It all started, of course, with Disney's announcement of its Mediterranean itineraries, and our first priority (well, second, as first priority was to get that news out to our readers) was to secure our DCL Mediterranean reservations at the best possible rate. With that accomplished, we had time to actually think about what Disney had just gotten us into... Ohmygosh! We're going to have to write port-of-call descriptions for all those incredible destinations! It didn't take long to realize that we'd need to visit those ports now, and the Disney ships couldn't help us with that little problem.

As always, we hit the Internet and the book stores for some preliminary research. After a several day blitz of the web, and after buying and skimming a half-dozen guidebooks to a half-dozen destinations (and by a half-dozen different publishers), we had enough preliminary information to get started in earnest.

We considered the possibility of a fly/drive/rail visit to these great destinations, rather than a cruise. When we thought about all the details we'd have to address - hotel reservations in each city, travel from point-to-point, and added to that the recognition that we wouldn't be experiencing the seaports (which are often far from the destination city) or sampling the shore excursions that are cruise passengers' principle mode of touring, we realized that a cruise on another cruise line would probably be the best approach. But which cruise, on which line? There are more variations on "the Mediterranean cruise" than there are cruise ships (or so it seems). While we might have done all the research on our own, our time is precious (we were working on the manuscript for PassPorter Walt Disney World 2007 at the time). So, we recruited a fellow expert, travel agent Beci Mahnken at MEI-Travel.

(We have close relations with several travel agencies, and often several agents at each of those agencies, so choices like this are always difficult. Our apologies to all! Rest assured that, when you're dealing with travel writers/publishers, there will always be another trip to book.)

There was a time when we were too independent-minded to work with travel agents, but over the years we've learned that a good agent can be a valuable ally who can enhance our plans and save us time, effort and sometimes, a good bit of money. We still feel it's critical to continue to book a portion of our travel needs on our own and to be able to apply that experience to getting the most out of our collaboration with agents when we work with them. Besides, we can't advise our readers who do use agents without having that experience, too.

So we posed our needs to Beci: Hit as many of the same ports/destinations as Disney will visit, at an affordable price, and in time for us to incorporate our research into the new edition of the book. Beci also suggested we try to sail on a line that we'd never used before, to broaden our cruise industry experience.

As it turns out, Royal Caribbean had sent its Voyager of the Seas (normally based in the Caribbean) to the Mediterranean this year, and its itineraries nearly matched Disney's (we're confident Disney was well aware of RCCL's itineraries, and strove to offer something just a little bit different). The cruise home port is Barcelona, just as Disney's will be, and the ship visited all but two of Disney's destinations (Sicily and Sardinia). There was also a variation in one stop. Voyager of the Seas would be visiting Livorno, the most popular (and closest) cruise port to Florence and Pisa, while Disney chose the seldom-visited port of La Spezia, a bit farther north up the coast. That choice probably puts the Disney Magic out of reach of another popular destination in Tuscany, Siena (home to the famous Palio horse races), but it brings the Italian Riviera and some very attractive beachside villages within reach.

So, the itinerary was as close to a match with Disney's as we could find, there were some great discounts available, it was on a new cruise line for us... so we seemed to have the right cruise. All that was needed now was airfare, and an extended stay in the home port of Barcelona. We wanted a more in-depth look at that dynamic city for the sake of the cruisers who will be adding a few days there pre/post cruise.

In all our years of cruising, we've never taken advantage of cruise air - the cruise lines' own air travel services. For travel within the U.S. we've always felt that we can do better on our own for price and schedule. However, as we began to research airfare and connections from Detroit to Barcelona, cruise air didn't seem such a bad idea. The airfare quote from RCCL (again, at a special rate) was little different than the rates we were getting directly from the airlines, and prospects for a really juicy airfare sale over the horizon seemed remote - taxes on European flights are incredibly high, and no matter how we sliced things, we kept coming up with the same number - over $800/person. As each leg of a European flight entails over $100 in taxes, the bargain flights that generally required an extra "hop" to reap the savings weren't such bargains after all, once the extra taxes were added in. So, we decided to lock-in with RCCL. We'd be assured of flights that got us where we needed to be, when we needed to be there. If an extra overnight stay was required, it'd be the cruise line's expense, and ground transfers were included in the airfare. We continued to monitor airfares, just to see if anything changed. It did. Fares went up. By the time RCCL sent us our preliminary flight itinerary, the same flights booked directly with the airline would have cost us over $600 more, each. Not only that, but the cruise line could have booked us on much cheaper connecting flights between Detroit and Philadelphia (direct flight from Philadelphia to Barcelona), resulting in a very long layover (never great when you're traveling with a two-year-old). Instead, they put us on the connection that gave us the shortest layover. Two hops (no direct flights to Barcelona from Detroit), short layover... Bravo!

All that was left was our extended stay in Barcelona. Again, we chose to book our extra stay through RCCL. We think that a significant number of Disney cruisers will turn to Disney for their pre/post hotel stay, and RCCL would be offering many of the same hotels Disney will. We wanted a reasonably equivalent experience. We'd preferred a pre-cruise stay, since we needed to get back to the office ASAP to finish up the book and get it to the printer. As it turned out, that was not so easy. Our ship sails on September 29, right at the tail end of Barcelona's biggest, week-long festival, The Feast of La Mercè. Room availability was scarce. While normally, hotels don't have a problem with a family of three (2-year-old Alexander is traveling with us) in a double room, this time, no go, not even for an extra fee. So, we chose (by default) to stay two extra nights post-cruise. While we would have liked to stay at a hotel within walking distance of the port (it's a pedestrian- and tourist-friendly port, and the heart of the old city is just a short stroll from the water), the budget didn't quite allow it, so we'll be near the city's new convention center, about a mile and a half from the port. On the bright side, it helps us shift our focus from the neighborhood of the port to the city as a whole.

So, that's where things stand as of early August. Between now and our departure we have to select shore excursions (we'll each take a different excursion in each port), and research, research, research. Wish us well!