I took my two youngest children on the Disney Wonder cruise to Key West and Castaway Caye over the winter school break. We had a ton of fun. There is a reason why Disney charges so much more for their cruises, it is a full family experience. The shows are all fabulous, Broadway-quality Disney entertainment, plus they show first run movies. We were lucky enough to be on the ship for the premiere of the new Star Wars which they showed on board many times to enthusiastic crowds.
The shows are great, really entertaining and different nightly.
The cabins are set up well for families. Our oceanview cabin had a curtain to separate the couch from the king size bed and we had a split bathroom which made it great for all of us to get up and ready in the morning.Castaway Caye (pronounced Key) is Disney’s private island in the Bahamas. There are lots of activities you can do and they serve a bbq lunch on the island. You can snorkel in the lagoon, my daughter saw a squid, which is really unusual. We also did the extreme adventure package so we could also have the stingray encounter which was very cool.You get to feed the stingray and then you snorkel in the lagoon with them.These stingrays don’t have stingers and so it is very safe.
There are deck parties at night, the pirate party is the big one when everyone comes out wearing their pirate costumes. The fireworks show follows and is the only fireworks show at sea at this point. There was also a Frozen party where the Frozen characters come out to sing and dance.
The dining is unique in that you are assigned different restaurants each night but you keep your servers so they get to know you and your table mates over the cruise. The food is exceptional, the best I’ve had on a cruise ship without needing to pay for specialty dining. The one specialty restaurant, Palo, was wonderful. It is adults only, and they do a brunch on sea days, which is when I went. The food was amazing and delicious.The Disney characters are all over the ship all the time so your kids can be sure to get pictures and autographs with all of them.There is a free character breakfast, be sure to reserve as soon as you’re on board. This is for the Disney Jr characters although Mickey does make an appearance.
Disney is definitely a great value vacation for a family of all ages.
