Difficult December Free Dining ADRs

[mytwinklestar]

I just made our 7 day ADRs for our December 14-21 trip. There were NO Fantasmic packages available for dinner. There were NO Candlelight Processional packages for dinner, either! Hmmmm... just wondering if I would have done better with our original plans December 9-17. I know it is free dining. Heck, that is why I changed my plans but I suppose I wasn't thinking about what this would mean for the crowds during this time. I wanted to absolutely do Fantasmic because after the first of the year, this will not be performed every night... and knowing that every time we have been, this show was standing room only! The Candlelight processional, we are going to do the lunch package but I truly wanted dinner. Its kinda scary that there are limited seatings for meals.

 

[goofygal531]

It could also be due to park hours and show times. Fantasmic is usually shown twice a night, but off season it's once a night.

Also off season they have less wait staff and not all sections of the restaurants are open.

Once your there, it might be easier to get an ADR. I find now that once I arrive I can usually get the ADRs for the rest of the week that I couldn't get before.

Something magical happens when your actually on Disney property

 

[lisa3635]

I just made our 7 day ADRs for our December 14-21 trip. There were NO Fantasmic packages available for dinner. There were NO Candlelight Processional packages for dinner, either! Hmmmm... just wondering if I would have done better with our original plans December 9-17. I know it is free dining. Heck, that is why I changed my plans but I suppose I wasn't thinking about what this would mean for the crowds during this time. I wanted to absolutely do Fantasmic because after the first of the year, this will not be performed every night... and knowing that every time we have been, this show was standing room only! The Candlelight processional, we are going to do the lunch package but I truly wanted dinner. Its kinda scary that there are limited seatings for meals.

I called yesterday and made a candlelight professional ressie for 12/16 and pretty much had my choice of resturants around 5:00 (except le cellier and coral reef of course) You might wan to call again. It sounds like the CM didn't know how to do it.

 

[jls886]

Someone started a thread just a couple days ago saying that when they called the DINE phone # they had no luck with Candlelight Processional packages, but when they called the general ressie number the CM found all kinds of ADRs available. It would be worth a shot to call back the vacation package number since they can do dining ressies too.

 

[lisa3635]

I called 407WDWDINE

 

[nhl66pens]

They have 2 Fantasmic shows on EMH nights (even in December). If you want to see Fantasmic, you can probably just plan on going to the 2nd show without ressies. Provided you can arrange a visit to DHS on an EMH night.

 

[magicalcouple]

I am hoping your call was just some mysterious CM that didn't do very well... We have all our reservations and I keep ammending them, and so far... I've had no troubles getting anything. I have a lot of the hard ones too.... Good luck!

 

[mytwinklestar]

Thanks to all who responded. I am going to try again for the ADRs we really wanted. I booked a TS meal for each day - though the times are earlier than we would ever consider dinner. Two days we had to take 3:00 and 3:30 P.M. This makes for a VERY late lunch or VERY early dinner. At least we have something booked for each day. I am hopeful that we will get lucky and get some better times at least. Thanks to all!

 

[ClemsonTigger2]

I'm the one who found Candlelight Processional availability through WDISNEY but not WDWDINE. The CM at WDISNEY put in specific times to search for Candlelight Processional packages - example, the 8:15 show - and found lots of availability. She was sort of talking while she was looking - it seems like at first she just did a general search, then said oh, wait, let me try picking the showtime, or something like that - and Voila! - there was availability. Try again!!!
Just so you don't feel bad, we're eating most days around 4:00 I think, since we just booked our trip a week or two ago. There are some things I'd like that I haven't gotten yet, but I'm hoping that I can get them closer to the time.