I'm beginning to understand there's a method to your....

[hllwdcruiser]

I was going to say "madness" but realized, in looking at recent Patters, it's not madness at all. I'm referring to preferred dining times.

What time is the best time to eat dinner (supper) on a cruise?

I've read on this forum multiple times about people lining up at 5 PM at the dining rooms. We are never around the dining rooms or the Piazza at that time, so we actually have never witnessed it for ourselves but were amazed that people actually ate so early. 

We are normally late diners, eating between 7 and 7:30 nightly. So I booked a standing reservation in the Amalfi for 6:40,  figuring we'd get served by 7 and hopefully be out by 8. 

But I realize now - this is why we miss so many shows. We always have to choose. Do we want to go to the game show or the comedian? The MUTS or the production show? We always miss something.

Although sometimes the later shows/game shows are not scheduled at the same time - by the time you get to the other venue from another one, there is never any seating left.

But if we ate at 5 or 5:30, we would be able to go to the early production show and catch the later game show, no problem. Plus, instead of being stuffed to the gills in the evening, we could even enjoy a late night snack.

The only problem is that we are usually just leaving the pool around 5 or 5:30 so what time would we have to go back to the cabin to make that early seating?

Do people actually eat lunch, then afternoon tea, then dinner at 5?

I realize we can never figure out the best time to eat without FOMO!

I am truly interested in how others schedule their dining times. What do you do?

[Paula_MacFan]

Just like we would do on any other vacation -- we eat when hungry and in the venue that sounds good at the time. We may make a reservation for specialty dining once or twice for special occasions, but that's it. We don't care about getting to know our waiters or any other nonsense, and don't plan our precious vacation time around dining room times. Many times the buffet has the same food as MDR without the 2 hour time commitment as well. 

Edited February 24, 2022 by Paula_MacFan

[skynight]

We plan our dining times and location around what we want to do and not activities around a fixed dining time. There is no best time. Eat when you want and when you enjoy dining.

If you want to eat at say 5:30 leave time to dress when you leave the pool. For us that's about 45 minutes. For others maybe a few hours.

 

[Jadn13]

We eat at 5pm. I’m up early, even on vacation, so 5pm isn’t as early to eat as it seems. We get served quickly and then can go on with our evening. It’s also easier to get the same table/wait staff when we show up early. 

I also live in FL so I don’t spend most days  at the pool  which makes it easier to clean up quickly for dinner

Edited February 24, 2022 by Jadn13

[hllwdcruiser]

1 hour ago, CarelessAndConfused said:

 

When you're hungry.

So funny............

[hllwdcruiser]

1 hour ago, Paula_MacFan said:

Just like we would do on any other vacation -- we eat when hungry and in the venue that sounds good at the time. We may make a reservation for specialty dining once or twice for special occasions, but that's it. We don't care about getting to know our waiters or any other nonsense, and don't plan our precious vacation time around dining room times. Many times the buffet has the same food as MDR without the 2 hour time commitment as well. 

 

1 hour ago, skynight said:

We plan our dining times and location around what we want to do and not activities around a fixed dining time. There is no best time. Eat when you want and when you enjoy dining.

If you want to eat at say 5:30 leave time to dress when you leave the pool. For us that's about 45 minutes. For others maybe a few hours.

 

Can you still eat at any time with Dine My Way? Can you still just show up like we did before? I got the impression that we had to make a reservation every night like the other lines are doing.

[Coffeeluvr05]

At home we never at or around 5, but when cruising we do!  That way, we have the rest of the evening free to get to any of the entertainment we want to see.  It can make it tricky if you wait too long to eat lunch though, which I am notorious for.  I usually cannot do afternoon tea because of the timing, but I always WANT to! lol

[JF - retired RRT]

3 minutes ago, hllwdcruiser said:

 

Can you still eat at any time with Dine My Way? Can you still just show up like we did before? I got the impression that we had to make a reservation every night like the other lines are doing.

Reservations not required.

[VibeGuy]

The entire point of afternoon tea is to fill the aching void caused between luncheon at noon and dinner at 8.  When second Traditional seating was at 8, it was a necessary lifeline. 

[MissP22]

We always eat our main meal before 3 PM at home (remember we live in Florida) 😁

On the ship we change our schedule around to meet the show schedule which means go to the main show first, dinner second and probably miss out on some other event.  If we eat early we can catch the first show, second event & go back to the DR or buffet for coffee & dessert. 

[hllwdcruiser]

@Coffeeluvr05 Exactly! That's what I'm thinking we may do. It actually makes a lot of sense when you look at the Patters. We only sail once a year if we are lucky, so we want to make the most of every day.

[Coffeeluvr05]

1 hour ago, VibeGuy said:

The entire point of afternoon tea is to fill the aching void caused between luncheon at noon and dinner at 8.  When second Traditional seating was at 8, it was a necessary lifeline. 

Ohhhh....Well, I'm not sure I've ever felt an "aching void," but I have been hangry!  🤓

 

Sorry, I get a little goofy when I'm excited and I sail on Saturday, so don't mind me!  I might actually be a little hungry as I type this as well, but surely not feeling an "aching void." 😁

[XBGuy]

Our daily meal routine on a cruise ship starts is fairly similar to our regular home routine.  Mrs. XBGuy likes to sleep in every morning.  At home I get up and head out to the local coffee shop where my usual breakfast is a bagel wth cream cheese and a couple cups of coffee.  On a cruise I head out for breakfast--eaither at the dining room or the buffet depending on my whim--where I will have a full-on breakfast that is way more robust than my norm .  Before returning the cabin I will grab something for Mrs. XBGuy such as lox and bagel or, more likely a couple pastries.  On our one cruise on a Royal Class ship, we learned that she liked going to the Suite Concierge Lounge for the pastries offered there.

 

Neither of us generally do lunch.  (The exception to this generality is if we decide to enjoy a mid-afternoon meal on a port stop.  In Juneau, AK, for example, we loved getting fish tacos at Deckhand Daves.  Sadly, but I really don't know if Deckhand Dave's survived the pandemic.  In San Francisco we love walking to a terrific Peruvian restaurant called La Mar near the Ferry Building for ceviches and empanadas.)  So, generally, by late in the afternoon the munchies will get us, and we will have some sort of nosh and some wine.  On board the ship, we will generally enjoy this ritual on our balcony--grabbing noshes from the buffet or the International Cafe.

 

Dinner can occur anytime after 6:00 pm.  We rarely have dinner in the dining room.  Quite regularly (but rarely on consecutive days) we enjoy dinner in one of the specialty restaurants. If we don't go to a specialty restaurant, we will usually have a relatively light dinner.  We may spend the evening at Vines noshing on Sushi (her) and Tapas (me).  We may grab something from the IC or a burger or pizza from the Lido Deck and take it to our cabin, or we may call Room Service.  For the last evening of a cruise we have started our own little tradition of having dinner in the buffet.  This is also where we finish off any unfinished bottles of wine that have been stashed in the cabin.  😁

 

I know this does not address the OP's concern about juggling dining with show schedules.  I just wanted to again point out that everybody customizes their cruise to please themselves.

[RNRcruisers]

We also prefer to dine later, usually around 7:00. Many of the shows were at 9 on our January cruise so we made our reserved time for 6:40. It worked out perfectly. We did miss some trivia and stuff like that which was often at 7 but that wasn't a big deal.

 

We kind of think the opposite of many who have responded. We don't want to spend our afternoon saying, when should we eat dinner, where shall we go to eat. That is pre-planned for us and one less thing to decide. We have also never eaten dinner in the buffet. We get enough of that with breakfast and lunch.

[Thrak]

1 hour ago, XBGuy said:

In Juneau, AK, for example, we loved getting fish tacos at Deckhand Daves.  Sadly, but I really don't know if Deckhand Dave's survived the pandemic. 

 

Deckhand Dave's is currently advertising for staff. They are seasonally closed and "should" be open again in May.

[2BACRUISER]

We don't do lunch but afternoon tea between 3-4pm and blooming heck, we dont eat til 8 or 8.30pm at night, the MDR will be a ghost town that time of night? we then like to do a late show around 10.30 then a night cap, deck walk and bed. 

[wowzz]

3 minutes ago, 2BACRUISER said:

We don't do lunch but afternoon tea between 3-4pm and blooming heck, we dont eat til 8 or 8.30pm at night, the MDR will be a ghost town that time of night? we then like to do a late show around 10.30 then a night cap, deck walk and bed. 

That would be us as well.

One of the best parts of a cruise is sitting in the sun in the late afternoon, drinking something refreshing. Why on earth would you want to sit inside,  missing the sail away in the sunshine?  

[FlaMariner]

Breakfast at 8am, lunch at noon, dinner at 5....rinse and repeat.

[wowzz]

23 minutes ago, FlaMariner said:

Breakfast at 8am, lunch at noon, dinner at 5....rinse and repeat.

Surely that gets boring ?

[hllwdcruiser]

6 minutes ago, wowzz said:

Surely that gets boring ?

Wow. Obviously not for @FlaMarineror they wouldn't do it.........don't you think?

[ZoeyVictoria]

Pool time/sitting in the sun is not quite as important for a lot of Floridians. We do our outdoor time early in the day and have never attended tea time.  At 2 p.m., my SO is ready for a nap.  Sometimes I join him, sometimes I read on a quiet deck, sometimes I have some extra casino time.  The alarm is set for around 4:15, so we can leave for dinner at 5:30 and rarely have conflicts with shows.

[hllwdcruiser]

I don't understand that even though I started a silly little thread just for the fun of it, there are still those who can't resist the snark.

 

Dealing with Covid these past two years and now learning of all that is going on in the Ukraine at the moment.....sigh

 

I do, however, want to thank everyone who has replied and managed to do so without disparaging what another poster chooses to do. I like learning how somebody else does cruising - never too old to learn! 

 

 

 

Edited February 24, 2022 by hllwdcruiser

[Cruise Raider]

We like to eat sometime between 6:00 and 6:30 PM so we make our reservations for 6:00 or 6:20 PM.  We like to see the 8:00 PM or 8:15 (maybe 8:30 PM) game show activity and then off to the theater after that which is somewhere between 9:00 and 9:30 PM.  If we are going with others, that requires a 6:00 PM dining time but when dining with just the two of us, we can easily make the 8:00 PM show.  

Since the restart, we've had no problem getting out of the MDR about an hour for a couple, more like 1:45 hours for four.  I went solo recently and was out in 45 minutes flat.  I'm sure the more people at your table, the longer it will take.  

 

 

[wowzz]

19 minutes ago, hllwdcruiser said:

Wow. Obviously not for @FlaMarineror they wouldn't do it.........don't you think?

Fair point - I guess I just like a bit of spontaneity in my life, especially on holiday.

[Potstech]

39 minutes ago, wowzz said:

Surely that gets boring ?

Sounds like a plan to me.  Then on with other activities