1/17/09 Magic anyone???

[Bytor01]

I do have a couple of ?'s for you about excursions. Do you always use Disney's excursions or have you gone off on your own? We aren't really the "group tour" type of people and are traveling with another family. We would much rather go off on our own, rent a van with a driver or something to show us to the shops and maybe a little beach time on St. Maarten, my kids would get a kick out of that beach with the planes flying over you. And with St. Thomas, I have my heart set on getting over to St. John because I hear it's absolutely beautiful. Any suggestions?

I am also fishing around and have just started to look into the excursions. While I do not have any suggestions just yet I can tell you a couple of things that you should be mindful. 1- You will probably pay less money in booking the excursion on your own than with Disney, BUT...2- If you do and your excursion is late and does not get back in time then you will miss the boat, literally. The ship will depart without you. If you book with Disney and your excursion is late, the ship will wait. So, depending upon what you are doing, what time it is, and where it is may all play a factor in who you book with. Honestly, the couple of bucks that I may save never outweighs the factor of knowing that I can always get on the ship. Would that piece of mind be worth maybe and extra 30-50 dollars or less? To each his/her own. Good luck.

 

[Georji]

I know that you can get DCL transfers from many of the resorts (Swan and Dolphin included).

Have you considered NOT doing DCL's transfers, though? Just a suggestion, for anyone who is interested. It's often much cheaper to rent a car. That's what we're doing, and we've done it on previous trips too. We rent a car right from Budget or Avis, which are located right at Orlando Airport. We stay in a hotel near the airport (which is often MUCH cheaper than staying on Disney property), drive to Disney for the day, return to the hotel, and then drive to the port the next morning. You can drop off your family at the port, and then drive the 5 minutes to return the rental car. The rental companies then provide free shuttle service to the port. Then, on disembarkation day, same thing....someone takes the shuttle to pick up the car, and comes back and picks everyone up. You can return the car right at the airport. We are getting our car through Avis. It is only $45 on each side of our cruise, so a total of $90. Disney Transfers are $35 per person, per way, so we're talking $70 per person!!!! The other nice thing about renting a car is that you can arrive at the port at whatever time you like, and avoid the long lines. On the DCL busses, you arrive at the time that Disney has established (which is usually after 12pm) and you arrive with a whole hoarde of other passengers, so check in lines can be very long.

Again, just a suggestion. DCL transfers work great and some people LOVE watching the cute little video that they show on the ride over. Plus you don't have to worry about driving or loading a car with your luggage.

Thanks TINK! I had just been thinking that waiting for the transfers would be kind of a bummer since I like to be at the port for cruises like the second they're open ... even if it's a little wait I'd rather be way early than miss a minute of being on the ship!! How long is the drive?? Also, it will be 6 of us traveling with all our stuff ... suggestions on that? Do they have vans??

 

[Georji]

The following places are the resorts that use the DCL transport:
Disney's Grand Floridian Resort & Spa
Walt Disney World Swan & Dolphin
Disney's Board Walk Inn & Villas
Disney's Contemporary Resort
Disney's Polynesian Resort.
Disney's Port Orleans Riverside (Dixie Landings Resort)
Disney's Port Orleans French Quarter Resort.
Disney's Beach Club Resort/Villas.
Disney’s Caribbean Beach Resort.
Animal Kingdom Lodge/Villas

As for discounted tickets use uncovertourist.com or mapleleaftickets.com they are usually the cheapest and most reputable in the business. They are both highly recommended and I have used both of them.

As for a place to stay, I don't think you can go wrong with any of the choices up there. I have not stayed at Poly, Contemp, Swan/Dolphin but have stayed at the others. They are all deluxe resorts except for POR so if you want to save a little dough to use on the cruise then stay there. Most people like the French Quarter resort a tad better.

Thank you so much for the info! We definitely want to stay onsite! Thanks for those websites ... I think my mom just found out that she can get cheap tickets because my dad works for the airlines. I'm not sure yet, but either way I'm so super excited!! I'll still check out those websites! You all are the bestest!!

 

[Georji]

Does anyone know how to pre-pay for gratuities?

 

[gary4jenn]

Does anyone know how to pre-pay for gratuities?

I just had my travel agent do it- she said she called DCL and had them add it to my reservation. It feels better to pay as much ahead of time since new airline fees and increased fuel charges keep adding to the expense of vacations these days.

 

[fltink]

Thanks TINK! I had just been thinking that waiting for the transfers would be kind of a bummer since I like to be at the port for cruises like the second they're open ... even if it's a little wait I'd rather be way early than miss a minute of being on the ship!! How long is the drive?? Also, it will be 6 of us traveling with all our stuff ... suggestions on that? Do they have vans??

The drive from the airport only takes about 45 minutes, so from Disney, about an hour to an hour and fifteen minutes. The nice thing is, it's a super easy drive! (Clear shot, straight down the Beachline, which is the road that heads out of the airport anyways.)

PLUS with luggage fees on most airlines now, we pack just our clothes to fly, and then on the way to the port, we stop off at WalMart (there's one near the port) and buy our toiletries and some food items and alcohol.

We also pick up some gifts for our favorite crew members. They like to get cash but they also LOVE getting WalMart gift cards and even just some candy. We get candy as an extra little THANK YOU for the crew members who are extra great to us.

We have 7 people driving to the port so we rented a mini van. It's a tight squeeze, but we fit in last time ok. What we did do that helped a lot was we bougth a set of roof ties (about $15 at WalMart) and tied some of the suitcases to the roof for the drive over. Then we just stored the ties in our luggage until our return trip. You could also devide up and do two smaller cars, which is sometimes cheaper. Check the prices on Avis and Budget. Those are the two places that have eady access to the Port.

Also, if you are looking for cheaper hotel accomidations than on Disney property, try the Orlando Airport Courtyard. We've stayed there previously and we got a deal for about $65 a night.

 

[fltink]

Just wanted to say Happy Birthday to my best friend, David, who is cruising with us in January, and I believe has been spying on these boards without posting. HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAVID! I love you and can't wait to cruise with you again!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[fltink]

Happy 175 days to go!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[fltink]

So we're down to 170 days and I am sooooo stressed out! I don't know about anyone else, but the economy being the way it is has made this cruise's bill a MUCH harder one to swallow than previous years. Don't get me wrong....I KNOW that a DCL cruise is Sooooooo worth it and we actually got a GREAT price, BUT we are feeling the strains of the economic set back here and it has made me start to worry. In fact, I am so stressed out that I NEED a Disney Cruise! )

 

[hgon76]

I feel the same way! When we booked, I thought "a year is plenty of time to pay this off" Now I'm thinking "oh no, only a couple months left to pay this off". At least gas prices have taken a little bit of a dive, although I am sure oil will be soaring right back up in time for heating season here in New England ! Well, my kids are at least pretty much taken care of for Christmas....the cruise is their big gift this year!

 

[fltink]

Yup! We all agreed right when we decided to book this that it will be everyone's Christmas present. No gifts for anyone except my three year old niece. And believe it or not, as much as I LOVE giving Christmas presents, it's a HUGE relief not to have to buy any!!!!

As far as the cruise goes, we, like I am sure most of you, had wanted to pay it off in full by the time the payment is due. However, due to crappy circumstances, we don't know that we'll have the cash in time, so as much as I hate putting things on credit, I think our approach is going to be to charge it, and then think of it as the cruise being on a payment plan. As long as we still keep in mind that it needs to be paid off ASAP, I don't mind charging it. Cancelling isn't really an option for us. Cruising is a priority in our lives. We crave it like we crave air, and having one to look forward to does world for our stress levels. We'll find a way to make it work! Though it'd be super nice if we could just hit a jackpot on a scratch ticket or something!!!

 

[Bytor01]

I agree. I am looking at our payoff and realizing that it is only 65 days away. While I have paid off most of it I am also looking at airline rates. I want to buy now but also don't want to charge the tickets. I need to work some more OT so I can get the tickets. A family of 4 out of NY-JFK airport on JetBlue is $1016. I do have about $55 in credits so that brings the cost down. Of course, I don't want to wait to long because the prices will just keep going up and up.

 

[fltink]

Do you have Southwest or Airtran as options? They've both had some great deals lately.

 

[Bytor01]

I do have both options but they are usually within a couple of bucks of each other. The convenience of having the TVs for the kids and myself utweigh the 20 bucks i could save. Now, if it was ever 200 bucks then we may be talking but it rarely is. In fact, Jet Blue usually is the cheapest.

In fact Air Tran is 100 bucks more and has stops both ways/Jet Blue is non stop and SW has not published rates yet for that week, at least not as of last week

 

[fltink]

I love Jet Blue! We're not flying them this time, though, because we got a great deal on Spirit.

 

[Bytor01]

We always fly Jet Blue. I always look at the other airlines but the prices and, yes, the service constantly have me going back to Jet Blue. Of course, as I said earlier the Tvs are a huge factor in the decision. It keeps the kids happy (and quiet), it keeps Mommy happy and therefore I am happy.

Is everyone doing Palo? If you are, what are you going to do...dinner or brunch? Or are you going to try to do both.

We ate dinner there last time. I want to eat dinner again but I would love to try the brunch, as well. I think we are going to try to do both. The extra day on the ship (we did the western last time) might be conducive to it.

Tim

 

[fltink]

We are doing breakfast, tea and dinner at Palo. We have become very dear friends with one of the servers, Sasha from Croatia, so we can not wait to see him. Brunch is, of course, our favorite, follwed by dinner. We're especially excited to do dinner now that there's a new menu at Palo! Marzcapone Lobster Raviolis? YUM!!!! I think we're hopinh for Palo the first night onboard for dinner. That way (provided we get the rotation we requested) we'll only be missing dinner at Parrot Cay. I'm not a huge fan of that menu, though the banana bread pudding is devine!

 

[The Dave Party]

Hi Everybody. This is David and I'm Tink's friend who has sailed with her on her many times and her very first cruise! Tink is right though, I have read but never posted anything yet. I travel 100% for my job, but going on a cruise is the kind of traveling I love. Its so much better to check into a hotel for a vacation than for another week of work. I'm looking forward to another Eastern on the Magic. My first cruise in Dec 2001 was this itinerary, so it will be nice to be back. I can't wait for the two full days at sea to start the cruise, it is the ultimate in relaxation and fun!

 

[fltink]

Yay, David! I am so glad you're here!!!! Welcome to our DIS Board Thread!!!

 

[Bytor01]

Well, David, glad you are here. I am sure you are looking forward to the cruise as much as everyone here is. Start counting dwn the days, oh you don't need to Tink is doing it for all of us. You go Tink!

Tim