From 12 night in 2020 to 8 night in 2022 - April 24, 2022 Update

[Ladybugx87]

Welcome to my second pre-trip report for DCL - we are heading on the 12-night Italy and Greece cruise next summer! Update: This pre-trip report was originally for 2020 12-night and now is for 2022 8-night on 6/10/22. Jump to post #34 for the 2022 cruise.

First a bit about us:

This is cruise #6 for me (the planner!), my husband, and our oldest daughter S, who will be 10 by the time we cruise and cruise #5 for our younger daughter C, who will be almost 6 when we cruise. Joining us are my parents - this will be their second DCL cruise and will be 76 and 72 - they are currently healthy and active and we want to travel with them as we can. Cruise group will likely only be my family of 4 (the girls will be 12 and almost 8 for the new cruise).

The photo below is from our other DCL cruise together in 2015 to Alaska.


Our other Disney experiences include:
2013: Visit to Disney Paris and our first-ever Disney Cruise (7 night Med)
2014: Visit to Disney Paris
2015: DCL Alaska
2016: Aulani
2017: WDW for Princess weekend & DCL Baltic
2018: DCL Western Carribbean (Fantasy)
2019: DCL 11 night Norway + Iceland (photo below)
2021: Aulani

 

[Ladybugx87]

Now a bit about our plans so far:

We live in Ohio and will be flying directly to Paris for a few days ahead of the cruise.

June 27: Direct overnight flight to Paris

June 28: arrive and force ourselves to stay awake for the day - I have a few things I'd like to do including Pompidou Centre, Jardin du Luxembourg, and walk the Champs with the girls (S has been to Paris many times, C has not).

June 29: C wants to go to the top of the Eiffel Tower so the plan is to pre-buy tickets for this day.

June 30: Travel to Rome and meet up with my parents, hotel booked for Civiatecchia

July 1: Embarkation Day!!!

July 2: Messina - planning to do a DCL excursion, waiting for the full list to be released

July 3: Day at Sea

July 4: Santorini - Private tour booked

July 5: Athens - Private tour booked

July 6: Mykonos - planning to do a DCL excursion

July 7: Day at Sea - celebrate my dad's 77th birthday a few weeks early (7/24 is the real date)

July 8: Naples - we likely will just enjoy a pizza and a quiet ship today - we are fortunate to have spent time in the Amalfi Coast and Pompeii before and think we might need a break this day!

July 9: Oblia- planning to do a DCL excursion

July 10: Livorno - Private tour to Cinque Terre booked- this is one of my favorite places in the world and I want to share with my parents and daughters (DH and I were there before kiddos)

July 11: Cannes - planning to do a DCL excursion

July 12: Day at Sea

July 13: Disembark and say bye to my parents - they will fly home, we will do a tour of Barcelona and fly to Paris in the evening for our flight home the next day.

 

[Ladybugx87]

and one more post to get us started -

We are waiting on our cabin assignments - we booked this one last year while on the Iceland/Norway cruise rather than on opening day and were met with a mostly full ship. We have a verandah room and parents will have an inside stateroom. They will be spending plenty of time with us on our verandah too!

DH and I are both big runners - he has qualified for the Boston and Berlin marathons and I just love to run so we will be searching for running routes when time in port allows and spending time on Deck 4/the treadmills when it doesn't. I already have some routes for Paris, Civiatecchia, and Naples ready to go.

We are planning to do the FE exchange and the treats exchange + both daughters already have penpals that will be on the cruise with us.

DH and I will likely go to Palo one evening - not sure which one yet, trying to wait to see the menu rotation to decide which one I want to try for. My parents didnt want to join in Alaska (they wanted to spend the time with the girls!) but may join now since the girls are older and love the kids club.

We booked through Costco and have been making payments here and there - PIF date is in February to Costco.

Thanks for joining in, I will be back as it gets closer!

 

[BadPinkTink]

waves hi, Im on The Magic in September 2020, so I will be following all the itineraries once the ship gets to Europe. Looking forward to see your planning as I'm in the middle of my planning.

 

[Dizney73]

Sounds great! We loved our Mediterranean cruise and I can't wait to see all your plans in action! We are doing DCL to Alaska this year. Do you have a trip report to your Alaska cruise?

 

[Ladybugx87]

Sounds great! We loved our Mediterranean cruise and I can't wait to see all your plans in action! We are doing DCL to Alaska this year. Do you have a trip report to your Alaska cruise?

I didn't do a Disboards trip report but do have one on our family blog that you can find here: https://jmsadventure.blogspot.com/2015/06/

Alaska was so beautiful - I definitely recommend Palo one evening for dinner as the views were so nice as you sailed through the wilderness and also to enjoy the different Pixar activities (if you haven't been on Wonder for another cruise that does this).

Did your Med cruise go to Sicily or Sardinia? If so, would love to know what you did there (or point me to your trip report)

 

[Dizney73]

Thanks for the link! We definitely want to do Palo. I hate leaving the kids for diner so it may be brunch but who knows. As Platinum members we get a Palo dinner for "free".
Our Mediterranean cruise didn't go to either! There just doesn't ever seem to be enough time to do it all! We flew into Venice and spent two nights in an astronomically priced hotel just off of St. Mark's Square... so worth it though! Then took the train to Rome for a few nights before we boarded. You are doing Greece too... I'm so jealous!

 

[Azrael360]

Looking forward to see your planning!
Greece is definately worth it! I spent a lot of time on Crete and adore it. Santorini is gorgeous (if overrun with tourists) and worth it. Rhodos was much more relaxed.
One place I do recommend on mainland Greece is Meteora. Look it up online and see for yourself! Not only was it incredible scenery, the town was quiet and there are several decent budget places to stay. You can also rent car in Greece. The roads are perfect (90% of your trip will be on a brand new closed highway with a speed limit of 140 km/h).

 

[o&smom]

Welcome to my second pre-trip report for DCL - we are heading on the 12-night Italy and Greece cruise next summer!

First a bit about us:

This is cruise #6 for me (the planner!), my husband, and our oldest daughter S, who will be 10 by the time we cruise and cruise #5 for our younger daughter C, who will be almost 6 when we cruise. Joining us are my parents - this will be their second DCL cruise and will be 76 and 72 - they are currently healthy and active and we want to travel with them as we can.

The photo below is from our other DCL cruise together in 2015 to Alaska.
View attachment 461182

Our other Disney experiences include:
2013: Visit to Disney Paris and our first-ever Disney Cruise (7 night Med)
2014: Visit to Disney Paris
2015: DCL Alaska
2016: Aulani
2017: WDW for Princess weekend & DCL Baltic
2018: DCL Western Carribbean (Fantasy)
2019: DCL 11 night Norway + Iceland (photo below)

View attachment 461183

Ooh, I can still smell those mud pots. They are forever etched in my memory.

 

[Ladybugx87]

Ooh, I can still smell those mud pots. They are forever etched in my memory.

Haha. My girls talk about the smell any time we look at pictures from the day. My older daughter even included the smell in her write up about summer break at school.

 

[o&smom]

Haha. My girls talk about the smell any time we look at pictures from the day. My older daughter even included the smell in her write up about summer break at school.

Same here, my kids talk about it as the most memorable part of Iceland! The pictures are so beautiful, but you cannot look at them without remembering that smell. Just when you thought you had adjusted to it, it would hit you again.

 

[Ladybugx87]

A few exciting planning updates - all of the flights to and from Europe are booked - as I mentioned we are heading in and out of Paris while my parents are coming just for the cruise - I found them good flights with not so bad layovers and so they are now booked as well.

And DCL has started adding the Port Adventures for the new ports so it's helped my planning - here is a detailed update of our excursion planned - any thoughts or advice??

Messina: DCL MSN02 - Taormina and Greek Theater: I couldn't find a private tour that I liked here and this excursion looks good for us - it's 5-5.5 hours long and should have us back for dinner on the ship (we have main dining) - I will confirm that once I can book excursions and see the time for it.

Santorini: Private 6 hour tour: I booked a private tour through Kallisti that will let us see everything we want at our pace. A question for those that have been there - any recommendations on what we should do instead of the winery? They told us we can customize that part and I'd love to find somewhere where the girls can play a bit.

Athens: Private 8 hour tour: I have booked private tour through Private Greece Tours and it includes both Athens (Acropolis) and Cape Sounion, Poseidon. Now a question - my family doesn't love super long tours - the tour company offers 4 hour private options as well where you choose either Athens or Cape Sounion - what would you recommend? Should we keep the longer one? My mom definitely wants to keep the longer one, no one else has voiced a strong opinion yet.

Mykonos: DCL MY26 - This is the newest choice as I was waiting for DCL to release their offerings. It's 4.5-5 hours and hits the things we wanted to.

Naples: Current plan is no excursion and to just head out for runs and pizza since we have been to the different highlights nearby. One potential other option is to take a car out to my father's grandparent's hometown - I cannot recall the name of it right now but know there was a small castle and running park there too. If we end up doing that, any private drivers you recommend here?

Olbia: DCL O05 - Costa Smeralda with train - 4.5 -5 hours - this DCL option seemed totally perfect for us.

Livorno: Private Tour to Cinque Terre with Bella Italia - today is our long day and the tour is 7:30-5pm - My husband and I love Cinque Terre and really want to share it with my parents and our daughters.

Cannes - DCL CN05- Scenic Coastal Drive + San Raphael - 4.5-5 hours


Apologies for all bold at the end, the formatting button stopped working!!

 

[tidefan]

Following... We are on the same cruise and posted some of our current plans in the meet thread.

Quick question, was your 2015 Alaska Cruise the DVC Member Cruise? We did that one and we all agree that it was the best cruise that we've ever taken...

 

[Ladybugx87]

Following... We are on the same cruise and posted some of our current plans in the meet thread.

Quick question, was your 2015 Alaska Cruise the DVC Member Cruise? We did that one and we all agree that it was the best cruise that we've ever taken...

it wasn’t the DVC cruise but that sounds fun!

 

[Ladybugx87]

We’ve made one decision already - we changed our Athens private tour to 8 hours in Athens. We won’t head to Cape.

 

[Dizney73]

We used Rome Private Guides when we were in Rome and Naples. I'm not sure if they offer just a driver to get around but might be worth a look. We went to Pompeii and then to Amalfi Coast. We went to a beautiful restaurant where our children made their own pizzas with the chef for lunch. They really catered to our family.

 

[tidefan]

Anyone used The Roman Guy for tours in Rome?

Also, comments on using DCL transportation from the Cavalieri vs. RomeCabs?

 

[PirateFrank]

Following....we're going on this cruise as well. Looking forward to your trip report!!!!

 

[Ladybugx87]

Popping for a quick update:

1) We changed our Athens private tour to all day in Athens to save the travel time heading to Cape.

2) I bought a big bulk of gift cards from BJ's online ($9900 gift cards for $9100) and now have our bookings (2 bookings -one for us, one for my parents) almost PIF. Costco PIF date is approaching so we will be paid in full soon!

3) I picked up some pins and other goodies for FE exchange - we don't yet have groups made so hopefully everything works for our group - if not, I have some things to pixie dust!

4) I booked my parents DCL transfer upon disembarkation to the airport. And in case I didnt mention this before, we also requested our favorite server on the Magic.

Beyond getting to PIF, here's what's on my to-do list before Gold Activity booking in mid-March:
- Final payment on trip insurance
- booking intra-Europe flights for my family of 4 (CDG to FCO pre-cruise and BCN to CDG post-cruise)
- booking all of the airport transfers - I will definitely book FCO to San Giorgio hotel for all of us. I might go ahead and book the Paris pre-cruise transfers or might wait.

 

[Ladybugx87]

Another update- my husband took the girls to gymnastics and tumble tonight so I had some free time!

Two quick things:
1) I was researching tours by locals the other day and found a great option for Cannes that I like better than the DCL option I had chosen so I booked that. Now our only DCL excursion ports are Messina, Olbia, and Mykonos.

2) I booked our Intra-Europe flights on AirFrance - we fly from Paris to Rome mid-day the day before embarkation and from Barcelona to Paris the evening after we disembark.