Day 2: Saturday May 18th
ITS HERE-SAIL DAY! Are those the salt breezes I smell? (No, Deann thats the exhaust from the airport.) I woke up at 4:30 and could not go back to sleep. I laid there thinking about the trip, I checked email, I played with the ipad, and finally decided I was going to get up and start getting ready around 8. The shower was really loud (finally, the family is going to wake up and talk to me-NOPE), well Ill bang around opening suitcases (nothing?), the blow dryer will get them up surely (me standing over the bed with the hotel blow dryer still nothing), maybe sounds of traffic and AIRPLANES taking off? (nope and now bugs are flying into the room through the open balcony door). Why rush it, were in no hurry, I might as well sit down enjoy some peace and quiet. OH, the sound of my reading and page turning suddenly wakes everyone up. You gotta be kidding me.
Everyones finally up and getting ready at 10:00. We ran down to the lobby to grab a box of cereal (just cereal youll eat on the ship!) and grab a luggage cart. Hey, do you know what happens when you snag a luggage cart on a sprinkler head? The answer- nothing but everyone freezes like youve just pulled the pin on a grenade. Potential for soaking wet luggage averted, we rolled on down to the lobby and got on the hotel shuttle back to the airport.
The shuttle driver took us straight to arrivals and we found/stole/requisitioned an airport luggage cart and started across four lanes of traffic. Suddenly over the chaos we see a big white hand in the air. I made eye contact with that big white hand and nodded, and he started doing a little dance, and I was so happy. My husband, who is not a big Disney fan and has no real affection for Mickey Mouse saw that hand and said oh God, finally, someone to take over. That about sums it up.
The big white hand led us inside to a desk staffed with ground transportation folks. They checked us in, and led us back outside to the bus. We have never used ground transportation before, but given how far the Houston airport is from the port and how expensive alternatives were, we opted to give it a try and were really happy we did. They loaded us up and we sat in the cool bus for about 30 minutes and then pulled out and pointed south.
The traffic in Houston, even on a Saturday morning, is just horrible. Lots of stops and starts, speeding up, hitting the breaks
I had been looking at my phone and said to my husband I need to stop reading this is making me sick. As if on cue, someone got sick 2 rows ahead of us. This is where I love Disney. Most Disney passengers understand kids, understand that things happen with kids, and are some of the most over prepared people in the world (myself withstanding). Out of nowhere people found plastic bags, wet wipes, and paper towels. The poor father kept apologizing over and over but hey I could be the next to get carsick so no judgment here.
We didnt skip a beat and kept rolling, rolling, rolling down the road. We finally start to see water, then we see the yucky underbelly of Galveston, then some overpasses, railroad tracks, is that the ship?, oh no factory smokestack, and TA DA theres the ship! They had us off the bus and into the terminal at 1:00. We checked in and there was no waiting, straight onto the ship. Introducing the S family (yea, clap, clap and it feels like a huge weight lifted off my shoulders.). Our room was already ready and we went to drop off the carry-on bags and head up to lunch. This arriving early at the port is a fools game.
We had lunch in Parrot Cay and happened to be seated with Stacia Martin, the Disney animator and lecturer aboard for our trip. She was so delightful and we enjoyed talking with her and her partner (he animated the Goofy home entertainment cartoon!!) for over an hour. We shut that buffet down.
Back to the room, and we have luggage. We started unpacking only to find that my hairspray had imploded at some point and drenched some of my clothes. The worst part was my favorite white shirt was now covered with huge purple splotches (why is my clear hairspray purple?). I thought Id give Disney laundry a shot and included a note that I knew it was stained and was just hoping for the best. Nothing else looked too bad so we started finding ways to cram three weeks of stuff into our room.
Then it was time for the Muster Drill. We headed on down to Deck 4 which only triggered another set of what if we crash questions only substituting the ship for the plane. Sorry again everyone. We packed into our line (Did somebody touch my butt? It felt like somebody touched my butt.) and listened to the slacker roll call. That ending, Carlitos and I headed up to Deck 10 for the Going Off Party (our friends couldnt remember the name of the Sail Away Party and kept calling it the Going Off party). Carlos was supposed to run down to the room to grab something and then meet us on deck. He never showed after claiming that he looked all over for us. I cannot prove it but Im pretty sure he ditched us and took a quick nap. We found our friends and had that awkward we havent seen you for a year but here we are on vacation together hug and watched us float away from the port. Im not a big fan of the Going Off party so we didnt stick around after going off.
We went back to the room and got ready for the show and dinner. The cruise wasnt very crowded. I believe the cabins were mostly sold out, but the capacity per cabin was way down, and there were only 400 children under 17 aboard. (Let that sink in
DCL veterans, only 400 kids!). The benefit of all of that was that the shows were never really crowded; we were in the fourth or fifth row center every night. We watched the typical Let the Magic Begin show. I dont love this show, but it really got us in the mood for Mickey and we got a preview of Max Winfreys juggling and Scott Peppers (who I kept calling Pickle) magic. We also met the cruise director Darrin. Hes great; we really missed him when he left after the Transatlantic.
After the show, we went to the Mickey Mania game show. We had never made it to these family shows before, and we really enjoyed the quick 30 minute game that took us right into dinner. Im not sure why we never did that before?? I ordered a glass of champagne during the game show (maybe thats why I thought the show was so cute).
Onward to dinner; we had late seating which Im a big fan of, even with a 5 year old. (Why?) First, dine and play (enough said??). They come and get the kids around 9:15-9:30 and whisk them away. It got to where I was excited every time I saw someone in a yellow shirt walk into a dining room. Second, with the time change eating was actually earlier and earlier each night. Third, do you have to let it linger? At late dining the answer is yes. No one rushes you, you can enjoy your after dinner coffee, third dessert, whatever and talk over the table. Thats my plug for late dining.
Tonight was Lumieres. I apologize now, but we do not take pictures of our food so no shots for you. I can tell you what I ate and what I thought of it though. So, two appetizers tonight (no judging). I got the calamari (just okay, the sauce wasnt good) and the Salmon Carpaccio (great, although by the end of the trip I would be completely sick of salmon which seemed to be in every meal). I skipped the salad, and got the seafood risotto for my main. The risotto was great, but I didnt eat any of the meat so theres a waste of a good lobster or whatever that was in the rice. Dessert was the raspberry cake from the sugar free section and it was great. Our server, Limbert, also brought both couples the Sweet Temptations (oh we love you Limbert. Thanks for just assuming wed want extra dessert and save us the embarrassment of order one from column A and all from column B.)
Full from dinner, we called it a night and went back to our room to find a Ducky Williams lithograph on the bed. We still had not met our stateroom host but assume he exists and is not a little bed making elf.
(This report was a little long, but there was so much going on. I promise they won't all be this mundane)
Ditto for the "Going Off" party. 
