Disney's Grand Californian Hotel

I’ve stayed at the Contemporary at Disney World and felt like this hotel should be comparable but was not. - bad water pressure - little hot water, and even at its hottest, it was never truly hot - shower in general was average - premium hotels at Universal, for example, have multiple shower heads to customize your shower - bedding is nothing different than a Hampton Inn - thin walls - terrible tv - when you get back from a long day in the parks, you might like to flop on the bed for a while and watch tv but your choices are almost laughably limited - requested connecting rooms months ahead of time, didn’t get it and didn’t even get close rooms - one room ready on time, the other room was 90 minutes late - lots of lobby seating but it’s not enough for the amount of people always in the lobby Every staff member we encountered was lovely. Having your own security line is immensely time saving. The early entry perk is nice. But for the price, it’s just not worth it. If this were a premium hotel, it still wouldn’t be worth it but I could justify it. But just the actual hotel itself, not considering the parks-related perks, this is not nearly up to par.

This was a bucket list resort for our family that didn’t live up to the expectations. I had booked a pool view room to accommodate 5 of us. They put us in a room that would only accommodate 4. After inquiring about being put in our requested room they stated they didn’t have the availability in our room class but could downgrade us voluntarily with no price adjustment. That wasn’t an acceptable solution to me. We were switched with the promise by management (Jaime)of a price adjustment only to not have that honored once we checked out. We absolutely needed to have a room that accommodated 5 as originally booked. Also, we were never informed that our last day visiting the park would also be void of the biggest reason for booking this hotel. The convenience of entering DCA from the hotel. If this is something that is motivating your booking the property they won’t have that option through May. How they are accommodating this I don’t know as it was never a conversation at check in. The rooms are just ok. For the price tag I would take Disneyland hotel over this. Grand Californian is nothing special sadly. The hallways smelled like a barn. The first room was small and tired and wouldn’t feel comfortable for two people much less four. A love seat that faces the bed. (Why ?) And a desk that is smack dab in the middle of the room that honestly just gets in the way. The set up is less than functional. The room we were switched to did what it needed to. We were told it would have scaffolding and no balcony access. We agreed with the promise of the difference of the price. Once we checked out they no longer cared. Which seems to be Disney’s attitude these days. Our family has visited World and Land since the 70’s throughout the years. Staying on property only. I don’t know why something always has to be lacking and a visit to the desk to stand and resolve it for an hour. I would have loved for the room to have been what we needed from the start. No trek back to the front desk. No negotiations to get us into a room we actually booked for a higher price tag. I would have really loved to have settled in after a long day of traveling and relaxed instead of that. Then I could have simply been disappointed that the bucket list item wasn’t what I had hoped it would be without the time involved trying to solve their mistake.

The lobby has become a sleeping spot for Park guests not staying here. I wrote to Guest Services and received NO response. Spoke with front desk and they smiled. This hotel is where thousands of Park visitors come to sleep on couches and eat and camp out and it’s crowded and loud and you can’t use these common areas if you stay here. The picture below was taken at 5PM. I hid their faces. I have never seen such a complete mess of a hotel lobby - it’s shocking.

I stayed at this hotel during Expo West as a business traveler and had a series of issues that made my stay uncomfortable and affected my overall trip. Every morning of my stay there was loud banging above my room between 5-6am (there is construction going on, uncertain if it’s related). On my third day, I had to take meetings from the room all morning and was not able to order in room breakfast because the kitchen was backed up. So after hours of meetings, I headed to my conference on an empty stomach. After reporting this to management, they were very empathetic and tried to make things right; which I greatly appreciated. However, on my final night, I called the front desk for a 4:30am wake up call since I had an early flight, and it never happened… I would have missed my flight had I not heard my phone alarm. Given this series of experiences, I cannot recommend this hotel for business travel. I left my stay exhausted and disappointed, unacceptable at any price point, but particularly for the premium charged.

The location of the hotel is excellent but other than that it was not a positive experience. We requested rooms on the same floor as another family we were traveling with, but we’re given rooms on different floors, but on top of one another. We requested that the bunk/sleeper bed be set up in our room and it never was. Despite the very high price of the rooms, there was no water in our room to drink. We ordered breakfast for the following morning so we could get to the park openings on time. We were called during our expected delivery time and told that the food was running 30-45 minutes late. Finally the noise on our fourth floor room was pretty bad. We could even hear Disney music very early in the morning that was loud enough to wake our toddler up. Overall, we did not feel this hotel was worth the high price and will likely stay off property next time.