Anytime Dinning ?

[kenmerloo]

What is a good time to go for anytime dinning, when it is not too busy? Is it best to book between the two traditional seatings ?

[weedpindle]

When you want to go is the best time.

[Loonbeam]

Different MDs have different rules about reservations. As a general rule, best time is either right at opening, or after the folks who sat at opening have had time to eat and filter out.

 

For example, the main AD room opened at 5:00 on the royal. If you arrived before 5:30 you sat pretty much immediately, but then the room was full, and with a 2 hour dinner, tables didn't even start clearing until after 7.

 

Also, with ships that have a room that opens for AD later (usually 8 ish), of course you can go then.

 

What is a good time to go for anytime dinning, when it is not too busy? Is it best to book between the two traditional seatings ?

[PrevailingConditions]

Anytime dining is just as the name suggest, you can dine anytime they are serving in the Horizon Court Buffet without the need of a reservation. This is our preferred dining choice but we use the Dine Line to reserve a few meals in the main dining room. Don't forget the specialty dining venues, Sabatinis or Bayou Cafe'. A $20 or $25 up charge but in our experience well worth the extra charge.

[dplusd]

We go to the first show and eat later, about 7:45 - 8:00, and will usually be seated pretty quickly. I would expect 6:00 - 7:30 would be a longer wait.

[skynight]

Here is our experience.

Most Princess ships have one MDR for ATD that opens at 5:30 and maybe even 5:00, and a second ATD that is used for very early 5:30 traditional seating and it opens for ATD around 7:30. In the N.A. market most passengers that like to dine early are there before 6pm. By 6 the DR is fairly full. Tables open again around 7:30. So if you show up around 6:30 it may be difficult. We have never had any difficulty getting seated immediately when we show up 7:30 or later. Also tables for two are more difficult to get than tables to share. Note the Coral and Island operate similar, but with 2 MDR's.

 

If you are on a cruise that has lots of passengers from Europe and/or South America these passengers tend to dine later. On our cruise in the Baltic and when we sailed around S.Am. we had no difficulty at all getting an early table, the DR was quite empty early.

 

Each cruise is a little different and depends on the passenger preferences. But, rule of thumb, longer cruises have an older demographic, combined with cruises that have lots of North Americans, equates to a larger demand for early dining times.

[Kamloops50]

What is a good time to go for anytime dinning, when it is not too busy? Is it best to book between the two traditional seatings ?

 

We usually are there as they open . By 7PM there is a wait to get seated.

You can make a reservation for a certain time and table.

[kenmerloo]

Thanks e everyone. We are sailing on the Island Princess to tomorrow. By the sounds of it, we can make a reservation in the MDR ? I thought we would have to just go and take our chances. If we had anytime seating.

[Treven]

I don't think you'll have to "take your chances". AD does what it's supposed to do. Just like a land-based restaurant, you go when you're ready to eat. You may, or may not, have to wait. Personally I eat early at home, so I'll eat about the same time on board ship. I've never had to wait for a table by eating early.

[JimmyVWine]

If the ship is using one of the ATD MDRs as an early Traditional, we go to that one around 7:20. The Traditional folks are mostly gone by then and the dining room really opens up. The longest we have ever waited was 10 minutes and that was only because the Head Waiter insisted that we wait so that we could have "the best window table in the restaurant". Had we passes on that, we would have been seated immediately.

[OCruisers]

We love AnyTime Dining and would never want to go back to Traditional.

LuLu

[SassyLeslie]

Also, you can make reservations earlier in the day for Anytime Dining. Since it was introduced, we always choose it. I have found that it also depends on the cruise and what is going on that day. Some cruises, we never had a wait at all, some, we have had waits up to 15 minutes. We love that we are not looked into a set time.

[sherryf]

Anytime dining is just as the name suggest, you can dine anytime they are serving in the Horizon Court Buffet without the need of a reservation. This is our preferred dining choice but we use the Dine Line to reserve a few meals in the main dining room. Don't forget the specialty dining venues, Sabatinis or Bayou Cafe'. A $20 or $25 up charge but in our experience well worth the extra charge.

 

You can dine anytime in the MDR without a reservation too! No need to go to the buffet! You CAN make a reservation for the MDR, but you don't have to. We always eat dinner in the MDR and have NEVER made a reservation. We tend to go early, around 6:00. We have occasionally waited a little while, and have only gotten a pager twice, but only on formal nights and have then only waited 10 - 15 minutes.