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Port Orleans Riverside, Fall Food Festival, 29-30 October 2017
Posted Friday 27th October 2017, 6:49pm (EDT) by The Sassagoula Sentinel
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On Sunday and Monday (29 & 30 October) from 5pm-8pm, Port Orleans Riverside will be hosting their second Food and Wine event, the Riverside Fall Food Festival. The first was a one-day event back in May, and the hope is that this will eventually become a week-long event every year. |
November 2017 Recreation Activities and Movie Schedules
Posted Thursday 26th October 2017, 5:28am (EDT) by The Sassagoula Sentinel
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The November 2017 Recreation Activities and Movie Schedules for Port Orleans Riverside and Port Orleans French Quarter are now available. See the main Recreation Activities Schedules page for full-size printable PDF versions.
Live Evening Entertainment No visit to Port Orleans Riverside would be complete without spending an evening in the company of the legendary “Ye Haa” Bob Jackson at the River Roost Lounge, playing 8:30pm—midnight four nights a week (Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday). Note: Bob will be not be performing at the Port on the evening of Thursday 30 November. Port Orleans French Quarter’s Scat Cat’s Club does not currently have "official" resident musicians, but filling the gap admirably are Jason Thomas and Billy Varnes, two members of the fabulous Off Kilter rock band which used to perform in Epcot’s Canada pavilion. Occasionally when one of the boys is not available, Greg Hayworth (from Mulch, Sweat & Shears) will sit in. The dates are only announced a month or so in advance (generally most Saturdays, Sundays, Mondays and Tuesdays) but if you happen to be around for any of their evenings (8:30pm—11pm) do yourself a favour and pop along, they are highly recommended.   |
Trial allowing pet dogs in Guest Rooms starts at POR on 15 Oct
Posted Friday 13th October 2017, 12:12pm (EDT) by The Sassagoula Sentinel
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Port Orleans Riverside will become one of four trial ‘dog friendly resorts’ starting on Sunday 15 October 2017, allowing guests to bring a maximum of two pet dogs on vacation with them.
Update on 14 Oct: Rooms will receive a more thorough cleaning at departure including carpet and upholstery cleaning. The room assignment department will try to put guests with pets into certain rooms; how successful they are will depend on whether they know about the guest bringing a pet in advance or not. Update on 18 Oct: So we are now a few days into the trial and the public outcry on social media and via communications directly to Disney has taken everyone by surprise - heck, it even took me aback, and I know how vocal Disney fans can be. I think it's safe to say that Disney completely underestimated the passion that many people would have on this subject, and the initial plans are being modified and policies rewritten on the fly at the moment. This process will probably remain fluid over the next few weeks, and Disney is closely monitoring and listening to the feedback and will continue to adjust procedures to try to make this trial work for everyone. Initially, as will have been seen from the printed Dog Relief Area maps, it was intended that all these happy fluffy pets (which everyone would surely like) would be permitted in any type of guest booking at Riverside, and the early announcements did state that the whole resort - barring certain areas such as food & beverage and swimming pools - would be canine accessible as long as the animals were kept under control and on a leash. However over the last 48 hours that intent has been severely trimmed back and they are now aiming to try to restrict dogs to only Standard and Garden View rooms, and the current intention from the room inventory department at Riverside is to use building 24 as much as possible for any guests who book to stay with their pets. This building is well away from the common areas, is located right next to the parking lot to make getting pets to and from rooms easier, and has a nice grassy area nearby to allow dogs to be exercised. However, although the telephone Reservations Center is now advising guests who wish to bring dogs with them that this will only be possible for Standard and Garden View rooms, the initial announcements - and even the currently posted wording on the Disney website - do not require guests to book that way, nor to preregister their dogs. Thus it is entirely possible that people who have booked for other room categories using the Disney website, via travel agents, through Expedia, etc. will simply show up at the front desk accompanied by their pet(s) and ask to pay the daily fee. This could mean that, in the short term at least, dogs will still need to be accommodated in other areas of the resort in order to comply with existing bookings. This will of course be closely monitored and subsequent deep-cleans arranged for any affected rooms, but at this stage it cannot be guaranteed that other areas of the resort will remain completely dog-free. I have reached out to my contacts at the resort who have said that so far (i.e. in the first three days of the program) they have not yet had a single dog staying at the resort. Over the next seven days there are currently just four one-night reservations with associated comments indicating that the guest plans to bring a dog with them, against more than 100 comments over the same seven-day period asking to be assigned to a room away from the dog friendly areas. Those four one-night reservations are apparently all from local Florida residents, and personally I would not be at all surprised to find that some or all of them turn out to be from social media aware guests, or even bloggers or website owners, testing out the new policies for themselves. If there have been any booking cancellations because of this new policy then they have already been replaced with new reservations, as Riverside is either sold out or very close to it for the rest of the month. Please remember however that we are still only three days into a year-long trial period and there is plenty of time for any of the above information to change in line with practical needs and guest comments and experiences. Update on 21 Oct: A copy of the waiver document which guests need to sign when they check dogs in to the hotel can be DOWNLOADED HERE. A few interesting new bits of information:
 Initial collateral leaflet for guests arriving with dogs. This is information still subject to change. 
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Room and Package Discounts Announced for Spring 2018
Posted Wednesday 4th October 2017, 6:06am (EDT) by The Sassagoula Sentinel
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Walt Disney World has just announced several new discount offers for hotel stays and packages during Spring 2018, and unusually the Port Orleans resorts are included for at least some of these offers. These discounts will have limited availability and will sell out quickly (and you may find restrictions on some dates and room categories) so book as soon as you can and be flexible with your dates if you want to snag a bargain. As always, I recommend visiting MouseSavers.com for full details of this and any other Disney offers.
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