Things I wish I knew before taking a Disney Cruise

Jan 2

4 min read

Thinking of taking a Disney cruise, or already booked one but not sure what to expect? Here are some tips and advice from our recent experience.

We took a Disney cruise on the Disney Wish in November 2024 and here are five things I learnt that would have helped a lot if I knew about them before cruising.

Online Check-in

As a Singaporean, or any other nationality, when you go for a cruise in the US, you’ll need the entry visa during online check in. For us, this meant we needed to have our ESTA ready as you need to key in the details during the check in. (On a side note, when we were checking in for our cruise from Melbourne, Australia, on the Disney Wonder, we didn’t have to key in our Australian ETA details)

Online check in opens up at least 30 days before the sail date. The higher Castaway Club member tiers have earlier check in dates, you can see the details in our earlier post here.

The online check in affects your boarding time. So the earlier you complete your check in, the earlier boarding time you can select. This means you have more time on the ship!

Don't really have anything to show for the online check in, so here's a photo of the sail away party

Bringing drinking water on board

There was some uncertainty on whether we could bring bottled water on board the ship. The staff later clarified, and other online sources say this as well, that you can bring water in your carry on bags, but not in your check in bags.

We also experienced this at the Nassau, Bahamas, port call. We went off the ship to walk around the area around the cruise terminal and bought a few bottles of water, which we brought back onto the ship in our sling bags with no one stopping us.

There is drinking water available from water dispensers around the ship, so if you want to you can refill your own water bottle throughout the cruise. For me, my stomach can act up if I’m not careful, so when travelling, I prefer to drink bottled water.

If you’re wondering what’s the deal with this water matter, it’s because one bottle of water on the ship costs USD 6! But of course, if you don't’ mind drinking from the water dispenser then no issues here.

Room ready timing

On embarkation day, passengers can start boarding the ship from as early as around 11am. However, you might not have immediate access to your stateroom. On our cruise, we were only able to access our stateroom from 1.30pm.

Before that, the stateroom sections of the ship were cordoned off. This most likely is because the housekeeping team is turning over the rooms from the passengers that had just disembarked from the previous cruise.

For most passengers, they would head to the lunch locations for their lunch. Some even start using the pools or facilities that are open. There are also a few programmes that would have started, so make sure to check out the programme schedule as soon as you can so you don’t miss anything! Like we missed a trivia game that had started at 1pm - when we were still figuring things out around the ship!

We could access our stateroom from 1.30 pm

Luggage

At the cruise terminal, you have the option of checking in your luggage, or engaging the services of the staff on the ground (which require tipping by the way, at least in the US). Doing so means you won’t have to drag your heavy suitcases all the way with you on board the ship.

The downside of this is that the luggage might not reach your stateroom for a few hours. This means that if you want to soak in the hot tub immediately after boarding the ship, you’ll have to make sure your swim wear are with you on your carry on bags.

For us, our luggage only reached our rooms around 4pm. The staff (or cast members) will bring them up and leave them outside your stateroom door. They won’t knock on the door to inform you that the bags have arrived, so you’ll have to keep opening the door to check if your bags have been delivered.

This also means that you should keep your valuables and important items such as medication with you and not in the check in bags.

Most people went to have the buffet lunch at Marceline Market while waiting for their rooms to be ready and their luggage to arrive

Pirate night

On the second night of our 3-night cruise on the Disney Wish, there was Pirate Night. We had no idea that there was going to be this event! We first heard about it on the ship’s announcements in the morning.

When we returned to our stateroom in the afternoon, we found that the housekeeping staff had left disney-themed pirate bandanas in our room. Later that night, we found out that many other passengers had put in a lot of effort to dress up as pirates! Some were fully decked out in pirate costumes, some others were to a lesser extent. But many had joined in the fun.

They gave us free mickey pirate bandanas!

On some other cruises, like the Alaska cruise on the Disney Wonder, instead of Pirate Night, they have Frozen Night - I suppose that better suits the environment.