Highlands Reserve Villas

We go to florida every two years. We have stayed at Highlands reserve twice and are going back next year.The first time our villa was booked through a company and we were very lucky it was like something ou of a movie. But now we book independently through private owners.You can look at most of the villas on their own websites or virtual tours and most have reviews. You are right next to a supermarket, restaurant, and petrol station and cash machines, Yet you are in the country side. The wildlife there is stunning and we often get up to see the hot air balloons go over which is a lovely sight.Sand hill cranes often come to the villas to see you,there are eagles in the sky, humming birds etc.It is like home from home. We have a relaxing breakfast by the pool, then head out towards dinner time or chill out.

16 readers found this review helpful

It was described as LUXURY what a joke the villa was in desperate need of a complete refurb.Dirty couches,a chair with the bottom falling out,broken beds,broken light fittings,no bath plugs,mouldy shower head,no mirrors in bedrooms,no draw space in bedrooms so all cloths had to be put on the floor,broken floor tiles,dead frogs in pool,the smallest and most uncomfortable double bed I have ever tried to sleep in,one of the pillows was actually a cushion you could not turn the a/c below 74 degrees otherwise the system would freeze and you would incure a 350$ call out charge it really was no better than student accomodation. We complained to the Virgin office who told us it was not their problem and told us to see the Palm Springs management who maintain the villas they refused to move us and said they would sort out the problems, youve guessed it,they didnt, after many visits to complain we gave up and tried to enjoy our holiday, I almost forgot to mention the GREEN water in the pool at least they did rectify that problem and to rub salt in they ask you to remove all the bedding proir to leaving to help the cleaners! On our return home i wrote a letter of complaint to Virgin together with photos we took.We received a reply with an offer of £300 voucher to use against another holiday we refused this offer as we will never use Virgin Holidays again eventually an offer of £550 voucher or £400 cheque was offered we reluctantly accepted the cheque. We are very dissappointed with Virgins response because it seems they had the same problems back in 2008 so it seems they are doing nothing to rectify the issues.The address we were allocated was 302 BIRKDALE STREET.

4 readers found this review helpful

was there in july of last year and omg poor poor poor is all i can say, we were robbed lost every thing as the safe was not alound to be used beware!all so pool was not in use, The staff are not helpfull at all and the villas with pools are no were near the facillities like there tell you there are. but florida in a hole was the best place ever and great for kids :)

7 readers found this review helpful

We booked our 17 day holiday to the surposed superior Highlands Reserve with Virgin Holidays.
I hadnt found this website until I came home but if you read this before you go or even book, do NOT go to the Highland Reserve with VIRGIN. The area itself is very exclusive, but it really does seem that Virgin have the worest villas on here. The Virgin flights were poor with poor entertainment, lack of food and drink. To say Virgin are surposed to be a excellent Airline, they might of been one day but NOT now. This was the start of things to come. After waiting over an hour at the airport to get our car from Virgin we eventually got to the Villa. Same old story, it was dirty, tatty, things were broken and missing, the carpets were well worn, stained and the pool heating did not work. After 10 days we told the Rep to turn the heating off as after £250 worth of heating, it hadnt warmed up a degree!
Light bulbs were out, floor tiles cracked and broken, beds broke, dirty linen. Not even a dishwasher tablet left in the villa for our arrival or a dishcloth. It states that the villas back onto the golf course, ours backed onto a very busy road and we were woken every morning at 4am by lorries!
To put the icing on the cake, the Virgin flight home had a 10 hour delay. I will say no more.

11 readers found this review helpful

We have just returned from a 2 week holiday in Orlando. We booked a 4 bedroomed "Executive House" through Virgin Holidays, which was on Highlands Reserve. What we actually got when we arrived did not resemble IN ANY WAY, what we had paid for. The house smelt absolutely dreadful, it was tired, old, worn and very dated. There were nasty stains on carpets, settees, damaged lamp shades, damaged walls, paper thin towels, and the final straw was filthy bedding, with stains of goodness knows what!!! And outside, the pool was full of pieces of blue plastic from the damaged protective pool covering.
I had read some very negative, as well as very positive reviews about this site, before we had left the UK and had already telephone Virgin with my concerns. But all of this did not prepare me for the poor, dirty state of this villa. Virgin's response to my concerns was to be dismissive of anyone who leaves negative comments on Customer Review Websites. They basically said that one should not be concerned, as "you don't know what motives are behind people leaving negative reviews".
Well I am now one of those people, and my motives are to just warn people to be prepared. My impression is, that on Highlands Reserve there appears to be a vast difference between the best and the worst houses, and Virgin seem to have the nastier end of the market. It was also a very busy time of year and the British holiday makers seemed to be placed into the poorer quality houses. We battled with the Rep for three days to get moved, and on each visit to the Virgin Offices, there were always other people waiting, with similar tales to tell. Particularly in reference to cleanliness. We were only moved when I informed the UK office and the local Rep, that we would be instructing our Solicitors to start legal proceedings that day.
I feel so let down by Virgin and would NEVER EVER EVER book with them again.

6 readers found this review helpful

We have just returned from our third consecutive holiday from Highlands reserve in Orland, previously we have booked flights and the villa independently and had a wonderful time with no complaints. This year however we decided to book the whole thing through Virgin Holidays and have been left with many regrets. Firstly the Virgin web site boasts about its in flight entertainment and we were led to believe by the person we booked with at virgin that all flights have an interactive entertainment system, with films on demand. This was not the case the films shown are on a rolling loop and can only be watched in this way, this was slightly annoying and 2 of our party even had 2 sit through the whole flight without any entertainment due to their screens not working. On arrival at Regal Palms who were the agents appointed by Virgin to supply our villa we waited behind a family complaining about the state of their villa before we were allocated with ours. We were allocated our villa and set out to find it. Once we had got into our villa we found that it was in a poor state of repair with sockets hanging off the wall, smoke alarms hanging off the ceiling, broken beds, door knobs hanging off, the electric cooker in pieces, badly stained carpets and hairs in the fridge. When we complained to regal palms they sent someone around to fix the problems and we happened to mention that the pool was not very warm and were told that this was due to the pool heating system being broken. This I questioned as I had just paid for pool heating for the 2 weeks and was not informed of any problems. The maintenance man told me that the pool heating had been broken for days and they were waiting for parts with no delivery date. This I was less than impressed with as I had just parted with over £200 for 14 days heating. This was just a few of the issues that I had with my Virgin Holiday and to say the least I will not be booking with them again. What I will say to anyone booking a Holiday here with Virgin is what you see is most definatly NOT what you get.

5 readers found this review helpful

Stayed in Higher Combe Drive, Highlands Reserve for two weeks over Christmas. We travelled on United Airlines to Washington and then onto Orlando. There was only an hour for transfer between flights which on the way out was not enough as you need to go through US customs and collect your luggage (it was not automatically transferred). We had to run to the Gate which was very stressful with two small children and we very nearly missed the flight. One of our bags did not make the Washington flight as there was so little time - (despite us checking it in) after several phones to the airline it was delivered to the villa the next morning. Collecting the mid size hire car was easy - recommend you pay extra for AA cover during your stay but you don't need the TomTom as its easy to get around.
The villa was a 4 star with three bedrooms, two bathrooms and pool. We paid extra for the pool to be heated but it took 48 hours to get warm (next door told us that the agency never put the heating on till the day of arrival and guests were always mentioning its very slow to get warm). NB: The pool heater was quite loud which took some time to get use too. On arrival we found the villa to be very clean and tidy inside and out. The furniture was very good quality. There was a TV/video in the lounge plus a TV in every room. It was a shame that it was not cable and no DVD player but this did mean we hardly put it in! The pool was a real hit with the children (3 and 6 yrs) as it was a great size. The location was perfect for Disney etc and very easy to find from the Airport. There is a local supermarket about 2 minutes drive which is very well stocked. There was a children's playground on the reserve but it was far too far to walk from the villa.
The villa did come with bedding and towels but there were quite a few things that we felt were missing: safely deposit box, tea towel, washing up liquid, dish cloth, initial supply of dishwasher cleaner etc. There were also 5 or 6 lamps/lights with blown out light bulbs which we did mention to the agent. There were a couple of tea bags and coffee on arrival so it would have been a nice touch to have a pint of milk! The washing machine and tumble dryer was huge.
The weather was amazing - the low was 70 and the high 83. On the return internal flight there was no need for US customs or collecting your luggage so the hour transfer was fine. Both our bags arrived at Heathrow :o)
A perfect holiday and much better than previous stays in 4 star Disney hotels.
PS Buy your tickets from Undercover Tourist - much cheaper than other sites.

We stayed in a 5 bed villa over looking the golf course with was the best aspect in Highland Reserve. The villa was beautiful and very spacious.
we arrived on the saturday evening settled in and off we went in the morning to register our villa with the travelcity office. The evening before we had read the information booklet provided by the villa to found out how to work the safe, but there was no information available which ment we had to leave our valuables unsucured that day while we found out the safe number. When we arrived back at the villa that evening we had been robbed the patio door had been forced open and our money and all our electrical items such as DS and PSP game consoles, ipods and mobile phones had been stollen. The police were very helpful which is more that can be said for Travelcity they seemed to be uninterested they did not reply to phonecalls. The girls in the travelcity office were snotty. The other thing to point out is that there were bars fitted to the patio doors, to stop anyone forcing them open, but they were not on, when we arrived and were hidden behing the blinds and so we were not aware of them. There was no mention of them in the booklet. If the bars had have been on that day the burglars would not have got in.
When we spoke to the police they said there had been another breakin that day and there had been a spate of them in the area.
All this said we had a great holiday and highly recommend Highland Reserve.

3 readers found this review helpful

Staying at Highlands Reserve was a real pleasure The Accommodation was 5 star and i would recommend this to any family or Group.
Our 5 bedroom villa had everything we needed this included free wireless internet, games room with pool table and air hockey nice swimming pool two lounges plus a fully fitted kitchen with massive fridge. Each bedroom had TV and DVD, all were clean with very high specification.
Disney was less than 10 miles away with very easy driving. A large Publix supermarket, restaurants and bars are a short drive or 10-15 mins walk (Dependant on your villa placement) Wall-Mart is about 10 mins drive away.
Our family loved this resort, location and holiday.

My party of 8 travelled to Florida with Travel City Direct and Excel airways on Dec 23 for two weeks in a villa.
I have never travelled on such a shabby aircraft before - with no in flight entertainment for the 10+ hour flight. We were told they had forgotten to put the monitors back in the aircraft.
Only one drink in that time, we could not even buy one, with only sips of water every couple of hours, with broken seats headsets not working and terrible customer service from the cabin crew, we were glad to get off.
The villa had cockroach’s, broken seats, stains on carpets, broken fire alarms, no pool heating of which they charged us before we went.
Never again!