3 or 4 night cruise w/ land portion???

[graygables]

I'm torn about a Dec 2005 cruise! I am a park FREAK and a DCL 1st timer. I have very bad motion sickness and fear of leviathan, so cruising is a *huge* step for me (the things we do for our kids) Anyway, if we do the 3 night DCL, we'll have 2 days before and 2 1/2 days after for the parks, incl MVMCP and CP. If we do the 4 night, we'll have one evening for MVMCP, and 2 days to get in the rest of the park stuff. We'd go straight home from the cruise.

I'm a single mom on this one, DH isn't interested at all, and I'm not a partyer, drinker, dancer, bar-singing, karaoke type. I don't swim and I don't know how to relax, apparently, either!!! I don't want to spend an extra day on the ship wishing I were at WDW instead. We will not be getting off the ship in Nassau, period. I've travelled the world and Nassau does NOT interest me, I'm only going for DDs and to experience the ship (and Castaway Cay, if possible)

If this cruise goes well, I've told DDs we'll do a 7 night Western when they're older (the are 9 & 7), if not, they'll have to get a big sister to go with them, so it could be my last.

There's the story...now it's your turn! Suggestions??? Thanks!

 

[Memaw2Wm]

For our first cruise last August/September I decided to do a land/sea for two reasons, one b/c I wasn't sure I'd like cruising and secondly my eldest grandson had never been to Disney with me and I wanted to share the world with him.

So we added a night to the 7 day land/sea ... arrived in WDW on Saturday, stayed until Thursday morning, then drove to Port Canaveral for our 3 day cruise.

Luckily we'd enjoyed cruising b/c our 3 day cruise turned into a 5 day cruise courtesy of Hurricane Frances.

We'll be doing a repeat in early December ... I want to see WDW and the Wonder decorated in holiday style!

 

[jlowejd5]

I most heartily recommend the Land/Sea option. We absolutely loved it, and we've got our second one scheduled for March. The quick 4-day Honeymoon cruise we took last year just went by WAY too quickly.

It's also incredibly nice to follow up four crazy insane days at the parks with a day spent doing nothing on the ship while docked in Nassau (I totally agree with you there) and then a second day of doing nothing, but with sand in between your toes and a fist full of something frothy.

 

[the kabuki]

Don't have any answers for you, but I'm in the exact same boat as you.

Love, love,love the parks, never cruised. Thinking it would be fun though, but only for the 4 days. It does give me some hope though that everyone says their 1st cruise was for 4 days because they weren't sure they'd like it and ended up doing a seven day next time around.

Good luck to both of us!!

 

[mom_rules]

We were in the same "boat" too! We did three day land 4 day cruise and another 3 day land. Loved it so much we are doing it again in Dec.!
I too get very motion sick but took my meds each day and had not one problem (not even on the rough seas day 13ft waves). There is alot to do on that ship-so never got bored (didn't relax much either LOL).

 

[the kabuki]

Glad to hear about not getting motion sickness. DH is very prone to this and one of the reasons he's not into going on a cruise.

What kind of meds did you take? Were they RX from the doc or OTC?

 

[erikthewise]

Our first cruise was a 3-day after 4 days spent in WDW. Our boys were 8 and 5 at the time. Yes, the cruise was too short, but it was still a great vacation and a good introduction to DCL. Last year we did a 4-day cruise and 5 days at WDW.

It is OK and for some people better to just book the cruise and land portions separately; we did that both times. You don't have to buy the land-sea package!

While we'd like to do a 7-day cruise it may not ever happen because we can only go once a year, and it's so hard to leave out WDW entirely.

 

[mom_rules]

I tried several meds before we left and came to the conclusion that Meclizine was my ticket (I think it's called Bonine in the US). I took 1/2 tablet starting the morning before we boarded and 1/2 in the evening. Also took ginger lozengers to chew for unsettled times. No drowsiness and no problem consuming alcohol with them (but that's only me-everyone has to decide for themselves).