Magical Memories of a Double Dip 9/27-10/4 - updated 10/16 w/pics

[alleluia5]

So this is going to be one of those step back moments - all the way back to a land far, far away - 90 days before cruise time, also known as M-90 (Mickey minus 90)

It was a cold, stormy night (kiddos cuddle close to your parents, this is a scary one). It was 10:57 pm CDT on the night of Palo booking, as her fingers quiverered nervously above the keyboard - could the time go any slower? To pass the slowly moving minutes she hit the refresh board to review the excited posts of her DisBoard friends. 10:58.....just to make sure her clock was calibrated she attempted to sign into her reservation - still nothing - the blaring read message reflected in her bloodshot eyes - afraid to blink lest she miss the turn of the hour .

10:59 WAIT she missed the turn of the clock, how will she know when it is exactly 60 seconds? Nervously, she stared at the glowing screen - posts flying across the DisBoard screen .....sign in now, or wait? Her shaking hands hovered over the enter button. Just then, the power flickered with a flash of lightening

With determination, she pressed the enter button with great anticipation. A few clicks and she was at the screen she had planned for weeks ago - the Palo booking screen, selecting the button and...... what....foiled!!! Apparently her cotravelers were not paid in full leaving the damsel in distress with a difficult choice. To book or not to book??? She did what any reasonable diser would do.....she booked a table for two

Fast forward to THE day, the day the Palo'd princess has boarded the ship and made her way with haste to the official meeting place of all things Palo - Rockin' Bar D. A noble knight pointed her to the correct queue and she stood shifting from foot to foot as her mission was clear - change her table of 2 to a table of 4 and add a brunch to her list of treasures. Slowly, the line inched to the beginning of the table and suddenly the heroine of the story stood before the holder of her Palo fate.....spelling name....spelling name.....spelling name AGAIN.... Precious moments are ticking away as ressies fly from person to person when finally the humble cast member finds the maiden's castle number (aka stateroom).

Moments later she left the line only 1/2 way to her goal....tablemates added - unfortunately, other cruisemates were faster on the draw and would be attending brunch without the princess. Perhaps the luck of the magic would fall upon her to grant her favor with the most revered of all lists.......the waiting list

Fast forward once again and you will find the maiden and her faithful friends arriving at Palo....alas though you will have to await the next installment to find the truth about how 4 friends actually spent 3 1/2 hours sitting in the same place and eating then ENTIRE time

. Tune back in for a fable of portions, misspellings and why we may never be allowed in Palo again.....

 

[Tink rules]

Yeah... you too, huh???

But you realize that MOST of us shouldn't be allowed back in Palo...

(Ok... so I only WANTED to take off with the whole plate of Crab legs... )

 

[zweihund]

Yeah... you too, huh???

But you realize that MOST of us shouldn't be allowed back in Palo...

(Ok... so I only WANTED to take off with the whole plate of Crab legs... )

Yeah, they weren't too keen on me taking a glass of champagne for the road, either.....

 

[alleluia5]

Funny, I didn't know there was an "open liquor" law on deck 10

 

[alleluia5]

So we arrive at Palo with one of our two cruising buddies. Mrs CB (cruise buddy) is looking beautiful and I notice her eyes darting from side to side as she looks for Mr CB, who is no where to be found. We stand outside Palo's for a few minutes expecting Mr CB to come around the corner. 15 minutes later, no Mr CB and the couch is filling up with folks waiting to be seated so we decide to wander on in. After all, if Mr CB ran into Belle in the lobby it could be forever before we see him

Now Angelina, one of our former servers had recommended that we request Mr R (name changed to protect the....well you know) because he is one of the best. So as we go to check in, we do so - which I am pretty sure upset all of their seating plans. However, as Disney always did, they started making arrangements to let us have Mr. R as our server. Meanwhile, I notice that everyone at the check in desk is whispering and looking at us. So as any female does, I starting thinking - are my undies showing, do I have chocolate on my chin, and other dastardly thoughts

Suddenly, the manager walks over to us with a wrapped present Each of us looks quizzically at each other just as Mr CB walks up to join the party (yep you guessed it - Belle was in the lobby).

We follow the seater to the far part of the restaurant and sit in our perfect seat right by the window. Its still early enough that there is a little bit of light out, so its gorgeous (now ask me if I have a picture of it - NOPE)

My patience is gone so we rip in to our present and discover it is from our Secret Mickey (Tiffany) It was perfect!!! We always wanted one of these timers

Meanwhile, we notice our waiter to be keeps walking past us looking at us with a quizzical look on his face. DH finally figured out that he was trying to figure out who we were/why we had requested him/had we had him before. So after we cleared that up, our meal started with a yummy pizza. Now right off the bat we noticed that although good, it seemed the meal wasn't quite the same as before. However, we slowly continued on to the appetizer which we ordered the cheese/prosciutto plate and Mr R continued to bring us 2 additional things to "try" which we of course did - we tried it until the plate was shiny and clean

Next it was time for the main course which of course the majority of us chose the filet. Bad news when it came though - the medium rare was mooing, the medium was jerky and we won't even go to the the medium well. Now let me say this was very unusual for Palo and we later found out that these issues have since been resolved but we had to have a redo on some of those filets. And before anyone flames or starts a new thread about why not to eat at Palo, let me be very clear that we LOVE Palo and always go - this was not the normal at all and as I mentioned, has since been resolved from what we have heard.

Meanwhile, a little bloody meat wasn't going to get us down. So the new filet came and looked yummy

and Mr R of course made sure we had an extra entree - here is the lamb

to which Mrs CB said, "I just can't eat Bambi...... Bambi?? Lamb...

Now, our favorite part of the meal is the chocolate souffle - make sure your waiter knows you want it because it takes about 15 minutes for them to make it. It was wonderful and amazing as always - Here is the before:

Now most of us chose the vanilla sauce to go with it - my personal fave. However, Mrs CB decided that she would go for a mix of both chocolate and vanilla, which resulted in a mix of enough chocolate to send anyone into nirvana. And this was the aftermath

For the rest of us, there just weren't as many crumbs left

Now at this point dinner is basically over with 2 exceptions - the after dinner "champagne chaser" and the Happy Birthday celebration for DH .

So Mr. R brings us our requested after dinner drinks . Mrs CB and I decided to try a creme de menthe coffee drink. Word of warning, unless you REALLY, REALLY like mint, pass on this one - as they say in Beverly Hills Chihuahua - "its MINTY" Now DH ordered a coffee drink w/o any alcohol......he takes one sip and I thought he was going to turn green It seems that Mr R has decided that he should surprise DH with "a touch of elegance" aka boose. One minor...ok major problem, DH doesn't drink, at all.....so imagine - Mr no drinker takes a big swig..... Well of course, that started the laughing.....which only continued....

When Mr. R delivers DH's birthday surprise - now Palo is not allowed to give out cakes, so for special occasions, they decorate a plate. Now here is an example of a plate we got a couple of cruises ago:

Notice the cute hearts, swirly letters....

Well Mr R walks over to us very sheepishly and delivers this

Now this sent us into hysterics. Probably for a few reasons:
1) We were about 3 hours into dinner
2) Those darn minty drinks - did I say MINTY?
3) DH was still trying to "clear his palate" of the "touch of elegance"
4) Mr CB says - oh Habby Birthday (since it kind of looks like that is what it says)
5) Mr R is looking incredibly embarrassed.
6) There had been quite the storm during our dinner to which Mrs CB continued to refer to the Titanic like rain as she nervously stirred her tea - over and over and over

Now Mr R launches into this hysterical ongoing apology for the quality of the plate. Keep in mind - its a PLATE but the poor guy...he felt so embarrassed about it. There were some other things that happened involving the plate, the manager and Mr R giggling guiltily from afar ...but I will spare the details to protect the mostly innocent.... Let's just say the day ended with the restaurant closed, and us meandering out as one of the few left.....3 1/2 hours later. Too bad the manager didn't have a better sense of humor too, we tried to have a little fun about the plate (at Mr. R's insistance) but he just didn't quite get our joke We of course thought it was hilarious - of course those MINTY drinks might have helped a little Seriously it was just a PLATE

After a walk around the 4th deck to make us at least feel like we had exercised all that food off, we retired to our cabin for a night of being rocked to sleep.

 

[jollytammy]

I love it!!! Keep up the good work!!!

 

[alleluia5]

Now let me start by saying, Cozumel is one of my favorite stops - why you might ask - well a few reasons:

1) No tender - you just walk right off the ship and wala you are in Cozumel.
2) It is easy to just get back on the ship for a yummy (and tummy safe) lunch and nap
3) Its just as easy to get back off the ship
4) The beautiful turquoise water
5) Shopping, shopping, shopping

Now if you are thinking - dang she must shop a lot, actually you would be surprised. I am not that big of a shopper at home - in fact, I am a bargain shopper much to DH's dismay. Yep thats me standing in the grocery aisle figuring out which can of tomato sauce is a better deal. THAT IS EXACTLY WHY I LOVE COZUMEL.

So after a leisurely breakfast, we set off for the first part of our day. As we walked out of the ship, we noticed that some OTHER ship had the nerve to park next to our beauty!!!

As we walked down the walkway, DH and DCBH (cruising buddy's hubby) noticed something in the water that they found fascinating - for this reason, we were delayed at least 15 minutes - now for those of you with the shopping gene, you know how painful this can be -

You know, there is something amazing about walking out beside that gorgeous ship. The detail is amazing and the sheer size of it really makes me stare at it in awe every time

So as we near shopping lane (my favorite name for it) we passed parrot guy who was charging $5 for a picture with a parrot. Of course I saw that sign AFTER I had already taken my own picture

After this lovely picture, I chose to take a picture of my perfect self (body)

Yeah right

As we walked along, I had this fascination with the horse led buggies

- to which DCB declared "its a horse - you do know we have them in America"

The rest of the morning we spent telling street vendors no, walking around people stopped in the middle of the sidewalk looking at shopping maps and looking for "the perfect bargain" I really didn't get all that much, a few t-shirts at my favorite t-shirt store (its about mid way down -and they use decent t-shirts that actually last and don't shrink) and a great find at the silver store - all together spent - less than $40!

After a lovely lunch back on the ship and a second shopping trip, it was time for the all popular cruise nap - oh how I wish I still could have those cruise naps!

The show that night was Twice Charmed which is probably one of my favorite next to Disney Dreams. I just love the sets and costumes and of course the music! We arrived just in time to order our daily strawberry/banana show smoothie and enjoyed the show. It was tough to get a good pic but here is one

Now just to jump ahead for a second, we attended the performer talk the next day and met about 8 of the cast members including the gal that plays Cinderella - interesting group, if you haven't attended, I would highly recommend it. Its very informal so you can ask pretty much anything and they give lots of background info.

Okay back to story, after the show we heard this loud but very cool music and realized that they had a live mariachi band in the lobby - very cool!

We took some of the pics of the night and headed for dinner at Animators. Tonight was show night which we love. For anyone who has not cruised yet, it is truly a magical experience!

Now I don't want to ruin the surprise so I won't give details but here are a few pics from the experience:

This last pic is of two of the head servers, Michelle is the one on the right - she is absolutely the best! We have had her for a couple years in a row and she stopped at her table every single night - practically unheard of for a head server

So after a lovely dinner, we stopped by Rockin Bar D and then headed up to deck 10. The captain had decided to give the crew a treat for all the hard work they did in drydock - so we stayed in Cozumel until one am. One of the POTC movies was showing on the Arial Vision so we enjoyed the breeze as it finished up then walked over to the rail to watch the show It was very strange to be parked there that late and we enjoyed watching the crew walk....errr stumble back at 12:59am

The best part though, and something you just don't get to see often was pulling out of port when it is pitch black. Since it was late, we practically had the deck to ourself - although I think I saw Eric and his DP walk by. It was so peaceful and just amazing to see the Captain literally pull the ship back and spin it completely in place and silently head off for our day at sea. I love that ship!!!

 

[TheDisneyGirl02]

Loved your pictures!

 

[anewmac]

haha I have pics of the crew partying.. they can get down and let their hair down for sure. They werent the only ones stumbling either lol

 

[DMMarla07860]

I see you were in stateroom 2088, how was it? good location? I'm staying in that cabin for my b2b cruise so just wonderong

 

[nenner1]

Now let me start by saying, Cozumel is one of my favorite stops - why you might ask - well a few reasons:
5) Shopping, shopping, shopping


The rest of the morning we spent telling street vendors no,

Too funny. We absolutely *loathed* that aspect of Cozumel! My throat was sore from the constant, "No, thank you..no thank you....". Does each store actually pay the three Mexican dudes that stand outside each and every shop trying to lure you in? Or do they work on commission? (I think the best one was the guy who tried to get us in by calling us "Rich family". )
This was our first time there and I was so dissapointed, I planned to shopping til I dropped but I didn't buy a thing...prices were not so great either. Oh well.

Love the update! Keep em coming!

 

[alleluia5]

I see you were in stateroom 2088, how was it? good location? I'm staying in that cabin for my b2b cruise so just wonderong

Loved it - perfect location in my opinion - and if you get the same room steward you are in great shape!!!

Too funny. We absolutely *loathed* that aspect of Cozumel! My throat was sore from the constant, "No, thank you..no thank you....". Does each store actually pay the three Mexican dudes that stand outside each and every shop trying to lure you in? Or do they work on commission? (I think the best one was the guy who tried to get us in by calling us "Rich family". )
This was our first time there and I was so dissapointed, I planned to shopping til I dropped but I didn't buy a thing...prices were not so great either. Oh well.

Love the update! Keep em coming!

Too funny, the first time I went it was a little overwhelming but I am really good at ignoring them. The one that cracked me up was the one that asked DH if he smoked, when he answered no, the guy said "so start" (cigar salesman)

You have to look very hard for the deals, and they are never the first price - maybe its my sense of "getting a deal" that enjoys the game.

 

[tinkerbellmom1]

Found you late, but I'm thoroughly enjoying your trippie! Now I can see why you think our thread is so quiet!

 

[Tink rules]

We left Acapulco at sunset (almost dark really...) and it was indeed strange... I had to get back from dinner early so I could watch us pull away... I love watching the ship leave...it just glides!!!