Fun, Sun & Strong Water Rum...*Yo-Ho*...23 Nights @ Sapphire Falls...A May 2022 TR

[schumigirl]

Such a lovely relaxing way to start your holiday. We almost always do the same with an overnight stay near the airport and a lounge post check in at the airport. Makes for a lovely calm atmosphere and the snacks and champagne don’t hurt either!

It`s definitely the way to start a trip for sure.....I think everyone should follow suit there......everyone at the airport would be mellow for sure.......well, we certainly are.....

You had me at snacks and champagne.......lol......I would definitely recommend that lounge if you were flying from Manchester ever, it`s so much better than the older Escape Lounge in the old part of the terminal.

 

[KathyM2]

That hotel does look like a great beginning to a trip. Love the walkway too!!

I am sorry you got a bug last week. Possibly covid BA2? Who knows these days!

 

[jump00]

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Well, this last week has been a little of not very much. I came down with what seemed to be a 24 hour flu, but hadn`t been in contact with anyone who has had anything like it. I do blame going out for a walk in Baltic temps on Wednesday morning. What were we thinking.

To be honest, we didn`t realise just how cold it was with the wind, I was chilled to the bone and we came home after 15 minutes, too late by then. I was frozen to the core had chills, aches, headaches and shivered for hours even with hot water bottles, but finally it broke and back to normal in time for the weekend. I really am the lizard everyone says I am....I was born to live in a hot climate! But, 2 days later and I`m back to full health again.

Of course as it`s still winter like here, no one is really doing much yet. Friends are hibernating like bears so no real get togethers yet. I`m so ready for spring.

Not much has changed in planning for this trip yet.......as most of you know we plan very little anyway, but some things have to be sorted, so we have booked our overnight hotel for the night before we fly. This was much easier this time compared to our November stay.

We would again liked to have gone back to the Marriott near the airport, but, reviews are atrociously grim for that one, so we are not even considering staying there again until things improve. If it was the odd bad review, we may have taken a chance, but there`s just too many saying the same things. And they haven`t brought back the Executive lounge yet either which is a big consideration for us.

So, back again to our old favourite the Radisson. It might be over double the cost of the other one, but we know it well, it`s handy and we do like it a lot.

Despite our worries just before the last trip regarding asylum seekers, the stay was wonderful and we weren`t disturbed in any way. There were increased security officers around the hotel which was unusual, but the cleanliness and friendliness of staff were as good as ever. So, it was an easy decision to get this booked as soon as we knew the other place wasn`t going to happen.

The Radisson is so convenient for either terminal at Manchester, you come out the main doors which are on the 3rd level and you are straight into the middle of the closed skywalk....turn left for T2 and right for T1. Both terminals are around a 5 -10 minute walk depending on your speed or the amount of luggage you are trawling behind you

(picture from Google)





I love staying here in winter when you walk through the Skywalk even in the early morning and it`s illuminated in beautiful electric blue lighting. It is stunning. This visit it`ll be light very early so we won`t see it as clear as it is in pure darkness. Downside is it`s usually freezing cold in winter, they do have heat, but it`s as useless as a chocolate fireguard, so we do have to layer then. In summer it is like a hot house.....makes you move quicker though!

We always book a room with Executive Lounge access. A bit like Club rooms, they`re no different to regular rooms, you just have access to the lounge. But, we like the rooms here, they`re a decent size and a very comfy bed. And huge beds too similar in size to the one we have at home....you can get lost in it!!

The lounge at The Radisson is very nice and it had somewhat got back to normal for our last trip after a couple of years of covid restrictions. There were still some things missing like olives and chocolates sat out to help yourself during the day and other little snacks. They now have wrapped snacks, which isn`t a bad thing, just different.

We normally check in around midday to 1pm and it`s often so quiet then, we usually have the place to ourselves for a few hours. It used to have it`s own check in area outside the lounge doors, but due to staff shortages you just check in down on level 3. Check in is supposed to be from 3pm, but if there is a room available in the category you have booked you`ll get it.

We usually ate lunch in the Little M bar, but again due to staff shortages it hasn`t opened back up yet, so we`ll sort something else out. Then head to the lounge which we did in November and this time round, instead of having to wait till 5pm, wines and beers were available all day. This had definitely changed since our last visit in 2019. So of course we took advantage of that........well, it would be rude not to........☺

Tom found the champagne!!

Yes, while on vacation alcohol is acceptable at lunchtime..........well, wait.......is it ever not acceptable.....guess not!!

However, tea and coffee are available, as are an array of soft drinks and water.

It is a very nice and relaxing way to start off a trip.

At 5pm, the staff put out appetisers and they don`t change much from one visit to another. I have to admit they`re not the highest quality, but they are fresh and replenished with frequency and I did notice people were far more considerate in regards to thinking that others would be eating too this time around.

A small selection of the offerings.....they also have cheese and proscuitto with salami and other continental meats with crackers......you can fill up nicely on them I suppose.

Depending on how we feel, we sometimes book a table for dinner in the Collage restaurant downstairs. We do like it and I think we`ll do that this upcoming trip as we missed last time. I think we filled up on appetisers that time

Food is very good here, although reports are again, they have a limited menu due to Covid which can seem like an easy excuse at times for so many things now......but, we`ve never been disappointed with any offerings from here and it`s a nice light and airy restaurant.

Our flight usually leaves too early in the morning to enjoy the breakfast in the lounge or the restaurant. We could come back after checking in, but we do like to get through and not head back the way!! It`s just a little too early for food for us at that time in the morning, give me a cup of tea and I`m happy.

Plus we again plan to book the lounge after security we enjoyed last visit.

The 1903 Lounge had been built in the new part of the terminal, and is advertised as child free which appeals to us now more than ever. It was lovely, and very quiet for some reason, they may still have been limiting numbers but it was a very civilised place to pass a couple of hours.

Everything is included in the cost.....any alcohol you can imagine is there, and it`s all help yourself, but we never saw anyone take advantage in any way. Food was also very nice and a good selection of cold and and hot food including bacon. You could order eggs any way you liked too.

It really was too early for us to take advantage of the alcohol options on offer, and I think we were too nervous to really enjoy it for some reason......but I think I`ll try and enjoy some sparkly this time around.......bacon and champagne....it kinda goes well together.....

Enjoying your lovely pre-trip pictures of the lounge and food offerings. Glad you are feeling better!
Brenda

 

[jocelyn6]

Another trip to look forward to! Excited to be following along with your adventures!

 

[schumigirl]

That hotel does look like a great beginning to a trip. Love the walkway too!!

I am sorry you got a bug last week. Possibly covid BA2? Who knows these days!

It really is ideal Kathy. I do like the othe hotel too, but this one has the advantage of being able to walk to the terminal in the morning rather than have to take a shuttle.

I really do think I just caught a chill of some kind. Simple flu symptoms that lasted less than 2 days. Although it felt longer.....even longer for Tom too......lol......

 

[schumigirl]

Enjoying your lovely pre-trip pictures of the lounge and food offerings. Glad you are feeling better!
Brenda

Thanks so much Brenda.

It does add to the excitement I have to admit, looking forward by looking back, and yes, that lounge is very nice.

 

[schumigirl]

Another trip to look forward to! Excited to be following along with your adventures!

back to you too jocelyn.......

Yep, another one up soon and yes, we are counting the days!!

Glad to have you along again too and hope everyone is doing well......hope you enjoy this one too....

 

[Cara]

Carole, it's so exciting to see you've started your next trip report! As we now have our previously postponed trip scheduled, I'm even more excited to read. I'm sure you'll share along the way, but I'm particularly interested in your top choices for dining in each park, on City Walk and in the hotels!

 

[schumigirl]

Carole, it's so exciting to see you've started your next trip report! As we now have our previously postponed trip scheduled, I'm even more excited to read. I'm sure you'll share along the way, but I'm particularly interested in your top choices for dining in each park, on City Walk and in the hotels!

back Cara!! Always good to see you here......

And yes, I`m so happy your trip is upcoming too, so excited for you too!

Yep, we have a few ideas of where we`ll eat and some new places too on the list of possibilities, and of course we`ll share them......

Hope you`re still keeping well and glad you`re along for this one too......

 

[schumigirl]

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[keishashadow]

Good to hear it was a quickie bug!

The Radisson is so convenient for either terminal at Manchester, you come out the main doors which are on the 3rd level and you are straight into the middle of the closed skywalk

we have a Hyatt attached at the main airport we use now & again when I can catch it at decent price. do love that leisurely stroll over in the AM, especially for a 5 am flight!

we drive to airport, always park offsite as they have valet type service…car is warmed up and waiting when you arrive on the short shuttle drive. I can only imagine how much it would cost to park for your lengthy trips lol. Good thing you found reliable car service.

m never sure if we should create an Uber account or not.

believe you can just purchase a gift card still to set up as payment. we’ve been burnt a few times seeing the price jump in the app upon trip completion This, after their initial ‘quote’ When summoning the ride. Their excuse, a form of ‘surge pricing’ during dinner trips. Not a fan of that sort of bait & switch, also, not sure if it’s common or we looked too ‘touristy’, ripe for the pickings. Have never had that happen elsewhere.

 

[schumigirl]

Good to hear it was a quickie bug!

we have a Hyatt attached at the main airport we use now & again when I can catch it at decent price. do love that leisurely stroll over in the AM, especially for a 5 am flight!

we drive to airport, always park offsite as they have valet type service…car is warmed up and waiting when you arrive on the short shuttle drive. I can only imagine how much it would cost to park for your lengthy trips lol. Good thing you found reliable car service.

believe you can just purchase a gift card still to set up as payment. we’ve been burnt a few times seeing the price jump in the app upon trip completion This, after their initial ‘quote’ When summoning the ride. Their excuse, a form of ‘surge pricing’ during dinner trips. Not a fan of that sort of bait & switch, also, not sure if it’s common or we looked too ‘touristy’, ripe for the pickings. Have never had that happen elsewhere.

Thanks Janet.

Yes, that morning stroll is very nice isn`t it for very early flights.

That was similar to what we had at the Radisson when we used to take our own car on past trips. Price was included in the cost of the hotel price. They took the car offsite and brought it back when our plane landed. We had no problems with them over the many years we did that, but then they were on one of those consumer complaint programmes where folks were getting their cars back damaged or had hundreds of miles added.......maybe we were lucky, but our car was always fine.

I would use it again if we had to, I think they were supposed to add on the extra nights charge to us as we were always over what they included with the room rate, maybe it was 14 nights maybe more, but they never did charge us extra. But, yes the car service is excellent.

I`m so wary of Uber to be honest. Yes, I`ve heard of folks being gouged on prices due to busy times......I need to think on it and see if we really need it as the hotel transport has always suited us fine. And we`ll have the car anyway.....there`s another year of unbelievably high pricings ahead......lol.....

 

[Pumpkin1172]

That was similar to what we had at the Radisson when we used to take our own car on past trips. Price was included in the cost of the hotel price. They took the car offsite and brought it back when our plane landed. We had no problems with them over the many years we did that, but then they were on one of those consumer complaint programmes where folks were getting their cars back damaged or had hundreds of miles added.......maybe we were lucky, but our car was always fine.

It's funny you say that, we did a park and pay for our truck for our trip.

Dh locked them from accessing any information with apple carplay/android auto, and he made sure to know how many km's were on the odometer. We think they stored or truck inside their facility, and it didn't even move according to odometer after we parked it. We would definitely use them again. They had the truck running and warmed up for us. Which was nice after it was a 50degree difference in less than 8 hrs lol.

 

[schumigirl]

It's funny you say that, we did a park and pay for our truck for our trip.

Dh locked them from accessing any information with apple carplay/android auto, and he made sure to know how many km's were on the odometer. We think they stored or truck inside their facility, and it didn't even move according to odometer after we parked it. We would definitely use them again. They had the truck running and warmed up for us. Which was nice after it was a 50degree difference in less than 8 hrs lol.

I can imagine how glad you were to have the vehicle warmed up for you arriving in those temps for sure!

The company the hotel used had the driver who removed the car offsite video around the whole car to show no damage was present or to register any damage a car already had in case of issues when you return. As I said, we were lucky we only had the mileage added to and from where the car was parked which was only 5 miles away from the airport hotel and no scratches or dents some have reported.

But, some of the stories.......very unlucky folks. Glad you had a good experience though.

 

[schumigirl]

HOTEL CHOICE
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This is always an interesting discussion for us as we have two favourite hotels in Orlando and we do like to mix our stays between both places.

Royal Pacific is our original choice and somewhere we absolutely love staying and have done since 2009, but the same can be said of Sapphire Falls. I have been known to make a Freudian like slip when one friend asked which hotel we were staying in this May trip......I automatically responed by saying we were staying at Strong Water....... You can guess where my mind is at this point going forward........

For our previous May trips we have always seemed to gravitate towards staying completely at Sapphire as opposed to a split stay like we do in September, so, even though this is a little longer stay, we thought we would like to just stay here...and again, one of the considerations is just how many nights we usually end up in Strong Water Bar.....if we`re already in Sapphire it certainly saves walking all the way back over to RP I guess.

Sapphire is still fairly new in regard to Universal hotels, and we genuinely didn`t realise just how much we were going to love it when it was being built.....although we were assured we would, we did doubt it slightly. However, when we saw it and spent time in it, we did fully appreciate just how lovely a place it actually was.

The lobby is one of the largest and brightest around and still manages to look warm and welcoming at the same time. At night it does have a homely feel and especially at Christmas with the huge tree, it is beautiful.

When you arrive by the boat, for us it is one of the nicest sights to see as you come back home from the parks. It shows the hotel at it`s best, albeit the back of the hotel.

And at night the views are stunningly beautiful when you can see some of the park lit up as well as the hotel.

Some folks always ask if we ever get fed up staying at the same places and the answer is always no. We never get fed up staying at either hotel for our stays.....why would we......they both have everything we need for our trips and it really is like a home away from home for us.

And of course Sapphire Falls has several food options that suit us. We don`t tend to use the Dutch Trading Co very often except maybe if we need a coffee or maybe a pastry. Quick service places we tend not to use, but this one is very nice albeit maybe too small for the size of the hotel. You can see long lines at certain times of the day and we have only tried a couple of the hot food options which were absolutely fine.

They do stock the usual snack items and alcohol too.

Amatista is a lovely restaurant with a fairly small menu, but it covers a good choice of food items from sandwiches to steaks, so I think most folks could get something and the setting is lovely as it overlooks the waterway and boat dock with huge windows that just flood the room with natural light.

We have never been disappointed by the food from here and we have met other friends there to eat and they`ve enjoyed the offerings too. They do an excellent breakfast buffet every day and I`m sure we`ll take one morning to enjoy that over our trip.

The Mother`s Day buffet will be on too while we are there in May. Although UK Mother`s Day is in March.......I can celebrate it twice......no excuses needed here!!! It was one of the best Brunches we have ever been to and as soon as we can book it we absolutely will. I can thoroughly recommend it for sure.

I`m going to cover Strong Water in another post....it definitely deserves a post of it`s own!!!

One of the unique points of the hotel is the central stairwell off the lobby. It takes you directly down to Amatista and the boat dock, we just found it very pretty and the bottom area has been known to hold small events and certainly holds the rum theme throughout.

We don`t spend a lot of time at the pool in any hotel. We do enjoy an evening on occasion watching the Dive in Movies and get some food from either hotels, and I have to say both hotels doe excellent pool food and being able to order from your lounger is very nice indeed.

It does have a pool slide which is very popular of course.

Sapphire for us is as homely as RP has ever been to us over the years.......it`s a relaxing atmosphere with some amazing staff who do look after everyone from when you check in.

Those are just a few of the reasons we love this hotel so much, there are so many more reasons....and yes rum does fit in there somewhere!!

​

 

[musika]

Aw man, you had already sold me on RPR and now you gotta go making me love SF! I think for us we want the Express pass experience for at least a portion of the trip but I do love the look of this resort! So hard to make a choice.

 

[schumigirl]

Aw man, you had already sold me on RPR and now you gotta go making me love SF! I think for us we want the Express pass experience for at least a portion of the trip but I do love the look of this resort! So hard to make a choice.

lol....that`s funny. Oh I completely agree with you on the EP, it is worth it`s weight in gold for sure.

Sapphire is just gorgeous!!!

 

[Worfiedoodles]

SF is so beautiful! We prefer to stay at RP for the Express Pass, but love to wander over as it's so close and easy. I love the light fixture in the lobby, if that doesn't say vacation, I don't know what does. The pool really does look amazing, and so fun to have the water features. We also discovered the hotel store has a larger and better selection than RP, and some things that are hard to find. Definitely worth a stop in!

Your hotel choice is looking lovely, what great beautiful photos to brighten up my dull day!

 

[schumigirl]

SF is so beautiful! We prefer to stay at RP for the Express Pass, but love to wander over as it's so close and easy. I love the light fixture in the lobby, if that doesn't say vacation, I don't know what does. The pool really does look amazing, and so fun to have the water features. We also discovered the hotel store has a larger and better selection than RP, and some things that are hard to find. Definitely worth a stop in!

Your hotel choice is looking lovely, what great beautiful photos to brighten up my dull day!

Oh yes, we do love our EP too!!

It just screams vacation whenever I see that hotel.......and yes, the light fixture is quite something isn`t it. The Universal store in Sapphire is a really good size, and carries a good range of products.

And I have to say, yes, that walk between the hotels is perfect........I think we have worn our own little pathway all the way from one hotel to the other the amount of times we walk it!!

Thank you Maria, I can`t wait to get back again, but you know that too......

 

[keishashadow]

And I have to say, yes, that walk between the hotels is perfect..

I go ‘rogue’ and short cut over the access road

JHMO, our experience - pre & post pandemic, specifically addressing the pool serving staff here…curious as to your take on it.

the SF staff appears to be more efficient & far more pleasant vs what we’ve encountered at RP, PB & (especially) HR. Don’t get me wrong, none of the onsite service is what I’d deem “bad”

will say, lately, the U resort TS servers have decidedly gotten the nod over what we’ve experienced at WDW when it was the reverse situation pre-pandemic.