Hello Everyone!
We are exactly TWO WEEKS AWAY from heading to Orlando to embark on our first cruise.
Who: Yours truly, JoAnna/Mom
Gracie/The Kid
Halie/Sister/Aunt/Sidekick/Person who is crazy enough to enjoy vacationing with me and the kid
What: 3 night cruise on the Disney Dream.
When: April 27th - April 30th
Where: Disney Dream
Why: Okay, so there is a backstory to this trip. After coming back from our trip last may celebrating my sisters college graduation, we decided that we weren't going to do another Disney trip until at least 2020 once all the construction is done (or close to done) in HS. We had been talking about going on a cruise, and figured why not cruise Carnival. There is a port in Mobile (we live just south of Birmingham) so it would be a quick drive. We paid the deposit and booked for President's Day weekend 2018. It was a 4 day weekend for the schools, so Gracie would only have to miss 1 day. Well toward the end of last year I'm sure most of you remember that Carnival had some issues (hidden cameras found in rooms, issues with health department scores, car accidents at port destinations). I am already a little nervous about cruising as I have this stupid anxiety anytime im not in control of transportation (not a fan of boats, trains, planes, or cars...unless im driving them
) so all of this bad publicity just added to my anxiety.
This is when we decided that we were going to cancel the cruise and just do something else. Unfortunately, by a matter of days we missed the free cancellation period and lost about 40% of what we paid (about $400). I was looking into different types of vacations, maybe a trip out to Disneyland?? Nope, flights are too expensive. DC?? Nah, maybe when Gracie gets a little older and is more interested in museums and stuff. I finally decided to look in DCL. The overall cost was about $1,500 more than what we were getting with Carnival, but since we weren't going to add any shore excursions it ended up only costing about $1,000 more. The thing about Disney is, even though you are spending more, you get your money's worth. Everyone that I have spoken to has had nothing but good things to say about DCL.
So in just 14 short days, we will be headed toward the Sunshine State. We are driving down (I actually love this drive, and road trips in general) on Thursday, April 26th. We are staying at Quality Inn By The Parks for the night (good review and free breakfast) before heading to Port Canaveral after breakfast. We usually drive my car down, but decided that after paying for overnight parking fees, it doesn't cost much more to rent a car and not have to worry about putting the miles on mine.
Out tentative plans are as follows:
9:00 a.m. CT pick up our rental from Hertz - we hope to just run back home, grab our bags (I always put them in the living room the night before we leave for easy transport) and hit the road as close to 9:30 as possible.
I don't like to make a lot of stops, so I am hoping that unless we run into a lot of traffic, we can get to Orlando by around 7:00 p.m. ET. We do have tentative plans to head over to CityWalk and eat at Toothsome's before heading back to the hotel to sleep.
We shall see if all goes as planned (which knowing me it won't, because it never does)!
We are exactly TWO WEEKS AWAY from heading to Orlando to embark on our first cruise.
Who: Yours truly, JoAnna/Mom
Gracie/The Kid
Halie/Sister/Aunt/Sidekick/Person who is crazy enough to enjoy vacationing with me and the kid
What: 3 night cruise on the Disney Dream.
When: April 27th - April 30th
Where: Disney Dream
Why: Okay, so there is a backstory to this trip. After coming back from our trip last may celebrating my sisters college graduation, we decided that we weren't going to do another Disney trip until at least 2020 once all the construction is done (or close to done) in HS. We had been talking about going on a cruise, and figured why not cruise Carnival. There is a port in Mobile (we live just south of Birmingham) so it would be a quick drive. We paid the deposit and booked for President's Day weekend 2018. It was a 4 day weekend for the schools, so Gracie would only have to miss 1 day. Well toward the end of last year I'm sure most of you remember that Carnival had some issues (hidden cameras found in rooms, issues with health department scores, car accidents at port destinations). I am already a little nervous about cruising as I have this stupid anxiety anytime im not in control of transportation (not a fan of boats, trains, planes, or cars...unless im driving them
) so all of this bad publicity just added to my anxiety. This is when we decided that we were going to cancel the cruise and just do something else. Unfortunately, by a matter of days we missed the free cancellation period and lost about 40% of what we paid (about $400). I was looking into different types of vacations, maybe a trip out to Disneyland?? Nope, flights are too expensive. DC?? Nah, maybe when Gracie gets a little older and is more interested in museums and stuff. I finally decided to look in DCL. The overall cost was about $1,500 more than what we were getting with Carnival, but since we weren't going to add any shore excursions it ended up only costing about $1,000 more. The thing about Disney is, even though you are spending more, you get your money's worth. Everyone that I have spoken to has had nothing but good things to say about DCL.
So in just 14 short days, we will be headed toward the Sunshine State. We are driving down (I actually love this drive, and road trips in general) on Thursday, April 26th. We are staying at Quality Inn By The Parks for the night (good review and free breakfast) before heading to Port Canaveral after breakfast. We usually drive my car down, but decided that after paying for overnight parking fees, it doesn't cost much more to rent a car and not have to worry about putting the miles on mine.
Out tentative plans are as follows:
9:00 a.m. CT pick up our rental from Hertz - we hope to just run back home, grab our bags (I always put them in the living room the night before we leave for easy transport) and hit the road as close to 9:30 as possible.
I don't like to make a lot of stops, so I am hoping that unless we run into a lot of traffic, we can get to Orlando by around 7:00 p.m. ET. We do have tentative plans to head over to CityWalk and eat at Toothsome's before heading back to the hotel to sleep.
We shall see if all goes as planned (which knowing me it won't, because it never does)!
.
