Leaving the parks for a meal

[kimbac3]

I'm not sure if this the right spot to post this but....
Is it really worth the time to leave the park and go offsite for a meal and then come back? I know the sit down restaurants in WDW are expensive but can I get just as good of a meal cheaper offsite? This is our first trip and as I looked over the menus for WDW - well I wasn't too thrilled with the choices.

Can anyone give me any insight to this? We are staying in a rental home so we will have a kitchen but...I don't really want to cook
Thanks,
Kimba

 

[isla bonita]

We eat breakfast at the house every morning. After that it depends on when we are down. On season we usually get out of the park for a breather in the pool. We usually stop and get something out of the park. Off season we stay in the parks and eat there. Reason the parks are open less hours so we don't leave. That's just what we usually do. We usually do a pull and click order from Sams club before we head down and it is waiting for us on pallets. We own a 6 bed and 5 bath so we head down with lots of friends. I order snacks water, breakfast foods, snacks, ice cream, drinks, juice, and lots of snacks. We never have to purchase any thing when hanging around swimming. There is also a packy once you get there. For the adult drinks. We are very frugal and spend all the money we save on breakfast and snacks have on tickets and meals that I refuse to cook. It is my vaca also I tell them.

 

[baileybelle]

If you are going when the parks close late, yes. If they are closing early, definitely no. We stayed in a rental home last year. We never left the parks unless we planned on doing something else after eating, like going mini-golfing or heading over to DTD, etc... It takes too much time to leave, eat, and then go back. You're easily losing hours of park time.

 

[onlyoneforme]

I agree with the previous poster also from MAINE
When the parks close at 7pm and open at 9am in Jan/Feb when we go, we eat a good breakfast at our condo, bring a bunch of snacks and drinks and have a somewhat larger mid-day meal in the park so as to carry us over until park closing and we head back to the condo for a light dinner...sandwiches or such.

 

[kimbac3]

That's pretty much what I thought. Since we are going late Nov/early Dec the parks will be closing early. I planned on bringing snacks in anyway. I'm making a shopping stop when we first arrive. I'll make sure to get some stuff to snack on when we get back (like hot pretzels, pizza rolls,that type of stuff).
Thanks everyone, you saved me some headaches!!
Kimba