LIVE FROM the Disney Wonder Holiday cruise 2011!

[magrudersmakes3]

Hope you have a great trip!!! I can't wait to read all about it!

 

[SanDeeKath]

Magnets? Did you say magnets? I probably have a few dozen I could give you, Hahahha! I have to downsize a bit this cruise because our cabin door was bigger last time, being the HA suite. I may have to rotate them in and out...!

Yaay, Christine! I'd love some extras. Trying to print some out now to figure out how big and what they should look like...

By the way, DH went out and got himself and the girls some basic wetsuits today to try to keep them from getting too cold. My friend who just got off the Wonder last week said the waters were a bit chilly at times. LEt's hope that they actually use them!

24h and we will be in our cabin, sippin' a glass of vino!

In the meantime, packing frenzy continues. Katherine

 

[SanDeeKath]

Forgot to add, DH decided to go to Walmart and get a waterproof camera as a last minute Christmas gift to himself. So, now we really should be all set. I think he got this cool little Kodak for $150. I hope it works well. Honestly, it doesn't look too water resistant to me, with all these buttons in the front. But what do I know? Walmart said they'd take it back if it leaks! We should have some great snorkeling pix from it! Kath

 

[Silly Little Pixie]

Oy vey! We just left my house (my parents are driving us to the hotel) when my son realized he left his toiletry bag. so we turn around at the next exit, drive back, only to realize my dad didn't bring keys to the house! So now we had to go to their house, get keys, and head back. My son is feeling pretty bad, but I just realized I didn't print the cruise contract!! Duh! So it's okay.

SOON we will finally be on our way!

See y'all tomorrow!

Christine

 

[LKFan]

By the way, DH went out and got himself and the girls some basic wetsuits today to try to keep them from getting too cold. My friend who just got off the Wonder last week said the waters were a bit chilly at times. LEt's hope that they actually use them!

Didn't you order wetsuits from Amazon? Were they no good?

 

[SanDeeKath]

Didn't you order wetsuits from Amazon? Were they no good?

Yes, I ordered my younger DD's wetsuit from Amazon and it was great and cheap! Here is the one I got:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002MPH3PQ/ref=oh_o00_s00_i00_details

They have size 3T to 9/10. I ordered a 7/8 for my DD, who is about to turn 7, and it fit her perfectly.

My older DD is 12 and is quite tall. Her sizing was impossible for me to figure out online so DH went to the dive shop with her and got her a wetsuit that fit great and will probably work for this summer. It better because it cost $100! Then he decided to get one for himself for $150.

They are the same shape as the amazon one (short sleeves, to midthigh) and they are 2mm. I think that should be plenty warm!

I also dug up our sunshirts (rashguards) from last summer and have those packed as well. That will help in the hot sun. I packed 3 bottles of sunblock as well, and sunglasses for all! Wheh!

Most suitcases are now in the van with the exception of the carry ons. I still need to pack toiletries and my caffeine free diet coke! And I got delicious caffeine free iced tea powder from LIpton today. I am going to take a tbsp scooper and a tumbler with me so I can mix my own. I know it's strange but I love my iced tea in the morning (and I can't do caffeine) and I love my CFDC at lunch and dinner. So I need 16 cans for an 8 nighter! LOL.

Now what to do about my decaf latte each morning????

Ah the funs of travelling!

BTW: verizon has a data plan for smart phones (3 tiers actually). They are expensive ($49.99, 69.99, 99.99) but they prorate for your time away. So it only ends up being 1/4 of the monthly fee for our 1 week trip. I signed up for the middle one (150MB I think). This way I can get emails and do a bit of internet stuff while away. I also told them that I am on the cruise ship and they said it's $2.50 per minute of calls and $0.50 for texts. I don't plan on making too many calls, that's for sure!

DH has AT&T and they have a similar data plan. We didn't get it, but he has an international phone plan now active for the week. It was $5 to add it on and it is now $0.59 per minute to make calls (while on land in MX, not on the ship). So we will probably use his phone at ports and make the "Happy Holiday" calls there instead of on the ship. Ship rates for ATT were the same ($2.50 per minute).

So with that bit of info, I hope to sign off for the night and get some sleep! We take off at 10am tomorrow and should be checked in by noonish. Then it's Parrot's Cay for lunch buffet and our DISboards get together at 3pm! YIPEEE.
Katherine

 

[JJsmama]

Oy vey! We just left my house (my parents are driving us to the hotel) when my son realized he left his toiletry bag. so we turn around at the next exit, drive back, only to realize my dad didn't bring keys to the house! So now we had to go to their house, get keys, and head back. My son is feeling pretty bad, but I just realized I didn't print the cruise contract!! Duh! So it's okay.

I really hope we don't have a departure day like this!! But with three kids, who knows? We have to fly around the world, so not much time for turning around for us. I always say the only thing we absolutely cannot forget is passports when we leave for a trip.

I hope it all turned out ok for you!

SanDeeKath, Enjoying the report and I hope it is all ok with DD's friend.

 

[SanDeeKath]

Hi all from the Disney Wonder Cadillac Lounge! We got to port at noon with quick parking and lightning fast checkin despite forgetting all of our paperwork at home. Doh! Concierge check in is amazing. Long line for regular cabins tho. But lots of agents. DD friend with us but her mom has texted us about 500 times. Lol. Parrot Cay buffet is closed (too crowded) so we went to BB. Very packed. Supposedly 950 kids on board. Eeeeek. Havent been to our suite yet but we cant wait.

More later...

 

[narsibvl]

Hi all from the Disney Wonder Cadillac Lounge! We got to port at noon with quick parking and lightning fast checkin despite forgetting all of our paperwork at home. Doh! Concierge check in is amazing. Long line for regular cabins tho. But lots of agents. DD friend with us but her mom has texted us about 500 times. Lol. Parrot Cay buffet is closed (too crowded) so we went to BB. Very packed. Supposedly 950 kids on board. Eeeeek. Havent been to our suite yet but we cant wait.

More later...

Which suite are you in ?

 

[LKFan]

Which suite are you in ?

I believe she is staying in the Roy Disney suite. Can't wait for the pictures!

 

[SanDeeKath]

Hi all

Sailed away at 5:15. Gorgeous night outside eith calm seas so far. Kids were hungry so we had burgers and such for dinner tonight. We have late seating so it is always hard to know what to do around 4 or 5. Buffet closes at 3. Welcome show is starting soon. That is 45 minutes only so we will probably do a kids club stop aftrr. We have Tritons tonight for dinner. Kids want to do the dance party at the kids club during dinner so it may just be dh and I. Adults only tonight is a piano bar and a dance dj party. Adults scavenger hunt is also happening but not till10+pm.

Palo brunch for us tomorrow. I have a feeling lunch is going to be without us.

Till later. Oh, forgot to say our concierge is Todd. He is new as of 3 weeks ago and so dar he rocks...

K

 

[cherokeemamma]

Thanks for the updates! Everything sounds just wonderful!

Looking forward to hearing more!

TTFN
Darlene

 

[Laundress]

Loving the updates. Can't wait to hear the next one. Enjoy.

 

[PizzieDuster]

Hi all

Sailed away at 5:15. Gorgeous night outside eith calm seas so far. Kids were hungry so we had burgers and such for dinner tonight. We have late seating so it is always hard to know what to do around 4 or 5. Buffet closes at 3. Welcome show is starting soon. That is 45 minutes only so we will probably do a kids club stop aftrr. We have Tritons tonight for dinner. Kids want to do the dance party at the kids club during dinner so it may just be dh and I. Adults only tonight is a piano bar and a dance dj party. Adults scavenger hunt is also happening but not till10+pm.

Palo brunch for us tomorrow. I have a feeling lunch is going to be without us.

Till later. Oh, forgot to say our concierge is Todd. He is new as of 3 weeks ago and so dar he rocks...

K

I was just wondering....Did The Wonder have to return to port? I was looking at the tracking the Wonder and it looked like it did... I hope all is okay.

http://www.marinetraffic.com/ais/de...8457000&zoom=10&olddate=12/19/2011 7:11:00 AM

 

[SanDeeKath]

Hi all.

Nope, didn't go back to port! Not sure what you saw! On our way to Manzanillo, passing Cabo in about 2 hours.


Terrible signal on our first sea day! UGH. I have been trying to post all day but no luck. We have the most calm seas that I have ever seen on the Pacific! However, it’s cool and overcast today. Never fear, they have a 1000 different activities for the kids. DH and I went to Palo for brunch and had the best meal ever! The views are spectacular from the back of deck 10 during the day! I would highly recommend it during daytime hours. We saw a couple of whales. Our server was super and very attentive and knowledgable (and just plain old nice!). The food was spectacular, especially the shrimp, crablegs, all the grilled veggies, caviar and oh, the mango vanilla dessert thingy in the glass. I also had the veal and Greg had the fruttetta, both of which were delicious!

Last night we were in Tritons. The good news is that we have a fantastic table by the window to ourselves since we are a party of 6 (and the kids and nanny were in bed by 8:15). The bad news is that the food was pretty aweful. I had some sort of tasteless salad with lime/honey dressing that tasted like water. I also had the halibut on peas with cream sauce. The sauce and peas were great but the halibut tasted rubbery and overcooked, like the stuff you buy in the frozen section of Safeway and cook in the grill at home (and not too well). DH had shrimp with risotto. It was good but ice cold. No chocolate desserts either except a sugar free one that was not very tasty. Ah well, we sorta knew coming in that the food is just NOT good on the Wonder so I was prepared. Rest of the nights we will probably order Palo for dinner to our cabin, especially after the Palo brunch today!

After dinner, DH and I went to listen to a live band in the Cadillac Lounge, followed by some nice drinks and then finally to bed. This morning, kids actually did the kids club and all enjoyed it (much to my surprise, even my 7yo liked it!). They are keeping the 1000 kids very busy on this cruise, which we are all very appreciative. We’ve seen the matinee of Golden Mickeys already today and the girls are in origami folding class now. They also did a “learn to draw Mickey class” this morning as well as scrabooking! Wheh!

By the way, someone made some comment about the crew being all new and inexperienced and the performers not doing the right steps, etc. I have to say, I have not seen any of that. All the crew we’ve met have been amazing and energetic and very attentive. The Golden Mickeys were flawless and performed amazingly well! The singers were fab and the energy in the show was great! Our room stewart is also fantastic and fast and efficient and friendly. Our concierge is Todd and he’s been amazing! When my DD had a headache this morning, he showed up with packs of ibuprophen. Plus 3 movies and popcorn. He checks in multiple times a day and recently noticed we were out of water so he brought a case up! Really top notch service!

So Sea Day #1 is going great and tomorrow we would see the sun so that the kids can finally swim. I have a feeling the pools will be a disaster but with “anytime” dining thanks to our suite perk, we may just have the girls out and about after 4pm, when things seem to calm down.

By the way, EVERYONE at every dining room table has kids. I would say almost ½ are preteens/teens so the age mix is great. Since we have late dining, we are not seeing too many of the super young kids but I bet the 5:30 time has more. I have yet to see anyone over about 50! I also don’t see young couples so far either. This is definitely a family cruise for the holidays.

Not sure if I can post tomorrow... Sea days are tough! Katherine

 

[UmmGooD]

Thanks so much for your posts!

It is good to hear the CM's are top notch. We are excited for our first cruise on the Wonder in March!

I am hoping we can upgrade to a suite at the port. I am not getting my hopes up but it would be nice

 

[narsibvl]

<< Our concierge is Todd and he’s been amazing! When my DD had a headache this morning, he showed up with packs of ibuprophen. Plus 3 movies and popcorn. He checks in multiple times a day and recently noticed we were out of water so he brought a case up! Really top notch service! >>

this was the kind of service one expects out of concierge, something that was lacking in Mike. Looks like you were lucky, enjoy the service

 

[SanDeeKath]

Sea Day #2

Well, I guess I was wrong on my previous post because we are just passing Cabo right now, on our way to Manzanillo. The seas have been completely calm all night and today and the sun has come out in full force. I have been watching for whale spouts all morning and so far have seen 3! We also saw a pod of dolphins earlier today as well. One of the whales pretty close to the ship actually showed his tail, so that was exciting. Of course by the time I got my camera, it was gone. We were on an Alaska cruise in May so I am guessing the same whales we saw migrating toward Alaska then are now heading South for a warmer winter! Very neat! Kids have been on the balcony with our new binoculars all morning (thank you for that awesome FE gift!).

Today was also our character breakfast and we got some great shots of the kids with Goofy, Minnie and Micket. Thanks to another awesome FE gift, the girls had a little notebooks that the Characters could sign for them! Very nice. ☺ Speaking of FE gifts, we delivered our stash today. Wheh! I even had a few adult gifts (salad tongs anyone) so I hope everyone enjoyed them. We didn’t do anything personal like the one person so far who has made a scrapbook journal by hand for every single kid in our exchange! So impressive. But we definitely did the Disney theme. We also had 2 Secret Mickey gifts to give out. Oh and my younger DD’s first Secret Mickey gift, a Ju Ju pet, was a huge hit! She’s been rolling it around the cabin all morning.

So let’s see, yesterday after the Golden Mickeys we had the kids in the clubs for a while, then wandered the ship and stopped by the Origami making class and the animation class. I booked a massage for later in the cruise and then we listened to some live music with the house band, Speakerbox, who by the way are probably the best cover band we have ever heard on a cruise. It’s nice that they have a family dance hour right before dinner, because my kids are really enjoying it! Especially my 7yo, who has the most hilarious “moves” on the dance floor. LOL. She drops to the floor and spins around and everything. She calls it “floorwork.” Never mind that the floor is packed with other families trying to dance. She carves out her own space, ROFL.

We also ordered Palo into our room last night because it was formal night and we really wanted to eat earlier than 8:15 so we could see the comedian and the live music afterward. 5:30 of course is just too early for us, especially with our time change of “springing forward” today. Basically, you are having a 5 course meal at 4:30. Hmmmm. So we had Palo delivered at 6:30 by a really nice room service person. He set up a nice white table cloth and all the silverwear, and then brought the food course by course. It was SOOOOO awesome! We were all decked out and had a lovely dinner and awesome dessert right in our suite. The food was delicious.

The steak with gorgonzola cheese melted on top was amazing. I had paper wrapped halibut with side of veggies and my nanny even got a vegetarian dish that was t odie for. We had our own alcohol in the room so that was a nice bonus too! They came and cleaned everything up at the end and we generously tipped our amazing server. We’ll do this again tonight, because we are assigned to Parrot Cay for dinner, which is a setting I really didn’t like on our last cruise since it’s so huge and loud. Plus the 80s white wash décor is really not all that condusive to a nice dinner. Surprisingly, the buffet is actually open tonight for 2 hours (6:30 to 8:30) so we decided to do Palo appetizers and desserts into the suite and then go up to the buffet for a lighter main course selection. That should work out well with our plans to go dancing again tonight. Also on tap for today are Gender Wars and a juggling workshop for the older kids, Mulan on the funnelvision by the pool, and Rock Band challenge for my younger one in the Oceaneer Club. We may try to squeeze in the Wonder Quest too at 4pm. Oh, I also have to point out that Hannukah services start today too.

Anyway, I am sorry to ramble on. Hope people are enjoying reading the little details. Just want to add that despite this being a totally sold out ship, things have not been too bad as far as crowds. There are a lot of advantages to having so many kids too. There are the extra shows, lots of classes during the sea days, lots of fun activities for the kids in the clubs and so on. Todd, our concierge, has been amazing and he even volunteered to go bring me breakfast from BBB this morning when I missed the character breakfast by accident (whoops, no alarm set). We have met some really nice people as well and have thoroughly enjoyed the DISboards crowd!

Katherine

 

[SanDeeKath]

Posting Day 3 since we actually have internet in port! Hope you are enjoying...


Manzanillo
Wow, we woke up today to sunshine, sunshine, sunshine. And heat and humidity! What a change. Yesterday was a gorgeous sea day but today it definitely feels like we are well South of California. Another night of calm seas made for a very peaceful evening and lovely morning. We docked at 8ish and have the catamaran snorkel to Elephant Rock planned for today. The kids were ready to go, equipped with lots of sunblock and even those wetsuits we got the week before. I doubt we will need it though! I managed to order breakfast from the dining room through Todd, our concierge, last night. So we had omelets, pancakes and French toast served in the suite before leaving. The only bad thing was the mocha I asked for. I think it was a latte with a sprinkle of chocolate on top. Missing my Starbucks bigtime because the coffee on board is aweful. Otherwise everything was delicious (and so convenient).

Manzanillo is beautiful and modern and very friendly. We are docked in the middle of a big C-shaped bay with lots of pretty houses and resorts scattered around. Many people are doing a resort excursion, and the town is hopping with Christmas break guests from all over. It’s definitely a nice port to add and I wish they would do this as the 3rd stop instead of 1 ½ days in Cabo! According to Trent, our amazing assistant cruise director (I mean this guy is EVERYWHERE and does everything with all the guests, including the Macarena with my younger DD in the pool!), Mazatlan is not likely to be added back to the itiniaries, even though it is written into 2012’s schedule. I guess the drug lord violence is still very active there. Sigh.

Anyway, trying to remember what all we did yesterday. The kids swam a LOT in the pools and did the waterslide about 2000x. They then went to the kids club for sombrero making and kids bingo. My younger DD is starting to take to the club, thank goodness, and honestly it has not been nearly as busy as I thought. We saw Ariel walk through at one point and my DD was so shy she didn’t want to go to her. To Ariel’s credit, she came over gently and took DD’s hand and leaned down and asked her what her favorite part of the day was. That opened the floodgates and DD proceeded to tell her everything about her day up to that point, including brushing her teeth after breakfast. ☺ Ariel as super sweet and walked her out of the club with me behind, cursing that I didn’t have a camera. One really MUST have a camera at all times for this ship! Anyway, the club is a hit now with little miss. Older DD and her friend are in the Edge and really enjoy it. There is 1 counselor there and the kids can come and go as they wish. The girls like the activities (gender wars, t-shirt making, going up to BBB for cooking pizza) and the independence.

Dinner last night was Palo to our suite again and it was so darn good again! We ordered way less and asked that everything be brought at the same time so it doesn’t take 2h to eat. The kids were itching to go back to the club and DH and I wanted to go see SpeakerBox again. We headed to Wavebands, our new fave place to hang out on the ship. It’s adults only after 9pm, which is also kinda nice. We listened to music, then watched a show with 2 guys beating on various objects like propane tanks and trash cans to make music (yes, it was actually really good) and then did about 30 min of line dancing. Never done the electric slide to AC/DC before but it was great fun! Lots of crew members were there to help ou the rhythmically challenged like me and DH. They gave away free cowboy hats and everyone enjoyed the ho-down. Then SpeakerBox came back on and we danced some more and then quickly turned into pumpkins around midnight. ☺ Oh, forgot to add the kids went to see the magician in the main theater at 8:30 and that was a big hit with all.

We are off to PV tomorrow, where we are scheduled for the Paradise Beach getaway through Disney. I will write about our Manzanillo excursion tomorrow as well. TTYL!

 

[cdunn03]

Loving your trip report!!! Looking forward to your post on the paradise beach excursion! We have it booked for our Feb trip!