Dinner at a Monorail Resort?

[sammielynn]

We will be having dinner at the Grand Floridian our first night and then want to take the monorail to the other resorts to see the Christmas decorations. We are staying at POFQ and I want to take the car to dinner and not spend so much time on buses. Can we drive to the Grand Floridian leave the car there while we tour the Contemporary and the Polynesian. I would really like to see the fireworks from the beach at the Poly that evening. Or should be drive to one of the parks and take the monorail to dinner and then resort hop.

 

[pamkas]

You can park at the GF have your meal and tour the other resorts. Just tell
The guard at the gate that you have a dinner reservation.

 

[TDC Nala]

The Grand Floridian has the worst self-parking lot on property. Remember that you'll probably be parking across the street, and the lot is small. If it's crowded you may have problems finding a space. It's also possible you will get a three hour parking pass.

 

[grimley1968]

But you will probably have a 3-hour time limit to park at GF if they bother giving you a pass. This would make it a little tough to have dinner AND tour other resorts on the line.

A way to avoid any time limits is to drive from POFQ to the TTC (it's free to park there if staying onsite at any WDW resort), and then use the resort monorail from there (or a long walk) to GF.

If you arrived a little bit early, you could walk over to the Poly from the TTC (5-minute walk) and view their lobby. Then walk or monorail from there to GF, and have dinner after viewing their decorations. After dinner, monorail over to CR and view their decorations, then monorail back to the TTC and pick up your car.

This is the way I would do it. You're shifting your parking from GF to the TTC, but since you wish to view other resorts on the monorail line, the only added time this would take would be possibly having to ride the TTC tram from your car to the front of the TTC. But I think it's worth it to avoid being rushed.

 

[pamkas]

Or, you could valet park at the GF; it's $12 + tip, but very, very nice!
And there won't be a time limit. Also, the lot at the Poly is close (not across
The street like at the GF) you could park there, check out their decor
Before dinner and then head to the GF. BTW, we've neve been given a
Time limit on parking.

 

[CR Resort Fan 4 Life]

You should also see what time the Magic Kingdom is planning to close the night of your ADR, because the Resort Monorail shuts down for the evening 1 hour after the Magic Kingdom closes. So you don't want to be at the Contemporary and not have the Resort Monorail so you can get back to the Grand Floridian and to your car. Basically to avoid that problem maybe you should drive to other resorts after your dinner.

 

[sammielynn]

The MK will be closing at 10:00 that night, that would give us an hour to catch the monorail back to the TTC. If all else fails we could walk back to the TTC from the Poly after the fireworks. That might be the plan.