On our most recent trip to Walt Disney World, we stayed in a Finding Nemo suite at Disney’s Art of Animation Resort. This wasn’t our first time at the resort; in 2012, we stayed in a Cars suite on their opening day. Our boys are big Cars fans, so they absolutely loved those rooms. Our daughter turned one on that trip, so she didn’t really have a say in the theme; this time, she was almost 4 and really enjoys Finding Nemo, so we thought it would be neat to pick a room geared a little more toward her tastes. Turns out, we all fell in love with the room and had so much fun looking around to find all the little details we remembered from the movie.
Keep reading and I’ll share our photos of the suite, highlight some references to the film and discuss our family’s pros and cons for the Finding Nemo suites.
These rooms can sleep up to 6, so they’re really great for a family like ours. Our kids are 9, 7 and 4, so we can’t fit into a standard Disney hotel room. We either need to get two rooms, choose one of the resorts that allows five in a room or book a suite. This suite was really perfect for our needs. The above photo shows the living room area. The curvy lamp and table legs, lines on the couch and floor all lead to the feeling that you are floating along under the sea. Our kids enjoyed the fish on the wall above the couch. There’s a scene in the movie where a group of silver fish swim together and form themselves into pictures, so it was fun to see this “come to life.” There’s another example of this fish art in the dining room. The couch folds down into a bed, so this is where our daughter slept every night.
The photo below is the rest of the living room, across from the couch. Everywhere you look in this suite you’ll find the Finding Nemo characters painted on the walls and furniture. I thought it was a nice touch that Bruce the shark is on the wall away from the turtles swimming down below. He’s not in the same scenes in the movie as the turtles, plus it gives the impression that he’s watching them, just waiting for his time to pounce. For a family of 5, the dresser and hanging rod are great additions that ensure every family member has adequate space for his/her clothes and personal items. The TV is equipped with ports under it for charging a variety of electronics or to plug in a laptop or iPad to show movies on the TV.
Each suite at the resort has a kitchenette area in the living room. There is a microwave, coffee maker, mini fridge and sink here, plus it comes stocked with paper towels, cups, bowls and plates. We tend to eat breakfast in our room, plus bring snacks and sandwiches for the kids into the parks, so this was such a handy space to have. We had plenty of room to store our supplies, as well as prepare our food.
Here in the dining room area, you can once again see how the undersea theme is brought into the room. The chairs look like coral, the silver fish return to the wall and the table is decorated with more underwater scenes and characters. This table actually folds down and becomes the third bed, which is where our boys slept.
A great thing about staying in these suites is that the kids have their own bathroom, with a tub/shower combo. This is so helpful to facilitate everyone getting ready in the morning instead of having to crowd around one sink to brush teeth. This isn’t a great photo, because the bathroom is small and the lighting was really poor (now that I’m thinking about it, the light over the tub was basically just a nightlight – maybe it needed a new bulb?), but you can see the nautical-looking mirror showing that the theme continues even into the bathroom. The shower curtain was dark blue with the sharks and Dory on it.
And now the best part? The parents get their own room and bathroom! It was so nice to be able to put the kids to bed and then close the door into our own room. They were able to go to bed and we could still stay up talking and watching TV. In the morning, it was really helpful to have our own bathroom as well, because we could be up getting ready earlier before we had to wake the kids up.
The bedroom is filled with the same colorful decor as the main living area. The nightstand lamp looks like one of the jellyfish Marlin and Dory encounter in the film. Peach, the starfish who Nemo meets in the dentist’s aquarium, is on the “coverlet” at the end of the bed, looking exactly like she does in the movie when she’s stuck to the side of the aquarium. A note about the bed coverings – when we stayed in the Cars suite 3 years ago, the comforter was awful. It was very heavy and scratchy and just really not comfortable. I was glad to find that was not the case here and that Disney is moving towards more of a duvet-style than a traditional polyester hotel comforter.
Like the TV in the living room, this TV also had ports for charging. Also located in the bedroom was a small safe and another hanging rod. I love the curvy drawers on the dresser and the images of Mr. Ray, Nemo and Marlin swimming. Here’s a view from the bed:
The spacious master bath features lots of counter space and a nice standup shower. This bathroom has the same mirror as the other bathroom, bringing one more nod to the film into the room. The mirror looks like a porthole from the submarine that Bruce and his friends meet in, even including their catchphrase: “Fish are friends…”
All in all, we loved our stay at the Nemo suites! They were fairly close to the main building, so it wasn’t a long walk back at the end of the night. The only issue we had with our room was that we overlooked the pool, so we were woken up each morning with loud music and couldn’t nap in the afternoons because of all the waterside activities taking place. However, this would not have been a problem if we’d been on the other side of the building, so I can’t really count it. And I’m guessing Disney would have moved us if we had asked, but because we had already unpacked, we just dealt with it.
I would definitely recommend the suites to any family who wants some extra space that can’t be found in the regular hotel rooms. This was perfect for us and I’ll have a hard time sharing a regular-sized room with all the kids again in the future! We really enjoyed all the details we found in these rooms and even watching Finding Nemo on the drive home just so we could look out for the scenes we had seen in our room.
Has your family stayed in these suites before? If so, what did you think? Did you enjoy the over-the-top theming as much as we did?
