Getting into AK for an early ADR?

[Kim1964]

I'm hoping to get an 8 a.m. ADR for Donald's Breakfast at AK. The park doesn't open until 9. We will be getting there via rental car. When we were at AK last year for an EMH morning, at 7:30 the parking lot was still closed and didn't open until about 7:45, which seems kind of late for getting all the way into Tusker House for an 8 a.m. seating.

Did we just hit AK on an off day for the parking attendants, or will it be a race into AK to make it to our seating?

 

[laughinplace199]

Bumping this for you.

We'll be in the same situation next month, so I'm interested to hear what others have to say.

 

[buzz1fan]

Are you staying onsite where you could take a bus? We have a 810 reservation, and I was told a bus will get us there from our hotel.

 

[Kim1964]

We are staying onsite but my understanding is that the buses don't start running until an hour before opening. If opening is at 9 then buses wouldn't start until 8.

 

[3"Mouse"keteers]

We are staying onsite but my understanding is that the buses don't start running until an hour before opening. If opening is at 9 then buses wouldn't start until 8.

A bus runs at the resorts at 6:45, particularly for those going to early character breakfasts. If you miss that bus, I'm not sure when the next bus runs. Last October, we had an 8:05 for Crystal Palace, and since we were not at the bus stop at 6:45 (we got in line about 7:15), we had to wait for another bus that didnt come until 7:50!

 

[disdrmg]

We had an 8am reservation in June and got to the park at about 7:30, but you are right we only got as far as the parking attendants. They had the parking lot blocked off and closed. There were several cars lined up and people kept walking up to the the booth asking when we could get in. So once they finally let us in, it was a mad dash to get to the Tusker House by 8am. If you are arriving by bus, you won't have the headache of the parking lot, but they still would not let us physically into the Ak until 8am so they once the gates opened everyone was dashing to get there. Not the peaceful walk to breakfast to soak up the park along the way before everyone else gets there like I had hoped.

 

[tyandskyesmom]

Like someone else said, there are busses running just for early ADRs. We used many of them on our last two trips. They begin around 6:30am and run in loops so depending on where you are at and where you are going, that would be the deciding factor of how long before the next bus came around. I was told that the dispatch has a list from the ADR system so they kind of know what they are looking at and where there might be people waiting. We found it best to be ready to catch the 6:45am bus because you just never know what is going to happen before or after it gets to you. If we missed that one, usually there was another around by 7:15am at the latest. We were never late and never rushed this way. We stayed at ASMovies and Pop and it worked great once we figured it out. If you have questions the front desk would be able to help you and if they cannot they will give you the number to the transportation department for further questions...that is what we had to do to make sure we understood what we needed to do. We even had a driver pick us up for one of our breakfasts, maybe Chef Mickey, and it was us and two other families and two of us were going to the same place and the other was going to maybe Ohana so rather than take us to MK and make us take the monorail to our destination, he dropped the other family off at the Poly and the rest of us at the Contemporary...it was very nice and gave us extra time to relax!

 

[MeredithRX]

Oh gosh...I had never considered that this would be a problem!

I look forward to more answers. We will be having the same concern during our trip.

 

[Octoberbabiesrus]

Take the bus. We got in for our ADR's through the very last lane on the right. We walked up, told our name, they looked on thier list and said enjoy your day. On our merry way.

 

[emlutz23]

We had an ADR for 8am at CP at the MK and we were told by a CM at the hotel that the early bus starts running at 6:45am. We got on a bus at 7:15am and arrived in plenty of time!