My 2nd tale... Fantasy Rd 2, TR Rd 2: NO sea sickness! [Apr '16-East Car.] (Upd Apr19: COMPLETED)

[NHPixidust]

Loving your trip report!!!

 

[rndmr2]

Nice update, that was a beautiful beach!

So sorry your Dad got banged up, glad it wasn't worse.

Nice dinner at Palo.

Your parents are too cute with their Pirate bandannas and selfie!

 

[jesterrific]

Loving your trip report!!!

Thank you!!

 

[jesterrific]

Nice update, that was a beautiful beach!

So sorry your Dad got banged up, glad it wasn't worse.

Nice dinner at Palo.

Your parents are too cute with their Pirate bandannas and selfie!

Haha we really didn't think they would get into it, so we were glad to see them enjoy themselves wearing bandanas haha. Or as my dad says, "bad-nananas"

 

[jesterrific]

Cruise Day 4 [part 7]: After Tortola (back on the water!) - PIRATES, PIRATES, FIREWORKS, PIRATES! (Pirate dinner, Pirate night, Fireworks, Pirate buffet)​

I am going to start this post off with this very random photo…

Why am I posting a toilet? Random story time!
*Skip down to next paragraph if you don’t read about toilet time!*
We made it a bit of a rule… that if you need to do number 2, then you can’t do it in the stateroom toilet. It’s a small space and connects to our sleeping area haha. Plus it means you take up the toilet for too long. So that means when you gotta go, you run to a public toilet. Most of the time… we went to the ones by Europa because they’re single toilets… so you know… more privacy. Glendon just went to go wash his hands and saw this on the toilet. OMG. Looks like other people had the same idea too. Out of Order. I swear that is something I never thought I would see on a Disney Cruise Line ship =O!!!!! Anyways I just thought it was hilarious so I shared with you all.


CARRYING ON!

On their way down to dinner, mom and dad ran into pirate costume Mickey

I have all of mom’s photos from their dinner at Royal Court for the pirate night dinner. She didn’t take a photo of the actual menu so I don’t know what all the meals are called, so I can only just show you what they ate haha.

She loved the artwork of the cover

Omg. Looks like they started to eat their main dishes before mom stopped them both for photos ahaha.

And a cute dessert!

Of course, when we asked mom and dad how their dinner was, they said it was fantastic, why would you pay extra money for a fancy restaurant when the food in the dining room was already so tasty haha. When we showed them our food my mom showed us theirs with the whole “well we had pasta and steak too!”


Then we got ready for Pirate night! We didn’t really put too much thought into our pirate costumes… so really we just put on comfy clothes in basic colours like… beige, white, black haha. And ties our bandanas somewhere.

We chose a spot on deck 11, port side, because we were told the fireworks shoot off starboard side. This way, we could watch the action, then continue watching for the fireworks! Plus you get the view of the lights of the ship itself!

Not a bad view!

Gorgeous!

Stage!

Glendon and I hadn’t told my parents or Michelle what the show was going to be, we just said oh make sure you can see the stage, and the funnel!

And there he is!!!

HI JACK!!!

(When the first pirates movie came out, my parents definitely took us to see it. And we were a little bit obsessed with the movie too, and watched the dvd a LOT in the house. So my parents were actually familiar with Captain Jack Sparrow)

And the show is on!

It’s quite a fun show! Even Michelle liked it haha. My mom ooh’ed and AH!’ed ahaha. And it was a pretty good Jack!


And then fireworks! Obviously they aren’t going to be super elaborate, but they are quite cute. Plus it made us feel so special, to have a private fireworks off the ship. (We could see lights from two other cruise ships, and all we could think was “imagine being on THOSE ships and seeing OUR fireworks.”)

Loads of fun! Plus they are right up close so even though the fireworks show isn’t huge, it still felt soooo cool. Then it was dance party time.

Look how many people there are!

So much fun

But really… with the party on… to us, that meant… BUFFET IS OPEN! (We weren’t exactly in need of food, but you know… why not hahaha)

[Here are all the melon carving photos on a separate post... couldn't fit all the images in a single entry haha]

Both Glendon and Michelle had planned on grabbing turkey legs… and taking pirate photos together with their turkey legs, but both of them were still feeling not the greatest and didn’t want to waste turkey legs just for a photo. Mom, of course, despite having only just finished eating a short while ago, still managed to fill a plate. We all kind of just nibbled and some foods and desserts. (Michelle grabbed a brownie because she felt sad she didn’t have dessert at palo… but had to name it “frownie brownie” because she took one bite and it was tasty but her stomach turned. Plus when she looked down at the brownie with one bite taken out of it… it looked like it was frowning at her. Oh Frownie Brownie.)

“Mine?”

After all this it was finally time to head off to bed. But first we stopped by the lounge areas, just because we hadn’t really gone into them yet. Especially Ooh La La

Continued for melon photos. Then...
Up Next… Cruise Day 5!! St Thomas!!!

 

[jesterrific]

Cruise Day 4 [part 7]: PIRATE NIGHT! Continued: Buffet Melon Carvings!

Here are all the melon carvings!

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​

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Up Next... St Thomas!

 

[franandaj]

Wow! That was one exhausting day! All that activity at the beach and then nowhere for you to sleep in the room!

Thanks for sharing the potty story. That's the kind of thing that no one ever wants to ask or share. I always travel with my SO, and we never share rooms with anyone. OK, we have let someone stay in our Grand Californian Villa in the living room, but that's because it has two bathrooms. But other than that, I always wonder how it is that families can go on a trip and have one bathroom, you laid it out there honestly and without too graphic of detail!

At least you got some sleep on deck. What you ordered at Palo is almost exactly what our group ordered on our Alaskan cruise last summer! Your parents are so funny and cute. Loved their selfie! And how your Dad felt left out an went back to the room to get the bandanas!

Those carvings are so great! I'm going to try and make it to the Pirate buffet on our cruise. Well maybe not. I just noticed that we have Remy booked for that night.

 

[sunfun94]

I'm so super excited that I found your trip report! We just booked our first DCL cruise and its the same you are currently reporting on!! You have no idea how inadvertently helpful you have been! hahaha... You are a fantastic story teller.. but one thing I missed.. what did you do so that you felt so much better on this cruise than the last? We dont tend to get motion, car, or air sick but I have to admit I'm beginning to get a little worried.. hahahaha! Cant wait for more installments

 

[jesterrific]

Wow! That was one exhausting day! All that activity at the beach and then nowhere for you to sleep in the room!

Thanks for sharing the potty story. That's the kind of thing that no one ever wants to ask or share. I always travel with my SO, and we never share rooms with anyone. OK, we have let someone stay in our Grand Californian Villa in the living room, but that's because it has two bathrooms. But other than that, I always wonder how it is that families can go on a trip and have one bathroom, you laid it out there honestly and without too graphic of detail!

At least you got some sleep on deck. What you ordered at Palo is almost exactly what our group ordered on our Alaskan cruise last summer! Your parents are so funny and cute. Loved their selfie! And how your Dad felt left out an went back to the room to get the bandanas!

Those carvings are so great! I'm going to try and make it to the Pirate buffet on our cruise. Well maybe not. I just noticed that we have Remy booked for that night.

Nobody realized how exhausted we would be from our excursion! Hectic day indeed haha.

I think even if you don't plan on eating anything at the pirate buffet it's fun to see what they bring out, food wise haha. Like the turkey legs!

 

[jesterrific]

I'm so super excited that I found your trip report! We just booked our first DCL cruise and its the same you are currently reporting on!! You have no idea how inadvertently helpful you have been! hahaha... You are a fantastic story teller.. but one thing I missed.. what did you do so that you felt so much better on this cruise than the last? We dont tend to get motion, car, or air sick but I have to admit I'm beginning to get a little worried.. hahahaha! Cant wait for more installments

Thanks for following along!
Honestly the only thing I did differently this time from last is that I didn't do anything at all. I chose not to worry, and not take any measures before hand. I went with the whole "let's deal with it when (or if, even) it comes" and luckily for me, it didn't come. But I also think it had to do with the fact that this was my second time around, stayed awake for the sailing away, so my body and mind got used to the motion of the boat gradually instead of waking up to it.

 

[rndmr2]

The pirate party looked fun, love the Melon carvings.
It must be so cool to see fireworks from the ship.

But I also think it had to do with the fact that this was my second time around, stayed awake for the sailing away, so my body and mind got used to the motion of the boat gradually instead of waking up to it.

My 2nd cruise I made the mistake of taking a nap shortly after we got on the ship and slept through sail a way and I felt so disoriented the first couple days - actually my Mom and I both felt that way, we were feeling the ship move when it wasn't moving, My dad thought we were nuts, LOL.

 

[jesterrific]

Cruise Day 5 [part 1]: St. Thomas! Breakfast, Shops at Havensport, Arriving at Coki Beach​

Mom was the only one who managed to wake up early. She was determined to catch as many sunrises as she could. So these are her photos:

She also noticed this teeny rainbow in the clouds and got very excited:

It was a very tough morning for the rest of us haha. We were all extremely exhausted from the previous entire day, and since we didn’t have any excursions booked for St. Thomas, we decided we would just figure out what to do whenever we got up.

Here is the view from our room… Hahahaha. Señor Frogs and all!

But first: Breakfast at Cabanas:

I had a bit of a cheat day with the donut and eggs Benedict.​

We had another GORGEOUS view this morning. Cabanas actually wasn’t too busy… I think we were part of the late wakers as lots of port adventure groups were already off the boat.

GORGEOUS day! And stunning view!

Just… WOW!

Omg we spotted this super cute excursion ferry boat…

IT’S A PIRATE SHIP!!!

Goodness, we all thought that was so cute and so neat! Wonder what kind of adventure they got to have haha. Anyways, we didn’t have anything planned for the day. We did a little bit of research and everything that had come up was mostly that nearly all the beaches are beautiful. The night before while we were at Palo, we had asked our server what she thought were some fun things to do. One of the things she mentioned was the cable car by the port to take you up the mountain for a view of St Thomas, and she also named a few of the beaches… We really couldn’t decide which one to go to. All we knew for sure what that we wanted to do a beach day. SO after breakfast we got ready to leave the ship. Except dad, because he was not feeling so great. He had developed a pretty bad cough and he didn’t feel up to leaving, so he decided to stay behind and rest.


But first… A Carnival ship was pulling into port next to us haha. We went on deck to wave at the people on the deck there!


And fiiiiinally we are off the ship! When we were still in our room, we saw that there were buses that would take you to the shops at Havensport… we could see the shops so it didn’t seem like it would be too far to walk! Most people were walking, so we decided why shouldn’t we walk too. (Mom totally wanted to catch a bus of course…)

Hi again, Disney Fantasy!

And here is the Carnival ship that pulled up next to us:

(I may be biased… but I honestly think if you looked at the two ships and had to choose on looks alone, you would say “THAT ONE!!” To the Fantasy. Because it looks so much more inviting and exciting and fun.)​

Turned out to be a HOT day at St Thomas. When we got to the shops, we decided to walk around and take a look around.
It’s kind of what you would expect at a busy cruise ship port… You know, the jewelry shops like Effy, and Alex and Ani… Michelle’s stomach was still doing flip flops so she decided maybe we should find a pharmacy and pick up some medicine (we didn’t think about this when we were on the ship, it just occurred to us when we were walking around and looking at a directory.) Took us a few tries but we got to the pharmacy. As you would expect… a bottle of Pepto Bismol was a teeny bit expensive.


There were brochures EVERYWHERE to tell you what there is to do, where you could possibly decide to go. We had thought about taking the cable cars, because we heard that it wasn’t too far to walk to. But after looking at the brochure, the cost per person for the cable car and the activities it included wasn’t really what we wanted to do… so in the end we decided to pass on that.


While we were standing around talking, a local man had overheard our discussion. “You want to go to a beach??” Well, we couldn’t decide on which beach. Magen’s Bay seemed to be the MOST popular… which sounded great. But it is a private beach which means you would have to pay to get in, on top of paying to get there. The man suggested we go to Coki Beach. He said it’s one of his favourites, and I had actually read about Coki Beach on some google searches so it seemed as good a suggestion as any. This local guy also does a taxi van service. Glendon wasn’t feeling so great at this point either, and had wanted to go back onto the ship… us three ladies wanted to go to the beach… but he didn’t really want us to ride in a random unmarked van with a stranger we just met haha… but turns out there were other groups of people in the van too. In the end… we took the van and Glendon headed back to the ship to rest up with dad. (Glendon and I had done a similar thing where we got into a taxi van run by a local fella when we were in St Maarten so I think it’s a legit way for the locals to make some money.) Besides, the guy was very friendly haha. He said he would charge us $6 per person to take us there, then he’ll come back to pick us up when we are done a few hours later!


The other groups in the van were headed to Magen’s Bay, and it was on the way to Coki Beach so our driver decided to drop them off first. Here are photos from the drive! (The beaches are basically on the other side of the mountain!!! We would never have been able to walk all the way there aha!!)

Super giant mansion on the cliff of the mountain facing the ocean:

Ocean and rocks:

A look back at the cruise ships! Bye!!! See you again in a few hours!

WOW!

Top of a house with view of the ocean and other islands:

Wow what a drive! The islands in the Caribbean are truly so beautiful. We caught a glimpse of Magen’s Bay too when he dropped off the other groups, and we had a slight disappointment that we had chosen not to go there. It is SO BEAUTIFUL! But for some reason, we decided we didn’t want to pay to go to a beach. So we continued on to Coki Beach. The parking lot area was a bit small so we were worried the beach would be disappointing. But holy cow. It was not.

This. This was what our day will be consisting of:

All of that super soft white sand beach and clear blue water. YES PLEASE!


Coki beach is actually right next to their Coral World, which is another very popular attraction here at St Thomas. You can easily walk over if you wanted to. But not us! We wanted to have a beach day.


We got ourselves exactly one lounge chair between the three of us. I THINK you have to pay to take one, but I can’t remember. We didn’t really need more than one anyways. Mostly just so we had somewhere to put our stuff and tag out watching our stuff.

Here are a ton of photos from beach vantage point!

Michelle and I

Mom taking her “on the beach here are my feet” photo

Mom’s turn to go swim in the ocean with Michelle

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Up Next: Lots of swimming photos!

 

[jesterrific]

Cruise Day 5 [part 2]: St. Thomas! Coki Beach - swimming, fishies!​

The beach itself was starting to fill up, but not too many people were going into the water yet. Swimming at this beach was so family friendly. It wasn’t steep at all, mom was comfortable walking and wading in the water. AND there were lots of fishies around! Some tiny ones and some decent sized!

Here are some ridiculous photos from my GoPro:

Mom and I

GoPro outtakes haha

View of the beach from the ocean:

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I think we spotted some fish haha

I also think I need to work on my GoPro skills haha

We didn’t bring any snorkel gear with us on this trip, but I had decided to bring my ugly goggles haha. So I could see under water! (I wear contacts so I can’t get those cool HERE I AM underwater photos. Instead, I get these… These really goofy HERE I AM WEARING FUNNY GOGGLES photos)

(The first time we loaded up the GoPro photos on my phone, Glendon and Michelle DIED laughing. They could NOT stop laughing at how goofy I look underwater wearing these ovular goggles ahahaha. I’m sure it wouldn’t have looked as weird if I wore snorkelling goggles omg.)​

I think this is also a blooper photo from my GoPro, but it just so happens I’m pointing in the direction of Coral World so you can see that it’s just down the beach

You can rent one of those paddle boards if you wanted to. There is also Michelle’s head popped out of the water

Mom swimming!

(I’ve been so proud of mom, because for the longest time she was terrified of swimming.)​

Here are some photos of FISH! Mostly it was these tiger-striped looking fish. There was a guy who had some bread and he was attracting schools of these fish over so I managed to catch quite a few photos!

Here I am, happy with seeing lots of fish haha

This is the view when you are above the water

And then back below water

Then Michelle and I tried to take some “serene floating on the water with the beautiful ocean behind us” photos… Which turned out to be a huge fail. All our photos ended up like this:

And this:

Finally after a few hours of swimming and sun bathing, we decided it was about time to meet up with our van guy. Plus, a huge group of people just came onto the beach as well (A Norwegian cruise ship had just docked not too long ago and their crowds had finally made it to the beach)

Here is one last wooper goggles photo

Up next... Leaving St Thomas

 

[franandaj]

Sounds like you had a fun time at the beach! We chose Coral World for our excursion in St. Thomas. DCL actually had a Handicapped Accessible excursion there, so we thought it sounded pretty good.

 

[bcwife76]

Ahhh gorgeous beach pics!!! I could stare at that gorgeous sand and water combo allll day!

Now that we are back from our Eastern Carib cruise I have an even great appreciation for your trip report Out of all 3 stops, St Thomas was our fave hands down (yes we did not love Castaway Cay, thought it was just ok...shock....horror....gasp). I can't remember what cabin you were in? We were in 5650 and had a very similar view of Senor Frogs (but I think we were further aft than you).

The day we were in port there was a HAL ship behind us and then this.....weird cruise line....I've never heard of.....in front of us. And looking at it....ugh. You'd definitely wish to be on the Fantasy if you pulled up in that hideous rust bucket

I haven't started a trip report yet, my photos aren't always as good as so many others'......I feel inadequate lol

 

[jesterrific]

Sounds like you had a fun time at the beach! We chose Coral World for our excursion in St. Thomas. DCL actually had a Handicapped Accessible excursion there, so we thought it sounded pretty good.

I'm excited to see photos from Coral World! It's reviewed pretty well from what I've read haha.

 

[jesterrific]

Ahhh gorgeous beach pics!!! I could stare at that gorgeous sand and water combo allll day!

Now that we are back from our Eastern Carib cruise I have an even great appreciation for your trip report Out of all 3 stops, St Thomas was our fave hands down (yes we did not love Castaway Cay, thought it was just ok...shock....horror....gasp). I can't remember what cabin you were in? We were in 5650 and had a very similar view of Senor Frogs (but I think we were further aft than you).

The day we were in port there was a HAL ship behind us and then this.....weird cruise line....I've never heard of.....in front of us. And looking at it....ugh. You'd definitely wish to be on the Fantasy if you pulled up in that hideous rust bucket

I haven't started a trip report yet, my photos aren't always as good as so many others'......I feel inadequate lol

Yeah, my mom ended up loving Coki Beach more than Castaway Cay! After being in the Caribbean and feeling the white sand beach, Castaway Cay is very different even though it's not that far away! But leaving the Caribbean and entering Bahamas actually is quite a difference! We still have lots of fun and still love Castaway Cay though! But for different reasons than loving Coki Beach!

What did you guys end up doing in Tortola and St Thomas?

We were in cabin 6138!

 

[bcwife76]

Yeah, my mom ended up loving Coki Beach more than Castaway Cay! After being in the Caribbean and feeling the white sand beach, Castaway Cay is very different even though it's not that far away! But leaving the Caribbean and entering Bahamas actually is quite a difference! We still have lots of fun and still love Castaway Cay though! But for different reasons than loving Coki Beach!

What did you guys end up doing in Tortola and St Thomas?

We were in cabin 6138!

In Tortola we did a land and sea tour. It was alright but not super exciting. The sea part was good but the land portion was....meh.

In St Thomas we did the catamaran sail to a private beach club - it was awesome!!!! We were on a catamaran called the Dancing Dolphin and the crew were amazing. The beach was great, the water was gorgeous - husband snorkelled, kids played on the beach making sand castles, my youngest made a new friend while my eldest swam with me. We were there about 2 1/2 hours and I only got out of the water for about 15 minutes total. I could have lived there!!

CC was SO crowded, we got off the ship about 30 minutes after it had been cleared and all the beaches were so over run with people so hard to find chairs and the water was cold.....ugh. We had a good lunch at Cookies (ribs and chicken and salads, yum!) but were back on the ship by 1:30 and just rode the aquaduck about 10 million times in a row

 

[jesterrific]

In Tortola we did a land and sea tour. It was alright but not super exciting. The sea part was good but the land portion was....meh.

In St Thomas we did the catamaran sail to a private beach club - it was awesome!!!! We were on a catamaran called the Dancing Dolphin and the crew were amazing. The beach was great, the water was gorgeous - husband snorkelled, kids played on the beach making sand castles, my youngest made a new friend while my eldest swam with me. We were there about 2 1/2 hours and I only got out of the water for about 15 minutes total. I could have lived there!!

CC was SO crowded, we got off the ship about 30 minutes after it had been cleared and all the beaches were so over run with people so hard to find chairs and the water was cold.....ugh. We had a good lunch at Cookies (ribs and chicken and salads, yum!) but were back on the ship by 1:30 and just rode the aquaduck about 10 million times in a row

Haha now we know only to book excursions that take you to the beaches 8)!

That sounds fantastic. Were there lots of people on the catamaran?

 

[bcwife76]

I'd say there were about 30-35 people on our St Thomas Catamaran excursion. Also forgot to mention the rum punch was a flowin' on the ride back to the port....I got 3 refills for whatever reason my dh would NOT let me shop at Louis Vuitton in town. Apparently I don't make wise choices when I've had some drinks

No idea what he's talking about......