PiratePug and Grumpy’s Double Dip Trip: Wonder 5/25 – 5/29 (Navigators added)

[SCRAPBOOKQUEEN]

Wow!! What a great report. I just love your pictures. I'm anxiously awaiting my 9/1/08 Double Dip. I, too, am a scrapbooker and you cannot imagine the stuff I have already collected!! Can't wait to get my hands on the scrapbook album there. Can't wait to read the rest.

Scrapbookqueen
Kellie

 

[PiratePug]

Day 4: Tuesday 3/27 Part 1 – Atlantis Aquaventure
Day 4 started with breakfast at Triton’s. We had been eating breakfast at Beach Blanket Buffet and I must say that I wish we had eaten at Triton’s for breakfast every day. I really wanted to try that pineapple tower thing I’ve read so much about, but a plate of French toast, Belgian waffles, and pancakes caught my eye. Then we scurried off to Wavebands to check in for our excursion to Atlantis. We booked the Atlantis Aquaventure excursion through Disney and I was very excited because I had read so much about this – I couldn’t wait to ride all the waterslides!

We checked in and received our Pumba stickers, then waited for a bit for everyone else to check in. At this point a CM set up a cart with things like sunscreen, cameras, towels, all that sort of stuff. I never wear sunscreen – I love baking in the sun – but for some reason, I felt like we should buy some sunscreen. Best money spent on this cruise!! (Well, almost!) We bought that spray-on sport sunscreen in the blue bottle – I swear by this stuff now (just bought two bottles for my upcoming trip to Universal Orlando). We used it several times while we were at Atlantis and I’m so glad we did – we would have been miserable lobsters if we hadn’t. OK, public service announcement over.

We walked off the ship with our excursion group (the purple Pumba’s) and received our wrist bands from the Atlantis employees. One person gives you the wrist band then you walk a little bit more and another person puts the wrist band on you. Then we were walked through the cruise terminal building in Nassau and out to a street where multiple buses were waiting. This excursion advertises a 25-minute bus ride to Atlantis, well this seemed to only take 10. Thank goodness, because I don’t think my heart could have taken much more. I was sitting next to a window and the traffic was making me a little queasy – I swear there were three lanes of cars on a two lane road. Grumpy found this to be quite fun, however. We were dropped off right in front of the building where the fancy-schmancy shops are and waited for our tour guide to take us inside. We were told to be sure to get back on the buses with the logo of a black bird flying into the sun, so I snapped a picture in case we had trouble remembering later on.

Our tour guide led us through the casino, then by the entrance of The Dig, and then to the Royal Baths Pool, which is near the Mayan Tower. She showed us where we could get some towels, then we were on our own. A note about the tour: the excursion info on the DCL website mentions a guided tour through The Dig; this is optional. If you want a guided tour, you’ll have to go to The Dig entrance and ask one of the employees about a tour. I’ll go into more details about The Dig in a bit, but we preferred to explore it at our own pace. We just walked in and started looking around. No one approached us about a tour, which was fine with me, but I just wanted to mention that you may have to ask for a guided tour if you want it.

Here’s a picture of the Royal Towers:

See that “bridge” between the two towers? You’ll find different stories about this on the Internet, but our guide told us that the bridge is actually a large suite that runs $44,000 a NIGHT and it has a 4-night minimum! It’s called the Michael Jackson suite because he was the first person to stay there.

I spent a great deal of time researching the Atlantis website and reading posts on the DIS before our cruise, so I knew exactly what I wanted to do: hit the waterslides at the Mayan Temple first, head over to the Power Tower waterslides, play in some of the pools, go to The Dig, then relax on one of the beaches. I also wanted to explore the resort and visit all of the lagoons.

Here is a link to the Atlantis map: http://www.atlantis.com/content/pdf/map.pdf. You’ll get a fold-up version of this when you arrive, which is very helpful in navigating the resort.
This is the Mayan Temple:

The pool is Ripples Kids Pool; there is larger pool on the other side of the Mayan Temple. There are five waterslides here, but two of them are the same; they’re the Challenger Slides.

Two people can race each other on these slides; there are clocks at the bottom to see who was fastest. Grumpy rode this, but I was a little leery. He said it was fun, but not thrilling. I’m one of those folks that prefer to gently swish through a tangled slide on an inner tube. Grumpy likes the speed slides with sharp drops. Rides that make me feel like I’m going to die just aren’t fun for me, though.

This was Grumpy’s favorite slide:

This is the Leap of Faith, which is described as “a 60 ft. almost-vertical drop from the top of the Mayan Temple, propelling riders at a tremendous speed through a clear acrylic tunnel submerged in a shark-filled lagoon.” Grumpy rode this several times. I rode the Serpent Slide, which is a winding (sometimes completely in the dark) tube slide that ends in the same shark-filled lagoon as the Leap of Faith.

See the tunnel under the sharks? That's where you ride through s-l-o-w-l-y on the Serpent Slide – this is also where I realized I’m a wee bit claustrophobic…. There’s another tunnel right next to this one, which is where Grumpy glided through at the end of the Leap of Faith. Both slides exit into the same area:

There is another body slide at the Mayan Temple called the Jungle Slide, but neither one of us rode this one. This is another kids pool, Splashers, located near the Mayan Temple:

We walked over to the Power Tower, which houses the “new” waterslides at Atlantis.

I don’t have any pics of the waterslides inside the Power Tower (sorry! ); there are four different slides here. The Abyss (another one of Grumpy’s favorites) is similar to the Leap of Faith; I think it’s a little shorter and you’re in the dark for part of this one. The Surge is a tube slide that starts in the same area as the Abyss. So Grumpy got in line for the Abyss and I grabbed a tube and got in line for the Surge. There is a bar right at the entrance to the Abyss and people would grab onto the bar, then sort of swing and jump into this pit of darkness – screaming all the way down. It was a little freaky because you couldn’t see them coming out, LOL! I’m thinking a nice tube slide can’t be that scary, so I’m looking forward to riding the Surge. You start out on a platform and are moved forward on a conveyer belt to a “track” propelled by water. If you only take one thing from this trip report, remember to KEEP YOUR BUTT UP!!! I heard to do this from several different sources, but holy cannoli it is not a joke. This ride will tear you up if you’re not careful. This was really a fun ride (much better the second time around) and it’s not to be missed. You swish around through a series of slides and rapids then eventually end up in The Current, which is a mile-long river ride with waterfalls, rapids, and stretches of smooth water. This is one of the coolest parts about this area because at this point, you can stay in your tube and ride The Current or stay in your tube and ride two other slides (without having to walk anywhere). The other two slides are the Drop and the Falls. I think the one I rode was the Drop, but all I remember was that it was really dark for a really long time and I kept my eyes closed during most of it (but I kept peeking and it was still dark – really, it was!!)
This is the Grotto Pool, which is next to the Power Tower:

We decided to get something to eat after we were done riding the waterslides. Along the way we found some hammerhead sharks in what I *think* was the Predator Lagoon:

My only complaint about this excursion (and this is very minor) was the food. We were given vouchers for lunch that offered several different places we could eat. All of them offered things like burgers, hot dogs, chicken sandwiches, pizza, and conch fritters. One of the places offered sandwich wraps and a chicken salad, but we were told by our tour guide that it was closed. The problem was that none of these places were on the guide map, so we ended up wasting a lot of time looking for them. I’m sure they’re not that hard to find, but Grumpy was getting grumpy and I was really hungry! So we decided to eat at a full-service restaurant and just pay for it because I wanted to eat something “Bahamian.” Well time after time we discovered that the fancy-schmancy restaurants were only open for dinner. So again, we wasted a lot of time walking around looking for restaurants. Eventually we ended up at the Marina and we each had a slice of pizza…very Bahamian. Here’s a shot of the marina:

After we ate, we didn’t have a lot of time left, so I had to prioritize and chose to go to The Dig instead of going to the pools or relaxing on the beach. Here are some pics of the beach we didn’t go to:

The Dig was absolutely my favorite part of Atlantis, so I’m very glad we went here instead of the pools or beach.

The entrance to The Dig was like walking into a dark cavern with several paths and viewing areas. I could have spent several hours in here, but ended up only spending about 45 minutes. Each area has artifacts from the lost city of Atlantis.

Smalltooth Sawfish

Stingray and colorful fish:

Moray Eels – these grossed me out. They looked like giant swimming bananas.

These starfish were in an open tank where you could touch them. There were also some large conch and a sea cucumber.

Mammoth Grouper – this picture does not do this giant beast justice. Some of these guys looked like they could swallow a five-year old!

Lionfish:

Spiny Lobsters:

School of Jacks:

There were some Moon Jellyfish in a separate tank that were mesmerizing to watch. I didn't get a decent picture, but they were beautiful.

There is a gift shop inside The Dig that you’ll walk through; they have Atlantis t-shirts, post cards, as well as lots of candles and stuffed toys. Our time here was coming to an end, so we trekked through the casino and boutique areas to get out to the pick-up location. Several times people tried to usher us into a cab, but we politely declined. There were several buses waiting and we easily found the one with the right logo. The ride back to the cruise terminal took about 30 minutes due to traffic.

Closing thoughts about the Atlantis Aquaventure excursion: The waterslides at Atlantis were Grumpy’s favorite part of our cruise. I absolutely enjoyed this excursion and felt it was worth the cost, but I wanted more time here!! There just simply isn’t enough time to do everything in one trip. There are so many beautiful things to see, but I felt like we didn’t have enough time to spend REALLY looking at things. There are also so many things we didn’t see at all, such as many of the lagoons and just touring the property itself. The landscaping is lush and worth a look. We didn’t spend any time in the casino, but had to walk through it several times – it looked massive to me, but I haven’t been to that many casinos. Grumpy noted that there are no “real” poker tables here. The beaches looked gorgeous, but we didn’t spend any time at those. The architecture and décor in each building was amazing. I really wanted to spend more time just looking at that. I definitely want to go back, whether it will be on another cruise excursion or on a vacation just to Atlantis, I don’t know. Someday…

 

[PiratePug]

Day 4: Tuesday 3/27 Part 2 – Shopping in Nassau, Pirate Preview & Dinner at Palo

I wanted to buy a bunch of Tortuga rum cakes for all my peeps back home. After being dropped off at the cruise terminal from Atlantis, we took a short walk to Frederick Street and easily found Tortuga’s.

They were offering samples of the chocolate rum cake…we bought two of those! We bought 8 cakes in all, plus some rum, yum! I have heard and read so much about these delectable delights and they did not disappoint. Now that they’re all gone (and no, I didn’t eat them ALL!) I wish we would have bought more, but there’s just no way we could have brought anything else home with us.

After that we went in a few shops along the way back to the cruise terminal. We bought a few more souvenirs (mostly sarongs for me and my sis) and headed back to the ship. Some of the vendors were very bold and pushy, but hey, that’s what they do. People were constantly trying to hand Grumpy things.

As we made our way back to the cruise terminal building, there was a long line of cruisers waiting to get back to their ship, but the line moved quickly. I didn’t take the time on our last cruise to really look around at all the shops in this building, but as we were waiting around in line on this cruise, I realized there were a few places here that I would have liked to shop in, so next time I will definitely spend some time here. There was a Christmas store that I regret not buying something from (I collect Christmas ornaments from the different places we’ve been) – I’ll add that stop to my list for next time. I felt like we needed to just get back on the ship because by this time I thought it was almost 4:30 (all aboard was 5:00). Later that night I saw a little girl with a straw purse from one of those stores in the cruise terminal building and I thought, darn-it, I could have gotten that for one of my nieces!

We headed straight for our stateroom to get ready for dinner – tonight we had a 6:30 reservation at Palo. That’s when I realized the clock on my camera was not on DCL time and it was actually just after 3:30. So Grumpy took a much needed nap while I scavenged for pirates:

The line for Captain Jack was really long. He spent a lot of time talking to everyone, signing autographs and posing for pictures. He was scheduled to leave at 6:00, so I’m thinking someone is going to step in the middle of the line at any moment and tell all of us “Sorry, Captain Jack is out of rum, but he’ll back tomorrow morning.” What actually happened was that a CM quietly stood at the end of the line and moved forward as the line moved. When people tried to get in line behind him, he quietly gave them the spiel about seeing Captain Jack later. When I left it was 6:15, so Captain Jack probably left about five minutes after that (there were two other families behind me). I noticed I was the only “single” person in the whole line…so I was thinking great, he (and everyone else) is going to think I’m one of those stalker chicks or something. I can’t say he was a gentleman , but he was so funny!!! I was laughing the whole time. He was just as smarmy as he was in the movies! I’ll just say that I only bought one of the professional pics because the other one would have made Grumpy REALLY grumpy!

Dinner at Palo
OMG. This was hands down the most fantabulously delicious meal we had on the cruise. But the BEST part…(this is me swooning)…was our server from Croatia, Dalibor!

Isn’t he dreamy?!?! I had such a HUGE crush on him…okay so maybe I still have a little tiny crush…. He was fabulous, made wonderful suggestions (I took him up on ALL of them!) and was just so good to us. We have been spoiled both times we’ve been to Palo and will always visit here at least once each time we cruise. Although I’m not sure if Grumpy will be too excited about seeing Dalibor again…

Here’s what we ate (with pics):
PiratePug:
Pizzette del Pizzaiolo: Quattro Formaggi: Mozzarella, Mascarpone, Gorgonzola, Parmesan

Garlic Roasted Rack of Lamb: Served with Barolo roasted shallots, crunched potatoes and herb jus (Dalibor’s recommendation - I started eating this before I remembered to take a picture)

Chocolate Souffle

Grumpy:
Mozzarella and Plum Tomatoes with Balsamic Dressing

Wild Mushroom and Hazelnut Risotto: Served creamy with freshly shaved parmesan and a Chianti reduction (this was very good; it had a slightly sweet taste)

Chicken Braciola: Baked chicken breast filled with escarole, raisins and pine nuts served with a light Marsala sauce (This dish was divine!! It was served with the creamiest mashed potatoes.)

Panna Cotta with fresh berries

With the exception of the desserts, all of the food was “something new” for me and I thoroughly enjoyed all of it.

So since this cruise is all about me trying new things, when Dalibor asked if I would like an after-dinner drink, I decided to try some Limoncello, straight up. Now if you’ve ever had this, and finished it, then I am impressed! Last year I saw part of an episode of The View (that morning show with Barbara Walters) with Danny Devito – he was a little silly on the show and admitted to spending the night drinking Limoncellos with George Clooney. I always thought that sounded fun so I wanted to try it. However, even if George Clooney had been at our table, it would have still sounded much better than it actually was. See that little shot glass on the table behind my water? That’s about as far as I got with my Limoncello. It tasted good at first, but the after taste killed me!

Fortunately Dalibor also brought us some complimentary shots (I think everyone gets these – they’re like a vodka and lemon sorbet type drink), which were really good, so that was my last taste of Palo on this cruise. Tim stuck with what he knew and just had a cappuccino.

Up Next: Pirate Party!!!

 

[PiratePug]

How long was the bike ride on CastAway Cay?

We only spent about 30 minutes on the bike ride, but some of that was spent "racing" each other. Next time I will take my time and slow down to see more of the sights. I think you could easily do the whole bike trail at a leisurely pace (with a stop at the observation tower) and return to the bike rental hut in an hour.

No more food porn?

I've got a couple more meals coming!

Wow!! What a great report. I just love your pictures. I'm anxiously awaiting my 9/1/08 Double Dip. I, too, am a scrapbooker and you cannot imagine the stuff I have already collected!! Can't wait to get my hands on the scrapbook album there. Can't wait to read the rest.

You will find so many things during the cruise to put in your scrapbook! I like to buy postcards for mine; one of the CM's in Treasure Ketch suggested I have the captain sign one of them that had Captain Mickey on it - I thought this was a great idea!

 

[wilma-bride]

Great update

The Atlantis Aquaventure sounds fun but at $155 each, I reckon we couldn't stretch to that for our family of 5. We weren't that impressed with Nassau on our last visit so DH has suggested we stay ont eh ship next time - however, I think we probably haven't seen half of what Nassau has to offer so I'm thinking of doing one of the cheaper excursions at Atlantis as I really would like to see it. Not sure if there would be too much walking around for our 5 year old DS though

I would love to see the 'would make Grumpy more grumpy' picture with Captain Jack. I am not a Jack groupy but I have to admit he's one of my fave characters

Your meal at Palo looks divine - I'm now wondering about doing this on our next cruise if we could get it on Parrot Cay night.

 

[PiratePug]

Great update

The Atlantis Aquaventure sounds fun but at $155 each, I reckon we couldn't stretch to that for our family of 5. We weren't that impressed with Nassau on our last visit so DH has suggested we stay ont eh ship next time - however, I think we probably haven't seen half of what Nassau has to offer so I'm thinking of doing one of the cheaper excursions at Atlantis as I really would like to see it. Not sure if there would be too much walking around for our 5 year old DS though

I would love to see the 'would make Grumpy more grumpy' picture with Captain Jack. I am not a Jack groupy but I have to admit he's one of my fave characters

Your meal at Palo looks divine - I'm now wondering about doing this on our next cruise if we could get it on Parrot Cay night.

I’m a little gun shy about booking excursions that are not through DCL due to a situation from our last cruise, but if it were more than just Grumpy and I, we definitely would have booked a room at Comfort Suites (to save $$) instead of paying that price for the excursion.

We were going to stay on the ship, too, because like you, I was not impressed with Nassau on our last cruise. But after reading so much about Atlantis I thought it would be worth a trip. Atlantis requires a LOT of walking! I enjoy walking and biking, and I work out on an elliptical regularly, but even I was getting sick of all the walking. I saw so many families with little kids and I was very impressed that they were able to take that on. I think if you didn’t do the waterslides and took time out to sit in the shade and relax every now and then it would be okay, though.

I WISH I had kept that pic with Captain Jack, LOL! It looked like we were about to kiss! He said something to me and I turned around to him to respond, so our faces were almost touching when the photographer snapped the picture.

You'll get different opinions on Palo, but I highly recommend it! I've heard the beef tenderloin is to die for.

 

[PiratePug]

Day 4: Tuesday 3/27 Part 3 – Pirates in the Caribbean Party
I was so excited about going to the Pirates in the Caribbean Party! I actually have a pirate costume that I like to wear on Halloween to hand out candy and I almost brought it, but there was no way Grumpy was dressing like a pirate so I left it at home. That being said, I saw many families dressed up in full pirate regalia. There is a ton of pirate paraphernalia onboard, so you can buy anything from a hat or a hook to a full costume (I only saw the full costumes in kids’ sizes, though).

I missed most of the pirate party on our last cruise (we had late seating and arrived just in time to see the fireworks). So this time, I scheduled our Palo dinner at 6:30 so we would be through in plenty of time to enjoy all the festivities. The pirate party was scheduled to start at 9:45, so after dinner at Palo I snapped a few pictures around the ship then headed up to Deck 10, where the party was in full swing.

The rest of my pictures from pirate night aren’t that great, but hopefully they will give you an idea of how fun the party was. I took about 50 pictures, most of which didn’t come out. These are the best of those. Here is a pic of the partygoers on Deck 9:

The CM’s were so full of energy, dancing and twirling around – this seemed to go on forever and I don’t know how they managed to stay coordinated. They teach everyone the steps for each dance then have dance-offs between starboard and port sides or between Deck 9 and Deck 10. It’s so much fun!! It’s LOUD, too, but I saw several kiddos asleep in the chairs or in mom’s lap.

Mickey promises to show up…. Just a spoiler warning: If you want to be surprised with what happens at the party, skip over the rest of this!

Each character comes out and has their own dance – I found that I got better pictures if I focused on the giant screen instead of the stage:

Captain Hook threatens to take over the party and ruin it…

Some “bad” pirates appear from the sky to foil our fun:

But Mickey saves the party! This is a terrible picture, but I wanted to show him flying through the air:

There’s a little more dancing then the fireworks begin:

The dessert buffet on Deck 9 was very enticing. They had a lot of cakes and creamy desserts, cookies, and turkey legs. I wanted to indulge but I was just too full from dinner. I think this opened right after the fireworks ended. There were two lines, so it moved really quickly.

Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl started playing on the giant screen and some people stuck around the Goofy Pool to watch, but we headed back to our room around 11:30. Prince Caspian was also playing in the Buena Vista Theater, but I was waaaayyyy too tired to stay up and watch that. I heard it was good, though.

Today was crammed with so much fun – I don’t think I could have taken any more!! I was a little sad when we were getting ready for bed; I told Grumpy we only have one more day left. He smiled and said “Yes, but you still have one more day left.”

Up Next: Day 2 at Castaway Cay (lots of character pics & snorkeling at the Family Beach), Dinner at Animator’s Palate, and I’ll introduce you to some special people!

 

[PiratePug]

Day 5: Wednesday 3/28 Part 1 - Castaway Cay

We woke up too late to have breakfast at Triton’s today, so we opted for the buffet at Parrot Cay. It felt really strange at breakfast yesterday and today to just get up and leave without paying. We were seated at a table by ourselves both times, FYI. We walked around a little bit and I took some more pictures of the ship. I think the lobby is so beautiful:

We headed back to our stateroom because I wanted to see if we could find Ron, our stateroom host. He was so good to us on this cruise and I just loved him. Luckily I found him cleaning another room and when he stepped out I asked if I could take his picture:

We talked for a few minutes and said our goodbyes, figuring we wouldn’t see him again.

Today my only plans for Castaway Cay were to relax in the sun and do some snorkeling at the Family Beach. When you get off the ship, there is an area nearby where a photographer takes your picture with the Wonder in the background. I really wanted one of these, but this guy kept stepping into the background of the picture. The photographer kept running over to him to try to get him to move out a little, but each time he would just come back! It was kind of funny until I saw our pictures with him in the background, shooting a picture with his own camera. I was thinking maybe they could put some brightly colored tape or something on the ground just while the photographer is there so that people would know not to cross that point.

We stopped at the post office and found these nutty guys:

They were funny – I got a lot of pics with them. Dale kept messing up my hair and in one of the pics I think I’m scolding him!

Next we found Mickey:

And Pluto!! I told him he was my favorite and he was all over that! We had a lot of fun:

We found a nice spot on the Family Beach and a waiter asked us if we wanted anything to drink. Grumpy was ready for a Konk Kooler; I thought it was a little early, but hey, as long as you’re asking, bring me a Mai Tai (please)! The beach was much less crowded today than on Monday.

Grumpy went snorkeling while I relaxed with my iPod. He found some interesting things:

This is one of the subs from the now closed 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea ride from Magic Kingdom.

I waited for Grumpy to return so we could go eat lunch at Cookie’s, but he wasn’t hungry so I went on my own. This is what I got:

There’s a piece of jalapeno cheddar corn bread just above the hot dog, then there are 3 different salads kind of smooshed together (pasta salad, couscous, and cole slaw), next is a tomato salad, Castaway Cay rice, a curry dish with plantains and seafood, then some pork with a sweet BBQ sauce. The desserts on the other plate are a ginger-lime bread and a piece of pineapple upside down cake (I think). I really wanted to try a bite of everything so I tried to get small portions. They also offered burgers, some kind of sandwich, a beef dish, a chicken dish, several different kinds of cookies, and soft serve ice cream.

I went shopping at Castaway Cay our first day here, but I went back to the shopping area to see if there was anything else I wanted. They had a different selection of shirts this time, so that’s something to keep in mind for all you future Double-Dippers. When I got back to our spot on the beach, wouldn’t you know it, Grumpy was ready to eat. So he went to Cookie’s and I fell asleep in the sun. Lots of people brought trays of food back to their spots on the beach, but it was easier for us to just eat at one of the tables by Cookie’s. Grumpy came back soon and I took off to go snorkeling. This turned out to be one of my favorite parts of the cruise. I hope to go on a 7-night cruise and do some more snorkeling someday. When I developed both of our underwater cameras, I discovered we’d taken pictures of all the same things!

We decided to head back to the ship, so we rinsed off at one of the showers and walked through the shops one more time. “Are you sure you don’t want anything?” I asked Grumpy. “I’m sure,” he said. Sigh…

One last look at Castaway Cay:

We stopped at Quiet Cove pool to swim and play for a bit. Quiet Cove is where I met a lot of other fellow cruisers on this trip; every time I came here someone new would strike up a conversation with me. When I finally decided I’d gotten enough sun for the week, we headed back to our stateroom.

While we were getting ready for dinner, the phone in our stateroom rang. We both looked at each other like we’d never heard a phone ring before! Grumpy answered it and we were asked if we wanted to eat dinner at Palo tonight. Part of me wanted to because I knew it would be a great experience, but a bigger part of me wanted to have our last dinner with our table mates. So we declined, but thanked them anyway.

The show tonight was Disney Dreams, which I loved on our last cruise. However, we decided to skip it this time because (surprise) I had a lot of shopping I needed to do. I bought some of the H2O body butter (love that stuff – I got the last bottle sitting on the shelf), some shirts for my peeps at home, tons of goodies for my nieces, a Mickey watch, and some other souvenirs for friends. There was a sign posted that said Captain Henry would be here soon, so I waited around for him. He was really friendly and he signed a Mickey postcard for me, which will be preserved forever in my scrapbook.

I forgot to mention that last night the evening show was Lynn Trefzger, a comedienne and ventriloquist. We missed her adult show the first night of our cruise and missed her show last night because we ate an early dinner at Palo then went to the Pirate Party. We ran into our table mates from Colorado earlier this afternoon and they said Lynn’s show was really good, so I was disappointed that we missed out on seeing her. After I spent our last penny at Treasure Ketch, Grumpy and I hung out in Diversions for a little bit, then decided to see what was going on in Wavebands. Behold! Lynn Trefzger was about to start a show! We snagged some seats and ordered drinks. All the kids sat on the floor – they were super excited, like they knew something I didn’t. Lynn asked for two volunteers; she chose a boy and a girl from the audience. They both said they had seen her show the night before and they knew exactly what to do. It’s hard to explain, but she made them talk like they were puppets. She and her bear “friend” acted out the story of Goldilocks and the Three Bears – it was really cute and now I’m doubly sorry I missed her other shows.

 

[PiratePug]

Day 5: Wednesday 3/28 Part 2 - Farewell Dinner at Animator’s Palate

I’m so glad we went to our assigned dinner at Animator’s Palate – this was the most fun of all the meals on this cruise. We talked and laughed and basically had a small party at our table. We all took pictures of each other and just had a blast. Here’s a pic of Pocahontas and Captain John Smith pre-show:

Here’s what we ate:
PiratePug:
Smoked Black Forest Ham and Vegetable Salad Terrine: Served with mustard cream sauce

Creamy Butternut Squash Soup: Garnished with chives and drizzled with sour cream

Lemon Peppered Oven Baked Stuffed Chicken: Filled with Provencal vegetables on jalapeno cheddar cheese mash served with cilantro infused tomato concasse

Chocolate and Peanut Butter Pie: Served with vanilla and coffee sauces

Grumpy:
Seafood and Avocado Wrapper: Rolled potato flat bread, filled with crab meat, seafood and avocado with a light oriental coleslaw

Confetti Tomato Salad: With confit tomatoes, bell peppers, olive oil, Jerez vinegar and herb dressing

Grilled Filet Mignon, Seared Scallops with Port Wine Demi Glace: On creamy spinach with crab meat and mashed potatoes

Ice Cream Sundae: Chocolate mud pie and strawberry ice cream, with date and walnut cake and chocolate sauce

I was still talking about the dreamy Dalibor from the previous night and our assistant server, Nikesha, feigned jealousy. Nikesha took great care of us and was a lot of fun. I must have hugged her five times that night. This was only her second week onboard!!!

Just before we ordered dessert, the “show” began and it was just as magical as it was on our last cruise. Pocahontas and Captain John Smith post-show:

The servers paraded out and we cheered the loudest for Edwin and Nikesha:

Our head server, Carina, was a delightful woman from South Africa. She spent a lot of time talking with us each night; she brought out some special birthday desserts for our Colorado table mates one night, and she gave me a pomegranate cosmo on the house!

The head chef, Edgar, stopped by some of the tables after the show:

We said goodbye to Colorado and Chicago, then headed to the lobby for the ‘til we Meet Again character meet and greet. From up above on Deck 4 I saw Cinderella, Princess Aurora, Belle, Snow White, Peter Pan, Captain Hook, the Fab Five, as well as Chip and Dale. I know there were others, but those are the ones I remember. It was so crowded I couldn’t even get to the stairs to go down to the lobby, which was just as well because we hadn’t even started packing! Our bags were supposed to be outside our stateroom door by 11:00 p.m. and it was already 10:40.

I wanted to take the pop-up hamper and squish it (with all the dirty clothes inside) into one of our suitcases, but Grumpy wouldn’t let me. He works out of town most days of the week, so he thinks he’s a seasoned traveler and that he knows how to pack. Fine, if he wants to fold all those dirty clothes, so be it. But you have 15 minutes and we have to find a place to put all these souvenirs. I put our return address labels on our Daisy luggage tags (we had Daisy tags on our last cruise, too!) and fastened them to our suitcases. We finished with three minutes to spare!

We set our suitcases out and got ready for bed. I set up our final wake-up call and quickly fell asleep.

Up Next: Debarkation and Closing Thoughts

 

[vatchr]

Your TR is great! I am getting so excited for our DD in July. So many things to look forward to...

Thanks for all the info and pics!

 

[CapnJackGroupie]

I don't want your TR to end!!! You've done a great job sharing your cruise w/ us... and your pics are awesome! Thanks so much!!

 

[TotallyAngelic]

I hope we have as much fun as you did! Thanks for sharing your stunning photographs!

 

[wilma-bride]

I'm all caught up now - shame you turned down Palo but I can understand wanting to have one last dinner wiht your table mates - plus, it's always good to see the 'show' at AP.

What a lovely second visit to Castaway Cay - sounds like it was a lot more relaxing than the first

 

[PiratePug]

Day 6: Thursday 3/29 – Debarkation & Closing Thoughts

Grumpy was really grumpy about having to lug all of my carry-ons to breakfast, but I assured him everyone would be carrying things and it would be okay. Having said goodbye to our table mates at dinner last night, I knew we wouldn’t see any of them at Animator’s Palate for breakfast, and sitting at our table all alone made me a little sad. After we ordered, a family of five was seated with us, which immediately made me perk up! I remembered the three kids from standing in line for photographs last night. The older girl and boy (maybe 6 & 5 years old?) were a riot! The dad was trying to keep everyone from playing roughly with each other and he kept saying things like “You’re going to make these people never want to have kids!” The older girl said “Really?” and while the dad said “Yes, really,” I smiled at her and shook my head no. She got this really mischievous look on her face and unfortunately for Dad I don’t think she took anything he said seriously after that – sorry Dad!!

We talked about the kids’ clubs and all the different things they got to do on the cruise – the kids seemed more upset about leaving the Wonder than the parents did! We finished our breakfast as the other family received theirs, so we wished them well and made the sad journey to the lobby once more. Clayton was there saying goodbye to everyone and I asked him if I could take his picture:

Then a little boy behind me started screaming “Show her the dance, show her the dance!” and Clayton broke out into it:

I took one last picture onboard (this is making me sad writing this!!) and hoped that the banner would come true:

Our cruise was over…time to start planning another one! Below are some of my thoughts about things I’ve read others ask about on the DIS. Just my two cents:

Embarkation/Debarkation
Couldn’t have been smoother. Highly recommend using a porter. Embarkation was different for us this time because DCL now uses numbered boarding passes; I thought this was an excellent idea because we could relax on a comfy sofa instead of standing in line waiting to board. Debarkation was also different for us because we picked up our luggage in a different location than last time. We walked off the ship and through the “gangway” then retrieved our luggage at the DCL terminal. A porter was standing by with a cart, we told him what our stateroom number was, he led us to the “Daisy” area and we found our two suitcases. The porter loaded them along with our carry-ons onto the cart and walked us to the customs area. I handed the customs official our completed declaration form and our opened passports; he told us to have a safe trip home and the porter took our luggage to the waiting area for pick-ups. Grumpy tipped him and he left us to wait for our driver. What I appreciated most about the porter during debarkation was that he was able to easily get us through the mobs of people and the mountains of luggage. Side note: I snapped some pictures of our town car driver and the car as we were dropped off at the DCL terminal on Sunday. When I went through my pictures at home, I realized the porter that helped us at debarkation was the same porter that helped us when we first arrived!

Food
Favorite Breakfast: Triton’s
Favorite Dinner: Palo
Favorite Rotational Restaurant: Grumpy – Animator’s Palate; PiratePug – Triton’s
We both liked Cookie’s at Castaway Cay; the food here reminds me of grilling out at home. I also liked Goofy’s Galley; I tried a chicken Caesar wrap from here and it was delish! The items on the room service menu looked really good & I wanted to try some things, but we just never had a chance. Overall I thought the food was great.

Drinks
I’m a bottled water drinker; I usually drink at least 3 bottles of water a day, so I knew we had to get the case of Evian. I was glad they offered a half-case of 12 bottles; this worked out perfectly. I carried bottles in our bag every time we stepped off the ship, which worked well for us. I like to use the little Crystal Light packets sometimes, so I packed some of those with my luggage.

I don’t drink soda and Grumpy drank mostly iced tea on this cruise, so we didn’t use the soda fountain on Deck 9. I usually ordered the drink of the day a few times each day. If you order it the first time with the souvenir (plastic) glass, you can hand your glass to a bartender and they will refill it with the drink of the day for $3.50. Otherwise each drink was about $7 - $8 (plus gratuity). On Castaway Cay, drinks are served in disposable plastic cups and it didn’t seem to matter if we ordered the drink of the day or not; everything was the same price for us. I’ve heard different things from different people about the price of drinks at Castaway Cay, though.

Treats & Extras
I felt like we received a lot of goodies and treats on this cruise. There was the Castaway Club gift and the surprise gift from my parents, which I loved. I was also really pleased with the gift I ordered from The Perfect Gift for Tim (it was really cool having the binoculars to look out at the sea from our verandah). We received a $25 onboard credit, which was a surprise (after we got home I found out that this was for booking our cruise online). We also received a pass to the Rainforest, but alas, we didn’t have time to use it. There were other *little things* that happened on our cruise that made our trip even more magical. For instance, one morning I realized I had left one of my 8x10 pictures with Mickey in the Internet café; when I went to look for it, one of my papers was there but the picture was gone. I checked at guest services three times that day, but no one had turned it in. When I went to Shutters that evening, I asked if anyone had turned it in (they hadn’t) and they reprinted it for free, which I thought was really kind. I also got to know one of the photographers onboard; she often took the Lifestyle Portrait pictures with the white backdrop. Our last evening, she took a lot of time to take some really nice photos of Grumpy and me. Having these photos meant a lot to me because the last time we had professional pictures taken was 3 years ago (on our last cruise). Grumpy also ordered the Bon Voyage Memory Box for me, to be delivered the last night of our cruise (his timing was a little off but it was a sweet gesture ).

Character Greetings
This was a huge part of my DCL experience and I had a blast meeting everyone. I looked at the navigators every day to see who was scheduled, also, the flat screens in the lobby on Deck 3 display character greeting times & locations.

Internet
Grumpy is a workaholic and it’s very hard to keep him away from a computer, so he used the Internet periodically to check his email. OK, OK, so I did, too. It was very easy to log in and the speed was faster than I imagined it would be. We also used it to check in for our flight home. The main thing I want to say about using the Internet onboard is that if you think you will use it more than once, buy a package!!! All the little 5-minute pay-as-you-go checking of the email episodes turned into 87 minutes of usage, which was $65. We would have saved $25 if we had just bought a 100 minute plan for $40.

Movies playing onboard
I’m sure this list has already changed, but for those that are interested, here’s what they were: College Road Trip, Step Up 2, Ratatouille, Enchanted, National Treasure 2, and The Chronicles of Narnia – Prince Caspian. I really wanted to see Prince Caspian, but never made it. It played once during the day and then again at 11:00 p.m. on Tuesday and Wednesday.

Watch/Clock
Neither Grumpy nor I brought a watch on this trip, which drove me crazy. I was constantly asking people what time it was. I planned to buy a watch onboard, but didn’t do this until the last night of the cruise. Eventually I realized I could look at my camera and/or my iPod to see what time it was – genius! I use a digital Indiglo watch as my alarm clock at home and I really wish I would have brought this just so I could keep it next to bed and be able to tell what time it was when I woke up. So if you can’t see well and are compulsive about knowing what time it is when you wake up in the middle of the night like me, you might want to bring something to keep next to your bed.

Bingo
We didn’t play this, but all of our table mates raved about Bingo! Colorado won twice (they won several hundred dollars). They said it was a lot of fun, so this may be something we try next time.

Teen Clubs
Our 17-year old table mate from Colorado said he had a blast at the teen activities, so I wanted to share that here. He stayed out until 2:00 a.m. one night, which concerned Dad, but the CM’s assured Dad that Son would be just fine – and he was! He spent a lot of time playing basketball with other teens as well as participating in the scheduled teen activities and had nothing but really great things to say.

Service
If you’ve read through my trip report, you already know how much I loved all the CM’s we encountered. Our stateroom host, Ron, was like an old friend, he called out to us using our names before we had actually met and I felt completely comfortable with him. Everyone works so hard and they always have a smile (and time for a photograph!). Mmmmm…and Dalibor…well, there’s not much more I can say about him without getting in trouble with Grumpy!

Closing Thoughts
I only have two regrets about this cruise. One is that I wish I would have bought some things the first night of our cruise instead of waiting until the end. For instance, there was this 8x10 frame that had the DCL logo in each corner; I really wanted this but thought, eh, I’ll just wait. They were gone by the second night of our cruise. My other regret is not booking another cruise onboard. I really, really, really regret this. Grumpy wanted to, and I said we shouldn’t because I’m graduating from college this December and we have so many bills that we need to take care of first. The thing is, I know we will cruise DCL again, and we would have saved the 10%, plus we wouldn’t have had to pay the new fuel charges (they added this mid-way through our cruise), plus we would have gotten the onboard credit – and we could have booked the cruise for next year then just moved it out if we needed to. Arrggghhhh!!!! I’ve been stewing about this ever since we got home.

This was the perfect vacation, filled with just the right combination of fun, excitement, and relaxation. The only thing that would have made it more fun for me was if my 3-year old niece had come. I begged my sis to bring her girls on this cruise (she also has a 1-year old). I could just imagine doing all the little dances at the Adventures Away and Pirate Party with my niece. I think she would have been amazed at seeing the characters, too. And we could have had fun building sand castles and playing at Castaway Cay. Plus she would have given me an excuse to hang out at the Mickey pool! OK, Sorry for the tangent - I really miss my sis and her girls; they live far, far away, so I only get to see them maybe once a year.

I think Disney cruises are for people of all ages, with and without children. Your cruise can be whatever you make of it – there are plenty of opportunities for romance and “adult things,” but there are also many things for families to do together. The kids I saw seemed to really enjoy the kids’ clubs – their parents said they had a hard time getting them to leave the clubs!

The best advice I could give someone going on a Disney cruise is just to relax and have fun! Have a plan but be open to changes. I am so glad I tried some new things (character greetings, different food, walking around Nassau, sting-rays & snorkeling at CC, waterslides at Atlantis). There is still so much I want to see and do on a future Disney cruise - I just hope it’s not another 3 years before I get to go again! I love meeting new people and listening to their stories; I was fortunate to meet so many warm, friendly folks throughout this trip.

Thanks for reading and commenting – it’s been fun!!

 

[msteddom]

Thans so much for your wonderful TR! My first Disney cruise is a 4 night double dip at the end of August. I can't wait! Thanks for all the neat tips!

Melissa

 

[wilma-bride]

I'm so sad that your trip report is over - I've been reliving it right along with you. Thanks so much for posting it and for all of the great pictures

 

[PiratePug]

A couple folks have asked about navigators, so I'm going to try to post them here. If you use your mouse to right click and select "Save As" you can download each picture to your computer then open the files from where you saved them and enlarge them so that they're readable.

 

[PiratePug]

 

[PiratePug]

 

[PiratePug]