I haven't been at Christmas myself. However I am sure it is too late now to make reservations at any theme park restaurants, so you will probably have to eat at a place outside. I understand the Disney parks fill to capacity and close to further admissions quite early in the day, so if you can face the crowds, you would need to get to them at opening time in order to get in. All of Christmas week will be incredibly busy at the parks, so I recommend you do your park touring seriously in your first few days before the queues become horrendous. Make good use of 'fastpasses'. Always be at the parks at opening time. Buy the 'Unofficial Guide' and follow his touring plans. Just enjoy the general Christmassy atmosphere.

Have a great time. I am envious as I would love to see it all at Christmas, especially the 3pm Magic Kingdom parade.

Just a suggestion on where to eat Christmas dinner, you could try 'Cracker Barrel' see http://www.crackerbarrel.com/ There is one in Kissimmee and they do the roast dinners type of food, so would probably be doing an American style Xmas dinner. It is a cheap place, not fancy, but definitely old-fashioned 'American'.

We was there xmas day in mid 90s,disneyland carpark will be full around 9am,and the park full not to long after,We went to the biggest park in size to escape some of the crowds xmas day to EPCOT but there will still be massive lines for rides.
the dates you are going i would try to do all the rides and the parks the first week of your holiday the parks will be very quiet then the 2nd week you will be amazed where all the people have come from.you could always book a place to eat in one of the parks in advance the first week you are there for xmas day.plus when we was there for 3 of the days it went very cold and we had to buy coats,and that time of the year they can have a cold spell so it might be best for you to pack a fleece or a jacket espically for night just in case..

I agree that the parks will be packed and perhaps best avoided on Christmas Day.

You definately need to plan ahead as many restaurants will be closed.

How about this as something different and a Christmas Day treat.

http://www.gaylordhotels.com/gaylord-palms/special-events/kissimmee-orlando-events/ICE/index.html?intcmp=gp-ba-icetix

Book a table for Christmas Day lunch at the 5* Gaylord Palms and then visit the ICE area afterwards.

The Gaylord Palms is about 10 minutes drive from the BW Lakeside.

Just to say that here are the details for the Xmas parade at the Magic Kingdom:-

Mickey's Once Upon a Christmas Parade will be performed daily at 3 p.m. beginning on Saturday, December 20, continuing through Saturday, January 3, 2009. Between Sunday, December 21 and Wednesday, December 31, the Christmas Parade will be performed twice each day, at noon and 3 p.m.

This has useful info on Xmas at Disney:
http://allears.net/tp/holiday.htm

This page is about dining at Xmas:
http://allears.net/tp/h_dine.htm

However I think Yeltzman is raising your hopes, suggesting you will be able to book a theme park restaurant just a few days in advance. Bookings open 180 days in advance and fill up fast for popular times.

One place which might still have availability is the Swan and Dolphin hotels, in Disney World, but not actually Disney owned. They have special Xmas meals with characters in attendance. These are 5 star hotels, but the prices seem reasonable to me. See here:
http://www.swandolphin.com/dining/holiday.html

Hope this helps!

BTW- there is no Boxing Day here- its back to work for most people. Everything is open as a normal weekday.

If you want casual dining, nice home cooking type of dinner then Cracker Barrel is great- you can also shop while waiting for a table, they have a 'country store' attached to the restaurant. Food is basic meat/potatoes country style dining,good portions and good prices but I think it would lack real Christmas feeling. IMO.
If you want a festive Christmas dinner then take a look at the Peabody Hotel on I-Drive ... they have a Champagne Brunch (fabulous menu) from 11am to 4pm and there is no limit to how much you can eat.
Prices are Adults $54.95 children 6-14yrs $24.95 children 5 and under free.
This would be a lovely way to spend the afternoon.
Also they have the daily 'Parade of the Ducks' at all Peabody Hotels- the manager brings the resident ducks down in the elevator every day at 4.30pm and they all parade to the fountain where they get in and swim. It is great fun and a must-see for tourists.
Their phone number is on the website.

emdia43 - I had a look at the Peabody website and your suggestion of their champagne brunch looks wonderful. Trouble is, we don't know how much the OP wants to pay. I suggested Cracker Barrel as a place where they would be pretty certain to find a roast turkey dinner, as I imagine that is what they want, but who knows? Maybe they will come back and give us more to work on. Of course with the way the pound is dropping against the dollar, all meals are getting more and more expensive to us.

I was in Orlando a couple of years ago for Xmas Day. We went to MGM Studios. Got there about 9.45am and entry was no problem. However, upon entry we were told that Magic Kingdom and Animal Kingdom were both full to capacity by 9.30am and therefore closed to any further visitors. Despite this, the queues of cars trying to get in was huge. I prebooked our restaurant beforehand from the UK within MGM. I dont remember how far in advance I booked though I'm afraid. I do remember that the restaurants were full to capacity, so unless you wanted to wait a couple of hours, lunch would have to be a fastfood option. The queues were perhaps upto an hour or so wait (I have queued longer in the summer months).

However, I went to Seaworld on Xmas Eve and it was empty. We queued for nothing. We literally walked on every ride.

Xmas Eve is a holiday here - many families celebrate their Christmas on that day, have the meal, the gift-giving, so public places tend to be pretty quiet.

Wow... thanks for all the replies and suggestions. Busy looking into them at the moment and will need to make joint decision with hubby but will let you know what we end up doing. Any more suggestions/experiences welcome.

It is really kind of those of you who do all this research for me. I have to say that I myself have spent hours and hours researching everything to do with disney/Orlando just to be able to understand the basics of what is what. I think the ticket options are just starting to sink in now, so I just haven't had the opportunity to do as much indepth research on Christmas Day as I would have liked yet. Thank you again.

I do give back to this forum when I have visited somewhere and am able to help others out. Looking forward to any other suggestions.
Nikki

Hi Nikki,
Myself and my family visited orlando for xmas and new year a few years back and are actually going again this year, 13th Dec - 2nd Jan as we had such a fabulous time. It was absolutely fantastic, but a LOT of planning needs to go into it as there is soooo much to do!! On our last visit we spent xmas day in blizzard beach, 1 of disneys waterparks, which was definately the right decision as it was very quiet here, whereas all other parks were packed to full capacity, meaning we had a section of the park to ourselves and there were no ques. It also had a great festive atmosphere (weird for a waterpark i know lol) because there was xmas music playing throughout the park and the theme of the park is a melting ski resort so there is the appearence of snow on all rides. I would not suggest going ANYWHERE near the magic kingdom on xmas day as its just too busy, so much so that you can't relax and enjoy yourself and take in the atmosphere. However, the magic kingdom is magical at this time of year, so I would recommend you go there maybe on xmas eve like we did- but the 'Holiday Season' begins in November over there, so anyday you go will be equally as magical. Epcot is also meant to be great on xmas eve, as there is a Candlelight Procession with the Christmas Story in the America Gardens Theatre everyday at 5, 6.45 and 8pm. Another piece of advice for you is that the week 13th-19th (your 1st week) is the quietest of the whole year, so take advantage of this and try and visit the main theme parks this week (Magic Kingdom, Epcot, Aquatica and Universal Islands of Adventure). However, the week after this- your 2nd week is the busiest of the whole year so leave any waterparks like blizzard beach and wet n wild until this week, and universal (which is quieter), busch gardens (in Tampa) and seaworld. Also, take advantage of the later opening hours this week, as the parks start to get quieter then. I have a full xmas itinerary with all event times and park hours if you would like me to post these for you??? Another thing i would say is not to try and recreate a british xmas over there with our traditional roast dinners- as they don't exist. We did xmas dinner in our hotel last time which was disapointing, so this year we r opting for the low-key Mickey D's on international drive for a big mac :-) Any other info, just ask and hope that was helpful.
Catherine

also, the thing about it being more expensive over there at xmas like over here is nothing to worry about- prices don't change for xmas. We were worried about this last time as we needed to get taxis back from some parks to stay for the later hours, but no double or tripple time on xmas or new years like over here- and a taxi from the disney resport to international drive is about 25 USD- not bad if you miss the bus.

Thank you very much for all the info. I have sent a PM to Catherine678 as it looks like we will be there at the same time. We have now booked the Arabian Nights dinner show for Christmas Day and are thinking of going to the beach on Christmas Day... unless anyone can suggest one of the parks which is not overcrowded on that day.
Thanks again, Nikki

Hi Nikki, I agree with everything Catherine says. It is quite a few years now since I was there at Christmas but it was certainly quiet for the first few days - we arrived on 15 Dec. So this is a good time to visit MK etc.

We spent Christmas Eve at Seaworld and Christmas day at Universal. It was quiet there but that may have had something to do with the weather - it was rainy and cool (had been sunny and warm up until then). We walked over to Hard Rock and got a table straight away. Prices and menu were the same as always. We then went to the pictures at Universal.

Hope you all have a great Christmas!

Ni nicky64

my family and I are in Orlando form 13th - 28th Dec and are going to the The Arabian Nights Dinner Show too.

We are going at about 4.15pm for the evening show.

Hopefully it will be a great evening.

Enjoy your holiday!!

Angie

Thought I would post this info about Xmas at Universal, in case it's useful to anyone:-

*Edit to remove material subject to copyright law and link added instead. Pippy*

http://www.universalorlando.com/holidays/index.html#top

Thanks mehmeh, this is useful as i didnt know they did character dining in the Universal parks- will look into this for xmas. Ive been to the macys parade however and wasnt very special- not compared to the disney ones anyway which suprised me as IOA and Universal are two of my favourite parks. Maybe i shouldnt of compared it to the disney parades tho.

Hi ,

We've spent Christmas in 2006 with our 2 kids (then aged 14 and 11) . It's a great time to be in Florida , although the Parks are very busy and possibly best avoided , particularly on Christmas Day . The Outback Steakhouse is only a 2 minute drive across the US192 from your Hotel . Food and service is great , but you'll need to book in advance . I'd also recommend Houlighans located about 1/2 mile down to the right from your Hotel on the opposite side of the US192 and Raglan Road in Downtown Disney (about a 15-20 min drive away) . Seaworld is a great Themepark to visit over the festive season , where they also have 'lookalike' snow falling on the walkways beside the lake in the evenings . You'll enjoy the Best Western Lakeside . It's handy for all the attractions plus it does great breakfasts !!