When planning for up coming Cruises Steve and I generally take a lot of time to hammer out which excursions we want to do. Knowing ahead of time what we want to do is important because when our booking day opens up we can be sure to reserve our spot and know that it won't be sold out. With Disney they have all of the excursions for each port already detailed on their website which makes it easy to determine which ones will be a good fit for your family. They give you highlights of the excursion, cost involved, ages of children allowed, and the amount of time it will take. They also tell you the amount of physical activity required and whether there will be food provided. When we sit down to look through our options we first do a quick overview to see what they have to offer and what stands out to us. We talk about them as a family and find out what everyone is interested in. This generally leaves us with a list of 2-3 to choose from at each port. When planning the excursions for our Mexican Riviera Cruise our daughter was completely smitten with the idea of swimming with a dolphin it was definitely at the top of her list. 
We refine that list by double checking the ages of children allowed. On many of the adventures it seems that five is the magic age. For kids younger than five there are only a few to choose from and they tend to be bus rides and tours of the town. When our children were under the age of five many times we opted to not do an excursion and simply go to the beach or walk thru the town and shop. This gave us the freedom to decide when, as a family and our kids endurance level, to go back to the ship for naps. When we were in St. Maarten we simply let the kids play on the beach and collect sea shells. They built a great sand castle and it didn't cost us much money except for the ice cream we bought nearby. Now that our kids are reaching the age where we can choose some exciting adventures we find that our next step is to look at the amount of physical activity and what type it is to gauge whether our own children and even us adults are up for it. Just because my daughter wants to scale a glacier or repel down a steep canyon doesn't really mean that she is quite ready to do so. And, if I must admit I'm not sure that I am up for that much adventure either. When my father cruised with us we wanted to make certain that there was not to much walking involved because of the arthritis in his knees. Whale watching was a great choice for our family that day. 
Finally we consider the duration of the adventure. One of the things I really wanted to do on our last cruise was to take the White Pass Train thru the historic Chilkoot Trail in Skagway. However, when we looked at the duration of the trip we realized that it was quite long and probably would not suit our kids well. My parents confirmed this for us when they took their Cruise to Alaska a month later and said that the 12 year old boy sitting in front if them slept on the way back. They said although they loved it they could not see our kids enjoying for as long as it was. The last thing we consider is of course what our budget will allow. How much can we afford? This really does help us to fine tune exactly what is the most important to us and what we can eliminate or scale back on. Doing this on our Alaska cruise really helped us chose the one excursion we all really wanted to experience and made it easier to say no to other adventures so that we could afford it. Now that we are back home from our trip that one excursion is the first thing we tell of when we share about our vacation.
One more thing to look into before your finalize your booking reservations is if booking the things you want to do on your own with out going through Disney Port Excursions Services is more cost effective and feasible. Although I have never done this I have heard of people who do and generally save quite a bit of money. Sometimes it is worth the doing this way. Just remember that when you do it on your own you are giving up transportation from the ship to your destination and the guarantee that you will be back before the ship departs. If you book thru your ships excursion desk they will never leave you behind in ports because of a delay getting back. In fact they will hold the ship for you. On those days when you are only in port for a short day you will want to be very careful about getting back on time. We always save our Disney dollars that we earn on our Disney Visa to help us cover these cost along with buying Disney gifts using our red card from target to save 5%. Once we get on board we go directly to guest services and have these gift cards applied to our account and then our port excursions are paid for. Picking your excursions is important and can bring you many memories to look back on as a family. My number one piece of advice is to do what you can afford, and what you will love because you will never regret it. 
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