Chapter 18 Princesses, Dolphins and Slides Oh My!
My kids are early risers, they get up at the crack of dawn without fail. Doesnt matter how late they go to bed, if it is school time or vacation time. When the sun gets up, they get up. I was never more grateful this than on our first morning on the ship:
There is something truly wonderful about seeing the sun come up on the horizon while at sea! The girls got up and their Minnie and Daisy got up:
I later captured a picture of the breathtakingly beautiful yet extremely elusive DW!
This was one of my favorite shots, although if you dont get another installment of this trip report you will know that my wife has found out about this picture and has either 1) cut off all my fingers or 2) bludgeoned me to death with a blunt object!
We went to Beach Blanket for breakfast and it was awesome. We then had awesome news for the girls. There was to be a princess gathering in the atrium that morning that coincided with our meeting time for our shore excursion. They bumped up our start time 30 minutes so we were able to get to the princess gathering. We were second in line got to meet all 5 princesses and still got to our excursion time with time to spare!
We did the Nassau Dolphin Excursion. My wife and I did this one three years ago while on a cruise with another line for our 10 anniversary. We were really looking forward to seeing the girls on this one. Here is a shot of us on the way:
and a shot of the beautiful Wonder:
I had read how so many people gush about how pretty this ship is, especially compared to others. We were tied up next to the Carnival Sensation both in PC and at Nassau and she is a very ugly ship, boxy, no real lines to her, a feckless drinking barge (as dubbed by Fatherforce) to be sure. I thought it was an exaggeration but when you see it up close it is obvious.
A shot of the girls with the Atlantis in between:
When you get there you go through a brief orientation meeting then they split you up into groups of about 25-30 people. Our dolphins name was Shawn and he was great. We got hugged, kissed, asked to the prom and drenched. I wanted to ask one family why they were there, the mom didnt want to get wet, complained about the water temp etc
. Didnt seem like they were having a good time. Now the water was a bit brisk, shrinkage inducing even. But the trick is to just get in and get wet. When it was our turn I dipped down up to my neck. Someone asked my why I was doing it but that helps you get used to it quicker! Whenever you werent following directions or to be blunt just being plain dense, the trainer would have the dolphin give you a raspberry, spit water at you or both. Why am I here? Mom dodged several attempts of Shawn to get her but in the end got a face full while she was trying to take a picture with NONWATERPROOF camera. I mean really? I knew from both the Dis and from our experience before that you bring a waterproof camera (from home they are cheaper). I smile smugly to myself as I turn my gaze of disdain from the hapless fools who either dont know the Dis or didnt heed its teachings, a return to my vacation.
After the excursion we snack on food pilfered from the breakfast buffet to tide us over so we dont have to buy the stuff there. Another great Dis tip. Got some great pictures from the Dolphin folks and bought the DVD of our group.
Since any and all dolphin pics are on the Waterproof Camera and we havent got them back from the developer yet, I will post those later if we get the chance and if the pics are any good.
On our trip back we decided we wanted to hit up the Del Sol store. Del Sol is very cool you get shirts, hair clips, watches, flip flops, etc. And they change color in the sun. (
www.delsol.com) The problem was we had a bunch wet towels. Didnt want to carry them around, didnt want to go back to the ship then back into Nassau. I was going to hoof it back and catch up. When our tender got to the dock what was there? A
DCL rep collected wet towels! This was very cool. I was very impressed with this.
We hit Del Sol get some gifts and the girls bought some stuff for themselves and head back to the ship.
We grabbed a later afternoon snack at Plutos, it was about 3 our breakfast and snacks had worn off but we didnt want to eat too much cuz dinner was right around the corner. The girls then wanted to go to the Goofy pool cuz High School Musical was on. How cool is that, I get to swim AND watch high school musical. Here is a shot of the girls dancing at the end with Troy and Co.:
It looks like they are standing still but they are dancing.
After Shar Pei decides she likes Crème Brulee, the girls want to go back to the slide. DW goes up to get a shot from Deck 10
Sweet Child:
Mini Me:
DW then wanted a shot at the bottom, she told the girls to get up and do the TA DA! when they get to the bottom. Sweet Child being the pleaser she is obliged:
Mini Me forgot to do the Ta Da so we asked her to do it again. She eventually gave us what we were looking for:
No she isnt having any fun at all is she?
We wanted to get the girls to have some quiet time because we knew that after the dinner and the show, the pirate party awaited. We were at the slide a bit longer than we anticipated but we did get about 20 minutes of quiet time.
Thats all for now tune in next time for Prancing Princesses, Golden Mickeys, Pooped Pirates, and Bouncing Buccaneers