sorry for the slow response... hate it when work gets in the way of my vacation planning! We had a great trip & packed in about as much fun as a family can have in a 3 night trip. I felt cramped in the studio room because we've always stayed in 1, 2, or 3 bedroom villas at disney. If you aren't use to that kind of space, then you will LOVE the poly studios.
Here is a post I put on another board:
We just returned from a quick Easter getaway to the Poly. We stayed in Room 2043 in Moorea and had a view of trees, bushes, Pago Pago and the parking lot to the left.
Let me know if you have any questions and I'll do my best to respond.
We typically stay in 1 bedroom units with 4 people or 2 bedroom units with 6 people, so with 4 people (2 adults, 2 kids) in a studio, it felt a bit cramped to us, but the room was very nice. The sheets felt as if they hadn't been washed before going on the bed and were kinda scratchy and rough. The full bathroom with the toilet had quite a bit of wasted space... wish they had put in drawers somewhere. I also prefer the bathroom set up in Grand Floridian where you can walk from one of the bathrooms to the other... I found that I was walking out into the hall and into the other bathroom on a regular basis to get items in the other bathroom. Not a big deal though.
Overall, we were happy with the room, but it does lack handy drawer storage. We used packing cubes and brought several outfits on slim hangers to maximize space. I did not use the drawers under the head of the bed as this was inconvenient to access with people sleeping and lights out. Next time (we are booked for a week in October), I will bring an organizer that hangs from the closet rod with collapsible shelves to hang on the side of the closet with the safe.
We were booked for nights from 2 different DVC accounts. We had 2 different reservation numbers that were linked, allowing us to stay in the same room. In the past, we've always had a full clean on the first reservation's check out date. Not so at the poly. I even called housekeeping because we didn't receive the cleaning we were expecting. They stated that we were not going to get any housekeeping during our stay. We also only received 3 full sized towels even though we had 4 guests in a room that was intended to accomodate 5. I requested more towels, which never came. My 4 year old made due with his sister's wet towel and later and microscopic towel from the pool. Poor performance by housekeeping.
We enjoyed the East pool on Friday, before the feature pool opened. Although the pool was nothing special, the temperature was nice and the lifeguards were very vigilant. We also enjoyed the feature pool and hot tub on Easter Sunday. The pool was VERY cold. I assume this is because the pool was just being filled in the days prior and had not had an opportunity for the florida sun to heat it. I hope the pool with be temperature controlled in the winter. The hot tub, was very warm, but not hot. In my opinion this was a good thing as I let my 6 year old "swim" in the hot tub when she found the pool too cold.
Trader Sam's was super busy, with 1 hour + waits in the evening.
Kona served a lovely dinner... noodle dish was especially nice.
Easter activities were very fun for the kids and photopass photographers were on-hand.
Overall, a great weekend! We are looking forward to going back in October, although in the future, I will likely book at BLT (one of our home resorts) or GVF where we can get a full 1 bedroom unit.
& later:
We arrived Thursday evening and checked in just in time to make it to the night time fireworks show (didn't even go to the room first). We had fastpasses to the viewing area and it was nice to have a spot without people pushing past. Our kids, 4 & 6 were in strollers. They loved the show and passed out immediately afterwards. On the Magical Express, the video said that the MK fireworks are Mickey's kiss good night to the guests... it surely was a perfect kiss good night for our kids.
Since the kids were asleep, we took the opportunity to bridge our 5 day park hoppers into DVC APs... all went great. I will post on my other thread about the fantastic savings we achieved. Only bummer is that GR wasn't able to get my Disney Savings Account number to work, so we just used disney gift cards and didn't get the extra 2% savings. Still a success overall.
My husband and I then stopped at the counter-service and grabbed a bite to eat while watching our kids snooze in the stroller and the activity with the lava pool construction... they were pressure washing and filling the pool. We should have gone to Trader Sam's that night (Thursday) because it was empty... the other 2 nights had a 1 hr wait.
We got back to our room at 10:45 pm. This was the first time we'd gone to the room at were pleased with the overall feel and look of the room. I was disappointed that our bags had not arrived from DME (our flight landed at 6:20 pm). I usually pack everything you could possibly need in carry-on bags, but since we were not planning to swim or do much, I didn't have PJs for myself or my husband. It ended up taking until 11:45 before our final bag arrived. By 11 pm I was ready to sleep, so that was a bit of a disappointment.
The next morning (Friday), we dressed and headed to MK. We arrived at 8:30, well after rope drop. We went right for 7 dwarfs mine train, which we were unable to get FP+ for. The wait was an hour, but the weather was perfect, and the line had a bunch of fun interactive activities to keep the kids occupied. The ride was great! From there we grabbed a light breakfast of muffins and fruit by mainstreet, enjoyed some of the entertainment there, and then rode a few rides. The kids were eager to do Sorcerers of the Magic Kingdom, so we spent most of the next few hours doing that. Unfortunately, we had an adventure on Main Street, so we were going up and down main street fighting the crowds both ways. I learned later that you can request your adventure in a different area of the park. The kids were ready to continue the adventure in adventure land, but mom and dad had had enough.
We returned to the resort to swim. I was hopeful that the feature pool would be open, but it was still being filled. We swam at the East pool and had a great time. From there, we dressed and dropped the kids off at Lilo's playhouse (they were begging to go to the kids' club!). Kids had a fantastic time, were upset that we picked them up too early, and their major complaint for the trip was that they didn't get to go back!
Jim and I enjoyed a great dinner at Sannaa and saw many animals at the viewing area. AKV and the AK park are my favorites, and we didn't have time to fit AK park into our visit, so I'm glad we were able to enjoy dinner at Kidani. After dinner, Jim and I went to MK looking for dessert, didn't see anything that struck our fancy and ended up getting dessert to go from Kona. The chocolate lava cake was good, not a big fan of the banana flavor they added to the creme brulee. We picked up kids from Lilo & heard them complain terribly that it was too soon to go!
Saturday, we were hoping to wake up early and make it to rope drop at AK, then to Epcot for our late morning/early afternoon fast passes. When 8 am came and we were still in the room, we decided to go to Epcot for the 9 am rope drop instead. We arrived about 8:30 at Epcot, enjoyed chatting as we waited for rope drop, and then at 9 am ran as fast as we could go, pushing the strollers, to Soaring. We were on and off Soaring by 9:10, at which point the line was 65 minutes and growing every moment. The run through the park was so fun, the kids were laughing, and it set the pace for a wonderful day. From there we rode Nemo, did the Talk with Turtle Crush, and looked at the aquariums. We visited the butterflys and generally walked from one thing to the next with no wait. Figment was fun. At 10:45 we went to wait for the 11 am rope drop for the world showcase. We zipped over to the Italian restaurant, got our names on the list for the opening seating at 11:30 and enjoyed looking at the exhibits in the area.
We enjoyed a fabulous lunch at the Italian restaurant where I had the best cooked salmon of my life. The kids enjoyed their meals as well and the service was top notch.
After lunch we headed back to Future World for our Mission Space/Test Track/ and Mickey Character fast passes. We finished Test track with a 30 minute gap before the character fast pass, so we went into innovations for the first time ever. We enjoyed finding the fire hazards at the Most Dangerous House in America and took photos at the fire truck. Then, it was off to meet mickey. By 2:45 we had seen it all and felt like we had the park to ourselves that day. We napped in the room, changed, and headed to Kona for a great meal. The noodle dish was yummy and the kids LOVED their sundaes. So fun for them! We went back to MK for some sorcerer fun in adventure land & rode the magic carpets. Then it was back to bed.
On Sunday, easter, we dressed and arrived in time for the Easter fun. I watched the kids hunt candy and we all met Chip & Dale. From there, I returned to the room while the kids participated in many Easter games and met the Easter bunny. I'm sorry I missed it, but Jim said that it was a blast. We then went to MK, saw the 11 am show, and then had lunch at Crystal Palace. The kids really enjoyed it. We had noticed that the feature pool was open, so we hurried back to the Poly, changed into our suits and swam for about 45 minutes. We grabbed our first-ever dole whips, then changed and were whisked back to the airport by DME.
Overall, the trip was amazing and we couldn't have fit anymore fun in our Thursday - Sunday trip than what we did. The hotel was very nice and the resort is beautiful. I look forward to when it is all opened up because it did get somewhat confusing when we ran into construction barricades a few times. I am looking forward to our return trip in October, but will likely continue to book 1 bedroom units for longer stays as we like having a kitchen, living area and washing machine. It's hard to go back when that's what you are used to. We have never stayed in a "normal" hotel room or DVC studio before... always 1, 2, or 3 bed villas (love the AKV Jambo Grand Villa!), so we've been spoiled. I would for sure recommend DVC Poly studios to anyone who otherwise would be staying in a Disney hotel room or other DVC studio. What it is, is done well. What it isn't (a full 1 bed unit with living area)... well, it just isn't (unless you are in a bungalow).
Other comment... location is FABULOUS!!! We loved being able to take the direct monorail from the TTC to the MK and the walk out to the TTC monorail from the MK exit was much easier. Also, the direct route to Epcot on the monorail was awesome. Walk to the TTC monorail is shorter than walk to the Poly monorail (and if you are pushing strollers like us, no need to ride the elevator). I can definitely see why Poly is the favorite of many Disney guests.
