Disney Cruise - HELP!

[Clare D]

Hi
DH and I were talking the other day about our 2006 holiday as I had received an e-mail from Virgin about free child places. This got me thinking about going on a Dsiney Cruise next year as I am 30 I thought that it would be nice to do something special for us all.
The thing is I have never been on a cruise and really don't know where to start. I have seen the ship docked in Nassau and know that it is huge but would really appreciate some help. I am thinking about maybe doing the 4 day cruise and finishing it off with 10 days down in Sanibel.
Let me know what you think to this, which room to stay in, how to book etc via Virgin or another - as you can tell I really don't know where to start.
Thanks in anticipation

 

[kristieuk]

We have booked for Nov 2006 directly with Disney Cruise Line - link is below. It had the cheapest prices (early booking discounts etc), and was more convenient generally - you get to choose the actual stateroom that you stay in subject to it being available.

You can also pay off your balance online bit by bit if you prefer (and wait for the $ rate be really good). You also have the option of cancelling completely up to 75 days out.

http://disneycruise.disney.go.com/dcl/en_US/index?bhcp=1

We booked a Category 5 stateroom on Deck 7 - there will be us and our daughter who will be 7 by then. We wanted to do domething a little different after our beach wedding, but its just the 3 night - we haven't cruised before and wanted to be sure that we liked it, plus it falls on a more convenient date for us.

If you check out the Disney Cruise Line board here, you will find laods of really useful information.

Good luck!

 

[florida sun]

Clare I have loads of info on DCL , far to much to type on here, but my advice would be:

I dont know how many of you there are, but the Varandahs are wonderful, we always go far a cat 6 on deck 6 as the varandahs are ever so slightly larger there than the other decks.

You can book directly with Disney, which is what we do, or through Virgin or through companys advertised on here such as Dreams Unlimited. Find the cat you want and price check first before booking.

Certain companys may offer you onboard credit to encourage you to book through them.

When you check out Virgins prices they may appear to be more expensive than the others, take into account that Virgin's prices normally include all the tips to need to pay, whereas the others such as Disney and Dreams do not.

Check out the cruise board on here, the information you can pick up from there is fantastic.

Midship and Aft are among the best places on the ship to not feel any motion, appently the front of the ship has the most motion movement.

Towards the back of the ship, if you book a varandah, you may end up with a solid wall varandah, due to the structure of the ship, we had one of these last year, although they are very private, we are going for the plexiglass next time, as on the solid wall varandahs you do have to stand up to be able to see out, on the plexiglass you can sit down and see out.

A lot of the staterooms have connecting doors, you may hear slighly more nosie from the next room if you have one of these.

Go to the Disney web site that kristieuk has posted above and check out the deck plans, you can see which rooms are connecting rooms, and which rooms have solid wall varandahs.

There are a number of stateroom which are classified as a inside rooms but have actually got portholes, albeit, portholes with an obstrction in front of them, however you do get a bit of extra light in your room for the lower cat price, the same is also true of a couple of varandah rooms which are advertised as cat 7 navigators varandah, but are almost full varandahs as in cat 6 and cat 5. They are priced as cat 7 due to a slight obstruction of view due to the curve of the ship. However these rooms tend to go very very quickly, but they are worth checking out, I am not sure what the room numbers of these rooms are but if you go to the cruise boards thread, do a search and key in secrect porthole staterooms, it is sure to bring them up.

If you want any other info, please feel free to PM me.

Hope this helps

Sue

 

[Clare D]

Thanks Kristie for the updates. I have looked at the Dsiney site but still am a little bamboozled.
Florida Sun phew you really know your stuff. I have seen your pics of you and your daughter on the cruise ship and knew that you would come back to me with loads of really useful info. How do I PM you as I do have loads of questions?
Thanks for the help girls
Clare

 

[disneyholic family]

we also booked both our cruises directly with DCL and found it to be very convenient.
I called DCL and made the reservations by phone. I prefer speaking with a live human being, to making reservations online.

I also made a specific room request (and got it both times).

 

[florida sun]

Clare

I have tried to send you a PM but you dont appear to be set up to recieve them, I am not sure how you do this, but I think you may need to go to your User cp and edit options, then tick the private messages box to enable you to recieve and send pm's.

Hope that works for you. You then can send me as many pm's as you like lol.

Sue

 

[Clare D]

Hi Sue
I think I have done it. I'll PM you shortly
Clare

 

[florida sun]

Clare

I have sent you a reply to your pm.

Sue

 

[Clare D]

Thanks Sue. Does this come via my personal e-mail? As you can tell Ihave never done this before either - and they say you can't teach an old dog new tricks
Clare

 

[florida sun]

Clare

When you log on , have a look up in the top right hand corner where it's says Welcome and the time you last visited, private messages are underlined, just click on that link and it will take you to your pm list, then click on the one from me.

Any probs let me know.

Sue