Alaska Cruise questions

[disneydudette1]

I am cruising May 30th on one of the Alaska cruise and I have a few questions......
1) Which night is Formal night? We leave on Monday with a sea day on Tuesday so I am thinking it will be like the Eastern Carib with Tuesday formal?
2) Pixar night...does this replace the Pirate Night? I see it on the activity calendar but no pirate night. I realize there are no fireworks but I don't want to take pirate gear if not needed. Any idea what this is?
3?Parking at port. We are driving up from Seattle and I see parking for the week is over $200 anybody know of a more reasonable place to park?

Also, I'm not sure if anyone can answer this here but I hate to do anther thread. This is my 10th DCL cruise.... However, this is the first one with a young person. LOL! I am taking my 13 year old daughter with me Are there a lot of things for the "tweens" to do? Chance to make friends? We would like to go to Palo's but I don't want her to be eating dinner alone. Are there other arrangements that can be made if she hasn't found someone to hang out with?

Thanks in advance. Bonnie

 

[PrincessShmoo]

I am cruising May 30th on one of the Alaska cruise and I have a few questions......
1) Which night is Formal night? We leave on Monday with a sea day on Tuesday so I am thinking it will be like the Eastern Carib with Tuesday formal?
2) Pixar night...does this replace the Pirate Night? I see it on the activity calendar but no pirate night. I realize there are no fireworks but I don't want to take pirate gear if not needed. Any idea what this is?
3?Parking at port. We are driving up from Seattle and I see parking for the week is over $200 anybody know of a more reasonable place to park?

Also, I'm not sure if anyone can answer this here but I hate to do anther thread. This is my 10th DCL cruise.... However, this is the first one with a young person. LOL! I am taking my 13 year old daughter with me Are there a lot of things for the "tweens" to do? Chance to make friends? We would like to go to Palo's but I don't want her to be eating dinner alone. Are there other arrangements that can be made if she hasn't found someone to hang out with?

Thanks in advance. Bonnie

2) There's no Pirate night on Alaska cruises. Pixar night is focused on Pixar characters. People do dress up. Not a lot, but they do dress up.

 

[Mrs Green]

I am cruising May 30th on one of the Alaska cruise and I have a few questions......
1) Which night is Formal night? We leave on Monday with a sea day on Tuesday so I am thinking it will be like the Eastern Carib with Tuesday formal?
2) Pixar night...does this replace the Pirate Night? I see it on the activity calendar but no pirate night. I realize there are no fireworks but I don't want to take pirate gear if not needed. Any idea what this is?
3?Parking at port. We are driving up from Seattle and I see parking for the week is over $200 anybody know of a more reasonable place to park?

Also, I'm not sure if anyone can answer this here but I hate to do anther thread. This is my 10th DCL cruise.... However, this is the first one with a young person. LOL! I am taking my 13 year old daughter with me Are there a lot of things for the "tweens" to do? Chance to make friends? We would like to go to Palo's but I don't want her to be eating dinner alone. Are there other arrangements that can be made if she hasn't found someone to hang out with?

Thanks in advance. Bonnie

According to my notes, last years formal night was day 2 or Tuesday, as you thought. Of course, they could change things for this season. Have a great time!

 

[disneydudette1]

Thank you for the rapid replies! I'm glad I found out about pirate night. My granddaughter would have been mortified. LOL!

 

[The Grays]

We got parking for I think it was around $187 Canadian. This is the place at the pier. If you need a link let me know.

You may not see you 13 year old. There is lots for them to do.

We do have a group set up for fe but that has closed. We are planning a group meet and greet on the ship

And there is a post card exchange set for the kids

 

[sc426]

I am cruising May 30th on one of the Alaska cruise and I have a few questions......
1) Which night is Formal night? We leave on Monday with a sea day on Tuesday so I am thinking it will be like the Eastern Carib with Tuesday formal?
2) Pixar night...does this replace the Pirate Night? I see it on the activity calendar but no pirate night. I realize there are no fireworks but I don't want to take pirate gear if not needed. Any idea what this is?
3?Parking at port. We are driving up from Seattle and I see parking for the week is over $200 anybody know of a more reasonable place to park?

Also, I'm not sure if anyone can answer this here but I hate to do anther thread. This is my 10th DCL cruise.... However, this is the first one with a young person. LOL! I am taking my 13 year old daughter with me Are there a lot of things for the "tweens" to do? Chance to make friends? We would like to go to Palo's but I don't want her to be eating dinner alone. Are there other arrangements that can be made if she hasn't found someone to hang out with?

Thanks in advance. Bonnie

My husband and I were on last years August 10-17th Alaska cruise. From what I remember:
1) Formal night is the second night.
2) Pixar night does replace Pirate night. There is also a Frozen night.

Even though we do not have any kids, there were a lot of tween/teen activities. We remember seeing tweens/teens hanging out at various areas of the ship along with the castmembers makign sure that everyone was having a good time.

 

[Keyser]

My daughter went on an Alaska cruise as a 12 year old. She loved the Edge club, and I think it might have been her favorite part of the trip - beyond the glacier, the excursions, the shows, etc. And, she's more on the introverted side. Of course, every kid is different, but I would not worry about her having nothing to do - almost all kids will be in the same boat, so they do tend to do stuff together, and Edge will have organized activities (or she can hang out there).

However, getting dinner is another issue. Some options there (we have done the first 2 of these on cruises):
- Order room service for her sometime before the Palo dinner so that she can eat before you.
- If the timing works with Palo (e.g. if you have a late Palo dinner, but have early dining), you can tell your servers, even a day ahead of time, about the situation. Then, you can go to the dining room like usual, and get her food served quickly (probably not all courses), let her eat, and leave early. It's best to let your servers know ahead of time if you need to do this, though, as otherwise it'll be a big hassle for them, and might not go so smoothly (the dining room is organized assuming everyone is on about the same schedule).
- Let her get food from the quick-serve places on deck 9. Note that the buffet (Beach Blanket Buffet or whatever they call it now) is not a buffet at dinner time, so don't count on going there - though you can go at any time for a sit-down meal. But, pizza, burgers, etc. were open. Many kids would just as soon have pizza as they would a sit-down meal, anyway!
- Let her just get food on her own. She will be allowed to go around the ship on her own, and can manage to get her own dinner (probably a quick-serve place). We did not feel comfortable with our daughter roaming the ship (we wanted her in one location, or to go directly from one to another where she would then stay, notifying us), so this one is up to you. But, if she does this, there very well might be some other kids who she can get to go along with her...

 

[xlxo]

Yep... formal night is the 2nd night.... they want to have it earlier in the trip when most cruisers can fit their clothes before the AYCE buffets.

There's also a semi format night.... I think that's the 5th or 6th night.

 

[jenpink]

I have a 14 year old who will be on the same cruise. She actually likes to eat in the main dining room by herself while I am at Palo. She already knows the serving team, by then and they take good care of her

 

[Snowwhyt]

My daughter has sailed at age 11 and 15 on the magic. Slow to make friends but not unpopular. She chose to stay with us the whole time but it's a family cruise so it worked out very well. She met somebody on one of our port adventures she had dinner with their family while my husband and I went to palo. We did have a dinner reservation for Palo earlier in the week but she was uncomfortable going to the edge at that time so we canceled our reservation after she saw the navigator. But I made those reservations knowing that could happen.

 

[disneydudette1]

Thank you all so much! my biggest concern has been my granddaughter because she is also a little introverted. Great ideas! Hopefully by the time we do Palos she will feel comfortable enough to either eat alone or head to edge. If not she may like room service.

I have a 14 year old who will be on the same cruise. She actually likes to eat in the main dining room by herself while I am at Palo. She already knows the serving team, by then and they take good care of her

I hope they get to meet up!

 

[jenpink]

I hope so too

 

[richkaryn]

I am on this cruise as well...if you log in and look at the overview/activities for the cruise on DCL website, it shows formal night is 2nd night, semi formal is 5th night (also pixar party) and 4th night is Frozen night.

 

[Snowwhyt]

I am on this cruise as well....

I don't often find people with a spelling so close to mine. Which week will you sail? I'm on July 4th.

 

[richkaryn]

We are on the May 30th

 

[Snowwhyt]

We are on the May 30th

Sorry forgot to mention my first name is Karyne. I meant to put it in the post above.

 

[saxmangeoff]

3?Parking at port. We are driving up from Seattle and I see parking for the week is over $200 anybody know of a more reasonable place to park?

We drove from Idaho. Like you, I cringed at the price for parking at the port. Because we're about an 8 hour drive from Vancouver, and didn't want to stress out about getting across the border on the day we departed, we went up the night before.

I looked into "stay and sail" packages at area hotels, but ended up staying at a nice (and much cheaper) place in Richmond, and reserved a parking space at Canada Place. It turned out to be super convenient. For drop off, you drive up, unload the rest of your party and your luggage, then go park. And when you get off the ship, it's really nice to just take an elevator down to your car and head on out.

We're going again in 2017, and I'm planning on springing for the Canada Place parking again.