which would you do the first night?

[H20DogsNDisney]

Which of these would you do the first night? I am leaning to California Grill Hoping their are EMH the first night. Oh we plan to go in June! And their may be 4 to 6 people. Thanks

Hoop-Dee-Doo Musical Revue

or

California Grill

 

[Pakey]

Which of these would you do the first night? I am leaning to California Grill Hoping their are EMH the first night. Oh we plan to go in June! And their may be 4 to 6 people. Thanks

Hoop-Dee-Doo Musical Revue

or

California Grill

I would not do either on the first night. We have twice had travel delays that have prevented us from making our first night dinner reservations so I would never book anything on the first night that required a credit card guarantee. I don't want to pay for meals I can't attend.

 

[PoohsFan1]

Our original plan, when we go in December, was to have dinner at California Grill and then take the monorail around the loop while waiting for Wishes to start. We had never been to Disney this time of year so we wanted to checkout the monorail resorts after dinner. Unfortunately a week after I had made the ADR, Disney Dining called and informed me that they had a private party scheduled for the night that we were dining there which meant they had to cancel our ADR . The CM was extremely sorry about the situation and had helped us get another ADR to fill that spot. Fortunately she was able to get us in to Cali Grill later on in our trip so all is good again

 

[Ciciwoowoo]

We made the mistake one year of booking Hoop de Doo our first night and a very delayed airplane made it so we almost missed this one!

It isn't worth the stress. Book a place to eat the first night close to your resort and make it one that will not require a credit card charge. We have gone to Ohana the past few years and that seems to work well for us.

 

[ToddyLu]

Thanks for the tip that is a great point...didn't think of it....so we have the CA Grill scheduled the night we fly in....we arrive at 10:40 a.m.....I hope

 

[H20DogsNDisney]

Thanks I will have to check my other ideas.

 

[bleeps]

Another voice of experience saying that it GREATLY reduces your stress not to have a first-night ADR that you pay a penalty for missing.

Another factor to consider is that you and your group may *really* want to be in the park your first night (if you have tickets that include your first day). We booked Spirit of Aloha once for a first night, and although our travel allowed us to get there on time, DS was really disappointed having to leave the park and would have been MUCH happier with a dinner in MK (it spoiled his ability to really enjoy the show).

Our rules-of-thumb are that we must have at least 6 hours from our estimated hotel arrival time (which we peg at 90 minutes after scheduled plane landing) to any dinner ADR, that the dinner be for a restaurant in one of the parks, and that there's no fee involved with missing the ADR. That's worked perfectly for us!

 

[belleatheart]

Agree on the park thing. We normally do not book a restaurant that does not require credit really ever in all honestly. The amount of times plans change, somebody gets sick, *cross you fingers this does not happen*, and what not is crazy! We normally end up changing 2-3 restaurants a trip because it is like oh we decided to do epcot today instead...well lets see where we can eat here. Also, when we go into on a park our first day, we never want to leave hehe. It is just so magical, yes cliche but oh so true! So it is always great looking at the restaurants your park has to offer if you plan on going in one. It sounds like maybe MK that night? LTT or Tony's and watching spectromagic on the patio is awesome!! We did that our first trip, it was so awesome and amazing!