When we initially booked our ADR’s for this trip (at the 180 day window of course!), this was not included in our plans. We did have a lunch reservation at Le Cellier and a supper reservation at Via Napoli, so the idea of a third ADR did not even cross our minds. However, while we were in that lull between booking ADR’s and booking Fastpasses, Luke was reading some things on the Walt Disney World Reddit page. One of the things that caught his interest was this place, which is located in the Mexico pavilion right on the water. There are these large, beautiful floor to ceiling windows overlooking the World Showcase Lagoon, and it offers a decent view of Illuminations (without staking out a spot hours in advance!). So, he looked online and found an 8:30 opening which he booked for us.

I don’t think we even had an hour between finishing our meal at Via Napoli and this reservation time, but it was freezing cold that night so it worked out quite well to be able to go inside again!

We knew when we booked this reservation that we would not be eating a full meal, but since we were in the Mexican pavilion we assumed there would be some margaritas to be had…

Shortly after we were led to our table, we were brought a basket of chips with salsa. The red salsa had lots of flavour and a decent spicy kick (I’m pretty soft when it comes to spice), whereas the green salsa  (salsa verde) was pretty mild (but still full of flavour). The chips were also pretty tasty!

Of course, we both had to order a margarita! I went for the Classic – tequila, orange liqueur, lime mix, on the rocks with salt on the rim, $12.50. This was good, but strong! The tequila was clearly better than any of the cheap stuff I used to drink in my university days, but you really need to be ok with the taste of alcohol to enjoy a margarita in my opinion.

Luke decided on the Maelstrom – tequila, mango puree, orange liquor, habanero peppers, blueberries, basil, Tajin chili powder on the rim, $14.50.  Luke thought this was good, and the mango helped to cool the heat from the habanero peppers, but overall it was a little too spicy and he said he regretted not just ordering the same as I did.

Even though we were not hungry, I was intrigued by the Queso Fundido on the menu (even though I actually had no idea what it was haha). The menu describes this as: Melted cheese with chorizo, Poblano and Serrano peppers, avocado-tomatillo sauce, and flour tortillas, $14.

This was not what I was imagining for some reason? But it was really good! I mean, it’s literally just a chunk of cheese, so how can you go wrong?!  It could have used more flour tortillas though, they only gave us two and they were gone fairly quickly (with over half of the cheese left). This is where the basket of chips really came in handy! I was not about to leave any cheese behind, and we polished it off with the help of those chips 🙂

Of course, the main reason we booked this reservation was to watch Illuminations. They dimmed the restaurant lights and piped in the music, and this was our view from our table.

There’s obviously parts of it which you can’t see perfectly, but if you’ve already seen Illuminations and are looking for a different experience, I highly recommend grabbing a reservation here!

Our total for an appetizer and two drinks came to $43.67.