Sunday, 29 May 2016

Disneyland Paris - May 2016 - Part 3 - Sequoia Lodge Hotel

After popping into Disneyland Park we headed for our hotel. We were saying in the Sequoia Lodge Hotel in a Golden Forest adapted room.

You enter the hotel from the back entrance and it is quite confusing as to how to get to reception. You go past the hotels restaurants (Beaver Creek and Hunter's Grill) and then to the left there is a (very small) lift for disabled visitors. Although the lift is sign posted as being for those with a disability (due to the sign), a lot of people use it, especially those with buggies.

The lift is really small and only fitted my and one person in (it was a squeeze on our first ride up as my sister had her rucksack on). The lift only goes up to the 2nd floor (so it only goes between the reception floor and the park entrance floor) and it also shuts really quickly so we found that people would come out, they wouldn't hold the door and it would shut before I could get in. Pushing the button on the outside wouldn't stop the doors opening so we had to wait for the doors to shut then call it again for it to open.

Once you get out it's not signposted where reception is so we turned down by the shop to go and look for it. Once we got to reception we had to queue for 20 - 30 minutes for the Golden Forest desk. This was really annoying and disappointing as we paid more for this service and the normal check in desk was empty. People also tried to queue jump in front of us. Only one person was on the Golden Forest desk which didn't help.

Once it got to our turn we were given room keys and I asked for a hotel charge card. Apparently not many people make use of this but I thought it best so it was linked to my credit card and meant less transaction fees. The card can be used in all of the Disney shops and restaurants. I kept each receipt so we could check when we checked out that it was correct.

We went up to our room which was on the top floor (7th floor). There were three lifts for our 'wing' but one was out of order (for the full time we were there, and we even saw people working on it). The lack of lifts was really frustrating, especially in the mornings and on check out, especially with the rudeness of some people not holding lifts or running for them.

We had adjoining rooms, one was adapted and one was normal.

The adapted room had a large shower room with a walk-in / roll-in shower with one grab rail and a seat attached to the wall. The floor was non-slip which was brilliant (some places say they're non-slip but still are, but this was definitely non-slip). There was a large sink with space under to get a wheelchair (although the sink was still high so I'm not sure how accessible this would be). There was also a raised toilet with one hand rail. I was a bit annoyed as I had seen someone else's photos of an adapted Golden Forest room which had a handrail on the left of the toilet which would have been better for me (as my left is my stronger side) and had requested this via the travel agent, but we were allocated one with a rail on the right.

The room itself had a single bed and a set of bunk beds and was really a normal room, nothing adapted about it (even the door didn't have a eye hole at wheelchair height). As my sister is quite tall she ended up sleeping on a mattress on the floor rather than on the lower bunk as the head space was low. We also had to move my bed out to fit a chair beside it so I could put my breathing machine on it. 

Power points are very limited in the rooms too. I had seen posts about it on Facebook before we went but thought maybe there would be more in the accessible rooms but there weren't. There are no power points by the beds, so we plugged my machine (via an extension lead) into a socket by the end of my bed. When we went to go to sleep though my alarm on my machine went off as the power went out. It turned out that that socket was connected to the lights and would only work when the lights were on so we had to plug my machine in under the TV which meant we had a wire trailing diagonally across the room (a major trip hazard).

The view from our room couldn't have been better. We were lake view and on the 7th floor and could see the castle and the fireworks each night.



The attached room, which my parents stayed in, had two double beds and a normal bathroom (toilet and bath in one bit, with a sink in the hallway bit to the bathroom.

As we had a Golden Forest Room we also had a fridge, kettle, cups, glasses, ice bucket and nespresso machine each. I didn't actually use our kettle or nespresso machine in my room.

Also with Golden Forest Rooms you get a seperate area for breakfast from other guests on the 2nd floor in the Golden Forest Lounge. This was much better as you don't have a time slot you have to book (you can go anytime from 7am - 10.30am) and you also get hot options for free. This was much more civilised compared to previous stays in other hotels without this 'perk'.

Between 12pm - 10pm the Golden Forest Lounge provides drinks to those in the Golden Forest rooms free of charge and these can be consumed in the lounge or taken away. (I have just read on a Disneyland Paris forum that the Golden Forest Lounge have stopped people being able to take drinks away due to high visitor numbers but that this is only for today and tomorrow - 29th May 2016 to 30th May 2016) Most days we would get drinks to take away to take into the park (ie getting them the evening before). On two occasions we did get drinks in the lounge. One day we came back early as I was feeling a bit dizzy (which wasn't helped by the brightness and music in the park) and we were in time for the afternoon treats (cakes, mini wraps and sweets from 2pm -6pm). These were really nice and the room is really calming and dark. 



In Disney they serve tea with hot milk, which isn't very nice in our opinion, so when we were in the lounge we requested it with cold milk. This was the best cup of tea we had during our stay! We also asked for a glass of cold milk to take to our room too for tea which they gave to us in a soft drink container.

Check out was quite easy, we went to the Golden Forest check in desk and someone came out and took our bags for Disney Express (we were advised that they would be at the station within an hour so we had them in time for our train) and we then checked the balance of my hotel charge card (they gave us a breakdown of each charge).






Before we went I saw someone posted on a Disneyland Paris Facebook page to put the 'do not disturb' on the door as maids will start trying to clean at 8am. We did this, however one day my Dad stayed at the hotel a bit later (he was in the park by 10am so not mega late) and had the 'do not disturb' on the door but the cleaners still came in while he was in there!
  I definitely think it was worth the upgrade to Golden Forest mainly due to the free drinks and calmer breakfast experience. The hotel may not be great accesswise however if you have mobility issues and are walking as everything is spread out (the Golden Forest Lounge is at the front of the hotel quite far from the lifts, and the swimming pool is in a separate building)

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