Too tired for TS dinner?

[DaParkers]

I recently changed my vacation dates, so I have to make new ADR's. While deciding if I wanted to keep the same restaurants or change them, I had a revelation. Why do I keep making these dinner ADR's and I'm usually too tired to really enjoy them? So, I decided to keep my TS meals this time to mostly character breakfasts and 1 lunch. It's easier this way for us since we get to the parks early. I only have 2 dinner ADR'S to make. The rest will be CS. WPE, Earl of Sandwich, Yorkshire county fish shop, and the resort food court.
Does anyone else find themselves too tired/sleepy to fully enjoy the experience at a TS dinner?

 

[ShannonMB]

On our first ever trip, my aunt booked all the ADRs, and we complained that she made them for too early -- like 5pm. We were like, shouldn't we continue to enjoy the parks and eat later??? So that's what I tried last trip. I booked everything after 7pm, and boy, what a mistake it was (for us). We had been going since rope drop every day, and by the time our ADR times arrived, I was pretty much done. ESPECIALLY since it seemed to take MUCH longer to be seated at these later times because of the restaurants getting backed up.

I do still enjoy dinners for most of our ADRs (although we are doing a couple breakfasts on our next trip as well), but this time I'll definitely be going back to the earlier dinners. Then we can enjoy the parks as much as we want afterwards, and can LEAVE when we get too tired!

 

[maj42169]

My family looks forward to our dinner ADRs. We use that time as our break in the day!

 

[WantToGoNow]

We always make our dinner ADR's early - like 5 or 5:30. Last trip we had one at Whispering Canyon for 8:30 (with 5 and 2 y/o's no less). We were all half-asleep at the table after walking around in the heat all day and sitting down in the AC. We are planning all of our dinners this upcoming trip for no later than 6:00 - especially since we will have 6 young children (2,4,5,5,8,9) along.

 

[BarleyJack]

We booked Boma at 8.15ish one night our first trip, after having been at AK all day + PM EMH. We were so tired, never again will we eat that late.

 

[B-Ride]

We had this problem a few times when our kids were younger but now that they are teenagers it isn't a problem. We usualy eat between 7 and 8 and it makes a great way to wind down from your hectic day.

 

[DaParkers]

We booked Boma at 8.15ish one night our first trip, after having been at AK all day + PM EMH. We were so tired, never again will we eat that late.

I've done it for two consecutive trips. I finally learned my lesson.

 

[ROEDISNEY]

I love my ADR'S. I always look fwd to them . I like to get them betwen 5:30 & 6:30 if I can. I don't like them earlier.

 

[JVL1018]

We actually like ADRs aorund 6:45-7:00, even when my kids were younger(they are 7 and 9 now).
My kids are night owls and stay up until 10,11 at night so eating at 7, 7:30 isn't a problem.
Also, they love to go swimming in the afternoon-so we hit the parks in the morning, leave by 2 or 3, go swimming-if we ate at 5, there is barely enough time to swim, shower and get ready for dinner. Havinga 6:30 ADR at the earliest gives us enough leeway so we don;t have to rush through pool time.

I love a good buffet breakfast, but that is prime park time for us(and I am not getting up super early on vacation to eat breakfast prior to a park opening), so we do one on our last day around 10:30.

I can totally see why people are dragging at the end of the day and would rather not have a TS dinner, but for us, we are refreshed after our rest/pool time and shower and raring to go.

 

[DaParkers]

We actually like ADRs aorund 6:45-7:00, even when my kids were younger(they are 7 and 9 now).
My kids are night owls and stay up until 10,11 at night so eating at 7, 7:30 isn't a problem.
Also, they love to go swimming in the afternoon-so we hit the parks in the morning, leave by 2 or 3, go swimming-if we ate at 5, there is barely enough time to swim, shower and get ready for dinner. Havinga 6:30 ADR at the earliest gives us enough leeway so we don;t have to rush through pool time.

I love a good buffet breakfast, but that is prime park time for us(and I am not getting up super early on vacation to eat breakfast prior to a park opening), so we do one on our last day around 10:30.

I can totally see why people are dragging at the end of the day and would rather not have a TS dinner, but for us, we are refreshed after our rest/pool time and shower and raring to go.

Good strategy.

 

[minnie mum]

I am so happy to see that most of the PPs prefer a really early evening TS dinner, or no TS dinner at all (that's what we did when your DDs were young)

That makes it all the easier for DH and I to get a 7:30 to 8:00 (or later) ADR. We like to spend the whole day in the park, so our dinner is our way to relax and unwind at the end of the day. Then after a leisurely dinner, unless there is something special that we want to see or do, we'll head back to our resort.

 

[Nadjalu]

We prefer to have dinner TS meals, as it gives us a break and time to relax.
I find that I get my second wind after dinner and a nice sit down meal.
Although we do like to eat earlier, 5-6pm.

 

[Hootch]

to do a lot more sit down dining. Then the kids came along. They always had a voice but only after a few years were they able to make coherent sentences and complain about not spending enough time touring.

Storm clouds gathered and we cut back on our table service dining and, regretfully, saved considerable money. Only now have we started to ween ourselves of only child friendly locations. We don't yet have the strength to try a signature place outside of CRT but that day is coming.

WE are now looking to expand our dining options but I'm not sure how much we will expand our dining time. There may come a time when we move to signature restaurants again. The trip this past June was our last CRT for a long time. But for a number of years I don't know if we will go back to the old level of dining. I have begun to enjoy the street characters a bit more and I follow my wife into the shops more.

There is only so much time.

 

[bfamily5]

Same strategy here! I made all early dinner ADR's..like 4:30-6pm. We do RD, tour all day, go straight to our ADR and then back to the resort to swim - then an early night before RD the next day! Worked like a charm!

 

[topmonkeygirl]

We live 2 hours away so we take mini vacations, and longer ones. On the short stays we go to the parks in the morning, eat lunch do a couple of more things, then head back to the resort for some rest. After naps we go to dinner. On our longer trips I plan ressies like Narcoossee's or Artist Point on our rest days, and our park days we do room service or non signature meals. That's our strategy. I did make the mistake of going to Yachtsman on one of our busiest days one trip and it was horrible. I just wanted to get out of there and go to sleep. I'll never make that mistake again.

 

[Hopefully]

We love evening TS meals and look forward to them. We (all adults) like to dine between 7:30 - 8:30. We often do the parks early in the morning and often a rest and swim mid afternoon and then back for our evening ADR
Even when I went with my 3 and 5 yo grandchildren we followed a similar strategy. Rope drop in the morning (they were up and raring to go). Back to the Poly for a 2 hour nap followed by an hour of swiming and them dressing up and heading for dinner at 7:30
Workes great for us

 

[eliza61]

I Does anyone else find themselves too tired/sleepy to fully enjoy the experience at a TS dinner?

No so much too sleepy just simply to much bother to try and keep them.
We just can never seem to get them right.
One year we made them early but no one was hungry.
Some years we made them and no one would really want to stop and eat.
Next year we made them too late and end up snacking.
We made them 6 months early and no one wanted to eat at the restaurants we picked.

So it seemed that out of our 10 day trips we made adr (or PS as they use to be called) and we would end up keeping 2.

Now we rarely make them. We simply don't think many of the places are worth the hassle.

 

[SharonZ]

I prefer to make ADRs at lunch time, usually between 1:00 and 2:00 p.m. and have drinks and appetizers somewhere later in the evening. It works better for me to make lunch my larger meal of the day.

 

[sixxmum]

We find it works better for us to do lunch ADRs and then eat a snack later (either in the park or offsite). The meals are so big and we're so tired that it doesn't usually seem like we enjoy our dinner ADRs. For our trip coming up in January, I've made one dinner res on a park day and I'm concerned that even that will be hard.

But, I think it also makes a difference what time you go and whether you rest during the day otherwise. Since we are there in the season when the parks aren't open as long, we tend to be there at the drop and then stay until the end.

 

[LoriJune]

Yes. We got sucked up into the DDP-get the most bang for your buck - mentality and did mostly TS dinners two trips in a row. It was rough, especially for the kids. So I think we're done with the DDP now, too much food for us anyway. I just made my ADR's this morning for our next trip and I made one breakfast, two lunches, one early dinner (5:20) and one "regular" dinner (6:30.) I think this will be much better!