August 25 2012

[My4PhillyGirls]

Getting realllllly excited now!!!! As we are flying in from NY....my preference is to split into two groups.....though would love to participate with everybody. Already worried about luggage weight with 4 people. We have booked a flight down on Friday but are having a heck of time finding a reasonable flight home.....hoping prices start dropping soon. Can't wait to meet all of you.

US Airways dropped their fares by a $100.00 this week and we jumped on it

One less thing to worry about

Now if I can just find my luggage scale so that I won't be paying for bags that are too heavy

 

[oldpatterns]

I like to know the age and gender of the kids who I'm giving the fish extender presents to. I often have some pretty girly and boyish things for the kids.

 

[i12go2wdw]

I like to know the age and gender of the kids who I'm giving the fish extender presents to. I often have some pretty girly and boyish things for the kids.

All that info will be on the master list that everyone will receive. It is starting to feel so real now that we are getting down to the nitty gritty of things

 

[Susiesark]

I would like to give to/receive from the entire group. If you split into 2 groups, please put us on both lists. We usually give 1 gift to parents, and 1 gift to each child.

 

[Pudo]

Getting realllllly excited now!!!! As we are flying in from NY....my preference is to split into two groups.....though would love to participate with everybody. Already worried about luggage weight with 4 people. We have booked a flight down on Friday but are having a heck of time finding a reasonable flight home.....hoping prices start dropping soon. Can't wait to meet all of you.

It is very common for DISers to box up their FE stuff and ship it down to save on luggage space. We have done this several times without a hitch. Basically you address the box to yourself with the sailing date, ship name, and stateroom number. Every time we have down this the box gets to the stateroom before us.

 

[eyes4mickey]

It is very common for DISers to box up their FE stuff and ship it down to save on luggage space. We have done this several times without a hitch. Basically you address the box to yourself with the sailing date, ship name, and stateroom number. Every time we have down this the box gets to the stateroom before us.

We're fine with the FE group the way it is.

Could someone please tell me when Silver can book Palo? I can't login on the website, it keeps telling me that the DOB is incorrect. I was on recently and it was fine maybe they're having some site issues.

 

[Susiesark]

We're fine with the FE group the way it is.

Could someone please tell me when Silver can book Palo? I can't login on the website, it keeps telling me that the DOB is incorrect. I was on recently and it was fine maybe they're having some site issues.

I read somewhere else that they are having site issues. I believe that Silver can book at 12:01 AM May 27.

 

[eyes4mickey]

Thank You

 

[Pudo]

We have said, to make things easier and less of a chore, that the rule will be one gift per family but anyone is welcome to give more than that if they wish. So getting a gift for your cabin will be the norm, anything above that is icing on the cake

I was talking to my wife about this this morning and it dawned on me that the Fish Extenders normally have individual pockets for each child and one pocket at the top for mom & dad.

If you only give one gift per family you will be faced with the issue of choosing which pocket to place the gift. Conversely any gift left in a child's pocket will be considered theirs and more than likely he/she would not be willing to share (just being realistic here).

Just my two cents, please feel free to ignore.

 

[dvcdisney]

Unless things have changed from last August there isn't anyway to know how many people have booked an excursion. Although, you should be able to find out the capacity of an excursion if there is one.

The online booking process allows you to reserve many things including Palo/Remy, Spa, excursions, kid's clubs, etc. You choose the appropriate link on the web page, in this case, excursions and then chose port of call and the excursion you want. If there is more than one time slot you'll get a choice assuming none are booked up.

In the past, I have posted screenshots of the online booking process for first timers. If time allows, I try to do that again. I'll be booking this Friday @ midnight EDT.

Jeff

Thanks for the great info.

I would love to see a screenshot of the process. I won't be able to book for another 2 weeks.

I don't think you can see how many people are going, just if there is availability for your family. I've always done the Disney excursions. A little more pricey, but I like the comfort of knowing that if there is a problem getting back to the ship, they will hold the ship til everyone on the excursion can board. This has happened to me once and I've also heard of it happening to people not on Disney excursions and the boat left without them.

As far as crowds, I've never found them to be overly crowded, maybe around 20-25 people on the bus. I think they have multiple transports per excursion, so it would never be more than a bus/van full of people.

Thanks, that makes me feel better.

I don't expect the tour to be personal, but it would be nice if we weren't crowded.

 

[JKSWonder]

At 30 cabins, I'm fine with keeping it at one group.

On our previous FE, we did one gift bag per cabin, which contained adult stuff as well as stuff for the children where there were children in the cabin. We placed the gift in one of the adult pockets, so that the adults could divide up the gift among their own children as they saw fit.

We had unisex stuff for the kids, but did consider ages for assembling our gift. For instance, for a cabin that had two year old, we included a medium size blow up beach ball but did not give the pencils or the pirate stuff we gave to the older kids.

We shipped the box of FE gifts down ahead of time and, like Pudo said, the box got there just fine and was waiting in our cabin for us.

 

[Pudo]

Thanks for the great info.

I would love to see a screenshot of the process. I won't be able to book for another 2 weeks.

I am staying up tonight to book. I should be able to put something together before the weekend is out.

Jeff

 

[krisgils33]

I think you make a good point. It doesn't apply to me, I only have one child, so she gets all the pressies. But, I can see how it would be an issue for families with more than one. If I count correctly, adding everyone 20 and under and 1 per cabin for those w/out kids, the number would be 46.

I was talking to my wife about this this morning and it dawned on me that the Fish Extenders normally have individual pockets for each child and one pocket at the top for mom & dad.

If you only give one gift per family you will be faced with the issue of choosing which pocket to place the gift. Conversely any gift left in a child's pocket will be considered theirs and more than likely he/she would not be willing to share (just being realistic here).

Just my two cents, please feel free to ignore.

 

[krisgils33]

So far, I'm reading slightly divergent views on how the FE gift exchange should be done. Maybe I'm overanalyzing or worrying too much about "doing it right" being that this is my first time, but I guess I want to make sure all the kids are happy.

Does everyone just do what they want/can afford/or whatever or do we need to come to some type of agreement on how it's done?

 

[Pudo]

So far, I'm reading slightly divergent views on how the FE gift exchange should be done. Maybe I'm overanalyzing or worrying too much about "doing it right" being that this is my first time, but I guess I want to make sure all the kids are happy.

Does everyone just do what they want/can afford/or whatever or do we need to come to some type of agreement on how it's done?

In all honesty, this is an honor system. Some families put their name on the gift so you know who gave it to you and others don't. Not to give anybody the wrong idea, but you could sign up for the FE, not handout any gifts and more than likely nobody would notice. There is no FE police monitoring who gave what to whom

It appears to be agreed upon that it will be one gift per family, if you want to give more, and many people do, then that's fine too.

 

[Pudo]

Sadly DCL strikes again. I have heard of some very frustrating experiences with the DCL website while trying to book online, but have been lucky, I guess, over the last 10 sailings.

Tonight, I spent the last hour trying to book ANYTHING, but nothing worked. I could choose the day, activity, and passengers, but whenever I clicked on "check availability" the website attempted to retrieve the data but then just stopped. There were no options, it didn't matter what I chose, Palo, excursions, etc. it all failed miserably.

I am an I.T. professional of 20 years, currently a Database Administrator so I know my way around a computer. I tried several different computers, multiple browsers and even downloaded the latest version of Firefox, but with the same result.

In Einstein's words, I have just exercised the true meaning of insanity which is to perform the same task over and over and expect (more like hope) a different result.

 

[DisneyGirlTinkerbell]

Sadly DCL strikes again. I have heard of some very frustrating experiences with the DCL website while trying to book online, but have been lucky, I guess, over the last 10 sailings.

Tonight, I spent the last hour trying to book ANYTHING, but nothing worked. I could choose the day, activity, and passengers, but whenever I clicked on "check availability" the website attempted to retrieve the data but then just stopped. There were no options, it didn't matter what I chose, Palo, excursions, etc. it all failed miserably.

I am an I.T. professional of 20 years, currently a Database Administrator so I know my way around a computer. I tried several different computers, multiple browsers and even downloaded the latest version of Firefox, but with the same result.

In Einstein's words, I have just exercised the true meaning of insanity which is to perform the same task over and over and expect (more like hope) a different result.

Boy...that's really frustrating! I was worried all day that it wouldn't work, but everything turned out OK for me (I'm running Firefox 9.0.1). At 11:00 p.m CDT, I was able to book Palo brunch and dinner date/times--my first choice, Castaway Cay bike, float and parasailing, and spa treatments for the week.

I hope you can get in touch with someone tomorrow to get some resolution. I know you must be ready to pull your hair out! I would be!

Hang in there!

 

[maryisme]

Sadly DCL strikes again. I have heard of some very frustrating experiences with the DCL website while trying to book online, but have been lucky, I guess, over the last 10 sailings.

Tonight, I spent the last hour trying to book ANYTHING, but nothing worked. I could choose the day, activity, and passengers, but whenever I clicked on "check availability" the website attempted to retrieve the data but then just stopped. There were no options, it didn't matter what I chose, Palo, excursions, etc. it all failed miserably.

I am an I.T. professional of 20 years, currently a Database Administrator so I know my way around a computer. I tried several different computers, multiple browsers and even downloaded the latest version of Firefox, but with the same result.

In Einstein's words, I have just exercised the true meaning of insanity which is to perform the same task over and over and expect (more like hope) a different result.

I am so sorry this happened to you. Same exact thing happened to me when my booking window opened for this sailing. I spent three hours trying to reserve excursions/specialty dining.

I am platinum and the rest of my party is gold and silver. When I called DCL the next morning I was told the issue is related to the linked cabins I was traveling with (4 total). Since their window to book was not open nor were they paid it was preventing me from booking as well. The solution is simply to unlink the cabins not paid and in a lower castaway tier. When my Mom's cabins (gold) opened this evening I had to have the two silver cabins unlinked once agan.

I hope you are still able to reserve what you want come morning. I just missed your post around midnight as I popped on here for a few minutes. I could have possibly shed some light on your situation (if indeed it is the same issue).

Good luck!
Mary

 

[dvcdisney]

Sadly DCL strikes again. I have heard of some very frustrating experiences with the DCL website while trying to book online, but have been lucky, I guess, over the last 10 sailings.

Tonight, I spent the last hour trying to book ANYTHING, but nothing worked. I could choose the day, activity, and passengers, but whenever I clicked on "check availability" the website attempted to retrieve the data but then just stopped. There were no options, it didn't matter what I chose, Palo, excursions, etc. it all failed miserably.

I am an I.T. professional of 20 years, currently a Database Administrator so I know my way around a computer. I tried several different computers, multiple browsers and even downloaded the latest version of Firefox, but with the same result.

In Einstein's words, I have just exercised the true meaning of insanity which is to perform the same task over and over and expect (more like hope) a different result.

I can imagine your frustration.

Online for Disney seems to be such an issue from all aspects. It is very frustating for time sensitive bookings.

Hopefully you were able to get what you wanted.

 

[Pudo]

Boy...that's really frustrating! I was worried all day that it wouldn't work, but everything turned out OK for me (I'm running Firefox 9.0.1). At 11:00 p.m CDT, I was able to book Palo brunch and dinner date/times--my first choice, Castaway Cay bike, float and parasailing, and spa treatments for the week.

I hope you can get in touch with someone tomorrow to get some resolution. I know you must be ready to pull your hair out! I would be!

Hang in there!

I am so sorry this happened to you. Same exact thing happened to me when my booking window opened for this sailing. I spent three hours trying to reserve excursions/specialty dining.

I am platinum and the rest of my party is gold and silver. When I called DCL the next morning I was told the issue is related to the linked cabins I was traveling with (4 total). Since their window to book was not open nor were they paid it was preventing me from booking as well. The solution is simply to unlink the cabins not paid and in a lower castaway tier. When my Mom's cabins (gold) opened this evening I had to have the two silver cabins unlinked once agan.

I hope you are still able to reserve what you want come morning. I just missed your post around midnight as I popped on here for a few minutes. I could have possibly shed some light on your situation (if indeed it is the same issue).

Good luck!
Mary

I can imagine your frustration.

Online for Disney seems to be such an issue from all aspects. It is very frustating for time sensitive bookings.

Hopefully you were able to get what you wanted.

Thank you all. The issue was being linked to another stateroom where their booking window hasn't opened up yet which could only be resolved by waiting until this morning to call. I spoke to DCL this morning; I was able to reserve over the phone Palo Brunch and an excursion on CC. Since they unlinked the reservation; I have now been able to book BBB for Sarah on formal night.

In the past, I have been linked to other families without issue, not sure why this year was different. Regardless, I am just happy to have this resolved. I agree with others the website has always been a bone of contention, not sure why they can’t seem to get that part of their business right.