Disney's Grand Californian Hotel

Warning!! I booked a 3 bedroom suite for the weekend of September 18th at over $3,000 a night. This family trip was months in the making for a special once-in-lifetime occasion. On Saturday morning at 8:15, heavy construction starts that woke me up! This is not a little noise. This is jackhammers early Saturday morning. Talked to weekend manager immediately. Apparently, they work on Sunday too!! There is no other suite available. Outrageous! They could have given us a suite on the other side of the hotel. They should not be using these rooms. After some discussion, they comp the room for both nights. But is that enough? A family trip was months in the making. To have everyone disturbed. It’s outrageous. Do not stay here!!!!!! Seriously. Find another hotel until the construction is done. Disney answers to a higher standard than other brands. They don’t just promise a room. They promise an emotion: it’s the Happiest Place on Earth. And this casts a pall on what was supposed to be a perfect weekend.

This is a premium hotel but honestly it was disappointing. Only positives were housekeeping (5 stars) and location (5 stars). The rest was a 2 star experience. 1) We did mobile check in but we did not get our room notification so went to the front desk and had to wait 20 minutes in line to get our room number. 2). Bell Services’s was horrible. Stood and waited on checkin and check out 30 minutes to get our luggage out of the back room. Not delivered but just hauled from the back to the lobby. While there are bell services employees just standing around. 3) They only serve black drip coffee at every restaurant. No cold brews, no espresso drinks, only black drip coffee. This is a premium hotel but not a premium experience. 4) beds are hard and uncomfortable. 5) bathrooms are tiny

Stunning! We stayed in a first floor 1-bedroom villa with one full bath and one 3/4 bath. The full kitchen included a coffee pot with 2 packets of coffee in filters, paper towels, dish soap, dishwasher soap, hand towels. If you plan to cook and require plastic wrap or aluminum foil, you’ll need to bring it. There were ice cube trays in the freezer. The verandah opened to a wooded courtyard with 2 chairs and a small table (you can hear the park but cannot see it). Also included are a washer, dryer, and laundry soap. The lobby is gorgeous! Craftsmen style architecture is throughout the entire resort. The pools were great with very nice lounge chairs and attentive and friendly wait staff. You can enter Disney California Adventure Park directly from the resort. We will definitely be back!

I have genuinely stayed in hostels with better customer service. Our stay at Disney’s Grand Californian Hotel was one of the worst hotel experiences I have ever had. For a hotel charging premium prices and presenting itself as a luxury Disney resort, the level of service was honestly unbelievable. The biggest issue was the complete lack of customer service. We constantly felt like we were an inconvenience simply for asking basic questions or requesting things that should be standard at any hotel. We were repeatedly given information that turned out to be untrue, and it seemed like almost every Cast Member’s priority was to pass the request on to somebody else rather than actually help. During our stay, our room was not receiving the towel service or garbage removal we were supposed to receive. We were travelling with a 1-year-old, so naturally we accumulated garbage, including diapers. After getting so frustrated that we had resorted to leaving garbage near the elevators, we saw a housekeeping Cast Member IN OUR HALLWAY, ON OUR FLOOR, PUSHING A HOUSEKEEPING CART. While holding the baby, we simply asked for some garbage bags so we could deal with the trash ourselves. He refused to give us any and told us we needed to call downstairs and request them. We called. Nothing came. We called for towels and were told to get them from the pool. We went to the front desk for help. Nothing. Then, on our final night, the hotel water went out around 1:00 AM. We unfortunately knew immediately because members of our group were also dealing with what appeared to be food poisoning after eating at the Craftsman Bar. The water remained off through the morning of our checkout day. What shocked me almost as much as losing the water was the complete lack of communication. No letter under the door. No voicemail on the room phone. No visible notice. No proactive communication whatsoever. We had to keep calling the hotel ourselves just to find out what was happening. We had approximately 30 hours of travel ahead of us that day and repeatedly asked if there was ANYWHERE we could shower before leaving for our flights. We were basically told there was nothing they could do. We then had to BEG for bottled water just so we could brush our teeth. Eventually, someone brought us five tiny bottles of water IN A GARBAGE BAG(finally). We were told to use the showers at the pool. Obviously these are public pool showers, so this already meant trying to shower while wearing swimsuits. We went down there anyway, only to be told THE POOL SHOWERS DIDN’T WORK EITHER. That was it. No alternative. We ended up putting the kids in the pool just so they could freshen up, then using bottled water afterward to try to rinse the chlorine off them before beginning our trip home. That is an absurd situation for guests of a hotel at this price point to be put in. Our experience with a package delivery was just as ridiculous. One of the kids’ tablets broke during our flight to California, so we ordered a replacement to the hotel. Before doing so, we checked with approximately 11 different Cast Members AND used the chat function in the Disneyland app to make absolutely sure we could have it delivered. Everyone told us it was fine, although almost every person gave us different instructions. The package was delivered to Bell Services. We repeatedly checked for it IN PERSON over the following days because, by this point, we had learned not to rely on the information we were being given. We kept being told it wasn’t there. At one point we were even told it needed to go through “security.” It took FOUR DAYS to finally get our package. We eventually discovered that it had apparently been at Bell Services the entire time. Nobody had bothered to actually locate it. After repeatedly watching Cast Members go into the back to “check” and then return saying it wasn’t there, it is very difficult not to wonder what they were actually checking. Finally, during the water outage we were specifically told that a manager would come to our room to speak with us face-to-face. Nobody came. Instead, someone claiming to be a manager called the room. The conversation was dismissive and left us with the impression that they really did not care about what we had experienced. Considering how much incorrect information we had already received during our stay, I honestly have no confidence that we were even speaking to a manager. The Grand Californian has an incredible location and a beautiful lobby, but those things do not make up for terrible service. At these prices, guests should not have to chase down towels, beg for garbage bags, spend four days trying to retrieve a package that is already inside the hotel, or use a swimming pool and bottled water to clean their children because the hotel has no functioning water and offers no reasonable alternative. Several people in our group described the experience as worse than staying in a decrepit motel. They aren’t wrong. Disney talks endlessly about its legendary level of service. We experienced the exact opposite here. We felt like an inconvenience from beginning to end. I would not stay at Disney’s Grand Californian Hotel again, and I cannot recommend it to anyone. Save your money and stay somewhere that actually treats paying guests like guests.

Fantastic hotel, wonderful location and great facilities. We had an amazing time and would definitely choose this hotel again. The direct access to Downtown Disney and Californian Adventure was so convenient. Loved it!