On our latest trip to Orlando we stayed at the Gaylord Palms Resort and Spa, which Mary recently added to her MouseSavers Preferred Hotels. The Gaylord Palms is located on Osceola Parkway in Kissimmee, so initially it seems a bit out of the way with regards to Walt Disney World, though in fact it’s just a few minutes from the gates of Disney property. The seemingly isolated location has the advantage of being quieter and less hectic than staying on property, though there is the drawback that there really is nothing in easy walking distance. With all of the restaurant offerings in the resort, though, there is probably little incentive to stray far if you want to relax after a long hot day in the parks.

There are a total of four Gaylord resorts: the other hotels are located in Nashville, Dallas, and Washington D.C. All of the Gaylord resorts are primarily convention hotels. The good news is that when the meeting business is slow, great deals can be found. The bad news is that when big conventions or meetings are going on, there may not be any rooms available.

There is some amazing theming in the public areas of the Gaylord Palms, all of it under an enormous glassed-in, air-conditioned atrium. The hotel is divided into four areas that replicate the essential themes for Florida: St. Augustine (old Spanish fort), Key West (sailboat restaurant and bar on a marine pool), the Everglades (a swamp) and Emerald Bay, where the “executive” rooms and suites are located.

The resort itself is huge – 1,400 rooms – and the rooms are certainly nice. I’d say the standard is somewhat higher than the Disney Deluxe resorts. Certainly the furnishings are of a higher quality than you’ll find at Disney. The room décor is pleasant and warm and the colors are pleasing, though overall a little dark. There’s no significant theming in the rooms, though each area of the hotel features a slightly different room décor. The rooms all come with the standard two Queen beds or one King bed, as well as a desk and an easy chair. The bathrooms are fairly large and quite attractive, with walk-in showers.

Interestingly enough the rooms overlooking the atrium are, as one might expect, the more expensive ones. The atrium is pretty cool. On the other hand, if you are prone to going to bed early, you might want to consider going for a room on the outside of the building. With all the meetings and such held in the complex, the staff is frequently breaking down or setting up spaces throughout the atrium for the next days activities. This will result in a certain level of noise. From our experience the resort seems to get most of the noisy stuff done by midnight, but still it can be distracting if you are close to comatose after a day in the parks. The view on the outside of the building is actually quite pleasant, as the grounds are nicely landscaped and there’s no neon or garishness nearby to distract the eye. It’s not quite as cool as looking down into the atrium, but if quiet is your first desire, it’s something to consider.

The Gaylord certainly does not lack for restaurants. There are four full service restaurants along with a number of other venues at which comestibles can be enjoyed. The full service restaurants include the Old Hickory Steakhouse, which serves, appropriately enough, steak. And some seafood. It also has a very nice cheese trolley that we can state from experience is especially good.

Villa de Flora serves buffet style meals all day long and offers a fabulous Sunday brunch. The food and theming are Mediterranean and the seating isn’t unlike sitting in the courtyard of an Italian villa. We’ve now sampled both breakfast and lunch and it is very good – at least as good as Disney’s best buffets, at similar prices. The food is all freshly prepared and the offerings vary from day to day, with different themes like Italian, Spanish, French, and the like.

Over in the Key West area you’ll find Sunset Sam’s Fish Camp, where you can get a tasty, casual seafood meal including crab cakes, conch chowder, grouper sandwiches and the like. There’s seating inside or out on a 60’ sailboat that’s moored in the lagoon area. There are also two bars here for those who like to take their calories in liquid form, just for efficiency’s sake.

A new addition to the restaurant scene at the hotel is Sora, a sushi restaurant and bar. It’s very stylish and cool, but they let us in anyhow. Besides the sushi and tempura, there are some more substantial entrees with an Asian flair. We like this place a lot and often stopped for a relaxing drink after a hot day wandering around Orlando.

For those who just want to relax around the pool and consume something simple like a cheeseburger, there’s the H2O Sports Bar which is located, appropriately enough, out by the pool. There are even mini hot dogs that I didn’t get a chance to try but sound like a lot of fun. Many food stuffs are fun when they’re mini-sized, I find.

Besides the restaurants, there’s also a coffee bar with pastries and sandwiches for people like us who schedule events much too early in the morning and have to grab something on the run. And if you’re feeling a bit peckish and want a little frozen goodness, there’s a Haagen-Dazs Ice Cream shop. We didn’t try the sandwiches but we did sample the ice cream and the coffee. They were appropriately ice creamy and caffeinated.

Finally, one very nice venue in the Gaylord is Auggie’s Jammin’ Piano Bar, where you can hang, drink alcoholic beverages and listen to dueling pianos. We’re kind of a sucker for piano bars and have always loved dropping into the similar Jellyroll’s piano bar at Disney’s BoardWalk. The advantage of Auggie’s is that there isn’t a cover charge, and it’s just a short elevator ride to your room.

Along with all the other amenities, there is a very nice La Petite Academy kid’s club, offering excellent facilities for entertaining the small ones while you go enjoy a juicy steak at the Old Hickory. And Clearwater Cove is the children’s activity pool area which is probably as entertaining as any of the Disney Deluxe resort pools, if not more so.

If you’d like a little pampering, Mary tells me the Canyon Ranch Spa Club, located in the lower level of the hotel, is “pretty fabulous.” She spent a fair amount of time in there getting her toes painted and her hair fixed, freeing me up to check out the hotel’s facilities for adult libations.

My final comment on the Gaylord concerns the staff. We’ve been coming to the Orlando area for over ten years and have visited all of the Disney Deluxe resorts as well as the best that Universal has to offer. We have to say that service at the Gaylord is pretty much on a plane all its own. Without exception, everyone we met or interacted with at the Gaylord was personable and enthusiastic. The service is uniformly excellent throughout the resort and I think anyone who stays at the Gaylord will find it a supremely pleasant experience.

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