The MR Halloween & Sweet Sixteen Trip Report! Finished 9/3~ See Ya Real Soon!

[Bonniec]

Yay! Thanks for the interest, guys! I'm uploading pics to Photobucket right this minute!

I'm really enjoying your pictures and I don't think there are enough pics of the older ships. I'm looking at a Magic cruise so very interested to see those ships.


Stitch is our favorite!!


Oh, and I have to ask....HOW was that cheesecake? Because on paper it sounds GROSS, lol. Is it cold or warm? I picture a sweet dessert cheesecake that they threw shrimp in and drizzled BBQ sauce.

 

[LittleGirlGrey]

Love this TR so much!!!

I SO want to be in WWTBAM!!!! I'm going on the Hawaiian Cruise in October *I hope our characters dress up!!!* with my DM! It will be our 4th cruise!

Where is this cruise headed to? I don't know if you said it and I missed it...

Can't wait for more!!!

 

[Schmoopsie Poo!]

I'm really enjoying your pictures and I don't think there are enough pics of the older ships. I'm looking at a Magic cruise so very interested to see those ships.


Stitch is our favorite!!


Oh, and I have to ask....HOW was that cheesecake? Because on paper it sounds GROSS, lol. Is it cold or warm? I picture a sweet dessert cheesecake that they threw shrimp in and drizzled BBQ sauce.

We absolutely love the classic ships! We haven't even gone on the new ones... The Wonder and the Magic are just so nostalgic!

The cheesecake. *sigh* Well, it's very rich (not exactly in a dessert type way though...) It's definitely savory and isn't as gross as putting shrimp and BBQ on, say, NY cheesecake. It's good, but not the best-thing-I've-ever-put-in-my-mouth. Tastes differ, and I definitely think it's the type of food that you either love or hate. I've been known to be on the "love" side, but this last time (in July) I didn't enjoy it as much. Try it! (It's free!) You never know: you might find your new favorite food!

Love this TR so much!!!

I SO want to be in WWTBAM!!!! I'm going on the Hawaiian Cruise in October *I hope our characters dress up!!!* with my DM! It will be our 4th cruise!

Where is this cruise headed to? I don't know if you said it and I missed it...

Can't wait for more!!!

Aw, thanks!

Here's hoping YOU get to be a mouseketeer too! You are SO lucky to be going to Hawaii! And if you're going in the last two weeks or so of October, I'm sure they'll dress up for you!!

This was a Mexican Riviera cruise. (The title used to say that, I *think*, but we've since changed it to describe updates and such.) Sorry for the confusion!

Glad you're joining us! *And I love your avatar by the way... can't wait for next season!*

 

[Schmoopsie Poo!]

Well, since this is a picture-heavy TR, we won't bore you with the details of this morning. Let's just say it was yummy, relaxing and Disney!

We would like to share with you some of the yumminess that was lunch at Lumiere's...

Butternut Squash Risotto: (this was absolutely scrumptious!)

Mango Cheesecake: (we can highly recommend this, too!)

The next TR-relevant event of the day was getting our semi-Halloween costumes on (we didn't want to take up too much precious luggage space for these...)

DD sneaked out early to get a few shots around the ship:

There was even a Halloween deck party!

About mid to late afternoon there was a trick or treat event with 8 candy stops around the ship. There was a flyer the night before in the stateroom that was specific to your area of the ship to control traffic. It was a cute event (cuz you know we needed more food to have around )

After we had completed all our stops, we started strolling around to try to glimpse our favorite pals in their Halloween finery (we think they looked pretty darn cute!)

We had a delicious dinner at Parrot Cay including a special Halloween dessert...(It's chocolate sponge cake, in case you were wondering!)

We even got DH to join on the Halloween fun:

We also saw some pretty cool characters after dinner, too!

Disclaimer: The characters seen in the next 2 pictures are not affiliated with the Disney Company and were specific to our cruise (in other words, these two super-cool guests got AWESOME costumes complete with voice changers...so we had to get a pic!)

(Back to Disney-affiliated characters! )

We loved Donald's costume! And he was so cute! He was running around in circles acting like a superhero... that silly duck...

All Halloween'd out, we checked out for the day...

 

[Bonniec]

Goofy's pants are lookin kinda tight!

 

[Schmoopsie Poo!]

Goofy's pants are lookin kinda tight!

I know! When you're as cute of a pharaoh as he is, I guess you can get away with that...

 

[Schmoopsie Poo!]

As day 5 dawned we were a *tiny* bit less than ecstatic now that our cruise was more than halfway over. But we were still determined to enjoy every second! (It was also DD's last day as a 15-year-old! But we'll make a bigger deal of that next update...)

We saw every member of the Fab Five at the pool today! And there were virtually NO lines for them. It was SOOOO much fun!! Here they are:

(DH was trying to tell us something in that one! But it's still a cute family pic...)

Awww...

And Minnie... oh, Miss Minnie... after the first couple initial "line-waiting" folks had gotten their pictures, there was NO line for her. At all. No one! So she and her attendant were dancing and having a grand old time together! We went up (after our pics) and started hanging out with her: asking questions (like who was the craziest character late at night... she said Goofy ) and telling her jokes (like one of my all-time personal favorites: What kind of car does Mickey drive? A Minnie van! C'mon... laugh! You KNOW it's funny... ). We also had a major Minnie photo shoot. It was so cool...(This isn't our photo shoot, just the pics her attendant took and another really cute candid shot)

Minnie was the last gazebo character for the day, so we were twiddling our thumbs, wondering what to do, when a friend of ours (a guest who we had seen in line several times throughout the week and with whom we had had a few conversations about the characters) walked by and told us that Ariel was strolling around on Deck 4! We couldn't miss such a perfect opportunity to indulge in our favorite onboard activity... so we hopped on down, and caught up with her in Studio Sea! She was just passing through, and talked with us for a minute or two then went on to find another adventure!

At this point, we were overdue for naptime, so we picked DS up and headed to our stateroom. An hour and a half later, we were rested and as piratey as could be! We headed out for our daily dose of pre-dinner character and saw three of our favorite captains!

We really enjoy the Pirate menu! One of DD's favorite entrees is the Shrimp and Scallops on Angel hair pasta:

And quite possibly our favorite dessert of the week is the rum-soaked chocolate cake: (Don't read anything into the "rum" part! It's just darn good chocolate cake!)

For more piratey fun, we stopped to see Stitch:

Minnie:

And Peter:

After some strolling family time, (we didn't have any interest in the movie feature of the evening) it was time for the pirate party! And, more importantly, the post-party food! A few buffet pics...

And on this, our fourth cruise, we finally took advantage of the turkey leg option! (I would show you our pics, but they're a little embarrassing... sooo...) We shared one and didn't eat nearly all of it. But at least we could say we did it! We were all tired out from our pirate partying, so we headed "home" to dream about looting and digging for gold... and such...

 

[kitty'sAuntie]

So good to see you back with more great pictures! That shrimp & onion cheesecake ..... sounds interesting. I'll have to try that!

 

[Bonniec]

Loving these pics. That's the first time I've gotten to see the pirate buffet.

Okay, dumb question but how do you get Minnie to talk to you? I thought they don't talk? lol

 

[Schmoopsie Poo!]

So good to see you back with more great pictures! That shrimp & onion cheesecake ..... sounds interesting. I'll have to try that!

Thanks! Yep, no harm in trying it! We love trying a whole heap of new foods... just because we can!

Loving these pics. That's the first time I've gotten to see the pirate buffet.

Okay, dumb question but how do you get Minnie to talk to you? I thought they don't talk? lol

Thanks! I can post some more pirate buffet pics later on today, if you want. We've got plenty!

Minnie would make hand gestures to her attendant (Robyn, who we hung out with a few times throughout the week) and Robyn would "help her out" and explain... Like for Goofy, Minnie just danced how Goofy does and Robyn interpreted. Good question! I realize I didn't really make that as clear I should have...

 

[Schmoopsie Poo!]

Well, as promised, here are all of our pirate buffet pics from three trips. Enjoy!

2011 Trip #1~

2011 Trip #2~

2012 Trip~ (Probably shouldn't be posting these, in case of a future TR... but oh well... )

 

[Schmoopsie Poo!]

And here's a picture of a firework... If you're so inclined...

Have a magical evening!

 

[Goldeelox9]

More More More!!! I love reading the Classic ship trip reports!

 

[kitty'sAuntie]

Those Pirate night desserts are beautiful! Is the buffet mostly desserts? I saw you had a picture of a sign for ham, and I've heard there are turkey legs. I'm just wondering how much room to leave for the buffet after dinner.

 

[Schmoopsie Poo!]

More More More!!! I love reading the Classic ship trip reports!

Thanks! More coming soon!

Those Pirate night desserts are beautiful! Is the buffet mostly desserts? I saw you had a picture of a sign for ham, and I've heard there are turkey legs. I'm just wondering how much room to leave for the buffet after dinner.

There are a lot of desserts, but there is also plenty of entree-type food. Bottom line: Leave LOTS of room! (If you're so inclined to eat another full-blown meal at midnight... )

 

[Schmoopsie Poo!]

As someone somewhere was singing the Circle of Life and day 6 dawned, we were simply too busy to be sad about the second-to-last day of our cruise! Because it was... DD's birthday! Happy Sweet Sixteen! I had bought her a tiara, a princess ribbon (you can see it on her shirt on the next pic), and a sash (which I misplaced somewhere along the line, so she didn't wear it.) so she was birthday-ready!

And what better "special birthday breakfast" could there be than... our favorite waffle breakfast in the whole world!

It was an absolutely gorgeous day in Cabo San Lucas!

But, like the ship-loving folks we are, we opted to stay on board to enjoy some sun, food and birthday relaxation. We certainly had the pool all to ourselves... which was wonderful...

Funnel Vision was showing the Little Mermaid, one of DD's faves, so we stuck around to watch. She took 24 pictures of the screen... (Keeping in mind, folks, that this is a movie we have at home and she has seen many, MANY times...)

Well, of course we had to see Donald while he was at the pool...

He "sang" to her... (conducted while his handler sang...) and insisted on a picture with just her...

as did Goofy when we bumped into him strolling later...

Lumiere's was also the lunch of choice, where we enjoyed the, yes, THE mango soup! (If you haven't heard my mango soup rant, check out "Our Wonder-ful MR TR", linked in our sig.) You see, after we enjoyed the Mango-Papaya soup so much in February, we arrived in October to find that they had (evidently) changed the recipe in Parrot Cay... But we were pleased to find it had simply been displaced to Lumiere's for lunch... so, we happily gobbled it up!

We also adore this turkey/thousand island sandwich!

And of course, we had to get as much dessert as was legal... Hot Chocolate Fudge Pudding...

NY Cheese cake...

And Key Lime Pie...

 

[Schmoopsie Poo!]

After lunch, we performed our normal afternoon-type activities including strolling around, looking for characters, and just hanging out. We also attended the Disney Vacation Club presentation in hopes of winning that coveted onboard credit... alas, we did not. After naptime and getreadytime, we were ready for semi-formal night at Animator's Palate. But not before a pic with the Goofmaster...

And our favorite mice...

Now, of course, this was the infamous lobster night, so we had to order at least twenty or so... (I kid, I kid... but we wanted to order twenty...)

DD ordered the Parmesan-encrusted chicken with fettuccine (YUM!!)

When dessert rolled around, we saw this...

And this...

And our servers sang to her! It was great.

After dinner, we strolled around for a while then headed to the room for present-opening... (as if being on a Disney Cruise for your birthday isn't present enough! ) We found these presents from our friends at guest services "just because"!

(There was a Pook-a-Looz stuffed animal for DD and DS, and arcade cards which we promptly used!)

We headed up to Deck 10 to play video games to our heart's content, and enjoyed some ice cream too!

At about 11, the boys were done, but we girls were just getting started because we were getting geared up for... the Midnight Buffet! (RIP... In July, we found out that the Midnight Buffet has been retired because "there wasn't enough interest" or something preposterous like that... )

(We always love how DCL has a server taking care of the chocolate fountain so there's not a mishap involving little ones... )

It was a beautiful night, and a perfect ending to a perfect day! In DD's words "Best. Birthday. Ever!"

 

[*999haunts]

Thank you for sharing...what a great looking family you have there! Our first cruise isn't until late next year so this is helping me bunches.

 

[Schmoopsie Poo!]

Thank you for sharing...what a great looking family you have there! Our first cruise isn't until late next year so this is helping me bunches.

Thank you! Always happy to help a fellow DISer! Enjoy all this anticipation!

 

[LittleGirlGrey]

YAY! I'm so glad she had such a fantastic birthday!!! I've had three of mine on DCL and my mom is having her first this October!!!! Disney b-days are the best!!!

Those desserts really make me want something sweet now!