Thrifty Thursday: Do You REALLY Need ADRs?

“So you’re going to Walt Disney World in 4 months, how wonderful! Have you made your dining reservations yet?”

And so starts a conversation that I have had many times with folks who are planning their first Disney vacation. The puzzled look I usually get in return, as they try to figure out why on earth any sane person would make dining reservations months in advance, always makes me chuckle….because at this point, I don’t have the heart to tell them there have been times that I have gotten up at 6 a.m. for 4 straight days trying to book our dining reservations… and of course, I am doing the same for my clients as well.  🙂 Read more

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Disney Vacation Tips: No ADR’s? Here’s the Scoop

Back in 1994 Walt Disney World implemented a Disney Dining change that has changed the way we view dining on property. Take a moment to guess what that was?  The Advanced Reservation phone number…adding this has made it much more difficult to get a walk-up reservation for most of the popular dining locations on property. Read more

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Yes, You CAN Change Your Dining Plans While ON Your Disney World Vacation

There is a lot of time and energy that goes into planning meals for your Disney vacation. Researching the many different options, finding out what your family would like, checking menus, picking the best times (and reserving them if possible), and then of course figuring out how to pay for it….are all part of the process.

(Now I do realize that many people prefer not to do that much planning when it comes to meals on their vacation…but I am guessing that if you are reading this, you are probably not one of them. 🙂 Nevertheless, if you are one of those people, keep reading….because this article will be of interest to you too. )

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Travel Tuesday Tales: What Do You Mean There Are No ADRs Available?

In last week’s Travel Tuesday Tales, I described the discussions my family and I had in deciding which restaurants we wanted to eat at for our New Year’s trip.  Knowing that I had the ability to book online at 190 days rather than the official 180 days in advance, I had worked hard to get a consensus of what our choices would be.

To review:

Night One: book at San Angel Inn for now until the Candlelight Processional packages are released and/or Hacienda de Saint Angel opens for booking.

Night Two (New Year’s Eve): Chefs de France.

Night Three: DD and DF want California Grill. DH and I chose Ohana.

Last Night: Coral Reef.

I should probably note here that this was my first official experience using the online Disney Dining platform, and was admittedly a bit nervous. Disney had just made some changes to the process. And then this 190 day “glitch” popped up which had thrown an additional layer of preparation into the mix. So I did some research, checking various Disney message boards to see the experiences of a number of folks who had successfully reserved online at 190 days.

(I have to say here that I felt a little “sneaky” as this is an unofficial option. Disney still officially allows you to make ADRs at 180 days in advance…and if you call Disney Dining to make your reservations, that is what they will tell you. But if you book online, the system does allow you to manipulate the dates…and for some to put in a fake Disney resort reservation…that makes it possible for you to make your ADRs at 190 days. Very weird, I know. And since folks have been able to do this for nearly a month now, one would presume that this “glitch” is on purpose as Disney is aware of it, and has not changed it. Yet. Still, it felt sneaky to me. I am SUCH a rule follower 🙂 )

Anyway, to continue with our story…

The online booking window for a new day opens at 6 a.m., so on my appointed 190th day, I was up, sitting at my computer at 5:45, waiting for the magic hour when I, along with who knows how many countless hundreds out there in cyber-space, would be attempting to book an Advanced Dining Reservation for December 30. (One thing about this “glitch” is that you must book each day individually, so I could only book December 30 that first morning.)

I reviewed our choice for that first night: San Angel Inn, temporarily until the Candlelight Processional packages and/or the new Hacienda de San Angel is available to book. So in essence, this first night would be practice for me for the “big event” the next day when I would be reserving our New Years Eve dinner. Still, I anxiously kept refreshing the stupid Disney website, wondering why we all had to wait until 6 a.m.

Ah Hah! Finally, 6 a.m. and our date of 12/30 showed up as an available booking date! Charge!!!! Quickly I put in our reservation number, chose the date I wanted again, and waited for the screen to show up with San Angel Inn as a dining option. I pictured hundreds of other Disney-obsessed folks doing the same thing, and I have to admit, it was a bit of a bonding moment as I imagined all these other Disney folks doing the same thing…. Yeah, I’m weird like that.

The screen finally came up and…..whhaaaaaatttt? Nothing available at San Angel Inn for 12/30 for my time? Geez, how did people beat me out that quick? Let’s try another time…. And another one…. Nothing. Holy cow, it’s only San Angel Inn, not exactly the most popular dining option at Disney World! I started putting in every time I could think of. Nothing! Wait a minute, something’s really strange here. I then took a look to see what I *could* book at Epcot that night, trying not to be *too concerned* as this reservation was only temporary.

And to my utter shock there was absolutely nothing available at any single restaurant in World Showcase, for the entire day…other than Norway and Germany, the two restaurants that no one in my group wanted to eat at.

Now what? Finding it hard to believe that ALL availability had been taken for all of World Showcase for the entire day, I was finally able to book an ADR for Cape May Café at the Beach Club…which was at least in walking distance to Epcot.

I closed out my session in disbelief, and attempted to regroup and analyze the situation.

Clearly there was something wrong, as there was just NO WAY that all those restaurants were already full. Maybe they had been blocked out by Disney for Candlelight Processional packages….that was somewhat plausible. But the WHOLE DAY? Hmmmm…..

I needed firm, concrete information, so I did what all self-respecting Disney planners do when faced with a Disney planning crisis: I checked out some Disney message boards. And sure enough, this problem was not just me. Whew….

But it also happened to a number of folks who had been reserving just fine all week long, wherever they wanted. And the problem was not just Epcot: only 17 restaurants had been available for anyone to book that morning for Dec. 30…51 were not available at all.

Yikes! What did this mean? And more importantly, what would it mean for tomorrow, when it actually mattered to me what we booked? The consensus on the boards was that it was a temporary glitch to the glitch, and to keep trying the rest of the day, it would probably fix itself later on.

OK….So I tried again at 9, at 11, at 1, at 3…and so on, until nearly 11 p.m. that night. No change.

Which really left me wondering what would happen the next day, when I (along with all of my newfound Disney cyberspace buddies) would be trying for New Years Eve?

The next morning I was at my computer again at 5:45, again refreshing the page, waiting, waiting, waiting. And really hoping that yesterday’s problem was no longer a problem.

December 31 showed up as an available date to book, I quickly put in the information requested for Chefs de France, hit enter…..and waited again, not really breathing………

SUCCESS! There it was! Hallelujah. I quickly confirmed it, got my reservation number, and then thought, let’s try again for Dec. 30….maybe NOW it’s fixed….

Waiting, waiting….yup, now showing availability! Hurray! I cancelled yesterday’s Cape May, now that I had San Angel Inn, and heaved a sigh of relief, as my hundreds of Disney Dining cyberspace friends surely did as well. 🙂

And I am happy to report that there were no further glitches the rest of the week: the other two days went smoothly, with no problems to report whatsoever.

I reported back to my family that all dining reservations had been achieved as requested.

And they said ……. “Thanks”.

So next steps? Waiting for Disney to announce the Candlelight Processional package, so that I can book that….and un-book my ADR at San Angel Inn that I worked so hard to get. I’ll keep you posted! 🙂

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Travel Tuesday Tales: The Fine Art of Negotiating Disney World ADRs

One of the things about planning Disney vacations that I take extremely seriously is booking our dining reservations. Known as Advanced Dining Reservations or ADRs, getting these scheduled well in advance of your trip can make life on your Disney vacation soooo much easier…and if you are traveling during Free Dining or a peak time like Christmas/New Years week, then making them is crucial.

In fact, for many restaurants, making them on the very earliest day possible can mean the difference between eating dinner where you want at a time that you would actually want to eat dinner….vs. eating dinner at like, 10 p.m….if you even get in at all.

The official earliest day you can make ADRs is 180 days before you check in (if a Disney resort guest).

You already know we are going over New Years, so clearly I had the 180 date highlighted on my calendar: July 3. I would be ready.

Except that we couldn’t decide where we wanted to eat. I brought it up every couple of days, and each time I did, I ended up with different answers!! Seriously folks, we need to get our act together here, July 3 will be here before we know it.

We agreed early on that our first two nights we would eat in Epcot. We will arrive on Dec. 30 which is the last day of the Candlelight Processional, and that is a must. Disney will be offering Candlelight Processional packages, where you reserve dinner at a particular restaurant, and you get priority seating for the Candlelight Processional. It’s very worth it to do this, especially since you can use the Disney Dining Plan for your CP meal….so it’s just a matter of choosing where you want to eat in Epcot.

However, since those packages had not yet been released, I still wanted to book an ADR for that night, in Epcot “just in case”. (Moms make their families always prepare for “just in case”. We really can’t help ourselves you know, it just happens.)

Our second night will be New Years Eve, and we’ll be celebrating in Epcot. On NYE, once you get to the park of your choice, you don’t leave. So we’ll be eating there as well.

It was decided that our 3rd night will be spent at Magic Kingdom, and then on our last night we will visit Hollywood Studios.

And as of June 16, that is about as far as we had gotten.

Choosing where to eat at Disney World is serious business in our family and negotiations can get intense. DH rarely has a strong opinion (unless it is about staying in Animal Kingdom Villas lol) but DD and I do have differing tastes and ideas. One of my big things is that on this trip, I really wanted to try some places we had NOT eaten before. Meanwhile, DD is bringing a friend and she had some places that she specifically wanted him to experience. Seems he also had a few opinions about where he did and didn’t want to eat.

Soooo, let’s see what we have here:

Me: Some new places, specifically Ohana (yes we have NOT eaten here yet! I know, shocking), and Sanaa, and hopefully the new Mexican restaurant Hacienda de San Angel (once they start taking ADRs there). Pretty much every place in World Showcase was fine too. 🙂

DD: California Grill one night with friend only (date night for us!! 🙂 ), Mexican is good, Ohana is not. Not sure about Sanaa. No Norway or Germany or England or Morocco. Interested in sushi in Japan. Nothing in Hollywood Studios or Magic Kingdom….  Alrighty then.

DF: Wanted to eat Mexican and eat sushi at some point. And keep DD happy. 🙂 (Smart young man I would say….)

DH: As long as we weren’t staying at Animal Kingdom Lodge, he was happy.

The thing is, we had a couple of weeks before I could book our ADRs on July 3, at exactly 180 days out from our arrival date…so I figured we had plenty of time to hash things out and get it all figured out.

And then I found out that people were (maybe accidentally, maybe on purpose?) able to book their ADRs at 190 days out if they did it online.

Whoa Nellie that’s in a couple of days! Fun time is over people, we have some decisions to make.

So let the negotiations begin!

With some shady backroom deals and dubious trading (“I’ll give you one Mexico for an extra ride on Soarin’….”), lots of talks, research on the web (thank you Disney Food Blog and Chip and Co.!), and multiple spreadsheet revisions…..this is what we managed to come up with:

Night One: book at San Angel Inn for now (you know, “just in case”) until the Candlelight Processional packages are released and/or Hacienda de Saint Angel opens for booking.

  • Fulfils Mexican requirement and if Hacienda, some place new.

New Year’s Eve: Chefs de France.

  • We all like this one, and DD told DF that he “will” like it too. 🙂

Night Three: We will have our “date nights” on this night. DD and DF will be eating at California Grill where they will eat sushi to their heart’s delight. DH and I will be finally eating at Ohana.

  • Cali Grill and sushi for DD/DF? Check.
  • Ohana/someplace new for me? Check.

Last Night: Back to Epcot for dinner at Coral Reef, then on to Hollywood Studios for the evening.

  • Not sure who exactly this one is for, other than we are all happy about it, so it’s all good. 🙂

We got it all figured out and agreed upon on the evening of June 22. My date to try booking at the new 190 days out was June 23, at 6 a.m.

And I was ready.

Hopefully we would get all the restaurants we worked so hard to agree on…

……..To be continued…….

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