Have you been wanting to let your inner Scarlett O’Hare out but were you born a few centuries too late? Well Disney has you covered at Port Orleans Riverside. The sprawling resort is styled in old Southern style – half having stately mansions with manicured lawns, and the other part having bayou style log cabins. On this particular trip, we stayed in the Riverside Mansions (it’s so named riverside because of the river winding through the property), and enjoyed ourselves immensely.
The rooms at Riverside looked like they had been updated recently, and where pretty standard to a moderate resort room. You have the option in the Riverside Mansions to stay in a “Royal” room, which we have done before, but chose not to do this trip. The main selling point of the “Royal” rooms is the fact that the headboards have LEDS that shoot off fireworks. (I’m not going to try to pretend that’s not ridiculously cool.) One of the things we really enjoyed about Riverside was the beautiful grounds, as when you walk along the river, there’s beautiful views of landscaping and mansions from every vantage point.
Riverside has a solid and creatively themed food court, with a water mill outside that fits with the Southern feel. The highlight of the food court, in our opinion, is the build your own pasta station, which is also a great value. Don’t forget that you can get beignets at Port Orleans French Quarter, which is just a short walk down the river! Also down the river is Downtown Disney, which is being turned into Disney Springs. Port Orleans offers a boat to Disney Springs, if you don’t want to take the bus.
There’s six pools at Port Orleans Riverside, with the main one being Ol’Man Island. Ol’Man Island is a short walk from the dining area, and is supposed to be themed like an old fashioned swimming hole. This theming was a little lost in translation on us, and this was one of the only weak points of the resort in our opinion.
All in all, we fully enjoyed Port Orleans Riverside, and have no reservations in recommending it. It’s beautifully executed in its theming, and a great place to live out your ‘Gone With the Wind’ dreams.