We will be in Seattle for two nights before the cruise visiting my family in Kirkland. We plan to stay in their area, likely at the Marriott. So, we need a rental car. Does anyone know what our best bet is for dropping off the car and getting to the ship? Is a taxi a ridiculous option? Also, we fly Delta from Vancouver home. Does
DCL do the on ship check in of luggage? What is the best choice for getting to the airport? Our flight is at like noon, so time is somewhat important.
Possible thoughts (I live very near Kirkland): Rather than dropping a rental car off at the airport, you might want to try renting from
Aero Rent A Car and consider staying at the
Silver Cloud Redmond--it has a very nice free breakfast, free laundry, and nice indoor pool for the kiddos. It's not very far from Kirkland at all, and it's right next door to Aero, so returning the car should be easy.
The one thing I would make sure of, regardless of vendor, is that you can return the car on Labor Day, since that's when we will be departing, or if you'll need to make arrangements the day before.
If you wanted to forgo the rental car, or cut down the number of days, the
Metro Transit 245 will take you pretty easily from the Silver Cloud into Kirkland, and the stop is close to the hotel. They also have refrigerators and microwaves in the room, and a Trader Joe's close by for snacks and easy-to-heat up meals, if you want to try to save a little money that way. They are known as one of the "go-to" corporate hotels for Microsoft, and if one of your relatives is a Microsoftie, they can get you an extremely good rate. They're a great place for families--we've stayed there before. Even without the Microsoft rate, generally their prices are fairly good.
We are planning to take some form of private transfer from the area to the cruise, and depending upon how many are going from your family, and what time you want to be there, we might have some extra room. If you'd like to join us--DM. If not, try
Eastside for Hire, and they will let you know what the flat rate cab fare is from your hotel--that way you can decide what would be your best option. I don't think it will be very expensive that way at all--the hotel is near the bridge, so getting into Seattle is quick. It will probably be about the same cost, or less expensive, than going to the port from the airport, and it will almost certainly be much quicker.
Living in this area as we do, we've never needed to check luggage from the ship, but another DISboards poster mentioned that she did onboard check-in with no problems, so I don't think that would be an issue.
If you're flying out of Vancouver, and have more than two people with you, you'll want to reserve a hired car. Taxis will take no more than two people, and the Disney shuttle may be kind of slow for such an early flight. We used
Ride Booker last year to book a ride from Richmond, BC to the port, and were quite happy with it. They took all 5 of us, plus luggage, to the port for quite a bit less than Disney would have.
I was able to move our 11am from Sunday to Tuesday, so I guess that will be ok. There is a lot less Palo availability on Tuesday though.
So I think we will try for Tuesday or Sunday 
my DS is 3, too! You will all have a ball!
How old are your kids?
For Skagway we're planning to book the Chilkoot Charters Yukon Bus, Rail, and Dog cart excursion. I haven't done it yet because they want payment upfront and it's a 10% fee to cancel. Juneau we're doing Best of Juneau. 
