I have early dining - can I go to anytime restaurant?

[PhoneGoddess]

:mad:

Hopefully, they will do a better job of checking cruise cards and turn away diners crossing over from the traditional dining room.

 

What if anytime diners went into the traditional dining room and sat down at your table? ;)

 

 

Whale-watcher,

I think that you might have misunderstood my post. The question was asked "Is it bad to have an early or late dining 'reservation' but go over to the anytime dining restaurant to eat?"

 

My reply was "Yes".

 

I was not saying that it was ok to do so. Absolutely not.

[bubbadog]

they checked ours a couple of nights,but we were in anytime like we asked for:)):p

[spongerob]

:o Actually, having fun with a serious question. We are set up with Anytime dining now but were thinking of switching to early dining (may be too late now- cruise is in 3 weeks). The question had popped into my head and thought it might be an interesting topic. :D I've always enjoyed a set seating but wanted to try anytime dining.

Okay, for the sake of amity I'll accept that. You can switch to Anytime dining any time, if you wish. You probably won't be able to switch back to traditional fixed seating. If you arrange to go for one night, I doubt you'll notice much difference since the menus are the same. Should you decide to meet your friends in an anytime dining room and intend to keep your seat in traditional, or dine in one of the alternate dining choices, please be considerate and let your tablemates or waiters know beforehand so they aren't waiting for you to show up. Enjoy your cruise!

[twocats]

After looking again at the schedules for dining and reading the discussions here, I decided to call my TA and see if we could change to early traditional from our schedules late trad. Too late, early seating is already waitlisted and this is for a cruise in October. So now I have a question regarding Anytime Dining; when two people are willing to be seated with other diners, are you put at tables where people are already ordering and eating or do the waiters start a new table so all diners can be ordering and served within the same time?

[Pam in CA]

http://www.princess.com/onboard/dining/dining.html

This is for the Grand Princess. My experience has been that late traditional is between 8:00 - 8:30PM, depending on the itinerary. Also, I've been on several cruises where the time changed if we were going to be in port a bit later. Over the past year, I've been on 3 Princess cruises, all late traditional, and the times were 8PM, 8:15PM and 8:30PM.

[Pam in CA]

Why would we chose assignment over the freedom? :D

This is a personal choice. I feel I have a lot more freedom knowing what time I'm going to be dining rather than have to wait in a hallway (no lounge or anywhere to sit in sight) up to 45 minutes and possibly miss a show. It's a matter of which you "freedom" you prefer.

[cruzinchris]

This is for the Grand Princess. My experience has been that late traditional is between 8:00 - 8:30PM, depending on the itinerary.

 

I posted the link specifically for someone who asked about dining on the Grand.

[Pam in CA]

I posted the link specifically for someone who asked about dining on the Grand.

Ahhh... I stand corrected. I wanted to make sure that some people understood that what is for the Grand isn't necessarily the same for all.

[BJS]

After looking again at the schedules for dining and reading the discussions here, I decided to call my TA and see if we could change to early traditional from our schedules late trad. Too late, early seating is already waitlisted and this is for a cruise in October. So now I have a question regarding Anytime Dining; when two people are willing to be seated with other diners, are you put at tables where people are already ordering and eating or do the waiters start a new table so all diners can be ordering and served within the same time?

 

No, you are not seated at tables where people are already eating. They seat everyone at the table before any food is served. Just like at breakfast or lunch. If some one orders all the courses and then dessert and you only order appetizer, entree and dessert yours will be served along with the rest of the table and you will have to wait until the other have finished soup and salad before your entree is served. Others might be in the process of ordering when you are seated but you will have time to look at the menu and order before anyone is served.

[whale-watcher]

Whale-watcher,

I think that you might have misunderstood my post. The question was asked "Is it bad to have an early or late dining 'reservation' but go over to the anytime dining restaurant to eat?"

 

My reply was "Yes".

 

I was not saying that it was ok to do so. Absolutely not.

:o I am so sorry PhoneGoddess!!!!...I was too quick on the draw!! my apologies:o

 

and for HappyCruiser...we actually really like anytime dining...and have rarely had to wait for more than 5 or 10 minutes to be seated.

[PhoneGoddess]

:o I am so sorry PhoneGoddess!!!!...I was too quick on the draw!! my apologies:o

 

and for HappyCruiser...we actually really like anytime dining...and have rarely had to wait for more than 5 or 10 minutes to be seated.

 

No problem!:) I've done the same thing myself.

 

On our Crown cruise, we never had to wait at all for a table. It was great!

[twocats]

This dining thing is a bigger issue for me than it needs to be I guess. My daugther complained about being seated with a group already eating and they felt like outsiders, then when everyone got up and left the were alone. They had been anxious to meet people. This happened on the Norwegien line, glad to know it won't happen on Princess. So we will stick with late traditional since early is waitlisted and change to Anytime if we find 8:15 to late. Thanks all for the help.

[Tatka]

This is a personal choice. I feel I have a lot more freedom knowing what time I'm going to be dining rather than have to wait in a hallway (no lounge or anywhere to sit in sight) up to 45 minutes and possibly miss a show. It's a matter of which you "freedom" you prefer.

 

I've already wrote this... We have NEVER waited more than 1-2 minutes!!! To avoid traffic, we arrived at DR between 6 and 7PM or at about 9PM.

 

We ate with whoever we wanted (mostly at tables for 2!!!) and in different locations of two dining rooms (we preffered the aft DR Coral?Palm?)

 

Had terrific service from every single waiter... and we accusomed to a great service after several sailings on Celebrity. :)

 

So I don't really see any advantages of Traditional Dining for us. In fact I will miss it on our next two non-Princess cruises. :(

[cruzinchris]

...If some one orders all the courses and then dessert and you only order appetizer, entree and dessert yours will be served along with the rest of the table and you will have to wait until the other have finished soup and salad before your entree is served...

 

This is actually no different than "traditional" dining and one of the reasons that DH and I prefer to dine at a table for two in one of the "anytime" venues. We never order all of the courses, rarely have dessert, and never have after-dinner coffee or drinks.

 

When we sailed with other cruiselines, we were often uncomfortable having to wait while others had appetizer, soup, and salad (we usually have one of these), our entrees, then most folks would order dessert, etc. We felt obligated to remain at the table until everyone was finished; dinner sometimes took up to two hours.

 

For the most part, "anytime" dining on Princess has worked out well for us, and we appreciate this option.

Chris

[LARGIN]

Am I missing something or is this a NO-FUN zone??:confused:

 

You might be missing something. :confused:

[regnig]

Am I missing something or is this a NO-FUN zone??:confused:

 

Oh you noticed too. Depends on who is responding as some take themselves far too seriously.

[stephenandrew]

We felt obligated to remain at the table until everyone was finished; dinner sometimes took up to two hours.

 

One of the short comings of anytime dining is that folks from different parties seated at the same table seem to get up and leave at different times. Some folks eat more quickly, have a show they want to get to, etc. We are slower eaters, and my wife and I are often then only ones left at a table for 6 or 8 when we go to anytime dining. I don't expect people to wait till we are done, but its just kind of a drag sitting at a large table alone. I guess this same thing could happen at a traditional seating, but for some reason, it seems to be less frequent. In general, it seems to me that those who participate in traditional are sharing a dining experience together; those who participate in anytime dining seem to be eating and other folks just happen to be at the table.

[shepp]

We were not on Traditional plan. ;)

 

Why would we chose assignment over the freedom? :D

 

Well, I never took myself for the type who'd opt for the "regimentation" of traditional if I had the chance. So I figured that we'd probably switch from late to anytime midway on our DP 11-dayer. Instead, we ended up with great dining companions and a fun waiter, and there was never any question of not keeping traditional.

 

For me, the nice thing about traditional is having that one constant in the daily schedule. (Fortunately, there was only one conflict with port activities.) There's just something about a roomful of people filing in and sitting down to dinner together that makes it feel...special. It was nice to drop in on friends we knew would be at other tables, too. Like dinner is a social occasion with food attached, rather than a meal with potential socializing.

 

And yeah, sometimes I waited for others to finish salads or whatever, but there were always those excellent rolls to munch on. I really didn't suffer...

[SuzCruise]

My DH and I just picked Anytime dining over traditional because of a bad experience on HAL with our last cruise where we were stuck in early dining and couldn't switch on a 2 week cruise - eating dinner at the buffet or in our room every night stunk. We don't care where we sit, or who our waitperson is as long as we don't have to eat in the middle of the afternoon! But with all the hoopla here about traditional versus Anytime I am starting to wonder if we made a mistake. Is there any difference in the menus? Attire for the evening? Anything other than we can eat when we want and decide night to night if we want to eat at a 2 top or dine with others?

 

Thanks for the help!

[LARGIN]

Suzcruise... Same menu, same food, same attire...

[spongerob]

Am I missing something or is this a NO-FUN zone??:confused:

Depends what your idea of fun is. Some kinds of fun get threads poofed and user accounts terminated. There seems to be a lot of that going around the Bay Area lately. ;)

[SuzCruise]

I'm getting some inconsistent info here. I have been told that the menus and food are the same in traditional and anytime dining rooms - but someone just told me that they don't do special pastas, flaming deserts or anything else that needs the "head waiters attention" in anytime dining. Anyone ever had "special pastas" (whatever that means) or bananas foster in the anytime dining room - especially on the Grand? Just trying to get accurate facts here.

 

Thanks

[MaryPoppinz]

That made me laugh - maybe I will try this on my next cruise and see what happens:D :D

 

Even if you were to choose Anytime Dining and you somehow took a seat in the Traditional Dining room one night, you would only be taking up ONE dining room seat that night. On the other hand, people who choose Traditional Dining and somehow take a seat in the Anytime Dining room are taking up TWO dining room seats that night.

 

So, in reality it's less disruptive for Anytime Diners to invade the Traditional Dining Room than the reverse. So, my suggestion to the OP is to make a decision that feels right for his needs and then enjoy it for the duration of the cruise.