May 25th, 2008 West Coast - Mexico

[lvstitch]

Anyone back yet I can't wait to read every detail. No pressure, just everyone going on a Mex Riv cruise is waiting to hear from you

 

[traceye]

We're back.....but I'm too tired to give all the details and have out of town guests today. I'll post some stuff tomorrow for you all. If you have any specific questions, please let us know....we can answer them all.

Obviously the trip was fabulous....well, it depends who in my family you ask....my daughter and I LOVED it, my Son had a great time but no different than on any other ship because he could care less about Disney or the characters, and my husband....well he didn't want to go to begin with and he couldn't wait to get off....not a Disney or Kid guy....wrong place for him.

I however are jealous of all of you yet to set sail on that wonderful trip.

THANKS so much for the pictures of us setting sail....they are AWESOME!!!!

I'll be back tomorrow...let me know what you all want to know.

Tracey

 

[4campers]

We are back too! My house is still moving!

I've started the laundry and went to the market already!

Our family had a very nice trip. We didn't over plan this time. Yes, I did over pack! We had no excursions planned for this trip. We really just wanted to enjoy the ship more and we did. We had a balcony and loved it. I could sit out with my coffee each morning or drinks at night.

We went to see the Narnia movie even. Who would of ever thought I'd go see a movie on a ship! But, it was really the best part of the trip for us. We really just wanted to take it slow and rest.

DD's had fun just hanging around. We didn't see many character's this trip, which was surprising, as we saw all of them the first trip. Not, sure how or why, but I think I was the only one who noticed from our family.

The one thing that was pretty cool for us was prior to sailing DD's each made the Captain a picture. I'm thiking ok, like we will every get these to him, but they said we will see him. DD 7 made the ship with great detail. On Captain's night we had our picture taken with him and they gave him the pics. He put them in his jacket pocket! The next day we had a thank you card, along with two autographed photos of the Magic from the Captain!!!!!

I'm not too good at all the other details many of you want to know. But, like Tracey said, if you want to ask we can all help!

Our thread group was the BEST!!!! We all got to meet in the Swanky Suite! Way cool!!!

James-sorry I woke you guys this morning!!

Ellen-Thank you for being so kind to all of us! Hope everyone is feeling better soon!

Hugs to ALL of you!!! Thank you for making our trip so very special!!! I will miss seeing you around the ship!!!

 

[lvstitch]

Just a few questions:

Did they have special menu's?
Did they have a deck BBQ?
Do they still offer the galley tour?
Was there anything special or different for the Mex Riv cruise?
And of course the obvious, do you have the navigators?

Thanks for any info you can give us...it is very much appreciated

 

[DMMarla07860]

glad you all had a great trip, can't wait to hear about it

 

[MousseauMob]

Hey everyone, we're not home yet, still in transit, I'm so jealous of everyone home already. Of course that may be the fever talking.

We had a fab time - and we have some navigators, but they are spread out a bit and still packed.

I want to give a special thanks to all our swanky suite swillers and especially to our organizers (Kim, Melissa, and James). Without you guys we wouldn't have pulled it off and had such a wonderful time.

I'll try to do the questions:
No, there was no special menu.
No, except for pirate night food - unless I'm mistaken and missed this.
Yes, they still have the galley tour - unfortunately I missed ours due to illness.
Sort of, although it seems to be more in the merchandise offered then anything else.
See above answer on navigators - when I unpack, I'll know better what I have.

Mary, I talked to the officer that sounded that alarm at 2:30am, he apologized for waking us all and he explained that Bright Star is a code word. I didn't pry into the details, but I'm going to do a bit of research later to determine what Bright Star means.

 

[CardinalDad]

I have a few moments before I have to catch up with my life so a few things. First off, let me say it was great getting to meet many of the folks from the board, including Kim, Tracey, and James. (And James, thanks so much for the gift!) And, of course, it was an terrific getting to chat with everyone at the gracious invitation of Ellen in her swanky suite. Thank you Ellen. That was a really special treat for all of us.

For those of you who are about to head off on the 7 day cruise to Mexico you should have a great time. If you’ve been following this thread, you’ll know that I went with 20 family members. Everyone had a blast. Here’s a few highlights from our trip, (with some unsolicited tips). I know I should probably be posting this in the other forum, but I'll just post it here for now. A few pictures will follow in a separate post next:

BOARDING

We got to the terminal at about 10:30am. Strangely, even though our group entered the terminal within a minute or two of each other we ended up with boarding numbers anywhere between 6 and 9. The difference was not a big deal though as the boarding process was pretty quick. The timing seemed to work pretty well. If I recall correctly we were all aboard the ship some time between 11:30am and 12 noon.

By the way, if you are driving yourself to the terminal, do not try to use MapQuest. The address Disney gives you for the Port is for the port administration building a few blocks away from the actual port. The port entrance is on Harbor. You can follow MapQuest to the 110 but from there follow the written directions. It’s actually pretty easy to get to the port if you follow the Disney directions because the freeway exit leads right into the port entrance.

While we were in the terminal they had the excursion desk open. My 9 year old daughter wanted to go on the canopy adventure. She is the size of a 12 year old and very athletic and will be having her 10th birthday in a couple of weeks, so we wanted to know if they would make an exception. Unfortunately, for that excursion you had to be at least 10 as of the day of the excursion. My daughter was pretty disappointed (a short-lived disappointment, however, given all the other things she got to do on the cruise).

PALO RESERVATIONS

The first thing we did when we got on the ship was head to Rockin’ Bar D and make some reservations at Palo. I made a reservation for my wife and I for brunch (see picture from said brunch in separate post) and we were also able to make a reservation for 10 for dinner for the 3rd night.

I need to digress a moment to talk about Palo. As many others on this board have said, Palo is absolutely the best dining experience of the cruise. It’s more than just the quality of the food and the service. It is the nature of the restaurant. Palo is very small compared to the other restaurants. The regular restaurants, as nice as they are, have somewhat of the ambiance of a school cafeteria. They need to feed a large group of people within a set time period and there is a lot of noise and hustle and bustle. Palo by comparison offers a fine dining experience at a leisurely pace with beautiful panoramic ocean views in a quiet atmosphere.

Our waiter for our Palo brunch was Toni (from Spain). We ran into him on the beach in Cabo (it was nice to see he was enjoying his time off). He was lounging in a chair in his swimming trunks and sunglasses and greeted my wife and me warmly. It was a pretty funny moment actually, as my wife didn’t recognize him initially. I had to remind her who he was. It is not every day that an attractive young man in swimming trunks greets her warmly at the beach.

One more thing about Palo -- while they have the private room for large groups, if you have 10 adults, like us, that would like to dine together, they have a great circular table in the center of the restaurant. We had an absolutely delightful dinner there at the center table. (I don’t know if they’ll accept less than 10 at that table, but we had exactly 10.)

DEPARTURE

The departure was very fun. There were many people to waive goodbye to us. As you’ll see in one of the pictures below, I thought I saw some lime green shirts, but it could have just been a coincidence.

SEA SICKNESS

Out of the 20 people in our group, I was the only person to experience sea sickness. Fortunately, it was pretty much gone by the time I was in Cabo. I don't know if I just got my sea legs or if there was some other sickness I was battling. Thankfully, it didn't affect the cruise. I bought some Dramamine in the gift shop and it seemed to help. As I say it went away later so I didn't need anything after that.

EXCURSIONS

There are tons of excursions to choose from. Here’s what I did and some tips (since I know Mexico is new for most Disney cruisers):

(1) CABO: I did not do an excursion in Cabo. Cabo is a bit of a pain because you need to take a tender to get to the shore. If you book an excursion for a certain time you get priority. We just decided to explore and ended up waiting about 45 minutes to get one of the tenders to the shore. The good news is, Cabo is not very big. If you want to just hang out, the resorts are pretty much clumped together. (By contrast, the resorts in Mazatlan and PV are pretty far away from the port, so what you save in avoiding a tendering process you lose in travel time.)

In any event, once you walk off the boat you will be accosted by folks trying to get you to hire them for taxis, jet skis, city tours, glass bottom boats, etc. They are not threatening, but they are everpresent. I made the mistake of mentioning to my wife a bit too loudly that I might like to rent a jet ski and within a second someone was at my side offering me a jet ski rental at a “good price!” After I finally got rid of him, my wife said, “boy, you can’t even have a private conversation,” and then my daughter joked, “private conversations, three dollars!” We all had a good laugh.

After walking down the boardwalk for a bit we found a kiosk that looked somewhat official and asked them if they could arrange kayak rentals for us. They could. We rented 3 kayaks (2 double, 1 single) for 60 dollars for 1 hour. The kiosk is essentially a broker that arranges the rentals for the resorts or other locations that actually have the equipment. After about 15 minutes a water taxi picked us up from the public dock and took us across the harbor to a beach in front of one of the resorts where we picked up our kayaks and life jackets. We had a wonderful time kayaking. We went 2/3 of the way out to the Magic and then headed over about 2/3 of the way to where the stone arch formation is and back to the beach. There were lots of watercraft in the harbor and the wakes (especially the jet ski wakes) were actually pretty fun in the kayaks. There were lots of people parasailing too.

After kayaking the girls swam for a while at the beach in front of one of the resorts and then we caught the water taxi back to the docks for a couple of drinks and guacamole and chips before catching a tender back to the ship. It seemed to me that it would have been easier to just catch a water taxi over to the resorts and rent kayaks, or jet skis or whatever directly from the resorts and avoid the middle man.

We had lots of fun, though it was somewhat stressful figuring out what to do and how to do it at first. Most of the other members of our large family group booked excursions hanging out at one of the resorts. Each seemed to have a fun/relaxing/delicious time. So, my wife and I decided we would go ahead and book official excursions for the next two ports. There’s not much time to figure things out as you go.

(2) MAZATLAN: I woke up early as we headed into Mazatlan and got to see a very pretty sunrise. It is a very pretty port to sail into. The city is less pretty as you first get off the ship. I booked a golf excursion at Estrella del Mar with some family members. We had a great time. The club is very much like one you might expect in the US. I am not all that regular of a golfer, so I can’t rate it all that well. However, it was a beautiful course right on the beach. It was also very challenging, with lots of sand traps placed in evil places. You can rent clubs there and they make you purchase balls if you do not have any. You can get a bag of used balls if you want for $10. The sack lunch was disappointing, but that was about all that I found disappointing about that excursion.

(3) PUERTO VALLARTA: I took two of the older girls in our group on a horseback riding excursion in PV. We all had a great time. It was a fairly long drive to get there. The horses were in good shape (only the cows on the side of the road were emaciated) and the trails were pretty. The photo I have does not do them justice. The horse I had was very responsive and the girls (both 12) had no problem with their horses either. None of us had been riding more than a few times, but the horses were trained well enough and were well enough behaved that it was a very enjoyable ride. The description of the excursion mentions a stop at a waterfall and a chance for a swim. This is the dry season, however, so there was not much of a waterfall and no real chance for a swim. No big deal, though. I was there for horse ride, not for a swim. It may be a different story later in the summer.

HIGHLIGHTS

There are too many other highlights of the cruise to mention.

One highlight is the dinners, of course (I already mentioned Palo). Our regular waiter, Godwin, who was from India, was terrific, and great with the children. He’s been working as a waiter on Disney Cruises since the very first one. He’s starting a well-deserved 8-week vacation this week but must first start it out with a 3-day trip to his home in India.

Another highlight was castmember Luke. Every show he was in was great. Boy does that man have energy and the kids loved him. He was particularly great in the pirate game show. Very funny.

Yet another was the graduation ceremony from the kids club on Saturday. Don't let your younger ones miss that!

A particular highlight for our family was the talent show Saturday night. My brother spent a summer almost 25 years ago working on the Jungle Cruise in Disneyland and amazingly still remembers much of the official Disney speech from the ride. So we threw together a skit where the kids from our group acted out the scenes from the ride as my brother did the lines. (For example: Guide: “We are now entering the hippo pool.” Cue kids as audioanimatronic hippos. Guide: “Now there is no need to worry folks, hippos are only known to be dangerous when they are blowing bubbles and wiggling their ears.” Kids pull out water bottles and start blowing bubbles through straws, then grab their ears and wiggle.) We were even able to come up with a way to reenact the totem pole scene. It was LOTS of fun and the Disney-loving crowd went wild. The cruise line staff also seemed to appreciate seeing something a little different from the normal singing/dancing/music acts they usually get.

KIDS CLUBS

There was lots to do in the kids clubs. Our kids said they liked them, but I found that they preferred to hang out with family whenever they could, especially toward the later part of the cruise. Though each family member had at least one other kid in their club age range, we found they wanted to hang out with the broader group of cousins. They always felt like they were missing out on something. That was fine. It was all about family bonding anyway. We got plenty of adult time at the beginning of the cruise.

DISEMBARKING

By the way, we had an 8:30am breakfast seating this morning and were through with breakfast, reunited with our luggage, through customs, and at the curb, by about 9:50am.

If I find more time, I’ll mention some other things we enjoyed, but that’s all for now. Happy cruising everyone!

 

[CardinalDad]

She is appropriately named!

(inadvertently) synchronized streamers during the departure

Folks waiving us goodbye (is that lime green I see?)

Our captain and his crew

Cabo: on the left is where the tender drops you off. On your right is the start of the beach where the resorts are. You can walk to those resorts (or take a cab), but water taxis seem to be the most convenient mode of transport.

Sunrise in Mazatlan from the ship

The beautiful beachside golf course at Estrella del Mar in Mazatlan

Horseback riding in Puerto Vallarta

Brunch at Palo

Lion King segment - but one scene from many incredible shows

My youngest peeking around the famous Mickey statue in the Magic atrium

 

[4campers]

Mary, I talked to the officer that sounded that alarm at 2:30am, he apologized for waking us all and he explained that Bright Star is a code word. I didn't pry into the details, but I'm going to do a bit of research later to determine what Bright Star means.

I thought I had a dream about that....Bright Star Bright Star....then it said a room number 80 something....I thought holly #@*^ it's the Swanky Suite!! I had forgotten all about it. I was wondering about that. Maybe, a medical thing....or security...let us know what you find out!

What happens on Magic shows up on the boards

 

[lvstitch]

Thanks for the info and the pictures

When debarking do you have to wait for your number (or color) to be called or can you just leave when you want like in Port Canaveral?

 

[4campers]

I Our regular waiter, Godwin, who was from India, was terrific, and great with the children. He’s been working as a waiter on Disney Cruises since the very first one. He’s starting a well-deserved 8-week vacation this week but must first start it out with a 3-day trip to his home in India.

We had Godwin too!!

Great post CardinalDad!!!

You said it all so well!

We were SO happy to meet you and your family! And, very glad you could make the meet!!

Hugs!!

 

[JLDSMD]

Welcome back everyone.

I do have a few questions if you'd be so kind to answer:

How early were you able to get into the terminal for check-in?

How early did anyone get to the port but not in the building?

Where did they queue you until the doors opened?

TIA.

 

[CardinalDad]

We had Godwin too!!

Great post CardinalDad!!!

You said it all so well!

We were SO happy to meet you and your family! And, very glad you could make the meet!!

Hugs!!

I can't believe you had Godwin too! That's so funny. I guess you were the early seating then. It was great to have an experienced server like that, wasn't it? (If any of you out there are lucky enough to have Godwin on a future cruise make sure you take the time to get to know him. He has an amazing life story. One night he regaled us with the incredible story of his betrothal, marriage, and honeymoon, according to full Indian custom, all during his regular 8 week break from his job on the boat. Another night, after we had lamented that there was no Indian food on any of the menus, he brought us out a specially-made chicken-curry dish. He was a delight!)

 

[CardinalDad]

Thanks for the info and the pictures

When debarking do you have to wait for your number (or color) to be called or can you just leave when you want like in Port Canaveral?

You have to wait for your color to be called. Those who have planes to catch have priority. We did not find out our breakfast time until the dinner before.

 

[MaryAz]

SO great to meet all of you!!
Cardinal dad great trip report-you should do one on the main page!!
I will be hopefully starting one this week.
Anyone else rebook?? We did for 11/09
Melissa I am sorry I did not get to see more of you.
Ellen Thanks for hosting us-sorry about the illness.
Mary

 

[NicoleDisneyFan]

We are back home. Hope that everyone had a safe trip home. I miss the cruise already! It was nice meeting everyone. I will give more details later on what happened once we get settled in.

 

[JennyW]

We're back, too. I tried to meet people at 2pm at the Mickey pool, and I couldn't find any groups of people! Did anyone meet there?

We had a wonderful trip and I'm hoping to do a trip report in the next week or so.

No seasickness at all with any of us. It was great. Also, no "tummy trouble" from anything. Unfortunately, all four of the members of my sister's family got one form of tummy trouble or another. It wasn't pretty. How did we stay so healthy and they all got so sick? Was it the incessant hand washing? The ton of water we drank? The fruit we ate? Or just our positive attitude?

 

[WVMD]

Bright Star is the code for a medical emergency...

Virgil

 

[Sorcerer Mom]

Welcome Back and thanks for posting all the great info. and pics!!! Glad to hear you had a Magical time I posted this question on the forum thread too but thought I'd inquire here as well...

Any feedback on the parking at port? Was it well organized, were any staff directing you where to go and how was the availability of spaces? Also, was there any specific time you could actually get into the parking lot or could you enter at any time? (we plan to get there pretty early). Thanks!

 

[CardinalDad]

We're back, too. I tried to meet people at 2pm at the Mickey pool, and I couldn't find any groups of people! Did anyone meet there?

I got there a few minutes late but was able to find Kim and her DH and also met James and his DW. Unfortunately, I had to run off to a family event so couldn't stay for very long. There was no big group. Sorry we missed you!