GAGandC1994Colchester, Essex, England
We stayed in March, booked two Superior rooms which were ok. 2 beds in each room, decent sized with a bathroom and separate toilet. Even after the recent refurbishment, the rooms still seemed to look tired and the bathroom area looked very old fashioned. They were spotlessly clean though and quite comfortable all in all.
There is a complimentary minibar which has 4 bottled waters, 1 soft drink and some nut snacks.
Unfortunately these are not replenished daily, which given it’s a (very expensive) 5-star hotel, seemed a bit of a poor show.
The housekeeping was a bit hit and miss too, unfortunately, but the rooms were cleaned to a high standard.
The building itself is just stunning and absolutely huge. There are a couple of restaurants, a bar and a gift shop along the corridor which joins the west and east wings. We had the dining plan, and we booked into both onsite character dining experiences for the two nights we were there. The Royal Banquet is a buffet style restaurant with the Royals Mickey, Minnie, Donald and Daisy making their rounds.
The food is ok, but it’s not the main attraction.
Table de Lumiere was really good, the food was amazing and you are visited by Belle, Jasmine and others, along with their beaus of course. Plenty of fun and really good food and service.
Breakfast, unfortunately, was a disappointment. No option to order anything not on the buffet, again, a bit weird for a 5-star hotel, but the buffet options were plentiful, even if you did have to wait around for some of the options to be topped up. The breads and pastries are just amazing. The service was extremely inattentive though, once you were sat down, you were pretty much ignored. We struggled to get coffee refills the first day, or to find someone with a bottle opener to open the bottled water for us, and the second day was even worse. We ended up clearing our own plates onto an adjacent table and made do with the drinks we had. This was a bit of a let down for us.
The bar was decent, but the soft drinks and bottled water were eye wateringly expensive (€9 for 50ml bottled water or fizzy drink!) but the service was good and friendly.
Location wise, you can’t beat it. You literally walk out of the hotel and you are a short walk from the entrance to the Magic Kingdom.
Only Disneyland hotel guests are permitted into the hotel so this meant the hotel itself was not overrun. The check-in staff, I have to say, were super friendly, and most of the people we encountered were very nice and very helpful.
It’s a very decent experience, but for the money, I expected much much more. I seem to remember it being much more attentive when we’ve stayed here on previous occasions, pre the refurbishment.
As lifelong Disney fans, would we return here? Yes probably, but I would definitely lower my expectations. Still a good experience but needs a bit of tweaking to make it excellent and worth the hefty premium.
