Fred and Wilma 'Wonder' Through the Panama Canal - With a Couple of Stowaways

Yay! So glad you're doing a report. What a fantastic trip this was, can't wait to relive it via your TR.
 
Chapter 3 – Bienvenidos a Miami

Forgive me for using a Will Smith song quote in my trip report but I just love this song and was singing it in my head most of the time we were there.

So, we had collected our rental car and were driving away from the airport. We had already decided, due to how late it was, to forego our original plans to have dinner at Burger & Beer Joint. We were all hungry, though, so we drove straight to Miami Beach to put Plan B into action. Gary had used Copilot on his phone to navigate which worked pretty well but, for some reason, we ended up pulling into the first parking lot we saw, rather than heading to the one I had planned for us to park at. The upshot was that it cost us $20 to park :scared:

We had a good view of the sunset from the roof though.



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And it became obvious that this was where the flashy cars of Miami were parked.



Having parked up, we made our way through the Lincoln Mall area to our destination.





Gary had a SmokeShack burger (without the pepper) and fries, and I just had a portion of fries. For some reason they charged us for a cheeseburger with bacon added, which worked out more expensive, but I was too tired to argue and it was only a few cents. The fries crinkle cut and really yummy.



I think Tony and Tee had a Smokeshack burger each and a portion of cheese fries.

After the burgers were done, it was time for dessert – the main reason we were here. The famous Shake Shack concrete! Gary and I shared a Vice Crispy Treat (vanilla custard, marshmallow sauce and crispy crunchies). It was nice but not as good as the one we’d had in New York. I don’t know whether it’s because I was too tired to appreciate it or whether it was just a bit boring. It certainly hit the spot though and I was glad we came.



Tony and Theresa both had a Shark Attack. I am pretty sure that Gary would have preferred one of these but I had wanted to share and so, as I detest peanut butter, he was a good husband and denied himself the peanut butter so he could share with me.



By now, the tiredness was really kicking in and we still had to get to our hotel, so we went back to the car. The boys went to pay and Tee and I headed back to the car. I made Tee take the stairs so we would feel less guilty about how much we’d eaten – I’d forgotten we were on the fourth floor, though, and it damn near killed me.

We managed to find our way to the hotel, although it took a while as there was a lot of construction going on. I had texted Sally (from our cruise group) to tell her we had arrived as she and her husband, Scott, were staying at the same hotel. We checked in easily – the reception staff were really friendly and helpful – and went up to the room. The hotel seemed really nice and I wish we’d had more time to spend there. The room was big and I loved the look of the rooftop pool and bar.







We had been given free drink vouchers when we checked in, so had decided to meet in the bar for a nightcap, and Scott and Sally found us there a little while later. Gary had a diet coke and I had a Cosmopolitan, my first of the holiday. It was very, very nice.



We spent an hour or so chatting about our journeys and the upcoming cruise, then tiredness hit and we decided to call it a night. I honestly didn’t think I would sleep a wink, I was so excited, but sheer exhaustion must have kicked in and I was soon asleep.
 
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We are hoping to do another cruise out of Miami in December. Looks like we are best off flying indirect.

Corinna

It is definitely a nightmare, Corinna. Indirect is seriously worth a thought. When we do the PC again in 2017 we are seriously conisdering either indirect or direct into Orlando and driving down.

When I used to work in a bank we always used to smell the new money! :rotfl:

Great start to your hols and I LOVE your nails! :thumbsup2

See, I knew it wasn't just me - thanks for making me feel more normal Elaine.

brilliant start - love your nails - how did you get that anchor on there? I am with you are the mayonnaise thing on burgers / sandwiches etc ... just yuck. That chambord drink sounded rather nice and a very nice start to proceedings.

The anchors are nail decals Sarah. They were a bit fiddly but turned out quite well. Neither of us likes mayo, I can't understand why people insist on putting it on everything. The drink was lovely but it really was quite lethal considering it was such a small glass.

Loving the report so far. We found Rekorderlig here just in cans tho. We have not tried it yet but we got three flavors we are afraid the cans won't be as good as the bottle. I had to laugh at the custard pic and comment. The one thing Disney does not do well is desserts. Can't wait to read more.

Kathleen, we get the cans of Kopparberg (same thing but different brand) here and I don't think they taste as good as the bottles. Beggars can't be chooser though, and at least it will be a nice reminder of the trip.

I was hoping you'd do a trip report. So happy I found it. Now going back to read all about the start of your adventure.

Welcome Karin, glad you found me :)

Great start Joh, and I too love the smell of $$$ :rotfl:Really looking forward to hearing about your cruise :)

See Mandy, we're all normal really ;) Thanks for reading.

Yay! So glad you're doing a report. What a fantastic trip this was, can't wait to relive it via your TR.

Hi Kristen, I am going to enjoy writing this, I think - it will bring back some happy memories of an excellent trip.
 
Hi Joh! I knew I liked you from the start - I love Denzel and HATE mayo (there was one salad dressing on the cruise that I took one bite of and made a terrible face). When you were reading your lovely Kindle, you weren't by chance reading Path Between the Seas????
 


Tony and Theresa both had a Shark Attack. I am pretty sure that Gary would have preferred one of these but I had wanted to share and so, as I detest peanut butter, he was a good husband and denied himself the peanut butter so he could share with me.

That looks yummy. I love peanut butter so that would be a winner for me. The rest of dinner looks nice, too.

Indirect is seriously worth a thought. When we do the PC again in 2017 we are seriously conisdering either indirect or direct into Orlando and driving down.

We have done both. The drive down from Orlando is soul destroying. Last year for the Panama Canal cruise we flew via JFK and that worked well. I find myself preferring flying indirect even if there is a direct option. I rather clear immigration in Atlanta, Philadelphia or even JFK then Orlando or Los Angeles.

Corinna
 
Hi Joh! I knew I liked you from the start - I love Denzel and HATE mayo (there was one salad dressing on the cruise that I took one bite of and made a terrible face). When you were reading your lovely Kindle, you weren't by chance reading Path Between the Seas????

Cindy, we obviously both have very good taste :thumbsup2 Unfortunately, I'm ashamed to admit I was not reading Path Between the Seas. I had every intention of reading it on the ship but, thanks to the company of all the lovely people we met on the cruise, I hardly read anything at all this trip. I am going to attempt to read it before my NEXT Panama Canal cruise though, I promise ;)

cant wait to read the next chapter
Hi Bex, thanks for reading along.

That looks yummy. I love peanut butter so that would be a winner for me. The rest of dinner looks nice, too.

Shake Shack was a firm favourite of ours inNew York and it was just as yummy in Miami, although I wish we had chosen a different flavour of concrete as ours was a little boring.

We have done both. The drive down from Orlando is soul destroying. Last year for the Panama Canal cruise we flew via JFK and that worked well. I find myself preferring flying indirect even if there is a direct option. I rather clear immigration in Atlanta, Philadelphia or even JFK then Orlando or Los Angeles.

We actually really don't mind the drive from Orlando, having done it a couple of times now. You're right, it can be tedious but I would prefer that to standing in a crowded and overheated immigration hall for hours. Plus, I like the idea of visiting WDW before the next PC cruise since I really didn't feel like visiting theme parks afterwards, I was so relaxed...but I'm getting ahead of myself.

Stay tuned for chapter 4.
 


Chapter 4 – Which way is down?

Friday May 1st

I woke up at 4am, tried in vain to go back to sleep, then gave up and, grabbing my phone, retired to the bathroom. When I checked the Facebook group for our cruise, I discovered that many others were awake and excited too. Those of you who read my pre-trip report may remember that our original plans for this morning had us getting up early and driving to South Beach to watch the sunrise, however having already experienced bad traffic coming back from South Beach the previous evening, we were concerned that we might be cutting it a bit fine if we tried to get over to South Beach and back before breakfast. Since we had other plans that we didn’t want to miss, we had vetoed the idea the night before (which I’m sure Gary and Tee were secretly pleased about).

At about 6.30, I woke Gary and we got showered and dressed. Tony and Tee had gone for a walk to Publix, which was just a couple of blocks away. We had arranged to meet them for breakfast so, in the meantime, we went to check out the local neighbourhood ourselves as I knew my Fitbit steps might be somewhat limited today. Back at the hotel, we found Tony and Tee waiting for us in the lobby area. Having not eaten for a whole 12 hours, we were more than ready for some food. The breakfast set up at the hotel was basic but there was plenty of choice, including make your own waffles!







Yes, I ate the whole thing – and a cinnamon and raisin bagel too. Gary had cereal (surprise, surprise), Tee also had a waffle and some very healthy fruit. Tony had a mixed plate of goodies.

I was really gutted to see a lady with her family at the next table wearing the same t-shirt as me. I couldn’t believe that, having come all the way from England, someone was wearing the exact same thing. I threatened to go and change but Gary told me I was being ridiculous.

After breakfast, we loaded our bags into the car and set off for South Beach. Our destination was Miami Beach. The traffic was absolutely appalling, although not surprising since it was rush hour. The satnav wasn’t being much help either, as it was telling us when we needed to turn but since there were so many different lanes and turnings off to the left and the right, poor Tony didn’t know where to position himself once he’d taken a turning. Eventually, we made it across to South Beach. As we crossed the bridge there was a sign saying ‘5 ton limit’ so Tony told me I had to get out of the car.

The lot where we had planned to park was closed, so we drove round again and Gary asked me which way to go to the alternative parking lot which I’d got written in my book. “We need to go back down this road” I said. “What do you mean, back down? I can’t see which way you’re pointing”. “Uh, well, duh, down is South so we head South DOWN this road”. Neither of the guys was amused. We found the Lincoln Road mall parking lot with no real problems and parked up (incidentally, this is where we should have parked the previous night at $1 per hour). From here, we walked to the Holocaust Memorial.

Back when I was researching things to do in Miami, this had been one of the most recommended places on TripAdvisor. I wasn’t entirely sure but it looked intriguing so we decided to factor it in to the plans. I am very glad we did. Although I found it very upsetting (I actually had to go off by myself to have a little cry at one point), it was so touching and a very fitting memorial. I am so pleased we took the time to visit.















We popped into the visitors’ centre, which hadn’t been open when we arrived, and signed the guestbook. The lady there very kindly offered to give us a very quick overview of the design and some of the features of the memorial. It was actually really fascinating and showed that a lot of thought went into the design and construction.

Time was marching on and we were keen to get to the cruise terminal now, so we made our way back towards the parking lot. On the way, we stopped at a little pavement café for Tony to get a Cuban coffee (made with molasses). We walked through the Lincoln Mall outdoor area again and did a circuit, before returning to the car.



We hadn’t made it to Ocean Drive, unfortunately, so decided we would take a route to the port which would have us drive down that way, which appeased me slightly. I will return there one day though, as it looked like a great place to sit and have a drink and watch the world go by.





As we travelled across the bridge back to ‘mainland’ Miami, we caught our first glimpse of the beautiful Disney Wonder. There was much excitement in the car.





We made it to the port with relative ease. After the problems we’d had with the guys getting back to port on previous cruises, we made sure that they both had photo ID, cash and mobile phones (switched on!) After giving them strict instructions to text as soon as they were on their way back to the port, we left our luggage in the reliable hands of the porters and made our way into the terminal. It didn’t take long to get through security and we spotted a few people from our cruising group along the way. Pretty soon, we were making our way to the check-in desks. For some reason, they wouldn’t allow us to check the men in (at Port Canaveral we have always been able to check in for them but Miami wouldn’t let us) but it wasn’t a major problem. Check in was efficient, if not quite as ‘magical’ as usual and we were soon receiving our Key to the World, our boarding cards and a copy of today's navigator (which I will post in the next chapter).

I got boarding group 8 and Tee got 9 but the lady at check-in said we could board together in group 8. As we were wandering through the (seriously crowded) terminal, I saw lots of familiar faces from the cruise group. It was so exciting to finally be here. We briefly met and chatted with Mari and her lovely family and I also finally met Kathleen, who had set up our fabulous Facebook group. As we were debating where to stand, I got a text from Gary to say they were on their way back. That was quick! I quickly texted back to say we would meet them at the top of the escalators and we weaved our way back through the crowds towards the exit, where we found a couple of seats and waited.

The first boarding group was announced and the boys arrived and it looked as though, for the first time in a long time, we might actually board with our group. Apparently they’d had no problem finding their way back to the airport and a shuttle was there waiting. When they mentioned they were in a rush and would just get a taxi, the shuttle driver agreed to leave there and then. Once the men were checked in and had their cards and lanyards, we made our way back to the boarding area. As we were waiting to board, a lady standing next to me asked if I was Joh and, when I said yes, she introduced her and her husband as Kim and Terry, a couple who we were linked up with for dining. We were so happy to finally meet them and we hit it off straight away. It was Kim and Terry’s first cruise. They had a later boarding group but a CM nearby said we could all get on together so, when they called group 8, off we went.



 
Chapter 5 – All Aboard! Let the Magic Begin

Today’s navigator:

For some reason, the navigators this time were in 2 parts – a 4-page overview of activities plus a single, 2-sided sheet with the timetable of activities and events on it. Although it was more useful to have it this way, it means that in order to post the navigators I need to scan, save and upload 6 sides of A4 so please bear with me.













After having our embarkation photo taken (the six of us had a group one as we weren’t too bothered about separate pictures), we made our way onboard. It was strange as we didn’t board through the normal entrance into the Deck 3 atrium, but, instead, boarded on Deck 4. I already knew about this from reading Corinna’s trip report last year but, even so, it still felt a little odd. Once onboard, we parted ways with Terry and Kim for now, as we made our way to Parrot Cay for lunch.







I honestly don’t remember what I ate, as excitement was still running high. I know I had the pork schnitzel as that is a given. And I may have had a small dessert or two. I was determined not to eat too much though. In fact, one of the servers asked me if I was going up to the buffet for another plate of food and I told him no, I needed to pace myself. I still had 14 days of food to come.

After lunch, we split up and Gary and I popped down to our stateroom to drop off our carry on bags, then we made our way to the meet and greet carrying our Crunchie multi packs. We had arranged with DCL in advance to have use of Diversions for the meet and greet and, when we arrived, it was already heaving with people. I couldn’t believe how many people had turned up. There was so much candy – and some very kind members of our group (Mari and, I believe, Joe and Andrea) had got together and had silicone bracelets made for everybody, with the name of our group and our cruise dates. Mari had also brought some name tag stickers and pens. Other members of the group had brought bags so the kids (and adults) could help themselves to candy. I sent Gary off with a bag and asked him to collect some ‘good stuff’. It was so good to finally meet so many people from the group and put names to faces, although I knew I would never remember them all.





Jan, a seasoned cruiser who I had spoken to a lot on Facebook over the past few months, and her husband Dave arrived and introduced me to their favourite bartender, Kelvin. I also met another couple, Gail and David, who I had been conversing with regularly. David gave Gary and I fabulous embroidered pins with Mickey/Minnie sailor hats and our initials. We loved them and immediately pinned them to our lanyards. All too soon, it was time for the lifeboat drill and, after a brief stop back at the stateroom and a bit of hurried unpacking, we made our way to our muster station (E). We ended up stood next to Vicky and Jeff (known for the rest of the cruise as Jif as, due to his Australian accent, that’s what his name sounded like when he introduced himself) and their two kids, Alex and Axel. After the lifeboat drill was over we raced back to the room, unpacked some more and made our way up to Deck 10 just in time for the Adventures Away party. We found Tony and Tee and Kim and Terry and set about celebrating our departure from Miami. Tee had got a drink of the day, something which I never managed to do that first day, despite it being on my list of things to do. Gary did run down to Deck 9 and get us a couple of diet cokes though.











Although I wasn’t a fan of the setup at the port in Miami, compared to Port Canaveral, I do understand that it is because DCL don’t have their own dedicated terminal. I did, however, prefer the sail away in Miami, it was far prettier and there was a lot more to see. A few people had stopped their cars and were taking pictures of us as we sailed past, which was pretty cool.









Back at the room, we decided to skip the first show in favour of unpacking and showering before dinner. We were both a bit hot and bothered and really wanted to get the room sorted and change for dinner. Gary took the eave phone out of the holder to make sure it was charged and discovered cigarette butts in the bottom of the holder. It absolutely stank of cigarettes. I was paranoid then, that I could smell smoke and also worried that we might get charged if they thought it was us who had been smoking in the room. To put our minds at rest, we decided to pay a visit to Guest Services on the way to dinner. We had late seating and our dinner rotation was TAP so tonight saw us arriving at Triton’s for dinner just before 8.15, after being assured by Guest Services that we would not be charged for smoking in the room and also that they would have our room host, Ben-Vos, place an air purifier in the room for us this evening. Kim and Terry and Tony and Theresa were already seated when we arrived and, not long afterwards, we were joined by Julie and Jim, who we had also linked with and had met very briefly earlier in the day. Julie brought each couple a flameless candle in a cute holder with a picture of Chip and Dale on. It was a really useful gift, especially for those of us in an inside stateroom.



Our serving team introduced themselves. Our server was Milan from Croatia and assistant server was Sandro from Italy. Although we didn’t know it at the time, this was their first cruise working together and Milan had joined DCL just 3 months prior, from Carnival cruise lines. Despite the fact that we had all just met that day, the eight of us chatted away like old friends, which made for a very pleasant start to the cruise. I ordered a Cosmopolitan from Sandro and my night was complete.



Tonight’s menu was Let The Magic Begin. I had the Calamari to start, which was absolutely delicious. Gary had the chicken bastillo. I didn’t think he would like it but he said it was tasty. For main, we both had the the NY strip, although I asked for mine to be served with a baked potato. The steak was cooked nicely but the baked potato was a little hard and just lukewarm. Kim and I both ordered Mickey bars for dessert. Kim’s had more sprinkles thank mine so she swapped with me as she doesn’t like sprinkles that much. I think I love her! Gary, of course, had crème brulee.











Just as we were finishing up, our head server, Rakesh, came over to the table and introduced himself. He asked if everything had been good with the meals and to let him know if there was anything he could do for us. Kim and I had been discussing how it would be nice if we could get some mozzarella sticks during the cruise so I asked Rakesh if he could arrange this for us. He said it may take a couple of days but to leave it with him. After dinner, we went to WaveBands with Kim and Terry to watch Wonder Quest. Tony and Tee weren’t feeling too great so they went off to bed. I ordered a Citron Martini, Gary had a Bud Light and Terry had a Guinness (which we thought was quite ironic). WonderQuest was fun; although we didn’t participate, it was just as entertaining to watch. At one point, Joe from our group was up on stage sporting a very fetching pink bra. After WonderQuest, we called it a night and made our way back to the room where we found this elegant swan.



We also had a card reminding us that the clocks were going back an hour tonight. And we were astounded to discover gifts waiting for us outside our stateroom. Although we weren’t participating in the Fish Extender exchange, we had brought some UK-centric gifts with us for various members of the group whom we had gotten to know well over the previous months (although I had discovered, whilst unpacking, that the gifts we’d bought for some people had been left behind – at least I assumed they had as they weren’t in any of our suitcases) and we were lucky enough to receive some great gifts from some of the fabulously generous people in our group. Tonight we got a beautiful embroidered laundry bag, some Avengers bottle caps on a chain, some pegs and cruise ship magnets from Mari and family and a bag chock full of goodies (a chocolate baking magazine, some baking chocolate, a baking guide and a lovely card) from Charmaine and her family. I felt so overwhelmed by their kindness and we were very lucky to continue to receive some fabulous pixie dust gifts throughout the cruise.







It was getting late now but I still wanted to write out my mixology postcards. I had organised a number of private mixology sessions for our group and wanted to deliver something to the participants to remind them of the date, time and location of their session so I had ordered custom postcards from Vistaprint before the cruise – I was really pleased with how they turned out.



After writing about half of the cards, I started to feel quite tired so decided to call it a night. I knew I would more than likely be up early in the morning anyway so planned to finish them then.
 
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You are really cracking on with your TR. Pretty good start so far will have to show Mike tonight.
 
Yay, you've boarded! :flower1: I watched the Wonder arrive in Vancouver yesterday afternoon (sad, I know ;) ) and all your lovely photos are making me start to feel a little excited!

What is it with people? Fancy doing that with their cigarette butts :confused3 :sad2:

The holocaust memorial looks extremely moving - my youngest DD became an ambassador for the Holocaust Educational Trust earlier this year and visited Auschwitz-Birkenau as part of her training.
 
I am so happy that you have started your TR! I am really looking forward to reading about your adventures!

Miami airport can be hit or miss. In November I managed to get out of the plane quickly and more or less walked up to an officer. And then had to wait 45 minutes for my suitcase to appear...

I loved your report on the Holocaust Memorial. We only looked at it from the car and I found it very impressive. It is even more impressive in your pictures. I think I need to make it a point to visit it next time I am in Miami.

Great to see that you are already on the ship! And without any problems as well! Well, besides those cigarette butts. How disgusting!!
 
You are really cracking on with your TR. Pretty good start so far will have to show Mike tonight.

I am trying to get plenty done before I go back to work tomorrow (to earn money for the next cruise). Is Mike coming around to the idea of 2017? Do I need to start posting pictures and videos on his FB wall? ;)
Yay, you've boarded! :flower1: I watched the Wonder arrive in Vancouver yesterday afternoon (sad, I know ;) ) and all your lovely photos are making me start to feel a little excited!

What is it with people? Fancy doing that with their cigarette butts :confused3 :sad2:

The holocaust memorial looks extremely moving - my youngest DD became an ambassador for the Holocaust Educational Trust earlier this year and visited Auschwitz-Birkenau as part of her training.

I was so excited, it seemed like such a long time since we'd been on a cruise (even though it was only 18 months). I was pretty grossed out by the cigarette butts, partly at the thought that somebody had been smoking in the room and partly at the thought that the room had obviously not been cleaned that well since the previous occupants.

That is a loely thing that your DD has done, the memorial really was very moving - like I said, I am glad we visited but it did leave me feeling a little sombre and I almost felt guilty about being excited for the cruise.

I am so happy that you have started your TR! I am really looking forward to reading about your adventures!

Miami airport can be hit or miss. In November I managed to get out of the plane quickly and more or less walked up to an officer. And then had to wait 45 minutes for my suitcase to appear...

I loved your report on the Holocaust Memorial. We only looked at it from the car and I found it very impressive. It is even more impressive in your pictures. I think I need to make it a point to visit it next time I am in Miami.

Great to see that you are already on the ship! And without any problems as well! Well, besides those cigarette butts. How disgusting!!

Hi Magdalene, I'm glad you've found me. You were defiitely the inspiration for this trip report - I only hope it can live up to the shining example you set, you're a pretty tough act to follow. You should definitely pay a visit to the Holocaust Memorial next time you're in Miami, it is well worth seeing.

Yes, no problems getting on the ship - it all went very smoothly. Hmm, yes the cigarette butts were disgusting - we had other problems with the cleanliness of the room, stay tuned. Thanks for reading along :)
 
Loving your report! A question about laundry...did they offer a special bulk service at any point on the trip? I have heard this was previously an option but that it may have been discontinued? We will be on EBPC this fall and I have my fingers crossed!
 
Loving your report! A question about laundry...did they offer a special bulk service at any point on the trip? I have heard this was previously an option but that it may have been discontinued? We will be on EBPC this fall and I have my fingers crossed!

Welcome :) I dont' recall a bulk service being offered. We did send a couple of things out the very first day, which I had omitted to mention above (a couple of dress shirts and my husband's suit) but I did some laundry myself later in the cruise so the first day was the only time we used the ship's laundry service.
 
Chapter 6 – And relax…and crawl

Saturday May 2nd

Today’s navigator:













Jet lag saw me awake at 5.10 this morning. Not bad for the second day but, not having gone to sleep until past midnight, I was still tired. Nevertheless, I was awake so decided to make the most of it. After a quick wash, I got dressed and made my way down to the Guest Services area on Deck 3, where I wrote out some more mixology postcards. When I saw signs of life at the Guest Services deck, I also went to check with them that an additional person had been added to the group (I had emailed just before we left but, without access to my emails, wasn’t sure whether it had been confirmed). After finishing writing out the mixology postcard invitations, I decided to get a head start on my steps for the day and set out to deliver those and my recipe postcards. A lady called Liz, from our cruise group, had organised a postcard recipe exchange. We bought postcards from our home town and wrote (or printed) our favourite recipe on the back. There were about 45 people in the exchange so, together with the mixology postcards, I had to cover a lot of the ship.

I started on Deck 2 and worked my way up. At 6.45 I returned everything to the stateroom and headed back to Deck 4 midship to meet the rest of the Disney Wonder-ers (a group of ladies who had been ‘competing’ in Fitbit challenges on the run up to the cruise and wanted to continue in the same fashion whilst on board). There was quite a group of us and we had a very pleasant walk around the deck 4 track, chatting while we went. An hour went past very quickly, with some people dropping out at various points throughout. It was already very warm and by 8 I’d had enough so I left and went back upstairs to get showered, having already achieved my goal of 10,000 steps for today and I hadn’t even had breakfast (eat your heart out Katie Hopkins!) Gary was just waking up so we showered (not together – have you seen the size of the bathrooms on the ship?!) and dressed and made our way up to Beach Blanket Buffet for breakfast. I am very proud of the fact that I can count the number of times I used the lifts (elevators) on the cruise on one hand. I had made a pact that I would always use the stairs, unless there was a good reason why I couldn’t. With the exception of one time, where we went straight from deck 3 to deck 9, and the last day when we had suitcases with us, I didn’t use the elevators at all.

Since I didn’t want to undo all my hard work from this morning’s steps, I had a (somewhat) conservative breakfast of some bacon, a piece of French toast and half an English muffin. Gary had his usual cruise breakfast of 2 boxes of low fat granola.



After breakfast, we decided to go and walk around deck 10. As we were heading towards the steps, we spotted our table mates Julie and Jim so stopped to chat. It was lovely to spend time with them and, before we knew it, it was time for this morning’s talk from Captain Ken Puckett so we made our way down to the Walt Disney Theater with Julie and Jim. Each sea day, on our cruise, Captain Puckett (an ex Panama Canal pilot) gave a presentation about different aspects of the Panama Canal. Today’s talk was on the history of the canal and was very interesting. The presentations were also shown on the TV in the stateroom. My only wish is that they would put each one on a different channel as you had to watch each one, in sequence, to get to the one you had missed/wanted to watch. I actually wrote this on my feedback card at the end of the cruise so it will be interesting to note if there are any changes for the next cruise.

Following Captain Puckett’s presentation, we went to deliver some postcards before meeting some of our fellow cruise group for lunch at Triton’s. Mari and I had been discussing, before we left, about how easy it would be to get to the end of the cruise and not have found time to spend with the people we had been getting to know so well before the cruise. So, with this in mind, we arranged to have lunch together – me and Gary, Mari and her husband, Jeff, and Andrea and Joe (he of ‘pink bra fame’ from the previous night). Mari and Jeff had been to the spa this morning so she did say they might be a little late. While we were waiting, we got chatting to some other cruisers – Dave Z, Dave L, Gail and Janet – and decided that we would all eat lunch together. The dining room were very good about finding a big table for us all and we made our way to our table in the centre of the dining room. Our server was Theo, from South Africa, who had a very posh accent. She was lovely and made us all laugh. As she was taking our order, Mari and Jeff arrived and were able to make a snap decision on food in time to order with us.

Lunch was very pleasant. I had a turkey melt sandwich, which was delicious.



We were all chatting and laughing. Andrea and Joe had bought Gary and I some lovely gifts, including the famous Tastykakes that our friend, Wendy, had told us all about and some Tsum Tsum minis. At one point during lunch, Dave Z asked for chips. Theo bought chips (fries) to the table and there was a lot of laughter as we discussed the different meanings of the word chips. We, of course, had to have dessert. Theo recommended the chocolate dessert, telling us that it was “life changing” so, for that reason Gail decided she had to have it. I was torn but, in the end, decided to have key lime pie. When the desserts came out, some people had little messages on their plates.

I think Dave Z’s was supposed to say FOREVER young…



Gail’s life was changed…



I don’t think Joe was ready…



I think Theo must have decided I needed my life changing too because, along with my key lime pie, she brought me a chocolate dessert too.





Unfortunately, one bite was all I could manage and, for once, Gary wasn’t helping me out.

After lunch, we all went our separate ways, although we would all be seeing each other again very soon at the Pub Crawl. Donna, from our group, had organised an event where we would visit the various bars/lounges on the ship and have a drink at each.

Gary and I popped back to the room to drop off our gifts from Andrea and Joe. We were very surprised to find a bottle of wine on the coffee table in the room. It was from Guest Services, by way of apology (I believe) for the issue we’d had with the room the previous day. A lovely gesture but, since neither of us drink wine, somewhat wasted – luckily, we were able to find a couple of fellow cruisers who could make use of it ;)



We had also received some more gifts (a pair of flip-flops from Elly in a Frozen bag, which Sian has since stolen from me) and a couple of recipe postcards.



Hmm, I recognise one of those postcards…I am guessing that Tony and Tee spent some time delivering postcards this morning.



We also got a cup from Mari with a sparkly DCL logo on.



And we had received, from Jan and Dave, a big bag of goodies, including two beautiful glasses from Michigan, a tree bauble, some chocolate and some DCL decals. Although we weren’t participating in the Fish Extender gift exchange, we were taking part in a couples/individual gift exchange organised by Kathleen. We had bought for Mari’s husband, Jeff, and it seems that Jan and Dave had got our names. We loved our gifts from Jan and Dave, they were amazing.



After admiring all our presents and quickly changing, we set off to meet everybody at Diversions. It was absolutely packed as there was an Obscurity trivia event (similar to Pointless, for my British readers) going on. Gary ordered us some drinks (a Cosmopolitan for me and a Bud Light for himself) and we set about catching up with some of our fellow cruisers. Before long, Donna was waving the clacker which signalled the fact that it was time to move on and we all made our way to the Promenade Lounge. Here I had a Citron Martini and we found some seats with Sally and Scott. At some point this morning I had received a message (through the DCL onboard app) from Sally, telling me that the Royal baby had been born. We found it amusing that an American had broken the news to me – apparently, I should have been showing more interest.



One of our group, Jayne, had taken some of the wonderful graphics posted in our group and turned them into postcards, which she gave out to us all. They were amazing and yet another lovely reminder of our trip. Soon enough Donna was waving the clacker again and this time we moved on to Signals, by the adult pool. It was lovely and warm outside and we made ourselves comfortable in chairs by the bar. The rest of the afternoon was spent laughing, chatting and generally having a good time. At one point, Terry was applying some sun cream which was made just for men – we ended up just calling it ‘man cream’ which elicited many a joke over the coming days.











We hadn’t seen much of Tony and Tee today but, judging from the photos they have posted in our joint Photobucket account, I am guessing they went up on deck before dinner which, tonight, was at Animators Palate. I know they also went to Captain Puckett's talk and they also joined a few of our group to watch the Kentucky Derby in Diversions in the afternoon. Apparently, they had to use some persuasion to get Clayton to allow the sound to be turned up on the television. Unfortunately, none of the horses we had backed won. Still, we were on a Disney cruise, therefore we were all winners!









Tonight’s show was the Prem-EAR of Avenger’s 2: Age of Ultron so there had been no hurry for us to get changed early since I didn’t want to see it and Gary planned to watch it later in the cruise.

Terry and Kim were already at dinner when we arrived, and we were closely followed by Julie and Jim and Tony and Tee.



Tonight was the Taste of the Caribbean menu. I chose the chilled seafood starter but couldn’t actually eat it – having only recently started eating seafood, I still can’t quite bring myself to eat it cold. For main, I had the veal parcel, stuffed with ham, cheese and pineapple, served with roasted onions and potatoes. It was very nice, although very slightly tough.



Gary had the Cajun Baked Bahamian Snapper, with saffron and leek mashed potatoes.



I had serious food envy over Terry’s rib-eye steak, which looked amazing. For dessert, I had a Mickey bar again. Terry ordered the Spiced Chocolate Cake. When it came, it was quite a small portion – Terry turned to Milan and said “Could I get a whole one please?” :laughing:

After one bite, he had decided that it wasn’t very nice and turned to Gary saying “I’m gonna do the guy thing now. Dude, this tastes like crap – wanna try it!” :rotfl:

After dinner, we briefly considered going to the 80s Music Trivia event in WaveBands but we were all pretty tired so decided to call it a night. Tonight’s towel animal was a cool bunny with (cheap) sunshades!

 
Have you forgiven me for the crack about the 5Ton weight limit on that bridge yet????
 
Chapter 7 – Talk in accent of country you’re in

Back to the Waldo Pancake titles today; not that I started speaking Mexican or anything. Tony and Tee's update is in purple.

Sunday May 3rd

Today’s navigator:













I did not sleep well last night and woke up convinced that we’d slept in, despite the fact that I had set an alarm call on the phone. I checked my Kindle, which said 3.40 – since the clocks had gone back, this meant it was actually only 2.40. I dozed off again and, when I woke up, checked my Kindle, which now said 3.37 – what the heck! At that point the phone rang, meaning it was actually 5.30.

After we showered and dressed, we popped up to Beach Blanket Buffet to grab a very quick breakfast before making our way to Studio Sea to register for our excursion – Secret River and Playa del Carmen. I had a few reservations about this excursion since we’d made the decision – horror stories of the ferry ride to Playa del Carmen, enclosed spaces and giant spiders all had me very concerned. I had tried to overcome my own issues with it, though, as I knew it was something Gary really wanted to do. We met up with Kim and Terry, who were on the same excursion, and also Tony and Tee, who were heading off to Tulum to see the ruins. We were quite a reserved group at that time of the morning.

We left the ship as a group and boarded the ferry (affectionately known as the vomit comet) to Playa del Carmen.





I had read that it was better to sit upstairs so Gary, Kim, Terry and I went up the stairs to the top. Tony and Tee had opted to remain downstairs, however we found out later that the air conditioning had not been on downstairs and quite a few people had gotten sick due to the movement and the heat, confirming to me that we really had made the best decision. Kim and I had made a pact that neither of us would be sick – it really was a very rough ride but, although Kim had her head down from early on, she managed to keep her side of the bargain. It was very unpleasant. About halfway through the journey, a man came around offering bottles of water, which we took thinking they were free (included with the excursion). Oh no, he wanted $2 per bottle. There was a slight confusion as I thought we’d only had two bottles between the four of us so gave him $4, which he kept insisting wasn’t enough. Eventually, I realised what had happened and gave him the requisite $6.

Finally, we made it to the mainland, much to Kim’s relief. We made our way off the ferry down the back steps; Kim slipped down the steps but, luckily, wasn’t hurt. We were met by Tomas, who would be our guide, and we were divided into groups and taken to a meeting point. We were in group number ‘ocho’ (8) with Kim and Terry, Mia (from our cruise group) and her husband, Todd, and son, Ashton, and another couple. We had to sign waiver forms and then boarded a minibus to Rio Secreto (the Secret River). When we arrived, we were introduced to our river guide (I can’t remember his real name but he told us to call him ‘Stache) and were issued with water shoes (a bit worn and raggedy), wetsuits (very flattering) and a helmet with a lamp. Before we put our wetsuit on, we had to take a shower to get rid of any sunscreen. ‘Stache told us there were two sides to the showers – a cold side – and an even colder side. The water really was very cold. After our shower, we struggled into our wetsuits while I secretly hoped that there was nobody nearby with a harpoon.

To add insult to injury, a young man with a camera accompanied us and insisted on snapping away. We had a group shot taken - and you will see why our guide was nicknamed ‘Stache.



We followed our guide along a trail through the jungle, until we came to a clearing where a local man performed a Mayan ceremony to cleanse our souls before we entered the caves.



After descending the stone steps, we entered the darkness of the caves. ‘Stache explained how the rocks were formed and the names for the different types of formations. Walking through the waist high water was fairly easy to start with but in places the ground under the water was quite uneven and several times we banged our shins on sharp rocks. Kim joked that we were leaving pieces of ourselves behind for the Mayans. I wasn’t finding the enclosed space too worrying and I was fine until ‘Stache started talking about the various creatures that were found in the caves. When he talked about how big the spiders were, that was it for me. My earlier fears were realised and everything came to the forefront and, before I knew it, I was having a full on panic. I felt like such an idiot. With the help of Gary, Kim and Terry, I was able to get a grip and calm down enough to enjoy the rest of the tour, but it’s fair to say I was relieved when it was over.



After the tour, we got changed and were taken over to view our photos. Before that, ‘Stache offered us a shot of a drink made from honey and aniseed. Kim and I both declined but Gary and Terry were game. I tried to take a picture but Terry had already drunk his so we asked ‘Stache to give him another so I could capture the moment on camera.





We viewed our pictures which, as you can imagine (or indeed have already witnessed above) were pretty dire. We did want to buy one of the pictures of me, Gary, Kim and Terry though, to keep as a memento (not realising at that point just how many of our holiday pictures they would feature in). Since Kim and Terry were going to buy the CD, we figured we would just go halves. The CD would only have Kim and Terry’s pictures on but we didn’t mind. However, ‘Stache told us that they would give us two CDs with all of the pictures on for the one price (I understand from Terry it wasn’t quite the original price quoted but just a little bit more). After we had sorted the photos, we were taken to a place where lunch was being served – tortilla chips, lime and chicken soup, black beans, cactus stir fry and some kind of scrambled egg dish. I was Wry of eating anything as I don’t have a great constitution at the best of times, so just had some tortilla chips (I saw the woman empty them from a sealed bag straight into a dish so figured they were the safest option). Gary was a little more adventurous. After lunch Terry went to collect the CDs. I mentioned to Gary that we ought to leave ‘Stache a tip – unfortunately I hadn’t thought to bring much cash with me so we gave him the rest of about $12, I think (saving a couple of $$ back for Tomas).

Back on the minibus, we were driven (accompanied by Tomas) back to the little shopping centre in Playa del Carmen, where we had some free time.



I wanted to buy a fridge magnet but couldn’t find any I liked. Kim and Terry bought a Christmas ornament, then we wandered round to Starbucks in search of a cold drink and some free wifi. We ordered a Lemon Refresher and a Berry Refresher. I tried to pay with my credit card except I was asked for a PIN and didn’t know it (as I only ever use that card in the US where we never need a PIN). For some reason, the cashier could not override the Pin and have me sign so Kim and Terry had to help us out and pay. I was so embarrassed. We took our drinks outside, but couldn’t get the wifi to work and Terry figured out that we needed to be inside so the two of us went back in. I finally got connected and sent a message to Sian, expecting her to be at home as it was a Sunday. Unfortunately, she was out with her boyfriend so I messaged Mother just to let her know everything was OK and that we were missing them loads but having a great time. After we finished our drinks, we went back to the meeting point. Kim was really looking forward to getting back on the ferry – not!

We did the Tulum Ruins tour. Our guide walked us through the town to the coaches waiting for all the tour groups. We were all given a bottle of water, headphones and a receiver each so our guide would be able to talk to the whole group while we walked through the Tulum site. Our guides were Jose & Patricio, who were Mayan descendants. It took about an hour to get there. The guides walked us around the site giving us an insight into the Mayan culture and the history of Tulum. We wished we’d brought our swimming stuff as the beach and sea did look very inviting and it was an incredibly hot day.









We spent our 2 hours free time looking around the ruins, then took the tram back to the shops and restaurants. We bought coffee, vanilla, chocolate and some hot pepper sauces to take home. Great minds think alike because we too went to Starbucks and bought a lemon refresher and a berry refresher and sat in the shade before taking the coach back to Playa Del Carmen.
 
great report im enjoying it so much.

you were very brave on the excursion, sounds like my worst nightmare spiders , water and bad seas
 

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