Tips on reservations at table service restaurants?

[disneydan55]

We are going for our first trip in late May and definitely want to go to Magellan's and try a couple other table service restaurants. We are not staying at a Disney hotel so will need to make reservations in the park. Any suggestions? Do they start accepting reservations at park opening? Do you just go to the restaurant entrance to make them? We go to Disneyland (Anaheim) twice a month and get the phone book sized guides to help plan Disney World vacations so the lack of info. For TDR is quite frustrating!

 

[Agent 86]

Yes. They accept reservations from opening. And yes, you make the reservation at the restaurant entrance.

Normally, we split up and one person goes for Fast Passes while the other makes a restaurant reservation.

 

[jacs1234]

We are going for our first trip in late May and definitely want to go to Magellan's and try a couple other table service restaurants. We are not staying at a Disney hotel so will need to make reservations in the park. Any suggestions? Do they start accepting reservations at park opening? Do you just go to the restaurant entrance to make them? We go to Disneyland (Anaheim) twice a month and get the phone book sized guides to help plan Disney World vacations so the lack of info. For TDR is quite frustrating!

We are going in early May but we are staying at a disney hotel, Does this mean I can book in advance? It looks like a place on the tdr website that allows me to book 1 month in advance.

 

[Agent 86]

If you're staying at a Disney Hotel, then you can book in advance. I'm not sure how it works exactly, especially if only parts of the hotel website are in English, as I've never stayed in a Disney Hotel.

 

[wanderlust7]

We are going in early May but we are staying at a disney hotel, Does this mean I can book in advance? It looks like a place on the tdr website that allows me to book 1 month in advance.

Yes, sounds like you already found where it is on the website. The restaurants in the parks are 1 month in advance. The hotel restaurants should already be open.

 

[Agent 86]

As an update, I'm not sure if it's all restaurants, but Magellan's now only accepts reservations after 10am.

It's not great timing since getting Toy Story Fast Passes takes 30 to 40 minutes and you then end up having to wait in front of Magellan's for it to open for reservations at 10am. Or go away and ride something, but then potentially miss out on one of the limited remaining reservations since you wouldn't get back to Magellan's until 10:30am or later.

We were unsuccessful on our first day, but managed to get a lunch reservation for the second day. We tried asking the cast member who mans the door to the restaurant from 9:30am to make the reservation online for us, but you must enter the name in Japanese characters, which wasn't possible on our iPhone since we obviously didn't have the Japanese keyboard installed.

 

[Nomarian]

We are staying at the Disneyland Hotel at the end of the month and I have already booked all our restaurants for the time we will be there from the website. It was fairly easy to do.

 

[kaygela]

If staying at one of the preferred hotels (Hilton), can you also make reservations a month in advance?

 

[Agent 86]

If staying at one of the preferred hotels (Hilton), can you also make reservations a month in advance?

To my knowledge, no. You need to stay at one of the official "Disney" hotels to be able to make reservations.

Otherwise, you will need to make them at the nominated restaurant on the day (after 10am) or use the app (if you have a Japanese keyboard installed on your phone and know how to read / write in Japanese).

 

[AquaDame]

If staying at one of the preferred hotels (Hilton), can you also make reservations a month in advance?

No, the reservation is done from the 'Travel Case' section of the website after you have your reservation and log in to view it.

 

[shelemm]

My caution about Magellan's is that the service is slow. So if you are hoping to get to a nighttime show, you'll have to prod them. I also think the food quality is not restaurant-level, especially for Japan. We did not need reservations on a pretty busy summer evening (a '46' day). In late May, it is about half as crowded, except for Saturday nights. They had plenty of seating, though obviously that is no guarantee.

 

[disneydan55]

@shelemm I never considered the pace of service - thank you for the response. Being or first time there we might want to make sure that we are not delayed for evening entertainment. Lunch might be a better option for us or saving it for a return trip. We will play it by ear. I did some internet searches for pics that I have not seen in the usual reviews and was really impressed with the detail - the entrance is especially intriguing to me. I know there is a bar there - perhaps we will try that on our first day and make up our mind on getting reservations on one of our park hopper days.

 

[shelemm]

It is a beautiful place. If you go, you should at least visit the upstairs level so you can look down upon the restaurant and the giant Old World globe in the center.