Planning for Alaska with Disney Cruise Line

When Disney announced they were going to Alaska for the first time in 2011, the new port sparked my interest. We had just come back from the Mediterranean cruise and we wanted to explore more ports with Disney. At that time the Disney Dream was new and we decided we really wanted to try out the new ship and we really wanted to limit the DCL trips to just one a year as we can not give up our Disney World fix.  Fast forward 2012. The Wonder was heading back to Alaska, and this time out of Seattle. I had always wanted to go to Seattle so Alaska on Disney (plus a great GTY price) meant that it may become reality. There were some pluses and some minuses about leaving from Seattle. The good thing was the flight was way cheaper then out of Vancouver. The bad was that the sea conditions traveling from Seattle to Canadian waters until you get to the inside passage were horendous. I believe for that reason Disney has chosen to depart once again out Vancouver, and in retrospect I think they made the right decision. Don't get me wrong, one of the best parts of my trip was the city of Seattle, but considering most people are going on this cruise for Alaska, Vancouver is a better departure port.

The Wonder in Skagway

I will not get too in depth about Seattle, as most of you will be traveling to Vancouver but I know many people who took the first DCL Alaska voyages from Vancouver decided to arrive/depart in Seattle or make a trip of it anyway. This is good enough reason to share my photos!

One thing I normally do not discuss too much is packing. However, for this trip I really want cover what I packed and how happy I was that I did pack a lot of things I was on the fence about. We were on a cruise in the beginning of June, but the weather was anything but summer. While Seattle was a tad warmer, we basically had weather in the very low 50's the whole trip. In Ketchikan it was 50 degrees and very wet, which made it colder. I will admit, even though I am a New Yorker I am not fond of the cold. At times I even found the ship to be freezing. My list:

1. 3-4 pairs of jeans (wound up being good because many got wet so I always had a dry pair)
2. Thin long sleeve shirts so I could layer, and a sweater
3. Dress for formal night/palo
4. Sneakers and water proof sneakers
5. Sweat pants & sweat shirt for lounging
6. A few nicer long sleeve shirts for dinner, but I most wore that with jeans as it was cold and I found the ship to be pretty laid back. More so then other cruises.
7. 2 hats
8. Gloves
9. Scarf
10. A really warm fleece- my North Face Denali- I was so happy I brought this.
11. A really good packable rain jacket with hood
12. My small North face backpack to hold my rain jacket, hat, gloves etc.

I packed a few other things, but this was the gist of it. Dan also packed a similar list.

Another thing to note was the tone of the ship. This cruise was very different from many of the other Disney Cruises I have taken. After speaking to some Cast Members, they informed most of the ship consisted of West Coasters which meant 75% or more first time cruisers. This isn't a bad thing but we found it made for a quite ship. Most people did not get involved in any of the activities and because the port excursions were so early, and the ships' exterior decks  really not usable , the ship was empty after dinner. For me the Alaska trip was a once in a lifetime trip. I glad i got to experience this at least once in my life. Stay tuned for this girls frozen journey North!