mexico complaints

[jd99]

ugh! we are booked for our first dcl cruise next spring...we're looking at spending probably close to $7500 for this...much more than any other trip we've taken and it will mean that we won't be able to do wdw for a couple years (we typicallly go at least once per year). hearing things like this makes me doubt my decision to do this...i know nothing in life is guaranteed, but we don't exactly have the money to gamble on this. i sure hope to read some more positive comments in the next few months or we may just head back to wdw and save a bundle of cash!

Please read other trip reports. I've read some great reports on this itinerary from this summer from folks. The OP even says that she heard from many first timers what a great time they had. IMHO the cruise is a combination of what you expect and what you put into it - and not sweating the details. Sure many of the CMs do not have English as their first language...but so what? We have had incredible service from folks who we had to take some time to comprehend and terrible service from those whose native tongue is English. That's a detail I wouldn't sweat. Take a look at the trip report by Justmestace and the live one filed from someone on this same cruise. I have a cruisemate from our last sailing who was on the June 15th MR cruise. She loved it - she didn't like the ports as much as the Caribbean but said the ship was all she remembered and more. I've read a trip report from someone who said they found the CMS MORE helpful and friendly than on past sailings. So again...I wouldn't sweat it if one person reports what she perceives to be a bad experience.

 

[jd99]

We were on TA crossing and our 2 twins were in nursery but because of lack of kids in nursery they were in Kids club with the nursery staff, they couldn't wait to be in the club with sister and then the club freaked all my kids out this time.

ALS0: Just heard that the June 15th MR all grad kids got The morterboard ears On our cruise they were not. SO angry. What is going on.

Sorry not trying to flame here but why are you SO angry about the mortarboard. To me this is such a minor detail. In fact, we have 3 of them. Tucked in a closet. Never have seen the light of day since returning from those cruises. I dunno. It just wouldn't be that big of a deal to me. But maybe that's just me.

 

[lbgraves]

Please read other trip reports. I've read some great reports on this itinerary from this summer from folks. The OP even says that she heard from many first timers what a great time they had. IMHO the cruise is a combination of what you expect and what you put into it - and not sweating the details. Sure many of the CMs do not have English as their first language...but so what? We have had incredible service from folks who we had to take some time to comprehend and terrible service from those whose native tongue is English. That's a detail I wouldn't sweat. Take a look at the trip report by Justmestace and the live one filed from someone on this same cruise. I have a cruisemate from our last sailing who was on the June 15th MR cruise. She loved it - she didn't like the ports as much as the Caribbean but said the ship was all she remembered and more. I've read a trip report from someone who said they found the CMS MORE helpful and friendly than on past sailings. So again...I wouldn't sweat it if one person reports what she perceives to be a bad experience.

ITA. Being prepared for what could happen will help you alot. I know that we always have been at early dinner for 2 hours. The kids have been entertained by sitting with their friends and the servers treating them like royalty. Last cruise we would sit at 6 and after ordering and a course or two I would excuse DD and myself to go to where a character was going to be and help her change into the appropriate princess dress for her picture, then return to dinner. I decided that the cruise was for the kids too and if we missed 10 minutes of dinner it wasn't a big deal. The lines were almost nonexistant at those 7:15 times because most of the ship was at dinner or at the show. It also helped to break dinner up for DD a bit.

 

[lmele]

I'm really sorry you didn't enjoy your trip. We were on the same cruise (our second Disney cruise), and I will post later tonight. We had a generally very good time. However, my kids are teenagers., so we can't speak to the kids' programs.

We did feel our service was not as good as the 3-day Wonder in Bahamas last year. We felt a lot of the staff was new. However, they were all very nice, in our opinion. Our regular servers and our Palo server felt that it is difficult for them to have a day off in LA as they must drive a bit before they get somewhere to shop or play. Also, regardless of which itinerary or ship they are working, they are on the ship for months wihtout a significant break. So that's bound to catch up with Disney eventually. They all just seemed more frazzled, but trying hard.

There was definitely a difference in the West Coast crowd, which I will address in my separate post. For the record, we are from LA also.

 

[mostyn17]

Sorry for your experience, but I know where your coming from. We LOVE all things Disney but we feel like the cruise needs to be revamped and new daily activities need to be added. We are booked on the EB in Aug and it will be our 15th cruise with Disney...(also getting married on the Magic next year) and have noticed some cut backs and difference in some of the quality of things. For example...the Murder Mystery @ Sea....they just did the same one for the WBPC as they did for the Trans-Atlantic...and will be also doing it for the EB....same characters...same act. With the large amount of return cruisers for these special cruises....how hard is it to switch the plot?....I think they need to try a little harder with the daily entertainment. (Love the nightly shows though..never change them )

As for concierge...I have only had it once and it was a modified hurricane cruise so really that didn't count. BUT, for the cost of those suites, the concierge team should NEVER be hit or miss. If that is the case, they need more training. There should be a certain standard for that job..period.

With that being said...please no flames... We really do love to cruise with Disney. I feel bad for the new cruisers that have a horrible time and saved for years for a cruise.

 

[mardonna]

Hey guys, don't want to make it seem like Disney is the worst or something. I have had 3 fantastic cruises ( 1 of them probably being the best vacation I have ever had with kids) I was just trying to feel out what was going on with this specific cruise.

The Morterboard issue was a 2 fold problem:

1) the Mickey speech is pre taped and he turned aroun looked at kids and told them to move their tassles (but they didn't have any) thought it made Mickey, Disney and the kids look weird)
2) my 7 year old has 2 morterboards, my twins have had to sit thorugh 2 of these ceremonies and this was their turn to go on stage and get one but they didn't (do you see the problem now?)

I had convinced 4 other groups of people to go on cruise and they all had really bad expeirences so it kind of makes me feel like I ruined their vacation. Much of the stuff I recommnded either didn't happen or wasn't up to Disney standard.

I do know many first timers had a great time but ten again they had nothing tocompare too.

 

[crystannsmom]

It might be my first DCL cruise but we had a wonderful time. We took our 11 month old daughter and still found lots of things we could do. Everytime that we were at the pool there was a CM there. I sometimes think that not every cruise is going to be the same. I don't know if anyone knows this but the cm are signed to a contract for 6 months on and 12 weeks off (at least this is what a couple of the cm told me) and I believe that they can resign if they want. All the cm we encountered were great with our daughter and with us. If you have ever been on another cruise line I am sure you will definitely appreciate DCL. I have been on two other cruise lines and they definitely do not compare to DCL. DCL is so clean, better food, better staff, better entertainment. I thought that they had a good amount of characters. The best thing my daughter loved were the characters, especially fiesta pluto. He got down on the floor and crawled towards my daughter when she crawled to him. It was a great moment of my life to see her having a blast with all of the characters. As with the wait staff, we had the second seating and our wait staff was quick and efficient. Anyway, we had a great time. Sorry that some of you didn't think that your cruise was what you were used to maybe when they come out with the 2 new boats in 2010 or 12 maybe you will have better luck with the service you expect.

 

[IceSk8ersMom]

What I meant was on a Florida sailing people traveling from anywhere other then the east coast will always be gaining hours in the evening (ie 8:30 dinner on fla sailing would work well for family on west coast since that feels like 5:30, you have a 3 hour time chnage window) On the west coast people that have an 6:00 seating feel like it is already 9:00pm, so things going on ship after 9pm are after midnight for east coasters and may be hard for kids to stay awake.

It is unfortunate that you had an unpleasant vacation. We will be going on our 4th Disney cruise, and since we are also from SoCal, my family and I are looking forward to not adjusting to a three hour time change. So when I requested our dinner assignment and made various reservations, I was always cognizant of that. We've also stayed in cat. 10, 9, and 5 and have had fabulous service in all three. I guess it is all relative to your experiences. Just remember spending time with our families is the true gift of any vacation.

 

[TiaMaria]

Aren't there a couple of time changes on the Mexican itin? I believe that the ship is on Central time by the time it gets to Puerto Vallarta. We are looking forward to that because that will mean dinner will be right in sync with our home time!

 

[koalagurl]

ugh! we are booked for our first dcl cruise next spring...we're looking at spending probably close to $7500 for this...much more than any other trip we've taken and it will mean that we won't be able to do wdw for a couple years (we typicallly go at least once per year). hearing things like this makes me doubt my decision to do this...i know nothing in life is guaranteed, but we don't exactly have the money to gamble on this. i sure hope to read some more positive comments in the next few months or we may just head back to wdw and save a bundle of cash!

Don't worry too much, we just got back and had an amazing time. Even after reading the boards to death, I was hoping my expectations hadn't been brought up too much, but they were still far exceeded.

It is unfortunate that you had an unpleasant vacation. We will be going on our 4th Disney cruise, and since we are also from SoCal, my family and I are looking forward to not adjusting to a three hour time change. So when I requested our dinner assignment and made various reservations, I was always cognizant of that. We've also stayed in cat. 10, 9, and 5 and have had fabulous service in all three. I guess it is all relative to your experiences. Just remember spending time with our families is the true gift of any vacation.

I didn't realize it, but on this cruise there are time changes (a total of 2 hours). Made it great for my kids who are usually asleep by 7 and 8...they got to stay up "late" for the fireworks, etc.

 

[Tarabra]

I'm just wondering if maybe there might have been a lot of newer cm's onboard and alot of the more experienced servers were on break. We cruised the Wonder for the first time in May after doing 6 cruises on the Magic and it seemed to be just as great as our other cruises, except waaay too short. DD 3.5 loved the kids club and spent most evenings there. We actually had too much to do and didn't really get any down time w/ the cruise being only 4 days. DD didn't get a mortarboard, but couldn't really get an answer out of her as to why. The other kids had them, but we were running late. One of the cm's told us to go back to the kid's club to get her one, but she started getting a cold and didn't go back and then we forgot all about it.

It's funny because I didn't discover the disboards until cruise number 6. How in the world did I survive??? Anyhow with as many good pointers as I have picked up, the boards also made me more aware of the negative points too that I never may have noticed. Whenever I saw something out of place, I'd point it out and DH would make a typing motion and say, "You better post it!" I usually only see things in a positive light so as not to ruin my vacation. Hopefully you continue to cruise DCL.

 

[lvstitch]

ugh! we are booked for our first dcl cruise next spring...we're looking at spending probably close to $7500 for this...much more than any other trip we've taken and it will mean that we won't be able to do wdw for a couple years (we typicallly go at least once per year). hearing things like this makes me doubt my decision to do this...i know nothing in life is guaranteed, but we don't exactly have the money to gamble on this. i sure hope to read some more positive comments in the next few months or we may just head back to wdw and save a bundle of cash!

You will have an amazing time if you don't worry and not over plan. Because of these boards we get more info than most vacations. I think there are ups and downs to knowing so much. Sometimes I think people expectations are set way to high. I just got back from the June 15th cruise, yes there were some things that I was not crazy about (Kids in adult areas and the ports) but it still was an amazing vacation because we were on the Disney Magic.

 

[ohana8363]

We were on the August TA crossing and the westbound PC. Both were great cruises. We had a cat. 12 last August and a cat.11 this May. Had great service! We had one poor excursion in PV and Disney refunded our money.

what was the bad excursion in PV, I am hoping it isn't one we have scheduled!

 

[gullyEARS]

With all due respect to the poster, who is entitled to their opinion...it's simply the 10% rule.

No matter what experience, there will always be 10% that don't enjoy/or had a bad experience. This is true of every cruise, etc. Disney has such high ratings but not everyone is going to have the time of their lives.

We went on our first DCL trip last February as a four-day on the Wonder. From the moment we left Port Canvaeral we had gale-force winds and the boat was rocking big time. The weather was truly the worst it could have been - sans a hurricane.

We didn't let that spoil our time.

We got to Casaway Cay...guess what? Cold, overcast and windy. We still had a great time.

These reports are important but everyone should remember the trip is what you make it and not all of it is in your control...or DCL's control.

 

[jd99]

With all due respect to the poster, who is entitled to their opinion...it's simply the 10% rule.

No matter what experience, there will always be 10% that don't enjoy/or had a bad experience. This is true of every cruise, etc. Disney has such high ratings but not everyone is going to have the time of their lives.

We went on our first DCL trip last February as a four-day on the Wonder. From the moment we left Port Canvaeral we had gale-force winds and the boat was rocking big time. The weather was truly the worst it could have been - sans a hurricane.

We didn't let that spoil our time.

We got to Casaway Cay...guess what? Cold, overcast and windy. We still had a great time.

These reports are important but everyone should remember the trip is what you make it and not all of it is in your control...or DCL's control.

 

[dizzi]

Aren't there a couple of time changes on the Mexican itin? I believe that the ship is on Central time by the time it gets to Puerto Vallarta. We are looking forward to that because that will mean dinner will be right in sync with our home time!

YEs it seems there was a time change almost everynight!!!!!!!

 

[jajomo0118]

I had convinced 4 other groups of people to go on cruise and they all had really bad expeirences so it kind of makes me feel like I ruined their vacation. Much of the stuff I recommnded either didn't happen or wasn't up to Disney standard.

The very first thing out of my mouth when we invited SIL and family along for our second cruise was "we love it, but it might not be your thing so decide for yourself and make sure" I showed her DIS and she booked then researched more later and decided to cancel.

You shouldn't feel bad for other peoples bad vacation. They had the choice not to go. Don't be so hard on yourself...

 

[tksbaskets]

I was on the June 22 cruise and never went by the Mickey pool that I didn't see a CM.

Just another perspective.

 

[winegeek]

The very first thing out of my mouth when we invited SIL and family along for our second cruise was "we love it, but it might not be your thing so decide for yourself and make sure" I showed her DIS and she booked then researched more later and decided to cancel.

You shouldn't feel bad for other peoples bad vacation. They had the choice not to go. Don't be so hard on yourself...

I agree. Even if they didn't have a choice but to go, it's still not your fault.

We just returned from a 4 day double dip, it was a family celebration, all expenses paid, an offer we couldn't refuse even though we didn't want to go. It was our first cruise.

I just read somebody else's trip report, they loved it. We didn't. I thought the service was wonderful, people really try their best to do right by you. However, we weren't very interested in many of the activities. Our kids didn't care for the kids' clubs (6&8) and only stayed for a couple hours.

We weren't thrilled with the food, enjoyed Palo, but wasn't wowed.

I don't think it's Disney, it just doesn't fit our family footprint. We enjoy doing other types of things. Our kids have never been to any Disney park, haven't watched many Disney cartoons (other than the basics : Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, Little Mermaid, Mulan), so nobody was interested in the character meets.

I'm glad we experienced it however, and while I wouldn't recommend it to my friends, I don't think it was the fault of the people who took us or Disney.

It just wasn't our cup of tea if you will.

 

[jajomo0118]

I agree. Even if they didn't have a choice but to go, it's still not your fault.

We just returned from a 4 day double dip, it was a family celebration, all expenses paid, an offer we couldn't refuse even though we didn't want to go. It was our first cruise.

I just read somebody else's trip report, they loved it. We didn't. I thought the service was wonderful, people really try their best to do right by you. However, we weren't very interested in many of the activities. Our kids didn't care for the kids' clubs (6&8) and only stayed for a couple hours.

We weren't thrilled with the food, enjoyed Palo, but wasn't wowed.

I don't think it's Disney, it just doesn't fit our family footprint. We enjoy doing other types of things. Our kids have never been to any Disney park, haven't watched many Disney cartoons (other than the basics : Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, Little Mermaid, Mulan), so nobody was interested in the character meets.

I'm glad we experienced it however, and while I wouldn't recommend it to my friends, I don't think it was the fault of the people who took us or Disney.

It just wasn't our cup of tea if you will.

Well said...
I am willing to be adopted...if someone else is paying...LMAO..