It's a WONDER we have any money left after the Cruise! - All done!

[franandaj]

Finally I got in line for the buffet. Salad was the first offering.

Now here is something I didn’t know anything about which really surprised me. Especially with all the trip reports I have read, and I’ve read a bunch! I’m sure I read at least a dozen, some with great food porn, some with no food porn and some with sporadic food porn, but not one person mentioned that at no point do you get to handle your food until it hits your plate!

I ended up passing on the salad because of this. With all the different stuff that I eat, I can also be really picky sometimes. Also because I am not a big eater, I tend to be very cautious at buffets so that I do not take too much and waste food. I thought about how ridiculous I was going to sound asking the gentleman to “Please give me only the romaine and iceberg lettuces, do not give me any radicchio, and only about 7 pieces of lettuce, and then can I have five pieces of spinach leaves, 1 slice of cucumber…” I ended up passing on the salad!

I didn’t get any pictures of the next offerings because I was so stunned by the whole “not serving yourself” thing. But they had

• 
  peel ‘em and eat ‘em shrimp,
  tomato, onion and basil salad
  cole slaw
  macaroni salad
  
  and all the hot items listed earlier.
  
  This is what I ended up with (notice that only the meat a potatoes are “touching”. I had a hard time explaining this to the servers as well )
  
  
  
  
  
  And Fran’s plate (all of her stuff is “touching”)
  
  
  
  
  
  She sent me for some chilled Cream of Pineapple Soup
  
  
  
  
  
  Fran is a little fuzzy here, but she looks happy.
  
  
  
  
  
  The Christmas decorations look nice
  
  
  
  
  
  I went back for some Mac & Cheese and Fran wanted more of the corn dog nuggets
  
  
  
  
  
  Right behind our table was an additional dessert station where they had peach cobbler with vanilla sauce, vanilla ice cream and shaved white and dark chocolate, along with chocolate and caramel sauce.
  
  
  
  
  
  I had some peach cobbler with Vanilla Ice Cream. I had to put the two together so that they were “touching”! The ice cream was REALLY good!
  
  
  
  
  
  Fran got a medley of desserts. She told me to have some, but by this point, I was just way too full.
  
  
  
  
  
  She then had me get her some vanilla ice cream with shaved white chocolate and caramel sauce.
  
  
  
  
  
  By this point we were both pretty stuffed. Fran only got two hours of sleep the night before and this is where things started to turn south. You see when we got on the ship, I asked one of the greeters if there was a special Concierge guest area where we could sit and leave our bags and they told me, “no.” I was getting pretty bummed that the piece of information I heard wasn’t true. Also it was 1:20PM and the room wasn’t ready yet, so Fran started to get cranky. I said I was going to go back to Guest Services and find out if there really was a special place for Concierge, and she said she was just going to wait “here”. Which was a very noisy hallway outside the restaurant where we had lunch.
  
  I waited about five minutes in line when a lovely man, Rodrigo, asked if there was anything we were looking for while waiting in line and I asked about the CL reception area. “Oh, come with me!” He said. “Where is the rest of your party?” I asked him to wait a moment and I ran to get Fran, we had to fight the crowds to get back and forth and finally we got back to the lobby. He took us back through the entertainment district to the Cadillac Lounge. It was quiet, peaceful and they had complimentary coffee, sodas and some snacks. Too bad we were so full!
  
  For the next half an hour Rodrigo told us all about various amenities, helped me pick out beverage tastings, went over the movie schedule, and various other things we could do. I was dismayed to find that the reports I’d heard online were false and that the only complimentary sodas we received are the “welcome package” in our stateroom. So we’ll see how that goes, it hasn’t even been a full day yet.
  
  By this time he was able to confirm that our room was ready and he told us the easiest way to get there and beat the crowds.
  
  Next up, OMG! Our room!

 

[Leshaface]

You and me are SO alike in that we want to be on the road, with no time to waste.

What?! CM's were serving all the food? I know on my trip, they would serve like the meat that they would have to carve, but other than that, we did it all ourselves! I'm wondering if something happened in which they now have to handle all the food That really stinks because I like my salads a particular way too!

Ugh, sorry the trip hasn't started off exactly as planned, but i'm hoping it gets better, and i'm hoping the room makes up for it!

 

[jetskigrl]

Now here is something I didn’t know anything about which really surprised me. Especially with all the trip reports I have read, and I’ve read a bunch! I’m sure I read at least a dozen, some with great food porn, some with no food porn and some with sporadic food porn, but not one person mentioned that at no point do you get to handle your food until it hits your plate!

It sounds like they may have had an outbreak of illness on the previous cruise. If that happens, they will do all the serving to avoid spreading it.
Otherwise you generally serve yourself at the buffet (other than the carved meats, etc).

 

[franandaj]

You and me are SO alike in that we want to be on the road, with no time to waste.

What?! CM's were serving all the food? I know on my trip, they would serve like the meat that they would have to carve, but other than that, we did it all ourselves! I'm wondering if something happened in which they now have to handle all the food That really stinks because I like my salads a particular way too!

Ugh, sorry the trip hasn't started off exactly as planned, but i'm hoping it gets better, and i'm hoping the room makes up for it!

It sounds like they may have had an outbreak of illness on the previous cruise. If that happens, they will do all the serving to avoid spreading it.
Otherwise you generally serve yourself at the buffet (other than the carved meats, etc).

They must have had an outbreak, they were handing out disinfecting wipes EVERYWHERE. Today was better, but yesterday was freaking weird. OK, let's see if I can sneak in a couple more updates.

 

[kaoden39]

Oh what a start! Your lunch sounds good! I am glad that you managed to meet up with Rodrigo. It sounds like maybe the cast members on the cruise ships are not quite the well oiled machine that the parks are. I hope it improved. I am naive I thought for sure that the rooms were ready when you got on the ship.

 

[dgbg100106]

Alison everything sounds great and I have seen ships go on complete lock down where they even remove the salt and pepper shaks from the tables, so you can't touch anything.

So hopefully it will get better shortly.

I can't wait to see the room, but I hope you are taking time for yourselves and enjoy your trip, we will all be here when you get back.

Have fun

 

[eandesmom]

Oh how odd about the no self serve, definitely not the case when we were on the Wonder so must have been an outbreak of something.

I can't believe you had 6 cartoons between the 2 of you. The thought of dealing with all of that and no room yet would've me cranky too!

 

[franandaj]

Thanks for the replies! This internet is really slow here. We have a break between breakfast and Bingo so we're in the Promenade Lounge seeing if the connection here is any better.

Continuing with embarkation day....

So we were on our way to the room. It seemed like the walk was forever, but we did travel the entire distance of the ship. Our room is the farthest possible back room on our deck and the Cadillac Lounge was at the complete front of the ship. Finally I saw this:

We entered the room

I looked at the bathroom and was really bummed because I was hoping that the room might have a bathtub, but since I knew it was a Handicapped room I wasn’t surprised.

I expressed my disappointment to Fran, and she asked, “What are you talking about? Isn’t this tub big enough for you?”

We had TWO, count ‘em TWO bathrooms!

Another view of the bedroom

We received this gift from DCL

And back out in the Living room area

And this gift from DCL

Then I went out to explore our Verandah, yes, this is all OUR PRIVATE verandah! I just wish I knew some people who were on this cruise, we could have had a party!

 

[franandaj]

By this time it was close to 3PM and we had our DISmeet in the Promenade Lounge. Fran wanted to rest, so I headed down there. Just as I was going out the door, I found three of our suitcases. We needed to send Fran’s vest off for Dry Cleaning ASAP, so I took care of that before heading out. I met a lot of the people we had chatted with online in our cruise meet thread. It was also good I went because a number of families changed staterooms, so I got the updated list. We said goodbye around 3:30, and I decided to explore for a bit. Deck 9 is where you’ll find all the quick food options so I decided to take a look around up there.

I took a picture of San Pedro, and the bridge. See what I mean about not being very picturesque? I think this is the bridge that some famous director jumped off of a couple months ago.

This is the Mickey pool.

Our room is right underneath Beach Blanket Buffet. The restaurant was closing, but the seating area was still open so I thought I would get a look around.

And take a look at our verandah from above

It was getting close to time for the muster drill so went back to the room and woke Fran up. We headed to our designated meeting point. It’s nice that they don’t actually make you stand on deck in front of your life boat. Instead our meeting point was

I really liked this restaurant the last time we were on this ship. We’ll be back here again on Wednesday night.

After the drill Fran wanted to go check out the shops, I took some pictures of the lobby on our way.

As we were still in port, none of the shops were open yet. I saw one display that I planned on checking out.

So I just snapped some photos of the display windows

Well, we would be back….

I hoped we would make it in here

Fran was still hoping

It had been a while since lunch and it was still a while until dinner, so we decided to head over to Goofy’s and get a snack. We ended up splitting this roast beef sandwich and some fruit.

 

[franandaj]

Pretty soon I noticed that we were moving.

We decided to go back to the room and get unpacked, well I unpacked. Fran was entirely exhausted, so she took a nap.

Here’s our room once I got everything sorted out.

And these are all my FEE gifts waiting until Wednesday to be given out.

While I was unpacking, I received my first FEE gift.

I spent the next hour or so working on the TR while Fran slept. I went out on the verandah a few times, just to watch the water go by as we sailed.

Up next dinner and shopping!

 

[rentayenta]

At this moment I am at an almost total loss of words. Your room is so COOL! Those aren't the cramped quarters I'm used to seeing. How'd you sleep? The bed looks comfortable.

The food looks good. How funny, you don't like your food to touch. I'm like Fran and let it all mush together.

The window displays are adorable. Disney nails it every time.

Can't wait to read more.

 

[Leshaface]

Your room is amazing! That is the way to sail! Looks like you'll be able to take your bath after all.

Aw lucky! We actually had to go outside and on deck for our muster drill on the Wonder. But for the Dream we went to the theater for the drill. Glad you didn't have to do that.

I hope dinner was good!

 

[pixielizzie]

Your room is fantastic!
We were on the cruise just previous to yours! There was an outbreak of illness so all drinks at the drink station had to be served, all food at the buffets. Kind of put a damper on things as I heard the staff was working double shifts and their moods did kind of reflect it...

Have an awesome time! I love the Wonder!

 

[eandesmom]

What a gorgeous room! Is that a category T? I am drooling! The very nice thing about the HA rooms is they are huge balconies. We were booked in a GTY 6A on the Wonder and apparently there are really only 2 (or 4) I can't recall, rooms in that category that actually sleep 4. So we knew our chances of an upgrade were really good and did happen but I'm telling you having that huge balcony would have been cool.

Our muster on the Wonder was outside but it was in the theater on the Dream. So much nicer inside!

 

[PrincessInOz]

That is an AMAZING room....what a wonder to behold! Absolutely magic!


Gobsmacked by your room and two bathrooms. That balcony looks huge!
Enjoy!

 

[dgbg100106]

I am in agreement with everyone that is an amazing room! I would love to be there....

 

[jetskigrl]

Ohhh, those pictures are making me miss "my" ship

The room is beautiful!!! I can't wait for the next update.

 

[Hawleys]

Wow! Sweet suite!!

(Sorry, I couldn't resist)

Sounds like you are having a good time already.

 

[dolphingirl47]

That cabin is amazing. I hope you are having a wonderful time.

Corinna

 

[franandaj]

Thanks pixielizzie for confirming why the ship was on food lock down. It's eased up now and we're back to serving ourselves at the drink station and buffets.

Thanks everyone for the comments on the room. It's bigger than my first apartment!

Leshaface, I dont' think the post stuck, but in the ads for the zip line tour, one of the pictures they show has you and Daniel in it I think!

We have been having a great time, and with how slow the internet is, I might not be able to update here until I get back. Besides I don't like having to shrink the pictures so much for fast upload.

I have completed quite a bit on the Desintation D report, so those may go up in the next day or two. I need to get back to the Promenade Lounge. Internet is definitely faster there, but it's more comfortable to sit at the desk in my living room! Off to breakfast and Cabo!