Feeling a little overwhelmed- help?

[BibbidyBobbidyBoo]

Hi!
New to the whole idea of going on a cruise (but it is decided... just have to make some decisions before booking SOON) but trying to read as much as I can here (have read 9 pages back so far LOL).. I have a few questions I haven't seen the answers to here yet- so I was hoping maybe some of you could help? Maybe relieve a little of my early anxiety LOL. We've never been on ANY cruise before... it just wasn't something I even considered for a vacation until I started looking into DCL and realize how much fun I think we would all have! (plus DH is tired of going to WDW right now and wanted to do something different on our next big vacation)

1.) Since a cruise is quite different than a normal vacation at WDW staying at a resort- how do you all feel about doing late night activities (you and spouse) with the kids asleep in the stateroom? I mean if your oldest was say 11 or almost 12yrs old... not old enough that you would consider leaving them alone OR with the younger two say at the resort room to go off and do something without them- do you feel differently about that when on a cruise? (meaning later than the programs/clubs are open for the children)

2.) Has anyone EVER missed leaving a port?? I don't know why I'm worrying about that but I'm always thinking of the worst and thinking what if you're on an excursion and something happens and you don't get back in time? I've read some of the excursions and they seem to start later in the day and one says 3hrs- that seems AWFUL close to the time the ship is leaving that port. So does that ever happen? And if so- what on earth do you do then? How do you make SURE you never miss the ship leaving?

3.) When you're at one of the ports- doesn't matter which since I'm basically asking about ALL, including castaway cay, how hard/time consuming is it to go back and forth from the ship? I'm asking because is it feasible to spend part of the day off the ship with your entire family but also have a little excursion (let's say snorkling or something like that) with just you and DH while the kids are in the clubs on the ship? Is that possible? Need to know this one because if not- we won't be able to do most excursions- they are either too young, not capable, and/or not interested in doing things like snorkling. Well maybe the oldest- but certainly not the younger two. Couldn't even get my son to snorkle at Typhoon Lagoon when we were there recently- he kept wanting to but kept chickening out. LOL (can't blame him... it kinda scares me too! Have to work at not hyper-ventilating myself... LOL) Even if he changed by the time of our cruise- it's doubtful that our youngest would be capable (great swimmer by that age- doubtful) or interested in doing such things. Never being on a cruise before- I'm not sure how that works or how difficult and time consuming it is to get off/on a ship when it's docked or at port.

I'm sure I'll have more questions in the future- but hopefully I can find the answers on my own. Those will do for now. LOL Appreciate any help you can give me!

 

[ChattyKathy]

I'll try and take a stab at this for you....first of all, I am feeling alot of the same way, my family is going on a cruise too, I was on one around 11 yrs ago when my daughter was just 10 mos old...
I dont know how to answer the first question....since my kids are basically the same ages, I was under the assumption that the kids can actually stay at the kids' labs til 12-1am.....would you have a problem with them doing activities just the same as you are since its a vacation ...?

The port thing I dont know nothing about and dont want to either, I dont even want to go there with that thought!!LOL


Good Luck!


Kathy

 

[Cruisin]

I will try to help a bit if I can.

The kids clubs are generally open quite late at night 12am-1am area. So if your kids will go into them then you can get a pretty good night out yoursel. Most of the adult stuff is done by around 2 am anyways. Disney ships tend to "shutdown" around then and everyone goes to bed unlike some of the other cruise lines.

As to leaving your kids in the cabin, it would depend on the kids and your comfort level. Some 11-12 yr olds are mature enough at that age to handle that and taking care of the younger ones, especially if they are sleeping. If it had been my kids at that age, I would have done it on the ship, but only you know your own kids and their maturity levels.

If you are on an excursion that you booked thru the ship then you don't have to worry about the ship leaving the port without you. The ship would wait for excursions booked thru them to return before leaving the port. Now if you are just off on your own, then make sure you have lots of film in your camera cause you will get lovely pictures of the ship pulling away from the dock (a cruise director said this on one of our cruises )

As to your last question regarding getting off and on the ship easily in ports I am only familiary with Nassau and Castaway Cay. Nassau it is real easy cause you are just docked by the main shopping area and it is a short walk to and from the ship.
Castaway Cay is very easy to access also.

Hope this helps some.

 

[kcashner]

Ok, thing one...kids sleeping alone in cabin while you "play." The Club and Lab are open till midnight or 1 every night, and even have "campouts" where they set up tents and sleeping bags and go to sleep. So...that is an option. Secondly, I'd have no problem leaving an 11 or 12 year old in a cabin. No one can get into the cabin. You have a beeper, and they have a phone. Make sure they know how to press the button to call guest services. If there is an emergency, guest services can have you paged (they actually have to go thru the club or lab to do this, but it can easily be done.)

I wouldn't suggest this with a 7 year old, but 11 or 12...no problem. If you are still uneasy, how about having the oldest take the Red Cross "Safe sitter" course before the cruise. It's very low cost, open to ages 11 and up, and could be very useful later in his/her life. Then just deal with the specifics of how to reach you on the ship. The beeper really makes it easy! I feel FAR safer on the ship than at a hotel anywhere including at Disney.

Secondly, shore excursions. Except at Grand Cayman, the Disney ships pull right into the ports (no tenders). That means that it is very easy to get on and off the ship as many times during the day as you like. We frequently do a 1/2 day activity (either as a Disney excursion or on our own) and then return to the ship for lunch...go out again afterwards. You'll have plenty of time and information to plan this, and the people at the shore excursion desk are really helpful. How time consuming is it to go back to the ship--depends on where you are. From Castaway, it will take maybe 10 minutes. Most places, at the pier, you are a 5-10 minute walk to taxis, etc.

You are given a time to be back on the ship. I was on one cruise where 4 people were over an hour late (they know whether you are on the ship because they swipe your card when you go off and come back on). The captain made a decision to wait till a certain time, by which time they'd made it back. He made quite an announcement that night about being back on time the next day. Someone at guest services said that they HAD left people who didn't get back on board. They have no way of knowing where you are at St. Martin or wherever! They do allow a small grace period, but after that, you are on your own. Guest services said that if 2519 guests could make it back on time, they didn't have a lot of sympathy for the 4 who couldn't make it. No one on one of the DISNEY organized excursions misses the ship!

I was also on a cruise where a passenger broke a leg while on a shore excursion. They contacted the ship, and (according to extended family members) Disney made major efforts to expedite medical care and return transportation for the teen and parents.

I find a cruise to be the BEST vacation from the standpoint of the mom. If my kid doesn't like the food, the server brings her something else and I don't have to pay for 2 dinners. There's plenty to do...there's kid supervision when you want it, or you can hang with them when you want that. You are in an isolated,very safe environment. We've cruised since my daughter was a month shy of her 4th birthday. We've cruised Disney since she was 7.

My DD is convinced that the cast and crew are her best friends. We have been on the Magic 9 times, and she asked for a cruise for her 13th birthday. We get on, and she starts checking on which of her "friends" are on this time (please be on, Miss Jacqui!) Yes, that is my kid, sitting in the front row of the theatre cheering for the cruise director, quizzing the crew about their jobs, their home countries, etc. She comes home and chooses a country for her geography paper based on where a crew member was from, etc. She is now allowed to leave the lab and come back to the room on her own...our rule is that if we haven't arranged another meeting place/activity, she is either in the Lab programming or in the cabin (meaning that if I leave her in the lab, she has to be one place of the other.) I frequently leave a note in the cabin as to what I'm doing. She'll come back to the cabin and call stateroom dining to order cookies and milk...or whatever. I've even had comments from them that she is always polite, but calls and says that "It's time for my cookies and milk snack now, please! I'll need 3 cookies and 2 skim milks to room whatever, but you dont' need to rush or anything."

Just relax and do it...you'll love it.

 

[BibbidyBobbidyBoo]

Thank you all so much for your replies! You have really helped a lot!
So basically...... I have learned....

1.) the clubs are open late- and since atleast so far (things could change by then I guess) my kids are night-owls and will stay up playing as late as we allow... we won't have issues with needing to even think about leaving them asleep in the rooms while off doing other things on the ship- most likely they'll be in the clubs until then anyway. DH is NOT a nite-owl.... so it's unlikely he'd want to stay up THAT late anyway. Sounds like the clubs last about as long as adult activities anyway- so no worries there. I would NOT have a problem with them staying in the clubs that late- I have a hard time getting them to go to bed at a decent hour (or what others might consider late LOL- atleast for children "late") when we are on vacation anywhere, especially WDW. So that's cool... wouldn't have to spend time trying to get them to sleep before going to do something. LOL

2.) um... thanks for making me even more scared about this. LOL So basically don't get off the ship unless you're doing planned excursions if you want to be assured of not missing the ship leaving. Got it. LOL (can you imagine if your children were in the labs ON the ship and YOU didn't make it back in time? Nightmare extraordinare is what that is... I don't even want to think about it. LOL)
BUT OKAY... so here's another question- if you do this to do an excursion off ship on your own (or you/DH)... how do they reach you if you are needed? Everything I read says the pagers work on Castaway Cay but I assume they won't work at other ports... give them your cellphone number or what? Um, wondering if my cellphone would even work there.... LOL

3.) Am I right in that you are all saying it IS feasible to oh say for example spend a little time together at the beach or doing something together and then going back to the ship for lunch and they go to the clubs while DH & I do a short excursion like snorkeling or something? If so, cool beans. DH wants to do stuff like that and I really would prefer he didn't have to go do that by himself while I stayed back with the kiddos. I have a feeling we're going to have a hard time getting them to LEAVE the ship to do anything with us.... but we might have to force the issue so they experience something other than just the kids clubs on the ship. LOL

Thanks everyone!

 

[Cruisin]

As for going off of the ship and leaving the kids in the clubs you are going to get two distinct schools of thought on that.

A lot of people don't think you should do that. For just the reasons that you have mentioned. I'm not sure that they can reach you if you are off the ship and on an excursion, if you are needed by your children.

It is a decision you have to make and one that you have to be comfortable with.

I'm not sure I could do it, but I don't have little ones anymore so I don't really know how I would handle it.

Try to relax, you are going to have a great vacation, don't stress yourself out so much before you leave.

Plan to the best of your ability and then just go with the flow

 

[MrsPete]

I'll only comment about the on/off the ship issue -- the others have been covered.

We were a little paranoid about the "make it back to the boat" thing too before our first cruise -- in retrospect, it was an unnecessary fear.

For our first trip we decided to stick to Disney's excursions. This seemed like a SAFE choice because there'd be someone to guide us, and we knew that if we were delayed Disney would be aware of it and they'd wait. It was probably the right thing to do for our first cruise; however, it was also more expensive, and we didn't really enjoy being part of such a big crowd.

Next time we'll probably skip the excursions and strike our on our own. The Personal Navigator (which your steward leaves on your bed in the PM) will tell you when the ship will dock and leave port. For example, looking back at ours from Nassau, it says "All ashore 9:45" and "All aboard 10:30."

When we leave the ship, we'll be sure to take along a watch for each person in the group, plenty of cash for taxis, and guest services' phone number. I don't think Disney would leave you if you called and let them know that you'd had an emergency -- still, I wouldn't cut it too close! I'd aim to be back with at least an hour to spare.

Here's how you leave the ship: They announce that people may leave from Deck 1 forward. All adults must show a key to the world card and a picture ID (even for Castaway Cay). They run your card through a scanner so that the ship's computer "knows" that you are off the ship. When you return, they'll run your card through again. They'll also x-ray all your bags as you return.

We did have one small problem re-boarding the ship: we didn't anticipate waiting in line to reboard, but we had to do so both in Nassau and on Castaway Cay. In Nassau we returned mid-afternoon, along with the bulk of the Disney excursion crowd. At Castaway Cay we waited until almost 5:00, and the lines were long. Of course, Disney's never going to say, "It's sailing time. Too bad for those people at the back of the line -- close the door."

 

[Cruisin]

MrsPete:

If Disney is going to close the doors on a line up waiting to get back on the ship, I will make sure that I am at the back of the line at Castaway Cay

 

[KathyTX]

I would never even consider leaving the ship and leaving my kids aboard.

Like others have said, DCL has no way to contact you if your kids should need you, and there is the very real (though remote) possibility that you would fail to return to the ship in time for departure. It DOES happen.

 

[BibbidyBobbidyBoo]

Hi and thanks again for your posts! Especially explaining how you get off/on and always know the times to come back & how they KNOW if you aren't back (with the card scanning and all that). I appreciate it!

I also would have to consider it very carefully before leaving the ship without the kids- but I find it hard to believe that no one has ever done that before. Especially with most of the excursions having age minimums kinda high (a few 6yrs old, more 8yrs and up- some 12 and up). That's why I asked if the pagers worked away from the ship...
I probably wouldn't even consider it BUT FOR the fact that it would only be one short excursion to do something they couldn't do (like snorkeling) and I'd have an older child still on the ship. Would they allow you to have them page your 12yr old child say if something happened during the couple hours you were off ship? Because unless an emergency happened (which is doubtful in the labs I would assume... other than illness ofcourse) she most likely could handle whatever arose. Say the youngest had an accident- she could take her to the room to change her, stuff like that.
Probably cell phones and/or your own personal pagers wouldn't work in places like that- right? (meaning if the oldest child needed to reach us)

Just trying to think it through.... otherwise we can't do any type of excursion like that at all. There are very few that I see that a 4yr old could go and participate in- especially the snorkeling and/or scuba diving my DH wants to do. (and my older two wouldn't even if they met the age requirement LOL) So we'll just be staying on the ship I guess- seeing as we're not really all that thrilled with spending a lot of time on a beach nor interested in shopping. LOL

 

[jilljill]

DH and I will get off the ship in each port and usually leave DD in the club or the lab. When you drop off a child they will ask you if you are leaving the ship and how long you will be gone. We are usually only gone around 2 hours and check back in with the staff to let them know we are back onboard. We then spend the afternoon, as a family, by the pool since it is not crowded on port days.
Again it is up to each family how they handle this situation, but this is how we handle it. We do not go on excursions either, just walk around town.

 

[KathyTX]

I'm sure some folks do leave their kids on board and go off and do on shore excursions... I just personally don't see that as something I would ever consider doing.

If there are "adults only" excursions that you feel you must do, have you considered you and DH switching off, a la the baby swap rides? You stay on board with the kids and let DH take his excursion, then the other way around?

Or have you considered taking a sitter along?

Only you can decide how independent and mature your kids are, and how important doing those grownup-only off ship activities are to you.

And I don't remember if I've seen it on this thread, but the kids' club pagers do not work off the ship.

 

[BibbidyBobbidyBoo]

No, I wouldn't consider doing the excursions seperately. We HATE child swap.... hence the reason DH said no more WDW until the kids are all old enough to ride all the rides... which is why I talked him into Disney cruise instead. LOL
But we'll figure something out... maybe just do the snorkeling on castaway cay because then the kids can be at scuttles cove (sp?) and I think they did say the pagers DO work on castaway cay- right?

If I had a sitter to be able to take along- I wouldn't be so excited about this cruise where we could have some time alone. LOL We don't have a babysitter. (And sister and/or friends all have 3+ children of their own they'd have to leave to come with us... although I'm sure they'd love to come, they wouldn't. LOL)

Ps. I wasn't just talking "adults only"- looking at the excursions at all ports of call for Western 7 day.... the majority are 6+, 8+ or 12+. That's not necessarily adults only- but it leaves out younger children. There is, however, the option of snorkeling at castaway cay with the child's program on the beach- so that's an option for us.

Thanks jilljill- that's a great idea about the pool on the ship on port of call days.... I imagine they aren't near as crowded then!

 

[HooKooDooKu]

Now if you are just off on your own, then make sure you have lots of film in your camera cause you will get lovely pictures of the ship pulling away from the dock (a cruise director said this on one of our cruises )

No joke, the ship will leave you behind (after a reasonable grace period as others have said).

On our first 7-day Disney Cruise (the first year they offered it), we noticed that as we were leaving St. Thomas, the ship was about 1/4 mile from shore when they cut the engines and started to coast. A few moments latter, a pilot boat pulled up along side the ship where one of the hatches used to disembark via tenders had been openned. A crew member jumped down on the pilot boat with a pair of life vests for a couple on the pilot boat. The crew then helped the couple litterally climb on board while the two ships were still in motion.

 

[abitjaded]

There was a post last year about the ship returning to St Thomas dock. Evidently the kids were in the club and the parents missed the sailing.

Consider some other options, not knowing how little your littlest ones are.

There are nice beaches where you could play and snorkel. My DH and I have stayed at a place in Hawaii where one of us stays on the beach and the other snorkels. The pool is in sight of the reef, kids play and one parent snorkels while other parent eagle eyes kids and spouse. You might consider checking one of the "beach" days at shoretrips.com. Many hotels will take daytrippers.

Gosh, I hate to think about you not getting off the ship. Your kids might surprise you with the snorkeling. We are experienced divers and snorkelers, but hated the snorkeling at Typhoon Lagoon, too cold, too rushed, no time to become comfortable in the gear and water. A good choice, if money allows, might be to hire a boat yourselves, which we have done. You can find good folks who will take all ages, then those that want to snorkel can and the rest get a nice ride. Larger group boats are out there that carry large boards with masks in them, so the really little ones can be floated around by you and poke their faces into the mask and see into the water.

Get the kids (and you!), even the little ones, masks and snorkels and let them play in any available pool or bathtub with them, our kids became addicted at an early age (youngest then barely 6). CC is so non-intimidating that just about any kid who can breathe through a snorkel could have a blast.

Carla