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Hilton Marco Island Beach Resort

3/10/2016

My husband and I booked 1-night at the hotel very last minute (2:30pm and then drove to the hotel). It was our anniversary and we decided to be spontaneous and get to the "other" coast. We're from the W. Palm Beach area. My mom had our son for the night. So we hopped in the car and got there just around sun-down. Unfortunately for us, it rained that night. We still made the best of our little get away.

The property is gated, so upon arrival you have to provide your name/reservation info to get in. Self-park is $10 and Valet was $15. We parked and proceeded to the front desk. When checking in we were told we were upgraded from our "king garden view" to a "gulf view." Yay for us! We headed up to the 6th floor and entered our room. Everything was clean, fresh, and welcoming. There was a souvenir bag of shells on the desk from the hotel to us. I immediately noticed that there were two queens rather than a king room. I called the desk and they gave us the option of moving to a king room which would be back to garden view, or stay in the current gulf view and they would provide us with breakfast vouchers. We chose the latter option as we figured the complimentary breakfast would be worth the money. It proved to be well worth the queen beds!

After inspecting the room and dropping our bags we headed across the street where there are a variety of good food options. Italian, Mexican, Steak, Sports Bar, and Ice Cream. There is also a small movie theater, beach shop, and a few other stores. We came back to the hotel and explored for a few minutes. Saturday nights they always have movies by the pool, due to the rain, they moved it in to one of the ballrooms. The sign was cute!

There is an upscale bar and restaurant "Sandcatles" as well as a casual restaurant "Paradise Cafe" which overlooks the beach & dunes. Paradise cafe hosts the breakfast & buffet each morning. It has both indoor and outdoor seating options.

We used the pool on the second day. It was advertised as heated, but it still felt chilly to me. Perhaps northerners might find it warm, but as a Floridian I would have enjoyed a few degrees more of heat. There were plenty of chairs to go around. Beach towels were checked out from the hut. Three times per day they have family games planned. There are also games by the pool that can be used all day like a giant Connect Four!

After hanging by the pool for a bit we migrated over to the beach. Gulf beaches are different than Atlantic beaches. I really liked the wide spread of sand. There were minimal waves. We commented that we'd love to come back with our son in the future because the beach would be much more tolerable for him compared to the rough waves back on our coast. The hotel partners with Marco Island Water Sports to provide beach chairs and umbrellas. I believe umbrellas are an additional charge, but the chairs can be used for free as a hotel guest.

Overall I was impressed with our short stay. I would definitely consider coming back in the future as either a family or with my husband again. I would not hesitate to book my clients here either. The hotel was very nice without the stuffy/snobbish feel that some hotels have.

*Click on the first photo in each series to view larger and then use the right and left arrows to cycle through each set.

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Disney's Vero Beach Resort- Room

3/9/2016

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The Vero Beach resort is technically part of the Disney Vacation Club AKA Disney's time share program. So booking here as a regular "hotel" guest can be limited. We reserved a studio, which is basically a regular hotel room. The resort is over 20 years old and undergoing a major refurbishment of all areas at this time. Our room was "authentic & original" but still clean and well kept. I am curious about the new look for the remodeled rooms.

Our room had a doule bed and a fold out sofa. Our son slept on the sofabed and thought it was "cool" that he had his own bed in the same room with us. We had a handicapped accessible room because it was a roll-in shower.

The mini fridge, coffee maker, and pack n play can be found inside the closet... Interesting...

One nice thing is that each building has an underground parking garage. Perfect for the new car we drove home with ;)

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Disney's Vero Beach Resort- Recreation

3/8/2016

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Being that it was in the 50s during our trip, we did not use the pool. It looked like a fun area though with the water slide. The kids splash area was under refurbishment so I couldn't even get a good picture of it. However, based on the online photos I have seen, my son would have loved it had it been warm outside and operational! There were pool noodles available for use, life jackets for little ones who may need assistance, and plenty of pool chairs available. Under the gazebo there was a shaded pool table for use as well.

We played a round of mini golf and let our son play on the playground. Typically mini-golf has a small fee $1-2 per person, but because the splash pad was closed they were not charging. Both were situated next to the pool. This made it convenient to hop from activity to activity. They had bikes to rent for riding the trails too. Across the street is a large park, still park of the resort, with many other activities as well.

Campfire

My favorite part of the trip was the Campfire Sing Along. Two Cast Members hosted the activity. Everyone met at the campfire The sun was just disappearing at that point so it became a little cooler. We did not pack properly for this trip, it was in the 80s back home the night before... So we brought the beach towels with us in case we needed to keep warm. They led interactive camp songs for about 20 minutes while the stragglers showed up. It was fun, but you need to have people who participate. If the other guests are just sitting and listening it isn't any fun!

After the sing songs, they broke out the s'mores! At most Disney resort they just provide marshmallows and roasting sticks. However, they provided everything needed to make a proper s'more here. Earlier in the evening we bought chocolate and graham crackers just in case. It was a nice treat to end the day!

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Disney's Yacht & Beach Club

3/7/2016

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Coming at you is another, really old review that I never got around to publishing. This one is even older than my last. I stayed at the Yacht Club back in May of 2015! The good news is that I wrote everything up back then, now I'm just refining the details and pairing them with photos. I stayed at the Yacht Club with my mom and my, then, two year old son. He's about to turn six. #momlife We chose it because it had one of the best pool areas of all the Disney hotels and we had no plans to visit any of the parks, just relax at a hotel and use the amenities.
The rooms at this resort have since been made over. However for those with Disney nostalgia, I will still include them for you to marvel at. I truly enjoyed the theming in the Yacht Club side. It had a classy nautical thing going for it. From what I have seen, it's since lost much of it's theming in the makeover :(

Stormalong Bay- Pools

The pools are the highlight of this shared resort. Beach Club and Yacht Club share a common pool area. While it doesn't have a splash pad, it does have some unique features. The section closest to the Yacht Club side is a beach pool, complete with sandy shores. Buckets and shovels made up the kids meal at the nearby quick service stand Hurricane Hanna's and they came in handy. We spent a lot of time in this section because it made for good fun for my 2 year old.

Then there was the lazy river section with inner tubes and bridges to follow your family and friends as they made their way around the circuit. Closer to the Beach Club end was a regular pool and water slides. The large "wrecked" pirate ship held the big slide. If you walked around the back side, near Crescent Lake there was actually a smaller slide for little kids to play on.

It definitely surpassed our expectations for a great pool area. We spent two full days enjoying the water.

Food

As far as food, we were not overly impressed. There isn't a true Quick Service Restaurant. Next door, at the Beach Club there is the marketplace but there were minimal options there for a hot meal. Hurricane Hanna's had a few burger/chicken sandwich options by the pool too. It's more of a daytime food kind of place and I don't recall it being open during the evening hours. It seemed lacking when compared to some of the other quick service locations at the Deluxe Resorts.

As for sit down meals, there is Beaches & Cream, a Disney fanatic favorite that books up months in advance. They serve bugers, fries, and of course ICE CREAM! Captain's Grill was good, as long as you like seafood. I do not fall in to that category so I didn't have a wide selection to choose from. Yachtsman's Steakhouse is supposed to have a very nice spread. Cape May Cafe hosts character meals at breakfast with Minnie's Beach Bash Breakfast and during their Seafood Dinner Buffet.

Overall there really were a lot of options, but nothing exemplary that we experienced. Thankfully this resort pair is a short walk around Crescent Lake to the Boardwalk Resort that boasts many different restaurants and eateries that include ice cream shop and a bakery! You can see some of my reviews of Disney dining in the past which includes a few of these venues.

Quick Service- http://www.sunkissedadventures.com/blog/disney-quick-service-dining
Table Service- http://www.sunkissedadventures.com/blog/disneys-table-service-restaurants
Character Breakfast- http://www.sunkissedadventures.com/blog/character-breakfasts-cape-may-cafe-ohana

Room

The look of the rooms has since changed, but I want to include the photos because I loved the decor. The room was beautifully decorated, perhaps a little bit dated, and the beds were too firm for me. I know some people like a firm bed, I prefer it to be more fluffy and giving. Everything was clean. We requested bed rails for my son. When we came back to the room, they were laying on the floor. I had expected someone to put them on the bed for us, they were somewhat tricky because both of the rails were two different types. We called for assistance and someone came up to put them on for us. One word of advice, pay the difference for a preferred location room if the option comes up. I actually haven't seen that option lately, but if it's there, DO IT! We took a run of the house with a water view. Well, after walking down three hallways and not by mistake, we finally arrived at our room. Leaving the room and heading back to the room was a chore and we double checked everything to make sure we never had to back track. Lets just say it was a LONG walk to the elevators. And our water view... well, check out the photos because it was kinda a joke!

Activities

The resort has nice activities on site. The typical movies at night and campfire too. We brought our own graham crackers and chocolate because we knew that they only provide the marshmallows. There were swings on the beach. Organized games from the Cast Members by the pool area are held throughout the day.

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Disney's Vero Beach Resort- Dining

3/7/2016

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In early February, we had to make a trip up to Orlando to look at a vehicle for my husband. Not wanting to drive for over 6 hours in one day we decided to split the trip. Drive three hours to Orlando early Friday morning, check out the car, then drive an hour and a half south toward home and stop at the Disney Vero Beach Resort for the night. I had always been curious about the place, so this was the prefect opportunity to check it out. We could have had better weather for the experience, as it was unusually chilly that weekend and we could not use the pool.

We arrived around 2pm that day. At check in they were very friendly, gave us a report map, schedule, explained the character breakfast that was being offered the next morning, and a few other features. We signed up for the Character Breakfast then just in case it filled up.

Bleachers

Once we checked in and dropped our bags in our room, we headed over to the pool deck for some lunch. The temperature was in the 50s, and that's just too cold for us Floridians to be swimming!! We ordered some food from Bleachers Bar & Grill because this is the only dining venue open for lunch on the property. I would say it's equivalent to the quick service dining at Disney's Yacht Club. I had the Hummus plate with vegetables, my husband had a tuna croissant sandwich, and the little guy had a grilled cheese. My husband ended up eating most of the grilled cheese though! Food was ready in a reasonable amount of time. We were given a buzzer to let us know when to pick the food up. They don't give straw because you are on the ocean and they can be dangerous to the wildlife and sealife.

Shutters
We ate at Shutters for breakfast during our stay. Goofy's Beachside Character Breakfast, which is only offered on Saturday mornings. The food was fine, nothing exceptional. It was family-style waffles, bacon, sausage, potatoes, scrambled eggs, and a plate of pastries. Our main purpose was to allow our son to meet the characters. We had the earliest reservation available because we needed to get on the road fairly early. So a 7:30 breakfast time did give us prime character time. There weren't many other families in the restaurant that early so we were able to get a few minutes with the characters rather than a few seconds (like it is as WDW).

Price wise it was a good deal. I think we paid $20 per adult. Our son was free because of his age. Most character meals can be very expensive, but this was a lot more reasonably priced.

The decor was nice. Beachy-dive but classy. I loved the high ceilings and plenty of windows. The kitchen is open to the dining room, I assume for other dining events.