Welcome to planDisney, Belita! You’ve come to the perfect place to chat about
Bay Lake Tower at Disney’s Contemporary Resort. It’s one of my family’s favorites, and it also happens to be our home Disney Vacation Club resort, so your question makes me smile already!
One of the best things about Bay Lake Tower is its unbeatable location, with easy monorail access and a quick walk to Magic Kingdom Park. And just like you, I adore both
Happily Ever After and the beloved
Electrical Water Pageant! While I haven’t yet had the chance to stay in a Three-Bedroom Grand Villa (definitely a bucket-list dream for me) I always get excited when we’re assigned either a view of Magic Kingdom or a water-facing room… unless it’s Marathon Weekend and I’m trying to be asleep extra early!
Bay Lake Tower has fourteen Three-Bedroom Grand Villas, and they come in two views: Theme Park View or Preferred View (formerly called Lake View). If you are hoping for the very best fireworks viewing, the six Theme Park View villas are the ultimate experience. From these rooms, you’ll have the best views of Magic Kingdom Park and the nightly fireworks right from your living room, bedrooms, or balconies. You can even stream the fireworks soundtrack through your in-room TV for the full magic.
If catching the Electrical Water Pageant is at the top of your list, a Preferred View villa will be what you want to book (and a plus is that these rooms will be slightly lower in points). The very best Pageant views come from the villas located along the south outside arc of the tower, which overlook Bay Lake directly as the Pageant floats by toward Magic Kingdom passing the marina. There are four Grand Villas in this prime location: 8544, 8540, 8536, and 8534. These rooms are wonderful for the Pageant but do not offer fireworks views.
Some guests like to try for a bit of both, fireworks and the Water Pageant, and that’s where the north-facing Preferred View villas come in. These rooms don’t offer perfect sightlines for either nighttime spectacular, but you may catch partial views of both. If you’d like to try for one of these, the rooms to request are 8502, 8506, 8510, or 8512.
To place a request, you can
call Disney directly and speak with a Cast Member in Resort Hotel Reservations. If you’re a Disney Vacation Club Member using points, you’ll want to contact
Member Services instead. Just keep in mind that room requests can never be guaranteed, though Cast Members do their best to honor them whenever possible.
Also, if your villa doesn’t end up facing Bay Lake or Magic Kingdom, you can still enjoy both the fireworks and the Electrical Water Pageant by heading to the Skyway Bridge on the fifth floor, which connects Bay Lake Tower to Disney’s Contemporary Resort. My family has watched from there many times, and it’s a great backup plan.
I hope this helps you choose the most magical, and most "Grand," villa for your stay, Belita!
See ya real soon,
Eean