Coral Reef or Kona 2x?

[1st*toright]

Help! Three weeks out and am doing final tweaks to my plans.

Background: we are staying at the Poly, have DXDP and are planning to do mid-day breaks.

Current plans have us eating lunch at Kona on 2 consecutive days. Just for variety's sake, I am considering switching one of the days to Coral Reef (we will be spending the morning at Epcot (future world only), then heading back to the Poly, so lunch on either end is convenient). Cost isn't a factor, since we are on DXDP. I've heard mixed reviews of Coral Reef, which is the only reason I'm hesitating.

Is Kona good enough that we will be happy with it two days in a row?

Is the ambiance at Coral Reef worth the potentially slow service and/or eh food?

I want to be sure we make it back to the Poly in time to have a good rest before we head back out again (so need to be in our room by 2pm at the latest).

Would consider another TS location, if it would be close enough to the park exit that we could easily get back to the Poly by about 2pm without having to add too much walking (trying to save the kids' energy for later in the day).

 

[FSU Girl]

I would make the switch just because two days in a row at the same restaurant seems like you could get bored quick with the food. The menu changed a bit recently at both so I would look over them first. Epcot has so many great places to eat you should look into some of the countries it wouldn't be that far of a walk there.

 

[Daniela Rose]

What about garden grill?

 

[1st*toright]

Garden grill is an excellent idea, but we are having breakfast there that day! I would love to do one of the WS restaurants, but I figure it would add about another 15 or 20 minutes to the time it takes to get back to the resort after lunch (walking to either the front of the park for monorail or BC for uber), and I feel like we are cutting rest time kinda short as is.

 

[jsternad]

I thought the food at Coral Reef was great, but unless you are right down front you can't see a whole lot. We were seated in the very back and it was hard to see the fish. We have an Aquarium Restaurant near us and the views are spectacular while you eat, so I don't think we will ever go back to Coral Reef, but it was good. Garden Grill is right there too and I really enjoy it there.

 

[TwoMisfits]

Garden grill is an excellent idea, but we are having breakfast there that day! I would love to do one of the WS restaurants, but I figure it would add about another 15 or 20 minutes to the time it takes to get back to the resort after lunch (walking to either the front of the park for monorail or BC for uber), and I feel like we are cutting rest time kinda short as is.

If you're eating breakfast at Garden Grill...I'd skip both, use snacks for a light lunch and hit a signature that night...

 

[DisneyAnytime]

We really enjoy Coral Reef! It's very nice if you can request a table by the tank. We had a beautiful sea turtle come sit next to us for most of our meal on one visit.

 

[DisneyHardin]

We've eaten at Coral Reef twice and it was excellent both times. I love the ambience of the restaurant - I think it is one of the prettiest restaurants we have eaten in. We ate there last year for dinner one night. DH had steak and I had the seafood pasta dish - both were so good!!!

 

[Praying Colonel]

We did Coral Reef once and that was enough for us. There are other EP TS restaurants we prefer.

But I'm glad we tried it once, and if you've never tried it before, I say give it a shot. Some like it, some don't, but you'll never know until you try it yourself.

 

[sleepydog25]

Do Coral Reef. As others have posted, try it so that you can judge for yourself. We avoided it for years until last year. It was quite good (dinner), so we returned for lunch just a couple of weeks ago. Again, it was good, though the one dish we coveted (the grilled octopus) had changed slightly (not an improvement).

 

[CynBeth]

We have always enjoyed lunch or dinner at CR.

 

[Mr & Mrs DD]

The first time we ate at Coral Reef, it was not very good. For some reason we decided to try it again. We had a very very good meal there the last two times we have eaten at Coral Reef. We plan on going back again.

 

[Mr & Mrs DD]

We really enjoy Coral Reef! It's very nice if you can request a table by the tank. We had a beautiful sea turtle come sit next to us for most of our meal on one visit.

We had the very same experience. We were seated next to the aquarium and the giant sea turtle sat right next to us for most of our meal. The waiter told us that he likes that spot.