First time cruisers - Eastern Caribbean Magic March 26-April 2 Trip Report

Ayeegit

Mouseketeer
Joined
Feb 9, 2010
Messages
103
Kevin, Ginger, Kayleigh (10), & Gillian (7)

After all the planning… the waiting… the anticipating… and the packing – we were finally about to go on our first cruise! We pulled the girls out of school a few hours early Friday afternoon in order to make our early evening flight out of DIA to start our “Magical” week. No problems getting to the airport, getting checked in, or getting on the flight – so far so good. We all sat on the right side of the plane, hoping to get a glimpse of Disneyworld or one of the other parks as we descended into Orlando International, but we never managed to pick it out in the late-night darkness. Obviously the parks are typically lit up like a Christmas tree, but so is the rest of Orlando…

As we were arriving into Orlando so late, we had decided to stay at a hotel close to the airport, knowing we had plenty of time in the morning to make the drive out to Port Canaveral. We found a great deal on a very nice hotel, the Crowne Plaza – wouldn’t be a great “Park” hotel for a typical Disney trip, being so far from the various Disney properties, but for what we needed it was perfect. It was tough getting to sleep that night, with the excitement of the cruise now only hours away – but everyone finally managed to get some shut-eye and soon the wake-up call told us it was time to get on the road for the final push to the port.

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We had decided to use a rental car (got a good rate with Budget) rather than the Disney transportation options – primarily due to the cost difference, but also because we knew if we got to the Disney terminal early enough on Saturday morning, we would stand a better chance of getting on the ship as early as possible. The drive from Orlando to Port Canaveral went by very quickly, and after cresting one of the drawbridges leading into the port, we were able to catch our first glimpse of the Disney Magic. While it looked like a *very* large ship, it was somewhat dwarfed by the Carnival Dream docked right next to it. Both ships continued to get even larger as we pulled up next to them to drop off Ginger, the girls, and the luggage while I went to return the rental car. The only downside to the process was waiting in line behind people who were getting cars (probably just off either the Magic or the Dream) to return ours – no “quick” drop off for returning a car. But I was quickly on the shuttle bus back to the port, and I met back up with the rest of the family inside the terminal. Once we were all together again, we were able to check in (boarding group 3 – getting up early and beating the Disney buses had paid off!) and get the girls registered for the Kid’s Clubs. Disney obviously has all of these “process” pieces down pat – quick and painless. After about an hour and a half (which seemed to go by quickly due to pictures with a few characters, looking at the model of the Magic/Wonder, people watching, and stepping outside to watch all of the cargo loading activity on the near-by dock), folks were allowed to start getting on the ship. Soon it was our turn, and we finally experienced walking through the gangway, having the group “about to board” picture taken, and then walking into the atrium while having our family announced.

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A Disney crew member approached us and mentioned where the restaurants were, but we wanted to let the girls hop into one of the pools before too many other folks were on board, so we headed for the elevators to get top-side. Walking onto deck 9 we really started to get a good feel for how much fun we were going to be in for – the pools, the hot tubs, the bars and restaurants – deck 9 alone was overwhelming, and we hadn’t even seen much else of the ship yet. Unfortunately, we were on board so early, the pools weren’t open yet – so a quick change of plans took us into Topsiders Buffet for a bite to eat. Everyone found something that they would enjoy, and we got to sit outside and watch all of the activity over in the terminal and on the roads and areas just off the ship. The food was off to a good start – the strawberry soup was really yummy, and the fresh fruit seemed to be everywhere (which would continue for the whole week), so we all took advantage of that.

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By the time we were done eating, the pools had opened – so the girls got changed into their suits, and jumped into the Mickey Pool (just for kids). After watching for a bit to make sure they were going to be comfortable in this brand new environment, Ginger and I went for a stroll around the rest of decks 9 and 10 to get our bearings. After reading about the tradition on some of the DIS boards, I had made magnets for our cabin door for our trip – knowing it would make it easier for the girls to find their cabin (those hallways on deck 6 were LONG, and they all looked the same!) as well as just adding a little “fun” to our trip. So once we were able to get into the cabin areas, we stopped by our door to put the magnets up – but as we had promised the girls we wouldn’t go into the room without them, we didn’t open the door. That came just a little while later, after we had gotten the girls (a bit begrudgingly – they were already having too much fun!) out of the pool and took them back down to find our cabin. They were surprised when, after finding 6549, they saw the magnets on the door with their names on them.

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We had a good idea of what to expect from our particular class of cabin from having seen pictures on-line, but it was still a lot of fun to see “our” cabin for the first time. I’ve heard the inside staterooms on the Disney ships are a tad larger than most other cruise lines, but no one would ever claim they’re “roomy”. But it was perfect for the four of us – we had a double bed for Ginger and I, a couch that converted to a bed for Kayleigh, and a pull-down berth for Gillian. We had decided that we really didn’t need a stateroom with a window, or a veranda, as we didn’t expect to spend much time in the room during the trip except to sleep – and I think if we cruise again we’d make the same choice. Just didn’t seem to be worth the extra money to be able to look (or sit) outside right from our room, at least for us. Especially when cruising with Disney, and paying that premium (which is well worth it!) - we were looking for ways to cut costs out where we could.

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After getting a bit settled in, we decided to go take the 2:30 “walking tour” to get a feel for the layout of the ship and figure out where everything below deck 9 was located. Sadly, that put us in the Promenade Lounge a few minutes late for the meet & greet that we wanted to attend (meeting up with the folks that had participated in our cruise thread on DIS), but we got to meet a couple of families before that broke up around 3:15. Back to our cabin to start unpacking our checked luggage which had started to show up by then, and soon it was time for the safety drill @ 4. They had to pack us in pretty tight in front of our lifeboat, but yet again Disney has this stuff down to a science, and even something as mundane as a safety drill was fun and taken care of as quickly as possible. We hurried back up to deck 9 for the sail-away party with some of the characters and staff (I even danced – I was on vacation! – I think my wife and kids were surprised), and soon the ship was pulling out of the port. As we had the early dinning seating @ 5:45, we couldn’t stay up on the deck too long, but we stayed as long as we could to watch the marinas, restaurants, and everything else alongside of Port Canaveral slip by as we headed out to sea.

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Eventually, we made our way to our first dinner, in Animator’s Palate. We walked into the dinning area, and a gentleman asked us what table number we were sitting at - I looked at my Key To The World card, and said "27 please!". He mentioned that he knew the waiter that worked that table, and said "He's a good guy". Turned out it was the very person seating us, just through a crazy coincidence. Zeljko (and his assistant server Jessy) were awesome with us and our girls at every meal, even though they had plenty to keep them busy they both made all of us feel like we were their only table (and I'm sure the other groups they served probably felt the same way!). The food and the atmosphere in AP was just as great as we had heard it would be - the slow color change over the course of the meal was fun to watch unfold.

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After dinner, it was off to the opening night show (after a quick look outside to see how far we had gone - it was crazy that we couldn't even see land at that point already - but of course it was pretty dark, and we couldn't see very far). Very entertaining little bits of what was to come - there was a great ventriloquist on board (Taylor Mason), as well as a hypnotist (Dale K) - each were going to have "full" shows later in the week, both aimed at families as well as just the adults later in the evenings. And of course some of the classic Disney characters took the stage and promised everyone that they were in for a great week - and they weren't kidding! But for now, it was time to turn in and call it a day...

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Great start to your TR!!! Can you believe this time last week we were anxiously awaiting our next day at Castaway Cay????? Is it really over? :sad2:
 
Great start! I love seeing the trip again through other peoples eyes. Hey that is Kara and her Drink of the Day in your picture at Topsiders. We all are appearing in each others pics.
 
Great start! I love seeing the trip again through other peoples eyes. Hey that is Kara and her Drink of the Day in your picture at Topsiders. We all are appearing in each others pics.

OMG it is!!! Great shot of the back of my head - it's my best side! :rotfl2:
 

Isn't that funny! I've seen a few of us in other people's shots as well. I wore my bright orange shirt because I figured it would make me easy to spot for my daughters' benefit, but now I can easily find myself in all the great pictures from people's TR's!

I even made one of your videos, Kara - sadly, not the Moooo! one though ;)

I can't believe we were eating lunch right next to you guys - wish we would have known!!!
 
Isn't that funny! I've seen a few of us in other people's shots as well. I wore my bright orange shirt because I figured it would make me easy to spot for my daughters' benefit, but now I can easily find myself in all the great pictures from people's TR's!

I even made one of your videos, Kara - sadly, not the Moooo! one though ;)

I can't believe we were eating lunch right next to you guys - wish we would have known!!!

I wonder if it was you who took.our Photo?
 
wow...just teared up a little bit, but Disney cruises tend to have that effect on me like nothing else! We leave tomorrow morning...reading this completely brings back the memories and emotions of previous embarkation days. Can't wait til tomorrow morning!!!
 
Days 2 & 3 - Sailing, Sailing, Over the Ocean Blue!

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Our first two "full" days of the trip were spent steaming towards St Maarten - our first port of call. Having the first part of our first ever cruise be “less scheduled” days (due do not having to worry about what time on/off the ship, rushing to get ready to dinner right after getting back on board, etc.) was actually a great way to break into the cruising “lifestyle”. Although one thing I did quickly realize was this – I had always assumed that a cruise would be a “lazy” vacation, where you would just sit around on a lounge chair with a book (or an e-reader I suppose now a-days) in one hand and a drink in the other. You certainly *could* do that, but at least on the Disney Magic, we always felt like there were so many options of fun things to do, that we spent very little time “doing nothing”. I think we all would have felt like we were missing out on things if just sat around, while that definitely would have been “lazy” and “relaxing” - which is obviously what some people vacation for in the first place. We all had our moments of downtime, but it did seem like, for the most part, were going from one thing to the next, even on our sea days. So that particular cruise misconception was quickly put to rest for me just a day or two into our trip.

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We had our character breakfast the morning of our first sea day. While we’ve been to our share of these at the Disney parks and hotels, this one was much more “get ‘em in and move ‘em out!”, which is understandable given the amount of families in each dining room, the number of characters cycling through, and the time limit to get it all done in. It was still a lot of fun, and the girls enjoyed getting the pictures and autographs, but it wouldn’t ever replace the experience at Goofy’s Kitchen. One of the fun parts of the meal was the servers giving everyone napkin “hats” – it was amazing what you can do with some colored cloth napkins (and a few plate covers in some cases!) We had only had two meals with Zeljko and Jessy, but they were already making us feel like family…

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We of course hit up the pools several times those first couple of days – the girls continued to enjoy the Mickey pool and slide, Ginger and I spent a bit of time in the adult’s-only pool and hot tub (talked to a couple of nice guys from Canada), and then we all swam some in the Goofy pool together. It was a very interesting sensation, when the boat was rocking a bit more than normal, to be floating in the water in the pool and feeling/watching it slosh back and forth. That was one of the few times I could really notice the “motion” of the boat – the others being the first night out, sitting in Animators Palate (as the boat was really getting under way for the first time at something close to full speed), and then anytime I tried walking *up* the stairs in the Walt Disney Theater after a show (that was almost always guaranteed to make me feel like I had had a few adult beverages).

The girls did check out the two different Kid’s Clubs (Oceaneers Club and Oceaneers Lab) several times – but they didn’t vanish for half a day at a time or anything along those lines. As they enjoy spending time together so much, neither of them immediately tried to seek out other kids of similar ages to pal around with – I think they also have a touch of Daddy’s shyness in that respect as well. If they had done so, and made some friends quickly, I’m sure there would have been a lot more of wanting to go do their “own thing”, and plenty of additional trips to the clubs to meet up. I do wish that we could have at least gotten them introduced to a few more of the other families that were participating in the Fish Extender group (great fun – more on that later – thanks for arranging and organizing Kara!), but there’s always something for next time. The times they did spend in the clubs sounded like good times – got to make Flubber, play some video games, plenty of arts/crafts, and just do all of the regular “kid’s stuff”.

We had our Formal Night the evening of our first sea day – I had finally broken down and bought a suit in preparation, and Ginger and the girls were all looking forward to getting dolled up as well. We got some great pictures of the four of us (the photographers were everywhere, during the entire cruise – but they were out in force on Formal Night), and it was off to Parrot Cay for dinner. Another great meal – I wish I would have written down what we all had at each meal, but it was all great – can’t think of any disappointing meals. It obviously helped a lot that the excellent Disney Service was in full effect during those dinners.

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Two of the three full-length shows were held during the first two days of the trip – Twice Charmed on Sunday, and Villains Tonight on Monday. We enjoyed them both, although we had to make sure we were in the theater 30 minutes before show time to ensure we had four good seats all together. Not a big deal, but it did seem like there were more people that wanted to see the shows than there were seats – not sure how many people get turned away on a typical night, but even with the size of the theater I have to believe they can’t quite get everyone in to each showing. The performers, the sets, the lighting, and the music were all great. We didn’t personally have too much to compare it all to, but we talked to a family on the rental car shuttle after the cruise that had sailed with several other cruise lines - and they raved about how Disney compared to the rest when it came to the shows.

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We squeezed in some other fun stuff during those two days – of course we had to try our hands at shuffleboard, a cruising staple! The girls really enjoyed it – although playing so early in the morning, we had to make sure they didn’t send one of those biscuits (that’s the name for those discs – had to Google it!) right into the path of any of those health-conscious-making-the-rest-of-us-look-bad joggers - the jogging track goes around the same deck as the shuffleboard courts. We also spent some time wandering around the rest of the ship (delivering more Fish Extender gifts and seeing other people’s decorated doors), and I think we saw just about the whole kit and caboodle – but we did realize later that we had never even peeked into the health club, even though Ginger and I had thought about trying to get some exercise while on the trip. I guess all of the walking/stair climbing/snorkeling/swimming would have to suffice.

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But one of the unexpected highlights of the trip was a pair of presentations/Q&As given by the director of Toy Story 3 – Lee Unkrich. The first chat was on Monday, our second sea day, and the follow-up was on Thursday. Turns out Lee and his family were on our cruise, and he had agreed to spend some time talking about his history at Pixar (he’s been there ever since the original Toy Story), the culture and what it’s like to work there (sounds like a great “job”!), the development of Toy Story 3, and plenty of insider secrets and hidden gems that you would never know of or likely even think about while watching one of their films. Lee had a nice multimedia presentation to go along with his stories, with some fun footage, storyboards, and audio from the different actors who portrayed the toys. Having just won an Academy Award for Best Animated Film of 2010, he had his Oscar with him as well – so now we can say we’ve actually seen one of those cool statues in person! During the second session later in the week, Lee took questions from the audience and told a lot of great stories. It was a really nice touch be able to attend both of the presentations – they were held in the Buena Vista Theater (the smaller of the two theaters on board), and it was standing room only.

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Our two days at sea ended on another high note, as after dinner on Monday night we ducked into the Studio Sea club to watch “Who Wants To Be A Mouseketeer” –DCL’s answer to “Who Wants To Be A Millionaire”. The girls were both nervous that their # might be drawn, so we told them that Mom or Dad would go up for them if that happened. Ginger’s number was actually the third one drawn, and we all cheered loudly for her as she took her spot in the “hot seat”. And in a coincidence to end all coincidences, we had *just* talked earlier in the day about which Disney movie Maleficent was from (don’t remember how or why it had come up) – and low and behold, that was her second question. “Sleeping Beauty!” she quickly answered, as well as the (intentionally) easy other first few questions. Luckily we’ve spent our fair share of time in Epcot, as one of her next questions was “Which one of following countries is *not* represented by a World Showcase at Epcot?” – the answer being Switzerland. She nailed that one! Sadly, she got caught on the final question, even after using the 50/50, and didn’t win the really cool “grand” prize – but she had a great time and won a rare Disney pin given out only to people who play... and of course it was fun to watch her squirm a bit!

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Next time – excursions ahoy!
 
Looks like your family was having a great time! How fun to get picked to play along with Who Wants to be a Mouseketeer!!! :cool1:
 
You certainly *could* do that, but at least on the Disney Magic, we always felt like there were so many options of fun things to do, that we spent very little time “doing nothing”. I think we all would have felt like we were missing out on things if just sat around, while that definitely would have been “lazy” and “relaxing” - which is obviously what some people vacation for in the first place. We all had our mo

I pictured the same thing!:rotfl2: Although we did get to enjoy some quiet time, we found we wanted to do so much...which just means whatever we missed, we'll aim to catch next time!:thumbsup2

(Oh, by the way, we were on the same cruise too. :) I plan on starting a TR this weekend...I see several from our cruise have done so- I wonder what the record is for TR's for the same cruise??? ;)

Looking forward to the next installment!!!:goodvibes
 
Great report Cuz! Sounds like you all had a great time as I knew you would. Can't wait to read the rest of it and see more pictures. First time I've ever seen family members on the DIS! Kind of cool.
 
Looks like you had a great two sea days. We loved the sea days and spent the time going from activity to activity with a little book reading in between. I loved the presentation from Lee Unkrich. I only got to see the first one, because we were having brunch at Palo for the second.
 
Great report Cuz! Sounds like you all had a great time as I knew you would. Can't wait to read the rest of it and see more pictures. First time I've ever seen family members on the DIS! Kind of cool.

Well, being a Disney board, I guess this is where we should start whistling "It's A Small World....", right?

Glad you've liked the report - writing it has been a good way to rekindle a bit of that Magic we've been missing since stepping off and back into reality!
 
Hey! I resemble that "lazy" and "relaxed" remark! :rotfl2: I do not "regret" any part of the trip, however, there are some things I'd do differently next time. We totally took advantage of the lounge chairs on our At Sea days...... my tan looks great?

But I am so kicking myself for not going to see Lee Unkrich. And for not going to the wine tasting, beer tasting, learn to draw classes, and so much more! I need to realize next time that I don't need to go shower and get all purtied up to attend these events, I can go in my coverup!

But it was pure heaven hanging by the Quiet Cove pool, or up on Deck 10 and just staring out into nothingness (I think I read 3 pages of my book the entire cruise! :rotfl2:). Did I mention my tan looks great? :rolleyes1

And we were very fortunate in that Ally made that "love connection" the first sea day with another girl from our FE exchange, and they were inseparable the rest of the trip. So Jeff and I had a lot of time to ourselves during the day.....
 
Day 3 - St. Maarten
Being our first cruise, one of the biggest "unknowns" for us was what would the Port of Call days be like. We did some investigating several months before our departure date, knowing that if we wanted to book any excursions we'd need to do that ahead of time. After lots of reading, talking to others who had cruised in the Caribbean, and debating - we decided to only book one excursion in advance, a snorkeling trip to Trunk Bay on our St. Thomas day. We did go ahead and pack our own snorkel gear, for all four of us, and while I gave Ginger a hard time about how much space it was taking up in our already full luggage, I'm glad we did. One of the reasons we had waited so long to try a cruise was we wanted our youngest to be comfortable enough in the water to do lots of snorkeling, so we knew having our own along would allow us to do as much as we wanted on our three days off of the boat.

For St. Maarten, we had looked at some of the options for where good snorkeling beaches would be, and read about Dawn Beach and Divi Little Bay. The day before we got to St. Maarten, we asked the helpful folks at the excursion desk on-board where a good place to snorkel would be - and they quickly mentioned that a $6/person taxi ride would get us to a beach called Dawn Beach. So having heard about the same spot both before taking the trip as well as from the "experts", we figured that it would probably be perfect for what we were looking for.

We got up early enough to see the ship pull into the port, and watch the sun rise, but sadly it was a bit overcast at that point in the day. It was fun looking back and seeing the other cruise ships lining up behind us to make their approaches into the bay as well.

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We had a quick breakfast that morning, grabbed our snorkel stuff, some snacks, and LOTS of sunscreen, and headed down to Deck 1 to disembark. It was a pretty quick process (we weren't in the initial rush of folks who wanted off right away, so the crowds had thinned out to a small trickle). Soon we were in the "visitor's area" looking for the taxi stand. Only problem was neither of the girls had their sunglasses - I figured if there was ever going to be a good time to jump back onto the ship to grab something we had forgotten, it was then and there. So after a quick trip back to our cabin and a quick walk back, I met back up with the rest of the family and we headed for the taxi stands. There were different pick-up spots for all of the popular destinations, including Dawn Beach, so we only had to wait about 5 minutes before we were on our way.

The trip from the port to the beach was fairly quick - once there, we were greeted by "The Guy", who quickly mentioned he would be happy to rent us lounge chairs and an umbrella - but we politely said "thanks, but no thanks" and headed a bit further down the beach and found a nice spot to throw down our towels. The water was, just as you see in some pictures/postcards, crystal clear blue - and very warm (St. Maarten had the warmest water out of all three of our Port days). We all spent a lot of time swimming, playing on the beach, and snorkeling - I think we were there at Dawn Beach until about 2 in the afternoon. Saw lots of fish and coral right off the beach - it was definitely a great spot for snorkeling. There were some other folks on the beach, but it never felt "crowded" and we had plenty of space to ourselves. Once everyone felt like they had had enough sun (being our first day off the ship, we knew we didn't want to start off the trip with any sunburns), we grabbed a taxi back to the port.

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After going back on board to change and drop off our beach stuff, we headed back off the ship to do some walking/shopping in Philipsburg. There was a slight drizzle starting by this time, but it wasn't bad and we were able to duck into various shops to get out of the heavier stuff the few times it got a bit stronger. We walked down Front Street (saw the beach there close to the port and were happy that we paid to take a taxi elsewhere - looked fine for "hanging out" on the beach, but not for snorkeling), and then headed back towards the Magic on Back Street. The girls found some neat swim cover-ups/wraps in some great patterns, so we felt like we had our "souvenirs" for the day taken care of. Back on the ship just in time to get ready for dinner and soon we were on our way to St. Thomas.

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Dinner that night was the "Pirate" meal - and our second meal back in Animator's Palette. The girls wore their new wraps and their princess pirate ears from one of our previous trips to Disneyland.

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The Pirate Party after dinner was a lot of fun as well - fireworks at sea was a neat treat, and there were a lot of classic Disney entertainment on stage as well. By the time it was over, Gillian was ready for bed, so I took her back to the cabin while Ginger and Kayleigh went to check out the big spread of food/desserts they put out after the Pirate Party - sounds like a lot of great stuff, for anyone who wasn't still full from dinner at least!

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Day 4 - St. Thomas

The following morning had a little "deja vu" feeling to it, with getting up early enough for breakfast in time preparation for going ashore. But having an excursion booked (Trunk Bay on St. John), this time we had to wait until our group was scheduled meet in the Rockin' D Bar around 10 o'clock. There were a few other excursion groups gathering there as well, but the check-in process was taken care of quickly, and we were soon on our way.

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This was perhaps the only disappointing thing about our whole cruise - even though we were prepared and knew about it in advance, we hadn't appreciated the travel time to and from Trunk Bay, and the amount of our "ashore" time it was going to eat up. It took just about an hour (each way) for the boat to get us from St. Thomas to St. John, and then some waiting around to get on the buses, and then another ~15 minutes to reach the bay. So we only had just over an hour and a half to actually snorkel. The water, while just as clear and beautiful as St. Maarten, was a bit colder, and Gillian toughed it out as long as she could, but eventually needed to take a break from being in the water. So while she and Kayleigh played on the beach, Ginger and I got some more snorkeling in. One of the things we had heard about in Trunk Bay was the "snorkel trail", which really wasn't all it was made out to be - some underwater plaques that talked about the various fish in the area, but I'd have a hard time calling it a "trail". But we still did enjoy our (brief) amount of swimming/snorkeling - it was just over too quickly, and we were rushed back on the buses to get back on the boat to St. Thomas.

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For the second day in a row, it did rain a bit - although much heavier than the day before in St. Maarten. Luckily it waited until we were done swimming, but we had to wait to board our boat due to them unloading another set of travellers - so while some people were able to take shelter under the covered portions of the line, there were a lot of other folks standing in the rain getting soaked. Luckily, once on board, just about everyone was able to seek shelter in the portions of the boat that weren't open to the rain.

We got back to St. Thomas in time to spend a few minutes walking through the various tourist trap stores, but pretty soon we had to go get in line so we weren't left behind!. Another fabulous meal, some more down time in the evening to wind down the day, and our cruise was already more than half way over - it was going by too quickly!

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Next time - Castaway Cay, and "What do you mean, the week's over already?!"
 
Great review of St. Maarten and St. Thomas. We were also on the ferry over to St. John. We did the Eco Hike. We really liked it but like you, I wish we would have had more time.
 
We went on the Trunk Bay excursion as well...When filling out our questionnaire/comment card, I expressed how DCL should have people meet MUCH earlier than 10:15! (Either that or we'll go by ourselves next time.) We really loved Trunk Bay and wanted to explore the island itself and enjoy it more.

Really enjoying your trip report! I keep delaying it, but I probably will do one still...maybe tomorrow...LOL!
 


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