I initially covered the planning for the cruise in our post about our 2017 Christmas trip, but I’ll summarize it again here.  In May 2016, Disney Cruise Line had just announced the fall/winter sailings for 2017.  After scanning through offerings, I noticed a 5-Night Western Caribbean sailing out of Miami on the Magic.  It would leave on December 24, 2017.  The prices were really high, but that’s to be expected with a holiday cruise.  We had a placeholder available from our Spring Break 2016 sailing, but it appeared that this cruise was blocked out from receiving the 10% discount.  This left us having to pay full price for the cruise if we wanted to take it.  The itinerary was one we have done a few times before.  Departing Miami, there would be a sea day, followed by a stop in Cozumel.  The sailing would then have another sea day followed by a stop at Castaway Cay, then return to Miami.

Our initial price was $6,034.52, including trip insurance.  It did not include ground or air transportation since we planned to visit Orlando first and drive to the cruise terminal.  We reserved stateroom 2512, which is on the starboard (right) side of the ship, all the way forward.  This would also be our first time on the Magic!  I would normally have preferred a verandah but those staterooms were $1,500 more.  We have sailed in an oceanview stateroom before and found them to be more than acceptable.  We thought we might try to upgrade when arriving at the port, but we would still enjoy the room if upgrades were not available.

Our first change to this plan arrived with Hurricane Matthew.  Hurricane Matthew impacted the Florida area in October 2016.  Nancy and I had planned a 20th anniversary cruise on the Disney Dream for October 7, 2016.  A couple of days prior to the cruise, we were notified by Disney Cruise Line that it would not take place because of Hurricane Matthew.  We were refunded the entire cost of our cruise, plus an additional 20% off a future cruise if we took it before the end of 2017.  When we found out about the future cruise discount, we reached out to our travel agent to have it applied to the December 2017 cruise.  It was great that we were able to apply this discount, because holiday cruises are ineligible for onboard booking discounts due to blackout dates.  We ended up saving a significant amount of money on this cruise because of it, with final costs close to what we had paid for the canceled October cruise.

Miami (Pre-Cruise) Hotel

We needed to get a room in Miami for our pre-cruise stay.  Fortunately, because of our IHG Rewards credit card, we had a free night that we used to book the Intercontinental Miami, one of our favorite places. 

Walt Disney World (Post Cruise) Hotels

Once we got off the ship, we would also need some hotel stays in the Walt Disney World area for the days before New Year’s.  We used our free nights from the Hyatt credit card to book two nights at the Hyatt Place Orlando/Lake Buena Vista, which is near Disney Springs. 

Since we had planned out the trip in conjunction with our Christmas trip to Walt Disney World, we were very excited for the entire trip to kick off.

Full Trip Report:  Planning | Travel  | Boarding | Day At Sea | Cozumel | Day At Sea | Castaway Cay | Disembarkation

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