Boardwalk Inn and Villas
During our Disney World trip back in February 2019, we decided to try the Boardwalk Inn and Villas. We originally booked at the Inn side, but then I found a great deal after the pass holder discounts came out, so we ended up staying on the Villas side in a one bedroom. We were actually afraid this would ruin us being in a one bedroom villa (and it did!). We didn’t spend quite as much time at our resort outside of our room, but I was able to grab quite a few pictures to show you!
Upon arrival at The Boardwalk, it is made clear which “side” is the Inn vs the Villas. This is nice if you are arriving late and have no clue where you are going!
Disney never notified us of our room number or location. They did send me a message earlier in the day that it wasn’t ready. When we arrived at the airport, I decided to check inside of the My Disney Experience app. And sure enough, our room number was listed. We didn’t have a map, but we just followed the signs throughout the resort. And after a fairly long walk (but we were ok with that), we found our room…5020.
When you enter the room, there is a storage closet immediately on your left. It contained a vacuum, broom, dustpan, mop, fire extinguisher, highchair, and extra bedsheets. You can find the room occupied sign hanging from a hook on the mirror. And if you continue walking, you will enter the main room.
The main living space is where we spent a lot of our time. Whenever we came back to the room, we would hang out here while Melody napped in the bedroom. We also would hang out here at night before going to bed too. We didn’t really spend much time at the dining table because we had the dining plan and didn’t eat meals in the room. It was a nice space to fold laundry on though!
Melody did have a few snacks at the counter/bar area. She liked sitting there and playing too. The living room was really large and provided enough seating for far more than the 3 of us.
Below is a gif Brad made for me of the living area.
Having the kitchen is amazing! I really wish we would have known we were going to have a kitchen when booking originally. We might not have purchased the dining plan, honestly. We did bring a lot of food, and even bought a few things like milk and bread once there. So we did use a lot of the kitchen and its amenities. We ran the dishwasher every night, and having all the counter space was great when making food for Melody and washing cups. [Since we booked through Disney we had unlimited supplies of dish soap, detergent, etc. However there is a list of how much additional amenities cost if booking via DVC.]
We used the heck out of the washer and dryer! I think if we stay in another type of room in the future, this is what I will miss the most. We literally washed clothes every day/night. Melody had a few blowouts because she was taking an antibiotic, so that made having a washer even better! We did bring a few packs of detergent so that we didn’t have to use theirs, but they did provide some. The dryer was super loud, but with the doors shut it wasn’t too bad. But man the buzzard when it was done was horrendous! And I came home with most of our laundry already done! We would usually start a load of clothes when arriving back from the parks in the evening. By the time we all showered and got ready for bed, the clothes were washed and we would move them to the dryer while we slept. Some nights we stayed up later and were able to get them from the dryer before bed.
So our villa had two bathrooms. The first is right off of the living space. It contains a shower, toilet, and sink. It had a door that led to the other restroom as well. The shower was nice and big, but the towel rack wasn’t super easy to access from the shower. There was also plenty of storage space on the shelf above the toilet/sink. And they also provided plenty of toiletries.
The second bathroom is accessed through the bedroom and the first bathroom. The unfortunate thing about this bathroom is there is not a door to shut from the bedroom to the bathroom. So if you are taking a bath it is open to the bedroom. This bathroom did NOT have a toilet, only a sink and jacuzzi tub. I enjoyed taking bathes each night here as did Melody. And again, plenty of toiletries and a hairdryer. Oh and the shutters open from the tub to the bedroom. Melody found that fun. Lastly, there is a LARGE walk in closet off of the bathroom. It had a laundry basket, pack and play, luggage rack, and plenty of hangers.
The bedroom was nice and spacious and contained a king size bed. It also had access to a balcony. We placed Melody’s pack and play next to the balcony door because it was farthest away from the door and bathroom where we would be spending time while she was asleep. The room was so spacious that I never felt like the pack and play got in the way. And we LOVED having the king bed!
We had two balconies, one from the bedroom and one from the living room. We didn’t spend too much time out here because we had all the space inside.
Below are some pictures from our balcony. We were able to see Hollywood Studios from our room. We could see the smoke and some of the fireworks from Fantasmic, but no music could be heard. We also had a view of the pool and playground.
We did spend one night at the arcade. It wasn’t super large compared to others I have seen on property. Melody enjoyed getting to walk around and pretend to play, ha.
Below are some pictures of Luna Park. It is the kid area side of the pool. It contained a small pool. It was too cold at night for us to take advantage of though. But we did spend a lot of time at the playground next to it. It was a really nice and large play area. My only complaint was it closed at 8. I wished it was like the French Quarter where it was separate from the pool area and never truly closed. It was disappointing for Melody a few nights when we didn’t make it back in time to play.
So the only day we really “explored” the inside of the hotel was our departure day. Since we had to check our bags and also leave a few things with bell services, we were able to take a different walk to the parks. Below are a few of the pictures. I do wish we would have explored a bit more, but we wanted to take advantage of our nice room we paid for instead!
Below are some of the pictures of the Boardwalk itself. It does have a lot of restaurants on it. We only ate at a couple. We were really not impressed with the food here. They did not have enough quick service options if you were on the dining plan, and it was frustrating to always have to go outside for food or drink refills. There was a lounge on the Inn side inside that did have food offerings in the morning, but nothing all day. There were plenty of open areas for kids to play and run around which was nice when the playground was closed. It was generally a really nice area, I just wished there was more to offer the hotel guests when it came to refillable drinks and such. On the Boardwalk itself, refills could be made at Boardwalk Bakery. It did have a separate entrance for refills so you did not have to wait in line. However, it does NOT have the Freestyle machines like some of the other resorts. A few of the places we went to and I blogged about are Boardwalk Joe’s and Boardwalk To Go. We did try Ample Hills Creamery which was just ok for us. The flavors were not quite as traditional which wasn’t pleasant for Melody. As I mentioned above, Boardwalk Bakery is where you could get drink refills. We also bought some milk here one night. We didn’t buy any food here, but it did all look good.
Here is a pretty view of The Boardwalk from the Beach Club.
Oh, and for anyone concerned about transportation. You can see below the bus schedule from both the app and the bus stop. If you are visiting Epcot or Hollywood Studios, you have to either walk or take the boat. I am sure if the boats aren’t operating for whatever reason they have a bus, but we never attempted a bus anyhow. We walked to both parks. We found the walks actually much shorter than we expected and it was nice. As you may can tell, for us walking isn’t a big deal. With a stroller it is much easier, we go at a decent but not fast pace, and we generally take our time and enjoy it. Our only bad experience with the bus was with Disney Springs. The DS bus is shared with all the Epcot Deluxe Resorts (Boardwalk, Swan and Dolphin, Beach and Yacht Club). That was SUPER frustrating. You pay all this money and have to wait forever to get somewhere. We found this an issue when we stayed at The Yacht Club too, so we were prepared and only visited DS once.
Below is a video I took of our room that gives you a better look than just the pictures above.
I think the 1 bedroom villa has definitely spoiled us. I don’t think it is a requirement for us every trip, but it sure was nice and may be hard to beat. The Boardwalk was nice, and if it has the best deal of the Epcot resorts, I am not opposed to staying there. It is not my favorite of the Epcot resorts though (that still belongs to the Beach and Yacht Club), but it is nice.
