Dining reservations question

[aroundtheriverbend]

We are taking our first trip to Universal October 15, staying at the Royal Pacific. I noticed that there is a character dinner at the hotel while we are there and called to make a reservation, but the woman on the phone acted like I was crazy to be calling so soon and said she couldn't make a reservation that far out. I asked when I should call back and she said "I don't know, about 30 days before?". Didn't leave me with a whole lot of confidence, and as a 180 day Disney dinner planner left me in a bit of a panic. Anyone have any experience with what to do here? Thanks!!

 

[mjohnson96]

We are taking our first trip to Universal October 15, staying at the Royal Pacific. I noticed that there is a character dinner at the hotel while we are there and called to make a reservation, but the woman on the phone acted like I was crazy to be calling so soon and said she couldn't make a reservation that far out. I asked when I should call back and she said "I don't know, about 30 days before?". Didn't leave me with a whole lot of confidence, and as a 180 day Disney dinner planner left me in a bit of a panic. Anyone have any experience with what to do here? Thanks!!

Hehe..yeah dining reservations are a tad different at Universal .

They usually will not take reservations until 30 days out and many people wait until they arrive to set up anything. If you are doing dinner or lunch reservations there are areas set up so you can make reservations for any of the resturants at City Walk or onsite. The only ones that I can think of that you might need that 30 day window would be the fine dining options at the onsite hotels.

We honestly have never make reservations (priorty seating) for any of our trips until this year. With WWOHP opening the week we are going and the hotels pretty much sold out already I made reservations at Margarittaville and Mythos.

 

[rpbert1]

We always stay at RPR in July, and have done the character dinner every year, never made any reservations, as there is always plenty of tables, last year there was only about 4 tables with people eating, Scooby and Shaggy spent quite a bit of time with us, and the other tables.

 

[scottishgirl87]

We just got back last week and I just phoned every afternoon to get a reservation. Had no problems, whatsoever, unlike Disney the week before that everywhere was booked up for!

Also if you stay on-site your room key acts as a Priority Dining card and we used this on a few occasions as well.

 

[aroundtheriverbend]

Thanks everyone for the info!!!!!