zeldacruiser
Mouseketeer
- Joined
- Jan 23, 2005
- Messages
- 140
Slept until 9 on our first day at sea, thanks to the command to set our clocks forward an hour. Took delivery of my teenage daughter's room-service breakfast and then left her sleeping in our dark, porthole-less cat 12 room and went upstairs to find a perfect sunny day, not a cloud in the sky, temp around the low 70s. Loaded up on fresh fruit (meager effort to balance out the creme brulee cheesecake of the night before!) and scrambled eggs with cheese (later in the week I didn't realize the sign said something different and got what turned out to be scrambled eggs with salmon - quite a suprise when I took the first bite) at Topsiders, and grabbed a table outside.
After breakfast, told DD it was really time to wake up and eat her breakfast. By the time we went up to the adult pool, deck 9 chairs were taken, but we found a few chairs on deck 10. I don't mind people saving chairs while they take a dip in the pool or grab a soft drink (did that myself plenty of times), but it appears that many people threw towels on chairs on their way to breakfast and then didn't show up for hours - very annoying. Not a big deal by the adult pool, but our tablemate admitted that she finally resorted to cheating that way to get a chair close to the Mickey pool to watch her 5-year-old son on our last day at sea, after four days of getting up early only to find all the chairs already "taken."
The pool was the perfect temperature - refreshing but not too cold. Took a break at 2 o'clock to attend one of the "Art of Entertaining" demonstrations about fruit carving and cocktail making. I think I could manage the chicken made out of a pineapple, but the intricate watermelon rose was amazing and way beyond my capabilities. As I had hoped, the cocktail making demo ended with free Bahama Mamas for everyone. On the way back for more lounging in the sun, I looked over the atrium railing to see the staff getting ready for Mr. Toad's Wild Race. Had wondered if there would be real toads, or if someone in each family would have to act like a toad, but it turned out to be large wooden toads that moved along some kind of rope contraption.
This being formal night, we went back to the stateroom early to get ready. I convinced DD that we should wear our formalwear to the 6:30 showing of the Golden Mickeys (we had late dinner). She lagged behind, worried that we would look silly with everyone else wearing shorts, but once we got there she saw that more people were already dressed up than not. Got there in time to watch on the screen inside the theater as "Rona Rivers" interviewed some of the kids arriving outside - very cute. The show itself was a mix of live action dancing and singing plus some animation, with a salute to villains, heroes, etc. Thought the Cruella Deville and Lion King segments were especially good.
Didn't go to any events between the show and dinner because we waited in two lines to get photos taken in the atrium (Daughter: "Why are you walking like you have a stick up your butt, Mom?" Me: "Because these heels are killing me after standing on this marble floor for so long."). The photo in front of the Mickey statue outside Lumiere's turned out to be a dud, since the photographer didn't seem to know how to arrange a mother and teenager. We liked the other one, at the fake boat railing, despite the fact that we both were too conservative that day in our use of sunscreen and looked a little more red than we would have liked.
Lots of little girls in princess dresses to be seen. There were opportunities to have photos taken every night, both with and without characters. They also did portraits with a plain white background, if you wanted something non-Disney. We took the advice from these message boards and looked at our photos in Shutters whenever we knew there would be new ones, tossing the ones we didn't like and stacking the others into one pile. Made me nervous, but they always reappeared the next night, and we finally made our choices the last night. Oh, the staff was also OK with people taking a photo with their own camera right after the photographer did.
Our dinner was in Lumiere's, with regular Lumiere's dinner menu. Now I remember what I had in Parrot Cay last night - mixed grill, yummy and more than I could eat; I also liked the sound of the coleslaw that was a side dish for another entree, so I asked for a sample of that as well - but my dinner in Lumiere's escapes me at the moment. Several times during the cruise DD ordered an entree with the sauce on the side if she wasn't sure about it, and Julio brought that with no trouble; also, a few times she ordered a salad with ranch dressing instead of the dressing listed on the menu, also no problem. Also met our other dining partner, who hadn't been there the night before, a man maybe in his 50s whose traveling partners had to cancel their cruise but who decided to give it a go by himself.
DD went to watch a movie in the room after dinner, while I changed out of the killer shoes and went to the Adult After Party to see the ventriloquist we had liked so much at the Welcome Variety Show. Then bedtime, to get ready for another sunny day at sea.
After breakfast, told DD it was really time to wake up and eat her breakfast. By the time we went up to the adult pool, deck 9 chairs were taken, but we found a few chairs on deck 10. I don't mind people saving chairs while they take a dip in the pool or grab a soft drink (did that myself plenty of times), but it appears that many people threw towels on chairs on their way to breakfast and then didn't show up for hours - very annoying. Not a big deal by the adult pool, but our tablemate admitted that she finally resorted to cheating that way to get a chair close to the Mickey pool to watch her 5-year-old son on our last day at sea, after four days of getting up early only to find all the chairs already "taken."
The pool was the perfect temperature - refreshing but not too cold. Took a break at 2 o'clock to attend one of the "Art of Entertaining" demonstrations about fruit carving and cocktail making. I think I could manage the chicken made out of a pineapple, but the intricate watermelon rose was amazing and way beyond my capabilities. As I had hoped, the cocktail making demo ended with free Bahama Mamas for everyone. On the way back for more lounging in the sun, I looked over the atrium railing to see the staff getting ready for Mr. Toad's Wild Race. Had wondered if there would be real toads, or if someone in each family would have to act like a toad, but it turned out to be large wooden toads that moved along some kind of rope contraption.
This being formal night, we went back to the stateroom early to get ready. I convinced DD that we should wear our formalwear to the 6:30 showing of the Golden Mickeys (we had late dinner). She lagged behind, worried that we would look silly with everyone else wearing shorts, but once we got there she saw that more people were already dressed up than not. Got there in time to watch on the screen inside the theater as "Rona Rivers" interviewed some of the kids arriving outside - very cute. The show itself was a mix of live action dancing and singing plus some animation, with a salute to villains, heroes, etc. Thought the Cruella Deville and Lion King segments were especially good.
Didn't go to any events between the show and dinner because we waited in two lines to get photos taken in the atrium (Daughter: "Why are you walking like you have a stick up your butt, Mom?" Me: "Because these heels are killing me after standing on this marble floor for so long."). The photo in front of the Mickey statue outside Lumiere's turned out to be a dud, since the photographer didn't seem to know how to arrange a mother and teenager. We liked the other one, at the fake boat railing, despite the fact that we both were too conservative that day in our use of sunscreen and looked a little more red than we would have liked.
Lots of little girls in princess dresses to be seen. There were opportunities to have photos taken every night, both with and without characters. They also did portraits with a plain white background, if you wanted something non-Disney. We took the advice from these message boards and looked at our photos in Shutters whenever we knew there would be new ones, tossing the ones we didn't like and stacking the others into one pile. Made me nervous, but they always reappeared the next night, and we finally made our choices the last night. Oh, the staff was also OK with people taking a photo with their own camera right after the photographer did.
Our dinner was in Lumiere's, with regular Lumiere's dinner menu. Now I remember what I had in Parrot Cay last night - mixed grill, yummy and more than I could eat; I also liked the sound of the coleslaw that was a side dish for another entree, so I asked for a sample of that as well - but my dinner in Lumiere's escapes me at the moment. Several times during the cruise DD ordered an entree with the sauce on the side if she wasn't sure about it, and Julio brought that with no trouble; also, a few times she ordered a salad with ranch dressing instead of the dressing listed on the menu, also no problem. Also met our other dining partner, who hadn't been there the night before, a man maybe in his 50s whose traveling partners had to cancel their cruise but who decided to give it a go by himself.
DD went to watch a movie in the room after dinner, while I changed out of the killer shoes and went to the Adult After Party to see the ventriloquist we had liked so much at the Welcome Variety Show. Then bedtime, to get ready for another sunny day at sea.
