First Time on DCL

[Jiminyfan1]

I am beginning to plan a Disney cruise for December 2007 (I know it's a bit far out) but I was wondering if there were any usefull tips? I will be traveling with my husband, and two teenage daughters; they will be 16 & 13 at the time of the cruise. I understand that there is a teen club, what are peoples feelings on this? Will this also be a good cruise for our family? We have been 1 other cruise with Celebrity and we thoroughly enjoyed that one. Also, any opinions on the family rooms - we were not very happy with our stateroom on our last cruise.

[mom x4,grandma x4]

Howdy,

It will save you a lot of money if you can pick a date and book as soon as the 2007 bookings are released, usually in October. We are going to book a Christmas 2007 as soon as it's posted. We do this all the time. Our next cruise is this December and we booked it about 14 months early and now, when we look at todays prices we are saving $800. per cabin and by the time the cruise actually gets it, it will be considerable more. It feels really good to know we saved that much. Plus you can make payments throughout the months so you wont be hit with a big bill at the end. If you change your mind in 6 months you can get a full refund or change the date a little farther out without penaly. Discuss this with whom ever you book with to see their policies. We book through DCL directly, because if we need to make a change, it's no problem.

If you havnt already ordered the free DVD from DCL, I would suggest you do that right away. Go to DCL's official web site to order. It is free and takes 2 to 3 weeks to arrive, but it will answer lots of questions you and your teens may have. You dont have to book to order this, anyone can do it.

Our grandkids love the club. The teen one is called "The Stack"

They have lots of free social time, structured activities, such as pool parties,pizza and movie parties, dances, karoake and teen only excursions and a teen only beach with volleyball next to the family beach. Disney has a family nightclub too that is for all ages, it is called studio sea. It has lots of different activities all night long too. The teen area is teens only, no adults. The teens love that idea. They are always well chaparoned, the counselors are great. Teens also have their own arcade. There are lots of activities for them that are not Mickey Mouse kind of stuff, so they can enjoy the magic with their families, but escape to their own club that is geared for teens, not disney themed.

I havnt met ateen yet that didnt like it in there, but some who are shy have a little trouble getting aquainted, but the counselors are trained to help kids get aquainted. Also once you decide on a date, you can go to www.dcltribute.com and go to cruise meets and scroll down until you find the date of your cruise and make friends with fellow cruisers. Your teens can put in a post for teens to respond too, so they can get aquainted on line before they meet. Of course until your cruise gets a little closer you may not get much response because lots of people havn't booked yet. If you dont see your date, then start your own thread. Then post it on the forum section too. So people will have 2 chances to see it. Those are really fun to chat on and thye do offer private messaging which the teens seem to use all the time to chat so we "old" folks can't spy on their plans. Ha! Ha!

Hope this helps you some, I'm sure you'll have a great time.

mom x4,grandma x4