Character dining or non character dining

[old lady]

Maybe I getting too old , but I prefer dining without characters.

 

[Pumbaa_]

I guess I’m an other. I enjoy characters but I’m not a fan of buffets. I prefer the family style where it’s brought to you. Breakfast ppo at GG is my favorite

 

[The WDW 3]

It’s fine once for the kids

 

[fly girl]

When my daughter was younger, character dining was definite choice for at least one meal on our vacation. Now that she is older, we prefer non character dining. (the food is typically better at the non character places)

However, we may return at some point for nostalgia. I could see us trying breakfast at Topolino's Terrace.

 

[olwyngdh]

I like character breakfasts but not dinners.

 

[CynBeth]

We are adults and enjoy a few character breakfasts - Crystal Palace, Tusker House, and Cape May.

 

[Bellex917]

My kids are still young (8 and 4) so for us it's a must. I try to do one a day during our trip.

 

[cobright]

We try to do an autograph-project with the princesses each trip. So instead of autograph books we will find a Book with all of the Princesses on the cover and get one signature from each on the cover. Or a couple trips back I found a set of over sized Princess playing cards so we got an autograph on each of the cards needed for a 'royal' flush.

Anyway, a trip to Akershus and a couple character-paloozas generally gets the job mostly done.

 

[DisneyJColeMom]

I dont have experience with it yet. I have a few character dining experiences booked for our trip & now wondering if too many. Im not a fan of buffets myself, and my son is picky. I think he would love meeting the characters tho. I have Storybook Dining at Artist Point, Minnies Seasonal Dine @ H&V dinner for Fantasmic seating, Cinderallas Royal Table breakfast & Be Our Guest Dinner, and Tusker House breakfast. Thoughts on any of those?

 

[rkstocke5609]

Tusker House (breakfast) , Garden Grill (dinner), & Akershus (lunch or dinner) are my favorite character meals because the food is consistently very good. I am looking forward to trying Storybook at Artist Point.

I have had dinner at Be our Guest , and the food was fine but it’s the ambience in there that would bring me back.

 

[illinidp]

Once a trip but not at a buffet. Love the breakfast at Topolino’s and al Forno.

 

[terri33inne]

We are huge Pooh fans so Crystal Palace will be a must-do on every trip no matter how old my DD gets. Now that my daughter is a bit older (12) that tends to be the only one we do. IF we do one I prefer the ones without a buffet... I get stressed that I'm going to be up at the buffet, and miss a character. We did Toppolino's in early March, and loved it.. it was relaxing, not too loud, and the characters were great.

 

[CynBeth]

I dont have experience with it yet. I have a few character dining experiences booked for our trip & now wondering if too many. Im not a fan of buffets myself, and my son is picky. I think he would love meeting the characters tho. I have Storybook Dining at Artist Point, Minnies Seasonal Dine @ H&V dinner for Fantasmic seating, Cinderallas Royal Table breakfast & Be Our Guest Dinner, and Tusker House breakfast. Thoughts on any of those?

Of what you mentioned we have only been to Tusker House breakfast and BOG dinner and absolutely love those! For TH we do the earliest ADR we can and for BOG dinner select around 4 or 4:30 before they get really crowded.

 

[The WDW 3]

Of what you mentioned we have only been to Tusker House breakfast and BOG dinner and absolutely love those! For TH we do the earliest ADR we can and for BOG dinner select around 4 or 4:30 before they get really crowded.

yikes

 

[gatour]

Normally don't do character meals. Since I almost literly grew up at the Magic Kingdom and later other parks, since opening year, I have seen enough of the characters.

The only exception was years ago we were staying at the original Hilton at the now Disney Springs. My wife was in the mood for breakfast, so we went down to the restaurant not realizing on Sundays it was character meal. The good news the breakfast buffet prices was in line with a normal hotel breakfast buffet w/o characters.

The other time we were at Disney with my in-laws with lots of toddler/youngster nieces/nephews. We had lunch at Hollywood and Vine. I actually didn't mind the characters, just let the rugrats get their photo ops. And the food wasn't bad, despite reviews to the contrary at the time and continuing to this day.

 

[TiggerTrigger]

I have never liked using park time for characters. I figure I have to eat, so I like a well timed character breakfast or brunch that fits with our touring plans to cover meeting characters. I thought we'd give this up as our kids got older, but we still throw in a number of character meals per trip...even when we don't have kids with us. Last trip was just me and a friend...we had two character meals together, and I went to another one solo after she flew home.

 

[Disney Bubble Lover]

We’ve done daily character meals on both our trips but our kids were young and meeting characters was a high priority for them. The character meals were a very memorable part of our experience and saved us a ton of time vs standing in separate meet and greet lines.

Now that our kids are a little older (9 & 11) we will likely only do one character meal on our next trip as they prioritize rides over most character meets, plus the character meals will be a lot more expensive once both kids are Disney adults. If it was just my husband and me we would skip character dining since we’ve already had that experience and instead choose to spend the extra money on a tour or signature dining experience which would be new to us.

 

[rdaky]

We aren't fans of character meals. We've tried most of them and we'd rather eat where the food is better and not a buffet. Even our kids prefer good food over character meals.

 

[tguz]

I have done it for the kids. When just my Fiancee and I go to Disney, we haven't had any character meals. I would do one for sure if there was one with Carl from UP.

 

[lorimay]

We usually only do the character meals when we travel with the grandkids..........