POP into vacation mode!

I have to admit, having stayed at other value resorts, I was expecting POP Century to be about the same. We were traveling with my brother and sister-in-law on their first every Disney experience. We let them pick the resort, and they wanted to stay at POP. Having never been there, I was a little nervous because I wanted everything about this trip to be special for them. As soon as we pulled in, I knew I had nothing to worry about. The outstanding theming begins as you travel down a long entrance road. With signs advertising Color TV’s and Air Conditioned rooms, my sister-in-law immediately begins reading everything in sight and laughing.

Check in was smooth, we waited for about maybe 5 minutes, which was no big deal as we had arrived around 4:30. We were assigned a room in the 1960’s right next to the steps on the second floor close to the main building. The room was clean, and even though we were four adults we had enough room to unpack and relax a little. We were there at the end of February and unsure about using the pool, however, we were able to swim two different nights coming back from the parks, which was a nice relaxing way to end the day. The pool never felt overly crowded and was warm. The food court was always very busy, but the lines moved quickly and there was plenty of seating to accommodate the crowd. The selection is typical counter service, but was usually hot and fresh. Since our room was so close to the main building, we were able to utilize the refillable mug more than we had been able to on previous visits, so I was pleased with that as well.

Bus service to the parks was good, and we never waited more than 10 minutes for a bus. Bus service to Downtown Disney was not as good, and we ended up driving on two different occasions after waiting more than 20 minutes for the bus.

Overall, POP Century is a great value for anyone who spends most of their time at the parks, but enjoys a little down time at the resort. We enjoyed walking around the grounds looking at all of the theming. The food court was well run and a great place to grab a quick meal or a snack at the end of the day, and bus service was good, although at park opening or closing it was a little crowded. This was a fantastic resort for the price, and the detailed theming puts this at the top of our list for value resorts.