Universal's Cabana Bay Beach R

A great holiday in Florida staying our first week at Universal Cabana Bay Resort. My first impression upon arrival was utter chaos for checking into the hotel. Very long queues which after an 8 hr flight and a coach journey from Melbourne Airport Florida was off putting to say the least. No acknowledgment from anyone at reception you just had to wait your turn. It was not great at all. Finally after an hours wait we got our rooms. The rooms were meant to be interconnected but they had overbooked and overlooked the request. They apologised and upgraded us to family rooms. I have since leaving given the Cabana Bay Resort my feedback and made suggestions for improvement which they emailed a response to state it would be discussed at their meeting. We were there for 2 weeks but used it as our base the 2nd week as we did a road trip to The Florida Keys & The gulf coast prior to returning. After an iffy start which we didn’t let dampen our spirits we enjoyed all that Cabana Bay offered. We were upgraded to two family rooms next to each other. Opposite the swimming pool and near to all the facilities within the complex. Easy choices of food at The Bayliner Restaurant and good prices we ate there a couple of times and purchased yogurts & drinks, water. Universal buses were very frequent at the hotel to take you to Universal Walk. Plus if you cross the road to Loewes Sapphire Falls you can catch the boats. This option is not as far a walk if you have mobility issues. I rented a mobility scooter it was 75 US dollars per day. So easy to use. I wished I had done it many years earlier. I only used it once as we went more late afternoon/ evenings when it was cooler and the park not as packed. The Cababa Bay is a decent base for families the family rooms have 2 queen beds & quite comfortable. Plenty of cupboard & wardrobe space. A safe. Separate toilet & a vanity room/ with sink and a separate shower/ bath making it easy for a family to get ready. Also a separate living area with a sofa bed. TV in that room and the bedroom. Card access to the rooms & parking behind the room was great when we hired a car from Avis. We hired the car online in the Uk before travelling and got a really good price for a Medium size SUV for 4 of us. Arranged a Sunpass for the tolls too with Avis and a sat nav. ( however the sat nav wasn’t brilliant). We managed with our phones. It’s not a fancy hotel it’s better than basic has all that is needed for a base. However, we did go to the Loewes Royal Pacific for 1 night but 2 days. I booked it through booking.com and we got an evening and the next day of universal fast passes which were fab especially if you have an arthritic knee like me and hate queues. It was a bonus we went on the boat. Nearer to the opening of islands of adventure & the studios. The hotel was in another league to Cabana Bay. Utterly gorgeous. The food was amazing a higher level all together. Huge portions. The room & the bed were really comfortable. We ordered room service for 4 of us after a busy night in the parks and it arrived within 30 mins and very hot. I would book this hotel again in a heartbeat. The pool was lovely and the view out of my room was really lovely over the parks too. We ate out in universal City walk for our evening meals. NBC bar & grill, Toothsome chocolate Emporium & Margaritaville. Once we had the car we then ventured to Longhorns & The Outback Steakhouse. Back to basic hotels for 1 night and then onto The Florida keys & The Gulf coast. Weather was incredibly hot & humid a few showers. We enjoyed the wonderful weather in the Florida Keys whilst Orlando had done dreadful weather. Our holiday was amazing all four of us loved every part of it. Universal are very good hotels & the parks are Great but prices are getting higher each year sadly. We all love Florida but I think Tge Florida Jeys and the Gulf coast are worth exploring more.

OVERALL, Great time ! Resort was laid out really nicely, the entire staff were awesome, from the Front Desk, to the dining area/ kitchen and room attendants. not a lot of frilly, over the top display, furniture or "high end" stuff. buses to parks were AWESOME ! Pools were a really nice evening amenity after a long day at the park. rinsed off and hit the pools. rooms were in BETTER shape and cleaner than some big named hotels. food was decently priced and PLENTY of it. not once did I have a concern. the resort was a "throwback" resort to the 50's and 60's. it was awesome. ! We will be back !

A once wonderful resort hotel that's in serious decline. I've visited Cabana Bay several times over the past decade and there was a time I would recommend this resort to everyone, but unfortunately now I cannot recommend to anyone. The wonderful little perks are still there such as the lazy river, one of the most spacious gyms of any resort, a bowling alley, access to a long but present dedicated walking path to City Walk, a great dedicated Milkshake and ice cream area, but everything else has clearly gone down in quality. 1. I went with my family and requested our rooms to be nearby, especially because my father needs serious medical attention and requires a wheelchair to get from location to location, but they separated us on 2 completely opposite ends within the same lazy river side of the hotel. Even we are technically on the same side of the hotel, the resort is so big that getting to his room takes at least a 5 to 7 minute walk. I was told that their room could be transferred but they'd be downgraded from a Family Suite to a standard room but the whole point of getting the Family Suite was so there was room for my father's wheelchair and my mother's scooter who also has medical needs. I decided to give the staffing the benefit of the doubt even though I booked and made my requests over a year ago and if this was the only problem I'd have let this go as an overpopulation problem in my head. 2. Speaking of which, this hotel is now absolutely packed with tons of people coming in and out on any given day. I wouldn't typically wouldn't give "popularity" a negative score if it wasn't for the fact that you can physically see families waiting and "camping" out for their rooms to be ready many hours after check-in time. Cabana Bay clearly books to full capacity and leaves zero room for problems that arrive from departing guests or lack of staffing to change those rooms. 3. Despite having a very kind staff, they're clearly stretched thin and pushed to their limits. Instead of increasing staff for the full capacity bookings, Cabana Bay has decided to limit the staff's cleaning duties. If you're spending a long week at Cabana Bay, don't expect your room to be vacuumed or your sheets changed. Staff will come in every other day and change your toweling, empty garbage, and make your bed but they won't do things like scrub, change your sheets, vacuum, clean the toilet, etc etc. So you really CANNOT do anything fun in your bed such as eat, drink or anything because any crumb or stain will be with you your entire week. 4. Transportation to the parks and City Walk has changed for the worse. Cabana Bay, one of the biggest resorts in Orlando used to have a smooth, dedicated bussing system that typically only had you waiting no longer than 15 minutes for a ride and that was was considered a long, rare occasion. On my recent trip, there have been serious issues with wait times and the new stop to a different hotel now included in the Cabana Bay bus route. I can imagine Aventura (the hotel now included in the Cabana Bay bus route) gets it much worse since Cabana Bay buses are beyond full capacity with people typically standing over seated individuals and spilling onto the driver him/herself and then stopping to Aventura guests. But Cabana Bay itself, there have been at least 70% of the time where I've waited 30 minutes or more for a bus during non-peak hours such as park opening/closing. The lines are typically astronomically long and everytime I am shocked as to how many passengers they squeeze into the bus as opposed to simply using the same amount of buses and drivers from previous years. And btw, some drivers choose not to pick you up if there isn't a dedicated bus line attendant waiting at the front of the line to wave down the driver. Yep, if there isn't a bus line attendant present to wave down the driver to pickup passengers then that bus many times will drive by you as a HUGE crowd of hotel guests waiting in line scream and yell at the top of their lungs toward the bus after waiting so long. 5. The overall upkeep of the hotel is seriously lacking, even from my last visit a couple years ago. The room hallway walls are scratched or marked from the tiny space staff has to move their oversized carts. There's different odors nearly everyday on the first floor that I have a hard time pinpointing but have a fun time trying to guess with my family when walking through those halls. There's several doors on the first floor between buildings buildings that do not open automatically even though they're designed to with the wave of a hand. Which wouldn't be a problem if those same doors were not so heavy for a regular walking human but for my father in a wheelchair, it's impossible unless someone opens and holds the door for him. There's lights in the room that should function with a switch that don't. And I can go on and on with the issues surrounding Cabana Bay, and I'm truly saddened to say this since I've loved this resort for so long... Stay away at all costs. All of the amenities I listed at the beginning in no way out weigh all of the other problems you're going to experience when staying there.