Cabo San Lucas anyone?

Where to start?!??!? I have been so full of nervous energy and excitement that the ability to sit still long enough to blog had deserted me.

The 21st of September seemed like a lifetime ago. Another monumental life-changing day was to be had on the 28th of September. Why are these dates so important you may ask? As my dear friend Hester would say, "WELL..."

The privileged platinimum and gold members were able to book the Disney 2011 cruises on the 21st of September. I kept nervously refreshing my disboards page as I read posts on member's waiting times on the phone..."got through at 8:03am, waiting time 16 minutes", "got through at 8:12am, waiting time 57 minutes", "8:23, waiting time of 647minutes" WHAT?!?!?! That can't be right. I can't afford to make such a long international call just to be kept on hold. Bugger, what now? The good news was that the cruise hadn't sold out. One of the previous Disney Panama Canal cruise sold out in 4 hours.

The troops had to regather and formulate a new plan of attack. Guerilla warfare was in order here. Our new motto was get on the ship AT ALL COSTS! In the process, we collected another family to join us on our adventures. Woohoo!!! We now have a slightly better adult to children ratio of 7:9. We decided to go with a travel agent, a Disney vacation specialist of course. We armed her with our credit card ready for battle on the 28th of September, when everyone else gets their chance to book the 2011 cruises. She assured us that we were her number 1 priority. We expected no less.

At 9:39pm our time (21 minutes before bookings opened), I logged onto the disboards to discover that online reservations had apparently already started. Frantically, I sent an email to the frontline to let her know (just in case, even though she mentioned that she would be online an hour early and be on the phone as well). She confirmed that she was already online and the stateroom acquisation had begun. By 10:01 pm, she had accomplished her mission of securing our 4 staterooms. By 10:14pm, our category had sold out! 5 minutes after this, early dining had closed.

WAHOOO!!!!! We are going on a Panama Canal cruise!!!!!