Morning, y’all. Well I bit the bullet and decided to move on property for 7AM ILL (ugh their devious plan is working). I’ll be staying at CB for the first time.
I’m a very solid front of pack RD to close kind of person. I also like good food. I have a very early arrival and very late departure, but neither are park days.
What do I need to know? Room tips (booked standard)? Transportation tips? Food tips? Other stuff?
Good morning! I have a lot to share about CBR, so I will try to capture it in one message, but if something is missing - just let me know.
All standard rooms are in the Aruba or Jamaica sections. You will take buses to get to MK or AK. In the mornings - until 10 or 11am - they send two buses to CBR, so one will come to just Jamaica (first) and then Aruba (second). You don’t need to walk to the first bus stops. We had no issues getting there for rope drop, and we are middle of the pack people.
On the way back, Jamaica and Aruba are the last two - of six - total bus stops. If you want to get back sooner, you could take a Riviera bus and then walk to your room. This could be a hike - and may or may not save time - depending on your room location.
We had building 51, and I loved it. We had two full resort days, so this location was close to Old Port Royale (OPR), the Skyliner and bus stops.
There are also quiet pools - we never saw more than 10 people enjoying the quiet pool at a time.
The Aruba section is closest to the Skyliner. I would recommend requesting buildings 43-51. The resort is really really spread out, so you will do a lot of walking. It didn’t bother me - but it might be important to you.
The coffee in the room is terrible. Plan on going to the coffee stand at the Skyliner or grab coffee at OPR.
We enjoyed the food from OPR! They have a quick service option, and we ate a lot of the chicken bowl during our week there, but also liked the classic pizza and chicken fingers. There is a pool bar - and my mom said she had the best strawberry daiquiri of her life there 
. Sebastian’s is the table service restaurant and many call it a hidden gem. We did not eat there but have heard good things. People also sometimes go to the Riviera for the quick service (Primo Piatto) or the table service (Topolinos)
You can see EPCOT fireworks from the Aruba beach section.
The Skyliner has three different lines. One line takes you to AoA/Pop. One takes you to HS. One takes you to the International Gateway at EPCOT. There is a quick stop at the Riviera. The SL opens up a lot of food options - you can go to AoA/Pop/Riviera/BW/BC/YC very easily.
We were at the parks before rope drop on our HS day, and we found that the SL line moved very fast. When we left at park close, it was fine. The line looked long but moved very very quickly.
I think that’s all for now! If you have more specific questions, I’m happy to answer!
We LOVED CBR! We stayed in Aruba 54 - I had requested 55 so this was close enough - because we wanted to be close to the Riviera so we could use their buses and not have to deal with multiple stops. We did this every day and it worked out great, I don’t think we ever took a CBR bus. That being said, I found that using the skyliner from the Riviera stop was a hassle, they were always full, so we walked to the main Skyliner station for Epcot and HS rope drops and it was a bit of a hike.
We are currently staying in building 55 and like our location. It is pretty central to each skyliner and the main lobby and food area. If you have a stroller or someone is doesn’t walk well, i would request first floor. No elevators so hard to get upstairs.
We will use the riveria busses a lot as the walk isn’t too bad. Nice to have the option when you are at the parks and can grab whichever comes.
July 2018 stayed at CBR in bldg indicated on map.
We’re really early park folk - usually had the bus stop to ourselves in the morning.
First thing we did was time the walk to the bus stop - 5 to 7 minutes. In 2018 MDE was showing next bus times. This worked out really well in the afternoons.
The whole central area was closed - no info there. Weather was HOT 
and no shade at quiet pool. We chilled in room in the afternoons.
Be advised resorts have safety checks every day as we found out one afternoon when there was a knock on the door as it was being opened by CBR staff who marched thru the room into the bathroom, looked into the tub and then left. Other reports here at TP differ slightly.
We like being ultra close to the bus stop. This building cluster works well.
This is because the water at CBR is sulfur-y garbage. Honestly, if you’re usually a ‘tap water is fine’ person (I am)…don’t to it. Order bottled water to deliver to your room or always bring a bottle of water back to the resort with you at night (if you are a BYOWB kind of person, refill it before you leave the parks). Then use that to make your coffee the next morning if you still want in room coffee.
I didn’t notice lol. We had bottled water. I thought the coffee was fine at OPR - I just blamed it on the weak ass pods. It was coffee flavored water.
WL - not DVC - has had the worst WDW water for us.
It wasn’t sulfery - DH’s aunt’s water from her well in Plant City was sulfery. WL water was more like my aunt in NY who lived slightly south of Kingston. Apparently some kind of bacteria in the well. At WL we would leave a glass of water sitting on the counter in the bathroom. The odor would dissipate after about 12 hours. Making it usable for wetting toothbrush.
