Frozen Fireworks: Alaska on the Wonder July 2, 2012

[RGirl]

Hello to all the future cruisemates!!

We were on the Med 5/28-6/8 on the Magic, and it was AMAZING. Interestingly, very shy DD4 was *thrilled* to be in the Oceaneers Club and went there at every.single.opportunity -- including staying aboard the ship a couple of times while DH, DD 6 months, and I went ashore for excursions. DD will be 5.25 on this cruise to Alaska, and she will definitely be all about the kids club again (hopefully nothing drastic happens to change that!!). We're going to the Mexican Riviera right after Christmas on the Wonder also, and she already talks almost daily about going back to the club.

We're doing the late seating for dinner even with two little ones -- in the Med, we successfully shifted their schedules to stay up until 11pm each night and sleep really late each morning. It gave us so much more flexibility. We're hoping to do the same for both the MR and Alaska.

Welcome!!!!! My DD will be 5 and 1/2 and is excited for the concept of the Club. Would love to hear more about what your DD loved about the Club, so I can tell my DD more about it.

 

[Love to Cruise DCL]

We are so excited to go to Alaska!
This will be our 7th Disney cruise and the first time not to someplace warm LOL!

We will be a family of 4:
DD Mike
DM Steph (that's me)
DS Julian (10 at sail time)
and DS's friend Joey (10 at sail time)

DEFINITELY WANT TO DO FISH EXTENDER...we had a blast doing it on the Med this summer. The kids had a ball helping me and we cherish some of the amazing things we got.

I love questions if anyone has any and if anyone knows what to pack for Alaska in July I would be eternally grateful!

Steph

 

[Doingitagain]

We went in July this summer. Difficult to pack. It was warm in the sun and we could wear shorts, but cool when on the water. My suggestion is to reduce the dress clothes and bring clothes that can be layered, like sweatshirts and fleece jackets. You won't need winter coats, but I liked my light gloves and hood.

 

[Cagirl767]

Welcome Steph! DH has gazillions of relatives all over the Allentown/Lehigh Valley area, Whitehall, Catty, Fullerton, etc. They've been there since the mid 1800's.

Glad you'll be joining in on the FE. I have a 7.5 year old DS going and my DD will be 5.

We're also bringing layering types of clothing and rain gear, too.

Welcome!

 

[OregonMom]

Hi, all! We're signed up for the cruise as well, and really looking forward to it. It will be our first Disney cruise, and our first cruise ever! Couldn't get early seating, which was disappointing, since we are very much early to bed and early to rise folks.

I'm particularly interested in anyone who has experienced the new tween club activities with their kids. My daughter will just be turning 11 for this cruise. We'll be:

Me OregonMom
DH Mike
DD 11 yrs

Can't wait!

 

[Love to Cruise DCL]

Hi, all! We're signed up for the cruise as well, and really looking forward to it. It will be our first Disney cruise, and our first cruise ever! Couldn't get early seating, which was disappointing, since we are very much early to bed and early to rise folks.

I'm particularly interested in anyone who has experienced the new tween club activities with their kids. My daughter will just be turning 11 for this cruise. We'll be:

Me OregonMom
DH Mike
DD 11 yrs

Can't wait!

When you get on board go directly to Rockin Bar D or Guest Services and if the ship is not too full they may be able to move you to early seating. We were able to do that on our Northern European Capitals cruise in 2010.
Steph

 

[dvcmike]

Hi All!

Just wanted to poke my head in and say we're on board for the chilly cruise also! We booked right after this years DVC member cruise on the Dream! Man that ship is big!!! This time so far it will be
DD dvcmike (me)
DW Alice
DD Michelle

With any luck we'll also have some other family members join us also. Can't wait,
hurry up July!!!


See ya'll soon

Mike

 

[Travelbee]

Dropping in to say hello! We booked this cruise back in April 2011 and were on the fence for a long time because of the short port times. We bought our airfares last week so there's no turning back!

My sister and family are also booked on this trip but work uncertainty may prompt them to cancel. So we are looking for playmates for our 9 yo daughter! Anyone with DD that age on this cruise and interested in having the kids email each other pre-cruise so they have "friends" ready and waiting? We've done this several times and always work out great.

BTW - this is the only cruise meet I've been on that only has 4 pages with the cruise only six months away! Hopefully it will become more active once everyone starts planning!

 

[lucky1]

Dropping in to say hello! We booked this cruise back in April 2011 and were on the fence for a long time because of the short port times. We bought our airfares last week so there's no turning back!

My sister and family are also booked on this trip but work uncertainty may prompt them to cancel. So we are looking for playmates for our 9 yo daughter! Anyone with DD that age on this cruise and interested in having the kids email each other pre-cruise so they have "friends" ready and waiting? We've done this several times and always work out great.

BTW - this is the only cruise meet I've been on that only has 4 pages with the cruise only six months away! Hopefully it will become more active once everyone starts planning!

Hi Connie - We will be on the cruise as well and our DD is 10 yo. I agree with you that it is a poorly attended cruise meet, but our MR cruise in NOV had very little activity as well, but by the time we sailed we probably had a FE list of about 11 cabins and about 10 others that did not participate. Not sure if people are just not committing early to vacations now.

I also noticed that the port times are increasing, so not as short as they were when they first announced 2012, but still not as long as last year.


Laura

 

[Travelbee]

Hi Connie - We will be on the cruise as well and our DD is 10 yo. I agree with you that it is a poorly attended cruise meet, but our MR cruise in NOV had very little activity as well, but by the time we sailed we probably had a FE list of about 11 cabins and about 10 others that did not participate. Not sure if people are just not committing early to vacations now.

I also noticed that the port times are increasing, so not as short as they were when they first announced 2012, but still not as long as last year.


Laura

Laura,

Do you think your DD would be interested in emailing my DD prior to the cruise? We can maybe start that a month or two out...

BTW - were you scheduled to do the 10-day MR back in April? I'm pretty sure I recognize your Disname from the roll call.

 

[lucky1]

Laura,

Do you think your DD would be interested in emailing my DD prior to the cruise? We can maybe start that a month or two out...

BTW - were you scheduled to do the 10-day MR back in April? I'm pretty sure I recognize your Disname from the roll call.

Hi Connie,

We can arrange that.. I think she would enjoy that. Our last Cruise in Nov, she really didn't connect with anyone in the club. We sat at a table with just the 4 of us and in the past she had connected with our table mates and made friends with them. We requested a table with others for this coming cruise. Figured it would be good for us as well to share adventures of Alaska with our tablemates.

Yes we were initially on the 10 night MR, but changed it after we found it wasn't just a good time to go for us and schedule to go in Nov and bring along my MIL (who will be on this cruise as well).

 

[Travelbee]

Laura,

I know Allison would love to have a friend onboard before she even gets on the ship. Our experience is that she could care less about the kids club and the activities unless she has a friend going to the club with her. I'll send you a PM maybe a month or so before the cruise and have the girls start writing to each other either through Disboard messages or email.

As for dining, DCL paired us with a family who didn't speak any English on our first cruise and on our second, a family with a severely autistic child who missed half of the meals in the dining rotation. We did have great table mates from the Dismeet another time and then we traveled with friends after that. So good luck!

Sorry we missed you on the 10-night MR. I was the one who created the website for that cruise. We ended up with almost 50 families and divided the FE lists into two and still had 20+ on each list! It was a really fun group of people.

 

[Cagirl767]

Hello DVCMike - welcome aboard!

Welcome to you too Travelbee. Hello Westminster! I'm originally from Orange County. We're trying to move back there, but without much luck so far.
(My dd is only 5, btw)

Hopefully something exciting will happen here on our thread soon.

 

[Mackie Mouse]

Well, all...it looks like we're delaying our trip to the great white north by a year. We moved our cruise this week to 2013 this week to take advantage of the itineraries from Vancouver. Looking forward to hearing from all of you how this cruise goes, though! Happy sailing!

 

[calihannah]

We're starting to research excursions etc. Anyone find any resources online that they particularly like?

 

[Travelbee]

We're starting to research excursions etc. Anyone find any resources online that they particularly like?

Haven't done any of my own research but have browsed through some of the Disboard threads. Someone has gone through the trouble of summarizing the excursions in each port and comparing them to booking on your own. Our excursions may be slightly different because of the shorter port times but I think it's a good start!

http://www.disboards.com/showpost.php?p=39823570&postcount=195
http://www.disboards.com/showpost.php?p=39774325&postcount=187
http://www.disboards.com/showpost.php?p=39738570&postcount=180

 

[lucky1]

Hi Connie,

It would be great forh the girls to connect. Are you going to allow her to checkin and out of the clubs? we did this with our DD and she never abused it, but she was not comfortable because she never had a "friend" that she connected with. When we were at Palo's our phone never stopped buzzing. "I am Hungry" "well go get some pizza up on deck" "I am done eating my pizza, so I am going back to the room", "I am bored in the room, I am going to check out the club again" On and on. She likes her alone time, but really doesn't like to be alone when others are having fun.

Laura

 

[lucky1]

We're starting to research excursions etc. Anyone find any resources online that they particularly like?

Haven't really started yet, but need to get serious within a month. Really want to do kayaking near the glaciers and also some one posted a seaplane trip that looked interesting.

 

[Travelbee]

Laura,

We have yet to give DD check in/out priviledge at the club and probably won't for this cruise. She knows the ship pretty well but she may still get lost (or maybe it's just her parents being paranoid!) She's usually good for about an hour at the club before she buzzes us. We're hoping it would be much longer (at least long enough for a Palo brunch or dinner) with a friend. We have allowed her to stay in the room to watch a movie by herself and she knows how to use the wave phones to give out orders (ie I'm hungry, pick up cheese pizza for me on your way back).

Connie

 

[lucky1]

Connie - Giving her check in and out privilege was a hugh step for us. She is our baby, so we had a hard time letting her have this. Our our previous cruise our table mates let their 8 year olds check in and out and our daughter did not, so they would leave the Lab and DD had to call us. Our most recent trip, We set a lot of rules and she did follow them. No going into anyone's room. No one in our cabin. Can go to Lab, Club, Movies and Food places and always carry the phone.

Laura