Dining at other resorts...

[njmom47]

Is it possible to eat at restaurants located in other resorts? From what I've read, it seems so...Transportation may be the only issue...Any suggestions?
Thanks!

 

[rkandmjsmommy]

Absolutely, one of our favorites is Ohana and we never stay at the Poly! Transportation can be tricky but worth it, have fun!

 

[Melissa_E]

Like Denise said, yes! However! When I was making my dining reservations, the CM made sure I knew that travelling from the Pop to those resorts to make an early reservation time could be tricky and I might need to rent a cab.

 

[SGMCO]

We do this every trip and it's the funniest part of our Trip.

If planned correctly and allowing yourself a realistic amount of time
we have never had any problems getting to other resorts using
Disney Transportation. Learn your best route to get to the resort you are eatting at.
When on vacation and have learned patience
and don't use a Taxi whenever the Disney Transportation is Free.

It has never taken us longer than 30 mins. to get to any of the different resorts
we have eaten at but we were always visiting in Value season.
I have no idea if the commute would be longer in busy seasons.

 

[Simba22]

Absolutely, one of our favorites is Ohana and we never stay at the Poly! Transportation can be tricky but worth it, have fun!

Yes!! Ohana is the greatest and we have also taken a liking to Boma at the AKL! We've never had a problem with the WDW transportation getting us where we need to be on time....now us getting up and ON THE BUS on time is another story...

Also just thought I would mention that the few times we were late for our ADR's, the CM's were very nice and we were still able to get seated in a reasonable amount of time...usually immediately

 

[autumnsmommy]

You can always use Downtown Disney or one of the parks as a transfer point. Ex: POP to Poly, take bus to MK, monorail (or boat) to Poly. Poly to POFQ, bus to Downtown Disney, Boat to POFQ. Just allow enough time and enjoy the ride.

 

[dawgfan]

Absolutely

 

[kxmeeh]

this is actually my main concern too. we are staying at por and dining at quite a few hotels, including the contemporary, poly and beach club. do the busses from DTD go directly to the hotels, or do we have to go to the parks, then get transportation.

 

[Mrs. T-i-double-g-er]

We have never stayed at the Contemporary, but we start EVERY trip with dinner at Chef Mickey's. It gets us all in the right mood, has great food, and you don't need a park ticket to do it!

My favorite restaurant in all of WDW is Flying Fish Cafe, which is on the boardwalk.

In terms of cabs vs. Disney Transportation, it depends on how much your time is worth vs. the money. We've used both, depending on what we were doing. So if it is in your budget, it may be worth using cabs occasionally.

 

[Pumbaa_]

Resort dining is on the top of our list of favorite places. The key again is to allow enough time if you use Disney Transportation.

If you can time your meal to when you are leaving a park (versus from your resort) that will save you time. Leave any park, take the resort bus to your ADR. To get home, if the closest park is open, go there than back to your resort. Or take a taxi back. Taxis are around $10-15 usually. And IMO< well worth it. (If I am spending $50 or $60 on a nice dinner, taking a taxi directly back to my resort and not taking an hour or 2 to get back to my resort is priceless)

Time of day matters - it once took my parents 90 minutes midday to get from AK to Epcot. Bus took forever to come midday and they waited and waited. (taxi would have been 10 minutes )

You can use DTD to transfer after dinner. I have found these buses to take forever. And it has taken us hours to get back to our resort. Can be part of the adventure, or take the happy buzz off your dinner, your vacation, you get to decide

If yo have any more questions on how to get to specific places, please let us know, we are happy to share experiences. Welcome to the DIS!

 

[Pumbaa_]

this is actually my main concern too. we are staying at por and dining at quite a few hotels, including the contemporary, poly and beach club. do the busses from DTD go directly to the hotels, or do we have to go to the parks, then get transportation.

Depending on time of day, the bus from DTD may stop at Blizzard Beach. There is also more than one stop at DTD.

Depending on where you are dining, it may be easier to go to a park then to the resort. Monorail resorts and WL would be easier to get to from MK then going to DTD then catching a resort bus. Go to MK then take resort boat to Poly, GF or WL. Walk to Contemporary. Monorail is another choice, but it is closer to walk to the contemporary from the bus then to go to the monorail.

For the BW, Y&B and S&D, may be easier to go to MGM then walk or boat over.

Alot depends on how often the DTD buses are running and your connections to the resorts. If you miss and have to wait 20-30 min for the next one, then that all adds up.

Taxi home is always the quickest way. We did the DTD transfer route once, it took us literally almost 2 hours to get back to our resort. We waited over 30 minutes for a DTD bus. Then from DTD, we waited another 30 minutes for a resort bus, then had to stop at the other 2 (at the time) DTD bus stops. Not a pleasant expereince. The norm, maybe not. But $15 taxi seemed cheap in comparison

 

[crisi]

http://www.ourlaughingplace.com/asp/twiz.asp

We do lots of resort dining at Disney (that's where the signature restaurants usually are). Cabs are by far the best (fastest, most flexible) but will add to your trip expense. At Disney, however, time is money, and transfering buses either at a park or at DTD will take time. (Remember that you can't take a bus to the Epcot resorts from Epcot.)

We try and plan most of our dining for near where we are going to be. For instance, on a MK day we might wear nicer clothes to the parks with collars, and head over for an early dinner at California Grill - having taken some time in the bathrooms to clean up a little from our park day. Or we do an early dinner at Narcoosees before going back into the MK for a later evening. We stay at the Boardwalk, so the Epcot resorts are always convienent. And AKL is always a cab - might as well go back to the hotel for a swim before changing for dinner.

 

[Hopefully]

Resort dining is one of the highlights of our trip!
First I plan which park which day. Then I plan our ADR's in the resorts near the park we are in that day.
We now use Disney's ME for airport/resort transportation, which means that we are saving the cost of either a Town Card service or the weekly car rental cost. I believe that the cost of an occasional cab ride back to our hotel after dinner is still far less than the cost of either of the other 2 alternatives. We use Disney transportation to the parks etc, but after dinner at Jiko's we cabbed back to the BWV.
HTH

 

[SmallWorld71]

Depending on time of day, the bus from DTD may stop at Blizzard Beach. There is also more than one stop at DTD.

Depending on where you are dining, it may be easier to go to a park then to the resort. Monorail resorts and WL would be easier to get to from MK then going to DTD then catching a resort bus. Go to MK then take resort boat to Poly, GF or WL. Walk to Contemporary. Monorail is another choice, but it is closer to walk to the contemporary from the bus then to go to the monorail.

For the BW, Y&B and S&D, may be easier to go to MGM then walk or boat over.

Alot depends on how often the DTD buses are running and your connections to the resorts. If you miss and have to wait 20-30 min for the next one, then that all adds up.

Taxi home is always the quickest way. We did the DTD transfer route once, it took us literally almost 2 hours to get back to our resort. We waited over 30 minutes for a DTD bus. Then from DTD, we waited another 30 minutes for a resort bus, then had to stop at the other 2 (at the time) DTD bus stops. Not a pleasant expereince. The norm, maybe not. But $15 taxi seemed cheap in comparison

Ditto what Pumbaa said.

I try to avoid DD as a connecting point because it is such a high traffic area. I think any open theme park (except AK) would be a better choice.
The MK resorts are very easy to get to. Just take the bus to MK and then either the monorail or boat to the Poly or GF. We found it faster to walk from the MK to the Contemporary.

I highly recommend eating at other resorts. It is a great way to check them out. My family fell in love with the Poly when we dined at 'Ohana in August.

 

[ericamcl]

we have an 8am breakfast ADR at Kona Cafe for our trip in March. we're staying at POFQ..what would be the best way to handle that with disney transportation? how early do the buses start running?

 

[CR Resort Fan 4 Life]

Depending on time of day, the bus from DTD may stop at Blizzard Beach. There is also more than one stop at DTD.

Don't you mean the Downtown Disney buses might stop at Typhoon Lagoon, since the buses to Blizzard Beach are the same ones that go to the Animal Kingdom.

 

[Cindy's Mom]

we have an 8am breakfast ADR at Kona Cafe for our trip in March. we're staying at POFQ..what would be the best way to handle that with disney transportation? how early do the buses start running?

We would take a taxi, it should be about $10 (and you'll get about 30-45 minutes extra to sleep).

For morning resort dining, we taxi there and Disney transport back. For evening resort dining we do the opposite.

 

[smfnj]

Is it possible to eat at restaurants located in other resorts? From what I've read, it seems so...Transportation may be the only issue...Any suggestions?
Thanks!

njmom47,

Welcome to The Dis.
There are a lot of great restaurants at the resorts. Look at the menus to see what you'd like to try, get the adr's and we can give you info on the best way to get there. Where will you be staying, any kids, dates of trip?

http://www.wdwinfo.com/wdwinfo/dining/disneydining.cfm

Keep in mind - if you're at the MK you can monorail to Contemporary (CR), Poly or Grand Floridian (GF) for a meal, or boat to Wilderness Lodge & Ft. Wilderness.

If you're at Epcot you can boat or walk to Boardwalk (BW), Yacht & Beach Clubs (Y&BC), Swan or Dolphin for meals / entertainment.

Steve

 

[kgibbler20]

I don't know what everyones physical capabilities are but my mom and I walk to resort dining too. When we have eaten at Chef Mickey's we walked from MK to the Contemporary. Last year we walked from MGM to the Beach Club for Cape May breakfast and that was a real haul so I would suggest researching actual distances. The walk to Beach Club was long but there was a lot to see and that was cool. It's fun sometimes to see the things you can't see from the car or bus. I know that a few places have easy walks though.

 

[smfnj]

I don't know what everyones physical capabilities are but my mom and I walk to resort dining too. When we have eaten at Chef Mickey's we walked from MK to the Contemporary. Last year we walked from MGM to the Beach Club for Cape May breakfast and that was a real haul so I would suggest researching actual distances.

The walk from CR to MK is VERY short, MGM to BW / Y&BC area is a bit of a haul. Resort to resort in different areas is another story.

For example, staying at POP and going to AKL or Poly to eat, I don't think you're going to be walking.
I believe this is what the OP was thinking when asking for transportation ideas.

Steve