Anytime Dining...Oh how I wish DCL would do this

[Meredisney]

Let me start off by saying that DCL is my favorite cruise line. I have been on Carnivel, Royal Caribbean, Princess and Celebrity. I guess it's just the pixie dust that makes DCL my Favorite!!!!!

Anyway the one thing I REALLY dont care for on DCL is the set dining times. A recent thread about which dining time (1st or 2nd seating) you perfer got me thinking that maybe the new Cruise Ships would adopt the idea of "Anytime Dining". It's so nice to be able to just go down to the diningroom whenever you are hungry. On Royal Caribbean they make you pay extra for it, but on Princess it's free. And for the guests that like the traditional set dining times, that is still an option.

Just wondering if anyone else has experienced being able to eat "anytime" they want and how you liked it in comparison to the set dining times?

 

[ppiew]

We have had anytime dining on Silversea and on Regent, but both were mostly adults - few kids. Although, I am with you - I would LOVE it! Interesting though on SS, when the dining room opened there was ALWAYS a line waiting to get in! Even though they COULD dine later - it seemed many wanted to at the moment the room opened. Go figure!

 

[mmouse37]

Since I never experienced it, I can't really say if I would enjoy it or not, but I do LOVE the way it is now but I am open for new things and would guess if it is very popular on other lines that DCL may try this on their new ships. Time will tell!!

MJ

 

[kcashner]

My first thought is that it wouldn't work well with the dining "shows," but over the years and depending on the cruise we've had more and less of those. How do you run the Animator's color changing show, the "small world" flag presentation, the pirate parade, etc. is people are coming and going at all times? And I wouldn't be thrilled with my server running off to do a show when I'd just been seated and hadn't received any food yet!

 

[SplashMountainManiac]

I can tell you from first hand experience that there is no bigger disaster than anytime dining. It can get annoying to have a specific time to eat, but anytime dining can make meals last up to 3 hours, and sometimes you don't even get served. The decline in service is also terrible. It is well worth a small loss in flexibility to have the excellent dinner service Disney provides.

 

[TnRobin]

I mirror SplashMountain's response. With Anytime dining it is like eating at home. If you show up at a popular time, then you have to sit and wait an eternity to be seated. The service inside seemed to be rather disjointed - not the well oiled machine I have come to expect with DCL. We ended up not eating in the dining rooms much, but having quick service stuff because the dining rooms were just not worth the hassle.

I had not thought about the shows. That was a good observation too. I would expect that everyone will show up at about the same time as they do now so that they can make the shows.

 

[lbgraves]

My first thought is that it wouldn't work well with the dining "shows," but over the years and depending on the cruise we've had more and less of those. How do you run the Animator's color changing show, the "small world" flag presentation, the pirate parade, etc. is people are coming and going at all times? And I wouldn't be thrilled with my server running off to do a show when I'd just been seated and hadn't received any food yet!

I have to agree with this. What I like about the dining times on DCL is that I don't have to worry about when we are going to go to dinner, it is already set. I don't like the idea of getting everyone dressed to go wait in a line to sit down for dinner. I prefer getting everyone ready, going downstairs at 5, get pictures done with the characters and then stroll to dinner knowing that a table is ready for us at 5:45 and we will be finished by 7:45 so that we can go to the late show, which I imagine we would be at risk missing if we did not have a set dining time.

 

[Pooh_Friend#1]

I think I would miss having the one on one relationship with the serving team if they went to anytime dining.

 

[MagicMe]

To be honest and fair, I've never experienced anytime dining but I would expect that it would interfer with the relationship you can currently develop with your serving team. I would expect that anytime timing would mean that I could go to any of the restaurants at any time (within a specificed dinner time) to eat. I would imagine that certain times would be crowded and you obviously would not get the same table or servers.

I'm really partial to the way it's done now. I like having a set time knowing I'll see "my" servers each time and getting to know the people around me. I would imagine that this would make it extremely difficult for large parties too. I don't think I'd want to show up with our party of 15 or 20 and have to wait to get tables together - meanwhile keeping children occupied!

Maybe they could have one restaurant that is strictly an anytime dining restaurant but you would still have the rotational dining for the other restaurants - oh yeah - that would be Topsiders, right???

 

[lbgraves]

I think I would miss having the one on one relationship with the serving team if they went to anytime dining.

Very good point. Dinner is one of the best times of the day where we get to reconnect with our friends and be pampered by our serving team. I know this makes my kids more at ease to know we will have the same people all cruise.

 

[PrincessYessenia]

To be honest and fair, I've never experienced anytime dining but I would expect that it would interfer with the relationship you can currently develop with your serving team. I would expect that anytime timing would mean that I could go to any of the restaurants at any time (within a specificed dinner time) to eat. I would imagine that certain times would be crowded and you obviously would not get the same table or servers.

I'm really partial to the way it's done now. I like having a set time knowing I'll see "my" servers each time and getting to know the people around me. I would imagine that this would make it extremely difficult for large parties too. I don't think I'd want to show up with our party of 15 or 20 and have to wait to get tables together - meanwhile keeping children occupied!

Maybe they could have one restaurant that is strictly an anytime dining restaurant but you would still have the rotational dining for the other restaurants - oh yeah - that would be Topsiders, right???

That's what I was going to say!

 

[DisneyCruiser83]

I totally agree!

I think I would miss having the one on one relationship with the serving team if they went to anytime dining.

To be fair, I have only done DCL, so don't know what it would be like on other lines. What I would be most concerned about is the level of service going down. I really love the feeling of being taken care of, and DCL does this really well. I don't think there is a need to change a thing. As it is, my husband and I do our own form of "freestyle dining" by eating at Topsider's or going to Goofy's Galley when our plans prohibit us from eating at our scheduled time. But, I would be disappointed if things changed and we were not able to have a set option available to us. There are plenty of other lines that provide freestyle dining, but I really hope DCL keeps the set dining as is for all the ships. Just my opinion.

 

[star2500]

Ques...we are doing our first family cruise in November of this year...just booked it yesterday

My ques is we have late seating which is fine with me honestly. I have 2 teenagers and a 4 year old who is very flexible and will be fine. I rather feed him something before the early show and make sure he's up for that. He'll just doze off on me at dinner if need be....thank god he won't get cranky about it.

Anyhows....my question is...what time would we need to be at the early show or actually what is the latest time we can arrive there. I'm just trying to gage what time we all should start getting ready. We do have 2 cabins...so two showers thank god. Or we would have to start way too early to get ready lol.

Thanks!

 

[riggins]

We sailed NCL earlier this summer and we LOVED anytime dining. It was so great to be able to change up our plans each day depending on our activities. Over 7 nights and with a party of 7 people, we only waited for a table once and that was only for about 5-10 minutes. We had great service from all of our servers, and frankly some of them were better than what we've experienced on DCL and none of them were worse. One thing to note is that with nearly every line that offers an anytime dining feature, you can choose to have a set time and the same servers if that's your preference. I think DCL could really benefit from offering both options.

 

[lbgraves]

...what time would we need to be at the early show or actually what is the latest time we can arrive there. I'm just trying to gage what time we all should start getting ready. We do have 2 cabins...so two showers thank god. Or we would have to start way too early to get ready lol.

Thanks!

The early show is at 6:15/6:30. It will be posted in the navigator each night. We always arrive at the doors 25-30 minutes before the start of the show. They open just about that time and we like to sit in the forward section of the theater so that the kids can see better. There will be characters in the atrium for picture taking starting around 5. They will be there after the show as well for about an hour, sometimes the characters are different however.

 

[PrincessShmoo]

Here's another vote for fixed dining. I've only done fixed, but to me, it seems that this is part of "classic cruising", including dining companions. I also wonder if it isn't easier for the chefs to have the dinner routine going at the same pace instead of having different courses going at the same time to accomodate the anytime dining.

 

[star2500]

The early show is at 6:15/6:30. It will be posted in the navigator each night. We always arrive at the doors 25-30 minutes before the start of the show. They open just about that time and we like to sit in the forward section of the theater so that the kids can see better. There will be characters in the atrium for picture taking starting around 5. They will be there after the show as well for about an hour, sometimes the characters are different however.

Thanks Lisa....that seems better than having to be ready for the early dinner for us.

 

[ladyvet]

We recently cruised on Royal Caribbean. We had a specific time for dining, but anytime dining was available. There was always a line of people waiting to be seated when we walked by to our assigned table. I could also feel a warmer welcome from the staff for those with scheduled dinner. It's like they were expecting us and eager to show us to the table.

I'll admit I'm a Type A person, so I like the structure.

 

[ScotnSteph]

I love, love, love Freestyle dining on NCL. My DH and I enjoy being able to get a table for two. We aren't great at small talk and sitting with strangers on a cruise is stressful for us. We enjoy the flexibility of eating when and where we want. We have never had to be wait to be seated on NCL. We usually cruise in the fall which isn't as busy of a time. As we talk about our next cruise the dining is a huge factor, maybe the biggest factor for us. We want to cruise a line that will allow us a table for 2.

 

[mmackeymouse]

We've never cruised, so I have no real perspective or dog in the fight.

I do remember when NCL came out with the "freestyle" cruising commercials, I was thinking that was what I wanted to do- easy, casual, private. But, on several message boards, in several posts, I have seen it mentioned how miserable freestyle dining actually is.

In fact, the previous posters in this thread are the first people I have seen to enjoy the open dining option.