On Site Hotels for Marathon Week.

Greenlawler

Greenlawler

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
So a couple of things

What on-site hotels have you stayed at during marathon week?

What was your favorite, is there one you would avoid?

Has anyone ever stayed at the FW Cabins during Marathon Week?


We have stayed at Contemporary, Polynesian, Animal Kingdom Lodge, Wilderness Lodge, and Boardwalk for race weeks.

Obvioulsy staying on the monorail was super convienant (but I will say that walk to the monorail station after the marathon is no fun). The only complaint I would have and it's not really a big deal is that The Boardwalk, Swan, Dolphin, Beach Club, and Yacht Club all share the same buses, which makes for a frustrating wait after the races in your sweatty clothes. Again, not much of a complaint. But when Boardwalk is always last...

Obviously we tend to spend a little more that week since it is traditionally my wife and I's only vacation without the kids all year. However this year it looks like the kids are taging along. Our kids traditionally prefer staying at Fort Wilderness.

Has anyone ever stayed at the cabins for Marathon week?
 
LAKid53

LAKid53

Official Member of the Girly Girl Fan Club
Premium Member
I've stayed at the Contemporary, but I was running just the 10K that weekend.

Stayed at the cabins several times for race weekends. While the chartered buses are shared with WL and CR for the Expo and return from the races, they aren't for race mornings. I always rent a golf cart so I don't have to walk from the internal bus stop to my cabin after a long race.
 
RunningKoen

RunningKoen

Well-Known Member
I’ve stayed at Coronado and All-Stars. (For marathon but also other weekend).

I like Coronado more, but that mostly sentiment because it will always be the first. Stayed at All Stars for the next three weekend and they were fine.
Didn’t notice a big difference with the busses. Coronado is a solo route bus has 4 stops at the resort itself. You either way have to wait a bit while sweaty. Can’t see a way around that.

Campsites sounds as fun!
 
Demarke

Demarke

Have I told you lately that I 👍 you?
For specifically Marathon Weekend, when I've travelled alone, I've stayed offsite at Orbit One (which is very close to Animal Kingdom), but I've always driven myself instead of using the Disney buses, so transportation was not a factor (and it was a pretty quick and easy drive from the hotel). For Dopey's I liked it because you could park a few feet from your condo door, had a full kitchen, living room area, a room with a deep soak tub big enough for a 6'9" guy to lay down in (which is nice to do an Epsom salt soak to keep the legs fresh for four days of racing), and a second bedroom with full bath that I didn't even use, all for substantially less than staying on site. It does lack on the theming and you miss early entrance perks, etc that you get on site though.

I'm doing AoA this year because I'll have my gf with me and her sister/family will be across at Pop! (we've only booked reservations for Epcot and HS as well which factored into the decision; we'll just do an afternoon hop to MK). We did Caribbean for Springtime Surprise Weekend and requested the building next to the skyliner, which was great, because we could walk 100 yds and hop right on to Epcot and Hollywood Studios without much fuss.

I've stayed at All-Stars for other race weekends and a Beach Club studio (which was nice, but seemed to take much more walking to wind my way from my room to Epcot than staying at CBR and hopping on the skyliner; also they didn't do cleaning at all (this was pre-covid) despite being non-DVC and were there knocking on my "do not disturb" door to finally give it some attention before 8AM on checkout). Both were fine as far as races were concerned, I think traffic flows are managed well enough that I've never had much problem getting to the Epcot parking lot on time.
 
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Greenlawler

Greenlawler

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Demarke said:
For specifically Marathon Weekend, when I've travelled alone, I've stayed offsite at Orbit One (which is very close to Animal Kingdom), but I've always driven myself instead of using the Disney buses, so transportation was not a factor (and it was a pretty quick and easy drive from the hotel). For Dopey's I liked it because you could park a few feet from your condo door, had a full kitchen, living room area, a room with a deep soak tub big enough for a 6'9" guy to lay down in (which is nice to do an Epsom salt soak to keep the legs fresh for four days of racing), and a second bedroom with full bath that I didn't even use, all for substantially less than staying on site. It does lack on the theming and you miss early entrance perks, etc that you get on site though.

I'm doing AoA this year because I'll have my gf with me and her sister/family will be across at Pop! (we've only booked reservations for Epcot and HS as well which factored into the decision; we'll just do an afternoon hop to MK). We did Caribbean for Springtime Surprise Weekend and requested the building next to the skyliner, which was great, because we could walk 100 yds and hop right on to Epcot and Hollywood Studios without much fuss.

I've stayed at All-Stars for other race weekends and Beach Club (which was nice, but seemed to take much more walking to wind my way from my room to Epcot than staying at CBR and hopping on the skyliner; also they didn't do cleaning at all (this was pre-covid) despite being non-DVC and were there knocking on my "do not disturb" door to finally give it some attention before 8AM on checkout). Both were fine as far as races were concerned, I think traffic flows are managed well enough that I've never had much problem getting to the Epcot parking lot on time.
Click to expand...

We stayed off site for the first three marathons we ran, twice with freinds, and once with my wife's family at a condo.

I personally, and it's not for everyone, would rather save money in other areas and pay the extra for on-site.
 
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Rteetz

Rteetz

Well-Known Member
I have stayed...

Port Orleans Riverside
Beach Club
Coronado Springs
Caribbean Beach x2
Dolphin
Pop x3
Bay Lake Tower
Saratoga Springs
Boardwalk

This coming marathon weekend I will be at Animal Kingdom Lodge. Princess I will be at Riverside and Springtime at Old Key West.

My favorite area is the Boardwalk area. If I could always stay there I would. I haven't found one I really don't like for a race weekend.
 
lukacseven

lukacseven

Well-Known Member
Old Key West, Kidani Village or Port Orleans French Quarter all worked well. OKW was a little bit of a walk outside to the main building. At Kidani, the walk could be quite long (we were in the very last villa one year), but it's indoors. Generally, only a handful of people waiting for the last runners bus. Stayed at All-Star back in 2010 and the line for the busses was really long and wound around the building and main pool. If it wasn't 30 degrees, maybe not so bad, but it was also a lot of standing around for 45 minutes until we got on a bus. Another thing we learned was that if you plan on taking the last bus to the start line, it's usually the least crowded. Lines tend to be longer for the earlier busses, regardless of resort.
 

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