First Time Cruisers - Need Help

[SimplyMagical]

We are considering our first Disney Cruise for February 2006 - President's week. We have been Disney Vacation Club members since 2000 and usually spend a week at the Villas at Wilderness Lodge each year in February or April. We just returned from our President's week 2005 trip a few weeks ago and decided that we wanted to try something different next year. We plan to rent our points out and pay cash for the cruise. I would appreciate help with the following:

Eastern vs. Western?
Should we try 3 or 4 night since it is our first cruise or go directly to 7 night?
We were getting pricing for a catergory 9 - good thing or bad thing?
We plan to select the later dinner seating, pro and cons please.

And any other information you could give us would be very much appreciated.
We would like to book this cruise very soon to lock in at the best rates.

 

[depomas]

Having done both cruises, I would always choose Eastern.... THis is due to the ports, and having the extra sea day. Western was o.k. for us....just O.k.

A lot of people think that trying a 3 or 4 day is a good idea to test your sea legs, and overall enjoyment. For us, when we figured in our airfare, it was not worth it, and still isn't to cruise for anything less than 7 nights...

We have stayed in Cat.9 on deck2... Just search around on top for the room reports, there are a few loud ones there...

We MUCH prefer later seating.. Our family of four is really tough to get ready and seated for 6pm, especially on days when at port. We do not enjoy rushing off the islands, etc...etc.. I mean, we are on vacation.....

So, these are MY opinions....Good Luck..

 

[banderson]

Tip # 1: Cruise later than February/March. Just back from the Feb. 26 Magic and I will never, ever go south that early again. If Lady Luck is with you, you might get great weather each and every day, but if she's busy elsewhere you just might find yourself reading on deck dressed in long pants, jacket and covered in a few towels like I did three days out of seven! And I'm from Canada, land of the Great White North!

Just my 2 cents...there is a reason why DCL charges more for cruises in April and later...it's the surcharge for "heat from the sun".

 

[MKPcm]

If you are looking to find out what cruising is all about skip the 3 day cruise. Many people like the days at sea better than the port days and a 3 day cruise doesn't have a day at sea. As for a 4 or 7 day cruise, my preference is for a 7 day day cruise as it takes me a few days to relax and get orientated to the ship.

Now choosing between Eastern and Western cruise is a personal choice. I tend to think of the Western cruise as more active with it's additional port and water sport intensive stops of Cozumel and Grand Cayman. The Eastern cruise has some awesome beaches and shoppiing. I have been on both iteneraries sevaral times and always came back from an Eastern Caribbean more relaxed.

As for early or late seating, it depends on who is traveling and early dining goes quickly on DCL. On DCL, if you have early dining, you will see your Disney themed show after dinner (8:30 pm). If you have late dining, your show will be at 6:30pm. Many kids will remember the show more than the dinner and many kids don't like to sit through a long dinner.

If you take second seating, you can always take you kids to dinner before the show on the upper deck (deck 9) where they have family friendly food like chicken fingers, hamburgers and pizza. Then take the kids to the show. After you can drop them off at the kids program and adults can go eat in the dining room. Younger kids can take a nap in the kids program.

If the kids join you for dinner, they may have plenty to talk about after seeing the show.

Of course you may want to eat together and early seating is the easiest to do this with. Kids may not stay awake for the show and they miss out on some of the activiites in the kids program