chef mickey good for first night at WDW or not?

[kate_great]

We will be taking our 10 and 7 yr old boys to WDW for the first time in Oct. Please give me your opinion. Is chef Mickey a good choice to get them in the mood for the days ahead. We planned on arriving at POR around 3p.m., swimming and then driving to the Contemparary to eat at Chef Mickey. Then riding on the monorails to give the kids a taste of what's to come. I made PS for 7:15. My hope was to be done and have the kids in bed before 11p.m. We are waking up pretty early the next day. Is this realistic for a bedtime?
Thanks ,Kate_great

 

[binkyj826]

......on the first night and it is just me and the DH!
We will be going there the first night next October when we take my stepdaughter for the first time.

 

[WiscMomof2]

I think eating at Chef Mickey's on your first night is an excellent idea. We did this last year and are doing it this year as well. It's a great way to start out a vacation and get in the Disney spirit. The food is pretty tasty too.

 

[kate_great]

Thanks for such quick replies! Am I realistic about doing the monorail and an early bedtime? Will the kids be able to see the parks well via monorail?
Thanks
Kate_great

 

[CindyAnn]

My two children are 7 & 10 also. They're used to going to bed early, though, and waking up early. Unfortunately, even if they go to bed late they still wake up early, so I'd be dragging two bears through the parks. We find that at least every second night at WDW we have to get them to bed close to their usual time of 8:30. They're generally awake at 6:00 or 6:30 a.m., though, so we're always up bright and early for EE.

If your boys are used to staying up later - go for it! If not, you might want to let them sleep in a bit the next morning so they'll be rested for a busy day.

If you show up a bit early for your PS, at 7:00 or so, you should be finished by 8:30 (assuming a reasonable wait time) and then you can zip around the resort loop on the monorail and still drive back to POR and get them in bed by 9:30 or 10:00 at the latest.

Don't forget to ask the monorail attendant if it would be possible to sit in the front of the monorail with the driver. It depends on whether another family is there before you, but that provides a wonderful first view of WDW. However, you'll only see a bit of the Magic Kingdom if you travel around the resort loop. You could transfer to the Epcot monorail, which provides a quick view of the very front of Epcot, but I'm guessing that would add at least another 30 minutes to your tour. AK and MGM are not serviced by the monorail.

Have a blast!

 

[kate_great]

Thanks CindyAnn, It sounds as if our kids are very similar. We usually have 8:30-9p.m. bedtimes and even if they manage to stay up til 11 they are still up bright and early in the morning. This works great for school but hard for trips. My sons would love to be able to sit in the front. I will try and work this out if possible. We are going to Epcot the first day (not on an early entry day) But I heard that in Oct. there are a lot of school tours during the week and the weekends might be a better option.?Thanks for your response.
Kate_great

 

[DisneyLisa]

A monorail ride & Chef Mickey's is a great way to start your WDW vacation...that's the way we usually start ours.

 

[matjef9091]

We will be there in October too and my boys are 11 and 13. We have PS for chef Mickey's for 6:15 then we can head to the Poly for the EWP for 9m.

 

[wdwnut61]

We always have dinner at Chef Mickeys our first night. It's become a tradition, one all of us look forward too. It's such a fun atmosphere and seeing all the characters that first night is perfect. Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Goofy, Chip & Dale all together...talk about a Disney fix. It's always the first PS I make. We'll be there on November 23 at 6:00 pm.....can't wait

 

[auntkelly]

Our first trip to Disney World was three years' ago when my son was seven and my daughter was five. I made a PS at Chef Mickey's for our first night. I told my husband, son and daughter that I had made dinner reservations at the Contemporary, but did not tell them it was a character meal (in fact, they had no idea that there were "character meals") . When we arrived at the Contemporary, I suggested we buy autograph books and pens "in case we run into one of the characters at the parks tomorrow." My favorite memory of Disney World was when my husband and the kids walked into Chef Mickey's and saw Mickey, Minnie, Pluto, Chip N Dale. They were so surprised and excited!. My husband loved the surprise too and he's not easy to impress! We're going again in November and the kids asked to go to Chef Mickey's on our first night. I think we've started a family tradition. Reading these boards, I've learned that Chef Mickey's on the first night is a tradition for lots of families! I hope you enjoy Chef Mickey's as much as we did.

 

[dcgrumpy]

This has also become a tradition for us also. For our Nov trip we are eating at Chef Mickey's at 5 and then heading over to Epcot for Illuminations.

 

[ceecee]

We did it last year. We then stayed to watch the fireworks and were really late getting back and had trouble with the bus service getting us back to ASMo. Next time we leave earlier!!!!!!!!

 

[cfewell]

We go to Chef Mickeys on our last day before we leave.

We go to other character meals during the time we are there, but always save Chef Mickeys for last.

LOL, we have always went agains the grain LOL

Have fun!

 

[Alice28]

This plan backfired on us when we went. However, we flew out at 6:25 AM from the west coast, had been up since 4:10 AM, and were so, so, so tired by the time our Chef Mickey's PS rolled around at 7:20. Even though we were on west coast time, and in theory we shouldn't have been tired, we were. My sons were 5 and 20 months at the time...I loaded their plates up and they picked and the food and waited (impatiently) for the characters to make their rounds. It also didn't help that I had a migraine- I think we would have enjoyed Chef Mickey's a lot more if we had scheduled it a different night when we had more energy. The food was good though. We also tried riding the monorail around the three resorts and catching a glimpse of the MK (We were staying at the Contemporary)- this didn't work for our boys either- they wanted to get out at every stop and were irritable (Read "Fit" for the almost 2 year old) that we didn't get off at the MK. I think since your kids are older, this plan will work better for you. If I had to do it again, we would have just grabbed chicken strips and burgers at the food court & played on the little playground at the CR our first night. (The one thing that did work was we went to the gift shop after our PS and I bought them each a stuffed toy- they were thrilled with getting something new right off the bat and they had it to sleep with the rest of the trip).