fine but food is just average. You should stay at The Cabins because you intend to cook. Wilderness is Disney's largest resort, so it's a long walk from your cabin to the lodge, the water, and the bus stop. The cost for a family of three for five nights and four days of park tickets would be about $2600, but you won't need the dining package because you're cooking all meals.
Moving up to the Deluxe Resorts, you have to decide what your priorities are. If you're going to focus on the Magic Kingdom, The Grand Floridian looks across the water at it (also see photo top left). You can see the nightly fireworks from your patio, take the water taxi across the lake to the main entrance, and glance at Cinderella's Castle 24 hours a day. The Monorail stops at The Grand Floridian en route to Epcot. Downstairs you have two of the best restaurants, not just in Disney, but in the country, and in all there are six restaurants. This is Disney's flagship hotel. It was the first one they designed when they planned the park and they intended from the start to use it to make an impression on the world of a first class, cutting edge destination. The theme is Old Florida, the Victorian Age resort that first beckoned Northerners to take a break from their Winters and come down for a week. You have white sand beaches, swaying palm trees, a riot of flowers, pastel colors and a full service spa. Service is impeccable and everything has been updated continuously since 1970 so the rooms are cutting edge. We've always been torn about staying here with kids. On the one hand, they're within sight of the Magic Kingdom, which is thrilling. But on the other hand, everything is so stately and dignified that any sort of boisterous or excitable behavior seems out of place and may get them frowned on. There are always kids here, but the ones at the value resorts always seem to be having more fun. However, if you want to try it, the base rate for two adults and one child for five nights, including four days of park passes, is $3000. Since we think The Grand Floridian is more suited to couples, the base five night, four day rate for two adults with park passes is $2400.
Another option is the Contemporary Resort (top right). 40 years old, it represents what Americans in the 1970s imagined the 21st Century would look like. That vision now seems a bit quaint, but this is still a very impressive resort, one that if in Lexington, Cincinnati or Louisville would be considered the city's premier hotel. For starters, you're in 10 minute walking distance of the Magic Kingdom and 10 minutes monorail ride to Epcot. If you request a Parkview room, you can see the Castle and Splash Mountain from your window and watch the fireworks from your balcony every evening. You can also watch the famous Electric Water Pageant on the lake every night at sundown. Contemporary rooms are the largest of any Disney resort. The bathrooms are large, too, although the sinks are large, flat and shallow, as architects imagined 21st Century sinks would be. Some people find this annoying, as they drain slow. Veterans who come to Disney several times a year and take turns staying at every Disney resort have long claimed the Contemporary beds were the best of all the resorts.
The Contemporary is home to Chef Mickey's, one of Disney's more famous restaurants. It can be hard to get a reservation, because every kid wants his family to take him there, and you might want to request a room as far away as possible, because Chef Mickey throws a lot of wild parties and the music and cavorting may get a bit old after several nights. But it certainly adds to the fun. Another famous restaurant, the California Grill (shown above), is quite upscale ($60 entrees), but if you want a reservation, we suggest you call a week before you arrive because they're hard to come by. Then there's the Contempo, a futuristic (at least in the 1970s mind) cafe where you order from touch screens. You can rent watercraft or take the ferry to various destinations. You could go Bass fishing out on the lake, or go parasailing high above it. There's water skiing, wakeboarding and power tubing (you're towed around the lake on an inflatable). Two pools (one with slides, etc.) and surrounding hot tubs offer calmer water time. The Contemporary's final touch is the monorail, seen in the 1970s as the classic symbol of the future, so it brings the monorail right through the lobby and the restaurants. The basic five night rate for two adults and one child, including four days of park tickets, is $2800.

If your major focus will be the Animal Kingdom, obviously the Animal Kingdom Lodge is your best bet. This is a truly magnificent facility just from an architectural and theming perspective. However, what makes it absolutely spectacular are the animals. This is the only place in America where you can wake up in the morning and make eye contact with a giraffe munching leaves just outside your second story window. For all the photos of the Castle, the Epcot Ball and the various rides, this African savanna (actually a 43 acre wildlife preserve) that comes right up to the rear of the Animal Kingdom Lodge may be Disney's greatest achievement. There are 30 species of animal roaming this grassland and the lodge has a dozen specially built lookouts for those whose rooms face the other direction. The hotel includes two nationally recognized restaurants. You could spend at least one whole day just wondering around this building taking pictures, and these are all authentic African artifacts.

The plants outside are also all native to Africa. A Botany teacher could teach a week long African Ecology course within walking distance of this lodge. There's a beautiful pool bordered by lush African vegetation. Among other activities, you can sign up for a safari conducted by a wildlife biologist, although it's $150 per person, and over in the Animal Kingdom park right next door there's a safari which is free and exposes you to pretty much the same plants and animals. Every school in America should bring students here one week a year to study African culture. You can soak up more of it sitting in this lobby than reading any textbook in print. If you really want to stay here but are on a tight budget, you can register for a room facing away from the savanna. The base rate for two adults and one child for five nights, including four days of park tickets, is $2200. A savanna view room will cost $2600, also including the park tickets.
If your major focus will be Epcot and/or Hollywood Studios, especially if you plan to eat at Epcot every night at one of the nationality restaurants, you should stay at the Swan & Dolphin Resorts. You can walk along the river trail directly into Epcot, or you can take the water taxi from the hotel to the dock at the French section. The water taxi also goes on to Hollywood Studios and The Boardwalk. It is about a 15 minute walk to Epcot and 20 minutes to Hollywood Studios or Boardwalk. The Swan and Dolphin are actually two hotels. The lake inside Epcot empties into a river which drains into a second lake. The Swan is on the South side of that lake, the Dolphin on the North Side. They share the tennis courts, pool and other recreational facilities. Both were designed by famed architect Michael Graves and are considered by most critics as the most beautiful hotels in Florida and among the most beautiful in the country. If you stay here, you may leave wondering why Disney regards the Grand Floridian as its flagship hotel. The Swan & Dolphin are more elegant, more luxurious and more impressive. The Grand Floridian is reminiscent of a previous era, while the Swan & Dolphin are trendsetters in the current era. The Dolphin Hotel is shown in this photo, with the Epcot / Hollywood Studios ferry in the foreground. You can walk or take the ferry to Epcot, then take the Monorail to the Magic Kingdom or the bus to the Animal Kingdom or the waterparks.
Together, they include 10 high ranking restaurants with world class chefs. Between Epcot and these two hotels, you could stay here a week and eat every meal in a different memorable restaurant.The spa is outstanding. You can play the famous Disney miniature golf facility, where the national championships are held most years. There are two 18 hole courses. Next door is a par three and par four course. There's a complete health club and 2, 3 and 4 mile jogging trails. You can rent power boats, or relax in the classy pool with the waterfall at one end. The base rate for two adults and one child for five nights, including four days of park tickets, is $2400. If you are a light sleeper and like to sleep late, request a room away from the water. The water taxi horns will wake you early. We like to get up and get to the parks early, so we loved it, but you might not. The Swan & Dolphin are not operated by Disney; they are subcontracted out. So the Dining Plan does not apply to the 10 hotel restaurants, internet service is free but very slow, and you pay $12 a day to park. The Swan Hotel is shown in this photo, with the Epcot/ Hollywood Studios ferry docked.

A word about concierges. The traditional definition of a concierge is a guest services ombudsman who maintains a desk in a major hotel lobby and solves problems for guests. Regardless of what the problem might be --- lost reservations, lost luggage, the need to find transportation to some other point, a medical issue, lost children, a noisy party nexty door, the need for a restaurant reservation when the restaurant says it's full, anything --- the concierge solves it. A good concierge has worked at the hotel for years, knows the ins and outs of local beauracracies, knows exactly who to call for which crisis, and has built up working relationships with people over a long time. Therefore, when he picks up the phone and calls, he gets results. He has the credibility and authority to make decisions and give orders and he does not take No or Maybe or Later for answers. A good concierge knows how to send a guest away happy. He is the face of the corporation to the public. As such, he is respected, paid well, and kept happy by top management. Disney's policy of placing recent hires, college interns or recent graduates in the concierge positions makes this sort of crisis management impossible. No one is in the position long enough to learn the back avenues of the beauracracy. Nor do they have time to build their authority, build relationships with custodians, maids, drivers, waitresses, policemen, or anyone else. So they don't know who to call and when they do get someone on the phone that person feels no obligation to help the concierge solve the problem. 60% of all complaints filed by guests at Disney hotels over the last decade involve some problem which was not resolved to their satisfaction by a concierge. Of course it is true people don't read directions, don't do what they're told, and often cause their own problems. Nevertheless, concierges once were skilled at dealing with such guests. No longer. So do not expect miraculous problem solving by the concierge or anyone else on the hotel staff during your stay at Disney. They don't know much more than you do. When you pay this much for lodging, do you have the right to expect more? Certainly. But those days seem to be gone. So we suggest you live a little paranoid and anticipate crises. Avoidance is the best solution.

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