2/15/2013 - 8 Night Western Cruise, Galveston, TX

[moniman01]

Gina, we are joining you in jumping ship from 2/1 to 2/15. Trying to get pumped about WDW since we were just there 5 months ago! Do you happen to know how much time we have at the parks? I am assuming the buses get there by opening but do you know when we have to leave to return to the ship? I want to make sure to get dining reservations when the 180 day window opens on thursday, and am wondering if we will have time for an early dinner or just lunch? I can't seem to find a detailed itinerary for our sailing yet.....

You need to book a time for the bus to take you from ship to parks. I called Disney and they told me that we are at parks from 6am to midnight. This will give you option to do night activities at park if you want since you dont need to be back on ship until midnight.

 

[tryin]

MK Fireworks are at 8pm, so that should be plenty of time. It also looks like they are running two parades that day - @ 7pm and 9pm. Park is open until 11. From what I remember reading about the NYC cruises, the last buses left MK pretty late, maybe as late as 11pm?

https://disneyworld.disney.go.com/calendars/magic-kingdom/2013-02-19/#timeofday=allday

We are planning to start at Epcot for a couple of hours and then head to MK for the rest of the day. I hope we can last for the entire day!

I was looking at this:
http://www.wdwinfo.com/wdwinfo/hours/febfw13.cfm

Hmm, did I read this correctly?
but, I guess Disney would know. I am glad its at 9pm. i loved the fireworks at disneyland best of all the things we did there and want so badly to see disney's fireworks again!

 

[moniman01]

We just switched from the June 1st Med cruise to this one. Took advantage of the the kids sail free offer also, even though only one of our 3 kids will be free. The cruise itself is the same price as the 7 day Mediterranean, but the entire Med vacation was adding up to over $10,000 for our family of 5...not an option for us.

I can't believe how quiet this thread is! No wonder they opened up kids sail free! Anyway, it will be Myself(Andrea), my DH(Ryan) and our 3 DD's, Ashley, Riley and Bailey, 18, 13, and 8. We haven't told the kids yet, not sure how they are going to take it since we booked the Mediterranean the day it opened up and have been talking about it a lot. I think we will sell them on going to CC and WDW, plus one extra night on the ship wont hurt. And, they wont be missing that much school since they have the week of Presidents day off. They are just as addicted to DCL as I am, so it shouldn't be too much of a problem.

My brother and his family should be going with us also. So this thread should be growing...

Hey there, we will be on this cruise too and our names are Andrea and Ryan, we have 2 boys, who are 8 and 4.

 

[moniman01]

We booked this cruise a while back bc we could not pass up the KSF deal. We live in Houston and we are so excited this cruise is going to CC. It will be myself, DH and our two boys who are 8 and 4. We booked excurison at CC and Palo. We havent booked any excursions at Key West. If anyone has suggestions, please let us know - we would love the input on a good excursion that would interest 2 boys. If anyone has useful things to pack, do's, don'ts please let me know. I have been reading reviews on other websites bc I want to start getting a list going of what to do!

 

[Luet02]

Hi Everyone:

Sorry that we're so late to the party! We actually booked just after Christmas! So excited! There are five of us going in two cabins, one is an IGT, but we'll just hang the FE on one cabin to make it easier for everyone. We've got 3 boys: DS 8, DS 4, & DS 1. Could we please sign up to be in the 4th FEE? This will be our 1st DIS Cruise!

Thanks,

Natalie

 

[Luet02]

Hi Moniman01

Looks like we have boys the same age!

 

[Luet02]

Hi again:

Don't mind me,. Does anyone know if the ship has a specific Disney character featured daily? I just wanted to know if I should get character T shirts for the kids to coincide with those days? It will be great to see the Navigators from the Jan 18th cruise! Woo Hoo!

 

[FloridaFun]

Hi Natalie,

You can email me at beth@sitesandsounds.com to sign up for the 4th FEE group. I will need the following:

Cabin number (if you have it assigned), Dis Board name, family last name, adult names, kid names with ages, where you are from, any special celebrations while on board, t-shirt sizes, any allergies, and your google email address if you have one.

Thanks,
Beth

 

[Luet02]

Thanks Beth!

I just sent you our info! Now I have to get going with all this stuff!

 

[castawaygirl]

We are still in for FEE Group #3!

 

[Tass]

Thanks for the pics WDRL! I saw the weather delay noted on the Disney website last night. That must have been some fog! I hope if we experience a similar delay, that we're the group already on the ship!

 

[Gina]

As much as I love cruising this time of year, the fog possibility is the worst thing about it. We got delayed on Voyager a few years ago because of fog -- didn't get onboard until almost 8pm, and then we couldn't leave Galveston until around 2am. Missing that whole first day was awful.

Got lucky on our last cruise, and I have my fingers crossed for this cruise!!

 

[FloridaFun]

Luet02 - Thanks for posting that you had emailed me. My outlook filter had put it in the junk folder. Ugh! I got you all entered and emailed you back with the link.

Just in case - If there is anyone else that emailed me to sign up for group 4 and you have not heard back from me, please let me know.

Thanks,
Beth

 

[Luet02]

FloridaFun:

Thanks, got it! Looks good! Yeah, I thought that there was someone else from Canada (calgaryfam)? that was signing up for FEE #4?

Anyone else from Canada coming? (Come on, I know you're out there!)

Natalie

 

[duck_widow]

My refrigerator is subbing for a cabin door until cruise time. Here are the magnets I made. I have 3 sets of 'ears' to put on our round door number during the cruise. I printed these on full magnetic sheets.
These were pulled from this thread
http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=2172891

I then looked through this massive thread:
http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=2897587&highlight=door+magnets
Tons of ideas, and the OP, milliepie, has links in her signature taking you to her file site, where I got most of the images

I dropped the image into a Word document and added in word art to customize. I filled in full 8-1/2 x 11 magnetic sheets then cut out from there after printing. I should have tagged all the designs with the cabin# to dissuade any passer bys from helping themselves. I will probably write something on the back of the ears in silver sharpie.

I bought 2 packs of 5 magnetic sheets, and that was plenty for me. I ended up wasting one as it jammed in my printer and generally mucked the whole sheet up. The ink appears to be smudge free and they came out better than I thought.

The smaller name tags are on magnetic business cards, and I made one for each person in my FEE group as one of their gifts.

Cheers,
Jeff

I totally love the Yoda\Mickey Bar one!!! We are obsessing over Mickey bars. I would love to copy this idea if you don't mind. Where can I get it, how do I edit it???

I just ordered a laminator for magnet making. I've never done door decorations before. I'm excited!

 

[duck_widow]

You need to book a time for the bus to take you from ship to parks. I called Disney and they told me that we are at parks from 6am to midnight. This will give you option to do night activities at park if you want since you dont need to be back on ship until midnight.

I didn't know this. Would we do this as another port adventure?

 

[wdrl]

As much as I love cruising this time of year, the fog possibility is the worst thing about it. We got delayed on Voyager a few years ago because of fog -- didn't get onboard until almost 8pm, and then we couldn't leave Galveston until around 2am. Missing that whole first day was awful.

Got lucky on our last cruise, and I have my fingers crossed for this cruise!!

Fortunately, fog related delays aren't that common, but Murphy's Law can rear its ugly head at any time. That is one reason why we prefer to arrive at our embarkation port a day early when we fly.

On another board, it was reported that the Crown Princess left about 12:10 AM this morning. The Disney Magic, which was berthed behind the Crown, left around 12:37 AM. I wonder if either ship will have to modify its itinerary to make up for the lost time.

 

[wdrl]

I didn't know this. Would we do this as another port adventure?

Yes, you select a time and a Park as one of your port excursions for February 19. You only book the bus ride to WDW; you can't reserve a return bus or time.

 

[Tass]

I didn't know this. Would we do this as another port adventure?

Yes, it is a port adventure for the Port Canaveral day. It's included in your cruise fare, but you need to choose time/park. My understanding is you do not need to choose your return time to the ship in advance. DCL gives you a listing of bus departures from each park and you choose when you want to return.

 

[FSU88]

I totally love the Yoda\Mickey Bar one!!! We are obsessing over Mickey bars. I would love to copy this idea if you don't mind. Where can I get it, how do I edit it???

I just ordered a laminator for magnet making. I've never done door decorations before. I'm excited!

Here is the blank I found. You can add text as you like. I edited mine in WORD, it was the easiest way for me to do it. If you are having trouble, let me know what you would like on it and I can edit easy enough, then I can just send you the WORD doc you can print from.
Jeff