Feb 20, 2011 - Presidents' Week - Mexican Riviera

[minie_meese]

Fish Extenders a lots of fun.
The basics are
you bring a fish extender and some gifts to share with the other participants on the cruise
you hang your fish extender on the "fish" under your room number outside your cabin door shortly after getting to your cabin (and decorate your door with magnets if that sounds like fun)
during the cruise you bring your gifts around to the other participants cabin and leave them in their fish extenders

The actual fish extender can be simple or fancy. Our last cruise was right before Christmas so some people bought a christmas stocking at the dollar store while others had handmade fish extenders.

The gifts can be as simple or as elaborate as you want. Some people brought candy, others brought gift bags with a variety of things and others brought hand made gifts. It's totally up to you how simple or fancy you want to get. Some places you can find inexpensive gifts are the dollar store, craft stores (they often have things for $1 or even less) as does Oriental Trading Company.

The things we like about it is that our little ones love bringing gifts around to everyone's room. I try to plan carefully when I am going to fly so I minimize the amount of space.

Here are a few threads that talk about how to make a fish extender - they are pretty easy to make and can be done without using a sewing machine - or pick up something like an inexpensive Christmas stocking and decorate it with iron on decales
There's lots of pictures at this thread
http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=1219607
And instructions for a simple no-sew FE at this thread
http://www.disboards.com/showpost.php?p=30302583&postcount=609
There are pictures of some home made FE gifts here
http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=1980639 -
This is a lot of data - let me know if you have any questions

Elaine

 

[Pooh Lover]

So...do you give gifts every day? Or do people take turns?

 

[LKFan]

Definitely not everyday. Some people give one gift while others space their gifts out and give them over two or three days. On our last cruise, we received a lot of gifts the day of pirate party.

 

[ll_california]

Hi, everyone,

We booked this cruise a while back. Just learned about the kids free discount from this board, and called DCL and saved $700+. Thank you, Dishy24!

The ship is sold out for 2 adults + 2 children in the same room, and I was pleasantly surprised that they can still apply the KFMR discount on our reservation.

We are new to the FE experience, but are very interested. How do we get a participant list so we know how many gifts to prepare and where to send them? Thanks.

 

[LKFan]

Welcome II California. What part of No Cal are you from?

 

[ll_california]

Hi, LKFan, we're from San Jose. Nice to meet you.

 

[LKFan]

We're in the South Bay (of Los Angeles) but my husband and I both went to grad school at UC Berkeley.

 

[minie_meese]

Hi, everyone,

We booked this cruise a while back. Just learned about the kids free discount from this board, and called DCL and saved $700+. Thank you, Dishy24!

The ship is sold out for 2 adults + 2 children in the same room, and I was pleasantly surprised that they can still apply the KFMR discount on our reservation.

We are new to the FE experience, but are very interested. How do we get a participant list so we know how many gifts to prepare and where to send them? Thanks.

Welcome II_california
We had this cruise booked too and were able to apply the kids sale free discount retroactively. It was a treat for us.

We're just starting to plan our Fish Extender activities for the cruise. I volunteered to coordinate it. With your family we have 15 families who have posted on the board. Many have expressed interest. February seems like a long way off (especially for those of us in the Northeast who are enjoying the 80 and 90 degree days and would rather not think about snow and 10 degrees). I'll post something soon to try and get the ball rolling. We have 15 families who have posted so far and most of them seem to have 1 or 2 kids. I posted some general FE information. You can find it on the top of page 5. Let me know if you have any questions.

 

[Monica D]

Hi, LKFan, we're from San Jose. Nice to meet you.

We live in San Jose as well!

 

[silence]

We called as soon as we got the email for kids sail free and we were told by our TA that it didn't apply to our cruise. Imagine my surprise when so many people here got it. It would have been helpful to save that money!

 

[ll_california]

minie_meese, nice to meet you, and thanks for the FE links.

LKFan, thanks for the great info re: San Pedro area. We just booked the DoubleTree hotel.

Monica D, nice to meet someone from the bay area. We're planning to drive to LA a day before the cruise. Are you guy going to fly or drive?

silence, I'm pretty certain that the kids sail free deal applies to the 2/20/10 MR sailing. I only found out this deal last week; at that time, there were not even a room available to accommodate 4 people. Still, I called DCL and they applied the KFMR code on my reservation without any problems. Right now, if you go to disneycruise.com and try to make a reservation for 3 people with KFMR code, you can still see $0 on the 3rd person. I remember hearing stories (either here or from CruiseCritic) that some TAs are unwilling to give you the discount because it may result in less commission for them, and they have to fight really hard to get their discount. You may want to talk to your TA and DCL again. It's a lot of money.

 

[ll_california]

silence,

Here is the thread I was talking about. DCL may be helpful in this situation:
http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1227493

"Wanted to add that to get the repricing benefits you should book direct with Disney. I've had a similar problem and my t/a wouldn't approach Disney for me (I think their commission would have been lower). I'm in the UK, so could be different, but it caused no end of problems. Disney were very kind and sorted out, but not without a month or so of pain, nearly losing our stateroom allocation and hours on the phone."

 

[minie_meese]

We had an existing reservation and my TA contacted us about the kids sail free before I heard about it. It didn't save us a huge amount because we booked on board and had to give up the shipboard credit but my Ta did the calculations and told ne it would save us about $300 so we were able to apply it

 

[vetbeth]

We'd be interested in doing the FE. Depending on how many families join us, I think it could be up to the family if they do an adult, child or family gift. That way there will probably be a variety of gifts and it would be a pleasant surprise to see what you'd get if you had no idea who the present would be for.

 

[LKFan]

We called as soon as we got the email for kids sail free and we were told by our TA that it didn't apply to our cruise. Imagine my surprise when so many people here got it. It would have been helpful to save that money!

Man, I would be upset about this. I agree with the others, see if you can get Disney to apply this discount to your reservation.

When I log on with my existing reservation and try to change rooms, I still get the KSF option for 9C, 4B and 4A. I believe they are all GTY at this time.

 

[minie_meese]

Just booked our airfare today so we're really committed now. - now I can start my planning in earnest.

We ended up booking Jetblue out and Continental on the way back. $154 each way is not too bad from the east coast and we'll just have to pay for baggage in one direction - the right direction for packing my Fish Extender gifts.

We're arriving the Tuesday before the cruise and staying in Manhattan Beach. I used to travel to El Segundo for work and have some fond memories of Manhattan Beach and some of the nice restaurants. Our adult children have friends in the LA area so they are very excited about seeing them. We also expect to spend a day at Disneyland.

Looking forward to checking out shore excursions for the cruise too.

Anyone else started any planning?

 

[LKFan]

How long ago did you used to travel to ES/MB? It has changed a lot in the past few years. The studios moved in on Rosecrans which brought a lot of nice businesses (restaurants, grocery stores, etc) to the area.

Where in MB will you be staying?

 

[Señor DonDuck]

You win

I'm still looking at different flights and will be flying in the day before to avoid any possible issues getting to port on time. I've also been going thru all the FE gift links to get ideas. (thanks for those links, BTW!)

Just booked our airfare today so we're really committed now. - now I can start my planning in earnest.

We ended up booking Jetblue out and Continental on the way back. $154 each way is not too bad from the east coast and we'll just have to pay for baggage in one direction - the right direction for packing my Fish Extender gifts.

We're arriving the Tuesday before the cruise and staying in Manhattan Beach. I used to travel to El Segundo for work and have some fond memories of Manhattan Beach and some of the nice restaurants. Our adult children have friends in the LA area so they are very excited about seeing them. We also expect to spend a day at Disneyland.

Looking forward to checking out shore excursions for the cruise too.

Anyone else started any planning?

 

[minie_meese]

How long ago did you used to travel to ES/MB? It has changed a lot in the past few years. The studios moved in on Rosecrans which brought a lot of nice businesses (restaurants, grocery stores, etc) to the area.

Where in MB will you be staying?

It's been almost 15 years since I've been to Manhattan Beach. I'm holding a reservation at The Sea View Inn but someone recommended the Marriott Residence Inn. I know it ist farther from the ocean but I know what I get from a Marriott. If anyone has comments on the Sea View I'd be happy to hear.

Two of the MB restaurants I went to are Mamma D's and the China Grill. I remember both as being very good. There was also an Irish pub at Huntington Beach but I can't remember it's name. Any recommendations are most welcome!

 

[Bruins]

It's been almost 15 years since I've been to Manhattan Beach. I'm holding a reservation at The Sea View Inn but someone recommended the Marriott Residence Inn. I know it ist farther from the ocean but I know what I get from a Marriott. If anyone has comments on the Sea View I'd be happy to hear.

Two of the MB restaurants I went to are Mamma D's and the China Grill. I remember both as being very good. There was also an Irish pub at Huntington Beach but I can't remember it's name. Any recommendations are most welcome!

I don't know anything about the Sea View Inn, but I do know the streets nearby, as I've gone running a couple blocks away from there. It's a really nice area, and the pier area is just a short walk away. It's a much more quiet area than the area surrounding the Residence Inn (assuming its the Residence Inn on Sepulveda Blvd.)

The Manhattan Village Mall is about a mile away from the Sea View Inn; just outside the mall is a cupcake place/ bakery called Susiecakes, which has the best vanilla cupcakes EVER.