Hey YouTube, it's Jacqueline for Pixie Dust PhD!
In this video we'll be going over all your need to know facts about Saratoga
Springs. As with all Disney Vacation Club Resorts,
and really all hotels at Walt Disney World, there is just
loads to know. Stay tuned to hear about cost, transportation options, dining, and more.
Saratoga Springs is a standalone Disney Vacation Club resort, meaning it's not
part of an already existing deluxe hotel. This resort opened in 2004 and fun fact
it actually opened on the old campus for the Disney Institute.
Themed after Saratoga Springs New York, this is a peaceful retreat full of a
lush greenery and a spa-like feel throughout.
Admittedly the themeing is subtle and to me it doesn't feel overly Disney.
Between the greenery, golf courses, pastel buildings, equestrian touches, and
location it just feels like a retreat away from Disney World.
The cost of Saratoga Springs makes it attractive to many for a potential DVC
home resort. Directly through Disney currently prices
for Saratoga Springs vary between 160 and 165 dollars per point pending on
your sources; i will leave some links in the description below.
On the resale market it's pretty easy to come across contracts varying between
100 and 110 dollars per point. If you're
looking for a larger contract you can also definitely find contracts for sub
$100 per point. Either way, buying directly
through Disney or on the resale market, Saratoga Springs is one of the
cheapest initial purchase options you'll find for DVC home resorts located at
Walt Disney World. Annual dues are also low. In 2020 they
were around $6.77 per point. This is the third lowest annual dues amounts for
all of the Walt Disney World DVC home resorts, and over a dollar cheaper than
the annual dues over at Old Key West which Saratoga Springs is often compared
to. Currently, the only lower dues are over
at the Grand Floridian and Bay :ake Tower at the Contemporary.
That being said, the initial purchase price for those two resorts is of course
much higher than the initial purchase price of Saratoga Springs. The number of
points required to stay at Saratoga Springs is also a really good value.
Your mileage of points will vary depending on the time of year you travel,
so what DVC season you're traveling in, and also which view category you book.
But if you don't mind staying in standard view rooms and traveling during
one of those lower DVC cost seasons then Saratoga Springs will often be one of
the cheapest options for you. Generally, you'll often find similar
point costs over at BoardWalk and Old Key West, again in those standard view
rooms. Although for those three bedroom grand
villas the point cost over at Old Key West is typically a lot less than you'll
find at Saratoga Springs. That being said, that three bedroom cost
at Saratoga Springs is going to be a lot less than your other
not Old Key West options. Overall, cost-wise Saratoga Springs is very
appealing. You have a low initial purchase price,
low annual dues, and generally speaking pretty low amounts of points required to
stay. It really doesn't get much better than
that. Saratoga Springs contracts expire in 2054 so you also have plenty of time
to make use of those points. Particularly if you purchase through the
resale market, the overall cost of Saratoga Springs is an extremely
attractive option. Saratoga Springs is a large resort with
the inventory ranging from 888 to 1320 rooms.
These are spread out across 18 buildings that contain a vast majority of the
villas, and then there are 60 standalone buildings that contain all the treehouse
villas. I believe the resort itself covers
around 65 acres, so it's definitely not compact.
This spread out resort is divided into five sections: the Carousel, the Paddock,
the Grandstands, the Springs, and Congress Park.
Interestingly, the Springs section was named well before the creation of Disney
Springs. The Congress Park section is a preferred
category so it will take more points to stay there.
This is because it overlooks Disney Springs with fantastic views and it is a
quick walk to the dining and shopping district destination. The up to
1,320 rooms at Saratoga Springs are comprised of 360 dedicated two bedrooms,
432 lock offs, 36 grand villas--that's those three bedroom accommodations, and
60 treehouse villas. Of note, there are zero dedicated studios
and zero dedicated one bedrooms; if you're looking to stay at Saratoga
Springs in a studio or a one bedroom you will be in a lock off.This has
little to no practical implications in my opinion, but just an FYI.
Studio room sizes at Saratoga Springs are fairly average coming in around 355
square feet. By pure rankings when sorting room sizes
for the DVC home resorts at Walt Disney World this is actually quite small.
That being said there's a cluster of five resorts with studios that are about
10 square feet within each other, so I consider that to be pretty average all
things considered. The same trend holds true for the one
bedrooms, coming in at around 714 square feet, and the two bedrooms, coming in at
1,070 square feet; while these are technically on the small
end if you're going to do a sorted list from smallest to largest accommodation
size, there are a handful of resorts with very
similar footprints. The exception to this are those grand
villas, which come in at around 2,133 square feet.
Although that is a lot of room it's actually much smaller than many other
grand villa options on Disney World property for DVC home resorts.
To my knowledge this is one of the smallest grand villa options, with the
exception of Bay Lake Tower being even smaller.
The treehouse villas are a unique offering at Saratoga Springs and these
actually opened well after the resort in 2009.
I know it sounds wild, but these honestly are the closest thing I could imagine to
an actual tree house as far as Disney Vacation Club accommodations go.
So no, it's not actually a tree house, but let's use our imagination.
Treehouse villas are located in their own separate section of the resort, and
they do stand tall off the ground--I would guess about 10 feet or so.
Most of these will require the use of stairs to enter, although there are a
limited number of ADA compliant tree house villas that have ramps instead.
The villas are an octagonal shape and offer three bedrooms and two bathrooms
and come in at around 1,074 square feet. These treehouse villas sleep up to nine
people. Although these are three bedroom accommodations you'll notice that per
the square feet it's actually much smaller than a three bedroom grand villa
and pretty similar to those two bedroom villa sizes.
And although there are three bedrooms, the treehouse villas only sleep up to
nine people. You might assume the treehouse villas
would feel quite cramped given the fact that they're squeezing three bedrooms
into the space of a standard two-bedroom villa,
but the layout is actually pretty ingenious. The kitchen, living, and dining
room areas are all very open concept so there's really great flow in the common
spaces of the villa. I do think nine people would feel tight, but I generally
feel like the maximum amount of people in any given villa size would feel tight.
Overall, I personally don't think they feel too crowded, but to each their own.
All Walt Disney World DVC home resorts come with a balcony, which is a feature
that is largely cherished by the DVC owners.
The treehouse villas kind of one-up this in my opinion; it's not just a
balcony, you get this large beautiful wooden deck to hang out
on. And as you might assume from the name, the area that the treehouse villas are
located in is pretty densely forested so you can
sit out on your wooden deck enjoy your morning coffee looking out basically into
the forest and feel a world away from Disney World.
Currently, other than those treehouse villas, I'm a little bit hesitant to
comment on the current rooms at Saratoga Springs, including the layout and quirks.
Saratoga Springs was in the midst of a full hard goods refurbishment when the
COVID-19 pandemic hit, and I think it's safe to assume that progress has slowed
a bit due to that. There have been a lot of complaints in
recent years about the Saratoga rooms feeling old and run down and like they
need a refresh. And honestly I think that's to be
expected when you are in the final years before entering a full refurbishment.
The full refurbishment started in June of 2019 and was slated to end sometime
in 2021, although that timeline may now be delayed.
Thus far, the updates given to the rooms result in a much brighter and cheerier
feel. I will leave some links in the
description below for you to explore some refurbished rooms yourself.
If you're headed down to Saratoga Springs soon and you want to be sure to
stay in a refurbished room I am fairly confident that the entire Congress Park
section of the resort is finished with the refurb.
If room layouts aren't changing during this refurbishment I will note a couple
of quirks. The main bathroom in villas larger than a studio will all have two
entrances: one from the master bedroom and one from the common area.
This isn't a problem by any means, but there are just some extra doors you'll
need to get used to. And the three bedroom grand villas are
spread out over two distinct floors. I highly doubt that's going to change with
the refurbishments. Both the downstairs and the upstairs do
have exterior exits into the hallway; this is a nice convenient touch for some,
but if you have small children it might be a security concern.
There will be two doors that exit the villa spread out across those two floors
for you to keep track of. For laundry if you're staying in a
studio each section of the resort does have its own common laundry area.
While you may need to schlep your laundry a little bit of ways in order to
get it done, you don't have to worry about there only
being one central location and it being very very far from wherever you're
staying. The section of the resort you're staying in will have a laundry room for you.
Transportation from Saratoga Springs to the theme parks will
be by bus. There are five bus stops along the route,
one at each area of the resort, that is: Grandstand, Carousel,
Paddock, Congress Park, and Springs. There's also usually a dedicated bus
that runs internally to service the treehouse villa sections.
Although you have to bus to theme parks you can actually walk or take a boat
over to Disney Springs. Depending on where you're staying in the
resort and how fast you walk, Disney Springs can be as close as a five-minute
walk. If you want to be as close as possible
to Disney Springs again stay in that Congress Park section, although it will
cost you more points. A nice option included when being so
close to Disney Springs is you can actually go ahead and walk to the Disney
Springs bus depot and then take a bus from Disney Springs to nearly any other
resort. This is super helpful if you have dining reservations at other resorts and
you don't want to necessarily take a bus to a theme park and then a bus from that
theme park to the resort. You can simply walk over to Disney Springs and then
take a bus from the Springs to that resort.
It's not direct door-to-door service, but it's pretty dang close. If you've instead
got a car that you'll be bringing parking is conveniently located outside
of each building. With some luck you can feasibly park
right out in front of your villa. Being such a large resort means there's plenty
of pools to choose from, and Saratoga Springs actually has two feature pools.
The High Rock Spring pool has a 128 foot long water slide and a kid's area
theme to Donald Duck. The Paddock pool has a 146 foot long
waterslide and also features a kids area with two
tiny little water slides; it's very charming. There are three more leisure
pools scattered across different sections of the resort; these are located
in the treehouse villas section, the Congress Park section, and the Grandstand
section. All the pools have at least one
whirlpool. Based on location, the Paddock pool is probably considered the second
main pool where the High Rock Spring pool is the primary pool.
That being said, the Paddock pool is arguably the best secondary pool in all
of Walt Disney World. If you have a pool loving travel party
the sheer volume of pools to try out at Saratoga Springs
may make this resort a great option for you. Other than pools, Saratoga Springs
features an array of various recreation activities.
Senses is the full service spa located right at the resort if you want a chance
to unwind, plus there's the Lake Buena Vista golf
course, fitness center, tennis courts, basketball court, arcade, jogging path,
bike rentals, yoga, playground, community hall with
loads of activities--games, crafts, stuff like that--
and the campfire. For dining there's a lot of options right on property.
You've got The Artist's Palette, which is quick service available for breakfast,
lunch, and dinner. Here you can sit down to enjoy your meal
and relax, or you can take grab-and-go options if you're in a rush.
Additionally this is essentially where you'll find the store with items like
groceries, merchandise, sundries, and snacks.
Next is the Paddock Grill; this also serves breakfast, lunch, and dinner as a
quick service option and is located near that pool.
The Turf Club Bar and Grill is a table service option for dinner including
indoor and outdoor seating with views of the golf course. The Turf Club also has
an attached lounge where you can grab drinks and snacks during dinner time.
Then there's your pool bars: there's Backstretch pool bar located in the
Grandstands, and On The Rocks located at the High Rock Spring pool.
Backstretch does have a food menu, similar to offerings at the Paddock Grill,
where in addition to typical pool fare and drinks you can get actual food.
On The Rocks pool bar does not really offer food as location wise you are very
close to The Artist's Palette as well as Turf
Club. If none of these options tickle your fancy don't forget you are
very close to Disney Springs, and you can take a short stroll or boat ride over
there to get whatever food or drink you want.
Overall, Saratoga Springs, really as with all the Disney Vacation Club home
resorts, has its fair share of very enthusiastic fans as well as some
haters. The biggest complaints I see tend to be around the location and the
themeing not being necessarily universally appealing. Of course, there
are also complaints that the rooms are run down and need a refurbishment, but as
we speak that work is ongoing. For those who love it it's often the
greenery, the space, the really peaceful environment,
not to mention at least for DVC standards it's a pretty reasonable hit
to your wallet--especially when you compare to other Walt Disney World
Disney Vacation Club home resorts. I hope you found this information
helpful! If you did please hit that thumbs up button to like the video and
subscribe to the channel; ring the bell icon for notifications for
whenever I post new videos. This video is part of a series where I'm
doing fast facts covering all of the Walt Disney World DVC home resorts.
If you enjoyed this content be sure to check out the other videos in this
series. I love talking about all things Disney.
If you want to chat leave a comment down below or you can find me on Twitter and
Instagram @PixieDustPhD. How do you feel about
Saratoga Springs? For me personally, if I'm going to buy something as expensive
as Disney Vacation Club I kind of want to be in a location closer to theme
parks where I don't necessarily have to take a bus to every single theme park.
For that consideration alone, Saratoga Springs wasn't really in the running to
become my home resort personally. The price though is super appealing, and a
resort like Saratoga may make a lot of sense if you're looking to buy an add-on
contract to get more Disney Vacation Club points.
I can't wait to hear what you think of Saratoga Springs in the comments down
below. I hope the rest of your day is
stupendous, and we will see you next time at Pixie Dust PhD!