We were there from 3/17 - 3/24, staying in Jamaica 42. It was myself, DH, DS and DD(both in college). I had requested 45 so we could be away from construction and be able to walk across the bridge to the OPR bus stop(the 2nd stop). 42 worked out just fine. We walked over to the Trinidad North stop most of the time. I was glad we did that. It was a pleasant walk...we found that we liked getting off there as well. We almost always were able to get a seat on the bus and one time, our bus was full, so they didn't even stop at Jamaica or Aruba. If you're relying on the bus or trying to avoid being by the bulk of the construction, try not to stay in Aruba.
The bus does take a bit longer due to the construction. They can't go all the way around, so they turn around once they get to Aruba and back track a bit before leaving the resort(near Jamaica). We needed to take the internal bus a couple of times and it would turn around at Aruba and back track all the way through the resort before taking you to to the main check in office. It was not that big of a deal for us.
The island markets were really no big deal. We bought a couple waters and powerade at ours. The food/snack choices were pretty limited. I suppose someone on the meal plan might want a snack or 2 from there, but it all just looked really overpriced in that setting...even though it was probably the same price as other Disney locations!
We don't normally eat at the resort much, so the limited choices didn't effect us much. There was one morning, we wanted to go in the tent to eat something we had gotten at Spyglass grill. It was cold out and we were banned from our room by DD as she was having a Skype interview. Every table was taken in the tent, so there was no place to go to be inside at all for us. Just the glimpse I got of the food tent didn't look like much and DH started saying that they probably shouldn't be open during all this construction.
Spyglass Grill opened while we were there. We don't normally eat at the resort at all, but a couple of things made it where we needed to. Spyglass Grill was a great option, so I was really glad they opened it. One afternoon, I had the chopped jerk chicken salad and it was good. Another day, we had breakfast there. I had the kid's meal breakfast Cuban. It came with fruit and a small water bottle. It was the perfect size breakfast, tasted good and only cost$5.50. DH and DS both had the adult size Cuban breakfast sandwich. DH ordered the cappuccino and a latte for himself and DD. They said it wasn't very good. They had trouble finding good coffee anywhere they went in WDW. On our last afternoon, we had time to kill before DME and just needed a bit to eat, so we stopped at Spyglass again. We all ordered kids' meals and it hit the spot. DD and DS had cheeseburgers. DD and I had the fish tacos.
DH was ill during our trip and he wound up calling for a paramedic and having an overnight hospital stay. He was alone when he called for help and he said Disney had a couple of CMs in the room with the paramedics. They called the next day to see if we needed anything. We asked for a specific time frame(3 hours) for them to clean the room before he would return from the hospital. They did not come during the time we asked, so we all cleared out of the room for an hour once housekeeping was near our room(late afternoon). That was frustrating since DH really just needed to rest, but we also needed to have a good cleaning of the room at that point so no else would get sick too.
DH bounced back pretty fast and wanted to go to the park for a while. The app was not letting me reschedule our fastpasses that had expired without using them, so I went to the concierge to see if they could help us get them back. They were really very helpful about this. She gave our whole party 3 passes for Epcot that evening and even added 3 more for MK on our last day. That was really nice that she fixed our immediate problem, but also gave us the MK passes. MK was PACKED on our last day and we were exhausted after an emotional week, so it was really nice not having to wait in line that last evening.
All and all, with the construction everywhere, it probably would have been a better visit if we had stayed at another resort. For us, CBR worked out ok, but nothing to be thrilled about or anything. The room we were in should be refurbished soon. It looked a bit tired and the mattresses seemed old. We saved about $500 over staying at POR, so it was fine. We only planned the trip a couple months ago. If this had been a trip we had dreamed of and planned for a long time, I definitely would have been wishing for a different resort. It was our 4th stay at CBR and we've always liked it. We probably won't be back to WDW for at least a few years and maybe we'll see what CBR is like then.
