Ship of Fools - Eastbound Repo II

[RobinMarie]

Part I
http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?p=10155485#post10155485

Day 6 – Day at Sea

We slept until 9:30am. The skies were overcast and the condition of the upper decks indicated there was lots of rain. Victoria went to the pools after breakfast but it was so windy we only stayed a little while. Today we have tea with Wendy and a Castaway Club party planned before dinner. The evening entertainment was a ventrilaquist and Joey Fatone doing Who Wants to Be a Mouskateer show.

Tea with Wendy was in Studio Sea at 4pm. Victoria, Sandy and Mary sat at a table and the mothers chatted at another. The girls each brought a doll or stuffed animal to enjoy having tea with. The whole ordeal lasted about fifteen minutes with picture taking another ten. It was at the tea when I was reminded it was semi-formal night. We rushed back to the room to change into our semi formal wear. One thing about cruising, you sure do change clothes an awful lot.

The Castaway Club reception took place by the Goofy pool on deck 9. We were told the Castaway Club, repeat cruisers, were approximately 1700 in number. We heard a speech from the captain, president of the cruise line and some other head figures. No secrets were revealed. Lots of people approached the Captain for discussion and photo opportunities. After the reception we went to dinner.

On our way to dinner we saw Roy Disney Jr walking with his wife. We were like little kids, we just giggled and walked behind him, never saying a word. We went to the show Who Wants to be a Mouseketeer where a little girl, with massive amounts of coaching, won a seven day cruise for two. We went to a trivia game show after and had some fun. Mary's father went up on stage doing his best impression of Miami Vice. Mary loved it!

Bed at 10:30pm

 

[RobinMarie]

Day 7

Victoria and Mary were fixated on babysitting Addison. They had made plans to meet Addison at the Mickey pool at 11am. After breakfast at Topsiders on deck 9 I dropped Victoria off at the LAB so I could get to my pedicure. My pedicure was scheduled for 10am. They were prompt and took me too the pedicure chair with a view of the water. The spa is on the top deck 10. I thought this pedicure was pretty fair and a nice experience. It is the same price as the day spa I use at home and the pedicure lasted a fairly long time. After a relaxing experience I went looking for Victoria in the kids' lab. She was in the CLUB, happy as can be because she could play in the treehouse.

Victoria met Addison as planned and began the ritual of going in and out of the pool. Mary was having her hair braided and joined the babysitting club immediately after. For a few hours they all had fun. Mary and Victoria put Addison on the ping pong table to play and later evened up the teams when little two year old Emma walked by and allowed herself to be put on the table.

In the afternoon we rested in the room for a couple of hours. We showered and dressed for dinner and took some portraits with the characters. Dinner was in Lumiere's dining room. The beef tenderloin was good and the crème brulee even better.

We were planning on seeing Ken Block, impressionist and commedian after dinner. We bumped into some Fools who told us he wasn't any good and some people had walked out during the show. We went to the show and an announcement was made that Ken Block would be sharing the stage with commedian and ventriloquist Michael Harrison. Ken Block did a ten minute show, including an impression of Bill Clinton which did not include Monica references. We had seen Michael Harrison the night before but the kids loved seeing about a forty minute show of him. We went to bed after the show but Lynn and her family headed to Studio Sea for another game show, those party animals!

 

[RobinMarie]

Day 8

It was hard to believe it was Saturday and we've been on board for a week. It feels as if we were very busy. A lot of people we talked with said they did not feel ready to leave the ship and if we were on a seven day trip, it would be ending. We woke up at 8am and headed to breakfast in Parrot Cay for 9:30am. We had breakfast with Jennifer, who recently adopted her 15 month old daughter Emilie. Emilie is adorable and very active. After eating her breakfast, Victoria pushed the stroller around the restaurant with Emilie. They both loved it. All that playing with dolls paid off!


I dropped Victoria off at the lab so I could read my book for awhile. With all the activities we were doing, I was falling behind on my reading! I did find the unofficial book swap site, in case you ever run out of books, check out the laundry rooms!

Unfortunately the Lab programming was on sports deck on 10. Victoria reluctantly agreed to stay with the lab programming so I could read. Sitting on deck four, I could see land and lots of birds eating the flying fish. I sat out on shaded deck 4 in a cushy lounge chair for a time. Lynn and her family found me and we chatted. Lynn's husband picked up Victoria from the club and took her to the ventriloquist workshop for kids. Victoria would later claim that she was saved from the lab! Lynn was feeling nauseous and said she felt better sitting outside. We watched Panama float by.

The girls had a great time at the show. Victoria was chosen as a volunteer and won three prizes including the 20 dollar DVD she wanted last year. It shows you how to be a ventriloquist. At lunch both girls demonstrated how they could say the alphabet without moving their mouths. See, a cruise is educational!

Victoria stayed with Mary and family while I went to my Martini tasting. The first martini was a traditional one – yuck! The second was a cosmopolitan which I've had before. The third was a chocolate martini, then an apple martini and finally a raspberry martini. The last three were good. As soon as I got home I bought large green olives. None have tasted as good as the one I had in the martini.

Feeling pretty tipsy I had to rush to pick up Victoria to get her to the Princess Party.

Victoria put on her Cinderella costume and we headed to Lumiere's. Each princess was announced and shown to a table. The princesses were given sashes and showed how to courtesy. Belle was the host of the event and Snow White, Alice, Rabbitt, Cinderella and her mice attended. The whole event lasted and hour. Each table received a tray with finger sandwiches and petite fours. It was a very nice event for the little girls. Victoria enjoyed spending time being a princess with Lara and Mary!

We changed for dinner. The kids went to Animator's Palate for a quick dinner then the lab while we dined at Palo again. Tomorrow is Panama Canal Day. The schedule was:

Pilot for Panama 7:20am EST

Entering Miraflores Locks 9:20am

Departing Miraflores Locks 10:40am

Entering Pedro Miguel Locks 11am

Departing 12 noon

Passing Gamboa 1:10pm

Entering Gatun Locks 3:50pm

Clearing Gatut Locks 7:00pm


We dropped anchor at 9:30pm to refuel and will be up early to see the whole process.

 

[RobinMarie]

Panama Canal Day

Mickey gave us a wake up call at 7am. Victoria took some convincing to get her up but she dressed quickly. The ship was moving slowly. We ate a quick breakfast at Topsiders. I was surprised to see the ship so empty and expected many people camped out in their preferred spaces. We sat on lounge chairs on deck 10 aft. Most people were crowded around the forward part of the ship. Victoria got bored quickly and napped in the lounge chair, along with most other children out on decks. I had a glass of champagne and watched the canal from aft and listened to the music. It was a pretty nice vantage point. The narration began around 8am and continued throughout the day off and on. Going through the first two locks was slow but interesting. After the first lock Victoria asked to be taken to the kid's lab.

http://community.webshots.com/album/444419899pztYTf

The weather was overcast and it drizzled off and on. It was the perfect weather to have for August in Panama. All that discussion about hats and sunscreen on the planning sites and you didn't even need a hat! I dropped off Victoria at 10am and headed to deck 4 for a different viewing point. I kept bumping into Fools all over. I saw Jason and Travis a lot walking the decks and taking pictures. (Hi guys, miss ya!)

I headed to my stateroom about noon for some air conditioning. I decided to do some laundry while viewing the canal from an interesting deck 2 perspective. At 1pm I headed up to deck 9 for lunch at the barbecue being provided on deck 9. I bumped into Lynn for awhile and we checked things out. I walked deck 10 for a time enjoying the pleasant cruising through Panama. I realized I enjoyed cruising while having land to look at. Fool Grumbo told me about his cruise through the Rhine River and how much he enjoyed it. I'm wondered what a cruise down the Mississippi would be like.

At 3:30pm Victoria's Nestle chocolate chip cookie experience was scheduled to end. Lynn and I met in the kid's lab and picked up the girls. We wandered around decks 9 and 10 viewing the final lock entrance. We were told we were running two hours behind. While on deck 9 we were looking at two captains steering the ship. We were told it was unusual to see two captains at the wheel. That's when we felt the boat hit the side of the canal. The Disney Magic is the maximum size ship that can fit through the canal. No one was hurt but it was startling.

We were running late and runned to change for dinner at 5:30pm. We were scheduled to be done going through the lock at 6pm. At 6pm we received a signed lithograph of Ducky Williams, cartoonist for Disney. It's pretty large and was tricky to bring home. I would later see a lot of tubes being sold for the purpose of transporting them. We checked out the lock at 6pm when we went to dinner and it pretty much looked like what we had seen. Victoria had seen enough so we went to the restaurant where a Mickey antenna top waited for each of us. We were given the menu to keep as well though all of our commemorative items have Cabo San Lucas on them.

After dinner I saw the comedian, Ken Block, who everyone had complained about in the atrium. It was told Disney received four letters the evening he performed. Apparently if you go to Guest Services to complain they ask you to put it in writing. I heard him saying something about having seen his show on shore and knowing what they were getting.


We went to the premEAR of the movie Valiant. I am glad we didn't go to see it in the theater. Victoria and Mary sat with little two year old Addison for half the movie. Addison got tired and her and her mother left the movie halfway through. The movie entertained the kids, but unlike most Disney movies, I wasn't loving it.


We went up to deck 9 and got drinks and looked at the stars. We went to bed to watch a Series of Unfortunate Events. We turned the clocks ahead another hour and were finally back our norm. The next night was formal night and everyone at our table groaned about it. We dragged the clothing onboard but aren't happy about the fuss. I also had my first high tea scheduled with the ladies!

 

[RobinMarie]

Monday August 29th

Day at Sea

Sitting on deck must be tiring because we slept until 10am, which was 9am before we moved the clocks ahead. We dressed quickly and went to breakfast at Lumière's. We sat with two other Fools from New Orleans who were very worried about their home and pets during the hurricane. After a hearty breakfast of pancakes with chocolate sauce, bacon and hash browns, Victoria was full and we went to Shutters to look at the pictures. They took a lot of pictures on Panama Canal Day. It was overwhelming trying to track down some pictures that I wanted. We went to the stores but found nothing interesting. We went back to the room and read for awhile.

After showering, it was time for tea with the ladies. Of course the kids lab was taking place on deck 10 at this time. Timing couldn't have been worse for the activities I wanted to do with the activities going on in the lab. They were building forts today. Victoria said it didn't go so well because it was very windy.

On my way to Palo I discovered a stowaway from the Canal. It was a HUGE grasshopper/locust thingie. This thing was gigantic.

Lynn had tried to get Palo tea reservations for this day but was unable to. She was with my reservation so it wasn't a problem. Most of the tables were empty. I don't know why it was not possible to get a reservation unless people do not keep them. The teas were good. I had the chai. The scones were delicious. They put out finger sandwiches, eclairs, fruit cakes, and served trifle. The best thing were the scones with jam. I later was told they do not open the entire restaurant for tea each afternoon. Good to know!

Marsha had made some tiaras for little girls and she gave one to Victoria and one to Mary to wear to dinner since it was Prince and Princess formal night. The girls loved them.

After a nice chat and my first tea experience, we left at 4pm and I gathered Victoria from the lab to get ready for formal night. We got to the room and prepared for formal night at leisurely pace. We headed upstairs to take some photos at 5:30pm. There were long lines for Mickey and Minnie in their best dress. We took a shot with Cinderella upstairs and caught the Genie heading down the hallway.

Dinner was in Lumière's tonight. The chef recommended the hot n sour soup which was absolutely awful. We all complained to Ancell about it who promised to talk to the chef. I had the fried ravioli which were delicious and the cioppino for main course. The cioppino was so-so but included decent seafood. Dessert included a white chocolate slipper filled with raspberry mouse. It wasn't very tasty but very cute to look at.

After dinner we took off our formal wear and went to the Walt Disney Theater to see the newest show, Twice Charmed. It is an excellent show. I do miss seeing Hercules but people will not be disappointed with this show. It was announced we will be staying in Curacao longer than expected tomorrow. I was glad as booking another boating event seemed silly after 5 days at sea. I wanted to be on land and have a chance to explore a little. The next night was pirate night so it will be tough to see the port and make it on board in time for dinner.

We set our wake up call for 6:45am and watched the Tigger movie until bedtime.

 

[RobinMarie]

Tuesday, August 30 Curacao

I was so eager for land I was up at 5:40am. I checked outside and saw land. Hurrah! I decided it was too early to get up and snoozed until my wakeup call at 6:45am. I ran up to deck 9 with my camera to take some shots in the morning sun and grab some breakfast. It was so hot and my camera lens fogged up coming from the air conditioning to the heat. I grabbed some breakfast and brought it back to the room.

Victoria woke up happy to have breakfast in bed at 7:30am. The workers were outside painting the boat almost as soon as we docked. They had a lot of repairing to do from scraping the boat in the Panama Canal.

We slathered ourselves in sunscreen and went out to meet the Bounty people at 8:50am. We met a few Fools before we left and we all left the ship together. We had a hard time figuring out where the Bounty people would meet us. We had booked the Bounty Pirate Adventure online and had filled up the boat's capacity with Fools. We met other groups and all 50 or so Fools took hired cabs for the thirty minute drive to the boat. We all paid our fare for the excursion. Total for us was 88ish dollars. We took a small boat out to the bigger vessel. We each climbed the ladder onto the ship, a challenge for most of us.

We sailed around the calm seas for a little while until we sailed out of the harbor and onto rougher seas. Many of us agreed we felt best when looking at the horizon and when our children distracted us, requiring us to look down at them, we felt sick. Soon we stopped at a site for snorkeling. It turns out to be the same area as the Disney's Spanish snorkel excursion. Most people snorkeled and some enjoyed swinging off the rope and dropping into the water.

The water was so blue and clear. It was so salty that floating was no problem. We had never snorkeled off a boat before and Victoria was having equipment troubles. Before I knew it I had lost my mask somewhere. We swam around a little while then took a break by climbing back on the ship. There was plenty of soda and pirate punch the whole time. Jason pronounced the pirate punch too strong and needed more punch, less pirate.

I had an excellent time getting to know SandyGirl, Darlene, a lot better as well as Ladypoo, Patti. Travis and Jason were a lot of fun to do an excursion with and wished we had more time to spend with them. Since they were on the later seating, we did not see them as much.

Victoria had a great time playing with Sandy and Dominique during the day. She was pretty upset I wouldn't let her swing into the water. I would have had to lift her to reach the rope swing and it didn't seem like such good idea.

Lunch was served. It included pasta salad, green salad, tuna salad, bread, seasoned rice, barbecued pork, ribs, and chicken. Victoria at more at lunch than she has all week. She loved the ribs. After lunch we grabbed different equipment and snorkeled again. This is the best water we've been in for snorkeling. We saw the sunken tugboat and many colorful fish. People reported seeing a turtle, a barracuda, and a squid.

At about 2pm we started heading back. This time the movement didn't bother me at all. We arrived back, boarded the taxis and got back to the boat at about 4pm. We showered and prepared for dinner. It was pirate night. We wish we had more time to spend in town but we really enjoyed this excursion.

I wanted to take some pictures of the port and tried blow drying the camera before I left the room. I had no difficulties with the camera fogging up when we went to the top deck for pictures. After taking pictures we went to dinner dressed in our best pirate wear. We were able to get Victoria to have a picture with pirate Minnie and Mickey.

Our entire table was dressed as a pirate and it was great fun. We really had a great time at our table, we could not have had better people to sit with each night! We passed out our pirate treasure bubble gum coins. It was a relief to be rid of the loot. The dinner menu was a rolled up treasure map drawing which could be kept. After dinner we went to the show.


The westbound repo cruisers had Boys to Men as an act. We were hesitant about our headline act: Susan Egan. She is the original Belle in the Broadway Beauty and the Beast. She also played the voice of Meg in Hunchback of Notre Dame. She had a pianist accompany here and did a fabulous show. She told stories and sang many songs. They played the animated part of Hunchback for Meg's song and removed the voice of Meg so it could be heard live and still have the backup singers. This was an excellent show. For her encore she sang When You Wish Upon a Star.

After the show we headed up to deck 9 for the Pirates in the Carribean Party. This is the first Pirates IN the Carribean party in three months, the others took place in the Pacific. At 10pm the party was in full swing and we left the port. Curacao set off fireworks as a departing celebration. We had been told Disney is considering Curacao as a regular port. The characters came out to dance, the line dancing was in full swing and everyone was having a good time. Those cast members dance up a storm trying to get the party in full swing.

A pirate came down from high on a rope when Captain Hook and the bad guys tried to take over the ship. Luckily Mickey and company took the ship back with a bang: The Magic's fireworks were all part of the pirate show. We had been warned by Rachel the cruise director that this was no Disneyland or Epcot fireworks but that they are the only ship to have fireworks. The show was pretty impressive.

There was a buffet set up of food and desserts. We weren't hungry and headed to be at about 11pm. We are scheduled for a character breakfast tomorrow but are undecided about it.

I am typing my entries offline then signing on to post them on the internet when I have time. The other night when I went up to the deck to post it took me about 15 minutes to post the entry. I would not recommend buying the wireless internet package if it continues to be so slow. I was reading through some of the posts and realized my spelling and grammar have been atrocious. Sorry!

All in all, this was a fabulous day. Somehow I got sun burned on my back and my pay for it later.

 

[RobinMarie]

Wednesday, August 31

My back hurt a bit but not too badly from the sunburn. Victoria insisted she wanted to do the character breakfast in the morning and got up with the wakeup call at 8am. I thought the breakfast was for 8:30am but it started at 8:15am. We were five minutes late and the only two people at our table. The other two families opted to sleep in.

We saw the fab five for breakfast and took their pictures. Victoria still waves her napkin enthusiastically for the breakfast dance. As usual, she ate very little because she was excited about the characters coming to see her.

After breakfast we posted yesterday's journal entry and bumped into Fool Grahame. We always seem to bump into him while we are posting the journal. Grahame was in line at Guest Services and Victoria notices he had some Disney pins on his lanyard. Victoria asked me if he was a 'pinhead'. It's the term I use to describe people who are obsessed with Disney pin trading. I assured her he was no pinhead but he was a Fool. Victoria fell asleep on the couch for a bit and Grahame took her picture. We went to see Jocelyn to inquire if rebooking with incentives would beat our price for the 8/19/06 cruise. It turns out because we booked so early it doesn't save us anything so we left our reservation as is even though I am hesitant about any future Mexican ports.

On our way back to the room I remembered commemorative pins were available for purchase. The woman showed Victoria the order form for pins and I asked her which one she wanted. Victoria chose the LA pin for 10 dollars. The woman asked if she wanted another and Victoria chose one with dolphins. Before I knew it I had spent almost sixty dollars on pins. She said she was very excited to have some pins and promised not to be a pinhead.

We went to Shutters to make some final decisions on photographs. There was one photo of Victoria I could not find. We gathered all of the photos we posed for and some candid shots and I spent a million dollars buying them. The man told me I got a free frame for buying so many. Free? Who is he kidding. I did manage to order Christmas cards, even though I haven't sent Christmas cards in three years. You just get so caught up in it all.
After we purchased our photos we went to Mickey's Mates to do some shopping. Victoria hadn't purchased anything in there with her own money and chose something ordinary and Polly Pocketish. Imagine how we laughed later when we found out her friend Mary bought exactly the same thing! We went to lunch in Lumière's at noon. This cruise I have enjoyed service much more so than last time. On the last cruise I spent a lot of time eating at Topsiders self serve buffet breakfasts and lunch. This time I have enjoyed leisurely breakfasts and lunches with full service in the dining rooms. It's a great way to meet and chat with other people.

After lunch we stepped into the atrium to pose for our Fool picture. There were a lot of people for that picture! The picture was available in Shutters later. With several hundred people in the shot you'd think they would charge less than the standard 20 dollars per picture but no such luck. Lynn and Peter dropped Mary and Victoria off at the kid's Lab and we enjoyed a few adult talks. We attended a question and answer session with Food and Beverage Managers and learned that we had two thousand pounds of lobster on board for this two week cruise among other interesting things. Dry dock changes in October will bring many changes to the ship, including making Scoops a deli-like station and increasing Pinocchio's Pizzeria.

Next we went to Captain's Corner where there was a question and answer session with Captain Tom and his officers. It was interesting. People had a lot of questions about the water. It was interesting to note how Captain Tom insisted the Magic did not hit the canal but it was the tension from the locomotives. He later said the Magic does not need locomotives to traverse the canal and the Magic could go on its own power. He said there are good pilots and bad pilots in the Panama Canal and he would not relinquish control over the Magic no matter what anyone said. We got the feeling he was not happy with the pilot the other day. Hmmm.

We went to Don Ducky Williams animation workshop. The power went out in the room and while we waited Don did 20 character sketches. He is the Senior Character Artist for Disney and does all of the advertising art for Disney. The girls paged us while we were waiting for the workshop and I ran down to the Lab to get them. The joined us for the workshop and we attempted to draw Donald Duck. Lynn's was the best at the table. Mine looked like psycho-Donald.

We showered for dinner and did some character pictures before dinner. It was out last dinner in Parrot Cay. It was hard to believe things were winding down. People started to talk about packing. Blech. After dinner we chatted with some Fools. Victoria is very taken with many of the babies and toddlers with our group. She especially loved Addison. Victoria played with Addison until it was time to go to the show. Kermit was tonight's show! Kermit appeared with comedian Mark Curry. They did a nice video of the crew interacting with muppets. The kids loved and it as well as the adults.

After the show we decided we wanted to see the Crew Talent Show at 10:15pm. Scheduling dropping the kids off at the Lab was tricky because they were in a movie and they ask there be no signing in or out during the show but it was unavoidable. We got in a long line to see the show and the crew played to a packed house. It was standing room only. The audience was so supportive of the crew they've come to know over the last couple of weeks. There was a very sweet guitar song by two men who sang two different songs together beautifully. Another man did a poem and another sang a song he wrote for his wife about the beautiful memories he has when he sails. There was comedy and a great dance/pop n lock dance by three brothers. Housekeeping, cruise staff, maintenance, dining room, mechanics, kids counselors were all represented in the show. They received a standing ovation. We were so glad we went. I wonder if this will be the start of something new.

We picked the girls up in the Lab and went to bed at 11:30pm.

 

[RobinMarie]

Thursday, September 1

We got up at 8:15am. I finally felt physically like I was back on schedule. I took bonine here and there but stopped using the patches. We have had very calm seas. I love it. The patch is effective but really makes me feeling foggy.

Victoria said she heard a knock at the door but I ignored it because the privacy sign was up. When we left for breakfast I discovered a bag with chocolate and rose petals in it. No note. I think it was some Fool who was being nice but I'm going to tell everyone it is my secret admirer. A secret admirer is nothing like Fool Amanda is experienced: a stalker. She had a stalker who called and followed her around the ship.

We went to Topsiders for a quick breakfast. I had a brunch scheduled in Palo with the Fools and had coffee. I wish Disney would break their contract with Nestle because I do not like Nescafe for coffee. Despite what our assistant server Lisa said, if everyone loved the coffee so much there would be no Cove Cafe where specialty coffees are sold. After breakfast we went back to the room to grab the computer and dropped Victoria off in the Lab at 10am.

I stayed on deck 5 and posted yesterday's segment. A little boy came over and sat next to me in a chair. He seemed very friendly and I found out he was six years old and his room is on the seventh floor. A six year old alone! I loved this two week cruise but I think the parents lost control a couple of days ago because there are packs of kids hanging out in corners and now they are as young as six!

After suggesting six year old Nicolas check into his room, I returned the notebook computer and went to Shutters and found two pictures I had been looking for, but still missing 'the one.' I spent more money on photos including a fabulous picture of Victoria with sorcerer Mickey.

I went to Palo at 10:50am and my brunch mate Janet was socializing with the other Fools. Janet is a single mother from Toronto who used to live in Connecticut until she returned to raise her daughter near her family in Canada. Her daughter is thirteen and is having a good time in the teen club. We sat with four other Fools but the restaurant. Brunch is excellent. We started with champagne cocktail and then enjoyed the stolen bread with berries and whipped cream. Shrimp cocktail, prosciutto with melon, olives, cheeses, sun dried tomatoes and king crab legs were next. Janet ordered eggs Florentine and I had the chicken parmigiana. We had a thin Italian sausage pizza with pesto which was delicious. Dessert was chocolate covered strawberries, key lime pie and cheesecake with ricotta. We rolled out of there at about 1:30pm.

We all went to our travel agent, Chuck Maida from All Seasons Travel to check out his suite and have a drink. The suite was a category three on deck 8. It has two bathrooms and a separate bedroom with big balcony and nice televisions. I don't think I'd ever leave the room! We had a nice chat with the Fools and I even got to meet our Fools from Japan!

Lynn and I got beeped at the same time from the girls wanting to be picked up in Animator's Palate. They do not like being there and paged us a couple of times from there. We went to Shutters again. We checked out the picture of the Fools the photographer took of us. Victoria is front and center but there are many Fools you can't see. Someone counted just over 200 Fools in the picture. Lynn bought one but I passed as it's pretty blurry.

We went back to the room and showered. I brought Victoria to the Lab to rehearse their farewell show at 4pm. When I returned I noticed a washer open and did the load of laundry. I was cutting it close and was able to toss the load into the dryer and ran to see the Farewell show. Lynn and Peter saved me a seat in the front on the right side but unfortunately the girls were hidden from our view and we didn't get to take their picture on stage. The show was shorter than I remembered but they got a t shirt and cap from graduating from Disney Cruise University.

Everyone went to pick up their child at 5:25pm and we rushed back to the laundry room to grab the clothes out of the dryer. I didn't have to bring home so many dirty clothes. I had done Victoria's hair before the show but the cap they put on her ruined it. It was semi formal night and Victoria wore her blue dress and the crown Marsha had made matched it perfectly so she wore it with the outfit. We were upstairs by 5:45pm to take pictures with Daisy, whose outfit was very much like Victoria's. She took some portraits and we headed into Lumière's for our final dinner there.

Semi formal night brings a wide array of dress. People dress glittery and some dress in jeans. For the most part I didn't notice what people were wearing on other nights but did notice more tonight. It's not worth fretting over formal wear and definitely next time I'll have everything pressed once I get onboard rather than try to keep it from wrinkling. Dessert was chocolate lava cake, the best chocolate dessert by far on board. Peter ordered a double lava order and Carol's son bet me fifty cents that Peter couldn't finish. I made fifty cents!

We heard the excellent speech again. I thought we made it clear we understood the excellent speech but we received an honest explanation tonight. Even though Disney gives you several areas to choose to evaluate service on, the only one that counts is excellent. I have heard rumors that servers get poor schedules if they do not receive excellent grades. I asked how many female head servers there are and Ancell assured me they had women: they have one now and the other left to start a family. One female head server is pretty pathetic. I told Lisa I expected to see her in a blazer as a manager the next time I sail. Disney might have sixty or so nationalities represented and a fabulous workforce but they are awful on the percentage of women in leadership.

After dinner we wandered around and took more photos and saw the Captain posing for pictures. Victoria was introduced to the captain and she said she saw him on the Disney channel. He seemed pleased. I was surprised Victoria was so eager to meet him. Carol was in line for the show and her boys wanted a photo as well so we took a picture for her. I hoped with all these Fools to have great access to thousands of photos I did not have opportunity or thought to take.

We sat with all our dinner mates for Disney Dreams show. This show has won an award for best in the cruise industry. It's a great show with all of the characters and ties in a nice theme. My favorite part is the beautiful woman in African garb who sings Circle of Life like nobody's business. After the show we bought a 6x8 frame in Mickey's Mates. It will fit one of the pictures I bought today nicely and has the Mickey cloud motif on it. We went back to the room.

I had packed the duffel bag earlier and got started on Victoria's clothes. I packed her suitcase up and have mine to pack the next day. We needed to have suitcases out by 10pm and then be out of our room by 8am the next day. Victoria wanted a snack and a drink so we went to deck 9 to have a cold drink and walked to Scoops to have an ice cream. The deck was pretty quiet at 10pm. We went back to our room.

Tomorrow is Castaway Cay day. Hopefully the weather will be calm and we'll have a great day there. The ship hasn't been there in three months since being on the west coast. Victoria is really looking forward to it. This has been a great length of a vacation. I don't know how I can go back to a seven night cruise.

In bed at midnight.

 

[RobinMarie]

Friday September 2, 2005
Castaway Cay

I will never use the AOL journals again. I should have saved this as a file but instead after I typed up the whole day’s events, it would not save and I lost the text.

Friday we got up at 7am. We stayed in bed for another hour. The skies were overcast but when I looked out the porthole I saw the site I recognized from a year ago. Castaway Cay, Disney’s private island, is a beautiful spot with white sandy beaches, blue water and the appearance of a desserted island.

We got off the ship after breakfast to find they were passing out two types of juices, red and orange. I was told the red was alcoholic. I was surprised to think people would be drinking alcohol at 9:30am. There were plenty of orange drinks. I grabbed an orange drink and we took the tram to the family beach area.

When we exited the tram we heard thunder. We were all herded under the canopy they claimed to be lightening proof. The food was ready at 11am but did not have the same taste as I remembered because it was sans the beach experience. Lobster burgers are very good after a morning on a sunny beach.

Lynn saved us spots on the beach and we were able to be there by noon. The kids played in the water for a few hours.

It was a great day and a nice end to our vacation. We headed back to the ship at 3:30pm. Victoria hopped in the shower while I finished packing. We returned the kids pager and took some pictures with characters. We went to our final dinner and said goodbye to our servers and tipped them.

After dinner we went to the final variety show. We attended the Until We Meet Again program and really enjoyed saying our final goodbyes to the performers and characters. In bed by midnight.

 

[RobinMarie]

Saturday September 3, 2005
Time to head home!


Up at 6am and in the dining room by 6:30am for breakfast. We headed out of the dining room by 7:30am and off the ship at 8am. The bus left for the airport by 9:30am. After two flights we arrived in Hartford at 8:30pm. It was a long day!



http://disney.ennis.tv/images/Movies/Disney Cruise Panama V1.1(High Quality).wmv

Some thoughts about the cruise:

Pros:

Best vacation we've ever had! Two weeks is not too long to be on board. I've heard from so many people who think they would go stir crazy but we thought it was a good length of time.

Cruising with an internet group is a great way to network, meet new people and make great friends!

High Tea in Palo is an excellent way to meet other people.

Photographers on board offer great opportunities for family portraits.

Being located near the laundry room is a GOOD thing!

Sailing in the summer was fine, the ports can be hot but I didn't think it was terribly worse than when we sailed in April.

Arranging private excursions rather than doing through the cruiselines is easy and saves a lot of money. The markup was huge on the Disney excursions. It can be a good thing if you are worried about time though, they'll always wait for you if you are on a Disney excursion.

Cons:

Packing was truly a nightmare. I brought too many clothes. Next time, less clothes and will just do laundry.

Victoria did not enjoy the Kid's Programming like she did last time. I wish there was a choice of activities for the kids. Often the girls did not want to be where the programming was scheduled to be for the next 90 minutes and we'd feel badly about the adult plans we had made.

I don't think I like Mexican ports. I think we prefer the islands better.

Seasickness meds work GREAT but I really liked sailing without them because I felt more alert and awake.

The coffee Disney provides is awful. As soon as I got to the airport I got a good cup of joe.

It's worth it to press your clothes rather than try to pack them without wrinkles. Skip the garmant bag and go with another suitcase.

I brought a roll of quarters which were not necessary. The laundry machines provided change. Those quarters weighed a lot more than my envelope of single dollar bills did. Next time skip the quarters

Thanks To...
All of my Fool friends who really made this an incredible experience!
Lynn and her family for being incredible travel companions
Carol and her family for making our dining experience and other events fun!
Jason for providing the glue which kept the Fools together and organized.
Everyone who provided some effort in organization or communication.
The disboards for being the start of our experiences.
YOU for reading this!

Faith, trust and pixie dust!

 

[Luv2Dream]

Robin,
Great report....thanks for the memories! ^5

 

[ladypoo]

wonderful report, Robin. I just found it.