Mexican Riviera 2/13-2/20 on the Wonder

[flybone89]

There seems to have been some negative reviews of the MR cruises that put some fear in some folks - me included, but let me put your fears to rest. This cruise was fantastic. I am a first time cruiser, so this was all new to me, though i have been to WDW 5 times so I know what Disney magic should be.

Overall:
PROS:
- Great service, especially our dining servers Francisco and Sandra and Alex in Palo
- Great food, especially Palo dinner and brunch
- Wonderful excursions and seamless tendering in Cabo
- Perfect weather, upper 70s and sunny the whole trip except the last day at sea back to LA
- Smooth check-in and boarding
- Great entertainment everyday
- The kids loved the Oceaneers Club/Lab and it was a great service to be able to get some adult alone time

CONS:
- Disembarkation that was chaotic at best
- Crowds and lines for some activities, especially character greetings
- Worst character breakfast compared to those we had in WDW. Characters moved so fast if you blinked you missed them
- Crowded pools, especially the Mickey pool, and it had to keep closing to clean out "accidents" - parents seemed to disregard the warning to not let potty trained kids in the pools. The pools to me were the biggest disappointment. They are way too small to handle the crowds we had.

Background:
I am a first time cruiser and we flew in to LA the day before from the cold Midwest. We wanted to ensure we had time to catch our ship the next day. We rented a car from Enterprise and dropped it off in San Pedro the next day. We stayed in a Residence Inn in Torrance only a few minutes away. We wanted to sightsee on our own and made it to Santa Monica and Beverly Hills. In retrospect we would have gotten in earlier and just did Disneyland. LA is a mess to get anywhere by car and our sightseeing involved mostly sitting in traffic. Also, Enterprise was not a very good rental company. Getting a car and dropping off took way too long. They are not at the standard of Hertz or National Emerald Club.

Embarkation:
Checking in was easy. We got there around 10:00 and had no problems flowing through the process as a newbie. There were plenty of people around to guide and help. We also did the online check in which helped. We got boarding card #5 and boarded around 1:00. There seemed to be no connection to the boarding time i picked online as the card was given to folks based on when they went through security. We got the kids bracelets for the club/lab - they are way too bulky - and there was a good 10 min line for that. Mickey showed up and began the many lines we saw for characters. Fortunately we have seen enough characters and the kids were not that into it so we could avoid them.

First Impressions:
They called our name, we got onboard and were immediately taken away by it all. I couldn't believe we were on a ship! Wow! We went up to Beach Blanket Buffet and had a wonderful meal out on deck in beautiful LA sun. We also got a taste of the great service to come as a server helped us carry our trays and get my family situated. We then took pictures, enjoyed the sun and waited for our room and the show to push away.

The Room:
We had a 4A room on deck 8 that slept 5. It was small of course compared to a hotel room, but we felt it was prefect size for us on the cruise and we loved the verandah. Besides we were hardly ever in the room! The only negative to this room is that it does require your host to set up and breakdown the bunk beds and trundle bed. And with them down it is hard to get to the verandah.

Things to Do:
I can't compare other cruise lines as this was our first cruise, but the entrainment was top notch for both quality and breadth. The evening shows were fantastic, especially The Golden Mickeys and Dreams. We also had a wonderful comedy act of Alfred and Seymour out of LA. They were hilarious. We also got lucky and had 2 movie premieres, Gnomeo and Juliet and I am Number 4. Some of the family game shows were just ok, it wasn't as much fun if you didn't get to participate. And the kids fell in love with the club/lab, but we didn't get them in there until Wed. We did lots of tastings, and although grumbled at having to pay for them, would do it again.

The pools were the most negative experience. They were crowded and were frequently shutdown to remove child waste. Our kids did get some time in them at the beginning and they loved the slide. The crowds didn't seem to bother them as much and once we got into ports we were so busy with excursions we didn't seem to use them as much.

As I mentioned we pretty much avoided character greetings. They usually had long lines and the kids were not in to them since WDW. We did get lucky once in while and see characters going to and from the greetings. And my daughter did catch Ariel with no line and had story time with Belle and Snow White in the club which she loved. In fact, I wish they had more natural character interaction with characters roaming around the ship or appearing in random places versus just in a "line."


Ok I am running out of time writing this on the plane back home, so i will continue with more on excursions and dining as well, and try to post pictures and/or navigators too.

To be continued...

 

[Mindyjoy]

Thank you!

Looking forward to reading about your excursions!

 

[pthuhges2]

Thanks for posting this! We are going on 4/3 and found this immensely helpful. The MR cruise will be our 2nd Disney cruise and I can see how the pool situation could be terrible.

Take care and stay warm!
Pat

 

[Stinkerbe11]

Great start to your TR Sorry to hear about the pools, to my knowledge we didn't have that happen on our cruise-that would be really frustrating

Keep up the good work, I can't wait to hear the rest!

 

[acpalmer]

Looking forward to reading more--thank you for taking time to post a report.

 

[acpalmer]

Sorry-- double post.

 

[A10560]

Do you remember who the Cruise director was on your trip? Hoping for Christian on the 3/6 sailing

 

[flybone89]

Our cruise director was Clayton, who we liked very much. He was very energetic and contagious. He was also very personable when we ran into him on the ship as well. We didn't have any needs that we needed him to address though, so I can't comment on that, but overall we liked him.

I will get back to my report shortly. I want to post a link to my photos but I need 2 more posts to do so .

 

[flybone89]

On the pools, the funny thing was as being newbies to the ship, we kept thinking every time we walked around how big everything appeared to us - bigger than what we expected on a ship and what we saw in pictures - except the pools! We thought they were much smaller than we expected. They are not very big so it doesn't take much to get them crowded. That said, our youngest kids didn't mind, they still had fun on the Mickey slide, and the adult pool was quite the opposite. Quiet cove was less crowded, quiet and perfect. We just had to get rid of the kids to enjoy it .

 

[pristinegem]

Thanks for posting this trip report! Looking forward to reading more and seeing some photos! You mentioned disembarkation was chaotic, are there any tips to lessen the chaos? What time did you get off the ship? Thank you!

 

[flybone89]

Back again with Ports and Excursions...

Ports:
We did Cabo on Tue, Puerto Vallarta on Wed and Cabo on Friday. We loved Cabo and although we missed Salsa and Salsa in Mazatlan, Cabo made up for it. Cabo was easy to get around, scenic and charming. The weather in all ports was awesome, upper 70's and sunny. PV was less scenic than Cabo, a nice Mexican town on the coast, but we didn't get to see much except for the Walmart across from the port and the bus ride to the Dolphin Encounter. But it seemed accessible and we did have at least more time there. Honestly, we would have been happy with all 3 days in Cabo. As far as getting on and off the ship in ports, no problems. The tendering in Cabo was very efficient, we went in with the port adventures team, but came out on our own and never waited for a tender. There were plenty going back and forth. Only complaint is we did not have enough time on either Cabo day.

Port Adventures:
We did the Cabo Beach Resort (Cabo Day 1), the Dolphin Encounter (PV) and the Whale Watching (Cabo Day 2).

Cabo Beach Resort: They took us to the Villa del Palmar and we got to use their beach facilities, their pool, and a buffet lunch with some bar drinks. Our mid-west bound kids loved the beach and never left it! This day on this excursion was when we felt the vacation began! The buffet was nice and I liked the chance to finally get some Mexican food and good tamales.

Dolphin Encounter: I probably can't add much more to what has been said for these excursions, but for our family we did feel it was a once in a lifetime opportunity to get this close to a dolphin (and sea lion) and it was the kids favorite excursion. Our trainer was great and worked well with both us and the dolphin. Although it is not an excursion I would do again, they really do set you up to buy those photo packages - and we bought them - I still recommend the excursion.

Whale Watching: This was a disappointment and the worst value. It was nice overall, but I think there are better options if you go out on your own. Yes, we did see whales, two of them, and we did get closer to them as well as the arches. But there was not enough time - only an hour. And we saw more whales on the deck of the ship (as well as dolphins, sea turtles and sea lions). They did serve drinks including margaritas and chips, but if I had to do it all over again I would have paid a private boat and got closer and had more time than what we got.

Ok, thats all I can type for now. I need to break again and come back with more report on dining and service. I have started to upload some pictures to flickr so hopefully you can see some of the trip. And yes, that is real blue on them skies, not photoshoped .

To be continued...

 

[flybone89]

In case it was missed in my long winded report reply, here is a link to pictures from the cruise on flickr.

 

[nsiordia]

Can't wait to see more pics!

 

[colmom]

"Port Adventures:
We did the Cabo Beach Resort (Cabo Day 1), the Dolphin Encounter (PV) and the Whale Watching (Cabo Day 2)."


Re: The Whale Watching- my 12 yr old will be on crutches at the time of the cruise. Will she have trouble getting on the catamaran for the whale watching excursion? It is one of the few excursions that don't involve swimming, so I am hoping she can do it!

 

[flybone89]

Re: The Whale Watching- my 12 yr old will be on crutches at the time of the cruise. Will she have trouble getting on the catamaran for the whale watching excursion? It is one of the few excursions that don't involve swimming, so I am hoping she can do it!

She should have no problems getting on and off the catamaran. It is a very large "party boat" that I would characterize as more yacht like than catamaran. It was called the SunRider 100 and you can actually see pictures of it here at their website. It is very large, roomy and smooth.

 

[misand]

Can you tell us more about your beach break? What did you think of the hotel? Food? Pictures? How long were you there? Was it worth the money?
Thanks,
Misand

 

[Yosemite]

Flybone - would you please post the Navigators from your MR trip?

Thanks,

Yosemite

 

[flybone89]

Can you tell us more about your beach break? What did you think of the hotel? Food? Pictures? How long were you there? Was it worth the money?

The resort is very nice, it is the Villa del Palmar and you can check them out here. They had a nice pool with slide, plenty of lounge chairs and a lovely stretch of beach. The food was good, a simple buffet, but they had some nice Mexican dishes I liked such as tamales, especially since we really didn't get Mexican themed dishes on the ship. Five of us ate there, no one got sick, so good safe food too.

The length of time and value go together and that is a tough call. We were there only 4 hours, so I felt it was not enough time. This was because the port stop in Cabo was short, not because they shorted us on the excursion. Yet for us, we felt it was still worth it because we were not familiar with Cabo, and for us midwesterners, it was priceless for my kids to play on the beach. In PV, I believe there was a longer beach excursion, but we already had dolphins booked on that day. Overall, I would recommend it if you want to play it safe AND you just gotta have beach time. Otherwise, you could try PV beach day or strike out on your own (some resorts allow you to use their beach for a fee).

 

[flybone89]

Flybone - would you please post the Navigators from your MR trip?

Thanks,

Yosemite

I am scanning them tonight. How do I post them?

 

[flybone89]

Sorry for the long drawn out trip report...work couldn't wait and it didn't help that I brought back a cold from LA :-(. But as promised, my final take on dining, services, and miscellaneous...

Dining:
We had late seating for dinner - which I thought would be very tough for us with a 2-3 hour time change, but we actually settled in and liked the late dining. My youngest is 7, so although she was tired the first couple of nights, we made it ok and liked we were more awake for the shows. And we made a habit of getting a light supper before the show which more than tied us over until dinner. I would definitely do the late dining again, especially if we can stay on our time zone next time.

Our rotation started with Triton's, then Animator's Palate for 2 nights, then Parrot Cay for 2 nights, Triton's again, and finally Animator's Palate which ended up being our going away breakfast :-(. We liked all three themed restaurants, but I think out favorite was Triton's. We just liked the softer colors and understated elegance of the place. AP was ok, I thought the show was just so-so. I expected more color and images. But the kids loved it and thats all that matters! The meals were very good, and between the 5 of us only 1 dish ever disappointed, a chicken salad on the last night. The portions were reasonable, not the "oversized" portions you typically find in restaurants these days, but that made it nice to have room to enjoy the appetizers and dessert, and also made it easy to sample other dishes if you wanted to.

Our servers were Sandra from Peru and Francisco from India, and our head server was Amil. We loved them all! Sandra and Francisco were fantastic, and were sooo nice to our kids, that they are still talking about them. Francisco was so talented, challenging our table to wonderful puzzles and making origami with the children's menus. We truly had a tough time saying goodbye to them and hope we see them again some day. Amil was also very good as a head server, in that he came to our table every night, made a point to check how things were going, and even removed my lobster tail from its shell! I can't complain about anything with our dining services. In fact, we enjoyed all the counter service, buffet and room service meals we had and the service was great.

Palo:
We ate at Palo for Dinner and for Brunch, and loved them both. Our server for both was Alex from Russia (we requested his table for brunch because he was so good). He shared with us stories about his children and family in Russia and his mother's cooking, I truly felt we were joining him in his own home and he was such a great host. I love this international experience of the Disney crew and it was so great to hear about their home countries. The food was outstanding, I had a rack of lamb for dinner that melted in my mouth and a chocolate soufflé that was to die for. Brunch was also excellent, with a great seafood variety that I appreciated as a seafood lover. Oh, and those chocolate covered strawberries, oh my!

Miscellaneous:
Guest Services: Well, as you can tell we ate a lot, loved it all, and really enjoyed our servers! My only complaint with service was the place I would expect more from, Guest Services! First, I could never get through to them on the phone. I had to call with mostly just questions, such as status of one of our bags, and the phone would just ring and ring. Eventually after multiple attempts I would finally get through. And a few I talked with were not very friendly. I understand they probably were getting a lot of work this cruise - when they asked at the away party how many were first time cruisers I would say most cheered as first time cruisers. But I still think when you are on the front line at Guest Services, you still have to at least try to put a smile on. Especially when I had just easy questions and was always pleasant to them.

Door Decorations: Ok, my kids made fun of me on this one. I put together a lot of decorations reading everyone here write about them on these boards, and funny thing was I was only one of maybe two decorated doors on one side of Deck 8 and I only saw a handful of decorated doors on the entire ship. Just thought it was funny because my wife always kept saying, "where are all these decorated doors you told us about."

Crowds: As I mentioned I was a first time cruiser, and my hesitation to cruise was also because I don't like crowds and felt there was no place worse for crowds than a cruise. In the end, I had mixed feelings about it overall. There were at times where this was absolutely true, especially around the pools. As I said before, those pools are just too small especially on a warm day at sea. The elevators would also some times get crowded and were quite small. And wow, that line for the Pirate's night dessert buffet! You have got to be kidding me. Didn't these people just eat hours earlier! Ok, we got some dessert too, but there was some "overindulging" going on here too. The lines were early and massive and people were piling on the plates! I just hope it was all eaten and not wasted. But there were also times where I wondered if anyone was on the ship with us! Some shows or wine/beer tastings would be very small groups and quite intimate and fun. So I would say it was neutral overall, and because we loved the experience so much I won't let the crowds stop me from cruising again.

Disembarkation: I mentioned this in my overview. It was the least pleasant experience of the trip next to the crowds and this is where you did realize how many people were on the ship! We had the second breakfast time and seemed to be rushed from the dining room so they could clean-up, only so we could sit in a hallway for quite a long time before they called our tag. There was a long wait to get off the ship and long pauses between the announcements where we did not know what was going on or if we missed our call. And everyone seemed to be jammed in the atrium to wait. I think it would be good for them to maybe have different color tag groups wait in assigned areas until their tag is called. Once we were called, it was a mass of pushing to jam into the plank to leave. And once in the terminal and through customs, there was a huge pileup of people with luggage trying to get out the doors and get transportation. The area where transportation queues is not very big, and it got pretty jammed up. I know Disney probably does not have much control here, so this complaint is more about this port than about Disney. Our next cruise is out of Port Canaveral, so I will be able to better compare and contrast then - hoping for a better experience there.

In fact, as hinted, we loved this first cruise so much we booked a second cruise while onboard for the Disney Fantasy in 2012!! Eastern Caribbean here we come!!! And this is one final comment. We had such a tough time with the time difference after dinner, we missed out on a lot of the late events. I look forward to cruising closer to our time zone next time where we can stay up and party later!

Hope this helps some, and will check back from time to time to answer any questions, but we can officially consider the trip report portion closed. BTW, I have all my navigators scanned now, so if anyone can tell me how to post them I will.