Orlando in July (The Nice One)

The JW Marriott Orlando Bonnet Creek Resort & Spa is a different Orlando entirely. Bonnet Creek is a resort complex tucked between Disney properties, with a lazy river, multiple pools, a spa, and grounds that feel more like a vacation than a work trip. The rooms are a step up from standard Orlando conference hotels: bigger, with balconies overlooking either the pool or the golf course, marble bathrooms, and beds that make you not want to go to the conference. Which is a problem when the conference is why you're there.

I got in the night before and went straight to the pool, which at 9 PM was lit up and nearly empty. The lazy river loops around the entire complex and you can float it in about 20 minutes if nobody's blocking the current. I floated it twice. Called G from a lounge chair afterward and she asked what the conference was about. I said I hadn't made it to the conference yet, I was at the lazy river. She said "so you flew to Orlando to float in a circle." She wasn't wrong.

July in Orlando is the hottest version of a city that is always hot. You walk from the air-conditioned hotel to the air-conditioned convention space through approximately 40 feet of outdoor air that feels like opening an oven. The humidity is the kind where your glasses fog up the moment you step outside. Locals handle it by moving quickly between cold spaces and never lingering outdoors between 11 AM and 4 PM.

The mornings were the exception. I got up early both days and walked the Bonnet Creek grounds before the heat set in. Around 6:30 AM, the grounds are quiet and the light is soft and the landscaping looks like it belongs at a botanical garden, not a hotel next to a theme park. There's a path that loops around the property past the golf course, and I walked it with a coffee from the lobby. A couple of ibises were standing on the fairway looking unbothered by everything, which is the default ibis setting in Florida. By 8 AM the heat was already building and I was back inside. But those early morning walks, before anyone else was up, were the best part of both days.

The conference was a different format than the January and April ones. Smaller, more curated. A few hundred people in the hotel's conference wing instead of thousands in a convention center. That scale makes a difference. I had four conversations across two days that turned into actual follow-ups. One was with a woman running a media company out of Atlanta who had a perspective on content distribution that I hadn't heard articulated that way before. We ended up talking for an hour over coffee in the lobby, missed the next session entirely, and neither of us regretted it.

Between sessions, the pool was unavoidable. The JW pool area is extensive: a main pool, a kids' pool, the lazy river, and a handful of hot tubs scattered around the property. I sat by the main pool during a lunch break and watched a dad try to explain to his six-year-old why they couldn't ride the lazy river one more time because they had dinner reservations. The kid was not persuaded. The dad went on the lazy river one more time. Dads at resort pools are a universal experience.

The JW has Sear + Sea, a rooftop restaurant with views of the Disney fireworks. I ate there on my last night. The tuna tartare was excellent. The seafood tower was good but the shrimp were the star, not the oysters. The fireworks went off mid-meal, visible from the table, and the entire restaurant paused for about 30 seconds to watch. At any other restaurant in any other city it would feel gimmicky. Here it felt almost inevitable. The couple next to me was celebrating an anniversary and the fireworks timed perfectly with their dessert. I texted G a photo from the table. She replied "jealous" followed by "of the fireworks not of Orlando." Correct ranking.

The other meal worth mentioning was a solo dinner at the hotel's lobby bar one evening. I sat at the bar, ordered a burger and a glass of wine, and watched the lobby traffic: families heading to the pool, couples dressed for dinner, a group of conference people loudly debating something about AI at a table nearby. The bartender was a guy named Marcus who had worked at the JW for eight years and had opinions about every restaurant within a 20-mile radius. He told me about a Vietnamese place in the Mills 50 district that he said was the best pho in Orlando, and a Cuban sandwich spot in Kissimmee that he said was better than anything in Miami, which is a claim I didn't challenge out loud but noted internally as incorrect. I didn't make it to either. But I saved them for next time, because apparently there's always a next time with Orlando.

Third Orlando trip of the year. Three different hotels, three different conferences, three different versions of the same city. The JW was the best hotel by a wide margin. The Wyndham had the best food discovery (the Colombian place with the yellow awning). The Hyatt had the best conversation (the woman who left corporate and ordered a second whiskey). Orlando keeps drawing me back for work and I keep finding reasons not to hate it. I still haven't been to a theme park. G brings this up regularly. I tell her next time. She doesn't believe me. She's probably right.