Disney Cruise Line threw us all a little curve ball with an email announcement on June 6 –

We are pleased you will be sailing with us soon and want to share with you some additional information about a few activities that are included in your cruise vacation that can be reserved online.

On Tuesday, June 7, 2016, we will open the opportunity for Guests to pre-book a special character breakfast and two of many meet & greet opportunities with our world famous Disney Characters online. As a Platinum Castaway Club Member, we wanted you to be among the first to know.

If you are interested in securing bookings for a Disney Character Breakfast, Princess Gathering or a Frozen Meet & Greet during your cruise vacation, please visit the My Disney Cruise section of www.disneycruise.com on or after Tuesday, June 7, 2016, to pre-book these experiences.

The email did not list when these would go live, and my cruise is only eight days away!  Being the over-eager booking fanatic that I am, I stayed up until midnight eastern, hoping to book these new offerings. With bleary eyes, I gave up around 12:30 a.m.  Ever the optimist, I was back online around 6:00 a.m. trying again to secure these reservations. Tap, Tap, Tap…anyone home?

Finally, just after 9:00 a.m. Eastern, the VIP Character Breakfast starting appearing. I was able to secure that reservation quickly, and then the system had technical difficulties. Heading off to work, I called my trusted travel agent to check on those elusive character meet and greets for me. After many technical difficulties, she was able to book them for us.

These bookings are now available for future cruises as soon as your booking window opens (120 days for Platinum Castaways, 105 days for Gold Castaways, 90 days for Silver Castaways and 75 days for first-time cruisers. Concierge guests will receive tickets to these events as a routine perk). The VIP Character Breakfast is only available on select cruises of 7-nights or longer. Best news ever – all of these activities are included for free! So how do you book? Let me show you!

After logging into the Disney Cruise Line website, click on My Disney Cruise, then My Reservations and then Explore Activities. You will then need to click on a cruise day. The VIP Character Breakfast is offered only on sea days. The Meet & Greets are offered at various times; you will need to click on each day to see what is available.

Once you have chosen a day, your screen should look something like this:

After clicking on On Board Fun, the next screen will offer two or more choices. My screen looked like this:

For the VIP Character Breakfast, you may see this option (some have reported seeing Disney Jr Breakfast listed):

This breakfast was offered in 15-minute increments from 8:00 – 10:00 a.m. Each guest is allowed to book only one breakfast.

For the Meet & Greet, you will see these options:

On my cruise, both Meet & Greets were offered in 15-minute increments. The Frozen Meet & Greet hours were 9:00 a.m. – 12:15 p.m. The Princess Gathering Meeting & Greet hours were 9:00 -10:15 a.m. Each guest is allowed to book one time slot for each Meet & Greet.

I hope this helps as you pre-book these fun activities!