Hilton HHonors - Orlando/Lake Buena Vista Recommendations

Mrs Royster747 and I are headed to the Lake Buena Vista/Orlando area for about a week in very early April. Haven't stayed at a Hilton Family property down there is some time, so was looking for member's favorite places down there...and please tell us why it is your favorite.

Feel free to tell us those NOT favorites as well.

The Mrs and I do enjoy ES properties...anyone ever stay at the ES just off the WDW property in Lake Buena Vista?

THANKS!

BTW...The Hilton at Walt Disney World Village is booked when we plan to travel.

A few months ago, we had 3 different family members staying at 3 different properties all on the same wknd. I kept shuttling betwn the three properties. My spouse and I stayed at the ES in LBVista. The website considers it an upgrade to stay at the lanai section but upon check-in I learned that a large group had been bawdy-loud the past couple nights at the outside Tiki Bar. Therefore we opted for the usual inside tower and requested to be away from the below dining area. Since you are traveling late April, the bugs and steaming heat should not be a factor for you. But usually in Florida around late May thru mid-October it is always better to have inside corridors. Many room a/c units cannot keep up with the heat and the stray mosquito flying through an open door is a sneaky 3am pest.

Of the two HGVCs on Int'l Drive I would definitely chose the Arrezo Way property over the Sea World choice. The pool is superior, they had night activities (it was a nature-creature demo the weekend we were there). I have posted earlier that we are Roman Catholic and especially enjoyed walking to Mass on Sunday. We headed out of the back of the property, down a side street and right into the back parking lot of that famous Shrine in Orlando called Mary Queen of the Universe. That Church has some nice gardens, so in addition to walking to stores, the Arrezo property has great off-street walking nearby. The stores nearby run the gamut from a full-size grocery store, restuarants to a superior outlet Mall. I'm not that crazy about shopping but the stroll is nice. The Hilton nearest to Downtown Disney also has nice strolling potential but the D-Tree farther down the road might be too far. The other LakeBuenaVista D-Tree is even farther outside of the main drag and is surrounded by less attractive congestion. The property looks noisy and crowded.

We have also stayed at Hamptons in the area and have nothing unusual to report. In the Spring of 2005 we stayed at the D-Tree at Universal. I would STRONGLY AVOID this property. Because of its close proximity to Universal, this hotel sells huge room blocks to busloads of teen groups, like high-school bands and youth sport leagues. The parking lot at night was a sea of diesel buses. The hotel did a poor job of segregating the groups and the public areas were overrun and noisy.

If you asked me my all-time favorite, I would say stay on any Disney Boardwalk Property and (gasp!) not a Hilton. The Swan & Dolphin have special Starwood rates or go nuts and stay at the Yacht or Beach Club. The Boardwalk ambience is the best of all the Disney areas, IMHO. The back entrance into Epcot is also a big plus. Its kind of fun being in La-La Land for a few days and never going off property or even jumping into your car for any reason. Have fun !

Stayed at ES LBV last October. The property was being sold from one franchise(?) to another. We met part of the advance team from the new owners and they had some good plans for the property. Overall we liked the property, rooms were a bit tired but staff worked very hard to keep things up to scratch. Staff were excellent. Breakfast was good, chef was a hoot. Evening meals poor, we usually ended up ordering from the pizza hut express on site. Pool ok, managers reception good. We stayed inside, some noise but not too bad (and we had one of the US Army bands in for part of the stay, they can party!). Location good, self parking free. 12 mins to WDW, bit more to Epcot/Animal Kingdom. We would definitely stay here again. Hope this helps.

Chris

Always stay at the Homewood LBV. Guaranteed suite with kitchen, hot breakfast buffet in the morning, close to supermarket, restaurants, near WDW hotel row gate, free internet, full HHonors points.

The Homewood LBV is now no longer a Homewood - they lost their flag and are now running unaffiliated. I would avoid Hampton Inn Maingate East (right next to the old Homewood LBV). We stayed there multiple times over the past month and found that they had sprayed so much air freshener in most of the rooms that we were popping allergy tablets all night. Also, the updated the vanities in the bathrooms to beautiful wood stands, but all the showers look old, rundown, and we had one room where the bathtub dripped all night and you couldn't get enough water pressure to get the shower to run.

As diamonds we like how we are treated at the Doubletree Club - nice welcome amenities - large rooms - down duvets and robes - and fairly close
to the parks.

The ES Jamaican Court is also fairly centrally located and is just off I Drive at Sand Lake. I've stayed there several times and have really enjoyed each time. I usually stay here for business.

For the times I've done personal stays around Disney, I've usually been disappointed regardless of where I've stayed. I don't usually go for rooms over $100/night on personal stays since I'm usually not in the room that much (especially in Orlando!), and I've found that the rooms are fairly run down due to the wear and tear that travelling families does to them over the course of the year. Tripadvisor.com is another site that usually has good reviews from people who have stayed at a property.

Good luck, and don't forget to bring your bottled water -- Orlando water is nasty!