Hey guys, thanks for the info.
My kids are in public schools but I didn't know they'd be starting school so late. I thought I had read elsewhere (somewhere on the cruise forums) that even though the legislature had changed, the schools would get waivers or something to start earlier until their contracts were up- or something like that.
It's definitely something to think about if they are starting that late. But the cruise does start Aug 17th- so they'd miss- like what... 5 days or so of school? It's a thought. I may just have to have a talk with the highschool principal and see what he thinks because she will be starting highschool by that time and I'm wondering if it would be better to miss some time in May or miss a few days at the beginning of the year. I know the younger grades we have been able to get excused absences for WDW trips -usually not too many days though... like taken around holidays or a few days at the end of the year... but I'm not sure what highschool principal and teachers feel about it. Or how hard it would make it on her to start highschool out later than everyone else. That cruise itinerary sure does sound nice though! (and 15 days is even more than 2 back to back 7 day cruises without the saturday in the middle spent at PC! LOL)
If nothing else, we MAY just:
Keep our reservation as it is and transfer it to a later date just to keep the stateroom credit (for rebooking onboard) then later see what 2009 summer cruises entail. If they do special itineraries 3 years in a row, then we just won't cruise Disney again for a long time (like until the kids are adults). But if not, maybe we can still go that summer because who knows, maybe by some miracle my oldest will be mature enough to be with the older teens by then. Miracles could happen. LOL
Or we'll just eventually cancel it, get our deposit back and go to plan B (as far as vacations go) sooner than we'd planned. What I'm talking about is Jamaica, this time with the kids. See we'd already figured this (summer 2008) would be the last
Disney cruise for us, for a long time and that's why we were going to do back to back cruises. Then we'd do other things like go to Jamaica again but this time with the kids instead of alone. If things don't work out for summer 2009 or we don't want to wait that long and cancel the Disney cruise all together- we can just go to Jamaica instead. For the amount we'd save on the Jamaica trip- we could still throw in some trips solely to WDW and not the disney cruise. yanno? (I looked for summer 2007 dates for the resort we'd want with the kids, including flight and counting the cost of passports and all that- and it's about $2k less than the cruise is for us not even counting the flight it would cost to get to Florida plus transportation to/from PC, etc. And it includes things we'd do on the cruise that would cost us to do those things at the ports, etc. So it's quite a bit of savings- and I'm talking about checking a 10 day trip to Jamaica! Still wouldn't be the same as a Disney cruise, but I'm sure we'd enjoy it especially at that price.) and we could do other WDW trips- either with or without DH since he's not all that keen on going to WDW.
anyway, it's a lot to think about.
Oh and I agree about ending the school year sooner and cutting that winter break a bit. This year we had winter holiday break from Dec 15th to Jan 4th and I thought that was a bit over the top- especially because it cuts so much on any other breaks the rest of the year- and especially if it makes us end the year later! I don't recall EVER getting out THAT much before Christmas when I was young- and we always started back on the 2nd unless it fell on a weekend. This time they got out before the end of the week 10 days before Christmas and started back Jan 4th near the end of the week. Ridiculous. Especially considering all they got was 2 days for Thanksgiving, one week in March (used to be in Feb and now it's in march like every other spring break making prices higher during that time for cruises and other trips) and 2 days in april that are weather makeup days- which they won't get probably because we've already had one day that it snowed and they cancelled school. So that's 2 days for Thanksgiving, a HUGE winter break, one week in march, 2 days in april which at this point they'll only get one day, if that. That's it. Shorten that winter break and give some other breaks throughout the year, like they used to, and end earlier- is what I say! Just a couple of years ago here they had shorter winter break and more breaks throughout the year- but every year it gets worse and worse on the schedules.
