SHADES OF GREEN at Walt Disney World Resort Information & Questions

[sweetyk83]

We had Evergreen's for lunch and thought it was okay for a pool bar. My Rueben was good and the shrimp tacos were ok. Our wings and Cuban sandwich were fine but meh. Kids grilled cheese looked crappy but they happily ate it? Swimming makes you hungry I guess!

We had the fish and chips last night and honestly it’s the best thing we’ve had thus far. So you might give that a shot!

 

[Wdloepp]

Here now, there is carpet in the rooms. Everything is gorgeous and the staff has been so nice. Let me know if you have any specific questions I can look around for answers!

We’ll be there in November. What would be good for dinner the day that we get there.

 

[Wdloepp]

All, here now and here is an (ot) update on DAS. The parks no longer give DAS for mobility purposes. They offer a complimentary wheelchair. I checked with multiple parks about this.

Complimentary as in free or is there still a charge?

 

[BigBlueWho]

Complimentary as in free or is there still a charge?

They offered it free.

 

[BigBlueWho]

Here now and nothing has changed as far as I can tell. They really need to open the buffet back up because dinner options are monotonous.

That is disappointing and I agree. They should bring it back.

 

[Neverbeast]

We’ll be there in November. What would be good for dinner the day that we get there.

Depends on how late and what you like. We keep eating a lot of the grab and go pizza which I think is technically garden grill? For late dinner. Otherwise I think evergreens or walking to poly are your choices.

 

[Neverbeast]

We’ll be there in November. What would be good for dinner the day that we get there.

So the hours for Manginos weren’t posted anywhere obvious but my mom and step dad ended up eating there our last night and the server said they’re open until 10 if you want a nice sit down later on the evening. I didn’t try it but they both enjoyed the mushroom pasta dish.

In the end we tried almost everything from evergreens and only didn’t like the chicken nachos. If you like plastic cheese dip you might like those but I do not! Fish and chips and Rueben and the shrimp tacos were our favorites. The garden grill pizzas were also a big part of our post-parks diet and I have no complaints.

 

[Leigh L]

To add to a post I wrote several pages ago - we stayed in the Palm wing this trip and rooms were definitely carpets too - I think I was thinking of when they redid the entryways and I think I just remembered it as being the whole floor.

 

[Leigh L]

Just came back last night from our 5-night stay at Shades. Great stay as usual. Normally, I request to stay in the Magnolia wing, but requested Palm for a change of pace.

Our room was ready by 1 p.m. which I was thrilled about because that meant we could head right to the parks without coming back to check in (it was a Wed and we wanted to get to our park reservation and Epcot and then do late-night extended hours at MK).

Rooms felt a little darker than usual dark with the lighting, esp in the vanity area (anyone else notice if the bulbs seem dimmer in this wing? We stay at SOG at least once a year even if just passing through town, and it's been a while since we had a Palm wing room). Other than that we loved the room and the view - on the 5th floor overlooking the gazebo area.

Didn't do dining at SOG except at the Express Cafe for lunch on our departure day. It was OK and convenient before getting on the Mears bus.

If you're taking the Sunshine Flyer (and presumably the Mears bus) you will be the last dropped off for the resorts upon arrival. Made sense when the driver explained to the passengers they couldn't drive onto the property with other guests, I hadn't thought about that, so we were the 6th drop-off stop.

We booked Mears for the ride back and were 1st picked up, but it turned out to be a minivan and only stopped at Poly and GF. Transportation went smoothly both ways.

The SOG buses were pretty good - and the drivers are so nice! I just get tired real quick of the whole transfer at TTC so tend to walk to Poly to get to and from MK. Epcot I'll take the SOG bus which is pretty efficient and if you get on the 1st or 2nd bus, you can be in the park around 8 a.m. for EE.

On the two mornings we rode the SOG bus to AK and DHS, the driver surveyed everyone by asking who was going to which park, and I didn't think anything of it. I was surprised when riders were dropped off at DHS first. Some drivers I guess will go to whichever park has the most people going. Another person I was talking to told me they were asked at a different time as well. First I'd heard of that! Historically, it was always AK, then DHS which was why we either walk to Poly and catch a bus or drive ourselves on DHS day.

At this point, I have no idea when we'll be back to WDW, but SOG will still be one of our top choices!

 

[NavyDad]

So the hours for Manginos weren’t posted anywhere obvious but my mom and step dad ended up eating there our last night and the server said they’re open until 10 if you want a nice sit down later on the evening. I didn’t try it but they both enjoyed the mushroom pasta dish.

In the end we tried almost everything from evergreens and only didn’t like the chicken nachos. If you like plastic cheese dip you might like those but I do not! Fish and chips and Rueben and the shrimp tacos were our favorites. The garden grill pizzas were also a big part of our post-parks diet and I have no complaints.

I did not like the nachos in April and I'm not super picky. I don't mind the liquid cheese stuff but overall they were just poor quality.

 

[dorchrislen]

Is the breakfast buffet and dinner buffet restaurant open?

 

[katyringo]

Hello all.. we are working on a summer 2023 trip and I'm looking at our options. We are eliigble for shades. But I've stayed away for a few reasons and maybe you can help me if they are true things to worry about:

1. Glitchy reservation in the Disney app. I've read stories of folks whose shades reservation would drop and then they weren't able to book ILL at 7am.

2. Busses. We love early entry.. are the shades busses reliable for EE? Especially at HS and Epcot?

This trip is budget. Shades is $100 more than cheapest value. We don't spend a lot of time in the room. Like.. non at all.

 

[Leigh L]

Is the breakfast buffet and dinner buffet restaurant open?

Breakfast is definitely back open, but I don't think dinner is yet? Just got home from there and they were still advertising different types of build-it-yourself bowls, etc. (We didn't try to eat dinner at SOG on this trip)

Hello all.. we are working on a summer 2023 trip and I'm looking at our options. We are eliigble for shades. But I've stayed away for a few reasons and maybe you can help me if they are true things to worry about:

1. Glitchy reservation in the Disney app. I've read stories of folks whose shades reservation would drop and then they weren't able to book ILL at 7am.

2. Busses. We love early entry.. are the shades busses reliable for EE? Especially at HS and Epcot?

This trip is budget. Shades is $100 more than cheapest value. We don't spend a lot of time in the room. Like.. non at all.

1. The reservation falling off thing is a pain but it's not enough to deter us from staying, the location is awesome and rooms are spacious - we also don't spend a lot of time in the room but it's nice to spread out, especially in the mornings when getting ready to scoot out the door.

I recommend keeping your reservation # easy to access and making sure everything is still on MDE the day before arrival. Before we checked in I doubled checked since mine fell off 2x over the past several months and thankfully it was still there. Sometimes Disney IT needs to intervene to fix this, but usually I can add the # back in and it shows right up. Unfortunately, that won't help for ILL though if it happens day of (I hadn't heard of this happening but can see it occurring... )

2. For MK, I 100% walk to Poly and use Disney transportation. It's way faster (DD and I tested this one morning and I beat her enough to do 2 rides before she even tapped in, lol)

Prefer to drive to DHS or AK if we have a car, but this trip we used SOG buses and it was fine. Usually, SOG buses drop AK first, but this time they surveyed how many people were going to each park and went there first. On our DHS day (D+ day) they dropped DHS first then went to AK. Not sure if that was a special case but someone else I spoke to said they were asked and the majority ruled on a different bus ride. May depend on the bus driver? First time we've seen that happen.

For Epcot EE I recommend aiming for the 1st bus, 2nd at the latest to arrive at Epcot before EE starts since you might get held up at the TTC. (edited)

The one good thing about SOG transportation is you always know when to expect the bus. It was very late one night at DHS after park close ( I wondered if AK filled it up too much?) and I think one other morning, but mostly is pretty timely.

 

[Neverbeast]

Breakfast is definitely back open, but I don't think dinner is yet? Just got home from there and they were still advertising different types of build-it-yourself bowls, etc. (We didn't try to eat dinner at SOG on this trip)

1. The reservation falling off thing is a pain but it's not enough to deter us from staying, the location is awesome and rooms are spacious - we also don't spend a lot of time in the room but it's nice to spread out, especially in the mornings when getting ready to scoot out the door.

I recommend keeping your reservation # easy to access and making sure everything is still on MDE the day before arrival. Before we checked in I doubled checked since mine fell off 2x over the past several months and thankfully it was still there. Sometimes Disney IT needs to intervene to fix this, but usually I can add the # back in and it shows right up. Unfortunately, that won't help for ILL though if it happens day of (I hadn't heard of this happening but can see it occurring... )

2. For MK, I 100% walk to Poly and use Disney transportation. It's way faster (DD and I tested this one morning and I beat her enough to do 2 rides before she even tapped in, lol)

Prefer to drive to DHS or AK if we have a car, but this trip we used SOG buses and it was fine. Usually, SOG buses drop AK first, but this time they surveyed how many people were going to each park and went there first. On our DHS day (D+ day) they dropped DHS first then went to AK. Not sure if that was a special case but someone else I spoke to said they were asked and the majority ruled on a different bus ride. May depend on the bus driver? First time we've seen that happen.

For Epcot EE I recommend aiming for the 1st bus, 2nd at the latest to arrive at Epcot before EE starts since you might get held up at the TTC. (edited)

The one good thing about SOG transportation is you always know when to expect the bus. It was very late one night at DHS after park close ( I wondered if AK filled it up too much?) and I think one other morning, but mostly is pretty timely.

Agree with all of this.
Dinner buffet is not open, it’s a very limited quick serve with pizza, wings or fried rice.

We had no problems with our reservations or the app at all.

The rooms are so much better than a value. We slept better and enjoyed winding down there so much. Having the exchange with reasonable prices saved us so much in water bottles, snacks on the way to the park, and replacing sunglasses etc. If you’re a park warrior, the hot tub after a long park day makes a huge difference in your feet and back across a week.

Busses come exactly when they say they will. I didn’t feel they were any different from the Disney ones in terms of time to get to parks, if you had a longer ride to MK from a value anyway… but we never tried for Early entry.

I think the only two real downsides were not being able to charge to a magic band and needing to keep my little resort paper ID dry the rooms more than made up for that.

 

[BigBlueWho]

Hello all.. we are working on a summer 2023 trip and I'm looking at our options. We are eliigble for shades. But I've stayed away for a few reasons and maybe you can help me if they are true things to worry about:

1. Glitchy reservation in the Disney app. I've read stories of folks whose shades reservation would drop and then they weren't able to book ILL at 7am.

2. Busses. We love early entry.. are the shades busses reliable for EE? Especially at HS and Epcot?

This trip is budget. Shades is $100 more than cheapest value. We don't spend a lot of time in the room. Like.. non at all.

Out of curiosity, what value resort was $100 cheaper?

 

[katyringo]

Out of curiosity, what value resort was $100 cheaper?

$100 cheaper for the whole trip.. which is only 3 nights. At shades we have to pay the highest rate.

 

[dorchrislen]

I think the only two real downsides were not being able to charge to a magic band and needing to keep my little resort paper ID dry the rooms more than made up for that.

What is this about keeping the resort paper ID dry? can’t we get the reservation put on an old magic band?

 

[BigBlueWho]

$100 cheaper for the whole trip.. which is only 3 nights. At shades we have to pay the highest rate.

Oh! I thought you meant per night. I was definitely interested in where (if that was the case) so I could check it out myself!

 

[Leigh L]

What is this about keeping the resort paper ID dry? can’t we get the reservation put on an old magic band?

You can use a magic band for early entry, extended hours, etc. But you will need the paper ID if you use Shades of Green transportation.

The ID is also good to have in case Disney has a tech failure. Years ago, for extra magic hours, we had to show the paper to get on attractions after park close. Magic bands *should* work now though and we haven't had a problem since.

 

[Neverbeast]

You can use a magic band for early entry, extended hours, etc. But you will need the paper ID if you use Shades of Green transportation.

The ID is also good to have in case Disney has a tech failure. Years ago, for extra magic hours, we had to show the paper to get on attractions after park close. Magic bands *should* work now though and we haven't had a problem since.

Right, I had no problems with anything reservation related for Disney. Just needing to pull out drivers liscence and the paper is to get on the bus or come back onto resort grounds on the path. Not a big deal. We had lanyards from universal so we just tucked them in there or our wallets but a minor difference to be careful with.