OK, ok, now I'm back on track. Not sure exactly how that happened...but it is what it is. Now we go back to the future and our regularly scheduled program....
Tonight was the last night for dinner...so we brought our tip money with us along with a bottle of wine for Dina and some beer for Frano. While this is technically not allowed, the always seem happy to receive the left over alcohol. From what I understand they all share it. I hope that is true...as they all work so hard...and deserve the release!
We had the parade of nations as always...there is Dina. Apparently she does not like to look at the camera!
And Frano. He genuinely looks like he is having a good time. Do you suppose it is relief? finally! no more dealing with these crazies!
Here is everyone at our table one last time....
I was able to sneak in a surprise here. DW's birthday is on the 29th of December...so I figured it would be good to get a birthday cake. I set Audrey on the task of getting the message to our servers and...
we did it! Happy Birthday DW!
Again, Frano is really into it. hmmmm....
it was a nice desert...but not the full cakes they used to give!
Got our picture with our severs. They did such a good job.
And one with just us and them
When we got back we had a card in our stateroom that I was very entertained by. I thought I had snapped a picture....but apparently not. It said something like "anything you take from your room that is the property of
Disney Cruise Lines will be charged to your credit card". I don't know why I found this funny as I'm sure people take things all the time (pillows from the Fantasy for example).
Not being one to leave well enough alone I went out to talk to our room steward Herold. I looked at him absolutely straight faced and asked him for a screwdriver. He looked confused. I showed him the card and told him that since it's an option I would like to take the hairdryer off the wall of my bathroom at take it home.
OK, so as I write this and read it it's not funny at all. but it was funny at the time, I promise.
So later that night we are chatting with Herold and his boss walks up and Herold brings it up that I was the one who asked about taking the hair dryer. She looked at me and told me that I could take one and the won't even charge me for it. Ha! Apparently there was much banter below the water line about that one...so I'm entertaining for someone. I'm sure they knew I was kidding....right?
Snapped a quick picture with Herold
That night Susan Egan was going to perform in the Walt Disney theater. We definitely wanted to see that. So after dinner we went up to change and pack a little bit more. We then went down to Doug and Audrey's room to pick them up. They were not quite ready so they poured alcohol down our throats while they finished up. Good times.
We headed out to the show (for those of you who do not know Susan Egan was Belle for the broadway show of Beauty and the Beast). Afterwords she signed autographs and we got one for our boys (whom we knew would not care), and one for the daughter of friends who we knew would think it was way cool because she is aspiring to be an actress.
Audrey got pictures with Susan
DW didn't pose...but there she is anyway.
We then headed over to Wavebands for pub night which was an adult show put on by some of the officers. We have seen this one before and it's definitely worth going to see. I'll leave it at that.
Here they are at the end of the skit
Then it was off to bed for the old folks. Double towel animals today...
But don't worry, I'm actually going to finish up!
We set our alarm for 6:30am (yikes!), woke up in the port.
Bright and early picture of Miami!
Our breakfast was at 7am...and as we liked our servers we definitely wanted to see them again one last time. Of course that's ironic isn't it? Technically if you like your servers you should want them to have a break. But oh well.
We had a decent breakfast..and at 8am we were ready to get off the ship. We went down and had to wait for our luggage to come off (not sure why), we grabbed a porter along with Doug and Audrey and went to meet our shuttle. We took SAS Shuttle which worked out great. We picked up a few more people at Carnival and it was off to the airport. Doug and Audrey got off at an earlier terminal so it was goodbye to our Canadian friends.
We got to the airport by 9:15, and hoped to go stand by on the 11:30am flight. We got it and made it to Boston by 3pm...but then got to sit and wait for our flight to SFO because of weather. Nice.
And that's the end, folks. All-in-all it was a terrific trip. A great way to spent a bunch of time with my wife...and with alot of other people. I would definitely do the long cruise again. It's fantastic to reach the 7 night point and know you have 7 more to go...instead of getting ready to get off. We may be taking a cruise on the Fantasy in March....so keep your fingers crossed for us (it all depends on airfare...which right now is terrible!).
Thanks for reading along....I'm sorry it took me so long to finish. However I can point to one of my other TR's that took 2 years...I'm not even at the year point!
If you have any questions feel free to post them!
Thanks!
DZ