Yet another dinning strategy question

[TheBigErn]

My plan for booking our in park dinners is to go after the ones most difficult to get. But the subset of that plan is what to do if you don't get your first choice. Do you book your 2nd choice for that particular day? Or do you go to the the 2nd most difficult one to get overall and come back to the day you didn't get? To be more clear, if I want Space 220 on may 23 and don't get it, do I book my second choice for May 23 or move to SciFi on May 26 and come back to May 23?

 

[MainMom]

My plan for booking our in park dinners is to go after the ones most difficult to get. But the subset of that plan is what to do if you don't get your first choice. Do you book your 2nd choice for that particular day? Or do you go to the the 2nd most difficult one to get overall and come back to the day you didn't get? To be more clear, if I want Space 220 on may 23 and don't get it, do I book my second choice for May 23 or move to SciFi on May 26 and come back to May 23?

At that point I would decide which ADR was more important to me the 2nd choice of 23rd or Sci-Fi on the 26th.

 

[Eastern]

What day of your vacation is Space220?

 

[wiparker824]

Depends how many days you have and what your priorities are tbh. For us sci-fi was the only real must have. So I went with 60+9 this morning and got it for 5/23 actually at lunch. If it didn’t work the back up was to try for dinner, if that didn’t work the backup was to do it for 60+10 even though we planned to be in Epcot that day, I’d have switched the park reservations and made it work. But everyone will have different priorities and different days they are there.

To be honest, after getting thru it all today it didn’t seem like I really needed to rush anything. What was there at 6EST was still there at 7EST (for the most part, maybe not exact times but close) - I know because I actually changed the times after rushing and just booking first I could get for the popular ones, I went back an hour later on my phone and casually switched the times of Hollywood and Vine, Chef Mickeys and Sci Fi…The biggest factor on availability just seeemed to be how far out from 60 days I could make the reservation. Like you might be trying to beat a small group of people for 60+1 for Space when it already completely sold out and has nothing to do with being online and fast right at 6EST.

 

[MainMom]

Depends how many days you have and what your priorities are tbh. For us sci-fi was the only real must have. So I went with 60+9 this morning and got it for 5/23 actually at lunch. If it didn’t work the back up was to try for dinner, if that didn’t work the backup was to do it for 60+10 even though we planned to be in Epcot that day, I’d have switched the park reservations and made it work. But everyone will have different priorities and different days they are there.

To be honest, after getting thru it all today it didn’t seem like I really needed to rush anything. What was there at 6EST was still there at 7EST (for the most part, maybe not exact times but close) - I know because I actually changed the times after rushing and just booking first I could get for the popular ones, I went back an hour later on my phone and casually switched the times of Hollywood and Vine, Chef Mickeys and Sci Fi…The biggest factor on availability just seeemed to be how far out from 60 days I could make the reservation. Like you might be trying to beat a small group of people for 60+1 for Space when it already completely sold out and has nothing to do with being online and fast right at 6EST.

What day of your trip did you book Chef Mickey?

 

[wiparker824]

What day of your trip did you book Chef Mickey?

5/21 party of 7 for breakfast, but I see availability for everyday of our trip except exactly at 60 days, there's an opening for a party of 4 on 5/15 for breakfast for example... granted the time options are fewer in the 5/15-5/18 days but still, based on some things I was reading thought it was going to be much harder. Thought I was going to be doing a lot of splitting the party into smaller tables, weird eating times, etc. Obviously having a long trip with flexibility helped a lot, just underestimated I guess how much that would help.

 

[TheBigErn]

What day of your vacation is Space220?

5th day which is our last full park day.

 

[wiparker824]

5th day which is our last full park day.

FWIW the 60+5 day for me is 5/19 and I don't currently see anything for Space (including lounge). I do see some 5/20 times still depending on party size but seems very limited like no times for party of 2 but yes for party of 4, but that's 60+6. That said I didn't check this morning, might have been more. Also probably doesn't help that 50+5/6 for me is Fri/Sat and generally I'm guessing more busy. Good luck.

 

[MainMom]

5/21 party of 7 for breakfast, but I see availability for everyday of our trip except exactly at 60 days, there's an opening for a party of 4 on 5/15 for breakfast for example... granted the time options are fewer in the 5/15-5/18 days but still, based on some things I was reading thought it was going to be much harder. Thought I was going to be doing a lot of splitting the party into smaller tables, weird eating times, etc. Obviously having a long trip with flexibility helped a lot, just underestimated I guess how much that would help.

Thank you! I will be trying to get a breakfast for 7 on our third day. I’ll take anything after 9am since we need to sleep in that day. My booking day is April 1.

 

[nonnadisney]

Okay I see people mentioning 6am EST for reservation window. I thought the window opens at 7 am on day 60 +. Which is it? Tomorrow is the day I need to make ADRs

 

[MainMom]

Okay I see people mentioning 6am EST for reservation window. I thought the window opens at 7 am on day 60 +. Which is it? Tomorrow is the day I need to make ADRs

It’s 6am EST. I have read a few reports where it opened at 5:30am EST. 7am is the time to reserve Genie+ Each morning.

 

[OhHeyLK]

Okay I see people mentioning 6am EST for reservation window. I thought the window opens at 7 am on day 60 +. Which is it? Tomorrow is the day I need to make ADRs

6am eastern for dining reservations. Though sometimes they open earlier at like 545. I've also heard that some enchanting experiences can open as early as midnight. Makes it challenging when you're trying to coordinate while also getting some sleep!

 

[nonnadisney]

Thanks MainMom and OhHeyLK for the quick response. Just changed my alarm for the morning. I'm not a morning person so this should be interesting!

 

[MainMom]

Thanks MainMom and OhHeyLK for the quick response. Just changed my alarm for the morning. I'm not a morning person so this should be interesting!

How did it go?

 

[nonnadisney]

How did it go?

It went pretty good. I got 3 of the 4 restaurants that I wanted. For Epcot I ended up booking at Chefs de France since there was no availability at Teppan Edo. Also had some issues with MDE on my pc. Booked my ts for 5/18 but then it wouldn't let me book for the 16th and 17th. So I used the MDE on my phone and had no problems. Thanks!