~ºoº November 27, 2010- Western Magic! ºoº~

[ukintheus]

That sounds awesome...will have to look into that. I was just planning on wrapping my wine bottles in bubble wrap!

I'm not sure that it will work any better than bubble wrap! I thought it was a good idea because it will be super-thin to pack (without the bottles of course ) and I need all the room I can get!

 

[champagne27]

Hello fellow cruisers! I posted way back in the beginning of this thread - glad to see it has been busy! Panicing now as well - so much to do! Need passports, book airline (waiting for SW), need to book pre-cruise hotel (thinking the Marriott just because we have some points we can use there), figure out transportation - hyperventilating!

Ok - deep breaths - ah! We will do the FE too so I will PM our info over soon. Anyway - it is me, DH, DD who will be 10 at cruise time and DS who turns 8 the day before the cruise. My parents are also going too. We did a 4 night on the Wonder 4 years ago and are really looking forward to the 7 night.

I am also a bit nervous about water temp because DS HATES cold water. Might purchase a shorty wetsuit just as a precaution but glad to hear it might not be too bad.

Anyway - looking forward to keeping up with this thread now and getting to know

 

[Saoirse]

Hi everyone! We've just booked this cruise - decided a vacation was in the budget and much needed for this year. This is our 3rd Disney cruise, first time to the Western Caribbean.

I need to catch up on the thread, but before I spend the next 5 days reading all the old posts (you're a chatty bunch!) I wanted to introduce us. My husband, Mike, I (Jamie), our 4yo son, Seamus and 1yo daughter Delaney are all looking forward to the cruise. This will be everyone's 3rd cruise, but for Delaney - this is her 2nd.

We're also spending 2 nights at the Park after the cruise, topping off with Mickey's Magical Christmas Party on Dec 5th.

 

[ukintheus]

Welcome and hello to Jamie and Champagne (I didn't see your name in your post anywhere?) How exciting to have some new people sign up You still have plenty of time to get all your stuff done I just have to keep myself busy in advance or I find myself researching the "next" vacation after the next vacation!!

 

[jd99]

Gotta get that 10th post in. Now Southwest is not opening tickets until June 15th for Thanksgiving...I am counting down the days to get my tickets.

Happy Tuesday!

Stephanie

I am also waiting for Southwest to open up those dates. Going to start checking on the 9th since that was the original date they said they would post them even though now it is listed as the 15th. Missed the first-day opportunity last year for a holiday trip and ended up with tix that were twice as much as they should have been. Not going to let that happen this time!

I also introduced myself very early on in the cruise thread so I'll come back and say I am Jeff and traveling with my DW, DD12 and DD6. It will be our 9th DCL and fourth time on Western Caribbean....

 

[DLW8]

welcome to all the new cruisers (or those that are starting to post again!). I will be coordinating the FE, so if you are interested, please PM me with the following information so I can add you to the list.

Room #
Last Name
Email Address
Names of people in party
DD/DS and ages for kids with their names
Celebrating anything?

If you are new to posting and haven't hit 10 posts yet, you won't be able to send me a PM yet, so keep on posting - glad to see more people, and more kids that are close to my DD and DS's age. They will be turning 9 a month after our cruise.

For those of you with cruise experience on the Western itinerary, any suggestions on excursions (what is good and what was not good)? That is the next part of my planning...that and the final payment 90 days out!

 

[jd99]

welcome to all the new cruisers (or those that are starting to post again!). I will be coordinating the FE, so if you are interested, please PM me with the following information so I can add you to the list.

Room #
Last Name
Email Address
Names of people in party
DD/DS and ages for kids with their names
Celebrating anything?

If you are new to posting and haven't hit 10 posts yet, you won't be able to send me a PM yet, so keep on posting - glad to see more people, and more kids that are close to my DD and DS's age. They will be turning 9 a month after our cruise.

For those of you with cruise experience on the Western itinerary, any suggestions on excursions (what is good and what was not good)? That is the next part of my planning...that and the final payment 90 days out!

We can't get enough of great beaches, so we love just going to 7-Mile beach in Grand Cayman and hanging out for the day. But if you have never done Stingray City, you should. We haven't only because our kids are freaked out by it but the waters are so clear in GC and snorkeling is amazing so a Stingray City/snorkel combo trip would be ideal. We may go to Rum Point this year. And in Cozumel, we love love love Paradise Beach. Others we know have done dolphin swims there but we had recently done so in Cabo so we have just gone to Paradise Beach and had a lovely day of a beautiful beach, fun beach toys, cheap beer and good food.

 

[ukintheus]

We can't get enough of great beaches, so we love just going to 7-Mile beach in Grand Cayman and hanging out for the day. But if you have never done Stingray City, you should. We haven't only because our kids are freaked out by it but the waters are so clear in GC and snorkeling is amazing so a Stingray City/snorkel combo trip would be ideal. We may go to Rum Point this year. And in Cozumel, we love love love Paradise Beach. Others we know have done dolphin swims there but we had recently done so in Cabo so we have just gone to Paradise Beach and had a lovely day of a beautiful beach, fun beach toys, cheap beer and good food.

Thanks for the good info. Have you been to the Caymans in the past couple of years? My brother and SIL said the good snorkling off 7 mile beach had been pretty much knocked out due to the hurricanes a couple of years ago. I haven't been there since about 1996 - I'm sure it's changed a bunch, but my thought was just to go hang out there on our own rather than do any kind of excursion.

 

[DLW8]

My passport came today! We are struggling through a VERY hot and humid weekend, and I would give just about anything to be on the ship right now with a nice breeze....

 

[ukintheus]

DH's passport came in on Saturday too. Mine will take a lot longer. H U M I D here too....miserable ugg!! On a beach with a sea breeze blowing does sound good!

 

[seba1]

I know I can research this, but thought I would see if the group knew the answer first.

Do I need to get the kids passports? Or, can we still just bring their birth certificates?

Thanks,
Stephanie

 

[Saoirse]

I know I can research this, but thought I would see if the group knew the answer first.

Do I need to get the kids passports? Or, can we still just bring their birth certificates?

Thanks,
Stephanie

I'm 99% sure that passports are needed for a child over 6 months.

 

[jd99]

Thanks for the good info. Have you been to the Caymans in the past couple of years? My brother and SIL said the good snorkling off 7 mile beach had been pretty much knocked out due to the hurricanes a couple of years ago. I haven't been there since about 1996 - I'm sure it's changed a bunch, but my thought was just to go hang out there on our own rather than do any kind of excursion.

We were there last November but we did not snorkel. WE just hung out at the beach and swam but the water was beautiful and clear as ever.

 

[DLW8]

I'm 99% sure that passports are needed for a child over 6 months.

You can use a certified (raised seal) birth certificate for everyone that is cruising, since it's a closed loop cruise and starts and ends at the same port. HOWEVER...they do recommend that everyone have a passport. If something happens when you are on the cruise, I feel better knowing that we have passports to get us home quickly. You can also go to the US Embassy wherever you are, but for us, the peace of mind of having them in our possession made the expense worth it.

HTH!

 

[champagne27]

Ugh - spent hours viewing FE ideas this weekend - overwhelming but looking forward to it! And now I need passports too! So much to do

 

[Fourgolds]

We got our castaway club numbers in the mail from our January cruise. Every time something comes, we all get excited again for the November cruise.

 

[Fourgolds]

Trying to get my 10 posts in. LOL!

We booked the Country Inn and Suites for the night before. We paid $129 for a room (with a free suite upgrade). Is that a good price?

Stephanie

I can't believe you already have 10 posts, it has taken me months to get to 9.

 

[DLW8]

I can't believe you already have 10 posts, it has taken me months to get to 9.

One more and you are there! Share with us what you want to do on the cruise, or about your family that will be cruising....I know I love it whern there are new posts on our thread so no need to lurk, just post!

 

[ukintheus]

I know I love it whern there are new posts on our thread so no need to lurk, just post!

Me too! I'm all about hearing what everyone else is doing/thinking of doing etc.

I agree that if you read the entire FE and FE gift threads it can be overwhelming. There are definitely some people that really go above and beyond and make some wonderful things. Too bad for y'all bcz that definitely WON'T be the case for me! I'm not THAT creative I'm in the pre-planning phase of that

So far for excursions I'm leaning towards doing Key West on our own, maybe grabbing the trolley to get around a little. Grand Cayman doing a beach day on our own, Cozumel doing one of the dolphin swims, and for CC day, beach and parasailing. It's DH's 40th birthday that day, and I think he really wants to do the parasailing. Looks like we can both go up together, I'm too chicken to do it on my own.

 

[DLW8]

Yes, the Homemade FE Gift thread can make you think you can't participate...just check out some pages for ideas (if you are crafty) or the regular FE thread for other ideas. My stuff will NOT be that creative, it will most likely be purchase instead of crafted.

As for our excursions, I think Key West on our own as well, would like to do the trolley where you can get on/off when you want, and to see the southern most point of the US. No idea on Cozumel and Grand Cayman. DH is not thrilled about getting off at Cozumel unless the "climate" changes from right now, and that is where DS has been most excited to go!

Excursions also depend on the financial situation. My desktop just got the "blue screen of death" so hoping my work can fix it tomorrow, otherwise, it's time for a new computer AND took DD to the orthodontist today, need a palate expander/rtainer and that is a pretty penny (of which insurance covers only 1/2!)

For CC we will just hang on the beach, do some snorkling and I think DS wants to enter a crab in the crab race again. I am hoping to do the Galley Tour on the ship and maybe a few more "mom time" things. DH went to a beer tasting last trip while I took the kids to the movies, so I think this is my turn for some kind of tasting...wine, beer, martini....

Other than that, I'm just looking forward to relaxation instead of checking it all out in just 3 nights like the last cruise.