Disney's Caribbean Beach Resort — Hotel in Bay Lake

We have just returned from a 14 day adventure in Orlando Florida and stayed at Disney's Carribbean Beach Resort. We were a family of five (two adults, three kids (17, 13, 10)), staying in the Aruba area (building 52), pretty close to the Riviera resort in a water view 5th sleeper. ||The resort is well laid out, the Market place restaurant offers a decent amount of variety for breakfast, lunch and dinner, there are pools available near the main lobby (Old Port Royale) and smaller pools at each of the different regions of the resort (Aruba, Jamaica, Martinique, Barbados, Trinidad). There are plenty of entertainment options available, though we didn't really take advantage of them as we spent very little time at the resort other than to eat or sleep. There is a bit of wildlife around the resort: we saw bunnies, lizards, birds, dragonflies, thankfully no Gators!||The room was pretty spacious; it comfortably slept the five of us, though there is limited storage, so we took two hanging clothes organisers. People complain that the fridge is not fit for purpose, but we managed to keep drinks, fruit, veg, and cheese cool in there for days. It is tiny, but it works just fine provided you don't overfill or block it. The beds are very comfortable, the pillows are so fluffy and I had a great sleep each night. The Aircon is LOUD, unavoidable if you want to stay cool, I guess, but if you're a light sleeper, bring earplugs. The shower feels like it has a vendetta against you and will pummel you clean. The dual sink situation was a nice touch. I do not rate the toilet situation, Orlando toilets are all the same, seemingly too low down and regardless or preventative measures, splatters the toilet seat with water, etc when you flush. Also and this is a major gripe of mine, the toilet paper provided by this Multi-Billion dollar company appears to be half ply. I think Disney could do better.||There are complimentary Disney buses, which are available at all CBR bus stops and at the Riviera (which we used quite frequently), these take you to Magic Kingdom, Animal Kingdom and Disney Springs (transfer here to get to the water parks Typhoon Lagoon and Blizzard Beach) and the Skyline takes you to Hollywood and Epcot. There are also Minnie vans (Lyft taxis in Minnie Mouse colour schemes available at triple the cost of normal Lyft hire) and Ubers available to take you anywhere you like. You cannot and should not walk or cycle from the resort to the parks.||As well as visiting the Disney parks, we took Lyfts to International Drive, Universal Studios locations, and Discovery Cove. All of this is pretty straightforward, provided you have set up your account appropriately beforehand.||The only downside to the holiday was that when packing up ready to return home, we noticed a number of items had gone missing from the room, including a number of souvenirs from Discovery cove, Universal Studios and my daughters wand, which she got from the Harry Potter wand experience. Needless to say we we all surprised and dismayed at how this could happen, but the manager Lauren offered some compensation for the missing goods in terms of money and Disney gifts. I'm not sure how this happened and hopefully this was an isolated incident, but put a real downer on our holiday. Because of this incident I probably won't return to this resort, but will try another Disney resort in future.||Overall, the Disney staff were amazing, very attentive, friendly, and always happy to help. They were well informed and great with the kids.||Some tips for anyone considering a visit;||. Do opt for the Disney Dining plan. We used the Quick Service Dining plan and saved thousands of dollars on food.||. Opt for the Photo pass, which is a photo service, where professional photographers take photos of you in the parks and you get to keep the HD versions of the digital photos, we have so many photos!||. Use 2 x quick service vouchers for a large pizza, they are huge, real value for money, and they are delicious.||. The Disney Hot chocolate is lovely and free (with the refillable mugs), the coffee is ok, but again part of the package.||. Try to make the most of resort facilities Pools, table tennis, volleyball, hammocks, movies under the stars, pool exercises, we didn't but if you have resort days, do.||. You can refill bottles as well as resort mugs in market place and refill stations, though only water and ice can be used in bottles. There are also refill and ice stations in each of the regional blocks.||. Use Mobile order where possible. Food can be picked up quicker, although it arrives in takeaway packaging, but convenient for ordering ahead of time and avoiding queues.||. Towels are available at the resort by main pool and at the Disney water parks, so you don't need to take your own. Universal do not offer towels.||. Make use of Disney complementary transport, Skyliner, bus, water taxi/ferry when traversing the Disney sites.||. Ask if anything is confusing, as sometimes the menus or signs don't tell you everything. Especially ask if you need to confirm if items are on dining plan, sometimes they are but are not well advertised. ||. Double check you are paying with dining plan before tapping on contactless payment, sometimes it will try and default to card payment.||. Use other resort restaurants but check the accepted dining plans before you go, we toured Primo Piatto (Riviera Resort), Artist's Palette Disney's (Saratoga Springs Resort & Spa), El Mercado de Coronado (Disney's Coronado Springs Resort), Sassagoula Floatworks and Food Factory(Disney's Port Orleans Resort - French Quarter) and Sanaa (Disney's Animal Kingdom Villas - Kidani Village) for breakfast.||Now, some things not to do|. Unless using a table service dining plan, do not eat at table service restaurants, we dined at space 220 and although the experience was amazing, it was over $600 for five of us. Unless you are filthy rich, in which case, fill your gold plated boots!||. Don't leave valuables outside of a safe or locked suitcases or unattended, as thieves operate in this area.||Other considerations||We used the Disney Experience app instead of magic bands overall the app was great and helped us first timers out a lot, it offers maps, shortcuts to regular activities and all photos collected via photopass (among a whole lot of other things).||I think the following would be good app enhancements if Disney are listening|. Could do with an open door with Apple wallet feature, so you don't have to open the app, and scroll through menus to get to one of the most used features.|. It would be beneficial to have all bus times for all resorts available via filters|. Filter on Dining menu's for items which are applicable to dining plan, rather than generic restaurant feature which states "Some Dining plans accepted". I had to rely on the staff knowledge to know whether I can use the plan or not (maybe that was always intended)|. Transportation route maps from and to resorts and parks, i.e. enter location and destination and it offers options with times|. Online shop option which could be used to deliver goods to room or lobby (we spent ages looking for a very specific t-shirt and had to visit all the parks to find it).|. Location of drinks , refill machines on map for resorts and parks||Some things I think the rooms would benefit from (again, if Disney is reading);|. Bigger safes|. Bigger fridges |. More storage |. Charging port or adapter for toothbrush chargers |. Iron and ironing board in the room |. More chairs for the table |....

If I could give 3.5 stars, I would give that. It’s not horrible by any means but it’s not what I expected for the $303 price tag I paid for a preferred room.

Our preferred room was in building 32 of the Barbados section. This resort is HUGE, so personally a preferred room was a must have for us. When we arrived, it seemed like we were a lot farther from the lobby than I expected for the price we paid. I could have paid an extra $40 and stayed at Wilderness Lodge water view with a nice updated room.

Pros: The main pool and the kids splash pad were fantastic! The main pool has two slides. We loved that they had a normal stair entrance as well as a zero-entry section. The kids splash pad was great. The atmosphere and grounds of the resort were beautiful and relaxing! They had a few little “beach areas” with sand and hammocks where you could relax and just watch the Skyliner go by or sit at night and watch the Epcot fireworks. The staff was good, they were awesome during the rain storms. They had extra towels all rolled up waiting at the entrances of the buildings so you could dry off. Another pro was Banana Cabana pool bar. I loved that you could sit down and have service like a restaurant and to our surprise, you could see the Epcot fireworks from the restaurant! We had dinner and saw fireworks twice during this visit and it was magical each time. The food was also good from Banana Cabana! They had grilled wings, we preferred the guava buffalo and the mango bbq but both didn’t have a prominent enough flavor of guava and mango so I wouldn’t really go out of my way to get them again. The Jamaican Jerk wings were pretty bad, we think maybe it was an overseasoning mistake because it seemed like someone dropped seasoning on them…I don’t see how anyone likes those if that’s the way they’re suppose to me. The coconut pineapple bread pudding was amazing! I didn’t see it on the menu but I knew to ask for it from a Disney video I had watched. Also the Banana Cabana burger was insanely good! 20/10, killer burger. Check out my reviews for Centertown Market and Banana Cabana for more in depth food reviews.

Cons: There’s no elevators. Yes, there’s only two floors but lugging a bunch of luggage up stairs is not fun and we were not fans. We purchased a preferred room but our building was still fairly far from the lobby, especially considering you had to walk through the pool area to get to the lobby. All the other resorts don’t make you walk through the pool gate like this resort does. They had a boardwalk type area that went around but it wasn’t a straight shot so the layout is definitely a bit odd in our opinion. They had pretty meh breakfast options in this resort, I was pretty sad. A Caribbean Omelet was the only like special breakfast item and it didn’t look all that great on other people’s plates so we passed. We got the bacon, egg and cheese bagel to share on the way out and it was terrible by any means but it wasn’t like knock my socks off good. Now THE ROOM….this was my irritation and beef with the price…it was very outdated. The AC was SO LOUD, omg, and it hardly ever shut off! We had to put it up to 74/75 to get it to stop and then it would get hot in the room fairly quickly. Everyone’s ac units were leaking onto the walkways. The bathroom has a shower curtain, which I do not like. Shower curtains don’t feel clean, especially compared to easily cleanable hard glass doors like they have in the other resorts. People pee in the showers (you know they do), and it splashes up on those shower curtains. They touch the curtain with their hands and leave marks all over them…they’re just gross and I don’t understand why any Disney World resort still has a shower curtain, especially when the value resorts are so much cheaper and the bathrooms feel so much cleaner and the ac units are quiet and clean.

So overall…I won’t stay here again unless they upgrade...

The Skyliner is great! We never waited more than 10 minutes for the Skyliner & it will always run unless the weather is so bad on its direct route.|There is an internal resort bus that makes all 7 stops & runs about every 20 mins. Parks & Springs buses also run about every 20 mins. Although once we did have to wait 40 mins & missed most of early entry. Watch for the times on the app so you know when the next bus is coming & when to be at the stop. And parents please put smaller children on your laps, especially at the end of the night, everyone is tired & should be able to sit, your 2 year old does not need their own seat.|The Centertown Market food is ok, its cafeteria food, kids will like it, actually thought it was better than Banana Cabana. You can always go to the quick service at Riviera(take the internal bus if at the other end) for a higher quality meal.|Absolutely recommend the refillable mug. 5 fills & you've come out ahead on it. There are 1-2 freestyle machines in each section.|I saw deliveries made from several different companies. We used Kroger & WalMart & it was great! They will leave your items at Bell Services & there is even a refrigerator if you have a few cold items(just remember the room fridge is small). The staff at Bell Services were so nice, even though they are constantly busy & working outside in that Florid weather. There are resort vans that will take you & your luggage directly to your room, but it might be quicker to take the internal bus. |The laundry rooms were great, especially since we were there for almost 2 weeks & I think open 24 hours. You download the app & make payments through there, $3.25 per wash/dry & it will tell you when your load is done. Since there is a room for each section getting a machine was never a problem no matter what time of day. They do have vending machines with laundry products, but since I knew we would be doing several loads(thanks to the FL heat & humidity) I ordered laundry soap through WalMart.|We opted out of the every other day housekeeping, especially when I saw our lady hacking coughing then spitting up in the bushes, its ok, I don't need you in my room! We just asked for what we needed along the way. They will leave you a phone message on your cleaning day that they saw your room occupied sign & that they come in to just do a quick room lookover to make sure everything is ok in there. They had not dusted our room in a bit prior to our arrival, because when we had set items down & then moved them you could see the thick dust marks. There was also a large hole in one of our walls. There is some maintenance that needs to be addressed, especially all the peeled off walkway floor paint & the chunks of it laying on the ground nearby.|The pool is nice & there seemed to be enough chairs. There were 2 girls walking around offering cool washcloths & water, which was a nice touch.|We did use Mears to & from the airport & had a good experience both ways. $17 per person, each way.|We had no problems with the wifi at any spot on the property.|Interesting info- One of the workers did say this property is the most humid because of all the landscaping.|Most all of the interactions with the staff were on the day we arrived, which were positive, and all workers always said hello when passing them throughout the property, except for a few housekeepers.|We payed about $250/night & would stay here again. Though, we would like to see improvements in maintenance & especially...