Day Twelve (May 12, Puerto Vallarta At Sea)
This was the day we were supposed to be in Puerto Vallarta, so Disney had created a full schedule to try to make up for missing out on excursions. The kids and I had been booked on an excursion to Las Caletas, which we had done in 2012 on our Mexican Riviera cruise with
DCL. We were very disappointed to miss it – it was the only stop Elliott had been looking forward to! We were all ok, though.
We enjoyed sleeping in, since we had originally been expecting to wake up quite early this day. We went up to Beach Blanket Buffet for breakfast and then completed the second day's Anna's Chocolate Chase clues.
After we finished up with that, we met up with friends in the Promenade Lounge to play a round of Steering Committee Hide-and-Seek. We had missed this the first time, because we hadn't realized how much fun it would be! Luckily, we were clued in this time and made plans in advance.
Our team consisted of the three of us, Ava, Mari, Jeff, Joe, Andrea, Sally, and Athene. Christa and Ryan decided to hang out in the lounge watching everyone run around like chickens with their heads cut off. We were attempting to unseat the reigning champs, team Avengers, which included Mari and Jeff's kids, Jonathan and Carmen, along with other members of the Stitch Club. We decided that our team name should be Hydra, in honor of our foes.
In Steering Committee Hide-and-Seek, members of the steering committee (captain, cruise director, hotel director, etc.) change their clothes and hide in plain sight somewhere on the ship. Each of them is assigned a point value based on their standard visibility (like, Clayton was worth the least points because everyone knew what he looked like). They may be wearing a different uniform and doing a job, or they could be dressed in plain clothes mingling with the passengers. The first group to find one of the brought the back to the lounge to receive their points. We only had about half an hour in which to do this.
After they showed us photographs of each crew member, we were set free. We immediately headed up to the shops on deck 4 and the amazing Athene spotted Clayton dressed as a woman, nicknamed "Anita."
This quick victory got us all excited, but alas, we never got another point. We were very close to almost all of them, but we passed the by! We had some confusion because we assumed that none of them would be in an area that was closed off to some people (like, they wouldn't be in the ladies room, because men/boys couldn't go in and find them). Unfortunately, three of them were in the adults-only gym. We had been standing right outside and one of them walked past – I had thought he was one of them but when he went in the gym we decided he couldn't be!
In the end, those pesky Avengers won and Hydra was defeated. We all gathered back in the Promenade Lounge for the big reveal of the secret identities, many of which had gone completely undiscovered. Captain Robert had been out on deck 4 oiling the deck (or something along those lines)!
Captain Robert and Clayton
The whole gang
After the game ended we all hung out in Promenade talking while the kids played board games. It was a lot of fun just having some chill time with everyone! I'd signed up for a chocolate and liquor tasting with Ryan and Christa, so soon it was time for the kids to go to the Lab while we headed off to the Cadillac Lounge.
This tasting was so much fun! I highly recommend it if you have the chance to do it. Set at each place were four sets of items: a pretty pink champagne (Taittinger Prestige Rose) with a small glass of melted white chocolate; a Malbec blend (Lasseter Family Winery Amoureux) with white, dark, and caramel feves (basically chocolate discs); port (Noval) with a dark chocolate feve and a small hunk of very good Parmesan cheese; and a very fancy shot of Scotch (Glenmorangie Signet) with melted milk chocolate and a white/milk chocolate stick.
It really was interesting to see how the flavors changed as you coated your mouth with different types of chocolate. My favorite, to my surprise, was the port. They had you chew the Parmesan and dark chocolate at the same time and then take a sip of your port. It was delicious! Since we had been told that the Scotch was a $40 shot (more than the cost of the event), I tried very hard to like it, but it was just a bit too strong for me. I did like it better after we added the chocolate!
After the tasting I went to the Lab to see if the boys wanted to be picked up. Elliott wanted to watch a movie in the room, so I let him do that while I delivered our FE gifts. I also found the first sign that the cruise was drawing to a close – the prepaid tip vouchers and envelopes were waiting on my bed for me.
That afternoon they were repeating the Pixar Pals Party, which was great because it had been held at the same time as my mixology on Toy Story Day. Elliott had no interest, but Oliver wanted to go, so I traded kids at the Lab.
Oliver was having fun dancing at the beginning, but very quickly he got bumped while dancing with Dug the dog and then he refused to have any fun.
I spent the whole party trying to cheer him up, dancing like a crazy person. Finally at the last minute a confetti cannon went off and he instantly became happy, peppy Ollie again.
I'd noticed that the Navigator said there were new Frozen-themed DCL items in the gift shop, so Oliver and I decided to go check them out on our way back to the room. They were very cute!
Ollie and I went to the room and watched TV/read, then went to get ice cream cones (every opportunity), and then headed back to the room to get ready for dinner. It was our second formal night, the Captain's Gala dinner, and we were going to be in Parrot Cay. This is one of my least favorite menus, to be honest, which is why I'd originally scheduled my Palo dinner this night. I put on a sundress that could pass as formal for the night, had Oliver change into a polo-type shirt, and brought a similar shirt for Elliott to put on after we picked him up at the Lab. I wasn't really in the mood to get dressed up, but I also didn't want to go casual, so this was a nice compromise.
Both of the kids ordered the penne pasta from the kid's menu – I can never convince my seafood lovers that they should try the lobster! Maybe next time I will just have one brought out for them to try.
I ordered the aged prosciutto appetizer, which is always tasty. I just love prosciutto! Nothing else really leaped out at me, so I asked if I could get the tomato salad minus the tomato. Everything else about it sounded delicious, but I wanted more greens. Luckily, they were able to do this for me!
The main course this night is tricky for me. There's no steak and the chicken is breaded and served with pasta, which didn't really appeal to me. I ended up ordering the “lighter note offerings” chicken with a baked potato. This was fine, though not particularly exciting.
As usual, Elliott got bored and asked if he could head off to the Edge open house. The kids were reaching their limits on eating every dinner in a formalish setting and were starting to be a bit more difficult. I can understand that, but it was definitely getting less enjoyable so I happily let Elliott go.
If the dinner menu isn't to my liking, the dessert menu makes up for it. I couldn't make up my mind, so I asked for both the warm chocolate lava cake and the banana crème brulee.
Both were very tasty, but I didn't end up eating too much of them. Oliver told me he had a headache and I was pretty full, so we went back to the room. When the open house at Edge was scheduled to end, at 8:00, we went to pick Elliott up and then watched Emperor's New Groove on the tv in our room. When the movie ended they both asked to go to the Lab.
I let them go for about 45 minutes, but then it was time to get ready for the big event of the night – Triton's Chocolate Gala Buffet! Oliver said that his headache was back and he didn't want to go, so I sent Elliott to get into line and took Ollie back to the room, gave him some acetaminophen, and put him in bed with a movie. I then ran back down to where Elliott was waiting just in time for the doors to open.
The buffet was really beautiful! I'm glad we weren't too far back in the line, because I heard that things got a bit out of hand after a little while. Apparently people were taking enormous quantities of food and insisting on eating the decorations. Grown-ups, man.
I got a nice selection of items to share and we took it back to the room to eat.
That's peanut butter mousse cake on the bottom, strawberry cake on the right, chocolate-dipped strawberries, a pink macaron, pineapple from the chocolate fountain, and that thing in the middle of the fruit at the top is marzipan cake. Elliott also had a plate with a macaron and a few pieces of chocolate fountain fruit. Everything was just lovely and very tasty. And seriously, how pretty is that pink cake? There were so many more things I resisted, because our bellies were getting close to capacity.
We put WALL-E on the TV and the kids quickly fell asleep. It was a time change night, so I reset everything and then decided to turn in myself.
so shows how great it is)
