Hi all!
We just finished up a two week trip, having a split stay of 3 nights at Poly, 3 nights AKL, and a week at CR. Our trip was fantastic, I think other people who also went recently covered almost all of the information I wanted to share, but here's my little bit anyway.
Our Poly visit was for just a standard room, but we did a front desk check-in and I followed the "doesn't hurt to ask" advice, and requested if there was any availability to pay for CL access. Unfortunately, I think we were there on a busy weekend (Sept 29 to October 3), and they said club level was "booked". I think she misunderstood what we meant and was looking for actual rooms for us, but we just conceded and let it go.
Our AKL visit was for a savanna view CL stay, and wow, it really was so amazing. We were there October 3-6, and after reading the posts it seems like we may have been there at the same time as some of you! Should have had a fun little meetup. This was our first trip to WDW in over 20 years, so pretty much everything was a new experience for us, and of course we have many other hotels to visit in the future, but AKL CL won me over. After having what I felt were a decent few days at Poly, I couldn't believe the huge shift in a hotel experience. We did the Senses of Africa tour while we were at Poly (which included our group being the first to see the newborn okapi!), and I was honestly overwhelmed when I went out to the balcony and right at one of the feeders was the 'teen' giraffe we had a chance to meet earlier in the morning. I took everything in me to not yell hi at her like a crazy fangirl.
Oh! Also, I don't recall anyone ever mentioning this before, but on our check-in afternoon we were hanging out in the lounge, and a young man from South Africa came to give a presentation on his country. It was his last day as a cast member and he was returning home to work in his family's
travel agency, but he gave us a card with his email address in case we ever want to travel to South Africa! His presentation was really great and I hope they have this kind of thing continue.
Anyway, thank you all for your posts that I've obsessively been reading for years; it helped me to have an extraordinary trip.