The Pirate Rooms at Disney’s Caribbean Beach Resort are a set of rooms that have a different theme than the rest of the resort. Rather than “just” be Caribbean themed, the Pirate Rooms are themed specifically to—you guessed it—pirates. In this post, we’ll give our impressions of the Pirate Rooms at Caribbean Beach!
Note: The Pirate Rooms will be discontinued in 2023. Argh.
Throughout this review, I’ll compare the Pirate Rooms to two other room types. The standard Caribbean Beach resort rooms are covered in our review of the hotel and are worth comparing to because they’re the other rooms at this hotel.
The Royal Rooms at Port Orleans Riverside are also worth comparing to because—like the Pirate Rooms—those rooms have unique theming at a moderate resort and come at a higher price than other rooms.
About Caribbean Beach Resort (Briefly)
We have a full review of Disney’s Caribbean Beach Resort hotel that discusses things like location, transportation, and dining at the resort in more detail, but I’ll provide a quick overview.
Caribbean Beach is a moderate resort at Walt Disney World. As the name implies, the hotel is Caribbean themed. As a Disney hotel it has access to a wide range of perks, and beginning October 1, 2021 guests will have access to the new Early Theme Park Entry perk, too.
The hotel has a food court, a table service restaurant, a pretty cool pool bar, and a pirate-themed pool that has been winning kids over for years.
Caribbean Beach is the hub of the Disney World Skyliner system. From the Caribbean Beach station, you can take the Skyliner to Hollywood Studios (6 min), Epcot (14 min), and Pop Century / Art of Animation Resorts (6 min).
Caribbean Beach guests may also choose to use the Riviera Resort Skyliner station, which is only 9 minutes to Epcot. To Hollywood Studios would be 11 minutes with a transfer at the Caribbean Beach station.
To the other parks, to Disney Springs, and to the water parks (Typhoon Lagoon and Blizzard Beach), you’ll be relying on Disney bus transportation. We’re not huge fans of the bus transportation at moderate resorts and highly recommend you consider Uber / Lyft / Minnie Van when in a rush (or bring your own car).
And as you may have figured, Caribbean Beach is next door to Disney’s Riviera Resort. This means you’ll have the restaurants and bars of that hotel conveniently close, but keep in mind you won’t be able to use other amenities at that hotel, like their pool. (It might make sense for guests in some Caribbean Beach rooms to use the Riviera Resort buses, but I’ve never tried this.)
What Are The Pirate Rooms?
The pirate rooms at Caribbean Beach are a special set of pirate-themed rooms at the hotel. Not all rooms at Caribbean Beach are pirate themed.
As we’ll discuss in more detail, they’re not really special beyond their theming. Their location is better than it used to be, now that the Skyliner station is nearby, but you’re still far from the main amenities of the hotel. But let’s talk specifics…
Booking Pirate Rooms
There’s no trick or secret request you have to make to book a Pirate Room. The Pirate Rooms are their own category of room on the Disney World website, and come with Standard View or Water Views.
Non-discounted nightly room rates at Caribbean's Pirate Rooms in 2022 range from $315 to $510. Caribbean Beach as a whole starts at $248 in 2022. That’s a pretty hefty upcharge for the theming. If you found a room offer, or a deeper annual passholder offer, you might get the room for under $275 per night.
I booked through Lauren Quirk of Travel With Character LLC, who books almost all of my Disney stays these days.
Pirate Room Location
The Pirate Rooms are located in the Trinidad section of the resort. This is far from the main area of the resort—Old Port Royale—but relatively close to the Disney Skyliner. There’s also a quick service restaurant—Spyglass Grill—located in the Trinidad section.
Here’s a map of the resort with the Skyliner stations (again—Pirate Rooms are in Trinidad south and the main area of the resort is Old Port Royale):
The location isn’t ideal, but with the addition of Spyglass Grill and the Skyliner, there’s no reason to make this the decisive factor for your trip. You’ll be far from Old Port Royale, which is where the main food court (Centertown Market) is located, along with the main pool.
Having to walk 5-10 minutes to these amenities isn’t ideal, but it also probably won’t weigh much in considering these rooms (since, c’mon, you’re here for the pirate theme).
And Disney clearly understands this, given the premium (about $75) you’re paying for these rooms. Unfortunately, this is an area where I think Disney takes advantage of relative inelasticity of demand. If you’re going to book a pirate room, you’re probably going to book it regardless of location, and you’re willing to tolerate the price because…pirates!
There are multiple bus stops at the hotel, including one near the pirate rooms. As we discuss exhaustively in our review of the full hotel, transportation is tricky throughout the hotel, and your specific situation (are you going to a theme park early? how much back and forth to the hotel do you need?) will play a role in your experience at Caribbean Beach.
A Look Inside Caribbean Beach’s Pirate Rooms
It doesn’t appear to me that the Pirate Rooms have been substantially refurbished since their 2012 debut.
The overall room layout is similar to most other Disney rooms in the value/moderate range. There’s two double beds (themed as pirate ships) with a nightstand between them, opposite a TV stand / dresser and a small desk, with the bathroom in the back. The standard Caribbean Beach rooms have two queen beds or one king bed, by the way.
The below gallery contains mostly Pirate Room pictures, but the second photo is from a standard room, for reference:
You might notice immediately that the beds are smaller. They’re doubles in the Pirate Rooms and queens in the standard rooms. There are other room configurations at Caribbean Beach—including a single king bed or a room for five—but the Pirate Rooms only come in this configuration.
The other notable structural difference between these two rooms is that the standard rooms now have sliding doors protecting the bathroom / vanity area. The Pirate Rooms are living in the past and stuck with a curtain.
Here are some bathroom pics, with the second photo from the standard room for reference:
There are other small structural differences between these rooms, but those are the major ones. Now, let’s talk about the pirate detailing and design of the rooms.
As you’d expect, the Pirate Rooms trade the relatively bland (in our opinion) detailing of the Caribbean Beach rooms for more pirate-centric detailing.
More detail is cool, but it also means more opportunity for the room to become worn. Rather than having a flat headboard, for example, the pirate room’s mast and wheel headboard has lots of edges and surfaces.
I was pleasantly surprised with the condition of these rooms in comparison to the Royal Rooms over at Port Orleans Riverside. While I did think those rooms were actually more worn than the pirate room, the theming also makes a difference. “Royal” implies something like “pristine,” which those rooms weren’t.
The pirate rooms, by contrast, benefit from their theming. There’s lots of imperfect wood by design, so little unintended imperfections fit right in. This chest—which has probably had a ton of luggage thrown onto it—is pretty scuffed and nicked, but it sort of still just looks like a pirate chest:
The flipside is that the Royal Rooms—if you’re not nitpicking—had a lot more of a “wow” factor than the pirate rooms.
The pirate rooms are mostly just lots of dark wood features, while the Royal Rooms (fitting their names) had more vibrant designs. Here’s a look at a Royal Room (only found at Port Orleans Riverside), just for reference:
Royal Room at Port Orleans Riverside
You can see that the Royal theming really lends itself to some beautiful details, from the headboards to the Magic Carpet, to the wall art.
With all the artistic possibilities—from treasure to navigational charts to ships to treasure maps—it’s a bit shocking to find the Pirate Room only with a single framed piece of art, and for that to simple be a Jack Sparrow / Pirates of the Caribbean scene.
The carpeting has some cool detailing…but how much do you want to look at carpeting? Even if you take the time to look down…it’s still carpet, and look long enough and you’ll find things you don’t like.
The photos on the Disney website are from a time when the red bed runners were still present. Disney has been eliminating these, though, and it’s stark how much vibrancy they added to the room.
Conclusions
Room updates have been a challenge for Disney the past few years, with some hitting the mark and others missing badly. A big complaint from one corner has been that the “theme” has been lost.
To me, the Pirate Rooms represent a pretty standard themed offering. It’s nice to have an option with some character, but the room also doesn’t hit the same high notes that the Royal Rooms at Riverside do. The pirate theme is there, but for what you pay it doesn’t hit too hard.
Sometime in the second half of the 2010s, Disney made a big leap forward in the functionality of its rooms, and those that have gotten that full refurbishment—Coronado Springs, Yacht Club, Pop Century, e.g.—are a huge step ahead. I’d love to see Disney give these rooms another shot, especially given the premium they’re charging.
Starting at $315 per night, the pirate rooms are more expensive than the standard Coronado Springs Gran Destino Tower rooms (starting at $263) that I’d consider vastly superior to the pirate rooms in every way except for pirate theming (because they aren’t pirate themed) and maybe transportation (it’s a tie).
The way I’d think about the pirate rooms is that they’re adequate without being special. Does that justify the premium you’ll pay over a standard room? Tough to say, and it definitely will vary by your family makeup and expectations.
The premium is about $75 per night. One option I’d strongly consider for longer stays is just doing two nights in the pirate room and moving to a standard room the rest of the stay. On a five night stay such a strategy would save you about $225, though changing rooms can always be a nuisance.
My bottom line—if someone in the family loves pirates, then I’d book the room and let them be pleasantly surprised. It’s a nice addition to a Disney vacation. But I wouldn’t hype it up as the most pirate experience ever, because that seems like a recipe for disappointment.
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