We chose this Disney Cruise because of the itinerary and the opportunity to take advantage of a seldom-offered good rate by this company. Traveling as two adults, we were not overly interested in the character greetings etc. but it was charming nonetheless. Disney does make a great effort to provide adult-only areas, which was appreciated.

We arrived at London Heathrow two days prior to embarkation day. We took the tube to Kings Cross/St. Pancras tube station, where we picked up prebooked train tickets to Canterbury using the ticket machines. At the same time, we picked up our prebooked tickets for the onward journey Canterbury to Dover (for embarkation day) and Dover back to St. Pancras for our trip home. The tube fare each way (using previously purchased Oyster Cards which we topped up using the ticket machines at Heathrow) was about 3GBP. The fares London to Canterbury and Dover to London were around 13 GBP when booked in advance. Certainly we were taking a chance that we might miss our train from London to Canterbury if our flight was late, but it all worked out smoothly.

We chose to stay the 2 nights ahead of the cruise in Canterbury as it seemed quainter than Dover and was only a 20 minute train ride away on embarkation day. We've been to London before so we decided to skip the hustle and bustle. At the Canterbury West train station, we took a taxi to our hotel (8 GBP.) We had prebooked the Premier Inn for around 54 GBP per night. Well worth it as it was a short, pleasant stroll to the pedestrian area of town and conveniently has a Tesco Express for food, sundries and wine/beer (great prices we thought) and also a Pizza Hut next door. As Disney allows 2 bottles of wine per person/per port, we bought 4 bottles to take on board with us. Read more