8/31/08 Wonder - Who's sailing

[Monte Cristo]

Let me know if anyone recognizes us from seeing us around on the boat.

One warning, I am not a good trip report writer so please bear with me!

We flew down Saturday night and went to visit a friend of mine in Orlando who was having his son's first birthday party that day. It was great, got to see him, his family and be at the party. After leaving, we went to the Country Inn and Suites for the night. Nice, clean room, nice staff, good shuttle to port, nice hot breakfast. I thought bottom line of $177 was a little high for one night, but it's vacation so oh well.

To be perfectly honest, we didn't love cruising. The boat and the staff were great, we just didn't love it. The food was good, not great, but good. Sorry all you die hards! Don't hate me!

I did MUCH better then I anticipated with the whole big boat phobia. I started off with massive issues at the port, and the gang plank...almost couldn't go on the gang plank, but once I was onboard, I was OK. On Sunday I couldn't get near the railing, by Wednesday night I was leaning on the rail taking the sunset picture. Maybe I got a little help from Mr. Xanax!

Our daughter couldn't get comfortable with the nursery. It had NOTHING to do with the staff there, they were great, I think it's her age. She wanted to be with us! Every time we dropped her off, the pager was buzzing within 30 minutes.

Our tablemates were good. They were from Montreal and the husband was a big hockey fan like me so that was good.

Wife is a big sleeper and someone had to stay in the room with our daughter, so she let me go out each night. I gave her EVERY opportunity to take a turn and go out but she wouldn't do it....so Clynt the bartender in Diversions, and I quickly became friends at the bar. He was great.

I caught a good portion of Pirates of the Carribean on the big screen on deck 9 so that was cool.

Castaway Cay was very nice. I plopped my beach chair in the water while wife and daughter waded in the water and I played lifeguard. Only downside was that it was very crowded....we were right on that rope between the snorkle area and the swim area so it got really crowded. Nothing a bucket of beer couldn't solve.

We didn't get off the boat at Nassau so don't really have much to say there. We hung out at the pool for a little while, and then the kiddie pool for a little while and then before we knew it, it was nap time.

The room was nice, small, but that's to be expected on a cruise. We just felt confined...and honestly, since our daughter couldn't catch onto the nursery, there wasn't a ton for us to do. You can only hang out at the pool for so long with a toddler...

Hopefully these all post good....

Nice view for breakfast!!!!!

I don't know how to make the sideways pictures appear upright. I tried to rotate, but it didn't work.

Enjoy!

Another day closer to WDW in January!


MC

 

[Tigger98]

Great pictures!

I have made a trip report "8/31 trip report). Not much, it was my firt time doing a TR.

On the "Post a picture of your server" thread, I have a picture of my family and our servers. I have been busy with work and playing catchup at home, but I will try to scan in a picture of all of us and post it.

My email address is capope@charter.net.

 

[rhondamccollough@hot]

I am going to try to post some pics...who knows how that will turn out!LOL

The whole family (minus Nana) at Animators

Had to be the first in the pool!

Oldest daughter eating before we even leave port!LOL

Sitting by the pool waiting for the party

The president and first lady of Magic!!

Captain Sam

My kids in the Golden Mickeys (the first 3 dwarfs)

 

[toesnthesand]

Hey Monte.....I think I saw you sitting in the bar one evening. Being this is my 3rd one and have always gone as a single that's pretty much my hangout and am best friends with the pubmaster by the time I leave. My fave pubmaster just left though. I didn't hang in there as much time....I tried to find other thing.

I agree with you that the food is good but not great. That's why it didn't hurt my feelings to skip the dining rooms 2 of the evenings. Maybe when your daughter is older you might find a cruise like that more relaxing.
It's really just a place for me to "chill".

 

[dennismcneely]

How about the shows? which one did you guys like the most?

The best for me was "Dreams", we actually saw it twice (2pm, 6pm)
My second choice would be "The Golden Mickeys"
I also liked "Toy Story" however, I found it a little bit noisy, especially for the kids.

I am still in the process of posting a few pictures of us, I hope I will be able to do it this week.

 

[rhondamccollough@hot]

I loved the shows...we didn't see Max but we were just too tired! "Dreams" was definitly our favorite, Toy Story 2nd...we were in the 3rd row and my kids LOVED it...except for the fact that they could "see" that the boys were actually girls!LOL My 7 year old son didn't appreciate that one bit!LOL They took part in the Golden Mickeys as the "dwarfs" so they enjoyd that, too! I too am going to try to put up more pics...just been to busy dealing with IKE!

 

[dennismcneely]

Hey folks,

This is the first time I am posting pictures so, I hope it will work.

I am the one with the black tie, my wife and my daughter are right beside me. Behind us, my wife's sister and her family.

If this works, I will be posting more photos later.

 

[Monte Cristo]

Hey Monte.....I think I saw you sitting in the bar one evening. Being this is my 3rd one and have always gone as a single that's pretty much my hangout and am best friends with the pubmaster by the time I leave. My fave pubmaster just left though. I didn't hang in there as much time....I tried to find other thing.

I agree with you that the food is good but not great. That's why it didn't hurt my feelings to skip the dining rooms 2 of the evenings. Maybe when your daughter is older you might find a cruise like that more relaxing.
It's really just a place for me to "chill".

That was me, trying to remember back....there weren't many people there it shouldn't be difficult! Your pic in your avatar is small, but I bet you were the gal with the Bronco's jersey on....I am all about football and notice things like that. Wish we had all done this before the cruise as we could have had a beer!

 

[toesnthesand]

One night I would've been in there with a Notre Dame jersey and another night I would've been in there in a Colts jersey. 3 Day cruises allow you to sit in Diversions and watch college games all day.

I agree....one of us veteran cruisers should've stood up to coordinate something. I know it's made a difference for us when we've made some friends on board with common interests to have a drink with.

 

[rhondamccollough@hot]

Ok...more pics

 

[dennismcneely]

Hey Rhonda,

Congratulations, you certainly have a beautiful family.

 

[Tigger98]

Nice pictures, everyone. I finally got a chance to look at the thread again, only after being sick with sinus crud for a week.

Well, it took about 3 weeks but we finally got our post card that we mailed. However, I have yet to develop the pics from the dolphin excursion. I dropped them off yesterday, but the place said today that their machine was down. I will try again somewhere else later.

 

[Monte Cristo]

Ok...more pics

How did you scan those in? I need to do that too.

 

[rhondamccollough@hot]

How did you scan those in? I need to do that too.

I just used my HP printer/scanner/copier.

I go to my Control Pannel and click on Scanners and cameras and it opens the scanner wizard and I go from there. This is just the basic Microsoft program that comes with Windows but I find it MUCH faster than using any of my photo programs. I can also use my HP program that comes with the machine but it is slower and has several more steps.

 

[Tigger98]

We have an HP psc 2410 Photosmart All-in-one scanner/printer/fax machine and did the same thing. We scanned in our photos:


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