Welcome aboard, Monica!
Sailing with
Disney Cruise Line is my family's favorite way to travel. We enjoy Captain Mickey's cruises even more than we enjoy the
Disneyland Resort or the
Walt Disney World Resort, which says a lot, since we love the Disney Parks and resorts so much! We actually looked into the
Disney Vacation Club, and after talking with the agents multiple times, decided it wasn't best for us at that point since the majority of our trips are with Disney Cruise Line, not necessarily longer stays at the Disney Resorts. The points didn't transfer as well, or get as much "bang for the buck", on the cruises as they do for the fabulous Disney Resorts. So, for us, we stuck with not joining the Disney Vacation Club, and we simply book our Disney Cruise Line vacations directly through Disney. However, for friends of ours that visit the resorts all the time, they are saving a ton of money by being Disney Vacation Club members, and they do get to stay in some pretty amazing Disney resorts!
That being said, if you come to a year when you have a lot of extra points to use, perhaps sailing with Disney with those points would be a good way to use them up. Other than that, I'd probably recommend simply booking and paying for your Disney Cruise Line vacation on your own and saving those points for where they'll go further: stays at the amazing Disney Vacation Club properties. We love to create our own
land and sea adventures with a stay at the Walt Disney World Resort before we sail out to sea with Disney Cruise Line, so you could do the same thing! Use your vacation club points for an amazing pre-cruise stay at the Disney Resorts, then set out on the high seas with Captain Mickey and his crew, paying for that separately.
There are charts and information available from Disney Vacation Club that outline points necessary for cruises so you may want to at least check that out for a particular sailing and see how that might work out for you. It's always good to investigate specific scenarios, Monica!
Have fun planning, and either way, I sure hope you sail with Disney very soon!
Marcy