Just booked our first Disney Cruise

[robtraci]

We just booked our first Disney cruise for Sept 2-9 on the Magic. I am so excited! We've done 2 RCCL and 1 Carnival. We will be traveling with our 4 kids (10, 8, 6, and 4) and Nana (mother-in-law).

 

Any tips for Disney that might be different than the other cruise lines? My one pet peeve on all cruise ships I've been on is the lack of clocks in the cabins. Does Disney have them in the cabins?

 

Robtraci

[Ginamarie]

We did have a clock on the Magic.. it's an adorable clock shaped like a ship's rudder I think. It's not digital though.

 

We love the Magic, and I can't wait to cruise on her again at some point. My recommendation for the cruiseline would be to make your Palo/shore excursion reservations online as soon as you can. You don't want to be running around trying to get reservations when you get onboard because it can be a mob scene. We enjoy the dinners in the dining room so much that we decided just to do the Palo brunch, which was fantastic.

[robtraci]

I figured we would do brunch at Palo's. The kids will most likely eat dinner with us. They really liked dining with us on RCCL because they got to try things they never would have before. My oldest loves any kind of seafood so this is her chance to go wild. We don't often (ever for that matter) order Lobster for our kids when we go out to eat. I'm not much of a breakfast person so brunch is great for me. Brunch for me is the meal between my pre-breakfast (room service) and lunch. I love cruise ships......so little time so much food!

 

Do they have the midnight buffets or chocolate buffets?

 

Any excursions you recommend? I will be taking the kids with us when we port for at least part of the time. We may not even book any excursion expect on Castaway, unless something really is just great. We've done they dolphin swim in Mexico so I don't think we would do it again.

 

Thanks so much for answering my questions. Every ship and cruise line is different.

 

Traci:D

[Ginamarie]

The brunch is really fantastic. They had seafood like King Crab legs, fresh made pizzas and omletts, dinner-ish entrees, pastries and fresh juices. The view from up there is spectacular as well.

 

Disney doesn't do a midnight buffet (I think because there are so many kids on board who wouldn't make it out that late). What they do is a Pirate's Night buffet around 10 pm up on the pool deck. It's all pirate themed and has lots of good food, ice sculptures, desserts, etc. I've heard that Disney has also resumed doing fireworks at sea during the pirate's night party. We didn't get to see them though, presumably because of bad weather.

 

Looks like you're doing the Eastern Caribbean cruise on Sept 2-9. We were just in St. Thomas and St. Martin about a month ago (albiet on another cruiseline). I would suggest taking a tour to St. John when you're docked at St. Thomas. We went to Trunk Bay Beach on St. John and absolutely loved it. They have a great snorkeling trail which my mom/husband/brother and sister went out on, and I stayed with the little kids, who were mesmerized by the soft sand and the waves. It's about a half hour ferry ride to get from St. Thomas to St. John, but well worth it, and you get gorgeous views from the ferry.

 

We haven't done any of the excursions at Castaway Cay. It's such a nice day at the beach together that you don't really need to book anything. I've heard that the glass-bottom boat isn't that great, because the water out there is pretty cloudy. We did do some snorkeling at Castaway Cay though, which is a long swim, but very cute. They have a few mickeys hidden down there with the fish. Also, the kids program did an archeological dig activity that my little sister really enjoyed.

 

I could go on and on about DCL! It's our favorite cruiseline, and I'm trying to convince DH to take a cruise next year, but with a baby coming in April he's wary about finances, so I'm just living vicariously through you other happy travellers.;)