Our first desert camping experience

Disney Cruise

Family Cruise

I’m ashamed at my lack of attention to the blog lately.  Our life has been busy but the real excuse is that I’ve simply gotten a little lazy.

2013 was a big year for Mom and Dad Barrack.  Mom turned 60 on May 24, Dad turned 65 on Nov 9 and it was their 40^th wedding anniversary on Aug 11^th.  To help celebrate this marque year, we decided to take a family cruise to Alaska.  Chandra did the initial research and quickly realized that Disney recently offered the Alaska cruise.   Since we had already experienced the Disney cruise we knew this was the perfect choice for this trip.

On July 29^th we all met in the Vancouver airport.  The 1^st benefit of this trip was the quick travel to get to the starting point. 


After travelling across the world to Canada from UAE the last thing I wanted was another long flight.  We left from Edmonton and Mom/Dad and the Vigs left from Calgary but we all arrived within minutes of each other.  This was the first time I had seen everyone since January.




After taxiing to the docks, we went through the loading process  4 different cruise boats were loading up for the week but considering this volume of people (each boat averages 2000 people) the process to get everyone through went very smoothly.

The Disney cruise line is set up perfectly for families.  There are Disney characters all over the boat, the entertainment coordinators are full of energy and the kids clubs   For those of you that haven’t done a cruise before, there are some definite pros and cons. 

Pros:

Service – I believe all cruise ships try to focus on quality service but I’m doubtful whether any can better Disney’s approach.   You are always greeted with a sincere smile and a helping hand whether its at the restaurant, buffet area, kids clubs or the room attendants.




Food – Disney freely admits that their business model is not the 5 star dining compared to some of the other ships however I would argue that it’s still very very good.  Of course when you are at the buffet area the quality will suffer but at the sit down meals we always had great delicious food




KIDS CLUB – That really does deserve to be in all caps because it’s the main reason that everyone had such a great time. Captain Hook teaching how to be a pirate, Snow White teaching a special dance, kids running around being Rescue Rangers like Chip & Dale. The activities went on and on. In fact, the kids liked being in the kids areas so much (the Oceaneer Club in particular) that they didn’t want to leave when we went to collect them.  Once we learned this, the kids asked to eat dinner in the kids club while my husband and I gloried in kid-free suppers almost every evening of our cruise.




Wireless communication – Each room was equipped with two mobile phones that worked throughout the cruise ship.  Firstly this is used for security to inform you if your child wants to leave the kids club.  Secondly this is handy for a bigger group to be able to track each other down when you’re scattered around the ship.  Kevin and I often would use it to agree to meet on the deck for a beer!!


Entertainment:  The shows on our cruise were the best. The quality of the performances and the costumes were all top notch. Of course 6 out of the 7 shows were Disney-themed but that’s to be expected.   




Characters: Of course, a Disney Cruise features Disney characters and the kids adored the extra time they got to spend with characters which is very unlike anything that happens in the Disney parks nowadays.  

Cons:

Excursions – Our cruise did the usual stops in Skagway, Juneau, and Ketchikan.  These are cute little towns that have character but since they are heavily reliant on the cruise ship industry its really the same thing in each town.  The excursions were very pricey and most of them would not be overly family friendly.  With that said we did zip lining at Skagway and really enjoyed it.


Price - There’s no question that a Disney Cruise costs a little more than other cruises, and though I think the price is worth it, it still can make it tough to swallow.

Odd Hours in Buffet: The buffet has the weirdest hours that I’ve ever experienced on a cruise ship. The hours were extremely limited which meant that if you wanted breakfast or dinner, you had to fight your way through the buffet along with everyone else on the ship.


Small Seating Area in Buffet: The buffet has an extremely small area for eating inside which meant that if you wanted to eat at the buffet, you almost assuredly were eating out on deck. This was okay as we had such nice weather but normally this would be a problem in the chilly air of Alaska.

Enjoy the pictures.  I think they are more interesting than me rattling on.