Akl...mara

[snyderla]

Can someone please tell me what floor Mara Food Court is on? Did you eat there often? What is a good, meaning least crowded time, to go for breakfast there? What time do they close?

Thanks,
Lori

July 22-27th ...can't wait

 

[sharoncity]

The Mara (all 3 restaurants for that matter) is on the first floor. Quite close to the pool. You can only enter Mara from the outside, but I think the walkway was covered. We enjoyed the food very much. For things from the grill, you place your order they give you a ticket. When you pay, you get a little numbered tent and they bring your order to your table. Sometimes they were looking for me before I even sat down. I thought the food was very good. DH and kids stayed with the basics - chicken tenders, hamburgers, etc. I tried the African Stew and one of the nightly specials. All was excellent. Had breakfast there one morning, really enjoyed the egg sandwich on croissant. We went at various times of the day, never really hit it too crowded. I was usually down there between 7:30 and 8:30 am for coffee refills - plenty of tables available and lines of only 2 or 3 people. I believe it closed at 11pm (this was late Apr/early May) They also had 5 or 6 tables outside for dining. Inside they had a TV that ran disney movies/shows continually. Enjoy!

 

[disneyohdisney]

We just returned from AKL last week, and really enjoyed the Mara food area. IMHO one of the best food court at Disney. Nice folks working there, a little higher quality foods offered (including some African-style offerings), great snacks, nice coffee bar, some complete "quick grab" food packs, wines, African coffee beans for sale, etc. If you buy your food inside and get a number, you can sit outside and they will bring the food out there to you. All in all a nice place.

(And, unlike the CSR food court, they don't charge you a high "service charge/gratuity" for all this great service!)

 

[Gillian]

I think it's actually the second floor. It's the same level as the pool.

I was there for breakfast at 6:30-7 & it wasn't crowded, but I'd say the resort in general wasn't crowded. I noticed that things started picking up around 8. The Magic Kingdom opened at 9, so maybe people were grabbing breakfast on their way out?

Very nice place!

 

[A1A1]

You can get to Mara by going outside to the pool and then turning to the right. I don't believe you can get to it from inside the resort.

The foods were interesting there, for example, the chicken salad had a curry flavor. As I said, it was interesting, but I didn't like the curry with the chicken salad. I thought this food court was VERY expensive. A little bit of fruit was extremely expensive. As in most places, the healthier the food, the more expensive it seems.

There are some seats outside, and they bring the food orders out to you. I remember there being some pretty aggressive birds there. They needed more seating, especially outside, for lunch, as this is the only place to get lunch at AKL. Get to lunch early if you plan to eat lunch.

The managers there were very nice. I remember having a problem, not theirs, but mine, and the manager was so kind to me. She really helped me work the problem out.

 

[ead79]

We went to Mara a few times on our last trip (usually just to refill our mugs) and ate lunch there once. My mom had a fried shrimp plate that was delicious and I had a sugar cane chicken (which turned out to be more spicey than sweet) that I didn't love. The Mara is decorated very attractively and the staff was very friendly.

 

[connor69]

We didn't like mara...and in fact we love akl but are considering not going there because of the food court. When we were there they didn't have hamburgers. With our family of 6 kids we wanted more kid friendly food. We did have pizza and maybe nuggets but there was not a lot to choose from. We liked Wl food court alot better. Breakfast didn't have alot to choose from....a few donuts, bagels etc. expensive fruit etc.

 

[izzarelli]

We had a surprisingly good breakfast & lunch at Mara. The salad was one of the freshest I've ever had on WDW property & the soup was excellent! I was a little surprised it wasn't bigger though (the food court, not the salad). We were there in value season & it was pretty empty, but I can imagine it would be a madhouse in the summer.

 

[colcol2]

We were there 6-4 thru 6-10. You push 1 on the elevator for the restaurants and pool. To go to busses for parks you push 3. The Mara closed at 11:00 pm when we were there. Don't remember when it opened. When I was there between 7 & 7:30 am was no waiting to pay. But things really picked up 7:45-8:30 am. They only had one checker most of the time when I was wanting to pay and the wait in line seemed long for me. Only bought donuts for breakfast. I wasn't very impressed with this food court (expensive... but it was sufficient), I was spoiled with Coronado Spgs last year. Mara did a huge serving of mac & cheese tho. Also, fill your icecream cup yourself and load it up! The hot chocolate was the pitts. Take along some choc powder to add to it. Coffee & tea strong (my opinion). The half chicken dinner came with a seasoned rice & vege stuff, it was ok, but not my thing... My favorite was the brownie. Try to take some stuff with you--Pringles, Goldfish crackers, oreo cookies, that kind of stuff is costly... Not a good food court for breakfast. The other 2 restaurants were out of our price range. They played Toy Story and Tarzan the 6 days we were there. One morning the coffee machine broke down and there were 15 people waiting! But the decaf machine was working. They got it fixed but I just thought it was humorous to see how many people besides me gotta have their morning coffee fix. You can take all the creams & sugars you need. They put the dressing on the Cesar Salad & drenched it, so next time we asked for it on the side, but the request didn't make it around and it got dowsed anyway. It was real convenient to get drinks while at the pool. Oh, if you drink liquor, they are required to sell one per person and they have to see each person. (you can't buy 2 alone).

 

[DisneyMim]

We've been to AKL 2X and have had breakfast at Mara most mornings. We didn't find it expensive at all and they did have a variety of things to choose from. My kids would have waffles or french toast, I usually had a bagel or English muffin and hubby always gets yogurt and things like that. We are not early morning people so we would get there around 9-10 and it wasn't too crowded. Oh, I always buy some fruit cups in the morning too for all of us. Mara always had a lot of them to pick from. We also had lunch a couple oof times, one time on each visit, and my family enjoyed our lunch by the pool. Kids got chicken fingers and hubby and I had salads, etc.

Have Fun!!!