It's A Small World - A Never-ending Pre-trip Report

[jedijill]

I can't wait to hear your impressions of the ship. I'm looking to branch out to Royal since DCL seems to be pricing me out. I did the Flowrider on the Freedom several years ago and it is soooo fun!

The ifly here in Denver constantly runs Groupon/Living Social deals so you might be able to find one for Orlando if you ever want to try it.

Fingers crossed the China cruises work out!

Jill in CO

 

[dolphingirl47]

I can't wait to hear your impressions of the ship.

I can't wait to see it. The more I read and see about the Ovation and to a greater extend her sister ships, the more excited I get. I am starting to get worried after experiencing the Ovation I won't want to sail on anything but the Quantum class ships again.

I'm looking to branch out to Royal since DCL seems to be pricing me out.

If my first experience is anything to go by, I can recommend this. I have now started to pre-type this trip report and will start to post this as soon as the Coast to Coast one is finished.

I did the Flowrider on the Freedom several years ago and it is soooo fun!

I am quite excited to try this. My dodgy balance won't allow stand up surfing, but I have tried boogie boarding in the Atlantic off the coast of Cornwall in the past and very much enjoyed it.

The ifly here in Denver constantly runs Groupon/Living Social deals so you might be able to find one for Orlando if you ever want to try it.

That is good to know although I think it will be a few years until I go back to Orlando. There is so much of the world to discover and if I limit my time in the USA then California will always win over Florida.

Fingers crossed the China cruises work out!

Thanks. I wish they made an announcement.

Corinna

 

[Flossbolna]

Hi Corinna, I think this will be of interest for you: https://www.shanghaidisneyresort.com/en/ticket/

 

[dolphingirl47]

Hi Corinna, I think this will be of interest for you: https://www.shanghaidisneyresort.com/en/ticket/

Thanks for sharing. This is very much of interest to me. I am hoping to spend two days there and one would be peak and the other off peak looking at the calendar. The prices for both seem to be fair though. As more details become available once the park has opened, I may come to the conclusion that one day will be enough. In this case I will go there for my birthday, which will be off peak.

I wonder when they will release the hotel prices as they are supposed to be available for booking the same day.

Corinna

 

[dolphingirl47]

After another whirlwind mini trip that was kind of cobbled together at the 11th hour especially as I had not been feeling well, I have now turned my attention back to the trips later this year.
Ta
We finally managed to finalise our next trip to Disneyland Paris. We are flying out after work on 3rd March and are flying back in the morning of the 7th March. This means that I will have three full days in the parks and will be there for the first weekend of their spring festival. I am very excited about this.

Speaking of Disneyland Paris, all going well, on Tuesday I can finally book our entry for the inaugural Run Disney event at Disneyland Paris. Up to now, bookings could only be made as part of a hotel package and the prices for those were insane. So I am hoping to get two entries for the 5K race on Tuesday. If all works out according to plan, we will be at Disneyland Paris for this from 23rd to 25th September.

The last bit of news is decidedly good news. Royal Caribbean has finally published the replacement cruises for the Far East cruise in November that we had hoped to book. This cruise has been split into a 5 night cruise and a 7 night cruise, both leaving from Hong Kong. The first cruise calls at two Taiwanese ports and is of no interest to us. The 7 night cruise however is a different matter. This is a repositioning cruise from Hong Kong to Singapore stopping at a port in China and two ports in Vietnam including an overnight stop at Ho Chi Minh. This gives us the opportunity to explore various parts of China before the cruise as well as having a couple of days in Singapore after the cruise. If we like the Ovation in May, we will book the cruise while we are on board.

Corinna

 

[Pinkocto]

So much exciting news! I enjoyed the pictures of the Ovation of the Seas, it looks like it is going to be gorgeous! and lots of fun things to try! I'm glad you'll have all those sea days to enjoy the ship.

I'm glad you like your room assignment. Two decks down from the adult area sounds perfect.

Exciting about your Paris plans coming together.

and that works out better with the Far East cruise everything seems to be falling into place.

 

[franandaj]

I hope everything went well with the registration for the DLP 5K!

 

[dolphingirl47]

So much exciting news!

Yes, I am doing a little of bouncing off he walls at the moment.

I enjoyed the pictures of the Ovation of the Seas, it looks like it is going to be gorgeous! and lots of fun things to try!

I am glad you enjoyed them. The more I see and read about the ships in that class, the more I wonder if I will ever want to get on another ship again.

I'm glad you like your room assignment. Two decks down from the adult area sounds perfect.

I was absolutely thrilled with having the assignment so early and the location.

Exciting about your Paris plans coming together.

Yes, they are and in more ways than one (see below)

everything seems to be falling into place.

It definitely is although it is kind of strange that I could pretty much tell you were I will be on any given day on the November trip, but have no idea what will happen with the first part of the May trip or in terms of excursions on the cruise. I really have to put my mind to this.

I hope everything went well with the registration for the DLP 5K!

Yes, it did. It cost me some nerves, but it was worth it. I had arranged my lunch so that I could use this to book our places. A friend of mine from Florida is also coming over for this and at least we could keep each other virtual company through the process. First of all it took ages for the booking page to go life. I think it was 10 minutes after 5:00 until it no longer stated to come back at 5:00. Once the link had gone life, it took forever for the pages to load. I had visions of the race being sold out before I could enter my details. During this process, I was messaging with my friend on the phone. She had the same issues. Fortunately shortly afterwards, I got our confirmation for two spaces for the 5K and my friend got hers a minute or so later. It was a good job that I managed to do this during my lunch break as by the time I got home, this had sold out. May the preparation begin.

Corinna

 

[Pinkocto]

Great that you were able to register for the race! Sounds stressful about the slowness but thankfully you were able to do it when you did

 

[franandaj]

I'm glad everything worked out for you. I hear those races really sell out quickly.

 

[dolphingirl47]

Great that you were able to register for the race!

I am so happy about this.

Sounds stressful about the slowness but thankfully you were able to do it when you did

As already Mr Shakespeare said: "All is well that ends well."

I'm glad everything worked out for you.

Thanks.

I hear those races really sell out quickly.

I have only been through the process once before when I signed up Graham for the Race for the Taste at Walt Disney World in 2009 and I don't think I even signed him up on the first day. I have however read that the races at the US parks can sell out in less than an hour.

Corinna

 

[dolphingirl47]

It really is all happening at the moment. The various trips we have planned are finally all coming to fruition. It all feels a little overwhelming. I have started to do a little shopping. They have a white night on Royal Caribbean. White is not a colour that I would normally wear. So I really had nothing suitable. I ended up finding an absolute bargain for a beautiful white gown. I am absolutely in love with the intricate design:







I also got a couple more Arabic dresses. I figured as about half the cruise is in the Middle East, I may as well dress to match:





The next couple of purchases I need to make are not quite so glamourous, but still rather exciting. Now that I have managed to register for my first 5K, I need to start thinking about training. I don't actually have any proper running shoes at the moment so that is the first thing to get taken care of. I am hoping to go for those. I think they look rather neat and will give me all the support I need:



I will also need to get a gadget for wearing my iPhone during training. Our National Health Service has podcasts for Couch to 5K on their website and this is what I am planning to us for my training. So I need to find a way to attach my iPhone safely. The idea is that I will start the actual training once I get back from my Disneyland Paris trip in two weeks. That should give me time to break in my shoes and get myself organized. I also think it is rather fitting to have a Disneyland Paris trip at the beginning of my training period. The programme I am planning to follow is designed so that you run 3 times a week with a day off between two runs. It also eases you in nice and gently.

It looks like a decision has been made on how we get to Barcelona. We had originally discussed taking the previous cruise on the Ovation as well, which goes from Southampton to Barcelona. Up to now, the prices had been higher than what we were willing to pay. Over night, there has been a huge price drop. So I rang my Graham and he told me to book it, but I could feel that is heart is not in it. It transpired that he would rather get there by train stopping off on the way. So that is what we are going to do.

There is a bit of history behind this. At the end of April in 2010, we had a Med cruise booked out of Barcelona on the Disney Magic. Unfortunately this was at the time when the volcano in Island erupted and closed first the UK airspace and then the airspace pretty much all over Europe. So we had a choice to make. We could either accept that the cruise was not going to happen and try and claim on insurance or we could another way of getting there. We chose the second option. It was all very rushed, a little scenic and ended up being rather expensive due to the last minute nature of this and the fact that we were a captive audience. We left Manchester late afternoon on the Tuesday and got to Barcelona lunchtime on the Friday. The ship left Saturday afternoon. It was utterly exhausting, but it was also a wonderful adventure.

We always said that at some stage we would repeat this, but organize it ahead of time, plan it out properly and stop over at a few places on the way. Since then we have done a lot of travel to some amazing places, but have never got around to this. So it looks like the time for this trip has finally come. We are going to have a proper look at this over the weekend. This time we are planning on using the Eurostar to get across to the continent rather than the ferry that we ended up taking last time round. I may feel the need for a quick visit to Disneyland Paris if we are in Paris anyway. I have an annual pass so this makes sense. I also really want to visit Carcassonne, which is on the way. This gives us the chance to get to Barcelona a couple of days early. I want to see Sagrada Familia again and we were talking about doing the cable car that goes across the port. I am a huge fan of Gaudi so I am hoping to see as many of his works as possible. On our previous visits we never had the chance to visit Parc Güell as we were too tired the first time and it was raining very heavily the second time. I also found an excursion that combines a visit to Colonia Güell, a worker's village constructed by Antoni Gaudí with a visit to the monastery at Montserrat. I told Graham that if I have not managed to get Gaudi out of my system by the time the trip has finished, I did something wrong.

It looks like we are covering a lot of UNESCO World Heritage Sites on this trip: Carcassonne, Parc Güell, Pompeii, Accropolis and Petra. I am getting more and more excited about this trip. This is really turn out to be a bumper year for travelling.

 

[jedijill]

Love that gown! Gorgeous!

I did a med cruise in May of 2010 and was sweating the volcano too! The flights up to 3 days before I flew were cancelled but I ended up getting to Barcelona with no issues.

You are having a great travel year!

Jill in CO

 

[franandaj]

Wow! It sounds like you are going to have quite the international travel year coming up. I will be looking forward to hearing about it all and seeing your pictures!

 

[Pinkocto]

The white dress is gorgeous! I love the sound of your train trip before the cruise, that will be fabulous.

Sounds like a good plan for the 5K training.

 

[dolphingirl47]

Decisions, decisions. The price for our cruise has significantly dropped and for the same lower price we could even get a balcony cabin. At the moment we are in an interior cabin. I am really torn about this. We are going to have 10 sea days and the weather should be nice. However, I am really happy with the location of the cabin we have been assigned. I really don't know what to do.

Corinna

 

[franandaj]

I would take the balcony. I love being able to wake up in the morning and look out the balcony without having to get fully dressed.

 

[dolphingirl47]

Love that gown! Gorgeous!

Thanks. I can't wait to wear it.

I did a med cruise in May of 2010 and was sweating the volcano too! The flights up to 3 days before I flew were cancelled but I ended up getting to Barcelona with no issues.

I am glad you made it. At least we had the option of a plan B.

You are having a great travel year!

Yes, this is going to be a fantastic year.

Wow! It sounds like you are going to have quite the international travel year coming up.

Yes, some of this is taking me out of my comfort zone, but it is all the more exciting for this.

I will be looking forward to hearing about it all and seeing your pictures!

I am looking forward to doing those trip reports. At the moment I am working on the one for our December cruise. I have pre-typed about half of this. I am hoping to have this all typed up before I have finished posting the Coast to Coast trip report

The white dress is gorgeous!

Thanks.

I love the sound of your train trip before the cruise, that will be fabulous.

I am getting rather excited about this.

Sounds like a good plan for the 5K training.

I think it is. I am a little scared about the prospect, but I am sure it will all work out.

Corinna

 

[dolphingirl47]

I would take the balcony. I love being able to wake up in the morning and look out the balcony without having to get fully dressed.

My only concern is that on the two occasions when we had a balcony previously, essentially we never used it. However, on the other hand, the price is the same as the interior cabin so we are not losing anything.

Corinna

 

[dolphingirl47]

Well, we have come to a decision. As I said, we had balconies twice previously and essentially other than watching us sailing away from the balcony the first day, we never used it. On both occasions we ended up with the balcony as this was the cheapest option. This time sail away would not even be a consideration as we are not leaving port until midnight. The crunch point is that the location of the cabin they assigned us is absolutely perfect. To a lesser extend I am also really excited about staying in one of the virtual balcony cabins, but this is not a deal breaker. The decision we have come to is if we can just re-shop and keep the same cabin at the lower price than that is what we are going to do. If we have to give up our cabin, we go for the balcony.

Corinna