Located just a ten minute walk from Disney Springs, The Holiday Inn Orlando, is often frequented by Disney Parks guests looking to save a bit of money by staying off property. A few of my family members recently stayed at this hotel, and suggested I give it a try as I had some points I wanted to utilize. During my stay I documented everything so that you can make the best decision on if this hotel is right for your next trip!
Staff Friendliness
Arriving at the hotel, staff were moderately friendly. I found it extremely odd that they said that guests were not allowed to borrow the luggage carts, but less than an hour later I returned to the lobby to see two male guests returning and a cart, and being handed a different cart. You may think that perhaps when I asked they were already being utilized however I asked with two carts right in my line of sight. And we had not only our luggage, but also an Instacart order and Owners Locker to bring up to our room. The friendliness continued to decline during our stay. Staff refused to make eye contact in the halls when we said hello. Our room, which we were told would be cleaned daily and we would receive fresh towels and water was only cleaned once during our four night stay. Again, I wouldn’t think much of this however a big deal was made when we checked in that the cost of cleaning the room daily and the water factored into the $175 “resort fee” we were charged in addition to the normal costs. When we went to the lobby on our last day and asked for two bottles of water since we hadn’t received any other than our initial cleaning and were met with such an attitude. Meanwhile…. there is a sign on the counter saying rooms would be cleaned daily and two bottles of water would be provided daily.
Location
For an off property hotel, the location of the Holiday Inn is fantastic if you enjoy going to Disney Springs! Disney Springs is a roughly 10-15 minute walk away. (READ MY POST HERE THAT DISCUSSES THE WALK IN DEPTH).
The Room
We stayed in a two queen, pool view room. I found the room to be quite spacious with a decent amount of space between the beds, and an open area in front of the sliding door to our balcony.
The bathroom was clean, but a little outdated. There were definitely a few scuff marks in the tub if you looked closely.
Pool
The pool is spacious and heated! During our stay it was 95 degrees, so I can’t speak to how warm the pool would be in the winter, but the water was so refreshing after a long day in the parks. There isn’t an abundance of seating, but a decent amount and we loved the water features on the pool edges, and ledges to sit on.
Gym
The gym was small but clean, and had enough variety to complete a decent workout. I appreciated that they had a water cooler within the gym and used it to fill up my bottle.
Dining
Breakfast is available starting at 6:30am and Lunch and Dinner are available from 12pm-10pm near the lobby. During my stay, I did not try this restaurant because of my allergies. I am usually not confident about hotel restaurants being allergy conscious, and preferred to take the short walk to Disney Springs where I know they take allergies seriously!
Visiting Walt Disney World
The Holiday Inn Orlando-Disney Springs Resort Area offers a shuttle service to the parks for free. Before my trip, this sounded fantastic, but in reality I tried it once and didn’t utilize the service again. In order to ride the shuttle you must make a reservation online. The shuttle comes to the hotel hourly, and picks up from the parks hourly. Because this shuttle service is not exclusive to this hotel we made a stop at a second hotel, and second park which brought our ride to 45 minutes. The Uber we took the next day was only $11 and 12 minutes!
As a Holiday Inn guest, you are able to participate in WDW’s early entry to the park! This is such a great benefit to ensure you can get a ride or two in before a surge of guests enters the parks and lines begin to lengthen. We tried to make use of early entry every day of our trip!
Other Amenities and Random Things to Note
Checking in we received 2 complimentary drink tickets to use at the bar as well as a coupon book to use at Disney Springs. I found this to be a nice touch, as well as the two photo opportunities in the lobby.
Daily, they offer free lemonade and cookies down by the bar from 4-6pm, and coffee in the mornings.
If you have a fear of elevators, this isn’t the hotel for you. The elevators to get to my wing were erratic, and bounced more than any elevator I have every been on, and on some rides took so long for the doors to open I thought we were stuck a few times during our stay.
I would recommend staying at the Holiday Inn Orlando- Disney Springs Area hotel! Although it didn’t have the Disney charm the on property resorts have, or very helpful front desk staff, we had a lovely stay with a clean room, great pool, and convenient location right near Disney Springs.