You're welcome Nancy.
Nancy and her friend were with DD and me when we went on the Butterfly Shore Excursion in St. Martin. We had watched the docking from our verandah. The port view was of the working part of the harbor, but starboard looked out at the other ship docked in St. Martin, the Costa Majica (which caused some confusion for people). DW was going scuba diving that day, so DD and I boarded a very nice air conditioned bus for the tour. I found out later there were several DISers on board the bus that day. The butterfly farm was just perfect for DD and all the children seemed to be having a great time. The rum punch offered to the adults for the supposed purpose of attracting butterflies also seemed to please most of the adults. Total time there was about 90 minutes, which was just fine. After leaving the Butterfly Farm, we drove to the French capital, Marigot. I have to agree with the guidebooks that prefer the French side to the Dutch side. Marigot was absolutely charming and a little more upscale than Phillipsburg. The only negative was the thick black smoke pouring out of the desalination plant. I never did find out what was causing that. DD and I did a little shopping for DW and sat at cafe and had some orange juice. On the return to the ship, several people did get off in Phillipsburg for shopping. DD and I stopped at the dock mall and bought some earrings for DW. The weather in ST. Martin that day was very sunny and warm, but bands of rain and wind moved in throughout the day. None lasted very long, but it did interrupt some of the beach excursions.
While walking back to the ship, the wind tunnel effect on the docks between the ship, tore my hat off. DD started running after it and I dropped everything to catch her about two feet on the wrong side of the red line and about two feet from running off the dock. After getting my heart rate back down what seemed a few hundred beats a minute, we collected everything up (including the hat) and went up to the Mickey Pool to wait for DW. DW showed up around 2PM from her scuba trip. She will be writing a report on the two scuba trips separately, but let's just say that when I heard she dove off a boat in eight foot seas to a wreck at 85 feet my heart rate went back up again.
DD wanted to go to back to the club, so we obliged and visited Phillipsburg. As has been stated on this board, the beepers don't work very far from the ship, so it is a bit worrisome, but the counselors assured us they could handle anything that may come up. We took the water taxi over to Crescent Beach and then walked back through town. The rain bands were starting to come more frequently, but they never lasted more than 15 minutes. It gave us an excuse to stop and have a drink (beer is $1 in St. Martin) and do some shopping.
This was supposed to be pirate night, so we struggled tying bandandas during dinner, but eventually gave up. We were delayed leaving St. Martin because of passengers returning late from shore excursions. By that time, it was pouring rain constantly, so pirate night was moved indoors for the show (Never did find out what they did with the buffet). DW and I went down to Sessions, where the bartender Jez, from South Africa, made some wonderful vodka martinis to go with the caviar we had ordered. After taking DD out of the club, we walked back to our room weaving around several buckets that had been set out near the atrium and elevators to catch the rain water pouring down the shaft (It was raining that hard!!!). Mickey Bars before bed soothed any feelings for missing the fireworks and buffet.
The weather in St. Thomas the next time was pefect, 84 and sunny all day. Clearing customs and immigration in the morning is a pain, but
DCL does a great job of reducing the inconvenience of getting up at 600 am to a minimum. DD and I did the Coral World excursion while DW did another scuba trip. The Coral World trip is another good trip to do with young kids, but this trip would be 10 times better if they skipped the two out of the way stops at scenic overlooks on the way and just went to Coki Beach where you could have a very nice beach day and go to the aquarium at your lesiure. As it is, you spend about 90 minutes or more going there, stopping twice for some scenic overlooks that you have to walk past several (tacky) tourist shops to get to. As advertized, there is no narration on this tour, so all you do is drive and stop. Coral World is very nice and the 90 minutes you do spend there is about right for the size and number of exhibits. The trip back was quick and this time I kept a death grip on DD as we walked down the dock to board the ship. It was not yet lunch time, so I checked DD into the club for her lunch and went to Topsiders for lunch ( my only time). The weather was very nice and sunny on deck, but I wished I had gone to one of the dining rooms instead as the food was not very good (some fatty ribs, steam table hamburgers, and carved ham). DW joined me and we swam in the adult pool for a bit, before doing some shopping in the Haversham mall. Prices seemed to be higher here than in St. Martin's and a beer was now $3.50. We did pick up four liters of liquor while we there. We were pleasantly surprised when we returned to the ship and found out that DCL does not put the liquor in storage till the end of the trip. You just take it back to your cabin and what you do with it there is your business. When we returned, we spent some more time at the adult pool. Our departure was delayed about half hour to wait for late returning passengers. We had watched the traffic jam from our verandah earlier. I don't think I would do an excursion on my own unless I headed back for the ship no later than 1 PM based on what we saw. The ship next to us is St. Thomas, was one of those huge mega ships with a rock wall. It just seemed way too big and the people on board sure did not seem to be having as much as we were. The weather was so good now that they did the fireworks that evening. It was fun to see, but the crowding on deck 10 was a little scary, especially with people standing on the towel lockers and stacks of deck chairs to see.
Thursday, our last day at sea, was one of the most enjoyable of the cruise. It started with coffee on the verandah only this day we had a nice rainbow to watch as the sun rose.This was our day for the Palo brunch and it exceeded everything we read. Our server, Ann-Marie from Sweden, was perfect. There really is just too much to eat, with all of it perfectly prepared. We splurged and bought a bottle of champagne to go with the free glass you get when arriving. The only off note was the fake caviar, a Spanish product that consisted of herring row darkened with squid ink. Neither of us had room to try any of the entrees, with DW feasting on the crab legs (which do come with garlic butter if you ask) and shrimp, while I oversampled at the desert bar. Afterwards, we spent a lot of time at the Mickey Pool before dropping DD off at the club for her graduation rehearsal.
For those of you who were on our cruise meet thread, you know that Griffin33 and I kept trying to get a whiskey tasting added to the program. I failed unfortunately, so earlier in the week I dropped off a scotch sampler at Griffin33's suite (He was in the Roy Disney Suite with his family). He was kind enough to invite DW and I up to the Suite for drinks before the graduation ceremony, since his children were participating also. Griffin's family is magnificent and he was a very generous host. We had our own private scotch tasting, including a private tour of the Suite (The master bath was about the size of our stateroom). After, we all went to the ceremony together. It truly was amazing to see how many children are on the cruise!!. Of course, like all proud parents, we looked for our DD and were very pleased to see her picture(along with every other one of the 800 or so kids on board).
That night after the semi-formal dinner in Lumiere's we went to see Disney Dreams. Honestly, this was the show we liked the least, although the performers, especially the actor playing Peter Pan were great. There were several reasons for that:
1) The people in back of us had seen the show before and kept up a running commentary on what was going to happen next throughout the show.
2) Another guest was complaining loudly about how disgusting it was that DCL served alcohol during the shows (She was definitely not scotch tasting material)
3) With the new show, Twice Charmed, the show seems a bit repetitious.
4)I'm starting to get a little grinchy when it comes to LONNNGGGGGGGG Lion King medleys.
Mickey Bars solved all problems.
NancyDVC has already reported what a great day we had for
Castaway Cay. Absolutely perfect weather. We checked DD into Scuttle's Cove (it really is a nice play area) and went off to our first excursion, the Personal Watercraft Eco-tour(AKA An hour jet ski tour of Castaway Cay). It was an absolute blast. DD and I had never been on jetskis before, but it was easy and really very informative. Taking a jet ski past the Magic really lets you know how large a ship it truly is. After getting back, we did the barbecue lunch, which I did not find as enjoyable as other people have. (it's really steam table hamburgers and such brought from the ship that are shown a grill with bagged potato chips). They also do very nice fresh fruit bowl and a psedo fresly made bagged caesar salad. We then checked DD out of the club and spent most of the afternoon on floaties in the lagoon. DD took a nap for about an hour while DW did the parasail (She loved it).
We were very tired and just did room service for dinner, missing the flag parade.(We had given our tips out the night before knowing that we would probablynot make it). We did a little bit of packing before checking DD back into the club before going back to Sessions for one more round of caviar with vodka martinis. We went back to the room and put the luggage out right before getting DD and going to the Till we meet again show. This really is a great way to end the cruise and we had a wonderful meeting all the characters one last time. One last round of Mickey bars and then we went to bed.
Our last morning was as stress free as our first day. I went down to AP for our going away breakfast while DD and DW slept in. The service was just as good as on our first night (I must have tipped properly). I had heard horror stores about other cruise lines that once the tips had been passed out that no server wanted to see you let alone treat you as well as I was that morning. I stopped off at Topsiders to grab a tray for DD and DW and was pleasantly surprised to see a full buffet with the exception of the omelet station. It was also no problem getting oversized cups of coffee to take back. DD and DW ate a leisurely breakfast in the stateroom. We left the room at 830 as requested and just walked off the ship, no lines. A porter met us as soon as we were in the terminal and collected our luggage. We were through passport control and customs in no time and went right to the Budget rent a car pickup. We had to wait for the second shuttle, but we were at the rental car desk and in our car before 9 am. (As I said earlier, the Magic was the only ship in port that day because the Carnival ship was now in drydock. Typical wait times for rental car shuttles are probably longer).
We were at Saratoga Springs by 10 AM and enjoyed a windy, but sunny day at Downtown Disney.
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