photo: Disney

On our last family Disney vacation, we did a split stay with the first two nights at Polynesian resort and the last three nights at Art of Animation in a Cars suite.

We had stayed at Art of Animation previously in a Lion King suite and were extremely happy with both the room and the location, but wanted to try one of the other themed suites this time.  Since the Finding Nemo suites were booked up, we took the Cars option.

At first, I was less than thrilled with the idea because I had toured the resort before and I felt the Cars suites were far too remote for my liking.  When I did the online check in before our arrival, I made sure to click the options for close to lobby and transportation.  I requested building 1 as I felt that would be the most convenient location.  We were assigned room 1625, located on the second floor of Building 1, closest to the stairwell on the parking lot end of the building.

Location

I thought the location was great.  It was not nearly as far as I had remembered, and was about the same distance from the pool and lobby as our Lion King suite had been.  Of course, the Cars area has their own Cozy Cone pool, but my kids were more interested in the Big Blue Pool with the splash pad and music.  It was actually very convenient because the poolside bar has a soda fountain and it was easy for us to walk over there to refill our resort refillable mugs than having to walk all the way into the lobby to Landscape of Flavors.

Room Quality

Moving from the luxury of Club Level Polynesian to Value level Art of Animation would be a shock to anyone’s system, but the fun and lively theme of the resort makes up for what is lacking in luxury.  The room itself was clean and spacious.  We are a family of five, so having the extra space and extra bathroom is wonderful for us.  It’s nice to have a separate bedroom for the adults for some extra peace.  And of course, the kids are enthralled by the fold down table bed and wanted to take turns setting it up each day.

Bus Transportation

At this resort, the bus stop location is located centrally outside the lobby, Animation Hall.  It was a quick 3-4 minute walk from our room to the bus location.  We did have a few times where the buses were quite full and we either chose to wait, or to drive ourselves to our ultimate destination.  Overall, our bus experience was not bad, but we did have to be patient and deal with full buses occasionally.  It did not detract from our fun and wasn’t a huge deal for us.

Food

Art of Animation has one of the best quick service restaurants on property, in my opinion.  We ate at Landscape of Flavors several times during our stay and I didn’t eat the same thing twice.  They have the standard burger and fries combo, but they also have things like make your own pasta dish, pizza, barbecue pork sandwiches, and even tandoori chicken.  There really is something for everyone.

Resort Amenities

Art of Animation has one of the best pools on property.  Their Big Blue Pool is very big and even has speakers you can only hear under the water.  There is also a really cute splash pad and a small climbing apparatus and slide.  There is also the Cozy Cone pool over in the Cars area and a Little Mermaid pool over in the Little Mermaid section of the resort.  There is also a self-serve laundry area, gift shop, and baggage services area on site.  The lobby is clean, spacious, and very attractive.

Overall, we enjoyed our stay at Art of Animation, as usual.  We look forward to staying here again on future Disney vacations.