Two Trips to Paradise

[dolphingirl47]

Day 1: September 1st 2008

Today our adventure really begins. As per usual when we get to Orlando, we were wide awake by 5:00 am. I decided to unpack the new Macbook that I bought at the airport in the UK and make good use of the free wireless internet at the hotel. I had my heart set on the first DCL bus. I had heard that this leaves about 9:00 am. We left the hotel at 8:15 and the hotel shuttle dropped us in the right area for the Disney Welcome Centre. When we got there, the DCL transportation check in desks were not even open, but they allowed us to check in at the Disney's Magical Express check in. We were advised that the first bus would leave after 9:30 and were taken to the luggage cages where we were able to drop of our checked luggage. I went up to the terminal to go shopping in Lush (they still do a bath bomb in the USA that was discontinued in the UK about 10 years ago and just happened to be my favourite) and then to Starbucks for a Green Tea Frappuccino. I then went back down to meet up with DH who had found himself a seat near the Disney Welcome Centre. We decided to head outside to soak up the sunshine and watched the world go by. Close to 9:30 I went inside to check with a cast member where we would get the bus from. He advised us to sit down near the Disney Welcome Centre and they would come and get us when the bus has arrived. About 30 minutes later we were called and escorted to a queuing area. At 10:15 we were finally on our way. On the bus they showed a video about the Disney Cruise Line and the ships and when that finished, we were nearly at the port. I got my first glimpse of the Magic and started to well up.

There seemed to be long lines first at security at the entrance to the terminal and then again at check in, but they moved very quickly. We were in boarding group 4. We had some time to say "hi" to some people from our cruise meet thread. We were given some lanyards that some people on that thread had made for everybody. DH was a little reluctant at first, but when I explained to him that this was a good place to put his Key to the World card and photo ID, he soon changed his mind. Shortly after midday our boarding group was called and we proceeded through the Mickey ears. We had a photo taken, but that part is a bit of a blur. We entered the ship, were announced and got our first glimpse of the breathtaking atrium. The plan had been to go to Rockin Bar D where we could sign up for reservations for the adult only restaurant Palo, but somehow I got confused and we ended up aft instead of forward. A cast member tried to intercept us and wanted to send us up to deck 9 for lunch at Topsiders, but having read the Disboards for the past 9 months, I stood firm and we ended up eating at Parrot Cay on deck 3. Lunch was great and with that done, we did make a second attempt to find the bar where we could make reservations for Palo. I tried to make reservations online as soon as I could 75 days prior to the cruise, but was unsuccessful. When we got to the bar, they only had a reservation left for the first night, but that went as well before the cast member had finished his sentence. I was quite relieved as I did want to spend the first night in our designated dining room for that night. We had been assigned to Animators Palate for our first dinner and this was the only time we would eat in that particular dining room whereas we had two evenings at Parrot Cay and Lumieres. He did offer to put us on the waiting list for both brunch and dinner.

DH made himself comfortable in one of the huge portholes on deck 3 for a while until I became impatient. We had been advised that our stateroom would be ready at 1:30 and it was nearly that time. So we headed up to deck 6. When we got there, the corridors to the staterooms were still roped off and we had to wait another 20 minutes or so. When we finally got there, we were both blown away by how spacious it was. We had a sideways category 11 standard inside cabin for this cruise. Once we had a look around and put down our carry on bags, we decided to go exploring. We headed up to deck 9 and ended up at the Vista Spa. We were given a tour of the spa and instantly fell in love with the Rainforest Room, an area with heated tile loungers, two steam rooms, a mild aroma therapy sauna, a rain shower and a fog shower as well as an ordinary shower that had water coming from both the top and the sides. We ended up getting length of cruise passes for both of us. We then had a look at the pool areas and headed up to deck 10 for the view. We saw so many brown pelicans that it is hard to believe that they are an endangered species. Soon it was time to head back to our cabin to get our life vests for the mandatory safety drill.

The safety drill could only be described as a shambles. I have never ever seen something so badly organised and chaotic. This kind of put a big question mark over what would happen if there was really an emergency. The assembly area was far too small for all the people who had to report to it. There were also other people trying to get past us to go to their assembly stations. People were joking around and taking photos. For the most I could not hear the names the cast members called. Then an announcement came and we were all dismissed before they had finished calling names. Still, I was glad to get rid of my life vest.

We had decided against going to the sail away party. We headed to the Vista Spa and the Rainforest Room instead. I relaxed in a tile lounger. They are amazingly comfortable. DH did the rounds of the steam rooms and the sauna. Now I am normally a steam room kind of girl, but these steam rooms were a little bit much for me. The mild steam room was OK for 5 minutes or so, the other one was a definite no no. To my immense surprise, I really enjoyed the sauna. So I spent some time there and then headed back to a tile lounger. The showers kind of defeated me that first day. I could not get the fog shower to work at all and the rain shower was ice cold. We decided to call it a day and got changed. As we came out of the changing rooms, we headed for the gym that was completely empty at the time. The only people there were two cast members. We watched while we moved out to the open sea from the panorama windows at the gym and talked to the cast members.

Once we were out to sea, we returned to our cabin. Most of our baggage had arrived. However, I got a little worried that a package that had been sent to the ship had not arrived. I had ordered some custom jewellery from the USA for formal night back in July and that was lost by Royal Mail. So the seller made me another set and I asked her to sent it straight to the Magic. As I had been told that packages would be waiting in the staterooms, I was a little worried that it had not arrived. So I headed back to guest services. I started to think that this jewellery was simply not meant to be. Guest services made a couple of calls and then advised me that our stateroom host was on the case. About 15 minutes later, our stateroom host came with the package and the missing item of baggage.

We decided to carry on exploring. We had a walk round the promenade deck on deck 4, but could not go round all the way as they had closed off parts of it. We then had a look around the shops and said "hi" to the people at the DVC desk and were given some bright red DVC baseball caps. As we were not interested in the variety show that was on that night, we headed back up to deck nine. We got some drinks from the soda station and some fresh fruit from Goofy's Galley and sat down to watch the sunset. Close to our dinner time, it got very windy and the sea was getting a bit rough. We headed down to deck four and got in line for Animators Palate. Soon we were shown to our table. We were at a table for 8 with a couple from North Carolina and a couple from the Netherlands. The fourth couple did not show. I don't think that first night anybody knew what to make of the experience. We were first time cruisers and the couple from North Carolina were on their first Disney Cruise. The Dutch couple were repeat cruisers and they helped us to get into the routine. Our server team was wonderful as well. We had Toto from the Philipines as our server and Gidion from Indonesia as his assistant. They made us feel completely at ease and explained how dinners work on the Magic. The food was wonderful. I have to say I was bitterly disappointed by Animators Palate though. I suppose there is such a hype around that dining room and the reality simply did not live up to that. We saw none of the gradual addition of colour. Colour started appearing and then disappeared again and it went through this cycle multiple times. After we had been served our desert, our server asked us to stay behind for a while. All the servers left while we were shown video clips and then came back with colourful vests and ties. They were then joined by Sorcerer Mickey, which was the highlight of the show for me as I had never seen Sorcerer Mickey as a character before. By that time we were more than ready for our bed. We said good night to our table mates and went back to our cabin.

While we were at dinner, our stateroom host had been to do a turn down service and he left us an elephant made from towels as well as some chocolates. We went to bed and it was a bit of an experience to lay down on a rocking bed. After being a bit jumpy at first, I slept really well.

dolphingirl47

 

[tinkerbell34]

What a great first day Corinna! It sounds much more relaxed then our chaotic first night. I can't wait to read the rest!

 

[dolphingirl47]

Day 2: September 2nd 2008

We woke up shortly before 6:00 am and decided to go up to the drinks station on deck 9 for some coffee. With our coffees in our hands we headed further forward and saw the most beautiful sunrise. We saw some land in the distance and decided to hang around. Sure enough, the land soon turned into Castaway Cay. I got my first glimpse of this bit of paradise and I was quite sure that I have never seen anything quite so beautiful.

We decided to go and get some breakfast. I really wanted to try Lumieres as I had seen that they do Eggs Benedict for breakfast. This is one of my guilty pleasures and was quite fantastic at Lumieres.

After breakfast we headed back to our cabin to put our swim gear on underneath our clothes and pick up the sun block. When we got to our cabin, the message light on our phone was flashing. there was a message that our excursion for that day (Personal Watercraft Eco Tour, essentially a jet ski ride around the island had been cancelled).

So we headed out and decided to go straight to the adult beach at Serenity Bay. On the way to the tram stop, I had my photo taken with Daisy and both of us had a photo taken with the Magic in the background. When we got off the tram at the family beach, I encountered Pluto with hardly a line. So I needed a cuddle and a photo with him as well. Then it was onto the tram for Serenity Bay.

DH headed straight for the water, but I was a little more reluctant. I was just wading in the shallows. We saw other people with Inner Tubes and decided to go and explore where we could get them from. At $6 for the day they seemed like good value. We got one and DH was pushing me about while I was lounging in my gently moving Inner Tube. At some stage I decided to go for a swim, but I exited the Inner Tube and ended up swallowing what felt like half the ocean. Still, it did not deter me and once I had stopped coughing and spluttering, I swam back to the beach to reapply some more sun block and then it was back to my Inner Tube and more fun in the water.

Once lunch was served, we went over to get some food. This was essentially a barbecue with various breads and salads, but we really enjoyed it even though DH usually hates barbecues. We were joined for lunch be one couple that we were sharing the table with for dinner and this gave us a good chance to get to know each other.

After lunch we decided that we essentially had enough sun and that it was time to head back to the ship. DH had one last swim and I actually managed to find myself an empty hammock that I relaxed in until he had enough of the sea. We then headed back to the ship.

I decided to go to distribute my Fish Extender gifts, but only managed to do three decks as I had so many cabins to do. We attended the DVC member celebration and I won a great new beach towel and we were given all kinds of neat goodies like a captains log book with lanyards. They did not have any record of us being on board, so they gave us our goodies at the meet rather than putting them in our stateroom on our first night.

After, the meet we headed upstairs to the Rainforest Room and I chilled out on the tile loungers while DH made the rounds of the steam rooms. When we had enough, it was time for me to have a shower and then to head for the show.

The show that evening was The Golden Mickeys. This was kind of an awards show and I really enjoyed it. After the show, I browsed the shops for a bit and then met up with DH to go to dinner. The second night we had dinner at Parrot Cay and the food was again fantastic. The whole affair was a lot more relaxed than the first evening and we had a great time chatting to the other couples.

On the first night, the Dutch couple on our table mentioned to our assistant server, who was from Indonesia, that on the previous cruise they got to know one of the chefs, who was also from Indonesia, and that he cooked Nasi Goreng and Chicken Satay for them one evening and they wondered if that chef was still working on the Magic. He happened to be on his two months off the ship, but the on our second evening they were welcomed with a huge plate of Nasi Goreng and Chicken Satay each. They had also made some extra so that we could all try some. The rest of our table was not very adventurous when it came to food, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. I was absolutely blown away that in an environment where they have to cater for nearly 2000 people they would still be able to do something like this, just to make somebody's vacation that little more magical.

By desert we needed match sticks to keep our eyes open so we headed to bed after dinner. I was thrilled to find a towel swan on our bed that our stateroom host had made for us. Again we slept very well with a gently rocking ship rocking us the sleep.

dolphingirl47

 

[travelgirl06]

I went up to the terminal to go shopping in Lush (they still do a bath bomb in the USA that was discontinued in the UK about 10 years ago and just happened to be my favourite)
dolphingirl47

I LOVE Lush! My favorite shower gel was the "B Never to Busy to B Beautiful" which was discontinued in the U.S. (actually, we may not ever have had it, but my mom used to bring it home to me from the UK). Now you can only get it at the special "B" store (and of course, its pricey!). Have you tried the bath bombs at Basin? I have found a few I really like there too.

 

[dolphingirl47]

I LOVE Lush! My favorite shower gel was the "B Never to Busy to B Beautiful" which was discontinued in the U.S. (actually, we may not ever have had it, but my mom used to bring it home to me from the UK). Now you can only get it at the special "B" store (and of course, its pricey!). Have you tried the bath bombs at Basin? I have found a few I really like there too.

I do like Basin, but have always been disappointed by their bath bombs. I suppose I am spoiled by Lush. I do love their soaps and and the premium lipbalm though.

dolphingirl47

 

[Palmfam]

Thank you for a great review.
I really look forward to reading them.

Any tips for first timers??

 

[dolphingirl47]

Day 3: September 3rd 2008

This day was changed around quite a bit. As per itinerary this was supposed to be our day at Nassau. When we checked in at Port Canaveral on the first day, we received a letter advising us that this had been switched with our day at sea. However, the previous evening it was announced that we would be going into Nassau after all, but we would get there about an hour earlier as scheduled and all aboard would already be at 4:00 pm rather than 7:00 pm. After this the storm would come too close for us to be there prior to the end of our cruise.

We actually had a bit of a lie in that they and when we went down for breakfast we were docking in Nassau. We had no excursions planned nor had we made any other plans. From the ship, Nassau looks positively idyllic with all the pastel coloured houses.

We had breakfast and then we went to the adult pool. There were some people in the surrounding sun loungers, but the actual pool area was empty. I got as far as the first step on the ladder and then I turned around. The water was so cold. DH swam laps for a while and I was quite content to sit on the wooden surround with my feet dangling in the shallow pool overflow area. Once DH had done enough swimming, we relaxed in the hot tub for a while and then headed for the Rainforest Room.

Around 11:00 we decided that we should have at least a look at Nassau. So we headed down to deck one to leave the ship. We were the only ship in port. In order to get into town, we had to go through a craft market and we were followed around by people trying to sell us all kinds of stuff (taxi rides, city tours, horse and carriage rides, t shirts, bags, scooter rentals, hair braiding, you name it, they were trying to sell it). I was not too impressed. This picked up a notch when we left the port building. Only then we also had to content with the time share people and people trying to almost drag us into the various shops. I was decidedly unimpressed.

My watch strap had come apart during the night and I had that fixed while in Nassau. Dh got himself a pirate shirt at the Hardrock Café store. He was not really interested in Pirate Night before we left, but suddenly started to get into the spirit the previous night. He was also trying to get a parrot toy for his costume, but no such luck. We even were brave enough to check out the Straw Market, but left this again at the speed of lightning. We quickly checked out where the meeting point for an excursion that DH had arranged privately for our second stop at Nassau was and then we headed back to the ship less than 90 minutes after we left it.

I was quite hungry by then and decided to have some lunch at Topsiders. The food was great, but I really did not care for the restaurant. It just seemed cramped and chaotic. The outdoor seating area was closed due to high winds which did not help either. Still, I had great views of Atlantis, which is truly stunning.

DH had booked the beer tasting so he went to that shortly after lunch. I decided to hang out in our stateroom for a while and then I headed off to the Martini tasting that I had booked. I had never tried a Martini before, but as I like most cocktails, I thought it would be worth a try. I got there a bit early and started chatting to one of the bartenders who was from Ireland and his contract would end at the end of this cruise. It was so nice talking to him. The Martini tasting itself was great it was just the right mix of being educational and getting to try some different Martinis. We got a Classic Martini, that we had the option to turn into a dirty Martini, followed by an Apple Martini, a Pomegranate Cosmopolitan and a Chocolatini. The one that I was looking forward to the most was the Chocolatini, but I did not really rate this at all. My favourite was the Apple Martini. I ended up sitting with a couple from the Disboards and once the class was over, we stayed behind and chatted for a while. It was so nice to have the chance to get to know some other Disboarders. I have to say, I was not too keen to get up. Even though the Martinis were quite small, they definitely had packed a punch and I felt pleasantly merry.

When I walked by one of the other bars, they were just getting ready for a session of Bingo. As they were also giving away limited edition pins as prizes during the session, I decided to have a go. Even though I did not win anything, I still had a lot of fun.

I decided to have some timeout and headed back to our cabin only to find DH working on his Pirate Night costume. He had got himself a Webkins Toucan from the Mickey's Mates store and was trying to attach it to the t shirt that he had got earlier in Nassau. This was a sight to behold!

The show on that night was some comedian and I was really not interested in this. So I decided to go to a trivia challenge instead. This was quite a humbling experience for me. I am normally quite good at trivia and I did great on the Disney questions, but there were lots of fairly obscure American history questions and even questions about the American school system. I had no chance there. Still, I enjoyed it and non-alcoholic drink of the day (some Mango and Mint concoction - very tasty) that I had during the quiz helped me to get over the after effects of the Martini tasting.

Now that DH was getting so in the Pirate Night spirit, I thought I better at least get myself a Pirate t shirt as well. I got a great t shirt with all kinds of characters dressed as pirates on the back and a modified Disney Cruise Line logo (with a skull and crossbones instead of a Mickey head) on the front. I also picked up an eye patch and a big gold clip on hoop earring for DH.

On the way back to our cabin, I encountered Stitch in Pirate costume. So I just had to get a photo with him. This turned out to be one of the best character interactions that I ever had. Stitch was in a mischievous mood and I was more than happy to play along.

When I got back to the cabin, I got changed into my pirate shirt and put temporary pirate tattoos, that kind people had left in our Fish Extender, on both of us. DH also put on some pirate medallions and his eye patch and earring and then we were ready for dinner. We made a small detour via the Disney Vacation Club desk as we had a message on our phone that they had some loot for us. We got some really nice Disney Pirate tattoos which I decided to keep.

We still had a little time until dinner so I convinced DH to have a proper portrait taken in the lobby. He looked so cute in this pirate outfit that I wanted photograhic proof of this evening. Once the photo was taken, we headed for Parrot Cay, where we were having dinner for the second night running. When we got there, they had bandanas and a special treasure map menu waiting for us. We again had a wonderful dinner and had lots of fun wth our table mates. Our serving team had realised that we were all big kids at heart and started to perform magic tricks in between courses and at the end of the meal. It was so funny. Unfortunately the dessert was the only disappointment food-wise that I had that week. I had ordered the white chocolate cheesecake and it was absolutely tasteless. Other people on our table had ordered other desserts and they were not too impressed with their choices either.

After dinner the others went up to deck 9 for the Pirate party, but we were so tired that we headed straight to our cabin. I went in first and looked on our bed. I was quite sad when I did not see a towel animal. I turned around to put my lanyard on the coffee table, and there it was. Our stateroom host had made us a monkey that was hanging from the curtain rail of the privacy curtain. The monkey was even wearing my sunglasses. Shortly afterwards DH came in who had been talking to somebody in the hallway. He looked over to the bed and looked so disappointed. I did not say a thing. Then he spotted our latest cabin mate and a huge smile lit up his face. We headed for bed. I can remember hearing the fireworks in the distance while dropping off.

dolphingirl47

 

[dolphingirl47]

Thank you for a great review.
I really look forward to reading them.

Any tips for first timers??

Only two:
If you are travelling with older kids or just adults, seriously consider late seating. We had late seating for the first cruise as we booked this only about 4 months in advance and that was the only seating that was available. This is much calmer and somewhat more leisurely than main seating from what we saw. On the second cruise I had requested main seating when we booked the cruise, but we changed this as soon as we got on the ship.

Have a look at the Rainforrest Room on the first day. We got length of cruise passes for this on both cruises and practically lived in there.

dolphingirl47

 

[BigDaddy7]

Day 3: September 3rd 2008

After dinner the others went up to deck 9 for the Pirate party, but we were so tired that we headed straight to our cabin. I went in first and looked on our bed. I was quite sad when I did not see a towel animal. I turned around to put my lanyard on the coffee table, and there it was. Our stateroom host had made us a monkey that was hanging from the curtain rail of the privacy curtain. The monkey was even wearing my sunglasses. Shortly afterwards DH came in who had been talking to somebody in the hallway. He looked over to the bed and looked so disappointed. I did not say a thing. Then he spotted our latest cabin mate and a huge smile lit up his face. We headed for bed. I can remember hearing the fireworks in the distance while dropping off.

dolphingirl47

That sounds like the magic!

 

[dolphingirl47]

Day 4: September 4th 2008

Today was our day at sea. We actually managed a bit of a lie in and did not get up until 8:30 am. While we were getting dressed, DH put on the bridge report. I suddenly noticed that it was showing Port Canaveral as next port of call. This got me a little bit worried as we were due for our second stop at Castaway Cay the next day. Still, the weather looked glorious so we ventured out.

Breakfast was at Lumieres as usual and then we went up to deck 9 for a swim in the adult pool. Well, I should say DH went for a swim. The water was decidedly too cold for me so I sat on the side for a bit dangling my feet in the water and then headed for the hot tub.

I left DH by the pool while I got changed and headed down to deck 4 to Studio Sea where I attended a cooking demonstration. The chef showed us how to make Ratatouille stuffed chicken breast (very similar to the dish I had on our first night at Animator's Palate). We got to try some and it was absolutely divine. We also got to take away the recipe and I am sure I will try to cook this at some stage. After the cooking presentation we got to taste a white wine that would go well with the meal. To my immense surprise it was a Chardonnay that I actually loved. I am normally far from a Chardonnay fan.

Once the demonstration/ tasting was over, I headed back up to deck 9 where I found DH in the gym. I decided to wait for him in the Rainforest Room where I managed to get a tile lounger and just relaxed.

Once DH had enough of the gym and had changed, we went for lunch. As the buffet theme for the day was seafood, which I hate, we ended up yet again at Lumieres where we had some great burgers. After lunch we went back to our cabin to chill out for a bit.

We had tickets for the Tequilla and Margerita Tasting and decided to go to the bar where it would take place a bit earlier. By the door we bumped into one of the couples whom we were sharing a table with at dinner. We decided to sit together and chatted until the tasting started. This was quite an experience. I love Margeritas, but have never tried Tequilla on its own. First we tried four Tequillas and then we got to try a classic Margarita and a Strawberry Margerita. The first Tequilla was quite hard work as it tasted very strong, but they got progressively smoother and there was one that I really like. The classic Margarita was nothing to write home about, but I really liked the Strawberry Margarita. The educational part was a bit of a disappointment. I had expected it to be interactive like the Martini tasting the day before, but the person holding the tasting was just talking and talking and lost all of us after about 10 minutes. Still, the company was good and I tried some drinks that I would never have drunk otherwise, so I was glad that I went.

After the tasting DH decided to go back to the cabin to sleep off all the Tequilla. The other couple and I decided to go to Bingo. They had cocktail each, but if I had another drop of alcohol at that stage, I would have been found underneath the table fast asleep. So I decided on a Virgin Colada that was very nice and diluted the alcohol somewhat. We had a great time and received some goodies like temporary tattoes, stickers and postcards in between the games of bingo. At the exit, everybody was given another gift and I ended up with a Disney Cruise Line mini flashlight keychain.

I headed back to our cabin to see if DH was still there. We decided to head down to the attrium for the Captain's Reception. We felt decidedly underdressed. This night was formal night and the people with early dinner seating were already in their formal gear. Still, we had a complimentary cocktail and checked out what photo opportunities there were and headed back to the cabin.

The show was Twice Charmed which I had really wanted to see prior to the cruise. This is the only one of the three Disney shows that is only shown on the Magic. So I knew this would be my one chance. Still, when it came to it, I did not fancy going and decided to give myself more time to get ready for dinner. We also decided to get down in plenty of time to allow us to have photos taken.

At this point DH saw my evening gown for the first time. I had managed to hide it from him as I was worried that he would refuse to go on the cruise if he found out about this beforehand. I love dressing up, but he hates it. Anyway, he wore a nice pair of slacks, a shirt and vest and a Disney tie and he was happy with this. He actually really loved me wearing the evening gown and I felt like a princess.

I went downstairs a little bit earlier as I had read in the Personal Navigator that Minnie and Mickey would be out in their formal clothes as well and I really wanted a photo with them. The resulting photo is one of my all time favourites. I do not have many photos of myself that I like and this is definitely one of the best.

Once I had my photo taken, I went down to the attrium where I met up with DH. We were offered another complimentary cocktail, which we declined. We had our photo taken with the captain of the Magic. It was obvious that he rather would have been somewhere else, but it still makes a nice souvenir. We also had our photos taken in front of the Steamboat Willy statue and in front of a backdrop of the Magic at night. Then it was time for dinner.

We were in Lumieres for dinner. It was kind of strange as we had so many meals there already and yet, it was our first dinner there. The menu of the evening was the Captain's Gala menu, which was too fancy for me. Oysters and lobster is really not my thing. I ended up ordering pasta with cheese crusted chicken breast, which was very lovely. Our serving team were on great form as well and we really had a wonderful dinner. After dinner, we headed straight to bed. We quickly checked what towel animal we had been left (a bunny) and the we fell asleep.

 

[nokidz]

Great trip report. needs some pics!

 

[dolphingirl47]

Photos will be added shortly. I managed to work out the scanner and uploaded everything to Photobucket. Now I just have to add them to the trip reports. I am working on the latest installment and that will have photos added.

dolphingirl47

 

[dolphingirl47]

Day 5: September 5th 2008

We woke up at 8:20 am to a lot of movement. The captain had announced the previous evening that we would be heading for Castaway Cay and the all ashore time would be 8:30 am. The fact that we were still moving at full speed at 8:20 am was not too promising. DH switched on the Bridge TV channel and all we could see was huge waves. We checked the information channel and that was talking about storm force winds and waves of 25 to 30 foot. It was fairly obvious to us that we would not be going to Castaway Cay that day.

We headed to Lumieres for breakfast and just as we were finishing, the captain made an announcement that we would not be able to Castaway Cay as the island manager had reported sustained winds of 50mph. He also said that no port within reach would be able to accomodate us and that we therefore would have another day at sea. I was a little worried. A few months ago there had been reports of near riots on the Wonder when the stop at Castaway Cay had to be called off. As I knew that many people had booked this cruise especially because of the two stops at Castaway Cay, I thought things could get ugly very quickly. Fortunately not so. I did not even hear any complaints or utterances of disappointment. Everybody just seemed to get on with their day.

We decided to head back to our cabin to await the revised Navigator and to do our packing. On the way I saw that Cinderella was in the attrium with no line to speak of. So I decided to get a photo with her, while DH went ahead. After a while we got tired of waiting. The stateroom hosts seemed to have no idea that they needed to get out new navigators. I headed down to guest services to pick up a navigator. On the way I spotted Minnie in her nautical gear and that was too good an opportunity to pass up. Dh was watching the impressive waves from the large portholes on deck 3.

Dh decided to go for a swim and I went to finish off my Fish Extender gift run. DH had his own private wave pool. Somebody on our cruise posted this video:
Disney Magic Adult Pool 9-5-08

The pool was closed at the time of the video being filmed, but it reopened shortly afterwards and it was stlll pretty lively then. DH is a pretty strong swimmer and as done most of his swimming in the ocean, but he said he was slammed into the sides of the pool on a number of occassions.

Once I had done my rounds with the Fish Extender gifts, I went to our stateroom to get changed into my swim wear and to pick up my book. I went to look for DH who was working out in the gym and then headed for the Rainforest Room. I found myself a tile lounger, picked up the book ... and the next thing I knew was DH coming up to me aftyer his workout. The warmth of the tile lounger and the rocking of the ship had sent me to sleep. About half an hour later he came back after having done the rounds of the steam rooms and the sauna and I was asleep again. I suppose I must have needed it!

Once I got woken up the second time, we decided to get changed and get some lunch. As I really did not enjoy my lunch at Topsiders, we headed down to Parrot Cay for the buffet. The buffet had a steakhouse theme and was delicious.

Having missed the show the previous day, I decided to go to the matinee of Disney Dreams. This show was absolutely fantastic and had me go a little bit misty-eyed. After the show I met up with DH as we had planned to go to the jackpot bingo. DH had one look at the crowd and turned around. I decided to still go for it and met up with one of our table mates. Her DH had opted out as well, but we had great fun, but neither of us won anything.

I headed back to our cabin and shortly afterwards DH reappeared. He got quite friendly with the Cast Members who are working in the gym over the course of the cruise and one of them offered DH a boxing lesson which he duely took.

I convinced DH to come to Who Wants To Be A Mouseketeer with me. This is essentially a version of Who Wants To Be A Millionnaire, but with a Disney spin. Unfortunately the computer did not pick us. I would have loved to win a special pin. Still, on the way to the game show I had checked in on the Officer's Pin Trading and managed to trade for some neat pins.

After the game show, we headed for dinner. One of the couples was eating at Palo that night so there was only 4 of us, but we really enjoyed our last dinner together. We were lingering a bit longer than usual being sat that our first cruise was nearly over. When we got back to our canin, we put our luggage out for collection before admiring our latest towel creation (a snake wearing my sun glasses) and retired to bed where we were once again rocked to sleep.

dolphingirl47

 

[pjstevens]

Corinna, loving your TR... I am so jealous of all your great photos! I need to do another cruise and get all those wonderful pics. Can't wait to read more.

 

[pjstevens]

Ok Corinna, where's part two? Let's hear about your second cruise a day later.

 

[disneydiva16]

Hi Corina...great TR. Cant wait to meet you on our Oct '09 cruise!!!!

 

[dolphingirl47]

Part two should be on the way shortly. I have everything typed up to including Nassau day and just need to get around to format them and post them. I have two days off coming up after tomorrow ...

Corinna

 

[dolphingirl47]

Day 6: September 6th 2008

We had a slightly earlier start today as our first cruise was unfortunately just about to come to an end. When we came down to deck three for breakfast, we came across a huge line of people waiting to get of the ship. We sat down next to the portholes near the Promenade Lounge on deck three, when I suddenly heard some excited voices. I looked out of the port hole and realized that we had visitors. There were three dolphins swimming in the harbor basin near the ship. This was the closest I have ever seen wild dolphins. Unfortunately soon I had to give up my grandstand view as our restaurant opened for breakfast.

We had a bit of a surprise. When we got to our table, there were two people there that I had never seen before. The fourth couple had finally made an appearance. To my immense surprise, this made me feel really uncomfortable. I suppose we had become so used to and comfortable with our usual table mates, that the last minute addition unsettled me. Unfortunately one of the other couples had left prior to breakfast. They were from North Carolina where hurricane Hannah was forcasted to make landfall that day. So I can understand that they wanted to get home as soon as possible, but it was a shame that we never got the chance to say goodbye. The new couple quickly ate some breakfast and left. We kept looking through the restaurant windows to see how many people were still waiting in line to get off the ship. We ended up having quite a leisurely breakfast. Our server team were really excited. During the ship's time in dry dock they would be moved into the guest staterooms. Our server had been allocated a suite and was really looking forward to this. While we were still in the restaurant, they started to strip tables and stack chairs. This kind of took some of the magic away.

Eventually there were not many people waiting to get off the ship. So we said goodbye to the other couple, got our carry on and headed for the gangway. We did not get very far though. Just as soon as we had left the ship we were asked to wait in the hallway of the terminal with a large number of people. We kept hearing that this is very unusual and that disembarkation is usually a quick and smooth process. Eventually we were allowed to go down to the baggage hall and we found our baggage very quickly. Clearing customs was painless as well and soon we had been released back to the real world. As soon as we left the terminal building, we were asked by a member of staff, where we are going and directed to the shuttle pick up point for our hotel.

This is were the problem started. Apart from us there were 2 other families waiting. We kept seeing the shuttles for our hotel go by, but none of them stopped. All in all we waited about 90 minutes. For us it was not really a problem as we were staying there for the night before going on our next cruise the following morning. The other families had parked their cars at the hotel for the duration of the cruise and were in a hurry to get on their way. It was interesting to see how quickly the ship was loaded with supplies. A large number of contractors went on board. Deck 9 was soon filled with containers. It was hard to believe that we were up there only the previous day.

Eventually one shuttle did stop and we were taken to the hotel. The guy organizing the shuttle was very apologetic and explained that the problem was caused by one of the ships getting in very late. He did check for us that he had us on the list for the next day and confirmed that we would be on the first shuttle the following morning.

To our surprise, we were able to check in straight away when we got to the hotel. We got a lovely, newly refurbished room near the pool. We had originally planned to visit the manatee park that is near the hotel, but after we have been told that it is a 2 mile walk, the sun was beating down and we were actually pretty exhausted, we decided against it. I made good use of my MacBook and the the free wireless internet at the hotel while the sun was at its strongest.

We decided to get some lunch and ended up at Subway. I am always intrigued how much nicer the food is at US fast food restaurant compared to their UK counterparts. I had a prime rib sub that had me positively drooling.

After lunch we headed back to our room as it was simply too hot to be out and about. When I checked in, I had left a message for one of the couples on our cruise meet thread as they were the only people for whom I had the full name. I had to spell my name three times to the person at reception. Shortly after we got back from lunch, the phone rang. It was one of the people for whom I had left the message. She thought it was somebody else from the cruise thread as the message that was passed on was simply "Your friend is in room ....". Anyway, she mentioned that they were heading to the pool so shortly afterwards I headed out there too. We had been chatting on the forum since late last year, but had never seen each other. I was scanning the crowd at the pool trying to figure out who they might be. Suddenly I saw some people waving from the opposite side of the pool and sure enough it was them. While we were chatting by the poolside, another family swam up to us, who were also from our cruise meet thread. After saying 'hi" to everybody, I headed back to our room.

Later in the afternoon, DH and I went for a swim. The pool was fantastic and after 5 days of the relatively small pools on the ship, this felt like the ocean. Another big difference was that the pool was warm enough to tempt me to get more wet than just my toes.

We were still really tired so we just had dinner in the hotel. They have a Seafood Buffet at the hotel on Saturdays, which kept DH happy and I just had something from the regular menu. After dinner we headed straight to bed to get a good night's sleep before the second part of our big adventure.

dolphingirl

 

[dolphingirl47]

Day 7: September 7th 2008

I had set the alarm so that we would be up in time for breakfast, but of course we were so excited that we were awake long before breakfast started. So we packed the few things that had gotten unpacked the day before and then I made good use of the free internet access while we were waiting for the restaurant to open.

The children of one of the families on our cruise meet thread had no idea that they were going on a Disney Cruise, but were under the impression that they were going to Seaworld as a birthday treat for the older of the two boys. Everybody on the cruise meet thread was in on the plans for the big reveal at breakfast. So I really wanted to be there when the boys got told. It ended up being really low key and I missed it all. Still, breakfast was lovely. No Eggs Benedict in sight, but cooked to order omlette and biscuits and gravy more than made up for this.

After breakfast, we collected our luggage and went to the lobby to wait for our shuttle to the port. All the families on our cruise meet thread that stayed at the Radisson the night prior to the cruise had managed to get on the first shuttle slot of the day. We were really looking forward to travel together. As it turned out, there were multiple shuttles at that time and we ended up traveling to the port with only one couple from our cruise meet thread. Even though I had just got of the Disney Magic the previous day, I felt a big lump in my throat when I got my first glimpse of the Disney Wonder. I could not believe when we actually turned away from the Wonder and headed for the Royal Caribbean terminal. We had some passengers for the Mariner of the Seas on the shuttle, who were dropped off first. Finally we were on the way to the Disney Cruise Line terminal and we were lucky enough to get boarding number 2 (1 are the suite guests). We had been told that there was a problem with the check in system and that therefore check in was delayed for a bit .We were actually the first people in line at the repeat cruiser desk, but they chose the party behind us in line for a trial run for check in. This was just as well. When we got to check in, for some reason the system had picked up the previous cruise in the reservation system when they scanned DH's passport and gave an error message that the debarkation date had already passed. They had to call a supervisor who managed to straighten everything out.

At the hotel they had passed out letters, that stated that no changes had been made to our itinerary. I took this with a pinch of salt. Sure enough, at check in we were given a letter from the captain advising us that we would have our day at sea first and that we would go to Nassau on the Tuesday and to Castaway Cay on the Thursday. Our original itinerary was Nassau, Castaway Cay, Day at Sea. This change of plan left us with a problem. DH had booked a private bird watching excursion in Nassau for the next day. We tried to ring the tour operator from the pay phones at the terminal, but were unable to do so as it was a long distance call. Fortunately I had insisted to bring my I Phone and we managed to make call with this. It being a Sunday, we only got a messaging service and we were still not sure if the day for the tour could be changed.

I had spotted Mickey in his white captain's outfit and decided to get in line. Of course, knowing my luck, just as I got to the front of the line, they took Mickey in and Goofy came out. I was a little disappointed but I got some wonderful photos with Goofy.

Pretty much as soon as I had my photos taken our boarding number was called and we walked through the Mickey ears again. We had our photo taken in the hallway just before we entered the ship and then I was on the Wonder. I actually prefer the atrium of the Wonder to the one on the Magic. It looks more sophisticated.

I had originally requested main seating when I booked the cruise as I figured we would be jetlagged and would not be able to cope with the late dinner seating. Of course, by this time we had been in and around the USA for a week and had late dinner seating the previous week and really enjoyed it. So our first job on the Wonder was to go to Wavebands to change our dining arrangements. Fortunately there was no problem changing us to the late seating. We even were able to keep our rotation and our table number.

Once we had that taken care off we decided to d to our favorite place - the spa. We had a little tour and then we were introduced to the port day specials. I had never had a spa treatment before, but decided to go for Cleopatra's Massage Ritual first thing in the morning on our Castaway Cay day.

After we had done our little bit of exploring, we headed down to Parrot Cay for some lunch. The food choice was not as good as on the Magic, but there was still food that we liked. This was the only time on both cruises that we experienced the draw backs of Disney being such a family orientated cruise line. We were surrounded by screaming and misbehaving kids and the parents did nothing to stop their kids making themselves as nuisance.

After lunch we headed down to our stateroom. For this cruise we had an outside cabin. Although the porthole was nice, I preferred the layout of the inside cabin that we had on the Magic. There were loads of lovely surprises in our cabin when we got there. We had booked the Romantic Escapes at Sea package and for that we received a bottle of chilled champagne, two white chocolate champagne flutes filled with dark truffles and a collapsible wine cooler with Disney Cruise Line logo that contained two bathrobes with Disney Cruise Line logo. As we were now repeat cruisers, we also received a Castaway Club gift that consisted of a beautiful black and red beach bag with Castaway Club logo, a red net bag with the logo, a pen, notice book, two sport bottles and a pencil case with colour pencils, eraser, pencil sharpener and a stencil. I did notice that our length of cruise passes and our letter that would let us know when our romance turn down service would be and the card on which we could order our champagne breakfast were missing. I headed to guest services and they told me that it was showing as delivered on their system. They asked me if I had my voucher for a free photo and that was missing as well. They promised they would look into it for me. I also asked if we should have received tickets for our Palo brunch and dinner and I was advised that no tickets are issued for this, but that our dinner was reserved for the Tuesday and the brunch for the Wednesday. I nearly fainted. Wednesday was now the Castaway Cay day and DH had a morning excursion booked. I especially asked her if this was correct as the brunch is normally only offered on the sea day and I was advised that they could not change all the brunch reservations just because the sea day had changed. I was decidedly unimpressed. I headed back to Wavebands with full intentions on canceling the brunch and ended up speaking to the restaurant manager for Palo who advised me that all brunch reservations had been moved with the sea day and we had a reservation for the following day. He actually came back to guest services with me to have a word with the person who had misadvised me.

Once all of this was taken care of, I went back to our cabin to collect DH. We decided to do the walking tour of the ship. For any first time cruisers on Disney Cruise Line I would really recommend this as it is as fantastic orientation of the ship. For us it was not quite so valuable as the layout of the Wonder is pretty much identical to the Magic, but we still enjoyed it.

We had arranged a DIS meet by the Mickey pool at 3 pm so I headed up to deck 9 for this. I was hoping to meet some other people from our cruise meet thread, but the only people there were the same people that stayed at the Radisson the night before. Still, it was nice to meet up again and exchange first impressions. Soon it was time to get back to our cabins to pick up the life jackets for the safety drill.

After the debacle on the Magic, I was really worried about this, but there was no need. This was so well organized. Everybody got ticked off as we approached our station and they were just calling the numbers of the cabins that they had not seen coming past just in case they had been missed. One family was thus found, but loads of people simply had not shown up. Later in the afternoon we saw letters outside the doors of the cabins that did not show up. Before we knew it, there was an announcement that marked the end of the safety drill and we were dismissed.

When we came back from the safety drill, our suitcases had already been delivered. We also had some vouchers for the Rainforest Room passes on our bed. So we headed up to the spa to have our Key to the World cards marked accordingly.

I had passed on the Sail Away Party on the Magic so I decided I should at least give it a go on the Wonder. I went up to deck 10 as deck 9 was far too crowded. I have to say that it was not really the Sail Away Party that I was interested in. I had read that the staff at the terminal would wear Mickey hands and wave the ship off. This was really what I had come for. It was worth hanging around for this. Having brown pelicans flying really low over the ship definitely added something to the experience as well.

Once the Sail Away Party was over, I decided to go and find DH who had disappeared earlier on carrying his telescope and tripod. I found him near the Wide World of Sports deck. We actually managed to see the Space Shuttle on the launch pad through the telescope. Suddenly something caught my eye that I thought might be dolphins. DH did not believe me at first, but suddenly it became very obvious that we had company. The first of many pods of dolphins was playing in out bow waves. We were escorted out to sea by various pods of dolphins. It was so great to watch.

 

[dolphingirl47]

Day 7 - Part 2

Once we had moved out to the open sea, we headed for our favorite place, the Rainforest Room. Although most of it was identical to the Magic, there were some differences. On the Magic there was a tea and chilled water bar just in front of the entrance and that was missing on the Wonder. The tile loungers were not nearly as warm as on the Magic, but that was actually a bonus as they were sometimes just a little too warm on the Magic. The outside of the fountain in the middle of the room changed colors and soft music was played, which made the whole experience even more relaxing. The only real drawback was that the mild steam room had no lighting whatsoever on the Wonder and was pitch black. I did not feel comfortable with this at all.

Once we had enough of the Rainforest Room, we went back to our cabin to get changed for dinner. The missing paperwork for our Romantic Escapes at Sea had arrived in the meantime. I quickly did my first Fish Extender run and then we headed for dinner.

Dinner that night was at Parrot Cay for us. To our immense surprise we were sat at a table for four. We had been sitting there a little while on our own and we were getting a little worried that it would be just the two of us, when the other couple arrived. How things can change! When we first got on the Magic, I would have been grateful if it had just been the two of us, but now I really wanted company for dinner.

Dinner that first night was diabolical. We had been seated for nearly 45 minutes, before we were even given the menus. The drinks order took forever to get to us and people around us had almost finished the main course, before we even had our appetizers. Our server did not seem to be able to cope. He just seemed monosillabic and harassed. After we were so spoiled with the serving team on the Magic, this was a bitter disappointment. The food was another disappointment. I could hardly eat the Cream of Sweet Onion soup that I had loved so much on the Magic. This version just tasted of raw alcohol. Our assistant server tried his level best to rescue the meal. He was absolutely brilliant as of day one. I don't know what had gone wrong this evening, but I saw tempers flare with other serving teams, so it must have been a bad evening all round. Our head server was brilliant. She ended up helping out towards the end of the meal and was really apologetic. She offered us a free drink with our dinner the next evening.

This evening we actually went for some of the evening entertainment for the first time. They did have a Match Your Mate show at Wavebands. I really wanted to play, but DH was not quite so enthusiastic. Still, we had a blast just watching. They also do a mean Pina Colada on board the Wonder.

On the way to our cabin, we bumped into our assistant server who was manning a dessert buffet outside Tritons and we had a really nice chat. I had commented that if I had known that there would be chocolate covered strawberries on offer, I would have passed on dessert. He told us to wait and came back with a selection of chocolate covered strawberries to take back to our room.

We headed back to our cabin where we found a towel boat on our bed, but no navigator. We also had a gift from DVC in our cabin. We fell into bed and the gentle rocking of the ship sent us straight to sleep.