I wanted to share my dining plan experience as we just returned from a week of free dining. In a word, it was awesome. We travelled as 2 adults and 2 children ages 6 & 8 and managed to make all of the credits stretch the entire stay and still had one child and one adult table service leftover we never did use.
The best part about the dining plan for us was that it gave us the chance to eat places we would never pay out of pocket for. For example, we ate at Hollywood and Vine at the Studios before seeing the Osborne lights. This menu was a bit eclectic for our everyday eating but since we were on the free plan we gave it a try and loved it. However, had we paid out of pocket it would have been over $100 and we never would have considered going there.
We did have two table service reservations we had to cancel because by the end of the day we were too tired to schlep from where we were to the restaurant. The children wanted to get back to the resort and swim and relax and that won over. What did we do? We used our table service credits at the resort and did so without any difficulty whatsoever. In using table service credits we had to use adult credits for adult meals and children's crecits for children's meals but that was fine.
Tipping was something I was dreading but that was never an issue either. As a regular restaurant goer I believe in tipping for service received. If I'm home and eat at a buffet style restaurant I don't tip much and didn't at Disney either. Frankly all our waiters did for us at all 3 of the buffets we ate at was refill our drinks one time. They would ask if we wanted to include the tip on the bill and we always just said no, we'd leave it on the table. We never didn't tip, just not always the 15-20% they would have liked.
It was a great trip and we had some great food. The best uses of our snack credits were the made to order goodies from Goofy's at Downtown Disney and the large McD's fries we found at the Studios. Of course popcorn, Mickey bars, pretzels (HUGE I might add) were all great too.
Now we start planning for our next Disney adventure!
The best part about the dining plan for us was that it gave us the chance to eat places we would never pay out of pocket for. For example, we ate at Hollywood and Vine at the Studios before seeing the Osborne lights. This menu was a bit eclectic for our everyday eating but since we were on the free plan we gave it a try and loved it. However, had we paid out of pocket it would have been over $100 and we never would have considered going there.
We did have two table service reservations we had to cancel because by the end of the day we were too tired to schlep from where we were to the restaurant. The children wanted to get back to the resort and swim and relax and that won over. What did we do? We used our table service credits at the resort and did so without any difficulty whatsoever. In using table service credits we had to use adult credits for adult meals and children's crecits for children's meals but that was fine.
Tipping was something I was dreading but that was never an issue either. As a regular restaurant goer I believe in tipping for service received. If I'm home and eat at a buffet style restaurant I don't tip much and didn't at Disney either. Frankly all our waiters did for us at all 3 of the buffets we ate at was refill our drinks one time. They would ask if we wanted to include the tip on the bill and we always just said no, we'd leave it on the table. We never didn't tip, just not always the 15-20% they would have liked.
It was a great trip and we had some great food. The best uses of our snack credits were the made to order goodies from Goofy's at Downtown Disney and the large McD's fries we found at the Studios. Of course popcorn, Mickey bars, pretzels (HUGE I might add) were all great too.
Now we start planning for our next Disney adventure!
