We’re continuing our look at Walt Disney World from the air today with a look at the Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser hotel!

During our flight on Monday, our helicopter flew much higher than normal as we worked around a flight restriction in the EPCOT and Magic Kingdom area. As a result, we got some wonderful views of all four Walt Disney World theme parks during their first day of closure due to the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

For our first photo, we’ll blame a cloud for blocking our view of the Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser hotel in this overview photo of Disney’s Hollywood Studios. You can just see the hotel through a light cloud in the extreme upper right of the photo. For a more comprehensive look at an empty Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge, Toy Story Land, and more, check out our earlier post.

Focusing a bit more on the hotel, we can see that while work has stopped during the closure of the theme parks, there has been some progress since our last look at the hotel.

The hotel is split into two sections. From our vantage point over World Drive, we can see the guest rooms on the left and the main “play” area on the right.

Here’s a closer look at the guest rooms, called “cabins” in line with the theming of a ship.

Here’s a look at some of the concept art of the rooms.

Focusing now on the “play” area, this warehouse-type structure will house a few different experiences including a lightsaber wielding experience, training on the bridge of the ship, and exploration areas. This warehouse will also hold a dining experience and “transportation” arrival experience that we’ll touch on later.

We’ll start from the outside, where we can see the bus station taking shape. Seen in the photo below on the left, we can see a pavement turnaround taking shape for the bus load and unload area.

A “spaceport of call” to Black Spire Outpost is included in your itinerary, where special passenger transports take you to the planet Batuu (also known as the destination for Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge at Disney’s Hollywood Studios).

To get from Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser to Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge and back, you’ll remain fully in-story as you step aboard the transport ships (bus) designed specifically for this new immersive experience, which you can see in the artist concept rendering above. It will connect you directly to a spaceport at Black Spire Outpost on Batuu, where the story you began in the starcruiser will continue and evolve while exploring the 14-acre land at Disney’s Hollywood Studios. 

We’re kind of writing this piece backwards in terms of how your Star Wars experience will unfold, but we’ll take a look at the arrival experience next.

Whether you show up via personal vehicle, Disney transportation or by landspeeder, curb-side check-in prepares you to leave Earth behind, jump to lightspeed and begin your Star Wars story. Guests will arrive at the Starcruiser Terminal on Earth before entering a launch pod to be sent up to the ship.

Here’s a look at the Halcyon, the ship that you’ll live in and explore during your two-day itinerary.

Here’s a look at the porte cochère from our helicopter flight.

Here’s a wider overview of the hotel construction.

From the Starcruiser Terminal, you will enter an exclusive launch pod for travel up to the Halcyon, your starcruiser in a galaxy far, far away. Through the pod’s viewports, it looks as though you are traveling through space to approach the massive ship that is much too large to land on any planet.

To end this post, we will note that construction on the Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser has been halted as a result of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. Disney has previously announced that the hotel will open in 2021 with reservations becoming available later in 2020. As of publish time, it is unknown what kind of impact the closures will have on the Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser project. Of course, here at BlogMickey.com we will continue to provide coverage of the Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser project and news as it happens!

As always, keep checking back with us here at BlogMickey.com for the latest Disney Parks news and photos. We’ll continue to bring you news and photos, where possible, through the Disney Parks closure due to Coronavirus (COVID-19) and will resume our normal coverage once the parks reopen to guests on July 11th!