Disney's Hotel Santa Fe Review
By Scarlett Shepherd
During a trip to Disneyland Paris, we opted to stay at Disney’s Hotel Santa Fe.
Disney’s Santa Fe Hotel is an onsite 2-star hotel at Disneyland Paris. This makes the Santa Fe Hotel one of the cheaper onsite options.
Check In
We arrived at around 12 noon and headed straight for check in. At this time the reception area was very busy. To try and manage the large volume of people, the cast members were asking for only one person from each group to stand in the check in line, and for everyone else to stand aside with the luggage.
My sister jumped in the line, which due to the large number of cast members checking people in moved very quickly, and after about 5 minutes she was at the front.
The check in process was quick and smooth, and everything that we needed was already prepared in an envelope. This included necessary information, our magic passes, and the voucher for our pre-purchased PhotoPass.
To our surprise, our room was ready early. This was a great bonus, as we were not expecting the room to be ready until 3pm, so we were able to go and drop our luggage off there straight away.
However, if your room is not ready early, there is a free luggage storeroom directly opposite the entrance to the reception. This will allow you to drop off any bags and suitcases, so that you can head off to enjoy the parks.
The Site
The Hotel Santa Fe site is located around 20 minutes from the parks on foot, or a short 8 minute shuttle but journey. At the front of the hotel is the pick-up and drop-off area for the shuttle bus, along with the reception and luggage storage.
Behind reception there is a gift shop, Starbucks and the on-site buffet restaurant.
The site is very large, with lots of smaller buildings where the rooms are located. The different blocks are of varying sizes.
We were staying in block 14, which was in the back corner of the site. It was probably one of the furthest rooms from the hotel facilities, but it was only around a short 3-4 minute walk to the reception area. We also had a ground floor room, which was useful as we had the pram with us.
The Cars theming run throughout the whole site, and you felt as though you were staying on Route 66 in the American Southwest with cacti and neon lights.
The Room – Cars Standard Room
We stayed in a Cars Standard room which included 1 double bed and 1 set of bunk beds. This set-up is ideal for a family of 4 or less.
The room was a decent size, and there was plenty of space for the travel cot between the double bed and bunk beds. There was a travel cot available in the room, but this was not set up on arrival. However, we always travel with our own Maxi Cosi travel cot, so we used that.
In the room there was a dresser with drawers, a table by the bed with a power outlet next to it, a medium size TV and a rail to hang clothes.
The bathroom included an all-in-one bath and shower with a shower curtain, a sink with large mirror over the top and toilet.
The theming of the room was excellent. There were lots of Cars themed touches throughout, from the lights in the shape of cones, to the tiles in the bathroom, the mirror, and the bathroom amenities. Any Cars fan will love the themed touches of the room.
The major downside to this Hotel is the lack of air conditioning in the rooms. We were staying here late June early July and the weather was very hot, which meant the room was also very hot. There was a ceiling fan in the room, but even on full, this did little to cool you down.
I feel that the lack of air conditioning is a major let down for this room if you are planning on staying here in the summer, and it may be worth considering a slightly more expensive 3-star resort so that you can escape the heat. However, in the wintertime, this would not be an issue.
The rooms were cleaned once per day, and the staff always did a good job.
Check out our room tour video below for a better look at the room:
Breakfast
Breakfast was not included in the price of the room. However, we did purchase the half board meal plan. This meal plan included breakfast at the hotel every morning.
Breakfast was served at La Cantina, which is the onsite restaurant at Disney’s Hotel Santa Fe.
Breakfast each morning was an all you can eat buffet, so you can fill up before a long day at the parks.
There was a great selection of food on offer. There were cooked eggs, bacon, sausages, beans, and hash browns. Sweet treats like mickey waffles and cakes with syrups and spreads. A large selection of pastries and rolls and other offerings like cereal, yoghurt, cheese and cold meats.
The food was all of a good quality and was always fresh and hot with the staff constantly refilling and replacing the items.
There was also a good selection of drinks, with tea and coffee from the machines, along with fruit juice , milk and water which you could help yourself too. There were several beverage stations, but sometimes lines would still develop, especially for the hot drinks.
The theming of La Cantina was also amazing, you felt as though you were in a truck stop in America. In the food area there were trucks where you could take rolls and pastries from, along with barrels offered food too.
When you arrive at La Cantina, if you have a pre-purchased package then they will just scan you magic pass and you can enter. Otherwise, you can pay upon entry. Once you have paid for your breakfast, a cast member will show you to an available table, and place a reserved sign on it so you can go and get your food without worrying about your table being taken.
We often went to breakfast as soon as it opened so that we could head straight to the parks for magic hour. At this time the restaurant was quiet with plenty of available tables. There would maybe be a small line of around 5 to 10 groups of groups of people outside waiting for the restaurant to open each morning.
On the one morning that we went to breakfast later at around 9am it was very busy with nearly every table taken. However, the cast members found us a table within a couple of minutes.
Gluten Free
For those that are gluten free the staff were very helpful in pointing out which items were suitable. They would also go out the back and bring back a selection of gluten free bread, cakes, biscuits, and crackers.
You can check out our video of the breakfast buffet at La Cantina below:
Travel to the Parks
Disney’s Hotel Santa Fe is around a 20 minute walk or 8 minute shuttle ride to the parks.
We found the shuttle bus to be VERY busy in the mornings when heading to the parks for the extra magic hour. Often there would be a queue, but this would still not stop people from walking up and pushing in at the front. There was never a cast member there to control the crowd of people.
This only seemed to be an issue in the morning, and throughout the day the shuttle buses were much calmer.
On the return from the parks during the day and early evening, the shuttle bus would be much calmer. However, they did become very busy if you stayed till after the fireworks at night. However, at night there were security guards around the bus stops trying to control the crowds.
Extra Magic Hour
One of the MAJOR benefits of staying at a Disney Hotel is the extra magic hour every morning.
This magic hour was simply AMAZING, and we would recommend staying at a Disney Hotel just so you can access this time.
For the extra magic hour, all Disney Hotel guests can enter and enjoy both parks one hour early each day.
We made the most of this hour as much as we could.
During the magic hour, the park would be much quieter, and we were able to get many rides done in a short period of time. We were also able to get some good photos with the castle when the park were quieter, along with the sword in the stone.
Not all rides would be open during the magic hour, but most would be, and some rides would open at different times throughout the hour. It is therefore best to check the opening times of each ride and have a plan of what attractions you want to try and get on during this time.
Around the Hotel
A bonus of staying at Disney’s Hotel Santa Fe is that next door is an Esso garage. This was useful for buying drinks and snacks at a much cheaper price than the parks. We were able to buy large bottles of water (over 1L) for around €1.70.
Luggage Storage
On our last day we were not due to fly home until the evening. Therefore, we checked out in the morning and decided to leave our luggage at the onsite luggage store at the hotel, so that we could enjoy one last day in the park.
This process was very easy. We turned up to the designated luggage storage area opposite reception and gave all our luggage to the cast members there in return for a ticket. At the end of the day, we returned with the ticket, and they gave us our luggage back. This service was free of charge.
Summary
Overall, we had a great stay at Disney’s Hotel Santa Fe. Staying at a Disney Hotel meant that we were able to utilize the Magic Hour in the morning, which was the best hour in the park all day!
The hotel was clean and the cars theming was amazing. It really added to the whole Disney magic.
The only downside to this hotel is the lack of air conditioning. This is definitely an issue in the summer where it was difficult to get cool in the room, and the nights could be a bit too hot. However, I don’t think this would be an issue at cooler times of the year.
I would definitely recommend Disney’s Hotel Santa Fe, and we will consider staying here again on our next Disneyland Paris trip. It is one of the cheaper options on offer for onsite Disney accommodation, and as we only spent time in the room while sleeping, as we were at the parks all day, we did not feel it was necessary to have a more expensive room for this trip.