Disney Wonder February 18-25, 2018 Port Canaveral, St. Maarten, San Juan, Castaway Cay, Port Can

[seacruise]

Starting to get close to online check-in, and final payment time (ugh). Think I have pretty much everything booked for our trip other than our shuttle to the port in the morning from MCO area hotel.

Still have to finalize plans for WDW, but that got pushed back a bit by deciding to stay offsite. We were going to stay at Yacht Club, but got a deal we couldn't refuse on staying at a friends time share resort (Bonnet Creek). Move likely cost us a chance at Fast Passes for Pandora, but oh well.

Looking more likely that the Wonder will do the regularly scheduled itinerary that week. Been reading about St. Thomas reopening and ships returning to St. Maarten next mont as well.

Cruise is getting close enough to start getting excited!

 

[KAS_73]

Starting to get close to online check-in, and final payment time (ugh). Think I have pretty much everything booked for our trip other than our shuttle to the port in the morning from MCO area hotel.

Still have to finalize plans for WDW, but that got pushed back a bit by deciding to stay offsite. We were going to stay at Yacht Club, but got a deal we couldn't refuse on staying at a friends time share resort (Bonnet Creek). Move likely cost us a chance at Fast Passes for Pandora, but oh well.

Looking more likely that the Wonder will do the regularly scheduled itinerary that week. Been reading about St. Thomas reopening and ships returning to St. Maarten next mont as well.

Cruise is getting close enough to start getting excited!

A few of the excursions that were listed on the website under St. Maarten aren't available for our sailing (yet), so I assume that's because of the damage from Irma.

 

[chrissyNYC]

hi all!!

we are also joining this cruise as well! it will be myself, DH, DD7, and DD2 this is our 5th cruise and 2nd on the wonder. so happy to see some discussion going on here - did the discussion of a FE ever pick up traction?

 

[KAS_73]

hi all!!

we are also joining this cruise as well! it will be myself, DH, DD7, and DD2 this is our 5th cruise and 2nd on the wonder. so happy to see some discussion going on here - did the discussion of a FE ever pick up traction?

Welcome aboard! There is an FE up and running on the other site

 

[Dug720]

Starting to get close to online check-in, and final payment time (ugh). Think I have pretty much everything booked for our trip other than our shuttle to the port in the morning from MCO area hotel.

Still have to finalize plans for WDW, but that got pushed back a bit by deciding to stay offsite. We were going to stay at Yacht Club, but got a deal we couldn't refuse on staying at a friends time share resort (Bonnet Creek). Move likely cost us a chance at Fast Passes for Pandora, but oh well.

Looking more likely that the Wonder will do the regularly scheduled itinerary that week. Been reading about St. Thomas reopening and ships returning to St. Maarten next mont as well.

Cruise is getting close enough to start getting excited!

Except we're scheduled St Maarten and San Juan...

 

[Dug720]

A few of the excursions that were listed on the website under St. Maarten aren't available for our sailing (yet), so I assume that's because of the damage from Irma.

Are all the ones for San Juan listed?

 

[KAS_73]

Are all the ones for San Juan listed?

The one that I wanted was there and I didn't check all the others. I noticed for St. Maarten because my first 3 choices weren't available

 

[Dug720]

The one that I wanted was there and I didn't check all the others. I noticed for St. Maarten because my first 3 choices weren't available

Ok, thanks.

 

[seacruise]

Except we're scheduled St Maarten and San Juan...

Sorry, wasn't implying that St. Thomas was on our itinerary. Was simply citing St. Thomas as an example of a port reopening. For what it's worth RCCL is retuning to St. Maarten in Nov. while Carnival has announced they aren't returning to St. Thomas and St. Maarten until early 2018. Carnival is returning to San Juan end of Nov. I guess my point is that all of this seems to suggest that our cruise will be the regularly scheduled eastern itinerary come Feb. Of course who knows, DCL could decide something totally different from the other lines and keep doing Westerns all winter.

 

[Dug720]

Sorry, wasn't implying that St. Thomas was on our itinerary. Was simply citing St. Thomas as an example of a port reopening. For what it's worth RCCL is retuning to St. Maarten in Nov. while Carnival has announced they aren't returning to St. Thomas and St. Maarten until early 2018. Carnival is returning to San Juan end of Nov. I guess my point is that all of this seems to suggest that our cruise will be the regularly scheduled eastern itinerary come Feb. Of course who knows, DCL could decide something totally different from the other lines and keep doing Westerns all winter.

Ok. I wasn't sure. And yeah...I guess we'll see.

 

[KAS_73]

Sorry, wasn't implying that St. Thomas was on our itinerary. Was simply citing St. Thomas as an example of a port reopening. For what it's worth RCCL is retuning to St. Maarten in Nov. while Carnival has announced they aren't returning to St. Thomas and St. Maarten until early 2018. Carnival is returning to San Juan end of Nov. I guess my point is that all of this seems to suggest that our cruise will be the regularly scheduled eastern itinerary come Feb. Of course who knows, DCL could decide something totally different from the other lines and keep doing Westerns all winter.

The DCL website doesn't even have the weather advisory listed anymore so I think they have changed all the itineraries that they're planning to change. I agree with you that ours will likely remain as is. I am cruising in December and they have modified that itinerary.

 

[jcarwash]

Scott Sanders (Disney Cruise Line Blog) was tweeting portions of this press release about how San Juan, St. Maarten, Tortola, St. Thomas ports are all gearing up for port calls: https://www.prnewswire.com/news-rel...-cruise-conference--trade-show-300542062.html

 

[seacruise]

Thanks for the link, interesting read. So the ports will be open, now its just up to DCL to decide they are recovered enough to bring their guests back to. I could see them going more conservative on a timeline to return that RCCL or Carnival.

Anybody else combining this cruise with WDW? We are doing 4 days afterwards (well 2 full days and 2 partial days). We haven't stayed offsite since the start of FP+ so trying to figure out our plans with only being able to do FP 30 days in advance. Park hours are currently really short for that week (hoping that means they don't expect massive crowds), but of course the hours can change.

Thinking we will do HS on disembarkation day. We should be there by noon and the park closes at 8:00. Really just want to do ToT, RnR and hit Fantasmic at 7:00. Then probably do Epcot on Mon and AK on Tue (both to avoid EMH days). Not sure what we are going to do on our last day. We are flying out from TPA at 6:00pm so probably have until 3:00 or so. Don't really want to go to MK, but I'm sure the kids wouldn't object to hitting a few favorites. Was planning on getting hoppers, but now that I write this out I don't really think we will need them.

Guess we also need to figure out what online reservations we need to make for the cruise. We have one daughter that always has to do BBB, and one that wouldn't be caught dead in there (well maybe for the pirate makeover).

 

[KAS_73]

We are doing the parks for 2 days prior to the cruise. Flying in late Thursday so we can have all day Friday and Saturday. I haven't been to the parks in years and have no idea how to book all this new stuff. I figure we'll just wing it

 

[seacruise]

I find all the pre-booking and planning at WDW to be a pain as well, but unfortunately they have basically made it necessary now to get the most out of your days. I would recommend at least reading up a bit on FastPass + so you know how it works. Even if you don't book rides in advance you can still take advantage of it in the parks.

 

[aaronm77]

Dug720 mentioned getting an e-mail about a price drop due to changes in port fees... did anyone else get a notification?

 

[jcarwash]

Dug720 mentioned getting an e-mail about a price drop due to changes in port fees... did anyone else get a notification?

I can see via my travel agent's site that my upcoming final payment due is about $70 less than was listed on my original reservation. So that would probably be an adjustment to port fees.

 

[seacruise]

Made our final payment last weekend. Amount owed for both cabins was exactly the same as it was when we booked over a year ago.

 

[jcarwash]

Silver CC, my activities booking opened today. The two St. Maarten beach excursions, Afternoon Beach Bash Tour (SM23) and French Riviera Beach Rendezvous (SM07) are both listed as sold out.

Did they already fill up with Platinum and Gold members? Or are these Orient Bay excursions actually not going to happen...I think all of the beach restaurants were destroyed.

I haven't had this happen before where a port adventure I wanted wasn't available on my booking day, even on my first cruise. Just surprised, although I also wouldn't be surprised if the cruise doesn't even visit St. Maarten at all.

 

[seacruise]

Also silver CC, logged on at 9pm yesterday and did our online check-in for both cabins. Got 11:00-11:30 PAT which is what I was hoping for. Booked BBB on 2nd at sea day for one of our daughters who is still into princesses, and a Palo brunch for DW and me. Reserved times for the princess and Frozen meets, but who knows if the kids will want to do those again.

Didn't look at shore excursions other than cabanas at Castaway. No surprise, they were all gone. Older daughter wants to snorkel at Castaway, so that will likely be the plan for part of that day. Going to put a crimp in our usual Castaway routine of dropping the kids off at Scuttles and heading for Serenity Bay. Guess we could still do that in the am and snorkel in the afternoon.

No idea what to expect in terms of excursions in San Juan and St. Maarten. We enjoy just wandering around the forts in San Juan so we will likely just plan on doing that.