by Pixie Dusted Diva
Welcome Home!
As Disney Vacation Club (DVC) owners, Saratoga Springs Resort is our Disney home. However, the resort is not only for Disney Vacation Club owners, anyone can stay here. When Disney offers cash discounts on rooms, the villas typically end up with the largest discount. Just ask our Travel Agent Military Diva for a quote! Saratoga Springs has easily become one of our favorite Disney resorts, as the feel brings us back to our real New England home.
Since Saratoga Springs is a DVC resort, the rooms are divided 
into categories that include studios, one bedroom villas and two bedroom villas. The deluxe studio sleeps up to four adults with one queen bed and one double size sleeper sofa. The one bedroom villa has one bedroom with one king bed and one queen size sleeper sofa in the living room. The two bedroom villa has the same set up as the one bedroom villa with the addition of an additional bedroom with two queen beds. The two bedroom villa can sleep up to eight adults and the one bedroom villa sleeps up to four adults. Grand Villas and Treehouse Villas are also available for larger parties. All villas offer views of the gardens, lakes, pools, woodlands or fairways. Saratoga Springs is also nestled on the fairways of Disney’s Lake Buena Vista Golf Course, so you can catch 9 or 18 holes while you stay here if golf is your game of choice.
When we stay at Saratoga Springs, we typically stay in a one bedroom or two bedroom villa, which includes a full kitchen and a washer/dryer, which makes vacationing with small children a dream. I love to come home with a suitcase full of clean clothes!
While the resort is very large and spread out (similar to the setup of Caribbean Beach), we personally love it! That also means there are several bus stops when going to the parks, but that doesn’t bother us. The resort has five areas, each with different pros and cons, but my personal favorite area of the resort is the Grandstand.
Here’s why I love the Grandstand:
–Bus Transportation: If you stay at the Grandstand, you are usually the first one on and off the buses. The Downtown Disney bus does stop at the Springs first, but the Grandstand is the second stop.
–Pools: There is a quiet pool and kids’ splash area in the Grandstand. There are also changing facilities, towels and other amenities available in the area. There are picnic tables and grills available at the pool as well.
–Snack Bar/Drink Refill Station: The snack bar and drink refill station is located at the pool, which is convenient when you are on the dining plan. You can use snack credits while at the pool for ice cream or nachos and refill your mug. One con is the snack bar is not always open and the drink station sometimes closes early. The Snack Bar is an actual bar that serves alcohol too! They also don’t have posted hours for the bar and drink station. We found out that if there was bad weather, both would close early. Some nights the drink refill station stayed open past 9 pm and other nights it was closed. We asked several different Cast Members the hours of the refill station, but no one knew what the set hours were.
–Near the Carriage House: It’s less than a five minute walk to the Carriage House, which is the main area of the resort that includes the front desk, resort gift shop, quick service and table service restaurants. The main feature pool, High Rock Springs Pool, is also located in this area, and has pool activities and a slide. Bike rentals, the arcade and the Community Center are also in this general area. Nightly movies are shown on a portable screen at this pool.
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Short Walk to the Boat Dock: Yes, a boat is available to Downtown Disney! You can actually walk to Downtown Disney as well from the resort. As many of you may already know, the bus stop can get very congested at Downtown Disney, and there has been a lot of construction lately with the renovations at Downtown Disney, so the boat is a nice perk. We’ve even taken the boat to Downtown Disney to resort hop and taken another boat to visit the Port Orleans resorts. However, because of the construction, the boat dock for Saratoga Springs is shared by Old Key West and the water taxi. The Marketplace boat dock is now the home for the Port Orleans boat and the water taxi. This may change once the Disney Springs construction is complete.
The other areas of the resort include Congress Park, the Springs, the Paddock and the Carousel. A quick service restaurant, The Artist’s Palette, serves breakfast, lunch and dinner at the Carriage House. The Paddock Grill located at the Paddock Pool is another quick service that offers breakfast seasonally and lunch. The Turf Bar and Grill, also at the Carriage House, is a table service restaurant on the Disney Dining Plan. An internal shuttle is available to visit the other areas of the resort to take advantage of the amenities or pools offered around the resort. Someday I will have a chance to try the spa as the actual name of the resort is Saratoga Springs Resort and Spa, but I tend to leave off the Spa portion as most people don’t have time to enjoy the spa part on a Disney vacation!
I invite your family to take a trip back to the Victorian 1800’s with a stay at Disney’s Saratoga Springs Resort!
We stayed there just last week, what a great resort. Thanks for sharing and linking up.