Book online or use a Travel Agent?? About This Page:

[MontiMouse]

We are planning our first Disney cruise for 2007 and I don't know if I should book the trip myself online or use a travel agent. Anyone have recommendations??? Or can recommend a travel agent??

[iamgrumpy]

I usually book our trips to WDW myself but had no idea how to go about the cruise this year and so I decided I would shop around some Travel Agencies first. I decided after getting some quotes to use themouseforless.com travel agency they are a free service and they had our date on special. I have used Deb and have been very happy with the service.

Now after booking with her I have to say it was nice not having to stress over whether its booked right or not. You can book it right off of Disney's website but sometimes agencies buy blocks of staterooms and can discount the date your looking for.

I would ask for quotes from a few online Agencies and price it on your own through Disney. Go with who saves you the most.

Have a great time planning your Cruise!

[wwaaww]

I am sure there are pro's and con's to both ways of booking. Since we went with a group, I arranged for a local AAA travel agent to handle everything. We were coming from all over the USA and she was very accomodating to all the families. We even had fabulous gifts in our staterooms when we arrived. Her name is Ingrid and she's with AAA - Michigan. If you want her contact information I will be happy to provide it to you.

Happy traveling!

[Cam22]

We booked our cruise through Sam's Club and have had not problems and got a great deal.

[KrisLuvsDisney]

This is a good question Monica! We are planning to do this in the future too and I was wondering the same thing!

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[SHEANA1226]

It is whatever you are most comfortable with. My first 2 cruises I booked with a travel agent and after that I started booking most of our trips on my own. A travel agent can give you a lot of great information. So talk to a couple and make a decision from there.

[Dave Marx]

If you book at the Disney Cruise Line site, you'll get whatever the current price is. Usually, that will be the same prices that travel agents can offer. However, agencies sometimes reserve a block of staterooms at early booking savings, then offer those savings later, when Disney's prices have gone up. If you're looking at 2007 pricing, you probably won't find a lot of special deals yet - they tend to appear later, as reservations become more scarce. If the agency doesn't have a special deal like that to offer, the rates will be the same as Disney's current pricing.

A good agent can enhance your vacation, at no extra cost. I suggest if you want to work with an agent, go with a Disney Specialist agent who at the least has attended the College of Disney Knowledge, and preferably has cruised with Disney several times. You can learn about a bunch of such agents and agencies from folks on these boards. Personally, we've always had very good experiences with MouseEarVacations, which advertises here. AAA is the single biggest seller of Disney vacations (outside of Disney itself). The quality (and education) of the individual agent you work with at AAA will vary, but AAA sometimes comes up with deals nobody else can offer.

Some folks will tell you to look for "Earmarking" as a way of selecting an agent. Note, however, that "Earmarking" is a designation based on the dollar value of the bookings made by the agency. A large, reputable agency can achieve this distinction without a lot of difficulty, but there are also small agencies who have all the expertise and reputation, but are simply too small to sell the amount of vacations needed to be Earmarked.

[Disney Franatic]

We've used www.yourmagicaljourneys.com for our WDW trips and they are great!!! They've always gotten us the best rates for our vacations to see the mouse. Everyone we've recommended to use them loves them too.

[JoanW]

We've done it both ways. Our first Land/Sea trip I booked online, only spoke to a human once and it was fine. The price was astronomical, but I booked it two months before we left (we waited till we got a school calendar for the year).

The second cruise we booked through MouseEar Vacations, as mentioned by Dave previously. Tim Larison was our rep, and he was great. He accomodated my ever changing guest list and was very easy to work with.

[MontiMouse]

Thanks everyone for your input. I just went ahead and booked our cruise online using the Disney website!!