Your Expert Opinion on My ADR Plan

[Claki]

My 180 days is approaching! It's our first family trip, and by DIS standards our first trip ever. I went once in high school with band, but all I remember from the trip is riding Space Mountain. I didn't see any characters in person, didn't eat in any restaurants, and stayed offsite. DH went with his parents for a one-day sidetrip to Epcot. All he remembers is buying a shot glass in Germany.

We're going with our two boys, 2 and 4 and staying at POR. Please advise me on our ADR plan. I've had a spreadsheet going since October and changed things multiple times. We're hoping for free dining, so this plan assumes DDP. If we don't end up with free dining, we'll scale back a few ADRS.

Day 1 (arrival day, no parks)-- Downtown Disney dinner T-Rex Cafe or Raglan Road (might make these reservations directly through the restaurant)

Day 2 (MK) No ADRS, however this will be a back up date, as our 3rd choice for CRT or CP breakfast. Possible BOG Fastpass for lunch, dinner at POR or POFQ foodcourt, or Boatwrights? Park closes early this day for MNSSHP, we're not going

Day 3 (Epcot) Garden Grill dinner This is our only Epcot day, and only chance to see Illuminations. What time should we reserve Garden Grill? I like the idea of a character meal where we don't have to struggle to rush to a buffet and back and carry plates of food for the kids. Which leads me to the next day...

Day 4 (Break day) 'Ohana -- undecided on breakfast or dinner. Breakfast would be cool for characters, dinner sounds good too! Other plan for the day is the pool. Also, it would be nice to stick around Poly after we eat to watch the fireworks from the beach. But would that be hard to plan? It's a Halloween party this night as well. We're not planning to go, but in the back of my mind I have a fantasy that we'll get last minute tickets and have a great time. Oh yeah, and DS4 wants to do Pirate League and maybe I make reservations for 4 p.m. and then we do party. So then I really should just make breakfast reservations? But really, there's a reason this is a break day?

Day 5 (MK) Crystal Palace or CRT for rope drop. It's my fantasy to go to CRT. One of the few things I remember from my high school trip was wanting to go in the castle. DS2 loves Pooh and friends though, and the food sounds good at CP. This is also the only day we will be able to watch the night time parade and Wishes from inside the park.

Day 6 (DHS) Hollywood and Vine for lunch. The boys are Disney Junior fans. 50's Primetime Cafe for dinner. I know this is a lot, but if we're hungry at dinner I was thinking we could just get milkshakes or drinks? I love the theming-- I was big into the original Nick at Nite in the 80s and 90s.

Day 7 (MK) Either CP or CRT for breakfast before rope drop. Whatever we couldn't get on Day 5.

Day 8 (AK) No ADRS, maybe FlameTree for lunch

Day 9 (Go home day) Maybe WPE at DD for breakfast before we leave.

Things that are not on the plan, but I'd love to do: Whispering Canyon, Sanaa, Boma, Biergarten, Kona, Via Napoli, and Chef Mickey's. These have all been on the spreadsheet at one time or another, but aren't on the latest plan.

 

[Simba07]

Our group voted that both Boma and sanaa were better than Ohana. But that said, I'd still like to do Ohana too!

 

[Claki]

Our group voted that both Boma and sanaa were better than Ohana. But that said, I'd still like to do Ohana too!

It's become pretty clear that with Disney you just have to experience things for yourself, or learn them the hard way. I'm definitely not following my practical side with most of my reservations and plans.

 

[jcjen519]

Where are you staying? Just my personal thoughts - we usually plan to eat at our resort on arrival day. we also avoid reservations for that day because you never know what will happen with travel. We once got stuck in traffic and missed a chef mickey's reservation and we've also had flights delayed several hours.

We love ohana for both breakfast and dinner. Breakfast is not a buffet and I agree with you that that makes the experience more pleasant. We LOVED the halloween party. I' suggest getting tickets to that.

We have a 4 year old son and he loved the hollywood and vine character meal (especially jake!) when he was 3. we are doing that one again at the end of this month.

Thoughts on what you're skipping - We don't love boma. I know a lot of people enjoy it on here but it just does not do anything for us. We're not big fans of buffets and generally don't do them unless we need to do a character meal and don't really have a choice. Biergarten is fun...we didn't love the food but the experience was one of our son's favorites. Kona is good although If you're not staying at the poly i'd probably just pick one meal there and ohana is good too. Chef Mickey's is fun but I'd probably stick to no more then two character meals. I'd do either chef mickeys or garden grill but not both so I agree with your choice to leave chef mickey's out. We've never been to whispering canyon or via napoli but are trying that at the end of the month.

sounds like you have some fun plans! hope you enjoy your trip.

 

[Claki]

Where are you staying? Just my personal thoughts - we usually plan to eat at our resort on arrival day. we also avoid reservations for that day because you never know what will happen with travel. We once got stuck in traffic and missed a chef mickey's reservation and we've also had flights delayed several hours.

We're staying at POR. Thanks for your comments, they are very reassuring. I'm thinking about making our reservations for arrival day at DTD outside of the system so we could possibly cancel the day of if things don't go as planned. However, we are leaving the shortest leg of our trip for arrival day-- we're driving. So I'm hoping we'll be checked in by noon.