December 13, 2008 Western Caribbean!! Let's get acquainted!

[PenskeSth1]

Welcome Dr G and STLDisney_freak!

DS will be 3 months shy of 11 at the time of our sailing.

We just had some friends call and ask when we are sailing. They want to come along too. Which will be great, they have 2 kids one who will be 7 at time of sailing and one who will just have turned 4. She said her TA quoted her a price of 3,000.00 for a cat 9. I don't think that was too bad. I know our cat has gone up 1,000.00 since we made our ressie back in Dec of 06.

Michele

 

[Dr. G]

Welcome Dr G and STLDisney_freak!

DS will be 3 months shy of 11 at the time of our sailing.

We just had some friends call and ask when we are sailing. They want to come along too. Which will be great, they have 2 kids one who will be 7 at time of sailing and one who will just have turned 4. She said her TA quoted her a price of 3,000.00 for a cat 9. I don't think that was too bad. I know our cat has gone up 1,000.00 since we made our ressie back in Dec of 06.

Michele

That sounds like a very good price to me. Doing a quick search on the Disney Cruise site shows a Cat 9 for 2 adults and children 7 and 4, and declining ground transport and declining insurance, comes to $3,896.60. So, the TA is almost $900 lower than booking with Disney directly.

If that's correct, I'd love to know who the TA is and maybe they can help me out. I had a couple TAs (DU and a local guy) price our cruise and neither of them could get anything lower than the Disney quoted price so we just booked directly to keep control We're in two Cat 11s so our price wouldn't line up with the Cat 9, but still....

 

[Stinasmom]

Welcome Dr. G!
My DD will be 2 weeks shy of her 12th birthday when we sail, so just right to meet up with your girls! Looks like we are going to have lots of TWEEN DDs!
I am so glad they have that Tween area now on the Magic (Deck 2..."ocean quest" I think it's called) so that the almost 11's thru the 13's can hang together and not be split up by the lab/stack age groups. Not sure I'd want my DD to be in the Stack at 13 anyway!

STDLDisney-- Welcome also!
So sorry to hear about your parents house! As long as everyone was ok... but I bet there were lots of memories lost---how sad.
Nothing cheers me up quite like reading trip reports on these boards and knowing I am going to take a similar trip this year, however!

Hey Silly-- Do you live anywhere near Disneyland? OR visit there with any frequency? Had a question for someone who does about comparing DL with the Magic Kingdom...

Hope everyone else is enjoying their winter! We are having snow most every night... burrrr! It was even foggy today... hard to keep up the spirits! Well, maybe with a few spirits!

We are getting together a small crowd here! Exciting! Let me know if any of the DDs want to exchange email, my DD11 loves to make friends!

Marcy

 

[SILLYANDI]

Marcey- We go to Disneyland almost every week, we live about 10 mins away. Ask away!!!

 

[Stinasmom]

Marcey- We go to Disneyland almost every week, we live about 10 mins away. Ask away!!!

Great! Two things...
One-- We are considering the type of ticket to buy for WDW in December--- how many days and base vs. hopper option.
We visited DL last May and will be there again this March. Can you think of anything at Magic Kingdom that is so great or so much better than at DL that we should make sure NOT to miss a day there?
I am thinking that if we want to save some $$ (and put it toward a day at Discovery Cove-Sea World... Shhhh... don't tell my kids! It will be the surprise part of the trip!), that Magic Kingdom would be the park to skip. My kids will be 7 1/2 (boy) and almost 12 (girl).

Two-- We will be at DL/DCA from March 15th (evening) through March 19th (morning)... Wanna meet?
We are going to be with a DIS friend and her family from Hawaii. She and another DIS friend that lives near DL also who will likely tour DL with us on the 16th, were on the first DCL cruise we took in 2005.

Thanks for any input!!

Marcy

 

[SILLYANDI]

I would definetely like to meet! HOW FUN!
As far as the Magic Kingdom...HUM...I LOVE breakfast at Cinderella's, but I truely love DL more than MK. Everything at DL seems more true, I don't know how to explain it but for example It's a Small World is so much more vibrant and has more moving parts and is more of an experience than the one at MK which is a "ride". MK is much bigger & there are a few rides that are not at DL, but nothing that I could recommend.
If they've been to DL and are going back in March then I would say skip it. If your kids are not adreneline junkies then I would say skip MGM because the only thing worth your time there (in my opinion) is the thrill rides and maybe the stunt car show. We are all roller coaster fiends so we have to do it, but otherwise there is nothing there that we "have" to see/do.
If you are getting hoppers than I would recommend 1/2 day at each (or you can do Animal Kingdom in the morning and hit Mk at night because AK closes early). Tour Guide Mike is really good at working out iteneraries so you can split parks and see everything (with a nap in between) without feeling wiped out. I have used his info everytime we have gone and saw everything without a wait or crowd everytime!

 

[Stinasmom]

I would definetely like to meet! HOW FUN!

Great!! Depending on what kind of AP you have, Sunday, March 16th may be the best day... it is not a blackout date for all but the least expensive level.
I will PM you soon and we'll make arrangements!

MK is much bigger & there are a few rides that are not at DL, but nothing that I could recommend.
If they've been to DL and are going back in March then I would say skip it. If your kids are not adreneline junkies then I would say skip MGM because the only thing worth your time there (in my opinion) is the thrill rides and maybe the stunt car show. We are all roller coaster fiends so we have to do it, but otherwise there is nothing there that we "have" to see/do.

You and I think alike. This is exactly what I was considering but wanted to make sure I wasn't forgetting something at MK that would make it worth it!

You bring up a great point about Disney's Hollywood Studios (the new name we all have to get use to now ). We do love the Rockin' Roller Coaster... well two of the four of us, but is that worth burning a full day's ticket?
This is interesting... I was trying to avoid getting the hopper tickets but maybe I'll price 3 day hopper tix vs. 4 day base. Likely the same...
Guess this is why many of us spend months planning these trips! There are so many considerations!

Marcy

 

[SILLYANDI]

We have Premium/Deluxe so we can go just about any days to DL. Went yesterday and it was beautiful. No crowd, the weather was perfect and we were all tuckered out by 2PM!
My oldest DD's favorite ride is Rockin Roller Coaster. She is afraid of EVERYTHING but loves roller coasters?! It's the strangest thing. She even hates the Haunted Mansion & Pirates but loves going upside down in the dark...

We have alway bought park hoppers at WDW because of Tour Guide Mike. We have been 3 times now and always followed his best parks at what time, etc. It was worth it to me to pay extra and be able to split parks to avoid crowds than sit with "them" (as TGM calls all of the people that follow each other around like cattle) at the most busy parks at the most busy times.
If you don't know TGM- it's a website of a former WDW tourguide that posts schedules, best times/days to visit each park, how to see everything in the parks & squeeze in naps and basically how to maximize your trip without burning everyone out. This guy has it doen to a science. It is the type A planners heaven!
DH is not a schedule kind of guy, but on our first trip after about 2 hours of following TGM's advice and getting on rides without any waits (I'm not kidding we spent 2 hours in the park going on the "big" rides without waiting more than 5-10 minutes on each ride) DH started asking "OK what does Mike say we do next!" Wow, maybe TGM should be giving me some kickbacks...

 

[pogopossum]

well, we did it, we're doing the cruise on the 20th, have a great trip and maybe we'll get together on another cruise in the future, looking forward to those new ships and itineraries. bon voyage, ya'll, and see you on the nascar picks trail, michele

 

[SILLYANDI]

Sorry to hear you are leaving us. Have fun on your cruise, maybe we will see each other in passing on the 20th!

 

[SILLYANDI]

******edited******
I originally wanted to see if anyone was interested in booking as a group but I've since learned that our 10% re-booking deal is better than the group rate so....
Here's a scary story. I booked on board and transferred my ressie to my AAA agent (who doesn't specialize in Disney anything, but always gets us a great rate & OBC) anyway, I got a call saying that my agent has been promoted and our vacation has been transferred to a random agent and here's her name & info...
I decided to call her up yesterday and check on a few things-including what day we can book our excursions and Palo being CC members. She called back and left a message that she thinks its 60-30 days prior to cruise and wanted to know what Palo was. I called her and told her I thought it was 105 or 90 days and that we booked at 75 days for our first cruise so I'm pretty sure she's got it wrong. She told me that 30-60 days is "industry standard" and she thought I could wait until we board to make reservations for a restaurant. WHAT!!!! I don't think I am going to sleep until the cruise now. I can see it now, everything is going to be wrong or confused or something. I really need to get over my control freak issues but I'm thinking of buying Passporter's 2008 and sending it to her (since I have few options now that she owns my ressie...)

 

[KATIESMOMMY]

just stopping into to say hi, we will know Tuesday if we are cruising with you fine folk!!!

 

[SILLYANDI]

Yay! I hope you can, it will be so much fun to meet you & your family!

 

[PenskeSth1]

SILLYANDI ....You should send the new passporter to that TA. They definitely need to do some research on Disney's cruises.

I used DU for our last cruise and everything went great until we got upgraded. Somehow they cancelled our REAS package or didn't transfer it to the upgrade. I am still debating on wether to add the REAS pkg again or not for this cruise. We really don't do any of the excursions except CC. But getting first dibs on Palo's is nice. I don't know what I would do with two more robes. DH didn't use his last one so I gave it to DD.

Pogopossum, I plan on coming over to the CB and doing the nascar picks when I can. Hope you and your family have a good time on your Christmas cruise!


Michele

 

[SILLYANDI]

We went back and forth about the REAS on our first cruise for that exact reason. We ultimately didn't do it and were able to book everything we wanted on exact days/times that we wanted at the 75 day mark. We ended up spending that money on a couples massage and the exoctic rasul (IT WAS SOOOO WORTH IT!)

 

[PenskeSth1]

I think we will skip the REAS this time and use the extra money for something else. I know it is nice to be able to book early, but we just want one night at Palos and if we don't for some odd reason get the reservation we won't be heartbroke. I feel we will have no problems though.

We did get a phone call today from our friend who was interseted in going on the cruise with us. She got our Ressi # so that we can link our ressies together. We look forward to them coming with us, the more the merrier!

 

[Stinasmom]

Hi everyone!
We're kinda keeping our thread alive!

Michele-- you should have no problem getting a Palo ressie for dinner on a 7 nighter... it's the 3&4 nighters that it is tricky and is an advantage to be able to book early.
Are you booking at 90 days as a CC member? Should be no prob. You just have to time the receipt of your final payment to occur before the actual 90 day mark so you can book all of your ressies.... (palo, excursions, spa, etc.)
You probably already knew all this, but if anyone else out there was in question....
Seems like forever before we will be 90 days out, let alone actually cruising!
At least we have a Disneyland/San Diego/Legoland trip in March to tide us over!

Marcy

 

[SILLYANDI]

We applied for all 6 of our passports at our local city offices on Jan 18th and received them yesterday! I was totally blindsided because we walked into the office and there was no line-it took a total of about 15mins to process all 6. Then we get them in the mail 2 weeks later? That's crazy! We did it early expecting to have a 3 month turnaround. I still can't believe it!

 

[SILLYANDI]

We had our DCL House Party Friday and it was a blast, can't say it was any thanks to Disney though. They really dropped the ball on this one. Anyway, We have 4 couples that are considering going with us. I think at least 2 of them are going for sure. I was thinking the same thing "The more the merrier!".

 

[Tinker_Bell16]

Hey Everyone. Just wanted to let you all know. My mom changed the cruise to the 6th of December. So we're going a week early. I'm happy, but also sad because It would have been fun to meet you all. Hope you all have a great time.

-Cassie