The details:
I’m PiratePug, a 32-year old lover of all things Disney and my husband of 11 years is Grumpy, a 42-year old that is slowly getting sucked in to Disney freakdom. We have a nine year old pug named Daisy, but I call her Princess Pugette.
The DIS was instrumental in planning this trip; it was most helpful reading the trip reports and the questions asked on the main forum. So thanks, y’all!!

The most helpful packing tips I learned on the DIS were: using an over-the-door shoe holder for toiletries and other stuff, using a pop-up hamper for dirty clothes (fit perfectly in the closet next to the safe), using suction hooks for wet bathing suits (and some of my shower stuff), bringing Shout wipes (apparently I’m quite messy – used nearly a whole package of wipes!), and bringing address labels for the color-coded luggage tags. Reading about and seeing pics of the different excursions helped me plan our activities – especially nenner1’s fantabulous report on Atlantis (
http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=1614137&page=4).
OK, now for the trip details! This trip, for me anyway, was all about sticking with what I know but being adventurous about trying new things – yes, I’m quite the conundrum.
Day 1: Saturday 5/24
We flew in the day before our cruise and stayed at the airport Hyatt. We stayed here before our last cruise and enjoyed it, so decided to do it again (sticking with what we know). The rooms are nice and quiet, despite being in an airport.
View from our balcony:
Here’s a pic of the pool:
There are several restaurants in the Hyatt you can eat at and of course you have all the restaurants in the airport to choose from, too. I mention this because for some reason the only thing I remember about our stay here was eating dinner at Macaroni Grill…. The last time we stayed here we went to Downtown Disney, which was fun, but we had a horrendous time getting back to the Hyatt and decided to just relax and lay low this time.
Day 2: Sunday 5/25 Part 1
Sunday morning we took a town car to the port (trying something new). We were picked up promptly at 11:00 a.m. in the valet area of the Hyatt (getting picked up here saved us the $10 airport fee and provided us a comfy spot to sit down and wait). It took about 45 minutes to arrive at the
DCL terminal. This was all very nice and our driver was so friendly – I have no complaints about the town car service or the hotel at all. It’s just that I felt like I was missing out on part of the Disney experience by not staying at a Disney resort and taking the DCL buses to the terminal. So next time we will definitely stay at a Disney resort the night before the cruise.
Once we arrived at the DCL terminal, a porter immediately took our luggage and directed us to a gate where our passports were checked.
We then walked into the terminal building and my giddiness overwhelmed me as I scanned the area for lime green Mickey heads…didn’t see any at that point. By this time it was noon; someone handed us a boarding card with the number 12. We checked in without having to wait (used the
Castaway Club check-in line), received our lanyards and KTTW cards. I completed the online check-in prior to leaving for our vacation, so I just handed in the paperwork and showed our passports. The terminal wasn’t that crowded; DH and I looked at the model ship in the lobby then sat down on one of the sofas. It wasn’t long before Minnie arrived, so of course I jumped up and had a picture taken with her.
Within a short time, they announced that those with numbers 1 – 11 could now board the ship – we would be next!! About 10-15 minutes later: “Those with numbers 1 – 25 may now board!” What?! Oh well, we took the obligatory embarkation photo and skipped aboard, where a lovely woman obliterated our names, but hey, we’re HERE!!
We headed up to Beach Blanket Buffet (our last cruise we went to Parrot Cay, so, you guessed it – trying something new!), where I helped pile my husband’s plate high with those fabulous shrimp I read about on the DIS. I don’t care for cold shrimp (sticking with what I know) but I wanted him to indulge. This is where I had my first Bahama Mama of the day…yummmm!
While waiting for our rooms to be ready, we walked around the ship and I took a bunch of pics of the pools, then stopped at Quiet Cove. The lounge chairs here are covered with a beige fabric pad, which was new for us (last time the loungers were the same plastic ones as they are at the Goofy and Mickey pools). So I picked out a spot and lounged for awhile.
This area was quite deserted, but there was a lot of action at the Goofy and Mickey pools. I love that they put a splash area in the Mickey pool area for little ones that aren’t potty trained – this gives the kiddos still in (swim) diapers a fun area to cool off and play in the water.
Next we went up to the Wide World of Sports Deck to see what was going on there.
After that, we checked to see if our room was ready, and it was!

Our stateroom was 6076 (category 6 with a verandah).
We had a few goodies waiting for us! One was our Castaway Club gift,
one was a gift I ordered for Grumpy from The Perfect Gift,
and one was a surprise from my parents!
Their gift turned out to be the most used. It was a plastic backpack with 2 zippered compartments holding 2 pairs of goggles and a beach mat. I wear contacts, so the goggles were great for swimming laps in the pool. The bag was the best part, though because we ended up taking it on all our excursions. It’s compact, but held all our (OK mostly my) stuff, plus it wasn’t affected by the water and sand.
Time to decorate! I spent a lot of time lurking on the door magnet threads before our cruise and made a few magnets for the outside of our door (trying something new).
I saw several other doors on our deck with their doors decorated, so as I pointed out to Grumpy, I wasn’t the only one! This was a lot of fun and I’m really glad I did it. I changed out some of the magnets based on the “theme” of the day and after the second night of the cruise, Grumpy actually reminded me to put more of the pirate magnets out!
Up next: Sunday Part 2 - lifeboat drill, Adventures Away, dancing with Goofy, and dinner at Parrot Cay.