Loved staying onsite but...

[Taratink]

We ended up spending $900 for food for 2 adults and 2 kids ages 3 and 5. My husband didn't like that he felt like we had to eat at WDW. I would be interested in staying at a nice hotel that had good dinner options at a reasonable price. Any ideas? We are usually tired at night and we don't feel like hunting down a rest. Maybe a house or condo? I am at a loss.
Tara

 

[princessknb]

Wow 900.00 for food!!! Where did you stay, for how long and where did you eat? Welcome back, I hope you had a good time.

 

[Local_Girl]

Hi Taratink,

Many of us have discovered Cypress Pointe Resort in the Lake Buena Vista area. There are studio, 2 bdrm, and 3 bdrm units with full kitchens and washer/dryer. Haven't been there yet, but we are scheduled to stay there in April and I have driven by before. It's really convenient to DTD and there are many restaurants in the area and a Winn Dixie grocery store very close by.

 

[Taratink]

We stayed at the WL. We ate at:
Dinners
Alfredo's- Epcot
WCC x2
1900 pf
Ohana's

Breakfast
at roaring forks
WCC x1
Chef Mickeys

Lunch
The plaza
Avalunch
Lottawater lodge
Pizza Planet

The rest of the time we had counter service. Each character dinner cost us $100 or more. Next time I will only do Chef Mickeys for breakfast and Ohana's for dinner. We were sick of eating and paying a fortune for the food. My husband was really aggrivated when he paid $2.50 for a cupcake. So we need to have some sort of kitchen next time or stay off-site. We did have a great time and experienced a lot of great dinners. It just stung a little.
Tara

 

[G00fyDad]

...The rest of the time we had counter service. Each character dinner cost us $100 or more. Next time I will only do Chef Mickeys for breakfast and Ohana's for dinner. We were sick of eating and paying a fortune for the food. My husband was really aggrivated when he paid $2.50 for a cupcake. So we need to have some sort of kitchen next time or stay off-site. We did have a great time and experienced a lot of great dinners. It just stung a little....

Did you get the MYW +dining plan? $900 is what we were going to have to spend for 8 full days there until I got the dining plan. Now it is down to about $300.

 

[sweetpeakaris]

WOW! That's alot for food. We normally eat offsite. This trip we are eating Dinner only for 2 days onsite.

 

[darlene9947]

I'm staying at the Vistana Resort in May and I would like to save some money on food too. I plan on eating most of the breakfasts in the condo, before leaving for the parks. However, even if we take an afternoon break back to the condo to rest, I won't feel like cooking. If we eat sandwiches and go back to the parks for the evening, I know we'll be hungry again. Haw do ya'll handle this? Thanks for any advice.

 

[ALostBoy]

Hi,
Your on site options are to stay at FW in a cabin
with a full kitchen. Also you can get a room at
any of the Vacation club resorts, the 1 and 2
bedrooms have full kitchens and the villas have
a refrigerator, sink, and coffee maker. When we
stayed in a villa we ate breakfast in the room and
other meals in the parks. We usually only do 1 character
meal, 1 nice breakfast and 1 nice dinner per trip
the rest of the time we eat counter service. One
big way we save money is to share some of the
meals, especially between our kids. Good luck.

 

[mickilovesmickey]

We are owners at the Vistana, so this is where we usually stay. We save money by eating breakfast in and also doing snacks in the condo. We significantly save on pop, late night snacks, etc. But $300 for MYW dining for 8 days?? That sounds like a really good price. How many people is that for?

 

[Lorix2]

We've stayed in 2 BR villas with full kitchens, 2 bathrooms, washer/dryer, balcony and living and dining areas twice now, offsite. I wouldn't vacation any other way for a week.

We went out for groceries once we settled in and bought snacks, breakfast food, deli meat, micro popcorn, etc...we ate in our villa every morning which saves us alot of money daily right there and we packed sandwiches/drinks/snacks for the parks in our backpack inside a lunch box with a frozen ice pack to keep things cold.

We freeze water bottles and juice bags and they are wonderful to have on us while they are thawing they are nice and cold.

The only food we bought outside the villa was for dinner either up on Int'l drive or on Disney property. Also, at our resort, we'd buy food here and there from their deli or marketplace, poolside.

The room to spread out on vacation is wonderful too