The finer details, aka - where is this place?

Since I had almost 2 years to plan this trip (obsessive much?), I had plenty of time to explore our options.

Cabin with a verandah was booked.
Early dining was chosen.

I was off to a good start.

The first option to contemplate was when to fly to San Juan?  In case you didn't know it, most Southern Caribbean cruises either:
a) Are a long trip - over 7 days (usually 10-12), leaving from the mainland    OR
b) Leave from a port that is further South of Florida, like San Juan, Puerto Rico

Checking airline itineraries had me realizing it would take a full day to get down there.  So we decided to book a hotel and fly in a day early.  Even flying in a day early has us arriving at 9:30 p.m. on Friday - not ideal to sightsee.

With that in mind, we booked the Sheraton OSJ:

This hotel can only be booked for a minimum of 2 nights on their website, but I was able to book one night through Expedia, don't ask me why, I really don't know.

Flights were another dilemma.  The flights from our local airports were too expensive, over $800 each.  Luckily, I was able to watch the flights from MSP and happily scored a deal we can live with.

So, where are we going?

Our itinerary is as follows:
Saturday - We board the Magic for our 7 nights of Disney-filled fun
Sunday - At sea day
Monday - St. Johns, Antigua - 7 am - 4:45 pm
Tuesday - Castries, St. Lucia - 7:15 am - 4:45 pm
Wednesday - St. George's, Grenada - 7 am - 4:45 pm
Thursday - Bridgetown, Barbados - 7 am - 4:45 pm
Friday - Basseterre, St. Kitts - 12 pm - 5:30 pm
Saturday - Depart the ship - unwillingly of course

So what do you do if you have no idea about your destinations but want to be obsessive-compulsive in your planning?  For a Disney twist, I troll disboards.com .  But I also found 2 excursions that I booked by reading from the good folks over at cruisecritic.com .  Sometimes Disney gets a little. . . well. . . TOO Disney and I need a break from it all.  Cruise Critic is a good balance, plus they gave me options for if I don't want a giant rat accompanying me on all my island ventures.

I'm most looking forward to this (but that's for another blog):

And that's all. . . until next time when I dive into what excursions we have chosen.