~~~ May 16, 2009 ~~~ Western Magic ~~~

[Hudson5&Lennon3]

GREAT! WONDERFUL!! AWESOME!!! Welcome to our cruise!!!! Looks like we'll all be coming from the middle of the country (so far). Thanks a bunch for popping in and saying hello! If you want, I can add you to the first post that lists us all so far. YAY!

Looks like you'll be taking another Disney vacation pretty soon. How exciting!

[starlawyermom]

Hi - my husband and I will be travelling with our two daughters, 7 & 8 at the time. I have cruised before and LOVE it - this will be new for the kids and husband. Will also be travelling with father and mother in-law, brother-in-law, wife and three girls ages 3, 4 & 5. We can hardly wait and look forward to meeting other cruisers on board. Not sure if my kids can hold out until next May. Are the kids' programs really as good as they sound/look?
See you on Board, and I will keep tabs on this thread.

[starlawyermom]

Oh, by the way, my family is coming from Massachusetts. Hope to meet/connect with others from the area.

[Nik's Mom]

Yeah! Two more families to join us! Welcome to Modomo and starlawyermom!!!
Modomo, what part of Missouri are you from? You will have a blast on a WDW cruise!!!!

[Hudson5&Lennon3]

YAY!!!! I'm so happy our little group is finally growing! I knew you guys were out there somewhere!! Anyone else care to come out of hiding?!?!

Here's a BIG to all the new families. I've got a busy couple days ahead of me, but maybe on Sunday I'll have time to update the list on post 1.

[modomo]

Yes, our kids are pretty excited as well! It hasn't really "sunk in" yet, plus we have a couple of other trips planned between now and then.

I have cruised before (took DD when she was 2), but DH, DS, and youngest DD haven't ever been before. I've only been on Carnival(3x), so I am expecting great things from Disney!

Nik's Mom - We are from South-Central Missouri, about 5 hrs from KC and 3 hours from St. Louis, and about an 1 from Arkansas.

Have you guys planned out all of your tours and excursions yet? The only thing I know we want to do for sure is the Dolphin Encounter in Cozumel. I haven't decided which on yet. I have been to the one at Dolphin Discovery, but Dolpinaris 9(sp) looks really nice. I love the beach at Dophin Discovery, but the actual encounter was just so-so. Do you guys have any experiences with either of these?


Have a great day!

[Nik's Mom]

We have done some research. I also want to try one of the dolphin excursions, but don't know which one yet. I have been pretty busy organizing our relocation to Kansas, sothe cruise has been on the back burner of my brain.

[Hudson5&Lennon3]

I've added everyone who is new to the first post. I wasn't sure which of starlawyermom's family was from AK and which was from FL, so I just guessed. If I'm wrong, let me know, and I can change it. If any of those family members are DIS'ers, I can add their user name, too.

modomo--I'm not really sure if we're going to do any excursions this time. I think we'll probably try and enjoy the ship a little more this time. I'm sure it was just because our kids were a little young at the time, but the stingray excursion didn't go over so well. We might try the one at CC instead of GC, but I'm not going to push that one on them. If we do anything we might just rent an electric car on KW, but I don't think we'll do much on GC or Coz. I would LOVE to do the dolphins, but my boys had a hard time leaving the ship at each port because they didn't realize we would be going back to it.

So, new thread members, here's a little quiz for us to try to get to know you a little better. If you'd like to participate, we'd love to hear about you! You can go back and read pg 2 for the answers from me and Sherri (Nik's Mom). Again, it's GREAT to have you abord our thread!!!! Now the next 13 months need to just fly by!!


1. How many times have you been on DCL? Where to and when?

2. What are you looking forward to on this cruise?

3. What are your kids (if any) looking forward to on this cruise?

4. If you've cruised before, what is your favorite food on DCL? If you haven't cruised before, what are you excited to try (if you've looked over the menus already--like I did before our first one!)?

5. What would your "dream" DCL vacation be?

[Nik's Mom]

Hi Hudson5&Lennon3!
Thanks for updating our list! Looks like we won't have any empty ship after all.

Please consider the stingray excursion on CC. My kids loved it! It is right on the shore line, so the water is not deep at all. My boys were 5 and 7 and they had a blast. As you may remember, they are both autistic and are not comfortable trying new things. I thought for sure that they would not want to do this. Instead, they had a great time and were not frightened at all. When my 5 year old got tired, I took him to the sand and we relaxed while DH and ds 7 snorkled. It was only an hour long, so it didn't take too much time at all.

[Nik's Mom]

I've packed up a lot of my pictures for the move, but I pulled this out of the scrapbook that I started from our cruise last May. This is DS7 on the CC stingray excursion. See how shallow the water is? That black object is a mickey head. You need to hold the food between your fingers and place your hand on the Mickey head. Then the stingrays swim right up and suck the food out of your hand. Both of our ds's had difficulty holding the food, so dh had to help them.

[starlawyermom]

Hi - I am a novice at this - where/how can I view the update you are referring to? My mother and father-in-law are in Florida and she is a Dis'er (she was here this weekend and I had to pull her away from the computer). My brother-in-law and his family are from AR. Here are my answers to your quiz:

1. How many times have you been on DCL? Where to and when?

Never - Brother-in-law family have been once. Huge Dis fans - got married there and have vacation club points as wel

2. What are you looking forward to on this cruise?

Seeing my kids' faces light up each and every moment they see something new...

3. What are your kids (if any) looking forward to on this cruise?

4. If you've cruised before, what is your favorite food on DCL? If you haven't cruised before, what are you excited to try (if you've looked over the menus already--like I did before our first one!)?

we eat just about everything, so we are looking forward to trying a bit of everything!

5. What would your "dream" DCL vacation be?

Having my side of the family join us all together on a DLC!

[Hudson5&Lennon3]

Originally Posted by starlawyermom

Hi - I am a novice at this - where/how can I view the update you are referring to? My mother and father-in-law are in Florida and she is a Dis'er (she was here this weekend and I had to pull her away from the computer).

It's the very first post to this thread on page 1.

Yeah, the only thing about the DIS boards is that it is SOOOO addicting!!! I've spent many nights staying up waaaaaaaay too late just to see if there's any info that I've missed.

Great answers, too! Seeing the kids' faces is probably the best thing of all! Although I think the fireworks made my face light up more than ANY kid who was on the ship. And if you really want that "dream" vacation to come true, rebook while you're onboard!!! That's what we did for this one with my parents. We booked a "dummy date" until the 2009 dates came out and then transferred both reservations to this one. We paid their deposit (they paid us back when we got home), and they still got the 10% discount even though this will be their first DCL cruise.

[Hudson5&Lennon3]

Originally Posted by Nik's Mom

Hi Hudson5&Lennon3!Please consider the stingray excursion on CC. My kids loved it! It is right on the shore line, so the water is not deep at all. My boys were 5 and 7 and they had a blast. As you may remember, they are both autistic and are not comfortable trying new things. I thought for sure that they would not want to do this. Instead, they had a great time and were not frightened at all. When my 5 year old got tired, I took him to the sand and we relaxed while DH and ds 7 snorkled. It was only an hour long, so it didn't take too much time at all.

I think the stingrays on CC would be much better than the ones on GC--for our kids anyway. We have also talked about doing the bike tour on CC, so we'll see how much time we actually have to do everything (gotta fit some beach time in there, too!). I really wish this was a DDip cruise (although I would then miss out on the frozen chocolate-dipped key lime pie on a stick at KW!!!!! THAT WOULD BE TRAGIC!!!). We loved CC so much that we could definitely spend two days there and would probably still not "do it all."

[modomo]

1. How many times have you been on DCL? Where to and when? We haven't sailed DCL before, but I've been on Carnival 3 times.

2. What are you looking forward to on this cruise? Sitting on the balcony and looking at the vast ocean.


3. What are your kids (if any) looking forward to on this cruise? It hasn't "sank in" what we are doing yet. I know that they want to swim with the dolphins.


4. If you've cruised before, what is your favorite food on DCL? If you haven't cruised before, what are you excited to try (if you've looked over the menus already--like I did before our first one!)? Each and every dessert! Maybe twice!! My hubby may have to borrow a wheel barrow to get me off the ship!!

5. What would your "dream" DCL vacation be? Complete solitude w/hubby in an overwater bungalow in Bora Bora. Naaaaw......We would miss the kids too much, how about a Disney cruise!

[starlawyermom]

Hi all - on my last cruise (way back in the days when I was a swinging single...too long ago to remember), I only got off in port once. I am not a big shopper, and none of the excursions really appealed to me. If we stay on board as a family while th ship is in port, will there be activities for the kids? Do the kids' programs still run when the boat is in port? I have to admit, I am looking forward to relaxing on a half-empty ship and hopefully be able to keep the kids entertained as well.

Thanks