!!!! Early Roll Call for January 21 2006 Eastern Magic Cruise !!!!

[JLDSMD]

soccrmom65,

I updated my earlier post to add you DN12.

As for airfare going down, what I have done in the past, and have always gotton, was to ask the airlines for a voucher due to the fare reduction. It will be good for 1 year from the date they issue it.

I had our air for this past January's cruise go down $30 each for my DW and DS (I was flying on a companion ticket) and they gave me a $60 voucher (Since I was the one who paid for the tickets, it was my name on the credit card, the airline offered me either $60 to me or $30 to DW and DS. I chose it for me). In hindsight, I should have had got it for DW and DS since DS has more frequent flier miles than me and we plan on using another companion ticket this year. Now we will be using the free ticket for him.

Where are you flying out of? Are you a Midwesterner like most everyone else is here?

Jeff

 

[gydell]

Why dosn't anyone fly into Melbourne? The tickets are running within $20 of Orlando. Just curious since I am looking at both.

 

[JLDSMD]

Most importantly, we are flying into Orlando because it is non-stop from Milwaukee on 3 different airlines. And I just hate to connect during winter even though we are going down early. Too many things can potentially go wrong.

Also, we are planning on going to the parks before the cruise (we are flying down on Thursday p.m.) and maybe again at the end of the cruise (we are flying back Sunday a.m.).

We flew down 3 nights early last year and flew back the Saturday evening after the cruise. It was a lot of sitting around trying to stay busy that afternoon (we didn't go to the parks ). I tried to convince DW to go to the airport for the early afternoon flight, but she didn't want to since it was mid-70's in FL and below freezing up here.

This year, we figured we'd use one less day at the beginning and instead use it at the end. Same number of nights at WDW. We got to WDW easily by 9:30/10:00 last year after we got off the boat. We had early dinner last year so we had early breakfast. This year, since we reinstated so late, we are on late dinner. That means breakfast at 8:00. I think we'll still have enough time to get to WDW for the day. We could always do the buffet on Deck 9 if we wanted to get out early.

Jeff

 

[the4nitz's]

My wife and I are trying to get caught up on all the new post here. We have been at the hospital with my mother for the past 2 weeks. She was transfered to a nursing facility on Saturday, but it does not look good. She is being kept comfortable for the time being, but we all know the outcome including my mom.

I like the list of kids and ages for our cruise. That was a good idea JLDSMD.

Plenam who did you get your tickets through? I have been watching air fare also waiting for it to come down. We would like to fly Midwest non-stop out of Milwaukee, but they need to come down in price. I see AirTran has a non stop out of Milwaukee and they seem to discount their fare sooner. Anyone fly with them before? I'm sure they all will start to come down in the next month or 2.

We had talked about going to WDW for a day or 2 before the cruise, but we hate to take DD6 out of school for that long. I think we will plan a seperate trip to WDW in the future.

On our past 2 cruises we have attended a DIS meet on board. My wife has a number for the contact person to set this up through DCL. We will have to decide on a day and time for our DIS meet, so start thinking about it.

 

[gydell]

Good reason. That's why we are looking at Melbourne so we don't have the ride back to Orlando.

 

[gydell]

Sorry to hear about your mother.

 

[plenam]

plenam, who did you book with?



Jeff

Booked with Midwest online.....We're on the 3:15 flight on the 20th and return on the 11:45am on Sat 28th...which is a rush but I'm sure we can make it.
Brett

 

[JLDSMD]

the4nitz's,

Sorry to hear about your mother. Best wishes to her and your family.

As for Air Tran, I'm getting a little bothered by them. We are flying them for our October cruise and the itinerary has been changed at least 5 times. The last one I found out about this morning (I looked it up, they did not contact me). We are not going on the non-stop on that one (hopefully no weather problems in Atlanta). Good thing we didn't go with it because they have changed that as well. It originally went out at 6 something at night and the return was at 3:40 p.m. or so getting into MKE before 6 p.m.. They have moved the out bound to 1 p.m. or 2 p.m. and is no longer available on Wednesdays and the return is now at 10:40 a.m. (a little too early for coming off the boat). If NWA and MW weren't so booked and high priced (going over teachers' convention weekend), I would have never looked into Air Tran.

As we sit now, unless the planes are nice and the flights/connections good, I don't think I'd try them again. And I haven't even flown them yet. DW and I think we'll see a change again (if not 2) before we actually fly.

I do believe NWA will at least run a sale come early/mid September. They have a sale now, but it only goes through November. Fares are around the low $200.

I honestly think we'll see $225 or less within the next 6 to 8 weeks. I won't wait any longer than the end of September though. I definitely want to be set by then.

We will definitely be going MW though due to us using FF miles and a voucher. I just hope MW matches NWA when they go on sale. It may be only for 1 day, so I have to be ready to grab it when it becomes available.

I could only hope that we see fares like we got last October when US Air was looking at bankruptcy. They discounted their fares and NWA matched. $115 roundtrip non-stop. Couldn't pass that up. Went down for MNSSHP at MK.

Jeff

 

[PiperG]

We hit a pretty good fare out of Minneapolis and got $266 each on a direct flight to and from Orlando.

The big deal is having a direct flight. Historically we used FF tickets on American (we had a credit card and I banked a lot of miles from my business travel). Although the connecting flight through St. Louis never bothered us, it just took so much longer to get to Orlando or to get home.

Last January, we booked NWA, but didn't want to pull DS from school to early and ended up with a Memphis connection on our outbound flight. A fairly big snowstorm hit Minneapolis that day, and we were stuck in a 2-hour line to get de-iced. We made our connection, but it was tight.

This year, we decided to take a direct both ways, even though DS will have to miss most of Friday. We fly out at 1:15, and will have plenty of time to relax and grab a bite after we arrive in Orlando. We won't have any worries about missing a connection. That is a plus.

Just to let everyone know, DH, DS8 and I will be at the port pretty early. I am shooting for around 10:00, although knowing us it will be more like 10:30. I always have some type of lime green item on (ribbon or Mickey heads from Home Depot). It is fun to meet other Dissers in the terminal.

 

[JLDSMD]

PiperG,

Non-stop is the way to go. Our flights in October will be the first time we connect with DS. He had a stopover (same plane) once when he was 11 months going to Manzanillo, but every other time was non-stop. The last time DW or I connected was back in 1997 going to Charleston.

Do you have any other competition to NWA up there in MSP that does non-stop? Luckily, a few years ago, NWA and Midwest discontinued their code share so now they are competing with each other. And in the last two years we have now added Air Tran. All three do non-stop. You can also book with USA3000 non-stop, but that is a public charter. Unless I'm going on an Apple Vacation, I'm not going on a charter.

I remember the snow storm last January. We were sitting in our room at Coronado Springs watching the Weather Channel. We just kept saying, good thing we left when we did.

We too plan on getting to the port early. Even though we'll be able to do Palo's, the Kids Club and our excursions online at the 90 day mark, we just want to get on the boat early and start enjoying the vacation. DS and myself will probably be wearing our matching CC t-shirts. We'll have to pick up DW one in October. This past January, DW asked a lady wearing a lime green shirt if she was a DISer. She responded rudely, "NO". DW didn't approach anyone after that.

I forgot if you mentioned earlier in this thread, but are you staying in Orlando or Port Canaveral the night before?

Jeff

 

[PiperG]

Sun Country competes with NWA, but DH said there were fewer flights to choose from and when we got the $266 we were happy.

Of course, there is the threat of a NWA mechanics strike this month, I believe. I am not worried about the cruise trip, but am a bit concerned about our WDW trip in October. Hopefully it all blows over.

Now, regarding Friday night. . . . . nobody flame me!!! We are staying at an MCO hotel, because our pre-cruise tradition is to go to Hooters. Yep, you heard me right! Many of the gals who work there are pre-Education majors, and they just love playing with DS. One time, two gals were out in the lobby throwing a football with him. He can be loud, run around, and get rid of some energy before we head off to bed.

So, if anyone is staying at the MCO Marriott, Hilton Garden Inn etc (there is a loop of hotels) let me know if you want to join us at Hooters!

 

[JLDSMD]

I haven't given the NWA strike much thought. I suppose I should. We are flying them to L.A. for my brother's wedding the 21st of Sept. (side trip to DL while we're there )

I won't flame you for going to Hooters (sorry, I just had to use that smiley right there. Don't flame me.). DW and I use to go there on vacation when we were first married. She never had an issue with it. I know that when you have a child and/or female with you the service seems to be really good. I think the waitresses like a break from the 20 year old men.

We will be somewhere in WDW that Thursday and Friday. Not sure where. Depends on the rate codes for the rooms and what parks we want to hit.

 

[soccrmom65]

I have flown Airtran several times and love them for airservice. Yes they do tend to have some schedule changes but I always give myself enough lead time to allow for that. We also have Southwest as a low cost option for us on the east coast but they post their prices so late it makes me nervous. The other problem with Southwest is the cattle call line up with the A,B,C lettering and no seat assignments. We normally fly Airtran because you can pre select your seat. Those flying NW just monitor them, because the strike looks to be happening on our about Aug 20th. We get fax alerts everyday from different companies we work with that we have clients booked on NW for with different schedules for different lines they have switched them over to.

As for USA3000 charter or not I would gladly fly them. I love the planes, staff and in flight movies and radio. If this is an option for you you might want to check into it.

We are flying down the day of and leaving the day we get back into port unless things change on this end. What type of transportation is everyone using. Since there are 6 of us we are looking into renting a van and Budget has the best prices thus far and will provide shuttle service to and from the port. We are going to be paying about 140.00 rt...does anybody know anything any cheaper?

 

[JLDSMD]

soccrmom65,

I haven't had a need to look into the price of a van, but we have and are renting a car both ways. They usually run less than $50 each way, but again, that is for a car.

He used Budget last year and we have them set for October as well as one side of January's cruise. The other company we use is Avis. Both have shuttles to the port. Last year we had Budget to, and Avis from. The Budget line seemed to be a little long when we came to drop the car off (mostly people picking up vehicles) and the shuttle seem to run a little less frequently. Not sure about Avis for dropping off, but when we picked up, they had all the paperwork and keys ready for us. Took no more than a minute to get the car. We are members of their preferred club. I would recommend that you join both clubs, Avis and Budget. It costs nothing and you don't have to have any minimum rentals. I do remember the Avis shuttle going past the Budget site a few times while we were waiting for the Budget shuttle. We wouldn't hesitate to use Budget again, don't get me wrong. Just being our first cruise and reading how people get to the port early and we are sitting and waiting to get there didn't help me as an Type-A planner/traveler.

As for AirTran, I will give them a shot. They at first moved us to a flight that didn't work with DS's school times, so I had to call them to get it changed. They did it without any problems. They did have several other changes (seems like they happen every 2 weeks) but haven't moved more than an hour to and hour and a half each way. Just gets frustrating. Good thing we had nothing planned that couldn't be modified. On the other hand, Midwest seems to keep their schedule for the most part. NW does too, but with our trip in September, they moved our flight from 7:55 p.m. to 9:30 a.m. That is a 10 1/2 hour change. Since we wanted non-stop, we had to change.

I've never flown USA3000, but they are a charter service that Apple and Funjet use here in Milwaukee. I just know of the cattle call to get seats that you have to do when flying charters. I like to be a little more relaxed when I leave on vacation. I'm not saying they are a bad airline, I just don't prefer to fly charter when scheduled is available. Plus, at least with the charters we've been on (not USA3000) the seat pitch is usually very little so they can cram more people aboard (the goal of charters). If they will save you substantially, then yes, I would consider it. Their schedule isn't up yet for Milwaukee, but I checked Chicago and their price is the same as American.

Now there is a charter airline, Allegiant, that flies into Madison up here, that is right now $60 cheaper than the closest scheduled carrier out of Milwaukee. You can also reserve a seat for an additional $10 each way. Not a bad deal.

I don't think I'd ever try Southwest unless you can get an assigned seat. Everything I hear and see about that airline is that they overbook. Don't want to miss the boat because I missed the plane.

You mentioned that you are on the east coast. Do you have service from JetBlue? They seem to be a decent airline. Unfortunately, they don't come to the midwest.

Jeff

 

[need_a_Disney_fix]

With all the talk of kids, is there anyone on our cruise that are empty-nesters?

 

[soccrmom65]

We do have Jet Blue out of DC but that is a little farther then I like to drive in the early morning..haha. We did a cruise in Feb out of Port Canaveral and used Hertz because they had the best price at the time. This time Budget was much lower then the rest when we checked. I have one on reserve so I will just keep watching and see what happens. I just want January to get here fast!

 

[NEPatsFan]

I just flew to Orlando and back twice in the last month on AirTran. First to take my two little ones down to visit my parents then a couple of weeks later to go back and pick them up. First time on AirTran and didn't have any problems. Price was good, around $220. They had a promotion for flying on Tues or Wed. Each trip I stayed for a couple of days and took the kids over to WDW with the grand parents!! Got to see the new car stunt show at MGM it was awesome. I would fly them again. We're already booked on NW for the cruise. Flying in Thurs night and staying at Universal until Saturday morning. That is if....

We don't cancel My company has had a VERY bad year and in the past 3 months has eliminated almost 100 positions and one of them was mine Righ now we're going on the assuption that I'll find something new and we'll still be able to go on the cruise, but we're also preparing ouselves that we may not be able to pull it off. Wish me luck and hope to see you on the ship.

 

[JLDSMD]

NEPatsFan,
Sorry to hear about your job. Good luck with the search. We hope you make it on board.

soccrmom65,
I'm surprised Hertz came up the lowest. In all my travels they seem to be the highest. I too check the rates constantly. I checked prices for our October cruise and they were great, but didn't book. Two weeks later and $15-$25 more for each way. Waited another week, back down to only $5-$10 more each way. I booked it at that point. I am already booked for January, but will continue to check the prices.

need_a_Disney_fix,
DW and I will be empty nester almost every night after the late dinner in Sessions. DS will be dropped off at the kids club for one of the late night movies and we'll have 75 minutes or so in the Jazz bar. We didn't even go into Sessions until our last night this past January. We couldn't believe we didn't go in there earlier. It had good music and great drinks.

Jeff

 

[JLDSMD]

Hey, where is everyone? We fell off page 1 again.

We must have the lowest percentage of DISers ever on our cruise. From my count, only 14 of us (screen name count) have checked in for our cruise.

Anyone out there lurking? Come check in. We won't bite.

 

[suejmj]

Hi
Don't know all the lingo but...
We are a group of 13
There are 6 kids - two moms, two aunts and three grandparents - the men didn't like our last RCL cruise so staying home. All except for grandpa - what a trooper!! We are from CT so looking forward to warm weather. A little concerned about the flight out as we booked Saturday a.m. - I know, we must be nuts, but we will have insurance and a Friday flight didn't work for us.
Kids ages:
boys: 5,8 and 15
girls: 13, 14 and 17
Traveled to Disney many times as DVC owners but first time on a Disney cruise. Looking forward to the experience.