Live from the Halloween Magic!!!! 10/28/06

[misseulalie]

Hello everyone!

Right now I am sitting in the Promenade lounge watching the rocky waves roll by. I just figured out how to log on, and I have approx. 99 minutes left!!!

I will write a trip report of how things are going so far, but will post it later.

Just wanted to say "hi" to everyone and that we have GREAT DIS members on board. We had our meet and greet yesterday and took a fabulous group photo, and tomorrow we will be having a DIS only trick or treat!

I need to get ready for Formal night and grab the kids from the club...

Talk to you all soon!!!!

Jennifer

[wltdsnyfan]

Thanks for taking the time to post. Looking forward to your report. :sunny:

[Disneygrl36]

Subbing to come along for the ride.......
Have a great trip. :wizard:
Happy almost Halloween. :hmghost:

[Kellie Pickler]

OH MY GAWD!!! You mean that you are on the Mickey boat right now?!?!?!? How cool!!! :) The DIS is such a cool place!

[Pea-n-Me]

Sounds great!! Tell kritter (Kristen) her friends from the multiples thread are thinking of her, will you? Thanks. Have an awesome cruise!! :sail:

[DisneyDmbNut]

Sailing out...Say hi to Fran from her sister!
http://homepage.mac.com/momme30/.Pictures/Photo%20Album%20Pictures/2006-10-29%2017.43.22%20-0800/Image-F89AD2D367B711DB.jpg
http://homepage.mac.com/momme30/.Pictures/Photo%20Album%20Pictures/2006-10-29%2017.43.22%20-0800/Image-F89F82D467B711DB.jpg

[pppiglet]

How cool is this? First I check in to the transportation board and Ty Pennington is on it and now Kellie Pickler on a Magic thread! Woo hoo!

[PhotoLisa]

There was a post from a recent Wonder cruise about the changes to the Castaway Club Reception that was not favorable.

Can you PLEASE let us know what the reception is currently like on the Magic? We sail in February and I can't imagine warm sodas and mickey crispies!!! Please tell me it isn't so on the Magic!

Enjoy your vacation!!

Lisa

[awoltoday]

Everybody here is having a great time! I just wanted to post a quick picture of the new KTTW cards! There are special gold ones for concierge and this is the pic of the castaway club member card

http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a131/awoltoday/kttwcard2.jpg

Nothing else new to report other than a rumor of a new brand of fish extender from "Solo" ;) pirate:

[interested]

I wish I could say otherwise BUT the reception we attended 2 weeks ago had crispies and soda, coffee and o.j.

We probably will not continue to attend the meets as it seems less organized and certainly doesn't have the same "treats". My husband LOVES the coconut shrimp.

There was a point that they were going to draw for prizes and Rachel said she would have 2 CMs help pick assts (children) from the audience. There was a precious little one that got up and raised her hand, the one counselor looked straight at her and then looked away. That poor little one stood there the whole time they picked out the other helpers. ALL from tables that were surrounding hers! Maybe there is some age requirement. I would like to give the benefit of the doubt. This child was probably around 4-5. I later noticed that the 2 CMs that picked the children seemed to work with the bigger kids, probably 8+.

At any rate, maybe I was so in tuned to this because the reception was quite disappointing.

[tksbaskets]

I love live posts! Thanks for sharing your trip with us.

[mom x4,grandma x4]

did you have live music at your sail away party, if so, what did you think of the band??

mom x4,grandma x4

[stampinshauna]

I hope all of you on the Magic right now are having a FABULOUS time. I was there last year and the year before that I was in WDW after getting off the Magic. It's sure going to be strange (and boring) being at home this Halloween.

[pgfour]

Can't wait to hear more! We leave in less than 30 days for a post-Thanksgiving extravaganza! :cool1:

[jsfein]

Will be on the Magic immediately following you. Would you please post which night is the Pirate's Party. Thanks and enjoy the rest of your cruise!!!!

[PhotoLisa]

Will be on the Magic immediately following you. Would you please post which night is the Pirate's Party. Thanks and enjoy the rest of your cruise!!!!

I think you're on the Western, is that correct?

If so, Pirate Night is Cozumel night - Day 5 - Wednesday. We did the Western last February (but went to Costa Maya due to storm damage) and it was on Wednesday. I also looked at a navigator from a western trip in June and it was the same night as Cozumel - Wednesday.

HTH

[misseulalie]

Hello everyone!

Didn’t get a chance to post yesterday, but today was Halloween on the Magic!!! We had a great DIS trick or treat and it was wonderful to see all the great door signs, costumes and wonderful goodies. The kids got SO much candy!!!! Other kids were wondering what we were doing and how we got so much candy. Thanks everyone. I will try to attach some photos.
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f162/jbendriss/DSC00291.jpg

http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f162/jbendriss/DSC00305.jpg

Well, the new bath products are here. They are ok, nothing special in my book.
We have a fantastic wait staff (Malwyn and Sameer, both from India. Fritz is the head server; he comes by twice every evening. I would highly recommend them. They brought us the chocolate soufflés from Palo!!!! Now, no point in spending $10 when we got the soufflés served at AP.

I heard there is still international day for lunch at Topsiders, but haven’t gone yet….

Everyone told me that Tea with Wendy wasn’t worth it, but had to try it. Yep, it stunk….
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f162/jbendriss/DSC00245.jpg

We brought 12 bottles of water, so far, we only drank 1 bottle. I don’t think I will go to all the trouble bringing water. The water on the ship is just fine… Maybe just a bottle to use while in port.

My dd (5) got to be on stage with Snow White at the Golden Mickeys!!!!
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f162/jbendriss/DSC00206.jpg

I’m very proud of myself, I was brave enough to take someone’s belongings and move them from a lounge chair!!! I was sitting on a lounge chair… the one next to me had a pair of shorts on it and it sat empty for 1 hour and 10 minutes. Well, my mom wanted a chair, so I took the shorts off the chair and moved them to another chair. No one came for another 20 minutes. When they did come, they said nothing… I think they knew that would happen. I was expecting them to say something so I had a whole speech ready, even showing the stamped “no saving lounge chairs for extended periods of time” on the top of the lounge chair, but nothing… oh well, I have another opportunity tomorrow!

I tried the “All Hands on Deck”. Why do people get all excited about this???
It was ok, but wasn’t worth all the hype. The cookies weren’t very good this trip either, they always seemed burnt….
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f162/jbendriss/DSC00262.jpg

They did have live music at the sail away party...I think, but I spent the whole time taking pic's of DD's dancing.

I didn't go to the CC party, it was the same time as something else; I don't remember now....

Well, I think that’s it for now… will write more tomorrow.

Night all….

Jennifer

[nzdisneymom]

A Dis-only Trick or Treat - sounds like a blast!!!! Are there many kids on board this time?

[TChrist05]

Sounds like the kids had a blast today for Halloween.....we just got off the Wonder on Sunday and taking the Magic in 26 days.....the post Thanksgiving cruise.....keep the live trip reports coming....anyone know if Sasha Sakic is still on the Magic??? Last time we were on he was home on vacation....he was working in Palo's.....could someone try and find out for me since he is very well known to the wait staff.....Thanks!
Tom :cool1:

[firemans wife]

Thanks for posting Jennifer. Sounds like you are having a great time. I too will be on the Magic after Thanksgiving cruise. :woohoo:

firemans wife :firefight

[3riverscruiser]

Is your head server named Fritz or Fitz -- Fitz is a very jovial Jamaican who was the best server we ever had. We are hoping he is still on the Magic and will be on for our January cruise. Just wonderin'.

[Laurarn]

Great report! Totally agree about the "All Hands on Deck" platter. Yours looks nice and neat. Ours came just thrown together. Just a couple crackers and slices of cheese.

Fitz is on the Magic. We had him 2 weeks ago. He was great! :thumbsup2

[DisneyDmbNut]

I agree...hers looks nice..

I ordered mine after a nap and I was so hungry that I enjoyed it anyway!

If you run into Fran or Dave...tell them their sister says "HI!"

[Kellie Pickler]

All those kiddies look so cute!!!

[tyedye]

Hi Kellie, Doesn't your cd come out today?!? Guess the tag fairy is a bit slow today. pixiedust:

[DisneyDmbNut]

Can't see you guys cause that "other" boat is in the way...but it looks like a gorgeous day!!!
http://homepage.mac.com/momme30/.Pictures/netcam.jpg

[TYTY]

Some friends of mine are on that cruise - I can't wait to hear from them when they get back. :banana:

[misseulalie]

We're back!!! :guilty:


Sorry I didn't post much. I ran out of minutes and my bar bill was getting high, so I had to set priorities!!!!

I will write up a final report by this evening, just wanted to say hello and that we all had a great time!!!! I am not looking forward to cooking dinner tonight. I think that is the worst part.

It's funny, as I sit here, I feel like the house is rocking back and forth. We had the WORST weather last night! Gale force winds and huge waves. I think 13 feet. The door to the closet kept sliding back and forth and you could hear the water in the toilet sloushing around. I don't think anyone slept last night...

Jennifer

[msaseifert]

Can't wait to hear your report!! THANKS for sharing

[Stephieann]

Took this for you guys last saturday
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f176/stephieann74/10280622-1.jpg

[GoofyDrivesACar]

It's funny, as I sit here, I feel like the house is rocking back and forth. We had the WORST weather last night! Gale force winds and huge waves. I think 13 feet. The door to the closet kept sliding back and forth and you could hear the water in the toilet sloushing around. I don't think anyone slept last night...

Jennifer

We ran into someone at the airport who was also on this cruise, and he said his bath tub broken last night and he had a water issue. I didn't get any other details, but it was bad. My DH is still sick from it. Can't wait to read your trip report.

[misseulalie]

Well, here goes nothing! I'm not a very creative writer, so there probably won't be funny jokes or stories. I still think GrumpyDude gave the best trip report yet, so no way to beat it, but here it is....

Cast of characters:
Me (mom of 2 girls) DH was in Germany for business.
(hmmm.... Germany+October = Oktoberfest!!!!)

My girls: Sophia(5), Lena (3)

My parents who never cruised before:
Dad (Newly retired; think Archie Bunker, but with nothing to do all day)
Mom (who was grateful to get out the house with newly retired Archie)

We had two adjoining cat 9's.

Day one:
Got to the port around 10:30. I live about 35-40 minutes from the port so it was an easy drive.
I was shocked to get a number 5 boarding call. 5??? The port just opened 30 minutes ago!!!
Oh well... I quickly saw lots of Dis'ers. Very easy to spot since we were all wearing green braclets.
No upgrades available; supposedly the cruise was completely booked.
Got through checking within a few minutes, so we sat for almost 90 minutes waiting to board. Last time we cruised, we were able to get on board before 11:30, so I assumed it would be around the same time. But with a 5 boarding pass, it ended up being closer to noon.

Dad was bored so he got a head start embarrassing Sophia by introducing her to other kids.
( This would be an on-going thing... He would walk around going to kids saying "look, this is Sophia, she's 5, where are you from??" The mom's would grab their kids and walk away fast..)
(We also soon got the arsenal of "critiques" of everyone on the ship. Did I say my father reminded me of Archie Bunker?? No race, culture, or gender was omitted) Oh well, we all have a black sheep of the family, mine just happens to be my father.

After we got on board, we went straight to change our dining time. We had late seating but wanted early. We were able to get 5:45 and had PLAPLAP rotation. I couldn't imagine eating at 8:15pm.
After that we went to lunch at Parrot Cay. Pretty good lunch. Dad couldn't believe we didn't get a check. How would we know how much to tip???

Finished lunch and had to wait until our room was ready. We had rooms 2122 and 2124. Nice aft rooms. I loved the location and booked it again for a cruise in the future. Close to the elevators, easy to get to the restaurants, shutters, drink bar, topsiders and the pools.

http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f162/jbendriss/DSC00196.jpg

Got the kids ready for the pool and took them swimming for about 2 hours. I had a DIS meet at 3pm, and finally got to see all the chat mates! We took a group photo and saw the infamous yellow speedo!

Boat drill was predictable and finally got sailing! Dad had the camera ready and it stayed glued to his face for the entire trip. I actually think he took all 7 days on tape...
Sail away was fun, girls danced (well Lena danced; Sophia pouted...)

http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f162/jbendriss/DSC00181.jpg

Got back to the room, got dressed and went to dinner at Parrot Cay.
We had Sameer and Malwyn from India for our server/***'t server. The first night I wasn't too sure about them, but they really were great and hope they are on the Med. cruise. They supposedly both already signed contracts through the end of next summer.
Fitz was the head server and he came by twice every night. I'll tell you more about what he did later...

Great dinner, dad was still kinda confused about tipping but I think he finally got it around the 3rd night.

Took Sophia to the kid's club and we went to the 8:30 show. Can't remember their names but saw a musician and juggler. They were pretty good, but didn't care for the wierd breaks in between where the cruise director would speak about different topics.

Got Sophia from the club and went to unpack.
Couldn't sleep so I watched the Da Vinci Code on TV.

That's it for day one! Hopefully not to boring!!! :wave:
If anyone else from the cruise is reading this, please feel free to jump in!!

Jennifer

[pansmermaidzlagoon]

great start to the trip report!!!!!! :sunny: We were right down the hall from you - 2147...kept passing your door!!!!


Friday night was really something - no sleep for me!

DD is in the Halloween pic - the little princess in the lower right that isn't smiling - ah well....

thank you to everyone who posted the cam pics of the ship!!!!!!

can't wait to hear more of your report!!!! :wizard:

[misseulalie]

Day 2 and 3 (not much happened so I combined these days)

These next two days were seas days, so we spent a lot of time at the pool. I was very surprised to see that the pools were not horribly over crowded. I was able to get a chaise lounge by the pool both days. (Though I did have to "steal" one!)

We got up, had room service for coffee (which we did every morning) then we went to Topsiders for real breakfast. After breakfast, I took my girls to the pool and my parents walked around the ship. We took turns watching the girls and walking around the ship. I met up with one of the DIS members who was mentioning how tired her daughter was these past two days. As we were talking, Lena (DD 3) laid down on the chaise and sent to sleep! She would do this everytime we went to the pool. She would swim a little bit, then lay down with towels covering her and go to sleep.
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f162/jbendriss/DSC00284.jpg

We grabbed some lunch by the pool and went to get seats for the mantinee show of the Golden Mickey's. I knew they choose kids to go on stage with Snow White, so I started looking for a CM. I found one talking to some guests and I asked her about getting my daughters to participate. She said "that's me" and she looked at my girls. She saw Sophia first and said she would be perfect, then she looked at Lena (yes, she still uses a pacifier; don' judge me!!!!! I just got her potty trained. One thing at a time!!! :rolleyes: )
The CM said "she's a little young, I don't think she could keep up". I have a feleling if Lena didn't have the pacifier in her mouth, she would have been choosen. She is 3 1/2, w/o the pacifier she could pass for 4, but with it; no older than 3.
Oh well, the show was great and Sophia loved being on stage. she was upset that her hat kept coming off, but had a great time regardless.
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f162/jbendriss/DSC00206.jpg

We got dressed, went to dinner and went to bed early. (We had a boring day at sea...)

The next day, we went to the pool early because we had our DIS trick or treat. We had such a great time and want to thank everyone who participated ad helped pass out candy. The girls got more candy they they ever did going around the neighborhood.
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f162/jbendriss/DSC00291.jpg
Right after the ToT, we had our "Tea with Wendy". I heard it was bad, but didn't realize how short it would be. We sat a table, had iced tea and a cookie. Wendy came in and told the story of Peter Pan and took pictures. It was finished about 20 minutes later. Everyone was looking around saying "this is it?" So we got our picture and went back to our room for a rest before we had to get ready for DCL's trick or treat.

DCL's ToT was a joke. They had like 5 candy stations and the lines were so long we jsut skipped them and went to the pool for the halloween party.

After the party, we got dressed for Formal night which my dad complained the whole time that he had to wear a tie. He threatend to wear shorts to see what the maitre'de would say, but we yelled at him for about 10 minutes until he put on a tie.

Dinners were great, I can't remember what we had, but tried a few different items. I seemed to get a lot of beef. I noticed they didn't serve a lot of chicken. There was turkey, or pork but not a lot of chicken.
I ordered a bottle of wine. Moscato (sp?) it was good and lasted me about 4 nights.

I had Lena at Flounders for dinner for a few nights, just so we could relax and have dinner without a fidgety 3 year old with us. (yes, she is potty trained, but she loves Flounders. She helps with the babies and feels more comfortable with the younger kids. It is a little more relaxed and calming. The Oceaneears club can be too overwhelming for her. She gets over stimulated very quickly and hates loud noises so Flounders is perfect. Plus the CM loves when she is there, she is almsot like a second set of hands because she plays with the younger ones and "helps".

Well, that's it for day's two and three; up next: St. Martin, pirate night and St. Thomas....

[Torontogal]

Wonder if it was you I saw on your laptop! I would walk up and always see someone on their laptop and wondered - "why are they not enjoying their cruise?" My husband said, "maybe they are a Diser!"
Anyway. hope you had fun - I was on the same sailing as you...

[misseulalie]

Well, I was on my laptop for the first 3 days, but I was on it one time, the battery died before I was able to logout, so I wasted about 30 minutes because by the time I could go up to my room to charge it and then bring it back to a hot spot, it would have been 30 minutes...( this is the 100 minutes for $55 and you have to log out otherwise the minutes keep ticking...)

So after that I just used the DCL computers..

I wasn't on much, probably 10 minutes a day. Mostly in the promenande lounge.

[kritter]

HI,

My daughter was the one sleeping all of the time too.. Come to find out it was a combination of the sea sickness meds and the rocking of the ship.. Funny how both of our kids feel asleep at the pool......LOL!!!!!!

[Torontogal]

I have to agree re: Fitz (the Jovial Jamacian). He was really nice and friendly. My kids loved him.
There were many CM on this cruise which really made my day!