June 21st 4 night cruise!

[minky122]

There will be a group of 10 - My mom and dad, husband and I - two daughters 11 and 13, my brother and his wife - daughter 5 and son 7. We will have been at DW for six nights and then on to the cruise. This is our first Disney Cruise...all are excited!!

hi mom!!!!

 

[cheer66]

We, too, will be cruising June 21. Our first cruise!

It will be me, DH, DS (turning 11 on June 22 - onboard!) and DD(5) along with my mother-in-law and father-in-law.

Advice from experienced cruisers welcome!

 

[jilljill]

We, too, will be cruising June 21. Our first cruise!

It will be me, DH, DS (turning 11 on June 22 - onboard!) and DD(5) along with my mother-in-law and father-in-law.

Advice from experienced cruisers welcome!

What advice are you looking for?
This will be our 7th DCL cruise with another one booked for next summer.

 

[cheer66]

What advice are you looking for?
This will be our 7th DCL cruise with another one booked for next summer.

Would you consider anything to be a "you HAVE to do this" or a "don't miss"?

I've heard that the kids will love the Oceaneer Club/Lab. Do you know if they take the kids to the swimming pool or do they stay in the kids' area? (Wondering if I need to take a bag for them to haul swimsuits/sunblock around...)

Have you ever celebrated a birthday onboard? We want to try to make the day special for our son.

Thanks!!!!

 

[jilljill]

Would you consider anything to be a "you HAVE to do this" or a "don't miss"?

I've heard that the kids will love the Oceaneer Club/Lab. Do you know if they take the kids to the swimming pool or do they stay in the kids' area? (Wondering if I need to take a bag for them to haul swimsuits/sunblock around...)

Have you ever celebrated a birthday onboard? We want to try to make the day special for our son.

Thanks!!!!

The clubs/lab do not take the kids to the pool or the water on Castaway Cay, so need to worry about that. There's really no need for your kids to take anything to the club/lab with them since there really is no storage.
Our DD has always loved the club/lab and would plan her day around the activites offered. I think in the 6 cruises we've done, she's only hit the pool on 2 occassions (other than right after we had lunch on embarkation day) because she's had so much fun with the other kids.

We've done b'days on board, but they have always been celebrated either early or late. Except for the cruise they kicked me off the ship on my b'day since it was on debarkation day - nothing worse than leaving the ship ON your b'day. We just did the cake in the dining room, nothing special.
Although, one year I planned a cruise for a small group of friends and they talked to the head server and had the pastry chef make me an all chocolate cake, including the chocolate roses and writing. It was really a nice surprise for me.

We really like the shows, except we aren't fans of the Golden Mickeys. We are looking forward to see the Toy Story show since it wasn't on the ship the last time we sailed.
We are doing Palo brunch for the first time and we've never had dinner at Palo. We've always liked our servers and the atmosphere of the dining rooms and never felt the 'need' to dine at Palo.

I suggest you look over the Navigator's that are posted on the main cruise boards under a 'sticky' at the top to get an idea of what goes on onboard. Also, realize you can't do everything and most of all have fun.

 

[mom2triplets]

How do most people dress for dinner? I know there is a rule no shorts, tanks etc.

 

[cheer66]

How do most people dress for dinner? I know there is a rule no shorts, tanks etc.

Also... does the shorts rule apply to kids and does the tanks rule applies to girls' "spaghetti strap" type tops?

Thanks!

 

[jilljill]

DD & I will wear capris to dinner each night. Yes, you will see us in the same ones at least 2 nights. We'll also wear a polo or cute shirt with them. We find the restaurants & theaters to usually be cold and will take a sweater to wear. I just asked DD about wearing a strappy tank and she said she's worn strappy and reg. tanks and had to put a sweater on. You will see ladies wearing tank dresses and skimpy strap dresses so that shouldn't be in issue for the girls/ladies.
My DH will wear docker type pants or a nice pair of jeans to dinner along with a polo or button down shirt.

I have seen little kids wearing shorts, the nice khaki type not pull on or sporty type shorts.

For Pirate night almost anything goes as far as dress goes. We won't be dressing up but a lot of people do.

The 4 day cruise is a much more casual cruise than longer ones.

 

[cheer66]

Thank you for the info on how to dress for dining. I guess I will have to wrestle my son into long pants.

Questions regarding Nassau...
Do you know if we dock close enough to walk to the Straw Market? And are there taxis or other transportation around to get to Atlantis if we don't do an excursion? We'd like to see Atlantis, but on our own. Any other suggested activities for the day in Nassau??

Thanks... again!

 

[jilljill]

I've heard the actual straw market is closed for remodeling, although I can't verify this. There are stall/shops set up at the terminal right at the dock.

You can either take a taxi or water taxi over to Atlantis.

We usually walk into town to a couple of jewelry stores, liquor stores and the rum cake shop and the go back to the ship to enjoy a failry empty ship. I'm not a Nassau fan so I can't help you at all on what else to do.
I've had no desire to go to Atlantis, since I've heard it's pretty but if you want to do anything or eat anything there it's super expensive. I don't feel like going over there to gamble either, so that's not a draw for me.

If you can get your son into a pair of nice jeans that might be a compromise for you. It's only 4 nights, and on Pirate night he can definately get away with nice shorts.

 

[jilljill]

In regards to Atlantis, my cousin and his wife were there last month and they paid $70 for the 2 of them to go to the aquarium and afterwards they wish they had saved their money since it wasn't worth the price.
Not sure if you were planning on going to the aquarium with your kids or not, just thought I would pass that along.

 

[cheer66]

My in-laws think that we have to see Atlantis and are pushing the aquarium. We were at an aquarium in Myrtle Beach last year, and my kids could have cared less. Maybe if they want to fork out the money for the kids, we can hit the casino to waste ours.

I will have to see what I can find out about the Straw Market. Thanks for the heads up. So, there is a shopping "area" that you can walk to from where the ship docks? Shopping is always a good thing.

Good idea about the jeans. I just realized that we are eating at Palo the first night, so the kids, I guess, will get their meals via the kids' club. One down...

 

[jilljill]

Got our docs in the mail today from the TA.

 

[jilljill]

My in-laws think that we have to see Atlantis and are pushing the aquarium. We were at an aquarium in Myrtle Beach last year, and my kids could have cared less. Maybe if they want to fork out the money for the kids, we can hit the casino to waste ours.

I will have to see what I can find out about the Straw Market. Thanks for the heads up. So, there is a shopping "area" that you can walk to from where the ship docks? Shopping is always a good thing.

Good idea about the jeans. I just realized that we are eating at Palo the first night, so the kids, I guess, will get their meals via the kids' club. One down...

The majority of the town and shopping are just on the other side of the terminal. Pick up a shopping map onboard at the excursions desk on deck 3 and it should help you.

For your kids dining on the first night they will have to eat in the dining room or you will have to get them room service or fast food from deck 9. The kids clubs do not open until 6:00 the first day and therefore dinner with the club/lab is not an option. This is also due to the fact that Topsiders is not open the first or last night and that's where the kids eat when dining with the club/lab.
I just verified this with a Navigator that I have from friend's that sailed in April.

 

[cheer66]

Wow! Thanks for the info about the kids' club the first night!! Guess that's why we were able to get reservations, huh?

 

[jilljill]

Wow! Thanks for the info about the kids' club the first night!! Guess that's why we were able to get reservations, huh?

Yes. Plus a lot of people don't like to miss the first night in the dining room getting to know their servers.
In 6 DCL cruises we've yet to eat at Palo and have no desire to have dinner there. We are having brunch on this cruise, DH didn't have a choice about it and I wanted to try it before our Baltics cruise next summer.


BTW....what time do you have dinner and what time are your Palo ressies?

 

[cheer66]

Palo is at 6:30 and we have the early dinner seating.

We didn't want to do the first night, either, but my son's birthday is the second night and there weren't any openings online the third night... and wanted to have the family together the last night. Kind of got stuck with it.

 

[jilljill]

Palo is at 6:30 and we have the early dinner seating.

We didn't want to do the first night, either, but my son's birthday is the second night and there weren't any openings online the third night... and wanted to have the family together the last night. Kind of got stuck with it.

Since 1st seating starts at 5:45 you can take the kids down, meet your servers, sit with them a while and then go to dinner at Palo. Depending on what your kids order they may actually be done and you can take them and drop them off at the club/lab on your way to Palo. Otherwise just leave them there to finish their dinner and then excuse yourself from Palo about 7:00 to go back down to take the kids to the club/lab. The servers are very used to kids eating in the dining rooms without their parents.
One year we met DD at lunch in Lumiere, on the Magic, and she had already ordered lunch and was talking with the servers. She didn't mind at all being the only one at the table. She was 11 at the time. She had been at the lab for a while and then went to the dining room for lunch where we found her waiting on her pizza while eating her appetizer.

 

[cheer66]

The more I read and learn... I may just try to convince the others to cancel Palo.

I found the dining rotations on the FAQ page, and it looks like the repeat restaurant is on Pirate night (either second or third night). Does that sound right? It looks like if we go to Palo the first night, we definitely miss one of the restaurants.

Our 5yo daughter wouldn't sit and eat without us there. She would socialize with everyone. And our 11yo son would eat all her food!

So much to consider and think about...

Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge and opinions!

 

[jilljill]

The more I read and learn... I may just try to convince the others to cancel Palo.

I found the dining rotations on the FAQ page, and it looks like the repeat restaurant is on Pirate night (either second or third night). Does that sound right? It looks like if we go to Palo the first night, we definitely miss one of the restaurants.

Our 5yo daughter wouldn't sit and eat without us there. She would socialize with everyone. And our 11yo son would eat all her food!

So much to consider and think about...

Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge and opinions!

You have the rotation correct. Night 2 and 3 you are in the same restaurant and one night is the rotational night and the other night is the Pirate menu. This is one of the reasons we've never eaten at Palo, didn't want to miss out on the dining rooms. If you are in Animator's Palate the first night you will miss the 'show'.
If you don't eat at Palo, it's an excuse to book another cruise.

I can understand about your DS eating DD's food. I have a brother that is 6½ years older than me and I could see us being that same way. In fact we were in WDW when we were their ages and we went to dinner one might by ourselves at the Poly and my brother ordered me a tunafish sandwich and himself filet mignon. To this day I won't let him forget that and I won't eat tunafish. You have to remember this was back in 1972 and it was ok for the 2 of us to go on the monorail by ourselves from the Contemporary to the Poly and back.

Ok, back to restaurant planning for you after my little digression story.

If you want to enjoy Palo, why don't you go to brunch on Wednesday? The last I checked last week there were still openings. Otherwise you can check we you first board in Wavebands to see if there are any openings or ask to be put on the waitlist. I've heard the food then is to die for.