Disney Names New Oahu Resort

Walt Disney Parks & Resorts today announced the name of its new Hawaii resort along with a new website for travel agents to visit to stay connected to the resort’s development. The resort will be called Aulani, a Disney Resort & Spa, Ko Olina, Hawaii. It is Disney’s first stand-alone family destination resort and is scheduled to open in 2011.

The new preview website, available through www.disneytravelagents.com, provides travel agents with updates and background information on the resort as it remains under construction. The site also details some of the unique features under development, and includes conceptual art, descriptions of resort highlights, regularly updated resort information and photos of Aulani as it nears completion.

Aulani, pronounced “ow–lonee,” means “the place that speaks for the great ones” or “the place that speaks with deep messages.” Nearby to historical sites on the western side of Oahu, Aulani will be located on 21-acres of oceanfront property in the Ko Olina Resort & Marina development. The Resort is planned to have 360 hotel rooms and 481 two-bedroom equivalent Disney Vacation Club villas. Among the recreational highlights planned for the resort are pools and sunset-facing hot tubs, a snorkeling lagoon, a variety of Kids Club programs for children, and a river, suitable for tube floating, running through a specially created volcanic outcropping. The resort will also include an 18,000-square-foot spa, a golf course and marina for adults.

The Resort, built adjacent to a blue lagoon and a white-sand beach, will also have two restaurants as well as ballroom, meeting space and event lawns.