What do you do all day?

sethschroeder

DIS Veteran
Joined
Feb 24, 2013
So as we are thinking about our first cruise. We are currently looking at a 5 Day Western Caribbean (Halloween Night) cruise. I have also thought about doing an Alaska 7 Day possibly in another 2 years when the youngest is 3yo and can take more advantage of the kids club.

I really have two different sets of questions:

For the Caribbean what do you do all day? Is it simply the pool or during the 5 days what would my typical days look like? I tried looking it up but there doesn't seem to be a good list of free on ship activities listed.

For Alaska taking in the scenery, animal watching, and the offship is a lot more intriguing. That being said is the Frozen night what happens instead of the Fireworks night in the Caribbean? Or is the Frozen night not on every Alaska cruise?
 
We just got off of the 7 night Eastern Caribbean and I was wondering the same thing. I honestly couldn't believe how busy we stayed on sea days! Clearly the kids club has activities all day but also: Mickey slide, Aqua Duck, Nemo's splash area, Aqua Lab, 2 pools and watching a movie on the big screen (all water activies), walking the track on Deck 4, tons of trivia contests, lots of arts and crafts activities, the movie theater shows something multiple times a day, Midship Detective Agent, character meets, spa, drink tastings, etc. We would have even been happy with more sea days because we couldn't get it all done!

EDITED to add: I didn't even mention Pirate night activities and the Halloween activities during the day and night!
 
We have only done cruises to the Caribbean. I recommend looking at the Navigators from the sailings on the Disney Cruise Line Blog page for lists of potential activities during the Halloween cruises.
For us, a typical sea day is:
  • Breakfast
  • Pool time (with movies showing on the Funnel Vision)
  • Lunch
  • Midship Detective, Trivia Games or a movie in the theater for the afternoon; maybe some more pool time
  • Character meet and greets
  • Get ready for dinner
  • Dinner in Main Dining Room
  • Evening shows or movie in the theater
In addition, there are lots of activities available in the kids clubs throughout the day for drop off or sometimes they are open for parents to join (Open House).
 


Frozen night takes the place of pirate night in Alaska. The ship is not allowed to shoot off fireworks in Alaska. There is also a special menu on Frozen night and other special Alaskan specialities on some of the other nights. We've done 1 Alaskan and 4 Caribbean cruises so far and still haven't done everything there is to do onboard. I believe Frozen night is on all Alaskan cruises.
 
So as we are thinking about our first cruise. We are currently looking at a 5 Day Western Caribbean (Halloween Night) cruise. I have also thought about doing an Alaska 7 Day possibly in another 2 years when the youngest is 3yo and can take more advantage of the kids club.

I really have two different sets of questions:

For the Caribbean what do you do all day? Is it simply the pool or during the 5 days what would my typical days look like? I tried looking it up but there doesn't seem to be a good list of free on ship activities listed.

For Alaska taking in the scenery, animal watching, and the offship is a lot more intriguing. That being said is the Frozen night what happens instead of the Fireworks night in the Caribbean? Or is the Frozen night not on every Alaska cruise?

On Sea Days, I love having a leisurely sit down breakfast and/or lunch in the MDRs. In my opinion it definitely beats the hustle and bustle of Cabanas. You don’t need to worry about rushing to a shore excursion which allows you to enjoy your meal while being served by the amazing dining crew!
 
I would say most days I do nothing! :teeth: I start out with breakfast (unless it's the rare occasion I go to the gym first), then head up to the adult pool deck and take in some sun. When it's hot I will sit in Satellite Falls for a bit then back to my chair. Lunch buffet, then more time on deck. By early afternoon we usually make our way to the adult pool bar for some cocktails. Before long its time to get ready for the evening activities.

With that said we do make it a point to do Palo Brunch once per cruise, and if anything catches our eye on the Navigator we will go to that.
 


11 cruises in and I’ve never sat by the pool once. Gym, trivia, bingo, Aquaduck, playing games with the family, movies, presentations, reading, watching the ocean while listening to music, Midship detective agency, taking a nap... I always find something to do and I’m never bored.
 
I feel like all we do is eat all day! But really, we spend a lot of time just relaxing on deck. I just got off the Fantasy yesterday, that was my 14th cruise. I've done the try-to-do-everything cruise and I prefer the laid-back-do-what-I-want-or-nothing-at-all cruise. It's really quite nice to just lounge around on deck all day, for at least one day of your cruise.
 
We are taking our first Disney cruise in a few weeks, but not entirely new to cruising. Sea days are my favorite!! In the past we usually don't set an alarm and wake at our leisure. Eat breakfast, and our daughter goes to the Kids clubs for a couple of hours. DH and I use that quite time to usually explore more ship and just sit and watch the the sea sail by! Then we go pick up DD for lunch (who never wants to leave) and then do some outdoor activities (mind you our last cruise was November so we sort of waited for the warmer afternoon for water activities). Back then she napped, so DH would often nap too and I would wonder the boat some more. We are well past naps now though. And then like others said the evening usually flies by with dinner and show and more wondering around :)
 
11 cruises in and I’ve never sat by the pool once. Gym, trivia, bingo, Aquaduck, playing games with the family, movies, presentations, reading, watching the ocean while listening to music, Midship detective agency, taking a nap... I always find something to do and I’m never bored.
I keep saying I will someday...but not yet! There is so much we still haven't done!
 
We did a cruise in June on the Fantasy and we are going again next September. I was just telling the people we’re going with in September that there was so much that we didn’t get to do because it seems like all we did was eat, go to the pool, or meet characters. Hopefully next time I’ll get to try some other things.
 
I don’t like sitting by the pool in the heat so I do a lot of trivia, tastings, detective agency, sitting my balcony with a glass of champagne is my favorite activity of choice though. We also watch one princess Disney movie with Dad in the cabin.
 
Haven't done an Alaskan cruise, and can only speak to Bahamas voyages, but FWIW: Now that our kids are a little older we like to sleep in -- oh, the luxury! -- and then there are lots of things to do. We tend to avoid the pools, the AquaDuck, and the pool deck like the plague during peak times and we've never been into character meets; instead we have fun doing things like Midship Detective Agency, Goofy Golf, shuffleboard, movies, trivia, walking/running around the Deck 4 track, random activities like towel animals or Anyone Can Cook, crafts, music, gym time, family games, and the shows before or after dinner... plus whatever is going on in the clubs if your kids are old enough. Mr. MacSpiff and the young MacSpiffs love the sports simulator (not free, but really inexpensive as far as DCL paid activities go) and I'm always happy to leave them to it in favor of spending an hour with a book and a glass of wine on a Deck 4 lounger. You can find recent Navigators online that will give you a pretty good idea about what you can expect in terms of activities.
 
My first DCL cruise was a 14 night transatlantic and I brought three books to read, thinking I would have all this down time with like 7 sea days. Well, at the end of the cruise I hadn't gotten through one!! I'm not a deck chair lounger, but especially when my kids were younger I would spend time with them in the pool. But really I find there are things I want to do but never have time to do more often than not...movies, trivia, other activities (JackJack diaper dash, kids club tours, eating (!), etc.
 
I find the days at sea go too fast. Up not too early, but I don’t want to waste the day. I go right up to the top deck and just walk back to Aft side of ship, we always stay Forward to be near the adult areas. Then, breakfast at Cabanas. I walk back to the adult pool area, get a lounger and chill for a 1/2 hour. I am not a gym person, so I like to take a lap or two on Deck 4.

I sometimes, have a spa appointment or maybe there is a movie I have picked out. Sometime during the next few hours I have lunch. Maybe there is a special event I am interested in or it would be an afternoon movie or time by the pool chilling.

I always do late dinner, so an afternoon snack. Pool areas are very quiet around 5pm. So, if I am on the Dream, it’s off to AquaDuck with Hubby or sons.

Get ready for dinner, top deck stroll after dinner and then off to one of the adult area bars or the club.

Now, kids the days can be now stop...or they are just in the pool and hot tub all day, like my boys when they were young.

This thread has go me yearning for my early January cruise with DH and 3 grown sons. Boy are we going to have fun! Enjoy! And remember you can do very little or busy as you want.
 

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