mississaugamom
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Nov 4, 2003
- Messages
- 1,066
Cast: myself (Arlene), DH (Martin), our 7 yr old DD (Lara), and DHs Aunt and Uncle (both 81)
Our adventure began with a 4 am departure from home to the airport in Toronto for our Air Canada flight to Orlando. Everything went remarkably smoothly, and although the plane was 30 minutes late leaving, they made up the time on the way down, arriving in Orlando at 10:10 am. We were met by Kal from Tiffany Town Car, who assisted us with our mountain of luggage into a 10-passenger van for the drive to Port Canaveral.
We arrived at Port Canaveral shortly after noon, and quickly checked in at the desks for non-US citizens. The queue to board the ship was very long at this time but actually moved quite quickly. Although I was wearing my lime-green Mickey shirt, most of the DISers had already boarded so we didnt meet anyone in the check-in lines. Once we were announced, we rushed to Rockin Bar D for our Palo ressies (no problems getting our first choices) and then to try switching our dinner seating from late to early. Despite being waitlisted since October, we were assigned to the LAP late dining rotation. There were no openings for a party of five, but they took our cabin numbers and said they would call if anything became available. Upstairs to the buffet at Topsiders , where I left my family eating while I went to make my spa appointments. (Again, no problems getting the times I wanted.) Since the day was overcast and cool, we decided to eat indoors. The welcome buffet was wonderful, with all the peel-and-eat shrimp certainly living up to their reputation on these boards. Yummy!!!!! I couldnt believe the size of them!
Since it was after 1:30, we headed downstairs to our staterooms; first Auntie and Uncles 5639 and then up to our home for the week, 6641. (These were both Category 11s.) While Auntie and Uncle rested, we explored the ship before our 4:00 lifeboat drill. This process was handled very quickly and professionally. I wished I had taken my camera though, everyone looked funny (in a cute way) in their lifevests! After returning our lifevests to the cabin, we headed up to Deck 10 for the sailaway party. Deck 9 looked much too crowded for us! We had a great view of the characters onstage, and Lara had a great time blowing bubbles as we departed right on time. As the crowd quickly thinned out on Deck 9, we headed down because Lara wanted to dance and pick up the streamers and confetti on the deck. We went back to our cabins hoping for a call about changing our dining time, but no such luck. 8:30 it was! Around 6:00, we all began feeling queasy from the rough seas and put on our Sea Bands. We had to go to Guest Services in search of my DHs suitcase. The yellow tag had come off, so it was downstairs waiting for us to come and find it. I also forgot all about booking my daughters hair braiding between 5:30 and 6:30! We took her up to Plutos for chicken strips and fries for her dinner since she wanted to go to the Club for the Aloha Luau party starting at 8:00. She ate a little but still wasnt feeling well. By 7:00, we all decided that Gravol might be a good idea!
After signing Lara into the club for the evening, we met Auntie and Uncle downstairs to look at the Pin Cart. There were a lot of nice ones to choose from, so we bought the limited editions that night. Luckily, the cart also sold Sea Bands, since Auntie and Uncle didnt have any! The waves were still really strong, and the cruise staff told us it had been very rough coming into Port Canaveral that morning as well, but that this wasnt normal. (Good thing we were starting to wonder what we had gotten ourselves into for the next seven days!)
We went to dinner, where we were seated with a lovely family of three who were also from Canada (New Brunswick). After introducing ourselves and explaining Laras absence, their 11 yr old son left the dining room because he was feeling too sick to eat. Fortunately for DH and I, the Gravol was kicking in and the seas were becoming calmer. Our servers were wonderful; Melwin and Paula. I ordered the shrimp appetizer, green salad and had some dinner rolls, while he had the grilled beef tenderloin. Uncle ate a full dinner, while Auntie only managed a roll and some jello that they were able to find for her. I was playing it safe because I had to have dessert Grand Marnier Souffle!!! It was wonderful, and I felt just fine by then and well able to enjoy it. During dinner Gaspare (the dining room manager) came to apologize about our request for early dining not being met. When he saw the ages of Auntie and Uncle and the absence of Lara, he told us to come to early dining the next night and he would work something out for us. We apologized to our dinner companions and our servers about the pending move, but we really thought it would be best for everyone.
After dinner we browsed in the shops for awhile and went to pick Lara up at her Club. We ran into a problem there the pager they gave us was defective! Lara had wanted us since she was tired and not feeling well again (fortunately only about 15 minutes earlier) and they paged us twice but it never came through. Although they were profusely apologetic and replaced the pager, Lara had certainly lost some faith in the pager system and insisted on staying with us for the next few evenings. We returned to our cabins and were quickly rocked to sleep.
Our adventure began with a 4 am departure from home to the airport in Toronto for our Air Canada flight to Orlando. Everything went remarkably smoothly, and although the plane was 30 minutes late leaving, they made up the time on the way down, arriving in Orlando at 10:10 am. We were met by Kal from Tiffany Town Car, who assisted us with our mountain of luggage into a 10-passenger van for the drive to Port Canaveral.
We arrived at Port Canaveral shortly after noon, and quickly checked in at the desks for non-US citizens. The queue to board the ship was very long at this time but actually moved quite quickly. Although I was wearing my lime-green Mickey shirt, most of the DISers had already boarded so we didnt meet anyone in the check-in lines. Once we were announced, we rushed to Rockin Bar D for our Palo ressies (no problems getting our first choices) and then to try switching our dinner seating from late to early. Despite being waitlisted since October, we were assigned to the LAP late dining rotation. There were no openings for a party of five, but they took our cabin numbers and said they would call if anything became available. Upstairs to the buffet at Topsiders , where I left my family eating while I went to make my spa appointments. (Again, no problems getting the times I wanted.) Since the day was overcast and cool, we decided to eat indoors. The welcome buffet was wonderful, with all the peel-and-eat shrimp certainly living up to their reputation on these boards. Yummy!!!!! I couldnt believe the size of them!
Since it was after 1:30, we headed downstairs to our staterooms; first Auntie and Uncles 5639 and then up to our home for the week, 6641. (These were both Category 11s.) While Auntie and Uncle rested, we explored the ship before our 4:00 lifeboat drill. This process was handled very quickly and professionally. I wished I had taken my camera though, everyone looked funny (in a cute way) in their lifevests! After returning our lifevests to the cabin, we headed up to Deck 10 for the sailaway party. Deck 9 looked much too crowded for us! We had a great view of the characters onstage, and Lara had a great time blowing bubbles as we departed right on time. As the crowd quickly thinned out on Deck 9, we headed down because Lara wanted to dance and pick up the streamers and confetti on the deck. We went back to our cabins hoping for a call about changing our dining time, but no such luck. 8:30 it was! Around 6:00, we all began feeling queasy from the rough seas and put on our Sea Bands. We had to go to Guest Services in search of my DHs suitcase. The yellow tag had come off, so it was downstairs waiting for us to come and find it. I also forgot all about booking my daughters hair braiding between 5:30 and 6:30! We took her up to Plutos for chicken strips and fries for her dinner since she wanted to go to the Club for the Aloha Luau party starting at 8:00. She ate a little but still wasnt feeling well. By 7:00, we all decided that Gravol might be a good idea!
After signing Lara into the club for the evening, we met Auntie and Uncle downstairs to look at the Pin Cart. There were a lot of nice ones to choose from, so we bought the limited editions that night. Luckily, the cart also sold Sea Bands, since Auntie and Uncle didnt have any! The waves were still really strong, and the cruise staff told us it had been very rough coming into Port Canaveral that morning as well, but that this wasnt normal. (Good thing we were starting to wonder what we had gotten ourselves into for the next seven days!)
We went to dinner, where we were seated with a lovely family of three who were also from Canada (New Brunswick). After introducing ourselves and explaining Laras absence, their 11 yr old son left the dining room because he was feeling too sick to eat. Fortunately for DH and I, the Gravol was kicking in and the seas were becoming calmer. Our servers were wonderful; Melwin and Paula. I ordered the shrimp appetizer, green salad and had some dinner rolls, while he had the grilled beef tenderloin. Uncle ate a full dinner, while Auntie only managed a roll and some jello that they were able to find for her. I was playing it safe because I had to have dessert Grand Marnier Souffle!!! It was wonderful, and I felt just fine by then and well able to enjoy it. During dinner Gaspare (the dining room manager) came to apologize about our request for early dining not being met. When he saw the ages of Auntie and Uncle and the absence of Lara, he told us to come to early dining the next night and he would work something out for us. We apologized to our dinner companions and our servers about the pending move, but we really thought it would be best for everyone.
After dinner we browsed in the shops for awhile and went to pick Lara up at her Club. We ran into a problem there the pager they gave us was defective! Lara had wanted us since she was tired and not feeling well again (fortunately only about 15 minutes earlier) and they paged us twice but it never came through. Although they were profusely apologetic and replaced the pager, Lara had certainly lost some faith in the pager system and insisted on staying with us for the next few evenings. We returned to our cabins and were quickly rocked to sleep.
