What did I do wrong??

[KATIESMOMMY]

Ww are planning our return trip to WDW, December 2006 was our very first trip, and I feel so lost because I am not planning ANY ADR's this time. I just felt all the TS were mainly a waste. Here is what happenned.
Our first night there we had a dinner ADR at Chef Mickey's. I was so excited about it.Well we get there at 6;45pm, our ressie was at 7.Well they take our name and 60 minutes later we still havent been called back. SO I go back in check in, the lady gives me a funny look and says it wont be long. 30 minutes later we havent been called back, kids are starving,so we leave. How can having an ADR make you wait over an hour past your ressie?

Next morning is CP-805am- I have no complaints about it, food was excellant, no wait, service was good, characters interaction was excellant. Only highlight of our trip.

Next night ADR at O'Hana-7:15pm. Now this is the one that did it in for me. We get there, they had our ressie mixed up and hadnt added our DN even though I had confirmed the problem was fixed before we left ( at one time they had us for 4 on ALL of our Adr's but CRO supposedly fixed it.) Well it was a 35 minute wait after check in- I wasnt upset about it at all. Finally the buzzer goes off and Cousin Kimmie comes and gets us. We are sitted in one of the worst seats there is. Right at the hallway where they park the strollers and people are walking by,at the very last table in the corner.You couldnt see or hear any of the entertainment and then to top it off the service was horrible and the food was awful ( well the potatoes and the pudding were good)The meat was cold and dry, our server never brought us refills and the meat we only got twice, once when we called her over while she was fawning over the table at the front ( they got drinks over and over and two ppl bring them skewers)and another server came over and gave us two burnt ends left on his skewer. In two hours we saw our server four times and that was ,seating, once with appys/drinks, once with the meat after we asked for her, and then when she brought the dessert and the CHECK at the same time. We asked for refills twice from her and never got them.I was in tears when we left, I had built it up so much to my DH< DD< DN and then it was horrendous. BTW-she only got a $10 tip on a $100 bill, hopefully she understood why, and after waiting for 30 minutes for her to come back to get the check I had to give it to another server!

1900 Park Faire was ok. We had first ressie for dinner and DD was asked to "officially open the dinner" but unfortunately we had to decline as she is autisitc and all the ppl watching her would have flipped her out. The food was GREAT, I will admit that, our server was awesome, but the part that bugged us was the lines to get AT the food. It was a 10 minute line everytime to get something. They pack you into that little area like rats. We saw Perla and Suzy a few times and both Cindy and Charming, but for over $120 plus tip it hardly seemed worth it.

I ended up cancelling our ADR's for Biergarten, Hollywood and Vine w/JoJo, Breakfast at Ohana's,Akerhaus and Boma.It seemed like we were spending alot of money for not spectacular food or horrible service. If you ask my husband, and I *almost* agree, Cosmic Rays was his favorite!We ending up eating at places like Captain Cooks & Pop's foodcourt and were perfectly happy with them, I didnt feel like I was getting "ripped off" per se or shoddy service.

Guess what I am wondering am I the only one who feels the TS are a waste?? Dont get us wrong, we are "foodies" to a point,and we would get tired of burgers very quickly, but I dont want to feel like I am paying Morton's price to eat at McDonalds!

 

[Cruz Family]

Sorry things went so bad for you. On our trips we have had very good luck with all our ADR's, nothing more then a short wait. I have to tell you the restaurants that you went to are not exactly our favorites anyway, we think they're okay but nothing great. I don't know how you feel about taking your kids to more upscale restaurants, but I would recomend LeCellier, Cali Grill, and Jiko. Those are our three favorites.
I say next time give it another try and see what happens!

 

[firemanslady09]

We had no waits for food at 1900. Perhaps because you were the first seating everyone was going up at the same time? We didnt have the best time at chef mickeys either. We are trying again next trip. Good Luck on your next trip. I hope you have a better time.

 

[Oofies]

Sorry to hear your story. I have not done 1900 park, but Chef Mickey's - we plan on having to wait. We had to wait for 40min for Boma as well a few years ago (but it was worth it).
Biergarten- we have never had to wait more than 15 min and that was without a PS. We have never had bad service there either.

 

[Boncho]

We never make ADR's. We go to counter service places and also eat at the Pop Century food court. The only exception to this was last year we went to Planet Hollywood for Mother's Day (good food, no wait, excellent service).
My son and I don't want to spend two or three hours eating when we can have a nice meal at say, Columbia Harbour House, in about 30 - 45 minutes if we take our time - we go upstairs where it is usually nice, quiet and relaxing.
So, to me, any TS is a waste of time unless you are going for a special occasion - no offense intended to those who like them, it's just a personal preference thing. Some people go to table service restaurants to relax, but we take a break in the afternoon to go back to the resort to spend some time in the pool , then we are back to the parks.

 

[Local_Girl]

First of all, sorry you had such bad experiences at Chef Mickey's and 'Ohana!

We've done both for dinner...CM was okay...didn't care for the food, but the character interaction and liveliness of the restaurant was fun. Our kids enjoyed it. We loved 'Ohana...been there twice. First time we were in that aisle way near the entrance area, away from the grill and the entertainment (is that where you were?) but our server was really great and we loved the food. The next time we were in a prime spot, near a window and all of the kid's activities.

I understand what you mean about the TS vs CS question. For us, the TS dinners are a BIG thing, because we NEVER pay that much for a meal for our family of 4 outside of WDW. I'm always worried (and agonize over every TS decision) that it won't be "worth it" to my family. We're usually on a tight budget on our trips, so our TS are limited and I want those experiences to be great. So, my plan is to choose TS that get pretty consistent good reviews, eat at "off times" when possible to avoid the most crowded times, and to be prepared to be assertive (SO not easy for me!!) if things aren't going well (like waiting over an hour to be seated beyond your ADR!).

We've also had some good experiences at CS places--Cosmic Rays is one of our favorites too! Hope you have better experiences next time (we'll be there at Christmas time '07 too). Good luck and here's some pixie dust...

 

[my4kids]

Since we were on the dining plan, I didn't fret so much over how I was getting shotty food for the money. If I had been paying out of pocket for some of the meals we had while we were there I would have been upset! I figured the cost, and realized for my family, the DP was going to cost about the same or less than what I would pay for CS throughout the week, so I went with it. Places like LeCellier were the only places where we were actually served what I would consider food. And even then, on these boards, it is made to sound like it is "upscale" It is still in an amusement park dealing with high volume everyday, and I would consider it on par with a family steakhouse in my city.

 

[WDWFRV]

Ww are planning our return trip to WDW, December 2006 was our very first trip, and I feel so lost because I am not planning ANY ADR's this time. I just felt all the TS were mainly a waste. Here is what happenned.
Our first night there we had a dinner ADR at Chef Mickey's. I was so excited about it.Well we get there at 6;45pm, our ressie was at 7.Well they take our name and 60 minutes later we still havent been called back. SO I go back in check in, the lady gives me a funny look and says it wont be long. 30 minutes later we havent been called back, kids are starving,so we leave. How can having an ADR make you wait over an hour past your ressie?

Next morning is CP-805am- I have no complaints about it, food was excellant, no wait, service was good, characters interaction was excellant. Only highlight of our trip.

Next night ADR at O'Hana-7:15pm. Now this is the one that did it in for me. We get there, they had our ressie mixed up and hadnt added our DN even though I had confirmed the problem was fixed before we left ( at one time they had us for 4 on ALL of our Adr's but CRO supposedly fixed it.) Well it was a 35 minute wait after check in- I wasnt upset about it at all. Finally the buzzer goes off and Cousin Kimmie comes and gets us. We are sitted in one of the worst seats there is. Right at the hallway where they park the strollers and people are walking by,at the very last table in the corner.You couldnt see or hear any of the entertainment and then to top it off the service was horrible and the food was awful ( well the potatoes and the pudding were good)The meat was cold and dry, our server never brought us refills and the meat we only got twice, once when we called her over while she was fawning over the table at the front ( they got drinks over and over and two ppl bring them skewers)and another server came over and gave us two burnt ends left on his skewer. In two hours we saw our server four times and that was ,seating, once with appys/drinks, once with the meat after we asked for her, and then when she brought the dessert and the CHECK at the same time. We asked for refills twice from her and never got them.I was in tears when we left, I had built it up so much to my DH< DD< DN and then it was horrendous. BTW-she only got a $10 tip on a $100 bill, hopefully she understood why, and after waiting for 30 minutes for her to come back to get the check I had to give it to another server!

1900 Park Faire was ok. We had first ressie for dinner and DD was asked to "officially open the dinner" but unfortunately we had to decline as she is autisitc and all the ppl watching her would have flipped her out. The food was GREAT, I will admit that, our server was awesome, but the part that bugged us was the lines to get AT the food. It was a 10 minute line everytime to get something. They pack you into that little area like rats. We saw Perla and Suzy a few times and both Cindy and Charming, but for over $120 plus tip it hardly seemed worth it.

I ended up cancelling our ADR's for Biergarten, Hollywood and Vine w/JoJo, Breakfast at Ohana's,Akerhaus and Boma.It seemed like we were spending alot of money for not spectacular food or horrible service. If you ask my husband, and I *almost* agree, Cosmic Rays was his favorite!We ending up eating at places like Captain Cooks & Pop's foodcourt and were perfectly happy with them, I didnt feel like I was getting "ripped off" per se or shoddy service.

Guess what I am wondering am I the only one who feels the TS are a waste?? Dont get us wrong, we are "foodies" to a point,and we would get tired of burgers very quickly, but I dont want to feel like I am paying Morton's price to eat at McDonalds!

Well my dear I understand perfectly what you are saying. My best experience with restaurants on my recent trip to WDW were at Olive Garden (44$ for a family of four compared to 88.00$ for supper and 40.00 for lunch, thank god that we ate breakfast in the resort and a couple of times we got some take out at a chinese restaurant which was sooo good) and TGIF just 10 minutes from our resort. I really enjoyed Ohana for Breakfast but it is very expensive dining at WDW. Almost our of our budget went on food. If you have a car, go out for dinner.

 

[scrapbookworm]

My take on it is you may have made too many TS ressies. We did the same thing on our trip in May 2005. We at ate Coral Reef and San Angel Inn (on the same day!), and neither were good. We ended up cancelling the rest of our ADRs b/c we were wasting time in sit-down restaurants for almost every meal. Time that could have been spent on rides. Now, we only make 2 ADRs for each trip, at the most.

 

[billysarmywife]

Since we were on the dining plan, I didn't fret so much over how I was getting shotty food for the money. If I had been paying out of pocket for some of the meals we had while we were there I would have been upset! I figured the cost, and realized for my family, the DP was going to cost about the same or less than what I would pay for CS throughout the week, so I went with it. Places like LeCellier were the only places where we were actually served what I would consider food. And even then, on these boards, it is made to sound like it is "upscale" It is still in an amusement park dealing with high volume everyday, and I would consider it on par with a family steakhouse in my city.

Well said!!! I agree with you 150%, this is why we get the dining plan as well. I figure if my family ate at CS for the day it would cost as much as the DP. So we get the DP and we can eat at some different places, try some new things and I don't feel so bad about the cost. If I where paying out of pocket for the TS places I would be really disappointed. But being on DP I don't feel like it is a bad deal.

 

[AnninIowa]

I agree with your feelings! We did the dining plan during our October 2005 trip, and felt like the majority of the vacation was spent eating, waiting to eat, trying to find the place we had reservations at to eat, trying to use up credits...

My favorite places we ate ended up being Earl of Sandwich and Wolfgang Puck Express. We are only planning 2 table service meals this trip, and only Wolfgang Puck's Cafe required a ressie (the other is Big River Grille). Otherwise we'll be getting by with snacks and counter service. We just aren't big eaters and by looking at menu prices know we can come in UNDER the $78 the dining plan would have cost us per day.

We are also people who retire early - no staying up for fireworks even! So for us, taking severl hour out of the day just to eat was a major waste of time. However, I totally see where others LOVE the plan and make the most of it, especially if you have kids and pool the credits for the character meals.

To each their own!!

 

[drag n' fly]

People really need to be more assertive when receiving shoddy service. This is what we do when we go to a restaurant up here as we are always entertaining corporate clients.

1. Arrive 10 minutes prior to ressie. Confirm reservation with host. We always ask what is the anticipated wait time for our reserved table. It is at that point we make the crucial decision to stay or leave. If we stay and we have not yet been seated after the wait time we then ask the host for a table. If she cannot find one we always request to see the manager immediately. I would say 9 times out of ten we are seated immediately. If they do not have a seat available inform them you will not be returning again and we always follow up with a phone call the next day. The reality is you have no control over the people dining in the restaurant so one must always have a backup plan. In this case try to have a cs back up plan if all else fails.

2.As for Ohanas it is all about what you are prepared to accept. The minute you were taken to your table you knew it was unacceptable. Before you even sat down I would have said this is unacceptable and asked how long it would be for another table and asked to speak to the manager. When you have hungry kids this is almost impossible and sometimes reality dictates you have to take the last available table(believe me I know). Even so you should have spoken up much sooner about your service. Never ask to speak to the server always request to speak to the manager or the head chef depending on the circumstances.
This is your hard earned money and it deserves to be spent wisely. Problems in a restaurant cannot be addressed if they are not brought to someone's attention. You have just as much right to enjoy a quality meal as the folks next to you ordering drinks. In this case I would have left no tip and in very clear terms told her why. She is not your friend she is paid to work for you and provide a quality experience. On the flip side exceptional service means generous tips, repeat service and sometimes free hockey tickets for our most favourite servers.

In the instance of Park Faire you really have no control over crowds etc. In this case I would have brought it to the attention of the manager at the time of payment and explained your concern and told them you felt you did not get your moneys worth due to the lines. Most times they will reduce your bill or in a ddp case not charged you full credit. If they dont do not return and do not leave a tip.

I hope some of this helps and remember you are the customer! Sometimes restaurants need to be reminded of that.

 

[Duchie]

I understand how you feel. This is the one thing that bugs DH about WDW more than anything else. We expect to pay a bit more for food when we're there, and we're OK with that. But to pay excessive prices for REALLY bad food just makes him

Our experience has been that the food anywhere in the parks is OK, but nothing really spectacular. There are 5 of us, so even CS meals can get expensive. We've tried TS meals, but since we've got a picky eater or two in the bunch, it's more of a hassle than it's worth. Plus with the dining plan being so popular, more people at the TS places means more waits, and less time for rides. We'll usually schedule only one character meal per trip, and even then we never expect great food (we figure we're paying more for the experience than the food anyway).

I agree with another poster that maybe you had too many ADRs at TS places. Maybe next time if you only had a few it would help.

 

[Jill Schwartz]

Totally agree! Our first time at Disney we only did one TS, the Biergarten. It was Xmas time and the kids got to participate in the dancing, etc. and since it was buffet style everyone found something to eat, and fairly quickly once we were seated. The second time we did NO TS. As you said it takes way too much time, and very often the timing you think it good, doesn't work with your plans once you get there.
Last time we did Hollywood and Vine which the entire family enjoyed. Again, buffet style with lots of choices so everyone was happy and no waiting to be brought your food.
I too get sick of burgers and fries, but if you get a book like the Unofficial Guide you will find other options (we love Columbia Harbour House, and Cosmic Rays is good, but always seems crowded. Lots of folks seem to not notice CHH.) Also, we very often bring "healthy" sandwiches in with us which we eat while we walk around. Then we feel that both calorie wise and dollar wise we can partake in some of the special Disney treats we don't get at home (Dole Whips, Japanese ice, SchoolBread, etc)
For our upcoming trip we are going to try taking the boat from MK to Whispering Canyon for the kids, and maybe Askerhaus at Epcot. But thats it. I've decided to only do TS at Disney if its someplace "unusual" as we have lots of decent restaurants at much better prices at home.
Before your next trip, get the Unofficial Guide to Disney. Some folks say they are harsh on Disney food, but I've found them to be pretty darn accurate.
Jill

 

[KimR]

We've never had a problem with unreasonable waits at table service restaurants. (with an ADR, I would consider anything over 30 minutes unreasonable). We make ADRs for dinner each and every night and the food is one of the things we most look forward to on our WDW trips. Some of our favorites are Brown Derby, Artist Point, Flying Fish, Portobello Yacht Club, and Coral Reef (this one gets mixed reviews but we love it). We've had reasonable waits and wonderful food at all of these restaurants. I've heard Citrico's is excellent also and that one is on my list to try. Maybe you could try one of these - I don't think you'll be disappointed.

 

[handicap18]

We've done the DDP twice and both times it worked out great for us. We are doing it again when we go after Thanksgiving.

At Chef Mickey's in '05 we got there over an hour before our actual reservation and they sat us early. We enjoyed the food and the characters. Crystal Palace we also ate and really enjoyed (only place ate at for both trips and are doing it again this year). I think the longest wait we had was 15 or 20 minutes. We ate at a few places where the food was good, but overall we didn't particularly care for (ie: Liberty Tree Tavern {liked the buffet's better} and Hollywood & Vine).

We will be doing CP and Chef Mickey's again, along with the Princess Storybook Dinner in Norway, Boma's at AKL, probably Mamma Melrose and 2 others. Maybe one at our hotel to be less hectic and maybe a lunch, we still have 4 months to decide.

Sorry you had problems on your last trip. Unfortunately when dealing with 2-3000 guests per day per resturant (not all are that much but many are) there are going to be some bad experiences.

Here's hoping that the next trip will bring magical dinners along with the rest of your trip.

 

[deb123453]

we have been to dw twice now and going again in may. we have the dining plan that way we know we don't need to save up extra money for food as well. we have gone to chef mickeys both times and plan to go again my dd loves it. thats the only one we have done before the others are new ones. we are trying whispering canyon and 50's primetime they both look like they will be fun. then coral reef and cinderella's royal table (just to say we ate in the castle). i would never pay that much money on my own but since we have the plan might as well try something new.

 

[fizz13]

Now I am a big fan of making ADRs and having a plan, but if I had the experience you did, i would feel exactly the same way. What you could do is make a couple for your next trip, but don't put pressure on yourself to get there. if you are in the mood for your ADR at the time then by all means go along. If however, you are not up to it, then forget about it, and like another poster said, have a backup plan of a CS nearby if the wait is too long etc. Also don't be afraid to speak up for yourself like another poster said, good advice.
I really hope you don't give up on WDW TS altogether as some of the restaurants are terrific and fun, its just finding the right ones Good luck and sorry you had these experiences,

 

[docburgo]

Sounds awful - puts me off coming !!!

 

[docburgo]

Some very good advice and tips

Thanks