ADRs; do you always know? Do you, would you PPO?

[rasadkowski]

Hey everyone!

Just looking for opinions here. This is only our second family trip to wdw. I am by no means an experienced planner, but, I can say that I spent every free moment reading the wonderful threads and entertaining responses here all last year and this year. I love it, and have learned A LOT. Thanks to all the veterans that are always there to answer questions.

Like most, I am really trying to plan a great trip for our family. I plan so far in advance for ADR day, and I always think I have all my ducks in a row, and then once I'm "finished," I suddenly come up with a new scenario that I "need" to plan for. And the ADR search starts again.....Is this normal?? Wondering if people cancel simply because of cancelled trip, or are they like me, making changes to their plans.

My second question is I always thought PPO breakfasts would be nice for our family....We are morning people, and I do like walking through the park before the masses. But, on our last trip, I definitely felt the rush to get through breakfast to get on FEA. As it turned out, Epcot dropped the ropes earlier, and although we were the first seated and out of Akershus, there was a 30 min wait at FEA at 8:50. (this was Dec)
So, I was wondering, to all the experienced travellers, do you PPO? If we want to really get on Soarin' at rope drop, (we have 2 kids) would you try to find a GG PPO breakfast? or would you prefer to just rope drop? Trying to not obsess over securing a GG breakfast....
Thanks, all. Happy Sunday
..posted in dining thread just in case..

 

[glassslippergirl]

I'll start with your second question: We don't do PPO meals to get on rides. First, that is one expensive breakfast, and if we're paying for it, we're going to enjoy it, not scarf it down. Second, as you've mentioned, there's no guarantees that you're going to get a line that was truly worth the cost of the breakfast. If we must go on a ride we can't get FPs for, we prefer to RD. Rope dropping, in general, is a challenge for us-- almost always the goal but hardly ever the reality as mornings are a challenge for DH. However, when we need to, we get to the park about 30 mins before it opens and have a strategy for getting directly to the ride. Honestly, though, if Soarin is the goal, as SDFP is pretty likely in all but the most crowded times.

To your first question, people's plans are constantly changing, part of the problem with making such specific plans so far out (Seriously, do you know what you're going to eat six months out in your real life? I don't know what I'm making for dinner tonight). However, this was even a problem in the days when FPs were paper and made day of-- I often gave FPs away to people entering a park because we decided to hop or leave before the FP time. Trips get cancelled, people change their minds, kids get tired and need a nap, adults get tired and need a nap, it gets hot and the pool beckons, etc. Most people's plans change a thousand times. You know what they say about the best laid plans of mice and men? Maybe the mice were Mickey and Minnie.

 

[10CJ]

I don't expect to make ADRs at 180 and never come back to them. I expect to make changes as more things open up and once I have my Fastpasses. We went in Oct one year and it seemed Disney had not open all the Via Napoli dinner slots at 180. A few months later a ton of times opened up.

We have had good success with BOG and Garden Grill PPO. Last trip we were able to get on Soarin with a minimal wait after a PPO Garden Grill.

Was the 30 minute wait for FEA the actual wait or the posted wait? I would not be surprised if the post wait time was inflated for that ride.

 

[rasadkowski]

Thanks so much for your thoughtful replies...I really do appreciate it.
Yes, the FEA wait time was posted at 30 min. And, from what I remember, we actually waited a bit more..maybe 40? I was very surprised. We were for sure the first ones seated at Akershus, and the first to see all the princesses, and we were finished around 845. I was very surprised. I knew that it was definitely not a guaranteed walk on, but most of the reports did say that they made it before the RD crowd. you never know

 

[rasadkowski]

I'll start with your second question: We don't do PPO meals to get on rides. First, that is one expensive breakfast, and if we're paying for it, we're going to enjoy it, not scarf it down. Second, as you've mentioned, there's no guarantees that you're going to get a line that was truly worth the cost of the breakfast. If we must go on a ride we can't get FPs for, we prefer to RD. Rope dropping, in general, is a challenge for us-- almost always the goal but hardly ever the reality as mornings are a challenge for DH. However, when we need to, we get to the park about 30 mins before it opens and have a strategy for getting directly to the ride. Honestly, though, if Soarin is the goal, as SDFP is pretty likely in all but the most crowded times.

To your first question, people's plans are constantly changing, part of the problem with making such specific plans so far out (Seriously, do you know what you're going to eat six months out in your real life? I don't know what I'm making for dinner tonight). However, this was even a problem in the days when FPs were paper and made day of-- I often gave FPs away to people entering a park because we decided to hop or leave before the FP time. Trips get cancelled, people change their minds, kids get tired and need a nap, adults get tired and need a nap, it gets hot and the pool beckons, etc. Most people's plans change a thousand times. You know what they say about the best laid plans of mice and men? Maybe the mice were Mickey and Minnie.

I don't expect to make ADRs at 180 and never come back to them. I expect to make changes as more things open up and once I have my Fastpasses. We went in Oct one year and it seemed Disney had not open all the Via Napoli dinner slots at 180. A few months later a ton of times opened up.

We have had good success with BOG and Garden Grill PPO. Last trip we were able to get on Soarin with a minimal wait after a PPO Garden Grill.

Was the 30 minute wait for FEA the actual wait or the posted wait? I would not be surprised if the post wait time was inflated for that ride.

Thanks so much for your thoughtful replies...I really do appreciate it.
Yes, the FEA wait time was posted at 30 min. And, from what I remember, we actually waited a bit more..maybe 40? I was very surprised. We were for sure the first ones seated at Akershus, and the first to see all the princesses, and we were finished around 845. I was very surprised. I knew that it was definitely not a guaranteed walk on, but most of the reports did say that they made it before the RD crowd. you never know

 

[MickeyWaffles]

1. I always end up adjusting things particularly around FP time. I usually book one ADR for every day until FP day. Then once I get our FP, I cancel a few. We don't like having too many ADRs and making too many commitments. I actually just cancelled two for our Sept trip just because I'm afraid to commit ourselves to so many (now down to 3 in a 7 day trip lol) We also have a group of 10 people so it is sometimes hard to switch around too much for the places we want to go to.


2. I like PPO breakfasts because I generally like the earlier seatings particularly for character meals/buffets. In some cases the earlier seatings at certain restaurants are less chaotic, cleaner and the food is fresher. I also prefer breakfast food at some of these places to the lunch or dinner offerings.

I am not a fan of PPO breakfasts for the purposes of getting on a popular ride quickly. Disney can change the hours at any time and all of a sudden (as you experienced) you would have been better off rope dropping. We also like to get to the park in the morning but do not like rushing to rides anyways so we always slowly make our way through the park. I'm a weirdo who would rather wait for a ride later but enjoy the sights, sounds and smells of the early morning park time before hopping on a ride

 

[robndani]

I think character buffet PPO is always a little tough. We've only done BOG that way and even with an 8:00 ADR we still were about 50 people back in line for 7DMT! Some people just book reservation and suck up the $10 per person for the chance to do rides. We were able to ride it twice in a row before the masses made their way back there.

Unless there's some new ride with crazy wait times that we've never been on but really want to I probably wouldn't do it for the sake of rides. I would do it for the chance to stroll through the parks without them being crazy crowded or just to jumpstart our day.

If you don't want to feel rushed on vacation (which we don't) then don't set yourself up to feel that way! Enjoy!

 

[rasadkowski]

1. I always end up adjusting things particularly around FP time. I usually book one ADR for every day until FP day. Then once I get our FP, I cancel a few. We don't like having too many ADRs and making too many commitments. I actually just cancelled two for our Sept trip just because I'm afraid to commit ourselves to so many (now down to 3 in a 7 day trip lol) We also have a group of 10 people so it is sometimes hard to switch around too much for the places we want to go to.


2. I like PPO breakfasts because I generally like the earlier seatings particularly for character meals/buffets. In some cases the earlier seatings at certain restaurants are less chaotic, cleaner and the food is fresher. I also prefer breakfast food at some of these places to the lunch or dinner offerings.

I am not a fan of PPO breakfasts for the purposes of getting on a popular ride quickly. Disney can change the hours at any time and all of a sudden (as you experienced) you would have been better off rope dropping. We also like to get to the park in the morning but do not like rushing to rides anyways so we always slowly make our way through the park. I'm a weirdo who would rather wait for a ride later but enjoy the sights, sounds and smells of the early morning park time before hopping on a ride

I think character buffet PPO is always a little tough. We've only done BOG that way and even with an 8:00 ADR we still were about 50 people back in line for 7DMT! Some people just book reservation and suck up the $10 per person for the chance to do rides. We were able to ride it twice in a row before the masses made their way back there.

Unless there's some new ride with crazy wait times that we've never been on but really want to I probably wouldn't do it for the sake of rides. I would do it for the chance to stroll through the parks without them being crazy crowded or just to jumpstart our day.

If you don't want to feel rushed on vacation (which we don't) then don't set yourself up to feel that way! Enjoy!

Thank you, both, so much. These experiences are very helpful. I really appreciate all of this information!!!

 

[srauseo]

I agree that one of the major benefits of the PPO breakfast is it's a little bit of nicer experience than rope drop. We are morning people anyway so it's not a challenge to get up and out the door. If you are one of the first tables in everything is usually clean and fresh. We also don't find it a challenge or that we are rushing to get through the meal in 40 minutes. And I've had great luck with SDMT and decent luck with FEA and TSMM. YMMV.

 

[vinotinto]

1. If we have planned a trip more than 6 months out, I will make ADRs at 180 days, but we don't always plan trips that far in advance. Regardless, we will move our ADRs plans around depending on what Disney announces closer to the date. This is our first trip with hoppers, in the past we have never had hoppers, so we would definitely change ADRs depending on the days.

2. We did PPO breakfasts when the kids were little including: Cape May (while staying at BC/YC), Ohana (while staying at Poly), 1900 PF (while staying at Poly), The Wave (while staying at WL, Crystal Palace, Tusker House, Akershus (before there was FEA, so can't comment on that). They used to get up at 5:30 - 6:00 am ready to go! It allowed us to start our day with a nice breakfast and we were up anyway. I don't think it gave us an advantage over the rope drop folks (except maybe TH for Safari), but there is value in having a nice breakfast.

 

[DisneyWishes14]

I make ADR's at 180 days out but I'm finding more and more (particularly with our upcoming August trip), park hours hadn't been updated, ROL and Pandora hours and FP+ hadn't been released, etc. etc., so I'm always making speculative ADR's and plans and then tweaking them as I go. As long as I get our "must-do's" in (for this trip it was MK dessert party, HDDR, Pixar concert and Pandora), I'm good. I did tweak our AK day to accommodate the fact that I couldn't get a FOP FP+, so, instead of doing an ROL dining package, I got a ROL FP+ instead. So within 180 days, I dropped the package and hopefully some family was able to pick that up. I'm not in a position where I need to line up a BBB appt. with a CRT meal, so I count myself lucky!

We've done two PPO breakfasts and they were lovely! (CP before they moved the opening ceremony in MK and H&V), but we did it for the breakfast, not to ride anything early (it was nice to be in the parks and restaurants early before the crowds came, especially as the meals are buffets). I wouldn't want to pay all of that money for a breakfast and feel stressed to get into the park.

 

[jkh36619]

Don't count on rides with a character PPO breakfast. And with the money you're spending, why would you rush it. When my kid was little, we would do a character breakfast about 1030ish and our usual RD for the rides.

Our MK example plan would be:

RD Seven Dwarves Peter Pan and Big Thunder or Splash(whichever had shortest queue).

Look at queues, maybe have time for a HM or Small World.

Late breakfast at CP or CRT. Then either:
A. Burn 3 FPs then wing the rest of the afternoon or
B. Head back to swim and have 3 FPs scheduled for a P. M. park.

 

[DizDaD7]

We've never done a PPO. And as others have stated, that it's an expensive way to get on Soarin.. True you have to eat, but at that cost, I'd say no, but to each his/her own.

I do enjoy making the ADR's though...After 12 trips , it should technically get easier, but no, it gets harder...We have a few fav's that we frequent, but always look for something new to try...And yes we change midway through sometimes as well.

Eg. The news that just came out with DVC/AP 30% off of some SIG. TS. That's enough to make me want to change our originals... Either way you go enjoy what you pick

 

[KittyKitty]

DisneyWishes14,

You got me wondering when when the hours were last updated. Looks like 7/18

https://media.disneywebcontent.com/StaticFiles/ParkHours/WDW_TAC_2017aug.pdf

Even my Nov. hours were updated.

 

[whiporee]

If you're looking to get an edge on the morning at MK, I really recommend EMM. I know it's pricey, but not too bad compared to a character breakfast at CP, and it's the only WDW thing that practically guarantees the ability to get multiple rides on popular things before the crowds appear. The BOG PPO crowd watched us do three turns on 7DMT before they were allowed in the line, and with Disney selling that option, I expect the time enforcement will remain that dramatic.

I don't think PPOs at Epcot help vey much if at all these days. Soarin' and FEA (at 10) were RD walk-ons when I went in July -- a PPO at Garden Grill might have saved me 5 minutes, or let me get to TT a little faster, but I don't think it would have made much difference.

 

[tinkerbella16]

Last year we had an 8am Akershus breakfast - we don't book this for the ride, it is one of our favorite character breakfasts. When we finished at 9am, we walked right on FEA and we did not rush through our meal. We were also there during a time (week of Labor Day) when the crowds are very low so that could be why there wasn't already a wait. We love PPO meals because we don't want to spend too much time in the restaurants during regular park hours and we are early risers when we are in WDW.