Sorry to make a new thread, but most of the threads on the party were at least a month old so I didn't want to bump an old one. Now that that's out of the way...
My GF and I attended the Illuminations Sparkling Dessert Party on Friday, May 23. It was her 25th birthday and a reservation opened up about three weeks ago (we had tried to book a spot back in March but were unsuccessful), so we decided to try it.
We arrived for check-in around 7:35 and had no problems checking in and getting our "of age" stickers. There were probably 20 or so other people already checked in at this point so we all waited patiently in line behind the rope. Promptly at 7:45 a cast member let us all in and my GF and I headed to a table near the sparkling wine station. Everyone who had checked in before about 7:50 was able to find a table and there were still plenty of tables to spare. A few latecomers were stuck leaning against the railings, and more than one person ended up sitting on the ground (including myself for a short period).
I immediately went to the wine station and got us each a glass of Prosecco. During the night we tried the Prosecco and the California sparkling wine and enjoyed both. I'm not going to tell you exactly how many glasses of wine we had but between the two of us the number was in the double digits...
We also tried every dessert available except for the prepackaged ice cream bars. Our favorites were the donuts with coffee ice cream, churros with vanilla ice cream, and tiramisu. The fresh fruit was also delicious. The shortbread cookies were quite good, and the baklava was good as well but a bit too sweet (I know, it's a dessert party, but still). We did not particularly care for the French chocolate creme de pot. We also had a bit of coffee and iced tea, both of which were fresh.
The view of Illuminations was excellent. I have seen it from several locations around the lagoon and this was by far the best I've seen. Plus, there were few enough people at the party that no one was stuck crowded in between sweaty strangers for the duration of the fireworks.
So, was it worth the money? For us, yes, and we definitely want to attend again. Here are some things that made it a good fit for us:
EDIT: just a typo!
My GF and I attended the Illuminations Sparkling Dessert Party on Friday, May 23. It was her 25th birthday and a reservation opened up about three weeks ago (we had tried to book a spot back in March but were unsuccessful), so we decided to try it.
We arrived for check-in around 7:35 and had no problems checking in and getting our "of age" stickers. There were probably 20 or so other people already checked in at this point so we all waited patiently in line behind the rope. Promptly at 7:45 a cast member let us all in and my GF and I headed to a table near the sparkling wine station. Everyone who had checked in before about 7:50 was able to find a table and there were still plenty of tables to spare. A few latecomers were stuck leaning against the railings, and more than one person ended up sitting on the ground (including myself for a short period).
I immediately went to the wine station and got us each a glass of Prosecco. During the night we tried the Prosecco and the California sparkling wine and enjoyed both. I'm not going to tell you exactly how many glasses of wine we had but between the two of us the number was in the double digits...
We also tried every dessert available except for the prepackaged ice cream bars. Our favorites were the donuts with coffee ice cream, churros with vanilla ice cream, and tiramisu. The fresh fruit was also delicious. The shortbread cookies were quite good, and the baklava was good as well but a bit too sweet (I know, it's a dessert party, but still). We did not particularly care for the French chocolate creme de pot. We also had a bit of coffee and iced tea, both of which were fresh.
The view of Illuminations was excellent. I have seen it from several locations around the lagoon and this was by far the best I've seen. Plus, there were few enough people at the party that no one was stuck crowded in between sweaty strangers for the duration of the fireworks.
So, was it worth the money? For us, yes, and we definitely want to attend again. Here are some things that made it a good fit for us:
- We are in our twenties and in good general health. We didn't mind standing most of the time (as noted, I did sit for a bit).
- We do not have children so we didn't have to worry about supervising anyone else.
- We enjoy drinking on vacation. Though we are not BIG drinkers most of the time, it was a special occasion so we definitely got our money's worth in the alcohol department.
- We live in Miami, which is not a cheap place to have a night out! For $98/2 people you can NOT get this much wine and dessert anywhere, and definitely not a fireworks spectacular to go along with it!
- If you don't want to, or are unable to, stand or sit on the ground for almost two hours, this may not be the event for you.
- If you have children, you may not want come at all, or you may not want to bring them. $49 is ridiculous for someone between 10 and 20 and yet ages 10+ are charged the same regardless of whether or not they can drink. Younger children cost less but may not be cooperative for as long.
- If you are not big on drinking and/or don't like sparkling wine, you probably will not feel like you got your money's worth.
- If $49 can go farther toward fun wherever you live, it will probably seem like way too much to spend and not worth it.
- Make sure you have a designated driver, or use resort transportation to get back to your hotel.
- Eat a decent healthy meal a few hours before. We had vegetarian pizza at Via Napoli at 4:30 and that worked well for us. If we had eaten any later we may have been too stuffed to try all the desserts; if we had eaten earlier we might have gotten sick from the sugar and alcohol on an empty-ish stomach.
- Arrive before 7:40 to check in. This increases your chances of getting a table.
- Drink plenty of the provided water.
- Get a table closer to the wine/donuts/churros stations rather than the large table with the other desserts. You will be closer to some of the action but not subject to the traffic around the main dessert table.
EDIT: just a typo!
it's helped me to make up my mind whether to go for it or not
