DISNEY'S BEACH & YACHT CLUB RESORTS
From the moment you find - easily - your big Magical Express Bus at the Orlando International Airport, the fun begins. An onboard video featuring the Disney characters reminds you of the pleasurable experiences which await, and the 55-minute drive to Disney World passes quickly.
The large welcoming porte-cochère at the Beach Club Resort provides an introduction to the neo-Victorian theme of the resort, which is located on Crescent Lake, adjoining the Yacht Club Resort and across the water from the Boardwalk Resort.
All three properties were designed by the noted American architect Robert A.M. Stern, who designed a number of buildings during the tenure of former Disney Chief Executive Michael Eisner. The Beach Club opened in 2000. Stern cleverly appropriated nostalgic details and shapes from 19th-century summer beach hotels. He never exactly duplicates, but rather re-imagines them in luxurious spaces inside and out with ornate and fanciful balconies, arches, towers, widows' walks, balustrades, lamps, and countless other alluring details.
As you enter, you receive a salute and warm cheery welcome from the official resort greeter, who is available throughout your stay for directions and other assistance. The lobby,
quiet in late afternoons and evenings, is busy and bustling in
the morning with many arrivals and departures. Online check-in
saves time. In addition to cove lighting, some 30 five-lamp
wall sconces light the room day and night. An electric extravagance,
but great ambiance for an especially warm welcome.
A quick fresh-up in the elegant black-marble rest-room just off the lobby provides a first touch of Disney deluxe attention to detail.
Next it's up to your room to unpack, relax briefly, and then set out to explore the premises.
You will note that many walls in the Beach Club have tongue-and-groove wainscoting, as seen behind the sign above. This was a very popular type of wall at the turn of the 19th-20th century. The Solarium is a lovely sunlit room for relaxation at the Beach Club.
Entry to the Solarium is through a bright corridor with highly polished wide-plank hardwood floors, undraped windows, and a row of comfortable white-painted benches.
The comfy benches are fitted with homey plaid cushions, and look like what one might expect in an informal seaside hotel.
The Solarium itself is bright and sunny, with high clerestory windows, and double-doors opening to the courtyard outside.
The wicker chairs, painted furniture and sea-shell lamps are reminiscent of a comfortable low-key seaside hotel.
Atmospheric paintings add to the cheerful ambience.
This quiet hall is decorated with beach umbrellas. Several hallways in the Beach Club have been raked, perhaps to suggest a seaside accommodation in which two small hotels or boarding houses, built at different levels, have been combined into one larger establishment, with adjustments to adjoining hallways. The Chalfonte-Haddon Hall Hotel in Atlantic City was a merger of two hotels built in the late 1800's, and combined in 1928.
Old re-purposed and re-painted purple sideboards are seen in the Beach Club corridors, with live plants and colorful sea-shell and fish lamps.
One painting
depicts a romanticized vision of a pre-Disney
turn-of-the-century seaside amusement park.
Disney's unmatched landscaping, lawns, gardening, cleanliness and upkeep are everywhere evident: painters and gardeners are seen at work, and the properties are always impeccable.
A wedding pavilion stands ready in the garden, decorated with hearts, ringed with flowers, and topped with a gold cupid weathervane blowing a matrimonial salute.
No time
to swim now, but you can check out the resort's great winding
pool and hot tubs for later relaxation after a day
Across the Seven Seas Lagoon is the Boardwalk, another excellent Disney Resort with shops, restaurants and a Dance Hall.
The photograph above is rendered nostalgically by a Disney artist in this imaginative postcard view.
All three resorts - The Beach Club, Yacht Club and The Boardwalk, are within walking distance of EPCOT and Disney's Hollywood Studios. "Friendship Boats" running every 20 minutes ply the Seven Seas Lagoon, with stops at the Beach and Yacht Clubs, the Boardwalk Resort, EPCOT and the Disney Studios theme park. Bus service to other Disney parks is available at the front door, with connections to the Magic Kingdom, the Animal Kingdom, Downtown Disney, and other resorts.
Not to miss, of course, are the breakfast and dinner buffets at the Beach Club's Cape May Cafe.
The crisp casual decor includes croquet mallets mallets and balls, and beach chairs. The buffet is plentiful, and the food speaks for itself in the following photos.
Mickey Mini-waffles ...
And of course, the hostess herself, Minnie Mouse, greets the kids.
At dusk
the lights come on all over the lakeside buildings.
With nightfall a whole new magic gilds the resorts.
Boats return to their slips as guests prepare for the evening.
The Beach Club takes on a fairyland appearance.
The pool area is especially inviting for an evening swim. These pools are noted for their "sandy bottom" areas, actually beds of imported ground silicate, delightful on the feet.
The turning windmill is a distinctive feature.
A peaceful quiet settles over the resort.
Night brings new magic
to the Boardwalk, which is garlanded with strings of carnival
lighting. Reflections in the water amplify the colorful gaiety of the Boardwalk's appropriately gaudy attractions.
What better time for a visit to the famed Beaches 'n'Cream?
This is a cheery recreation of a mid-20th century ice cream parlor.
The menu offers everything an ice-cream lover could want ...
But how can you not order the establishment's signature offering: "The Kitchen Sink"? Warning, it takes at least four people to finish one, and better, six.
Then come all the wonders which four theme parks and two water parks have to offer: rides, shows, parades and nightly fireworks. And swimming in that wonderful serpentine pool.
A chief achievement of Architect Stern's plan is that the Beach-Yacht complex, while spacious, has a cozy feeling. A diagram reveals how large the complex, which includes a convention center, really is. With so much to do and so much to see, your days pass all too quickly .. But all good things must, regrettably, must come to an end, and soon the time comes for you to return home.
Your Magical Express bus will return to take you, your luggage, your photos, and your memories of "The Happiest Place on Earth," back to the airport for your flight home. Safe journey!
Yacht Club Contact Information |
