Was live - now great memories from the April 26th Eastern Magic

Day 4 - St. Maarten!

We meet up at the spa and I spent time on the bike as the ship headed into the dock. We had 4 ships total in port today including Liberty of the Seas that has someone I work with on it. Our plan for the day is simple, take the water taxi into town and do some shopping, we may or may not stay for the Carnival parade. After doing my workout I meet up with Mark who is on deck 10 taking some pictures of us docking. We then hear that the ship has been cleared and we can go ashore. We grab a quick breakfast at Topsiders and then head out.
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The line for the water taxi wasn't too long yet (two of the ships hadn't cleared yet) and we made good time into town. Our first stop was Del Sol where we picked up 2 t-shirts for us and 2 jars of color changing slime for the Ohio kids. We also got free color changing lanyards and a free hat for Mark. Next was to Majesty where Mark had bought me a beautiful ring years before. Over the years a small chip happened in the opal and he was hoping to buy me a new piece. We were thinking of a pendant this time but everything was way out of our price range. No worries at all, the gold band on my left hand is my most important piece of jewelry. We decide to head back to the ship to relax and opt to miss the parade and the crush of people. After getting back to the ship we head to the mostly empty adult pool and relax there for a while, then a nice lunch at Topsiders.

For the afternoon we catch National Treasure 2 in the Buena Vista theatre. We rarely go to the movies at home but there are a lot playing on this cruise we want to see.

Dinner tonight is back in Parrot Cay and we get to watch us sail from Saint Maarten while at dinner. The show in the Walt Disney theatre is a movie tonight - College Road trip which we go see, cute movie! After that we say goodbye to the Ohio family, they are headed to the Pirate Party but we are opting to watch the fireworks from our verandah. There are no plans for a workout tomorrow as we report to immigration at 6:45 and our shore excursion at 7:15.

Day 5 - St. Thomas!

Up nice and early as we are heading into St. Thomas. A quick breakfast at Topsiders and then up on deck 10 for some pictures, we then make our way down to the Walt Disney theatre to check in. Immigration hasn't started yet so we are seated in the back center and wait our turn, once it starts it goes pretty quickly. We then go back to the room to get everything for our excursion and head down to the BV theater for checkin. The boat we are taking over to St. John, the Island Girl, is docked right next to us.
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It is a beautiful ride over and we are soon boarding a taxi and making our way to Trunk Bay. Our driver stops right before we get there on an overlook to show us the beautiful beach!
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As we enter the grounds we see the surf conditions are rough today and the visibility fair but it is a beautiful day and we are going to make the most of it. We spread out our DVC beach towel next to the lifeguard station in partial shade (we aren't beach and sun people). There are spikes that come with it to anchor it into the sand, nice! We then get our gear out (we bring our own snorkels and masks) and make our way into the water. There is a snorkel trail here that is marked with 3 buoys. I didn't think I would make it, but did pretty good once we got started. Mark took video out in the water and then went back for a second time to take some pictures. After resting a while we got our stuff together and headed up to the showers and spent some time after that just sitting and talking while waiting for time to leave. Like I said we aren't the type to lay in the sun for long.

We got back to the ship about 12:30 which gave us time for a quick lunch at Topsiders and then a change of clothes. We then headed out for a quick trip up to Paradise Point and them some shopping at the Havensight Mall.
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Back on board we took our showers and relaxed until sailaway at 4 pm. We went to deck 7 aft as we were leaving port and who did we meet up with but the Ohio clan. They had listed lifestyle portraits in the atrium and we wanted one done so we headed down early. Well the lifestyle portrait they did was with a black background not the white one. These are more close-up ones and since we were there we decided to do one. Karen and KT showed up and their family was going to do one as well expecting the white background. We all agreed we'd have to dress twice tomorrow night. Once for the lifestyle portrait and once for semi-formal night. We also took pictures with Lilo and Stitch (since we were in our Hawaiian wear) and one as a group with Captain Jack Sparrow since he had no line.
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Dinner was back in Lumiere's and I made Ivo very happy by ordering an appetizer. Well it was cheese sticks off the kids menu but it still made him happy.

There was a new show tonight. Alfred and Seymour a Hip Hop comedy show. We were beat and didn't go but I heard this morning from Karen and Mike that it was very funny.

We again agreed not to meet up in the morning as I planned to do some laundry.
 
Our last sea day

The cruise has reached the point where it is moving fast and the end is near.

Woke up this morning at 6 and headed out to the laundry. Some of the machines were already in use but I managed to grab 2 of them (one for whites and one for darks). I then headed down to deck 4 to walk a mile. It was overcast this morning and I thought I felt a little rain.

When I got back to the laundry room it was already getting crowded. So glad I already had my wash going. After switching out to 2 dryers I stopped by the room to pick up my book and then up to deck 9 to make some tea. When I walked out on deck 9 I realized it was pouring rain!

I made my tea and headed over to Cove Café where I would be nice and dry. Settled in with my tea, a piece of stollen bread and my book. One couple was in there and they seemed really worried that the rain would ruin their day. As for me I just relaxed with my book.

When time was up I headed back down to the laundry room to get my stuff. People were already claiming machines that weren't ready yet and getting upset that washers were finished but not cleaned out yet, I'm out of here!

Grabbed a quick breakfast and brought it back to the room.

Mark headed up to deck 9 to watch Cars on the big screen and I headed out to the Buena Vista theatre to see a presentation by Theron Skees a Disney Imagineer. Great talk with a Q&A session.

After lunch now and we are chilling and writing this report.
 
One thing I'd like to add - last night we had a *new* menu for dinner, 'A Taste of the Caribbean'. I have pictures, but, due to their resolution and the wi-fi here onboard, I'll be posting them and some pictures of the dinner selections when we get to WDW after the cruise.


About the servers, Mary already mentioned who ours are, and don't know any way of finding out who they are in advance, as the first time you'll know your rotation is when you get your KTTW cards when you check in at the port.
 
Quote by WDWLVR: Paola is our assistant server.

Mary or Mark, is the young lady, on the left in the photo below, your assistant server Paola from Mexico? If so, she was our assistant server back in August 2004. If I remember correctly, she was serving her first contract back in 2004 when we were on the ship. Our server that cruise was Prudence, she is the young lady on the right.

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Mary or Mark, is the young lady, on the left in the photo below, your assistant server Paola from Mexico?


Yes, that is definitely her! She's great, really on top of things along with Ivo, who both have been with DCL for multiple contracts already. :) She mentioned this might be her last go however, she's married, her husband has been busy setting up shop in Cancun. Where she gets to visit when the Magic is on a Western, and is looking to settle down with him for a while to start a family.
 
Yes, that is definitely her! She's great, really on top of things along with Ivo, who both have been with DCL for multiple contracts already. :) She mentioned this might be her last go however, she's married, her husband has been busy setting up shop in Cancun. Where she gets to visit when the Magic is on a Western, and is looking to settle down with him for a while to start a family.



Thanks!!! I'm not sure if she will remember us, but could you let her know that Andy, Hazel, Angelina and Vi said hello and we send our best wishes her way!!! :goodvibes
 
Thanks for the trip report - makes me think I am there with you --- :goodvibes And next week we will be driving to the Port Friday. WOW.....

Sylvester was our server in Palo on the Dec, Cruise....:thumbsup2
 
popcorn:: LOVE THE REPORTS!

I'm glad to hear you're able to get to the spa so much...I love it there!
Great details! I hope you have a wonderful day at CC today! :goodvibes
 
Hi guys,

Paola was our assit server also in July of 04. She was with Toto at the time. great team we loved them. we were a party of 18 with lots of boys so they may rememeber us.

Thanks for sharing your trip, have a great day at CC.
 
Thanks for the trip report - makes me think I am there with you --- :goodvibes
Sylvester was our server in Palo on the Dec, Cruise....:thumbsup2

Thanks for the reports. I LOVE THEM!!! Tell the Ohio clan "Hi" from the Scubas. Lisa and I especially wish we were there with you. Hopefully some other time.

Sylvester was our server on our Christmas 2002 Cruise (that seems so long ago)
 
Well it is Friday night and the bags have all been packed and taken away. The cruise is coming to an end. :sad2:

I must say this has been an awesome cruise and today was exceptional!

Yesterday we were in rough seas all day long. So much so that the thought we might miss CC crossed my mind. We woke to rough seas again today but as we passed Abaco they seemed to calm down. Before we knew it we were approaching the island, then the captain spun the ship around and backed in.

We headed down to deck 2 to wait to be cleared and soon we were on the island. Our goal for today was to hit the adult beach and do some snorkeling. We walked over to the tram for the adult beach and only had to wait a few minutes before we were on our way. We then picked two loungers under an umbrella, moved one of the small chairs in the middle to hold our stuff and unpacked. Sunscreen on, masks conditioned and snorkels in place we headed out. Tide was really low today. We walked out very very far and even at the buoy we could still stand easily.

We started out seeing just a few fish who seemed to follow us to get whatever we kicked up with our water shoes. Then we found some starfish that were beautiful. After about 1/2 hour of snorkeling we found the mother load at the man made reef. Tons of fish and they just seemed to hang around and let us watch them. It was great!

Mark took a ton of video and we only had to quit when the camera battery died. We headed back to shore to change the battery. I decided to relax on the lounger at this point while Mark went out for more. He was out maybe another 45 minutes and when I saw him headed back I ordered him a virgin konk kooler. We chilled a little longer, Mark just relaxing while I went and chatted with Amy. We then decided to have lunch. We've never eaten at the adult beach before so did that. It was like a mini DIS meet at lunch and we even got to chat with our server Ivo.

After lunch we headed back to the ship. We wanted to get cleaned up and start our packing. So we showered, rinsed out our suits, put them in a dryer and started the packing. Once that was done I relaxed on the verandah with my book. At 4:30 they sounded the all aboard so we moved down to deck 4 to watch everyone get on and the sailaway. The line to get on the ship was huge!

After sailaway we stopped by Shutters to check out our lifestyle pictures from the night before. We liked two of them so added them to the others we bought.

Our last dinner was back in Parrot Cay. I passed on Joanne and Andy's greetings to Paola and she seemed very happy to hear she was remembered.

Ivo and our Head Server Hemant made sure our cruise ended on a magical note.

We went to the Remember the Magic show which was fun and here we sit.

Tomorrow we head off to WDW and our Boardwalk home for 3 nights. We'll meet up with the Ohio clan one last time on Monday for lunch at Kona Cafe.

A great big thank you to all the DISers who participated in our meets thread over the past year and half. Special thanks to all those we got to meet in person. You really made the cruise special for us. It was so much fun running into everyone and everyone seemed to be having a great time. Of course how can you not while being on a Disney cruise!

We won't be too sad getting off as we'll be back on DCL in September when we board the Wonder for the DVC Member Cruise.

Thanks to everyone for reading!
 
Thanks for the TR Mark and Mary!!! Thanks for passing the message to Paola!!!

So hard to believe your cruise is coming to an end already. Have a MAGICal few days at WDW........:thumbsup2
 
Mary,

Thanks for the wonderful posts and pictures. The cruises just get better & better, don't they? :cloud9: Have a wonderful WDW visit.

Mark, we'll be looking forward to the pictures you promised! ;)
 
Thank you, Thank you, Thank you, for your wonderful trip report! It was so nice to read. We are booked for our first Disney Cruise for next May and we can't wait.

Reading your report made me even more excited!

I just saw you are from the Chicago area, me too. You sure picked a good week to cruise. We started the week in the 30's and 40's!!!! I think it might be 50 right now!!!!

Glad you had a good time. Thanks again for the report.

Could you bring a little warm weather home with you?

Enjoy WDW!
 
hi guys!! sorry I didn't contribute to this thread while on board, I hardly ever used the internet. It was so great meeting you Mary and Mark, and karen and family too and everyone else!! It was great running into you all on board, made the whole trip even more special!
 
Hi Mary and Mark,
Can't believe I didn't know you were going in April. Nice surprise when I came to DIS tonight. I always enjoy your reports. Walt and I are a bit behind you - 11 DCL cruises :worship:

We will be taking our 4th in June. Hope you are having fun at BWV!

Teresa
 
Thanks so much for sharing your trip with us......it brought back so many memories........we haven't sailed Eastern in many years but we'll be back next year for the Tortola trip..........thx again!!!!:thumbsup2
 
Glad everyone's enjoying. :)

As promised, here's the two menus that are new since we last cruised, at least one of these is brand new, the other, I think has been shown before, but I'll be repetitive.

First up, the Taste of the Caribbean(click on the images for a MUCH bigger one). In experiencing it, I'd more call it a taste of the tropics, myself, but still a good menu.

Front Cover:


Page 1:


Page 2:


Desserts, P1:


Desserts, P2:


And some selections from the menu:

Appetizer, Windwood Island Sunrise. I call it the Pineapple Condo, it's layers of pineapple with seafood sandwiched in between, and I wonder if it's a typo and should be Windward. :)
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Soup & Salad, Aruba Shrimp Salad:
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Soup and Salad, Chilled Pineapple Soup, check out the funky coconut crouton:
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Main Course, Caribbean Panfried Veal:
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Main Course, Vegetarian, Sweet and Sour Veggies with tofu fried rice, the s&s sauce on this is plain awesome:
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And, last, off the Dessert menu, Toffee Crunch White Chocolate Torte:
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This is, overall a great menu, but having been in both the Caribbean and The Hawaiian Islands, this menu comes across as far more pacific Tropical than Caribbean to me.

Next, the last night's menu, Around the World.
 


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