Been meaning to post this sooner but after 2 months, here it is.
Did the Feb 25th 7-Night Western Carribean cruise on the Fantasy. Went with my wife and our three kids (13 yo son, 11 yo daughter and 9 yo son) celebrating our 15th wedding anniversary. This was my third Disney cruise, seventh overall and first cruise in over 10 years.
We took advantage of the Disney+ 3rd & 4th guests sail free offer. From one of the biggest Disney fans I know IRL, this hasn't been offered in over a decade.
The entire check-in process in done entirely online now. It's no longer done at the cruise terminal. Thirty days before your sail date at 12am ET, you have to upload a headshot, photo of your passport, passport number and any pre/post cruise travel info. You choose your Port Arrival Time (PAT) and they'll assign your Boarding Group number. You can then start booking excursions and on-board experiences. This was an entire mess as their servers kept crashing for hours. I gave up and just did it in the morning without a hiccup. Got a 12:30pm PAT and BG 15.
Pre-Cruise Travel
We were scheduled to arrive the night before the cruise and stay at an MCO area hotel. Received an alert that morning that our 10:30am flight was delayed until 2:00pm but was advised to show up at the airport for the original departure time in case there's no longer a delay so we arrived at LAX at 8:30am.
Around 11:00am, our flight got delayed again until 5:00pm so I asked for food vouchers and was given one for $60. Even with the ridiculous price gouging at the airport, we managed to get 4 poke bowls without having to pay extra out of pocket and it was enough to feed us all.
Around 3:00pm, our flight was now cancelled and I started suffering major anxiety about possibly missing the cruise (we did not have travel insurance). They managed to get us on a 6:00pm flight to JFK arriving around 1:30am with a 7:00am from JFK arriving 10:00am at MCO. This was cutting it really close but that was the only option we had. We could still miss the cruise if the 7:00am flight got delayed.
The 6:00pm LAX-JFK was on time and we arrived at 1:30am. There wasn't really enough time to get a hotel for possibly a couple hours of sleep so we spent the night at the JFK terminal where none of us got any real sleep. The emergency exit alarm went off sporadically several times. By 4:00, the snack stand near us was getting restocked so that created a bit of noise. By 5:00, people were slowing entering the terminal which caused more noise.
Couldn't use the MCO hotel we booked but they were gracious enough to give us a full refund less $25 processing fee (~$250) so not too bad considering it was technically too late to cancel. Not the most ideal start to the vacation, but there were no further delays. Our 7:00am flight was on time and we arrived at MCO before 10:00am and our Lyft arrived at 10:30am. Stopped by a local Wawa for some grab-n-go breakfast and 4 wine bottles to take on board the ship and got to the port by 12:30pm. (They let you bring onboard 2 bottles of wine or 6 bottles of beer per 21+ adult per port.)
A huge sigh of relief as we didn't miss our cruise and boarded the ship at 1:00pm.
- to be continued at a later date -