Which resort?

[Robbieligh]

We are going to the Saratoga Springs from Sept.19-26 using our vacation points. We are taking my 86 year old mother and we have a 1 bedroom villa reserved. The second week we reserved a 1 bedroom villa at the Saratoga Springs using our annual pass discount. My question is that for $900 more for the 2nd week we could get a concierge room in the sugar loaf building? I have always wished to stay at the GF but could never afford it. Would this be worth the difference in price to go from a 1 bedroom villa to a standard concierge room? Please, I need opinions!
Thanks!!

[TammiMcMan]

It's always hard to answer questions about whether or not it's "worth" it to do one thing over another. The easy answer is that it's really personal choice.

In terms of room size, a standard club level room at the GF is going to be smaller. They typically come with bedding of 2 queens and a daybed. In the SugarLoaf building, there are 3 lodge tower rooms. These are all bigger than the standard room and offer a living room space. It's sort of like a studio suite. You can request one of these room styles with your pre-planner, there's no extra charge, but there's no guarantee either. All 3 have a garden view and there's no balcony in the lodge tower room on the top floor. All other rooms in SugarLoaf come with your choice of either a marina or garden view.

The SugarLoaf lounge is nice, but a little on the small side. I generally compare it to a very nice bed & breakfast. The food offerings have always been good and they have an afternoon tea, which is nice. Personally, the GF is my favorite resort, so I would probably opt to upgrade the 2nd week, but that's just me.

[Robbieligh]

In your opinion, would it be worth $900 to do the Grand Floridian Sugar Loaf concierge for the 2nd week of a 2 wk vacation. We are staying the 1st week at Saratoga Springs in a 1 bedroom villa using our vacation points. We are taking my 86 year old Mother who is in a wheelchair, if that makes a difference.

[yasmina]

I can't offer an opinion on the GF Sugarloaf, but we returned 2 days ago from a split stay - 5 days at SSR 1 BR villa and 3 days at POFQ,

We will not stay at SSR again. Let me preface the negatives by saying that the 1 BR villa was very nice. The pullout couch that my dd's slept on was comfortable. It was great having our own kitchen. We loved having a washer and dryer in the room - we did laundry each night.

That said, we were disappointed in the lack of maid service. After the first day, we didn't get more coffee for the coffee maker, nor any more detergent for the washer. Since this was our first stay there (as guests of a DVC member), maybe we were just unaware of the ins and outs of procedures.

I really made a mess of several towels once we got in.

We threw the towels in the washer, but I felt more comfortable with towels cleaned and sanitized by the hotel. I called the next day to ask for more towels and was told that there would be an extra charge for them!

Neve in my life have I been told that and I was shocked and told them to forget it.

My husband was not thrilled to have to take out our garbage.

We did get clean towels on Thursday.

Like I said, we were staying as guests of a DVC member, so probably all of this is the norm, but not what we expected.

Finally, and probably most importantly, the bus service was, in our opinion, very poor. We were in the Springs. Every AM, no matter which park we were going to, there were 3-4 busses to other parks that would come before ours would. It almost seemed like a conspiracy. ;) Our wait time, whether going to a park or returning to the resort, was 15-30 min., 90% of the time.

So based on our experience, I would go for the GF. We stayed there once for 2 days, and for the exceptional service, daily maid service, and proximity to the monorail, it would get my vote hands-down.