Disney's Hotel Santa Fe, Marne-la-Vallee

I stayed in the Hotel Santa Fe in September with my boyfriend for three nights as part of a package booked through the Disneyland Paris website. This was the cheapest Disneyland hotel and the package was very good value - we got 3 nights at the hotel, breakfast included plus four days park tickets for both the Disneyland park and Walt Disney Studios for £292 for 2 of us. This was on the Early Booker September deal. To buy four days of park tickets ...
...would cost £242 (based on the website prices for a 3 day hopper ticket (£89 each) plus a one day hopper ticket (£32 each)), so the hotel worked out at an incredibly cheap £16 a night for two of us. Bearing this in mind, although the Santa Fe was not the most luxurious hotel I have stayed in, and a lot more basic than the Newport Bay hotel (one of the mid range Disneyland Paris hotels), it was great value and since the parks were so much fun we weren't ... more

I stayed in the Hotel Santa Fe in September with my boyfriend for three nights as part of a package booked through the Disneyland Paris website. This was the cheapest Disneyland hotel and the package was very good value - we got 3 nights at the hotel, breakfast included plus four days park tickets for both the Disneyland park and Walt Disney Studios for £292 for 2 of us. This was on the Early Booker September deal. To buy four days of park tickets for 2 adults (yes, it was 2 adults, no kids!) would cost £242 (based on the website prices for a 3 day hopper ticket (£89 each) plus a one day hopper ticket (£32 each)), so the hotel worked out at an incredibly cheap £16 a night for two of us. Bearing this in mind, although the Santa Fe was not the most luxurious hotel I have stayed in, and a lot more basic than the Newport Bay hotel (one of the mid range Disneyland Paris hotels), it was great value and since the parks were so much fun we weren't in the hotel much anyway!

The theme of the hotel is America's South West which seems to be that sort of red dusty sort of look. The hotel is split up into different little blocks including one which has the reception, shop, restaurant and a games room and one which has the left luggage place. Upon arrival we went to reception where the only fiasco was me forgetting the code to unlock my suitcase to get all my paperwork out! The reception desk has little flags over each member of staff which represent the languages they can speak. We only had to queue for a minute, and that was because we came on a coach from the airport so there were lots of people arriving at once. The lady we spoke to at reception was very helpful, she explained the breakfast system and we chose a time slot for each days breakfast - this was a bit annoying having to choose what time to have breakfast each day at the start of the holiday, and we only went on a couple of days in the end. I can see why they have that system though as the hotel was very busy and there was a long queue for breakfast even with allocated time slots. She also gave us our passes for the parks and our ticket to show we were staying at a Disney hotel which allows you to stay longer in the parks during the 'extra magic hours'. She also gave us some other paperwork and a leaflet with a little map of the hotel and thoughtfully gave us directions to our little block. The exterior of the hotel isn't what I would call very attractive but the theme is done quite well even down to the plants and the cleaners outfits.

The room itself had two double beds so obviously was pretty big. It was one more than we needed but I think all of the rooms have two doubles to cater for families. The room was quite simply decorated but the colour scheme fit well with the theme of the hotel and was bright and cheerful. There was a TV with a couple of English channels including, unsurprisingly, the Disney channel. The en suite bathroom was quite small but had a shower over the bath, toilet and washbasin, plenty of towels and a mickey mouse soap (the same ones they had last time I went to Disneyland in 1998!) so had everything we needed. The rooms seem to be cleaned regularly as there were always cleaners in the corridors, and the room seemed very clean when we arrived. They didn't disturb us early in the mornings though which is definitely a plus!

We visited the buffet restaurant once for dinner, it seemed a bit chaotic as it was self service and the system is not immediately apparent. There was a large selection of food which you could help yourself to, you then pay a set price before finding a table and then get a hand stamp so you can go back as much as you like. The selection was very wide but the quality wasn't brilliant. Drinks have to be bought individually and I thought were overpriced. Although you get a lot of food for your money it was very busy and the atmosphere wasn't great. It reminded me a bit of a school dinner hall and very oddly there were little birds flying around that had found their way in. It worked out cheaper than eating at the Disney Village but I think it is a better option for families with young children than a couple. I'm glad we gave it a try though, as it would have been a shame not to try the hotel's restaurant at all, and it was nice just to be a minute's walk from our room after dinner.

The breakfast was served in the same place and the system was again self service but this time you took your card with your time slot on and handed that in at the beginning. This was again very busy and we had to wait in a long queue (annoyingly some people ignored this queue and just went straight to the front) but the system was explained to us by a member of staff who amazingly could guess everyone's nationality before they even spoke and explained what to do in their language, very impressive! The food was OK but we only went a couple of times even though it was included in the price of the hotel as it was very hectic and the time slot system was restrictive and the food was not good enough to get up early for.

The free left luggage facility was handy for the last day. No problems or queues there. The check out was very straightforward we just had to drop the key off and the time you had to check out by was reasonable. We didn't visit the games room but there seemed to be quite a few arcade type games. The shop had quite a good range of souvenirs but was quite small and didn't seem to have much that you couldn't get at the shops in the parks.

There was a free shuttle bus every few minutes to the parks which was handy, and the Santa Fe bus stops closest to the park which is handy. This was so convenient that we never walked to the parks but the journey was just a couple of minutes on the bus so it can't take very long to walk there.

All in all I thought the hotel was very good value for money and as we were only there 3 nights and both me and my boyfriend are students on tight budgets it was ideal. Next time I go to Disneyland I will probably stay at a different hotel, especially if I am staying longer, but that is mainly to experience the different hotels rather than because of negative aspects of the Hotel Santa Fe. If it is luxury you are after then go for one of the mid or high range hotels, but if you would prefer cheap and cheerful then the Santa Fe is a good bet. The quality is a lot better than many other hotels in its price range. The eating facilities aren't great but even if you don't use the breakfast facilities then the hotel is good value. I would also point out that if you aren't restricted by school holidays, mid September is a very good time to go as the park is quite quiet (particularly mid week), the price is much better than during peak times and the weather is still warm. We got flights for just over £100 return for 2 people, so that plus the package we chose meant that a brilliant Disneyland holiday was affordable at around £200 each for 4 days. 

...less