I need help! back to back or something else?

[bananapepper]

We want to do a cruise next fall/winter (end of 2021 or beginning of 22) for our 10 year anniversary but are having trouble deciding what we want to do.

We know we want to sail out of Galveston as that port is within driving distance and saves us the money/hassle of flying with 3 kids. Also, the Wonder is the only ship that has the Frozen show which is my DDs favorite movie on the planet.

We really wanted to do a 7 night but there aren't any available except for January 2021 in just a few months and I would be shocked if that itinerary actually sailed.

We were thinking about doing a 4 night that stops at just Cozumel and then a 6 night that stops at just Key West and Castaway Cay. But my husband pointed out that a 10 night cruise with only 3 total stops might get boring on sea days, especially since we would be repeating restaurant menus, pirates night, etc. He thinks we should just do the 6 night by itself.

However, the 6-night cruise ports of just Key West and Castaway seem kind of blah. That's only one beach stop which is what the kids love doing the most.

What do you guys think? This will be our first ever Disney Cruise and the first time for 2 out of our 3 kids to cruise at all and I want it to be a good experience! Will it get boring and repetitive doing a b2b with so many sea days (6 total I believe)? Should we just do the 6 night alone instead?

Thank you so much!

 

[FigmentSpark]

If you can afford the B2B, then why not book it? You have several months to change your mind and drop the Cozumel cruise. Try to get the same room so you don't have to pack up to move in between.

I don't think you'll be bored. You'll love the first one and be glad you have the second with all the sea days to do the stuff you couldn't do on the first.

Menus repeated... so what? Choose your faves. You eat the same food at home every week or two, don't you?

You'll get to book 2 placeholders (one on each cruise). You might feel cruised out after the second, but trust me, unless you hate cruising, book the placeholders. They, too are refundable if you don't use them and if you want to do more cruising with the next two years (from those cruises), 10% off is a big deal.

 

[PrincessShmoo]

We want to do a cruise next fall/winter (end of 2021 or beginning of 22) for our 10 year anniversary but are having trouble deciding what we want to do.

We know we want to sail out of Galveston as that port is within driving distance and saves us the money/hassle of flying with 3 kids. Also, the Wonder is the only ship that has the Frozen show which is my DDs favorite movie on the planet.

We really wanted to do a 7 night but there aren't any available except for January 2021 in just a few months and I would be shocked if that itinerary actually sailed.

We were thinking about doing a 4 night that stops at just Cozumel and then a 6 night that stops at just Key West and Castaway Cay. But my husband pointed out that a 10 night cruise with only 3 total stops might get boring on sea days, especially since we would be repeating restaurant menus, pirates night, etc. He thinks we should just do the 6 night by itself.

However, the 6-night cruise ports of just Key West and Castaway seem kind of blah. That's only one beach stop which is what the kids love doing the most.

What do you guys think? This will be our first ever Disney Cruise and the first time for 2 out of our 3 kids to cruise at all and I want it to be a good experience! Will it get boring and repetitive doing a b2b with so many sea days (6 total I believe)? Should we just do the 6 night alone instead?

Thank you so much!

Remember only 4 of the menus will repeat on the six night cruise (and you can always choose a different item).

We've done a 10 night B2B with a 14 night. Yes, 10 of those menus were repeated on the 14 night, but with the time lag it didn't seem that repetitive. Plus the 10 night was port intensive and we didn't make it to all the shows during that one. So no repeats of the shows on the 14 night for us.

We've also done the 7 night Eastern and Western Caribbean B2B. Totally repetitive on menus, shows, etc. But, as I said, it's like visiting the same restaurant once a week, and you can always order something different.

Sea days, they're actually very nice for "just sitting" and watching the sea go by. Remember, it's a vacation, you don't have to schedule something for every minute.

 

[o&smom]

Neither us, nor our kids have ever been bored with sea days - even on WBPC cruise!

 

[Cruising Engineer]

We've cruised the 14-day EBPC and never got bored. Repeat menus, yes, but with several choices of appetizers, soups, salads, main entre, and a half dozen choices of desserts, you can try something different. Sea days are relaxing days. It's not WDW where you have to plan every minute of the day. Relax, read a book on a chaise lounge, play shuffleboard, watch a movie, and enjoy just walking the decks. We cruise just to get away from the computer/phone and relax. My DH spends a vast majority of his time on the verandah with his ebooks and a pair of binoculars. I have the Navigator and find things to explore.
We're booked for a January 2021 Galveston Disney Wonder cruise to KW and CC. 50-50 chance it sails but we are hopeful.

 

[DCLCrazy64622]

Sea days are my favorite. Our eastbound trantlantic cruise had 6 sea days in a row and I loved every minute of it. Your kids will not be bored between the pools and the clubs. I say go for it.

 

[Geomom]

The Fantasy also has the Frozen show, but that would be out of Port Canaveral. For the Galveston options you listed, I would probably just do the 6 nt cruise since it's your first Disney cruise and first cruise for 2 of the kids. Longer is better, but I wouldn't do back to back until you know everyone loves DCL.

 

[Chrissy-Mickey]

The Fantasy also has the Frozen show, but that would be out of Port Canaveral. For the Galveston options you listed, I would probably just do the 6 nt cruise since it's your first Disney cruise and first cruise for 2 of the kids. Longer is better, but I wouldn't do back to back until you know everyone loves DCL.

I thought that the Fantasy had Aladin?

 

[Geomom]

I thought that the Fantasy had Aladin?

Fantasy has Aladdin, Frozen, and Believe for their stage shows. Frozen was added last October.

 

[MomOTwins]

Fantasy has Aladdin, Frozen, and Believe for their stage shows. Frozen was added last October.

Yep, we saw Frozen on the Fantasy last November and it was incredible. If you can change ports, that would give you a longer cruise and more port stops. Everyone has a different preference for cruising styles, but I am with your DH—I even found the 7-night Fantasy to be a bit too repetitive (my ideal cruise would be a new port each day) so 10-nights with shows repeating would be not appealing.

 

[bananapepper]

Yep, we saw Frozen on the Fantasy last November and it was incredible. If you can change ports, that would give you a longer cruise and more port stops. Everyone has a different preference for cruising styles, but I am with your DH—I even found the 7-night Fantasy to be a bit too repetitive (my ideal cruise would be a new port each day) so 10-nights with shows repeating would be not appealing.

I wish they had more options out of Galveston I heard they were going to be expanding itineraries there but then COVID happened so I don't know where all that stands now. It adds a lot to an already expensive cruise to have to fly 5 people round trip to Florida.

 

[Sun_soakin]

Since it’s so close, I’d just do one sailing for now. Book another one later from another port or when they add a Galveston itinerary that you are more interested in. That said, my family loves sea days.

 

[bananapepper]

I wish they had more options out of Galveston I heard they were going to be expanding itineraries there but then COVID happened so I don't know where all that stands now. It adds a lot to an already expensive cruise to have to fly 5 people round trip to Florida.

Does anyone know if this is still the plan for the Galveston port? https://www.cruzely.com/big-growth-ahead-for-the-port-of-galveston-heres-whats-coming/

 

[Colo17]

Took son, DIL and granddaughter on a 4 night Dream trip and they didn't even see the whole ship. It was much too short for them and even the 7 day Fantasy we took a few years later was too short. If you can do the B2B, do it. We've done around 50 cruises and have found that 7 days is absolute minimum on a ship for us. If we can't do a longer cruise we will book B2B. You are paying premium prices for the Disney onboard experience, so the more days you spend onboard the better. And you won't be packing your bags just after unpacking them.

I tried to convince my son he could get an Aquatheater suite on one of the Royal Oasis-class ships for 14 days for the price he is paying for a week in a regular cabin on Fantasy. He picked Fantasy.

 

[bananapepper]

Neither us, nor our kids have ever been bored with sea days - even on WBPC cruise!

Still so torn! Does doing two Pirate's nights and such so close together get old?

 

[PrincessShmoo]

Still so torn! Does doing two Pirate's nights and such so close together get old?

Not for me. And you can always opt to skip it.

 

[Starwind]

Still so torn! Does doing two Pirate's nights and such so close together get old?

We did a B2B2B on the Dream this past December - 3-4-3 nights. It was wonderful !

Multiple stops at Castaway Cay.

Yes, the menus repeated, but that meant we tried more things and had repeats of our favourites

Our serving team and stateroom host were very excited we were B2B [and even more so it was B2B2B] and we had some great conversations with them that we wouldn't have had if we had just done one cruise.

We did pirate night once, the fireworks more than once, and then found other activities to do the other pirate nights - including just watching a movie in the stateroom We don't particularly like pirate night anyway, so it was pretty easy to avoid. Except the fireworks, we like those so made a point of watching them each time.

For the shows, we chose which nights we did which shows and spread it across the entire time we were aboard. This gave us time to do other things or just relax, which we appreciated.

SW

 

[Colo17]

These days we mostly do B2B cruises - saves a lot on airfare. And like Starwind we have a B2B2B 3-4-3 on Dream scheduled. That said, you need to realize that the turnaround day is pretty blah. The kids center isn't going to be open and you will need to get off and back on during the morning. Most venues are not open during turnaround. Might have new Covid stuff as well. Key West just voted to restrict large cruise ships (although nobody knows if they legally can do this yet) so you may not stop there.

If I was doing a 3-4 out of Galveston I would recommend Royal Caribbean. We did a Cozumel/Progresso and Cozumel/Costa Maya set of stops on those that included both beaches and some pretty spectacular ruins. And the combination of those trips cost less than one 3 day on Disney. No Disney stuff onboard but Royal has other things to do. We were on Vision which is less suitable for kids, but Liberty of the Seas and maybe Allure will be sailing out of Galveston. Both are spectacular ships with lots of kids activities. And a suite for 5 on Allure for a week often costs about what a 3 day balcony on any Disney ship does.

 

[KashasMom]

The repeat food probably wouldn't bother me but that many sea days would be torture for us! The pools are so small and crowded so that's not really pleasant. And if your kids don't go in the kids' clubs, they might be bored. I'd take a look at the Navigators for similar cruises to see what kinds of activities there are, dining, etc. and then decide. If you go mid-Nov to end of Dec, they'll be Very Merrytime Cruises and those have a lot of activities. It might be worth it to go to PC for the Fantasy.

https://disneycruiselineblog.com/20...bbean-cruise-from-galveston-november-12-2018/
https://disneycruiselineblog.com/20...ith-2-stops-at-castaway-cay-november-29-2019/

 

[o&smom]

Still so torn! Does doing two Pirate's nights and such so close together get old?

When you do a longer cruise (not back to back) you only get one pirate’s night. I would choose one of the cruises for pirate’s night and then maybe Palo dinner for the second. I would mix it up, and plan different things for each cruise. If there is something you really love, do it twice.