"Will it still be MAGICal?" A Honeymoon Trip Report - Updated 10/31!

[michellem1118]

When we woke up on the morning of Aug. 2, we still needed to decide whether to keep our lunch ADR & head to MGM, or head to one of the water parks. At this point, we had one day left on our 7-day no expiration park hoppers to use in the parks, but 6 entries to water parks/Pleasure Island/DisneyQuest. So, with the upcoming cruise in mind, we decided to head over to Typhoon Lagoon instead.

Usually, we start our trips to WDW with a trip to a water park, because DH really likes the water park PhotoPass cards, since they have the wrist strap thing. He thinks they’re easier to use than the cards they give you in the other parks. By Saturday morning, after two days in the parks, we still hadn’t had a single PhotoPass picture taken, and DH was really looking forward to some of the silly shots we always end up with at the water parks.

We hopped on a bus, and got to TL around 10:30. The parking lot was packed, so we were a bit concerned about the crowds. We went straight over to grab a locker, and then headed back to Crushin’ Gusher. On our last trip to TL, we ended up with some really great pictures as we came down Crushin’ Gusher, so we were hopeful that we’d end up with some cute ones from the honeymoon as well. We went down all three slides, and every time, the THREE PhotoPass photographers at the bottom were too preoccupied to get our picture, which really irritated us.

After that, we hopped into Castaway Creek (I think), the lazy river, and floated around for an hour or two. Around 1:00 or so, we decided we were hungry, and headed over to get some food. I had a pepperoni pizza, and DH had a grilled chicken sandwich. After lunch, we went to play in the wave pool for a while, then debated hitting the snorkel lagoon with our waterproof digital camera. We decided to check the time, and realized it was already 3:00. We had 7:30 reservations at Citrico’s, so we decided to head back to OKW to shower and get ready for dinner.

Around 6:00, we decided to head over to the Grand Floridian, since we’d never been over there before. We took a bus to the Magic Kingdom, then hopped on the resort monorail and rode over to GF. As soon as we arrived, we went to find Citrico’s so we’d know where it was. Then we walked around the resort until it was time to check in for our reservation.

We were seated, and they surprised us with personalized menus… unfortunately, since I’d made the reservations in my maiden name, the menus were personalized in the wrong name… and it was misspelled! I’m sure they would have reprinted them for us if we’d pointed it out, but for us it wasn’t worth it. I do all of my scrapbooking digitally, so I figured I could just change the name after I scan in the menu. For dinner, DH started with the Seared Tuna Carpaccio, and I had the Arencini. For the main course, one of us had the Kansas City, and the other had the Filet Giardiniere, but I forget who ordered what. They were both delicious! For dessert, DH ordered the tropical fruit crème brulee, and I had the seasonal berry gratin. We also both ordered hot tea with dessert. Dinner at Citrico’s was definitely worth the two dining plan credits, and we’d definitely eat there again.

We had hoped to finish dinner before Wishes started at 9:00, but of course we didn’t. Meals at WDW always take so much longer than eating out at home – both because we order more food and because we actually sit and take our time with the meal. After we finished eating, we took the monorail back over to MK, and considered going in… but ultimately decided that spending an hour or so at MK, all dressed up, wasn’t worth using our last day of park entry, so we headed back to OKW to pack up and get ready for the cruise.

Up Next: How we almost missed the bus to Port Canaveral, and the start of our “wonder”ful cruise.

(p.s. sorry for the lack of pictures on this day, I’m not sure why we didn’t take any… but there are a ton coming up once we’re on the cruise, I promise!)

 

[michellem1118]

the next update is coming soon, for those of you still lurking here...

 

[irky416]

Sounds like you had a nice day. I would be bummed too if I didn't get any pictures.

I can't wait to see the pictures from your cruise!

 

[VanniGirl]

the next update is coming soon, for those of you still lurking here...

I'm still here

 

[tink1957]

Patiently waiting on an update. I can't wait to read about your cruise.

 

[michellem1118]

Sunday, August 3, 2008

We woke up around 8:00am, got ready for the day, and packed the remainder of our belongings. We’d been told to leave the luggage with bell services before 9:00am, and we had breakfast reservations at Olivia’s at 9:30.

We headed out just before 9, pulling our luggage behind us. We noticed we’d just missed a bus and decided to just walk to the Hospitality House, since it wasn’t far. Of course, we were wearing our bride & groom ears.

As we walked, the bus pulled up beside us and stopped. The door opened, and the driver said to DH, “You should be carrying your bride, not your luggage. Hop on!” How magical! We were the lucky recipients of an unscheduled bus stop. That can’t happen often, even in Disney, and we were impressed. We dropped off our luggage and headed to breakfast. I don’t remember what we had, but it was very good – and I don’t typically like breakfast food, so this is saying a lot.

We finished breakfast around 10. We weren’t supposed to meet for our DCL pickup until 11:45 (well, they said no later than 11:45), and the bus was scheduled to leave at 12:00, so we had a lot of time to kill. Since we were so close to DTD, we decided to go do some souvenir shopping at World of Disney. We made it to DTD by 10:15, and just before 11:00 we were back at the bus stop for OKW – we didn’t want to be late! We sat and watched as bus after bus stopped at our stop, but none of them were going to OKW. Finally, at about 11:30, a bus arrived. When we got back to OKW, the DCL bus was waiting. We ran straight over to the DCL employee to check in, and she wasn’t going to let us on the bus! She said she’d already checked off everyone with reservations to be picked up at OKW, and they were getting ready to depart. DH started to get mad, and kept telling her our names, while I fumbled around in the carryon bag for the DCL transfers that said we were to be picked up at OKW. Finally, she found us on her list, and told us to go ahead and board the bus.

We got on board, and got seats right near the front. As DCL lady went back to the Hospitality House to get the other checked-in passengers, DH darted over to the General Store & bought us a bunch of bottles of water using the rest of our DxDDP snacks, and got some cash from the ATM. He made it back in time, and we settled in for the drive to Port Canaveral. The bus left OKW at 11:50am – that’s TEN minutes EARLY – so we were very thankful that we’d managed to get back in time.

The drive to PC was uneventful. They showed us a cute video (much like the ME video, only DCL-themed), and then played some old Disney cartoons for a while. The video stopped when we were about 10 minutes from PC, and I knew from reading other TRs that we should be able to see the Wonder soon. Thanks to our seats near the front of the bus, we were in the perfect location to spot our ship as we approached. When we finally saw her, we were so excited!

The bus arrived at the port just before 1:30, and the excitement on board was palpable! They gave us some short instructions, we grabbed our carryons, and headed off the bus to security. Security took a while, and then we headed up the escalator to the check-in area. The lines were LONG. All of the busses from Disney resorts arrive at about the same time, and it seemed everyone was a first-time cruiser. The Castaway Club (repeat cruiser) check-in had virtually no line at all. After what seemed like forever, we finally got to the check-in. The CM was so nice! Even though the reservation had my maiden name on it (as did my passport), she first printed me a KTTW card with the married name as a souvenir, then reprinted it with the name that matched my ID.

We headed straight over to the Mickey Head to board the ship, and were on board just after 2:00. We took our embarkation photo (which we didn’t buy), were announced, and then headed to our stateroom to put down our carryons. On the way, we stopped to take several photos of the large chandelier in the atrium, which was created by artist Dale Chihuly. DH & I went to see a Chihuly exhibit on our first date.

We found our stateroom, 6082, and walked inside. We found a lovely card from Minney & Mickey on the bed, along with our excursion tickets & dining tickets.

I took a few pictures of the stateroom, and then we headed off to get lunch and explore the ship. We headed up to the Beach Blanket Buffet for lunch, and had a small snack. We weren’t starving since we’d eaten a big breakfast, but we had the late dining rotation, and we didn’t want to be starving by 8:15pm when it was time for dinner. Again, I can’t remember what we ate, but I know we enjoyed it. Then we walked around the ship some more, before deciding to head back to the room to get ready for the lifeboat drill.

While we were waiting on the lifeboat drill, our stateroom host came by with our luggage, so I pulled out the door magnets I made and decorated the door. I learned about door decorations on here on the disboards, but it didn’t seem to be as popular on the Wonder as on the Magic. We only saw one other door with decorations the whole cruise!

Around 4:15, they sounded the alarm so we headed down to deck 4 for the lifeboat drill. While there, we noticed a sea turtle swimming alongside the boat. He’s the orange blob in the center of the following picture (hey, they wouldn’t let me get up close to the railing, we were in the middle of an emergency drill, lol).

The lifeboat drill is really short, so when it was over, we ran back to the room to drop off our lifevests, and then headed to the Sailaway party.

We watched it for a bit from deck 10, and then headed to the adult pool. DH really wanted to swim, but I wanted to watch the ship push off from port, so we compromised… we watched the ship leave port from the adult pool area, and as soon as we were headed out to sea, we hopped into the pool. I freaked people out by jumping in with the waterproof camera. I took some silly underwater pictures with the camera while in the pool and hot tub. We enjoyed the bulk of the first evening in the pool, and then headed back to the room to get ready for dinner.

Our dining rotation was TAAP, which meant we had dinner at Triton’s on the first night. We headed down to the atrium a little after 8, and got in line to wait for the doors to open. At exactly 8:15, they opened the doors, and CMs handed out hand-sanitizing wipes as you walked into the dining room. We were taken to our table, and within a few minutes had been joined by our tablemates. We were at a table for 8, and were joined by another couple on their honeymoon, as well as a nice family from Argentina. We also met our serving team, but their names escape me right now. They brought us our menus, and we began the first of our amazing meals on board the Wonder. I believe DH & I both started with the shrimp appetizer. I had the beef entrée, while DH had the lamb. For dessert, I had Cherries Jubilee, and DH went with the Grand Marnier chocolate soufflé. As we finished dessert, the head server for our section came over with “Congratulations” cakes for us and the other honeymooners at our table. It was really cute, although the cake wasn’t great.

We finished dinner around 10, and headed back to the room, where we discovered our first towel animal of the trip.

We headed to sleep, anxious to begin our next day at Castaway Cay.

Up Next: Did we get attacked by stingrays? What happened when I got “lost” in the snorkeling lagoon? Did the DVC presentation end up costing us money??? And LOTS of pictures from Castaway Cay!

 

[tink1957]

Sound like a great start to your cruise, I can't wait to read more & see your pics.

 

[michellem1118]

I'll have the next update up by Saturday! I haven't forgotten about my loyal reader... or readers... I've just been really busy with work.

 

[Mickey'sMainMami]

I can't wait to hear more!! Soooo sorry that you started out your trip not feeling well, but am glad that it wasn't so bad to keep you in bed the whole time!! I want to do a cruise someday, we were talking about it maybe 2010, so we will see! Again, thanks for writing and can't wait for more!!

 

[VanniGirl]

I'll have the next update up by Saturday! I haven't forgotten about my loyal reader... or readers... I've just been really busy with work.

Understood

Hopefully there will be lots to read shortly!!

 

[michellem1118]

Monday, August 4, 2008

We woke up bright and early, excited for our first day in Disney paradise. We had our first excursion of the cruise, Castaway Ray’s Stingray Adventure, booked for 9:00am. We donned our swimwear, grabbed our snorkel gear, and headed up to the buffet for breakfast, since we hadn’t been cleared to debark the ship. I have no idea what we ate, but it was tasty, and provided the necessary fuel to get through the morning. Around 8:30, the gangway was opened, and we headed off the ship onto Castaway Cay.

(Please note, these pics were taken on our second stop at CC – we were in a hurry to make our excursion the first morning so we didn’t stop for pics – but they fit well right here)

We hopped on the tram and headed down to the family beach, then began the rather long hike to Castaway Ray’s stingray lagoon. We checked in for the excursion, and were told to have a seat on some benches behind the check-in shack. A bit after 9:00, we were greeted by Jen, the stingray caretaker who lives on CC! She gave us a quick lesson on the types of stingrays we’d be interacting with, taught us the “stingray shuffle,” the special way to walk so you don’t accidentally hurt one of the rays by stepping on it, and explained how the excursion would work. We also learned that Disney keeps the barbs trimmed on their rays (it’s like clipping their fingernails) so that no one accidentally gets barbed. Soon, we headed down to meet the stingrays.

Since it was early, the stingrays were hungry, and they swam right up on the ramp to be fed. They’ve been target-trained to eat off a Mickey head, and will swim straight to it when it’s placed in the water. We took turns feeding the stingrays for a few minutes, and then around 9:30 were told we could snorkel in the lagoon with the rays. The rays were really friendly, and would bump up against our legs while we stood in the water… they even played “chase” with us for a bit – they’d swim away from us as long as we were following them, but as soon as we stopped or went another direction, the rays would swim back towards us. We have LOTS and LOTS of pictures of the rays… I’ve included a sampling of the best ones here.

The excursion ended at 10:00, so we headed down to the snorkel lagoon near the family beach. We’d heard there was a sunken Mickey in lagoon, and we wanted to find him. The theme of the island is a shipwreck, so there are also other shipwreck-type “artifacts” hidden out in the lagoon (like treasure chests, etc). We found some lounge chairs near the lagoon to drop our stuff, and DH headed over to the lifeguard stand to get the required life vests, and ask where Mickey was. Turns out, Mickey had been removed for cleaning & repair, and Minnie was there in his place. The lifeguard told DH that the more interesting sites were marked by buoys, and pointed out which buoy marked Minnie’s location. We put on our snorkel gear again (including fins this time) and headed out into the lagoon. We found some interesting things.

Eventually, we made it out to where Minnie was located. Here’s DH diving down to say hello to her.

After seeing Minnie, I noticed a buoy out near the far edge of the snorkeling lagoon. I told DH I wanted to swim out there and see what it was, and he said he’d be right behind me. Unfortunately, even with life vests and flippers, it can be pretty difficult to swim in ocean currents. By the time I made it out to the buoy, DH was nowhere to be found. Here’s what was out there:

After snapping the pictures, I headed back towards the shore, trying to find DH. Every few minutes, I’d stop swimming and look around for him. Finally, after about 15 minutes, I (quite literally) bumped into him. He was still heading towards the far away buoy, so I told him I’d meet him back at the lounge chairs, as I was getting tired. He agreed, and I continued my way back to the shore… until I got caught in a current. I ended up out beyond the edge of the family beach and had to swim along the buoy-rope to get back to shore. When DH finally emerged from the water a few minutes later, he had a similar story of getting “lost” in the lagoon. We decided that we’d had enough of snorkeling, and decided to head down to Serenity Bay, the adults-only beach.

We walked over to the tram station, where we saw this “hidden” Mickey in the rafters:

When we arrived at Serenity Bay, we decided it was time for lunch, and headed over to Cookie’s. I believe that I had some sort of seafood skewers, and DH had ribs, then went back for steak. We also both had some sort of salads from the buffet. While eating, we saw this little guy:

After a delicious meal, we headed out to the beach, and again found some lounge chairs to stow our stuff. As we headed out into the water, we bumped into the other newlywed couple who shared our table for dinner. We spent the next few hours hanging out with them in the ocean, discussing our weddings, our real lives, and our 3 days in Disney before leaving for the cruise. While there, we found a real, live starfish. This picture of him (or her?) was taken under the water… we made sure to protect it and not let people pick it up or take it out of the water.

Around 3:00, we decided to head back to the ship, since we really wanted to go to the DVC member celebration at 4:00. We took the tram back to the main beach area, then began the long walk back to the ship. Once onboard, we briefly enjoyed the view of CC from our verandah, and I snapped this pic of DH with the Flying Dutchman in the background.

Then we headed to the member celebration. We enjoyed tea and cookies and played DVC trivia. We were lucky enough to win a beach towel, even. Of course, the point of the member celebration is to get people to buy more DVC points, and they gave us some literature about the specials for purchasing on board. We took it with us, although we were confident that we didn’t want to take on that added financial responsibility right now. The member celebration wrapped up around 5:00, and we headed out to explore the ship. We walked around for a little while, then decided we wanted to see the show before dinner. Since it was Pirate Night, we didn’t need to worry about getting dressed up for dinner, so we headed straight to the Walt Disney Theatre, stopping for a few character pictures along the way. I need to scan in the ones we bought, but I’ll add them in later.

The show was a juggling comedian, and the family show was pretty entertaining. We enjoyed the hour-long show. When the show ended, we still had an hour or so until our dinner seating, so we sat out on the deck and enjoyed the ocean breeze while we waited.

Our dining rotation had us in Animator’s Palette tonight, but since it was Pirate Night, we didn’t get to see the “show”. Our newlywed friends were dining in Palo tonight, so we expected it to be us & the Argentinean family for dinner. We showed up right on time, and 15 minutes later, our server took our order even though the family hadn’t arrived. This would become a habit with them, being extremely late to dinner. Thankfully, our server never held us up. We did feel a little odd for a while, though, as we were all alone at a table for 8! For dinner, we started with the crab cakes and the honeydew & mango soup. Our entrees were the pork (DH) and the beef tenderloin (me). I don’t remember what we had for dessert. The food was pretty good.

After we finished dinner, we headed up to deck 10 for the Pirates IN the Caribbean Party & fireworks. Here are a few pictures of the festivities.

It was cute, and we were glad we went, but we were exhausted at this point. We headed back to the stateroom, where we found tonight’s towel animal.

We headed off to sleep, excited about our next day in Nassau.

Up Next: Nassau day – would we make it to our independently-booked excursion? Would the excursion be everything we’d imagined it to be? And what was the excursion, anyway???? Also, a lot more pictures.

 

[michellem1118]

I'm going to finish this up, even though I don't think anyone is reading anymore...

Tuesday, August 5, 2008

We awoke bright and EARLY – around 8:00am – on Tuesday morning, anxious to begin our excursion. I looked out the window onto the verandah, and saw we were just pulling into port in Nassau. I must say, this had me a *bit* nervous, since we booked our excursion on our own & not through Disney, and as a result were on a much tighter time schedule than we would’ve been otherwise. If we didn’t make the excursion on time, we’d be out a decent amount of money, but more importantly, we’d miss out on our once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. What is our excursion, you ask? You’ll see, it’s coming soon… I want to keep you in suspense for a few minutes longer.

We dressed quickly, and headed up to the buffet for breakfast. After all, its always good to eat before you leave the ship! While we were eating, Rachel, the cruise director, announced that Bahamian officials had just cleared the ship, and they would be opening the gangway in 15 minutes or so. DH & I hurried to finish our breakfast, and then headed all the way down to deck 2 to disembark… if I remember correctly, we took the stairs.

Once off the ship, we followed the herd of people out of the cruise ship dock area, and stopped to ask directions… we needed to find a taxi to get to our destination, the Paradise Island Ferry Terminal. We’re told that the cheapest way to get over there is to take a water taxi, and we’re pointed in the right direction. We pay $3 each, and are allowed to board the water taxi to the ferry terminal. In hindsight, this was probably not a good decision, as I’ve learned reading subsequent TRs that these water taxis often break down, but it worked out fine for us, and we arrived at the ferry terminal around 9:45am. Our excursion time was listed as 10:30, but we’d been told we needed to check in 30 minutes ahead of time… we learned the hard way that 10:30 WAS the 30 minutes ahead of time, but hey, it’s better to be early than late, right?

At the ferry terminal, we checked in for our excursion… DOLPHIN ENCOUNTERS! Yes, we could have booked a dolphin encounter, with the same company & at the same location, through DCL, but we wanted to SWIM with the dolphins, and DCL doesn’t offer a swim excursion, so we booked on our own. At check-in, we were given bracelets that identified us as part of the swim & told us which group we would be in, and then we had to sit & wait on the ferry out to Blue Lagoon Island… which arrived full of DCL guests at 10:30 exactly. We boarded quickly, and then began the 30 minute ferry ride out to Blue Lagoon Island. Here are some pictures of the boat ride.

Upon arrival at the island, we first listened to an informational presentation about the dolphins and their behaviors, and then we were sent down to grab life vests before heading to our assigned group areas. The life vests were required more for dolphin safety than human safety, but I was glad to have it while we were in the water. Soon, we were sitting on a platform while three dolphins swam around our feet. After a few basic instructions, we were told to hop into the water and swim out about 10 feet from the platform. At this point, our interaction began. One of our dolphins was named MacGyver, and he was one of two dolphins who played “Flipper” in the movie made a few years back. Here’s MacGyver with DH:

Our basic interaction lasted almost an hour. We all got to hug a dolphin, dance with a dolphin, etc.

After about an hour, the trainers called us back up onto the platform, and we were sent back in one at a time for the famous dolphin “foot push.” This was the most amazing feeling, being pushed through the water by a dolphin. I was the “unlucky” member of our group, as I only had one dolphin pushing me for my foot push, but DH had a dolphin on each foot. Here are the pictures we took of the foot push:

Me:

DH:

After the foot push, our experience was over. We had a little while before the ferry would be returning to pick us up, so we walked around the island a bit. We saw some sea lions…

… and watched the dolphins for a while. Then we perused the gift shop (because, as all expensive experiences do, you end up in a gift shop before you can leave) and purchased a few small things – I got a shirt & DH got a coffee travel mug with a dolphin on it. Oh, and we purchased some of the photos the professional photographer on site took of us, because, well, we had to!

The ferry returned for us around 12:45pm I believe, and we headed back towards the ferry terminal. At the ferry terminal, the announcement was made for all DCL guests to stay on board for transfer back to the cruise ship dock, so DH & I stayed on board. Here are some of the pictures from our return trip to the cruise ship:

We were back on the ship by 1:30pm, and after dropping off our souvenirs in the stateroom, we headed straight to the pool area in search of food. We didn’t want to eat too much, because we were having an early dinner at Palo, the adults-only restaurant, and then were planning to attend our regular rotational dinner because it was our Animator’s Palette night, and we wanted to see the show. I ended up going by the Spa to see if they could do my hair before dinner (it was ALSO dress-up night this night as well), and they gave me an appointment time that was only 30 minutes before our Palo reservation. We went back to the stateroom to see about changing the Palo ressie, and were able to move it from 6:00 to 6:30, which worked out better. It was around 3:00 by this time, so I decided to take a shower to get rid of the sea water residue. Right after I got out of the shower, the hairstylist from the Spa called. She’d had a cancellation, and asked me if I’d like to come right then to get my hair done. So I said sure, and headed up to the Spa.

Getting my hair re-washed with the really high-quality stuff in the Spa was very relaxing, and then she blew out my hair, smoothed it, and styled it. Since I didn’t have a hair dryer with me (remember, I was SICK the night we were frantically packing for this trip!), my hair had been pretty frizzy all week, and I’d basically been keeping it in a ponytail. It was great to actually have my hair down & looking nice before our dinner at Palo… but OMG it was expensive! I believe the stateroom charge was $50, plus the tip I gave her, for just a wash & blow dry. Lesson learned: Always pack a hair dryer!

We really enjoyed both dinner experiences this night, although even after looking at the menu, I have no idea what either of us ate at either meal. We did get a nice honeymoon surprise at Palo:

and a tasty dessert at Animator’s:

Here is a picture from the “show” at Animator’s Palette:

Following dinner #2, we were STUFFED, so we headed back to the room. We were greeted by this towel animal, wearing DH’s sunglasses tonight:

Even though we were a bit tired, we changed and headed back out to meet our newlywed table mates for a comedy show in one of the bars. We enjoyed the show, but not our waitress, who continually refused to bring me a glass of water because water is free. After the show, we headed back up to our stateroom, and drifted off to sleep.

Up next: How did we fill our time on Castaway Cay day 2? Did we succumb to the sweet DVC add-on deals and buy more points? And why were we accused of being stalkers???