Need Feedback for ADRs and Schedule - Nov Trip - Please!!

[Rachel L]

We are going to WDW Nov 4-10 to celebrate my 40th birthday. It will be me, DH, DD1 (10) and DD2 (7) and my mom and we are staying at POR hoping for rooms in alligator bayou so we can get the extra pull down bed. The four of us have been twice before, first time in early March 2013, then early May 2015. My mom hasn't been in a long time, since I was a kid.

The plan is to fly in Nov 4 and hang out at the hotel for a bit. (don't know flight time yet) I'm hoping to get an ADR for Chef Mickey that evening for dinner to get some character stuff out of the way and enjoy a fun dinner.

Nov 5 - Uber to US and spend the day at Wizarding World. (We've never been and I am a huge HP fan so this is something I had to do on my birthday trip!)

Nov 6 - Probably HS. I plan to go rope drop to Fantasmic but we will take breaks in the park. No real plans for this park yet. We ate at Sci Fi last time and it was fun but not sure if we should try something different this time.

Nov 7 - Planning on this being our MK day! This is the one I have the most questions about. We only have 1 day at MK and no PH. I am hoping at these ages we can do most of the character stuff while dining and spend more time on rides in the park. Biggest questions: I'd like to do CP and BOG (if I can get ADRs). Do we go for PPO CP and late lunch BOG? or would late breakfast CP and dinner at BOG give us a chance to do more? (with a snack/early breakfast) I don't want to be rushed through breakfast but I don't want to miss seeing things b/c we weren't in line at rope drop either. We've done BOG for lunch before but not dinner so I don't know if there's a big difference there. Another concern is how likely are they do make this an EMH morning? That could mess things up as we aren't super morning people. Also I'm concerned about if they'll have the nighttime fireworks show that night. Do they skip some nights in the fall? We really want to see the new show.

Nov 8 - Epcot or AK. Not sure which at this point but if Epcot is likely to have morning EMH Nov 9 we'll probably do Epcot on the 8th.

Nov 9 - Epcot or AK, whatever we don't do Nov 8.

Nov 10 - breakfast at Ohana (DD1 loves Stitch!) then flying home

I'm nervous we won't have any mid day breaks out of the park or times we can really just go to the park late or anything. We'd like to see the evening shows at all parks except Epcot I think. I don't have a lot of ideas for where to eat outside of MK and the two mentioned outside the parks. In the past we just stoped and ate wherever we were when we didn't have reservations. I've used touring plans in the past with a good amount of success but we usually customize them.

Any advice (especially about the MK stuff) would be greatly appreciated. Hope I did ok on the acronyms, it's my first post!

Thanks!

 

[Hootch]

If they continue the current entry process in the MK, everyone is let in up to the castle, the value of the PPO reservation is not there.. There is speculation that this will be the ongoing process, but no one really knows.

Last year Disney cut back on a lot of things to compensate for higher than expected costs in Shanghai. Fantasmic and Illuminations happened very night. Wishes skipped some days. They will have a new show so maybe the odds are better.

If you are looking at places around the MK that can appeal to kids, maybe Kona at the Poly, Grand Floridian Cafe, there is a character meal in the evening set around the Cinderella, Whispering Canyon at Wilderness Lodge.

Epcot - Via Napoli, Teppan Edo, Coral Reef (more about the aquarium than the food) San Angel and La Hacienda del San Angel, Biergarten

DAK - Tusker House, Yak and Yeti, Rain Forest Cafe

Welcome to the board. People here can very helpful - not that we all agree.

 

[Rachel L]

What do you all think of doing CP for a late breakfast (is 10:30 still breakfast?) and then BOG for an early dinner (If I can get it)? Would that give us enough time to ride a few rides at rope drop, then eat, then ride a bit more, etc.? We can grab snacks in between to tide us over if needed. We only have 1 day at each park so trying to squeeze it all in.

 

[alliecat523]

I would check the BOG dinner menu and make sure it appeals to your group. It's a nice experience but we didn't enjoy the menu.

 

[Hootch]

I agree with alliecat on checking the menu out. I wanted to go there but my wife and daughter nixed it. It may work for your family.

Disney shows CP as having breakfast until 10:45.Booking at 10:30 will give you time to hit some of the smaller rides that can have long lines. Peter Pan and Pooh are two slow loading rides that you hit early.

Take a look at this information. Josh periodically uses his own touring plans to see if they still work. He also has a book for people that are not that familiar to DW -

http://www.easywdw.com/easy/magic-k...s-rope-drop-wait-times-and-fastpass-priority/

He has touring plans for the other parks too.

BTW - I have never done breakfast at CP but I have done dinner a couple of times and liked it, The characters are great.

 

[jalapeno_pretzel]

I would not want to take time out at 10:30 for an hour+ breakfast. If you really want to maximize your MK day, I would get quick service breakfast early at your resort, have CP for a late(ish) lunch - maybe 12:30 or 12:45pm, and QS dinner at somewhere that appeals to you.

Or the CP early breakfast would be okay - we did that once at 8am when the park opened at 9am. We were the first people seated, but we still didn't get out of there until just after 9am. But like you said, you run the risk of EMH being announced and then everyone else is in the park while you're at breakfast.

 

[Rachel L]

I would check the BOG dinner menu and make sure it appeals to your group. It's a nice experience but we didn't enjoy the menu.

Ok I checked out the dinner menu and I'm not sure it's worth the money. We went there for lunch two years ago and it was ok but not great. I would do lunch again there, though. I could go back to my original plan and try to get an 8:05 CP breakfast there but if we miss rope drop by like 15-30 min will that be a huge difference in wait times? We could be done eating quickly but characters are a big part of the reason for eating there so wouldn't want to miss them.

Thanks for the advice! Keep it coming!

 

[JackOfHearts]

Ok I checked out the dinner menu and I'm not sure it's worth the money. We went there for lunch two years ago and it was ok but not great. I would do lunch again there, though. I could go back to my original plan and try to get an 8:05 CP breakfast there but if we miss rope drop by like 15-30 min will that be a huge difference in wait times? We could be done eating quickly but characters are a big part of the reason for eating there so wouldn't want to miss them.

Thanks for the advice! Keep it coming!

Our waiter told us it can take up to 90 minutes to see all the characters.

 

[mindeola]

What do you all think of doing CP for a late breakfast (is 10:30 still breakfast?) and then BOG for an early dinner (If I can get it)? Would that give us enough time to ride a few rides at rope drop, then eat, then ride a bit more, etc.? We can grab snacks in between to tide us over if needed. We only have 1 day at each park so trying to squeeze it all in.

With only one day, I personally would not want two TS meals to take up valuable park time. I would not want anything before noon, just because so much can be accomplished then. You can slow down in the afternoon.

Have you thought of doing the Christmas party on the 9th? That would give you some extra MK time!

 

[Gophers]

Make sure you you have the park to park ticket for universal. That is the only way to ride the train to and from the two parks to get that Harry Potter experience.
Also agree about CP at MK. To see all characters could take up to and hour and 30 mins

 

[Rachel L]

With only one day, I personally would not want two TS meals to take up valuable park time. I would not want anything before noon, just because so much can be accomplished then. You can slow down in the afternoon.

Have you thought of doing the Christmas party on the 9th? That would give you some extra MK time!

Ok so do I fight the masses and try to get a PPO for BOG and then do dinner or lunch at CP instead?
I don't really celebrate Christmas so don't want to do the Christmas party.

Thanks!

 

[Rachel L]

Make sure you you have the park to park ticket for universal. That is the only way to ride the train to and from the two parks to get that Harry Potter experience.
Also agree about CP at MK. To see all characters could take up to and hour and 30 mins

We haven't gotten the Universal tickets yet but will definitely be getting the park to park tickets! so excited!

 

[Rachel L]

I think I have a better grasp on the MK day now. Hopefully they'll have Happily Ever After on that day. Do they generally have shows every night in November? We've been there on more off seasons when they don't do shows every night and I want to make sure we see it.
Are there any other PPO reservations worth doing? We usually just show up a little before rope drop for the other parks. Thanks!

 

[hes122]

Ok so do I fight the masses and try to get a PPO for BOG and then do dinner or lunch at CP instead?

I was going to recommend a PPO reservation for BOG. They'll let you in with the early crowd and seat you (they did for me) even if your reservation is 10 minutes before park opening. We were finishing up our meal right around the time of our actual reservation (it helped that we pre-ordered) and got in line for 7DMTR before the park opened. We got off the ride 2 minutes after the park opened.

 

[jlnten17]

I would pick one TS PPO at BOG or CP depending on which appeals to you. Saves time and $ not having 2 TS meals. We had a 10:30 CP breakfast on our last trip and waited FOREVER to see the characters because there was a large tour group ahead of us that was taking forever for photos (e.g. one of just me, now just her, now us together now the whole group. . . and on and on and on). Many families with older kids gave up and left without seeing them at all which is a huge waste of $ as the food was good but not worth the price without the characters. For those with younger kids like ours leaving was not an option so we were there nearly 2 hours just sitting waiting which is a huge waste of time. PPO would hopefully get you ahead of these groups at CP or at BOG it would get you in line first for rides in fantasyland.

 

[Rachel L]

Here are the ADR's I got yesterday:
11/4 Chef Mickey 7:45pm
11/6 50's Prime Time 5:50pm
11/7 BOG 8:15am, CP 1:30pm
11/8 Tutto Italia 5:30pm
11/9 Tusker House 1:55pm
11/10 Ohana 9:20am

I'm excited that I got all the places I wanted and almost all the times I wanted. I am hoping I can get an earlier Chef Mickey (closer to 6) but otherwise they are just what I wanted! I'm not 100% set on Tusker House, Tutto Italia, or 50's Prime time but wanted to get something in there.

My next question is what is the best way to get from POR to CR and Poly for our dinner and breakfast? (there are 5 of us)

Thanks!

 

[Rachel L]

Yay! I got an earlier Chef Mickey this morning! TP alerted me at 3am. I saw it at 6:30am when I got up and it was still there so I got it!
So I have all the ADRs I want, but now I still need to know the best way to get from POR to CR and Poly and back. bus/monorail to CR? How long will this take? Uber to Poly?
TIA!