Disney Dream Party of Eight: 5-night Double Dip June 7-12 2011

[LissaW16]

Thursday, June 9th, 2011
A Day at Sea

I woke up around 7:30, pulled on my workout clothes, and headed to the gym. It was surprisingly crowded! I walked on a treadmill for a few minutes until an elliptical machine opened up, then did 30 minutes on the elliptical.

Back in the room, I showered, and Tim and I headed to Cabanas for breakfast while Trinity and Grandma Val enjoyed cereal and donuts from room service. I had oatmeal (yum!), one egg benedict, sausage, and a donut. It was pretty good, for buffet food. WAY better than buffet food on our Royal Caribbean cruise in 2008.

After breakfast, Tim went to “making of the Dream” while I met the girls for the Princess Gathering. This is by far my favorite thing about characters on the Dream. There is a single line (we got in it about 15 minutes before the “start” time), and you get to meet each princess, one at a time. It’s very well run. I had Trinity dressed in her Cinderella dress – and she got to meet Snow White, Aurora, Tiana, Ariel, and finally Cinderella. When we almost to the front of the line, we saw the line forming for Tinkerbelle. Grandma Val ran upstairs and grabbed the Tinkerbelle dress, so we did a quick costume change, then met Tinkerbelle too. While the girls were in line for Tinkerbelle, I was able to snap a few shots of Princess Minnie, in the upstairs of the Atrium.



Next time – I will make a point to meet Mickey & Minnie while on the ship. We skipped them because we had met them at Animal Kingdom (complete with pics and autographs). But, I think (looking at pics taken by our travel mates) that the cruise pics with Mickey and Minnie just make great souvenirs, whether in their cruise wear or their formal wear – the mice are just icons that shouldn’t be missed.

During the Princess gathering, Tim also went to a session by Don “Ducky” Williams, one of the original Disney artists. He even won a beautiful pencil sketch of Winnie the Pooh! He really enjoyed it, Don told the story of how he got to be a Disney artist – if you ever get the chance to hear him speak, it’s a “don’t miss” (or so I’m told).

I took Trinity back to the room after the gathering to change into play clothes, then she was off to kid’s club. I asked her if she wanted us to come get her for lunch, or eat there, and she elected to eat there.

Grandma Val headed off to the pool, and Tim and I went to lunch at Cabanas. I had sushi, shrimp, fruit salad, and tiramisu. All of it was surprisingly good.

Our lunch at Cabanas:


After lunch I went to Rainforest to enjoy the aromatherapy showers. I had purchased 4 day passes to Rainforest before the cruise, and gave one each to my mom, Chris, and Barb. Terry and Kathy had booked spa treatments, so they got use of Rainforest from that. Of course, there are 4,000+ people on the ship, and when I go to Rainforest, I see Chris, Barb, Terry, and Kathy! The showers were great! There were 2 steam rooms and a sauna – I found I liked the “dark” steam room the best. It was very much worth the $15 I paid for the pass to enjoy the area for the day.

Tim picked Trinity up from kid’s club only to find out that she never ate lunch. We’re not quite sure why, but luckily we had a stash of granola bars and fruit snacks in the room to bring with us as we headed to the matinee performance of The Golden Mickeys.

The show wasn’t what I was expecting. I was expecting a lot more Mickey, that’s for sure! It wasn’t bad, but just not my favorite. It was like watching an Oscar red-carpet pre-show, something I would just never do. I definitely preferred Villans over this one.

We took Trinity back to kid’s club after the show, then Tim and I went to deliver our Fish Extender gifts. I can’t seem to find a pic of them, although I KNOW I have pics somewhere… anyway I made the clothespin magnets, and the Captain Jack magnets. For the record, Grandma Val made keychains, and Chris & Barb made magnetic bookmarks. I’m not sure what Terry & Kathy gave – they had a combination of things they made and things they bought.

We collected Trinity from kid’s club, got her back into her Cinderella dress, and headed to Enchanted Garden for dinner. Trinity had a fruit appetizer (which she did not eat, she’s just not a honeydew melon fan), mac & cheese with French fries and veggies (she ate every bite of everything on this plate!) and a Mickey bar for dessert.

I had the Ahi Tuna with avocado appetizer (awesome!), the apple carrot curry soup (interesting, fun flavors), and the Ahi Tuna salad entrée (to DIE for good!). For dessert I had the Bananas Foster sundae (also awesome).
Tim had a green salad, I forget what else, and a steak. For dessert he had strawberry cheesecake.

My dinner:


Tim’s dinner:



Trinity’s dinner:


Other food from Enchanted Garden (some kind of fish entrée?, a trio of ice cream and the dessert trio sampler):


Trinity was quickly running out of gas, so Tim took her back to the room as the rest of us lingered over dessert. Since we had seen the matinee show, there was no good reason for us to try to keep her up late – it’s not like we were able to get her to sleep in or anything!

Since Tim had Trinity, my mom and I took a walk through the art store and looked at our pics so far at Shutters – they were GREAT, and I knew we were going to end up spending a fortune on pics. We walked through the clubs in the district, but they were all empty. It seems that one ever showed up there until after second seating was finished.

After our walk, I tucked mom into bed, and Tim was off to chat with his parents about their rebooking quote. I decided to get my full $15 worth and headed back to Rainforest for one more shower & steam. Later, Tim and I wandered around, and ended up at the comedy show. It was actually very funny. Afterward we went to Evolution for the 70’s dance party. I had a pomegranate cosmo cocktail, and Tim had a beer. There was a really annoying game going on, and then someone from the cruise director’s staff abducted Tim. A little while later, he was up on stage, shirt unbuttoned, wearing a police officer’s hat, dancing to YMCA with other guests dressed as members of the Village People. THAT was unforgettable!

Tomorrow – Nassau, and Pirate Night (and WAY too many pictures!)

Full pic collection:
Full set of pics here

 

[LissaW16]

Friday, June 10th, 2011
Nassau, and Pirates IN the Caribbean!

I woke up around 6:30, but managed to stay in bed until almost 7am. I got up, showered, and watched out the window as we pulled into Nassau in a little light rain. Grandma Val said, “why should she have to wait until supper to be a pirate?” so we dressed Trinity in her pirate outfit and headed to Cabanas for breakfast.




It stopped raining, so I took Trinity to the pool while Tim went to the gym and Grandma Val went ashore to do some shopping. Trinity and I rode the Aquaduck together, then she went down the Mickey slide about a million times. After Tim finished at the gym, we traded off and it was my turn to exercise.


We went to lunch with Grandpa Terry and Grandma Kathy and Grandma Val. I had to ask for it, but a very nice server brought some milk for Trinity. He was from Serbia, which is where my maternal grandfather emigrated from, so my mom chatted with him a bit. We also found the hand-dipped ice cream that day in Cabanas – WAY better than the stuff that comes out of the self-serve soft-serve machine!

Trinity went to kid’s club after lunch, and Tim and I headed to the rebooking desk (with Trinity’s 2011-2012 school calendar in hand). We booked another 5-night on the Dream for April 2012, for the week after Easter (Trinity’s Spring Break). We ran into Terry and Kathy at the Vista Café (right by the rebooking desk) – they had just finished rebooking for June 2012, also a 5-night double dip!

We enjoyed a coffee from the Vista Café - T & K each had the Café Toledo, I had a frozen decaf cappuccino. We then collected Trinity from kid’s club and waited in line to meet Captain Jack Sparrow.


After that, we had family portraits taken.


Our Pirate Night dinner was in Enchanted Garden. I had one of the specialty cocktails (the Rusty Anchor), potstickers, chilled watermelon & honeydew soup, prime rib with sweet potato sticks, and a banana and chocolate crepe for dessert.

Grandma Val had the crab cake appetizer and some kind of salad, I forget what else. Tim had some kind of potato soup, the seafood pasta, and a Mickey bar for dessert. Trinity had some kind of beef entrée and a green salad (which is weird, she never eats salad at home). All the food pics are on a separate post – this one is maxed out for pics!

Me & Chris at dinner:


A pirate and his girl:


The GrandPirates:


After supper we went up to the pool deck for the Pirates IN the Caribbean Party. Trinity seemed to really enjoy herself, dancing and learning to be a pirate.


After that we went to the D lounge for a family pirate game. The game was geared more to school-age kids, but it was something to do to keep Trinity awake as we waited for fireworks. We eventually took Trinity to kids club to play for a while until it was time for fireworks (which don’t start until 10:30pm). Trinity enjoyed her first view of fireworks, and was a trooper about waiting and being patient, despite being very tired.

We got Trinity to bed, then Tim and I found the late-night buffet. Tim had chocolate chip cookies, and I had a piece of cake covered with chocolate syrup and coconut. We just weren’t hungry at all, but it was fun to walk through and see all the goodies.

Finally, the moment I had been waiting for – we went to the 11:15pm showing of Pirates 4 On Stranger Tides. It was freezing in the theatre, but the movie was decent. It just wasn’t the same without Will Turner and Elizabeth!

Tomorrow – Castaway Cay AGAIN!

Pirate Night Food Link:
Pirate Night Food Link

Full pic collection:
Full set of pics here

 

[LissaW16]

Saturday, June 11th, 2011
Castaway Cay, AGAIN!

Grandma Val and Trinity had planned on room service, but no one ever collected the room service menu from their door. I guess that’s the price you pay for having an overly-decorated door…

Anyway, the 4 of us headed to Cabanas for breakfast around 9am (we slept late due to the late night before). Some breakfast pics, including Tim’s creation – breakfast bagel sandwich, my oatmeal, and mango yogurt.


We got ready to head to the beach. At the Post Office, Trinity finally collected the last signature she had been waiting for: Donald Duck (pics must be on Grandma Val’s camera – I didn’t have any).

On the tram, ready for the beach:


Once at the family beach, Tim and I rented snorkel gear and went snorkeling, where we found Chris and Barb. The snorkeling was fun, lots of stuff and fish to see.

Trinity played in the ocean with mom, and made sand castles and sculptures with Grandma Val.



We sent Grandma Val to Serenity Bay with Chris and Barb for lunch, and the 3 of us headed to Cookies Too. Trinity had a hot dog, and really liked the banana bread. I had a burger, corn, tomato salad, and banana bread.




Grandma Val came back from Serenity Bay, and Tim and I went snorkeling again. This time we found the underwater Mickey! I tried to take pics with a disposable waterproof camera, but they weren’t really that good.

After snorkeling, we all decided we were done. Trinity and Grandma Val boarded the tram, while Tim and I decided to walk back. We browsed the shops, took pictures, and of course eating ice cream from Cookies along the way.

Pelican Point overlook:


Last call at Cookies:


Mount Rustmore:


Back on board, everyone had showers, then the 4 of us went to the matinee of Believe at 4pm. It was by far the best of the 3 stage shows (with Villans a close second).

After the show we mixed one last round of cocktails - between us and our happy hour guests Chris & Barb, we killed the entire bottle of Captain Morgan Parrot Bay Mango Rum! Then we headed off to our final dinner, at Royal Palace.

I had the chilled seafood trio AND the seared salmon (yes, two apps!), spinach salad with blue cheese, and stuffed orange roughy. For dessert I had the baked Alaska. Tim had the conch chowder, a steak entrée, the lamb entrée, and the baked Alaska dessert. Trinity had the kid’s spaghetti and meatballs, and a banana split.

Once again, so many pics that the food gets its own post!
Night 5 Dinner Pics

Grandma Val swears she wasn’t sunburned, but she really looked pink to all of us at the dinner table!


Of course, the chefs came parading through with the flaming baked Alaska:


Trinity and her banana split:


Me and waiter Edward:


After supper, Tim took Trinity to kid’s club to turn in her wrist tag. Did I tell the story about how we noticed it was gone? On CC day 1, another parent pointed it out to my mom that Trinity’s wristband was missing. She told us about it later that day, and we were lucky enough that someone found it (likely in the Mickey pool) and turned it in. Replacement cost for lost wrist tags is $50!

Anyway, they went to turn it in, and I went to Shutters to buy our photo CD. The $250 price tag is pretty steep, but we had SO MANY awesome pics on it AND my mom offered to share the cost with us, so we just couldn’t say no. At least that way we didn’t have to pick and choose the best pics – we get them all! Note – if you decide to purchase the CD, you don’t have to wait in line at Shutters – you can order the CD from the kiosks on the other side of the atrium (between the rebooking desk and the coffee shop). Thanks to the nice Shutters employee who helped me out with that one! We just had to pick up the CD after 7am the final morning.

Next I went to the gallery to buy a print that we had been eyeballing, and ask if they had something to transport the Winnie the Pooh sketch in. The nice gentleman sold me a shipping tube for $8. Seriously? I was purchasing a $45 print, you couldn’t throw in the cardboard tube as complimentary? Oh well, at least I knew that Pooh would be safe.

And by the way, Pooh wasn’t going to travel alone in the tube. Grandma Val went to the second session of Don “Ducky” Williams right after supper that night, and she too won a sketch – hers is Pinocchio!

Grandma dropped off her sketch, and ran out to do some last minute souvenir shopping while we threw stuff into suitcases, and put Trinity to bed. After she came back, Tim and I took one last walk around the Dream, had one last soft-serve cone, and finally went to bed.



Tomorrow: We have to get off of this fabulous vessel!

Full pic collection:
Full set of pics here

 

[LissaW16]

Sunday, June 12th, 2011
Chris and Barb’s Birthdays
Debarkation Day (sad sad sad!)

Mickey Mouse called us at 6am for our wake up call – note to self – that was fun, use that feature again! We dressed, woke the girls, and were all downstairs to Royal Palace for our 6:45am seating.

Trinity ate waffles, bacon, and grapes.



I had corned beef hash and eggs, hash browns, and fruit. Tim had eggs, sausage, bacon, and hash browns. I’m not sure who told Edward (but it wasn’t me) – but he knew it was Chris & Barb’s birthdays, so he brought 3 donuts arranged like Mickey, and the waiters sang for them.



Tim ran to Shutters to pick up our photo CD, then we made one last pit stop, and off the ship we went. This is the saddest sign:



When my card was scanned on the pier, I was told to go back to Guest Services. Like a salmon swimming upstream, I weaved my way back inside and waited in a short line at guest services. Apparently my credit card didn’t go through for my stateroom charges. The girl tried again, and this time it went through, everything was fine.

By the time I got off the ship the second time, Tim had gathered all of our luggage. We hailed a porter, and got to the customs desk in about 10-15 minutes. My mom had spent over her limit, which she reported on her customs declaration. The agent asked what she bought, she pointed to the sapphire pendant (shaped like the breast cancer ribbon – my mom is a survivor), and he smiled and let her go without any penalty!

Tim called Park ‘n’ Cruise as soon as it was legal to use a cell phone, and they arrived within about 5 minutes to pick us up. We boarded the bus, then stopped at the Carnival terminal to collect another family, before heading back to the lot. We were in our vehicle, on the highway, by 9:15am.

Chris, Barb, Terry & Kathy boarded a rental car bus at the port, collected their car, then dropped Chris & Barb off at the Orlando airport. The six of us met up at the Marriott Orlando again for one last night. Tim and I sent our girls to the pool while we sorted out our luggage situation. On board, we simply put everything into some suitcase, not caring what went where. We had to sort out what was going to Ohio with Trinity, and help Grandma Val get all the contraban liquids out of her carry-on. We also had to get my big suitcase down under 50#, and figure out what we could ship home (we had the box from the stuff that I had shipped to the port, plus the big cardboard tube of Don Williams sketches).

After the re-packing, we drove through McDonalds to get lunch to bring back for everyone. We got back to the hotel, got the girls out of the very hot pool, only to find that Trinity’s happy meal was missing – all we had was her milk. She ended up drinking her milk, then eating all the grilled chicken off of my salad. She was clearly beat, so I put her into our bedroom with the shades drawn, with her little DVD player to watch a movie and un-wind (she’s not a napper, and hasn’t been for several years).

At around 3pm, the six of us headed to Downtown Disney. Grandma Val had never been there, and was excited to do some shopping. Trinity had very little patience for shopping, and it was brutally hot, but she managed to hold it together. The longest wait was while Grandma Val was commissioning a sketch from one of the artists at the art store – it’s a sketch of the Fab 5, with purple “pixie dust” and “Valerie” on it. It turned out very cool, but it was a lengthy debate (regarding color – my mom didn’t want the classic red…).



At the World of Disney, Grandma Val bought Trinity a Toy Story tee shirt, and eventually we all ended up at Rainforest Café for dinner. Trinity had cute mini hot dogs, and I had a burger & fries. We had Mickey bars for dessert (Trinity had a rainbow popsicle).



After supper and dessert, Trinity convinced us that she had to ride ONE MORE THING before we could go back to the hotel – the carousel:



Kathy and Terry had an early flight, so we called it a night.


Full pic collection:
Full set of pics here

 

[LissaW16]

Monday, June 13th, 2011
Heading Home

Terry and Kathy had a very early flight, so they snuck out sometime around 5am – we never heard them. Tim and I got up and went over to the main Marriott lobby to find the FedEx place. We were kind of bummed to find out they were actually open on Sunday, so we should have come over the day before. Oh well, now we know! We shipped a box (sand toys mostly) and the tube of sketches to our house in Minnesota, and another box of “fragile things” to Terry & Kathy’s house in Wisconsin. $60 later we began to wonder if maybe a second suitcase would have been the way to go… oh well.

We loaded the car, gathered the girls, and went to Waffle House for breakfast. I had grits (something I cannot get living here in northern Minnesota), and sausage gravy & biscuits. Why not live a little, it’s vacation, right???



After breakfast, we returned our rental car and headed for our gates. Trinity and Grandma Val were flying from Orlando to Detroit, we were flying to Minneapolis. Our flight left about 10 minutes after theirs, from a gate about 3 doors down. I bought everyone a sandwich “to go” from one of the vendors, and we were all on our way.
Once back in Minneapolis, it took us a bit to figure out where to stand to catch the Park ‘n’ Fly bus, but once we determined that, it arrived after about 5 minutes. The driver dropped us off directly at our car, helped unload our luggage, and with our pre-paid voucher we were out of there ASAP – to make the 3 hour drive back home to Duluth.

Random thoughts:
Regarding our rebooking: So two things really bother me about our April 2012 cruise. One, we are scheduled for late dinner. We are wait-listed for early dinner, but if we don’t get it, I don’t know how we will manage. Part of what I love about cruising is getting into nice clothes and having dinner together as a family. I just can’t see my then-to-be-five-year-old surviving a meal that begins at 8:15pm! Second, we have a GTY cabin, not an assigned cabin number. We have a GTY oceanview, which makes me think we’re going to end up in “steerage” down on deck 2. I guess I’ll get used to it, wherever it is! I loved deck 8, it was an easy stair walk to the pool/gym/Cabanas (all on 11), easy walk to the kid’s clubs (deck 5), and the only time we took elevators is if we were going UP a significant number of flights.

So I never finished the story about the rash. During the Villans show, night 2, I noticed a rash on the backs of my hands, and once I got a look at it in the light, it was also on the inside of my arms near the elbows. I’ve been known to have sensitive skin – many things make me break out in a rash, such as perfumed soaps and lotions. I started to go through in my head everything that had touched my skin that day, and finally determined that I was reacting to the wipes that are handed out at the entrance to the buffets and dining rooms. I had cruised through the eating area at Serenity Bay on my restroom run (and used the wipe, because someone handed it to me), then shortly thereafter I was back at the eating area on Serenity Bay, wiping before my meal. I was wiping again before dinner in the dining room each night, and with every breakfast at Cabanas. Of course, this is the one time that I don’t have any hydrocortisone cream with me, and I’m not about to go pay the ship’s doctor a ridiculous fee just to hear that I have “contact dermatitis”. I happened to have some Benadryl tablets in my suitcase, so I took those at night to help with the itching, and then Chris found me some topical Benadryl spray in Nassau that I was able to use during the day (the tablets make me very sleepy).

So once I determined what the cause was, I had to try to avoid it. I would accept the wipes as handed out by the staff, delicately wipe just my fingertips, then drop the wipe in the nearest receptacle. And of course I made sure to wash my hands whenever I could.

Things I want to make sure to do next time:
make it to more meets with the fab 5 (Mickey, Minnie, Goofy, Donald, Daisy)
make sure my husband is in at least one character photo (how did we manage to avoid this for the whole trip?!)
try breakfast at a sit-down place for a day other than debarkation day
try lunch at Flo’s-Luigi’s-Mater’s rather than always Cabanas
go into the Cove Café – somehow I walked past this place a hundred times and never went in for a fancy cup of coffee!
buy more Rainforest passes – that was worth the $15 for sure

I’m sure there will be more, but that’s the short list so far


Full pic collection:
Full set of pics here

 

[harleyquinn]

Okay to post now? I can't wait for the details!!!

 

[MommaMouse411]

LISSA..i might have to steal your hat idea...i love it ...and I wish i can sew because I have so many ideas in my head

 

[marhs]

YEAH! Can't wait to read your TR!!!

 

[LissaW16]

Okay to post now? I can't wait for the details!!!

Yes, absolutely! My type-A self has "reserved" all the spots I need for my TR.

I'll fill in words soon (I hope)! For now I hope pics will give you a little teaser!

 

[LissaW16]

More Sea World/day 2 pics

 

[LissaW16]

Ok, 2 days worth of photos uploaded, one and a half days of trip report done. Whew this is hard work! (but fun work!)

 

[Cheryl726]

Enjoying your TR and the pics, especially since our Dream DD is in 5 weeks! Do you remember how early you could start getting off the ship on debark day? Not that I want to rush that, but we have an early flight so I'd like to be off early. TIA!

 

[ibouncetoo]

How we are passing the time until our trip... Thanks Aaron for the nice writeup!

http://www.disunplugged.com/2011/04/23/building-a-disney-vacation-countdown-chain/

UPDATED WITH A LINK THAT ACTUALLY WORKS

Just started your report and saw this. Would you share the link to where you got the template with Disney/Pixar characters? (and if you did already....I'll see it when I get there )

Taking the great neices (twin 6 and sister 9) and would love for them to have this project to make over the summer break!

.

 

[LissaW16]

Just started your report and saw this. Would you share the link to where you got the template with Disney/Pixar characters? (and if you did already....I'll see it when I get there )

Taking the great neices (twin 6 and sister 9) and would love for them to have this project to make over the summer break!

.

Hope I don't get in trouble for posting a link to a non DIS site, but here you go!

http://www.themouseforless.com/downloads/kids/chainlink.shtml

 

[LissaW16]

Enjoying your TR and the pics, especially since our Dream DD is in 5 weeks! Do you remember how early you could start getting off the ship on debark day? Not that I want to rush that, but we have an early flight so I'd like to be off early. TIA!

I don't honestly recall. First seating gets to eat breakfast at 6:45am. I'll tell the story later, but I didn't get off the ship very fast.

But what I can tell you is that our party of 4 cleared customs (despite being over the shopping limit, also another story), waited for the Park 'n' Cruise bus which picked us up and then made a stop to gather another family at the Carnival dock, and we were still in our vehicle by 9:15am. We were back at the Mariott Orlando by 10am. Catching a noon flight would be super-easy, if you were aiming for something like that.

 

[ibouncetoo]

Hope I don't get in trouble for posting a link to a non DIS site, but here you go!

http://www.themouseforless.com/downloads/kids/chainlink.shtml

Thanks!

If you were to post a link to a banned site, the DIS filters would ****** it out. (Just as if you'd typed a naughty word.) You'd only get in trouble for trying to bypass the filters...like typing the words in the address with spaces between and the word 'dot' where the . would go. Don't ever to that!

.

 

[LissaW16]

Ok, 2 days worth of photos uploaded, one and a half days of trip report done. Whew this is hard work! (but fun work!)

Ok, Animal Kingdom TR is done *whew*. Next stop, Magic Kingdom!

 

[iloverags2]

Really enjoying your trip report! What a fabulous trip so far...and you haven't even stepped foot on the ship yet!

 

[LissaW16]

Dinner #1 pics

Trinity’s supper:


Tim’s:


Mine:


Grandma Val’s:

 

[harleyquinn]

Loving it all so far. We're planning to take our DD on our first cruise when she turns 4, so I'm dying to hear how yours did on the cruise!