Chance of getting a decent PAT??

[mjnap]

We can book our PAT on August 20 for our November 3 Dream cruise. What are my chances of getting a decent PAT time being that we will only be 75 days out from departure?

 

[jdb in AZ]

We can book our PAT on August 20 for our November 3 Dream cruise. What are my chances of getting a decent PAT time being that we will only be 75 days out from departure?

Pretty good. Not everyone jumps in at a minute after midnight on day 75 to do their online check-in. Also, Dream cruises tend to have a lot of newbies, who can't get their PAT any sooner than you.

 

[PrincessShmoo]

We can book our PAT on August 20 for our November 3 Dream cruise. What are my chances of getting a decent PAT time being that we will only be 75 days out from departure?

I'd say pretty good to fair. Not everyone wants to (or can be) at the port at opening. I've read many reports of first time cruisers (75 day window) getting the 11:00-11:30 PAT with no problem.

On the other hand, what's a "decent PAT" to you? Once boarding starts (usually around 11:45) it goes pretty quickly, with Open Boarding (anyone holding any boarding number) starting around 12:30 or so.

 

[kiford]

And not everyone wants to be there as early as possible. There are disadvantages:

. longer lines
. hauling around carryon bag because room isn't ready
. getting up earlier to get there earlier instead of taking leisurely morning
. arranging your own transportation whether coming from the WDW resorts or not.

An extra hour or so doesn't really make much difference in the context of the entire cruise.

I hate arriving early. We usually get there 1-ish, take DCL transportation, walk right on (like 5 minutes from arrival at port to walking on ship), right to stateroom to drop off bag, down to restaurant, no crowding.

That can leave a number of early PATs even if lots of silver and gold cruisers have already done on-line check-in.

 

[lanejudy]

We got earliest PAT (11-11:30am) on our first cruise, and I didn't even do the online check-in until the afternoon (not at midnight like some). So there's definitely a chance you can get it. Early November isn't the most popular time for cruising either, so possibly fewer passengers.

Enjoy your cruise!

 

[ibcrazie4dizney]

we got 11-1130. I did go on at midnight but I started with the port adventures booking. I almost didn't do the other stuff cause I had no clue what to do or what it was. I decided to poke around and found it. I probably got to that section around 1 am. so I guess it isn't too hard or I just got lucky.

 

[sullins5]

Our first cruise, in 2011, we got PAT 11:30. And it would've been fine, but took dh an hour to get back from dropping off the car at Budget while trying to get on a shuttle ...

 

[lady9]

We are silver CC members so we pick right before first time cruisers. This past cruise we did get the 11-11:30 PAT. We got the port at 11:33, left our bags with the porter, parked the car and were in line to check in at 11:40. To our great surprise, no one was in the terminal and open boarding had already started! We were shocked it was that early especially for a ship that was sailing full.