Erica1016
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Sep 28, 2012
- Messages
- 694
Table of Contents
Introduction and Travel Day
Embarkation Day - Part 1
Embarkation Day - Part 2
Nassau
Lookout Cay
Sea Day
Disembarkation Day
Welcome to our third trip report!
We’re the type that plan out pretty far in advance. We currently have a triple-header cruise booked in May 2026 (Destiny-Fantasy-Fantasy), a Treasure trip in January 2027 and the Wonder booked for May 2027. However, when we got off our most recent cruise on the Treasure in May, we were sad to wait an entire year…we know, first-world problems! We also tend to book inside rooms to save the money for more cruising, so it was pretty exciting when we found a decent OGT rate for a Magic cruise that we could fit in during August! I was looking forward to being back on the Magic and it happened to fall over Todd’s birthday, so it worked out perfectly. We booked just short of two months out, which felt very quick for us!
A brief intro, if you haven’t read our previous reports…why haven’t you? (Magic-Fantasy Double Cruise, Treasure Eastern Caribbean) We’re Todd and Erica, a couple in our mid-40’s with no kids and an adorable dog. We became big Disney fans after our first Disney World trip in 2007 and spent many years going to the parks. We’d done a couple of cruises, but it was our third cruise (Fantasy, 2018) that put us on the DCL bandwagon! Now we might be bordering on the precipice of egregiousness. This trip on the Magic marked our 12th cruise and, as mentioned, we currently have five more booked through May 2027 - I’d bet we’ll manage to fit something else in, too.
Travel Day - August 12, 2025
We live in Central PA, but headed to Upstate NY to visit Todd’s parents and leave our dog with them. We were able to head up several days early to get in a nice weekend visit before heading to Florida on Tuesday. We had an early morning flight out of Rochester, so we had to get up around 3:15 am for Todd’s parents to take us to the airport - thank you to them!
Our now traditional group photo when Todd’s parents drop us off at the airport.
For the past many years, we’ve been fairly loyal Southwest Airline travelers. However, with the recent changes they’ve made, it doesn’t always make the most sense financially. For this trip, we were trying to keep costs as low as possible, since it was really an “extra.” So, we spent A LOT of time searching flights and figuring out baggage costs. Eventually, we opted to fly United Airlines on the way down and Spirit on the way back. We also challenged ourselves to pack very minimalistically, with only one checked bag. This was particularly difficult for Todd who is a heavy packer and doesn’t like to make choices about what to bring.
Overall thoughts on the new-to-us airline experience: everything was fine. We did not pay to select our seats ahead of time, which worked out fine. We were together on the first leg and near each other on the second. We also have been spoiled with direct flights for a long time and we had a layover at Dulles this time, which was…interesting. It was like being in a time warp, everything just felt outdated. We ended up having to move from one terminal to another and were on some kind of “rover” of some sort. Not a bus, not a tram...really, it felt like a space rover. Packing also worked out fine, luckily we had our backpacks and could stuff a few things in those.
The boarding area for the “rover.”
The first sight of a beach from the plane
We arrived at MCO around noon. We were staying at the same hotel (Country Inn and Suites Orlando Airport North) that we’d stayed at in May. However, when we called the hotel to send the shuttle, it was a bit confusing compared to last time. They let Todd know that an Uber would be showing up, which was not something we were expecting. Somehow, in a miscommunication, Todd canceled the Uber and we had to call to have them request another. Eventually, it all worked out and we got to the hotel without too much trouble. It turned out that BOTH of their vans were broken, so they were calling and paying for Uber for everyone that normally would have been using the shuttle.
We were at the hotel by around 1:00 and weren’t able to get into the room, yet. We were obviously quite early, so we didn’t mind. We had a seat in the lobby and chatted with some other guests who were also there early. Todd had gotten an email with an offer for a free cake or ice cream at Publix for his birthday. So he had an adventure planned. He left for an approximately 2.5-mile walk to the closest Publix to get his free cake (the ice cream would have melted!). After he embarked on his walk, I ordered subs for him to pick up as well. He enjoyed the walk (I don’t know why!) and seeing some new areas.
After a little while, the desk let me know that I could get into the room. Once I brought our luggage up, I spent a while sitting outside by the pool. Todd made it back just before a brief thunderstorm. Once the rain cleared, we got into our bathing suits and headed to the pool and hot tub for a bit; the weather was beautiful. We then ate an early dinner and settled in for the evening. I took a nap while Todd went down to the exercise room to do some stretching and PT exercises. He had surgery in July and was just getting to the point he’d be able to run again, so keeping up with his recovery was important.
My view by the pool while I waited for Todd to return from Publix
Dinner in bed!
Excited to be getting up to head to Port Canaveral in the morning, we headed to bed on the early side!
We like to keep track of our sleep and steps while on vacation, so we’ll post our daily stats at the end of each day.
Erica’s Sleep: 4:27
Erica’s Steps: 7,244
Todd’s Sleep: 4:30
Todd’s Steps: 20,020
Table of Contents
Introduction and Travel Day
Embarkation Day - Part 1
Embarkation Day - Part 2
Nassau
Lookout Cay
Sea Day
Disembarkation Day
Introduction and Travel Day
Embarkation Day - Part 1
Embarkation Day - Part 2
Nassau
Lookout Cay
Sea Day
Disembarkation Day
Welcome to our third trip report!
We’re the type that plan out pretty far in advance. We currently have a triple-header cruise booked in May 2026 (Destiny-Fantasy-Fantasy), a Treasure trip in January 2027 and the Wonder booked for May 2027. However, when we got off our most recent cruise on the Treasure in May, we were sad to wait an entire year…we know, first-world problems! We also tend to book inside rooms to save the money for more cruising, so it was pretty exciting when we found a decent OGT rate for a Magic cruise that we could fit in during August! I was looking forward to being back on the Magic and it happened to fall over Todd’s birthday, so it worked out perfectly. We booked just short of two months out, which felt very quick for us!
A brief intro, if you haven’t read our previous reports…why haven’t you? (Magic-Fantasy Double Cruise, Treasure Eastern Caribbean) We’re Todd and Erica, a couple in our mid-40’s with no kids and an adorable dog. We became big Disney fans after our first Disney World trip in 2007 and spent many years going to the parks. We’d done a couple of cruises, but it was our third cruise (Fantasy, 2018) that put us on the DCL bandwagon! Now we might be bordering on the precipice of egregiousness. This trip on the Magic marked our 12th cruise and, as mentioned, we currently have five more booked through May 2027 - I’d bet we’ll manage to fit something else in, too.
Travel Day - August 12, 2025
We live in Central PA, but headed to Upstate NY to visit Todd’s parents and leave our dog with them. We were able to head up several days early to get in a nice weekend visit before heading to Florida on Tuesday. We had an early morning flight out of Rochester, so we had to get up around 3:15 am for Todd’s parents to take us to the airport - thank you to them!
Our now traditional group photo when Todd’s parents drop us off at the airport.
For the past many years, we’ve been fairly loyal Southwest Airline travelers. However, with the recent changes they’ve made, it doesn’t always make the most sense financially. For this trip, we were trying to keep costs as low as possible, since it was really an “extra.” So, we spent A LOT of time searching flights and figuring out baggage costs. Eventually, we opted to fly United Airlines on the way down and Spirit on the way back. We also challenged ourselves to pack very minimalistically, with only one checked bag. This was particularly difficult for Todd who is a heavy packer and doesn’t like to make choices about what to bring.
Overall thoughts on the new-to-us airline experience: everything was fine. We did not pay to select our seats ahead of time, which worked out fine. We were together on the first leg and near each other on the second. We also have been spoiled with direct flights for a long time and we had a layover at Dulles this time, which was…interesting. It was like being in a time warp, everything just felt outdated. We ended up having to move from one terminal to another and were on some kind of “rover” of some sort. Not a bus, not a tram...really, it felt like a space rover. Packing also worked out fine, luckily we had our backpacks and could stuff a few things in those.
The boarding area for the “rover.”
The first sight of a beach from the plane
We arrived at MCO around noon. We were staying at the same hotel (Country Inn and Suites Orlando Airport North) that we’d stayed at in May. However, when we called the hotel to send the shuttle, it was a bit confusing compared to last time. They let Todd know that an Uber would be showing up, which was not something we were expecting. Somehow, in a miscommunication, Todd canceled the Uber and we had to call to have them request another. Eventually, it all worked out and we got to the hotel without too much trouble. It turned out that BOTH of their vans were broken, so they were calling and paying for Uber for everyone that normally would have been using the shuttle.
We were at the hotel by around 1:00 and weren’t able to get into the room, yet. We were obviously quite early, so we didn’t mind. We had a seat in the lobby and chatted with some other guests who were also there early. Todd had gotten an email with an offer for a free cake or ice cream at Publix for his birthday. So he had an adventure planned. He left for an approximately 2.5-mile walk to the closest Publix to get his free cake (the ice cream would have melted!). After he embarked on his walk, I ordered subs for him to pick up as well. He enjoyed the walk (I don’t know why!) and seeing some new areas.
After a little while, the desk let me know that I could get into the room. Once I brought our luggage up, I spent a while sitting outside by the pool. Todd made it back just before a brief thunderstorm. Once the rain cleared, we got into our bathing suits and headed to the pool and hot tub for a bit; the weather was beautiful. We then ate an early dinner and settled in for the evening. I took a nap while Todd went down to the exercise room to do some stretching and PT exercises. He had surgery in July and was just getting to the point he’d be able to run again, so keeping up with his recovery was important.
My view by the pool while I waited for Todd to return from Publix
Dinner in bed!
Excited to be getting up to head to Port Canaveral in the morning, we headed to bed on the early side!
We like to keep track of our sleep and steps while on vacation, so we’ll post our daily stats at the end of each day.
Erica’s Sleep: 4:27
Erica’s Steps: 7,244
Todd’s Sleep: 4:30
Todd’s Steps: 20,020
Table of Contents
Introduction and Travel Day
Embarkation Day - Part 1
Embarkation Day - Part 2
Nassau
Lookout Cay
Sea Day
Disembarkation Day
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