A Magical Trip from the Lone Star State - Oct 13 2012 Sailing

[ukintheus]

Hello to everyone that might follow along. First time trip reporter here and hopefully I'll manage to get all the text and photos in the right place!

Pre-trip: As soon as DCL opened the bookings for Galveston we were in!! No way was I going to let the Magic sail from less than 100 miles from my front door and not make the most of it!! My Mum said she'd come along for the fun of it, and so did my Sister, so it was a done deal. Mum was going to fly over from the UK for the winter months anyway, and my sister is a short flight away in Knoxville...it was all planned and we were booked! My DH gets to come along just by default of being married to a Disneyholic, but he's a good sport about it, and has now become as addicted to DCL as I am.

So the castmembers for this trip are:

Scott and I (Jenny) - Former Disneyworld addicts and now DCL addicts

Mum and Sister (Maureen) - along for the ride. This photo of them was taken a couple of years ago, and is pretty formal, but they look good.

 

[ukintheus]

My final day of work and it was a nightmare. I wonder why we have to work twice as hard before we leave for vacation and then three times as hard when we get back?? Anyway, while I'll leave you to ponder that...it was 6:00 pm and I was OUTTA there!

My sister, Maureen...aka Mo, was flying into George Bush Intercontinental (IAH) from Knoxville and was arriving at about 7 pm. I got to the airport early and sat in the cell phone lot to wait for her to call to say she had arrived. Sure enough she was right on time (by way of some miracle given it was United AND a Friday night - usually a sure combo for disaster), and I swung by the terminal to get her and we were on our way home to Magnolia, talking non-stop along the way because we hadn't seen each other in forever...for no good reason other than life getting in the way. Magnolia is a small town just northwest of Houston. We're kind of in the boonies, but can get into Houston in about 35 minutes which makes it really convenient when it comes to employment. We made it home by 8 pm and scarfed down some Shepherd's Pie my Mum had made for a quick dinner. It's been about a year since we've all been together, so we sat up talking for a while...well, the 3 women talked, Scott decided it was a good time to get his camera out and play with it a bit...I guess we aren't as interesting as we think we are In the end we forced ourselves to go to bed so we could get an early start in the morning.

Mum claims that she's been on cruises before, but she counts a troop ship from the UK to Hong Kong back in the early 50's...so I kinda discount her previous "cruise" experience. My sister had been on a Carnival cruise about 14 years ago, and hardly ever gets to go on "real" vacations...Scott and I sailed on the Magic in 2010 and were a little worried that after being on the Dream and Fantasy since then, the Magic wouldn't seem quite as Magical. So...with that said, we all went to bed to attempt to get some sleep.

This is one of our cats, Simba, who is always determined to try and pack himself when a suitcase is available. He's a little on the "excess baggage" size though. .

 

[mandymouse]

Great start Jen I'm really looking forward to reading about your adventures and finding out how big your cocktail count is

I look forward to your next update

 

[Mau Loa Disney]

Subbing. Yay...great start! Can't wait to read more

 

[MedicGoofy]

Looking forward to reading about your trip

 

[ukintheus]

Great start Jen I'm really looking forward to reading about your adventures and finding out how big your cocktail count is

I look forward to your next update

Well Mandy, you know how hard it is for me to acutally keep "count" and I didn't take many photos of the booze, which now I think about it is really strange. Maybe I was just ensuring that the evidence was minimal.

Subbing. Yay...great start! Can't wait to read more

Yay - so glad to have a fellow cruiser subbing along.

Looking forward to reading about your trip

I'm so glad that I'm not here alone. There's that moment of panic for a newbie trip reporter that maybe nobody will follow along! Thanks for joining in.

 

[TinksMomma]

So excited to read another TR on the Magic from Galveston! Loving your start so far! We leave in just 3 days so this gets me even more ready to go!

 

[perfectmatch300]

Can't wait to read more!

 

[ukintheus]

Finally!! The long awaited day to head down to Galveston to start our cruise arrived! I was awake early by about 5 am and got the Galveston webcam fired up so that I could watch for the Magic arriving. Scott woke up....I wonder why?? ...what could possible have woken him up?? We both watched OUR ship arriving into Galveston and make the turn in the channel before docking. It was just about cracking daylight when she was finally moored at about 6:30 am. We were all up by 7:00 am and making tea for the Brits in the house and coffee for those of us that are either converted (me) or the token US guy. To just prove what a great guy DH is, he went to the local donut shop to buy kolaches and tacos for breakfast. Amazingly a blueberry filled donut was also in the bag...but just one!! It should be noted here that blueberry is his FAVORITE..... OK, so maybe he has an occasional flaw... We finished packing last minute things like toiletries into our cases. Scott and I were checking 4 pieces 2 suitcases, 1 bag with JUST shoes, and a box with the FE gifts from the 2 cabins. We also had a rolling carry on with our alcohol.

By the time we got the car loaded, it looked like this...

At 9 am we all piled in and started the drive down to Galveston. Houston is a really massive city, and it takes us about 2 hours to drive from Magnolia down to Galveston, but it's an easy drive, especially on a Saturday with no rush hour traffic, and it was SO nice not to have to fly!!

We arrived at the port at about 10:50 am, and our check in time was 11:00 am to 11:30 am. The Carnival Triumph was in port as well, but the cruise terminals weren't that busy. Terminal 1 where the Carnival ship was didn't seem to have anybody there at all? Terminal 2 for DCL had some people dropping off, but it was easy to find a spot to stop along the curb and we dropped our cases/bags with luggage tags with the porters. It would have gone a bit faster if I hadn't got myself all confused/crazy with the pre-cruise check-in jitters. Mum and Mo found a place to sit while Scott and I drove over to Galveston Park and Cruise where I had prebooked our parking space. The parking is on New Strand street and it can be accessed from two ends. We were glad that we followed the directions they gave us as the street is barely more than an alley, and if you went in from the "other" side, you had to try and turn around to get back to the parking building. It was a very easy process though, they had our name on a clipboard and directed us down to one of the buildings. Once we got parked we started to walk back down the "street" but a guy in a golfcart came charging up to get us and drop us back off at the street entrance, which was really nice. It was an easy walk back across Harborside Drive and then to the terminal, my guess is that it was less than 15 minutes total. The only dicey part was that the crosswalk doesn't have one of those buttons that you push, or the "little green man", so you have to try and judge the lights changing and just make a run for it!

I took this as we walked back to the terminal...

We met back up with Mum and Mo and headed into the terminal.

It was a very short walk down to the security lines, and there was barely a line at all. They seemed a little more TSA-like than we had found at Port Canaveral but were still friendly. For example, Mum had an ipad.....yes....my 84 year old Mum was the ONLY one of us with an ipad....where's the justice??? LOL Anyway, they made us take the ipad out of the carry on bag....so a little more strict maybe than Port Canaveral....but maybe it's just because I've never travelled with an ipad before.

 

[ukintheus]

After security you head upstairs where they handed you the medical questionnaire as you entered into a big open area, the roped areas are for check in, but there was no line when we were checking in. They wanted us to fill in the questionnaire at the check in desk but I think that was because there really wasn't anywhere to stand and fill them in before that.

Check in was fast and Scott and I got boarding group 3, Mum and Mo got 4. We ran into fellow Disers Dena and her DH Mike, who had got there even earlier than us! It was Dena's birthday and their first cruise, so technically they had every reason to be even more excited.

We headed over to find this guy...who we had already run into after we got through security at the top of the escalators...

...but as we got there they hustled him out a door and in came Minnie!

After having our photo taken with Minnie (which didn't turn out too great) we found a seat and patiently waited.

We didn't have long to wait though...they called for Family of the Day to board at about 11:40 am. It turned out that the Family of the Day were also fellow Disers, although I confess that I have forgotten who they were! It didn't take long at all for them to call boarding group 3. I had heard that as long as one of your party had the boarding group number, everyone could board at the same time. NOT TRUE!! Maybe we just got someone who was being very "official" but they wouldn't let Mum and Mo through with us, so we stepped to one side for the whole FOUR minutes until they called boarding group 4. Of course, right as she said to me "you can go through" an entire family, who had strollers and a ton of bags stepped right into the entrance of the boarding aisle and then proceeded to set down all their stuff while they gathered their group. Although it was tempting to trample small children and others to get around them I tried to think my best pixie dust thoughts and waited for them.

The gangway has lots of glass so it's a good place to grab a few shots of the ship along the way...

We crossed that final space between the "real world" and the "Magical world". Announcements were made....we didn't come up with anything exciting or funny ....Mum and Mo were in front of us and were a bit confused by the whole thing as they have different last names. I hadn't come up with anything worth blurting out....so decided to stick with the tried and true last name approach...it's good in a pinch . We walked into the atrium and it FELT SO GOOD!!! We had already decided to eat at Parrot Cay, as I didn’t want to have to deal with the masses in Topsiders. PC was busy though, there seemed to be groups of travel agents that were eating, but we managed to find plenty of things that looked good.

This was Scott's plate....

And this was mine...

I guess we were too busy shovelling the food in to remember to take pictures of the desserts!

 

[ukintheus]

So excited to read another TR on the Magic from Galveston! Loving your start so far! We leave in just 3 days so this gets me even more ready to go!

I know you will have a wonderful time!! We were originally on your sailing, but changed it a long time ago....we LOVED the Magic...she is still a beautiful ship.

Can't wait to read more!

Thanks for joining in!

I have to credit Mandymouse for doing such a GREAT trip report for their cruise on the Fantasy It was so cool to relive our trip through her report, that it inspired me to give it a shot...plus I will do everything possible to extend this one for as long as I can!

 

[cruisecrasher]

Looks fun!

 

[Ajojo]

ooooohhh, I cant wait to read the rest!!

We are officially in a cruise countdown (where there seems to be something new to do everyday) with just about 2 weeks left. I can feel us all getting excited!!!

 

[Rm3idm]

So excited to read your TR! Great looking family! We were on board with you, so I'll be reliving the magic through your posts... Wish I wasn't so lazy, I'd write one myself...

 

[princess aleya]

Great start can't wait to hear more about your trip.

 

[Bonniec]

Loving the pics. I'm in for any TR on the Magic

 

[Luv2Diz]

Fun TR so far! Looking forward to reading lots more!

 

[DisneyFan907]

We are cruising out of Galveston in January, can't wait to read the rest of your TR!

 

[ukintheus]

On our way out of PC we stopped at the station set up to sell the packages of water and beer etc. in the Promenade lounge.

They were also selling Texas wines from the Messina Hoff winery, which is a nice touch.

Scott bought a beer mug and then found out that the only beer available on draft to fill it was Shiner Bock. Apparently there is some type of Texas law where they can only sell Texas beer on draft until they are 7 miles out. Later in the cruise he was also disappointed to find out that they only sold Stella Artois (his beer of choice) in Sessions, which was only open after 6 pm every day. I think if he could do it over again, he'd have skipped the beer mug this time and just got Stella by the bottle. The choices on draft weren't great. I think Longboard, Bud Light, Shiner Bock were the most readily available. There was also Amber Bock at Pinocchios, but twice he got one from there that was "bad" (his words ) so he gave up on that. Also, he had bought a beer mug on the Fantasy, but we didn't realize that you could take them with you! Obviously the beer mug hasn't been working in his favor since then.

We also ordered a 12 pack of water that we could split between the 2 cabins. We refill them as we find the water on the ship to be just fine.

We went up to check on the room at 1:15 pm but it wasn’t ready yet. We went back down to do some wandering on Deck 3, they had some of the openings to the atrium closed, so you could only go around past Guest Services which led to it being a bit chaotic. I took this photo, trying to be 'artsy'.......it didn't turn out great, but who can miss the opportunity of taking pics of the chandelier. DH is the real picture taker of the family, I just point the camera and hope it turns out!

We walked down past the gift shops and down to the Walt Disney Theatre where we stuck our head in to take a look. The starboard (left) side decks were closed off because they were fueling on that side. There were lots of people finding things closed off and having to back track.

We headed back to deck 6 and the rooms were ready!! We were in 6620 and 6618 and we LOVED the location. I was worried about them being right by the elevators, but they were quiet and SO easy to get up to Topsiders & the drink station, or down to Animators or PC.

We dropped our day bags, checked the view from the balcony and took a good look around our home away from home for the next 7 days.

This is our room...6620

 

[ukintheus]

We then headed up to decks 9 & 10 to take photos and walk around to take a look at Galveston. There weren't many people around...it was still fairly early.

This is the terminal and gangway onto the ship...

And this is the view in the other direction. Judging by the flocks of birds on the ground this has to be a rice or grain loader but on the railroad tracks in front of it were huge wind turbine blades. We often see them on the freeways around Houston, so now we know where they come from!

There were dolphins swimming around, but the area is very industrial, so not the prettiest to look at. The Carnival Triumph was also in port.

This group were Earning their Ears. New Disney castmembers in the making. We had passed them about 5 mins early coming out of the Aft elevators by Palo, so they got down there in a hurry!

Here's us 3 girls....I'd like to point out (for those that are going to be counting) that at this point my cocktail count was still zero. That's water in that cup from the drink station...nothing added!!

At 2:50 pm we went down to our rooms just to grab FE maps and lists and went down to the Promenade Lounge to meet with our Disboards group. I was the FE coordinator so I had promised to have extras, but I should have known that fellow Disers are SUPER organized and would never need them!

Dena & Mike were already there...we had run into them twice already in the space of a couple of hours...but then never saw them again the entire cruise!! We began to wonder if they were lost at sea! Lot of our group came to say hello and it was really great to put faces to all those names. We had to keep the meet short and sweet, as we all had to be ready for muster drill by 3:45 pm. I was just really happy that so many showed up as I know how hard it can be to tear yourself away from the excitement of getting on board.

About 3:35 pm we left Promenade Lounge and headed back to our room. 1 suitcase had arrived before we left for muster drill at 3:45 pm. It went fairly quickly, but it was fairly warm and they do the drill in Spanish and English. Lara from the UK was one of our station coordinators and she kept us all entertained with funny/crazy faces.

Coming up later...sail away and dinner in Parrot Cay...first I need to get some work done! If only employers realized how important trip reports are....ha...ha..