Disney Cruise Tech and some tips
We just got back from a short little Disney cruise on the Disney Dream ship and I noticed some things that I thought were interesting that I wanted to jot down for my own future reference. Since this blog is my personal Knowledge Base, you get to read it too. Ha!
This was our very first Disney Cruise and I wish I would have known/read about this somewhere prior to boarding. We are Disney Theme park Pass Holders and everything we do at the parks is tied to our Magic Bands. For some reason, I thought the cruise would be similar. I really thought all room keys and transactions would be done via a Magic Band. Not so on the ships (or at least the one I was one). As soon as we boarded the ship, a plastic Key to the World card was printed up for each of us and was used for pretty much everything on the ship including room access, port of call entry/reentry and all purchases. Since almost all of you reading this post are tech veterans, here’s a tip: Bring a conference lanyard with card holder for each guest to put this card into. As first time cruisers, we were not given a holder for the cards and had to keep them in our pockets, etc. The lanyards would have been excellent for the kids and would have been a real asset on beach and pool outings. I’m sure like me, you have dozens of these hanging by your desk from all of the tech conferences you’ve attended in the past. Bring them.
And while you have them, bring one of your printed conference badges as well. Assuming it’s normal credit card size, you can use it in your room to keep the lights on. Each room, as you walk in, has a little card slot that you would normally put your Key to the World card into to activate the lights/electricity in the cabin. If your Disney cards are in your lanyard, you can just leave an old conference badge in the card slot so that lights will always be on when you get back to your cabin. It’s a neat little trick and works well.
The next thing that I saw on the cruise that I loved were the Disney Wave phones.
Each stateroom came with 2 of these rechargeable portable old-school IP Phones. They worked all over the ship and also on Disney’s private island for ship to ship and ship to shore communications. These things were great for my kids allowing them to explore the ship and head to the kid’s club while still being able to stay in contact with us. Of course Disney also has a Navigator App that can be downloaded to an old iPhone or iPod but these things were just so convenient. I think they are unique to the Disney cruise line. Another option for using all the tips here would be to use lanyards with pouches on the bottom to hold an old iPod/iPhone and the card.
Something like this : Link
This would have allowed communication with the kids over Wi-Fi (there is no free cell service on the ship when out in the ocean) and given them the additional ability to take photos as well as they explored the ship.
Happy Cruising!