How long to plan for Character Meals?

[them2854]

We are doing Character Meals for the first time when we go in September with our DD6. I'm currently working on our ADRs and Touring Plans. I have no idea how much time we should plan for them.

Currently we have lunch ADRs at Tusker House, Disney Jr at Hollywood n Vine, Akershus, and dinner at Chef Mickey's.

 

[OhThePain]

We always figure that worst case is 90 minutes from the time we sit for character meals. That is figuring that we just missed all the characters and have to wait for them to swing back around. It rarely is that long (usually closer to 60-75 minutes), but it has taken us that long before. We also add in an additional 15 minutes before our ADR time as well as 15 minutes after our ADR time. So a total of 2 hours is how we plan it.

 

[them2854]

Great! Thank you for the reply!

 

[magicaldisney]

I was also going to say 90 minutes. You don't always get seated right away so you have to keep that in mind as well.

 

[kj2mom]

I too usually keep 90 minutes or so in mind from the reservation time but we do always get there 15 minutes early as well. For me it is much better if I allot too much time rather than too little because it can be frustrating knowing we are paying a fair chunk for a meal that we could possibly be clock watching the entire time because we made our schedule too tight to sit back, relax and enjoy. We were there in July and we often used our meal time as our time to recoup (we didn't do afternoon breaks) and we really needed that period of time to not be eyeing our next thing and constantly checking our watches. We traveled with another family and one meal their FP was soo close they ran out of the restaurant before I even paid my bill (and they tried to tell me that they paid my tip which is another whole story).

 

[mkla2015]

I always schedule for 90 mins at character meals. They rarely take that long- usually closer to an hour.

 

[them2854]

Thank you for the replies. I'll go with a 90 minute window. I've got most of our days pretty spread out, because it will be hot and I'm sure we are going to have some random rain too. I also don't want to feel rushed this trip, we are hoping to take a relaxed approach and take it all in.