Will tonight be the night our tablemates show up? Our adventure on The Treasure 1/11-1/18

[Kari0180]

A Happy Birthday Day at Sea, Part two

At this point, I had finished my mimosa, usually, I just stick with water, but on other trips to Palo, plus others trip reports, I see them get the iced tea with those tea ice cubes and since it was my birthday, I decided to indulge

This was very good; it was so nice to get iced tea that wasn't watered down by the time you finish it. We also tried a calzone for the first time

Photo taken after Herlina cut this up for us. What can I say about this calzone? How come we've never ordered this before? We usually wind up getting a pizza and this calzone was 100x better than any of the pizzas. My mouth is salivating as I'm typing this, there was so much cheese and the bread was perfect. I don't really like red peppers and these peppers were amazing. We didn't plan on eating this whole thing, but we kept going after it even after our main courses arrived, it was that good! This will now be a staple that we always have to get! We were then served our soups


We split both of these, once again, the tomato soup was the star! We do enjoy the celery soup but really dislike the sausage they put in it. Thankfully, they only put in 3 pieces and they're large enough to pick out. It wasn't as good as other trips, but we still enjoyed it. Finally, it was time for the main courses

First up, my favorite, the Parmesan-Crusted Chicken breast. This is still fantastic and my favorite entree to order, but I agree that it's not as great as it was in the past. The chicken is pounded as flat as it used to be, and I found it a little tough to chew, but the flavors were still incredible.

We also got the Lasagna Bolognese, also always a favorite. On our very first cruise in 2014, our server told us we had to get the lasagna, that it was one of the best things on the menu and he was right. We have to get a lasagna to split on every trip. We should've been done, we should've walked away, but how can we pass up dessert?

We started with the Buttermilk Panna Cotta Pot, we were hoping for something light and this definitely delivered, you gotta love those strawberry popping pearls. The chocolate butterfly was beautiful and delicious too!

We also split the Chocolate Raspberry Tart, we also enjoyed this. As much as we normally love Amaretto Chocolate Fondant, this was not as rich but still had plenty of flavor. With that, brunch was over, since we used our Platinum entitlement on dinner, we had to pay the $50/person. I wasn't charged for my iced tea, I don't know if that was a mistake or if it's complementary? Besides not being offered the pastries, I also wasn't wished a Happy Birthday, I know that I got my "birthday plate" during dinner, but I thought it was a little strange that since it was the day of my birthday, and I didn't get any well wishes. We've sailed multiple times over my birthday, and I'm used to being a little spoiled. We said goodbye to Herlina and headed out, we had to grab a quick picture since we were a little dressed up

We made a quick trip down to our room to change into "normal" clothes and had a little surprise waiting for me

I thought this was very nice and made up for being ignored at Palo! Along with my lovely birthday surprise, we had our tip envelopes. You know what this means, we're getting closer to the end of our trip. The tip envelopes were set aside for the time being, we're going to pretend that those don't exist for the time being!

 

[Kari0180]

A Happy Birthday Day at Sea, part three

There wasn't any trivia or activities going on that we were interested in, so we decided to wander, our plan was to walk the walking deck (lord knows we needed to after brunch). As we got to the Grand Hall, we stumbled across a character dance party.



This was adorable and so much fun! The characters rotated throughout the Grand Hall and they and their handlers had different dances that they would lead the kids (and some adults) through. At one point, there was even a conga line! Every character had their moment on stage with their own special dance and at the end, all the characters came back on stage to end things with a party!

Seriously, this was so cool, I was very happy that we stumbled upon this and stayed to watch! We then headed up a level and outdoors to start our walk. Unfortunately, this day was pretty windy, and they only had a tiny portion of the walking track open, so we weren't able to go very far. There still wasn't anything going on for activities, but we didn't really feel like changing into swimwear and going to the pools. We decided to do our own little pub crawl; our plan was to go to the places we hadn't visited yet and get a drink. We started with Periscope Pub

DH ordered The Narwal, Kraken Black Spiced Rum, Cointreau, Lime, Orgeat, and Ginger served with some sour gummies on top. I got the Outis Daiquiri, SelvaRey White Rum, Luxardo Maraschino, Lime, Grapefruit. We both enjoyed the drinks that we got but weren't fans of what the other was drinking! We hung out in the pub for a little bit, watching the marine life swim by on the ceiling. Fun fact: We learned during our walking ship tour that the projections on the ceiling are recorded from the Seas Pavillion at EPCOT!

Next, we decided to see how busy the Haunted Mansion Parlor was (and add some more gift cards to our onboard account, cocktails add up). The Grand Hall was pretty empty at this point, so we made a stop to take some photos in front of the statue. Once again, it was disappointing that people were using Genie's lamp as a place to store their trash. Several cups and some silverware were left there. I get it, there weren't any trash cans around, but just find one, don't be lazy!!

It was then time to head to the Haunted Mansion Parlor

I was surprised that it wasn't too busy inside, DH was super excited because the Donald chair was open, and he was able to sit in it!

We once again grabbed seats at the bar and looked at the menu

DH went with The Chilling Challenge

Not the greatest photo, they present it in a box with smoke and shine a black light to show the Haunted Mansion logo on the foam. I wasn't too big a fan of this drink, best way to describe it as a weird tasting margarita.

 

[Kari0180]

A Happy Birthday Day at Sea, part four


I went with the Regions Beyond; I really enjoyed this drink. I wasn't sure about the Bubble Gum cream, but I thought all the flavors worked well together. If we weren't on a pub crawl, I might've ordered another one. While we were in the parlor, another show started.

I liked sitting at the bar, you got a good vantage point of the whole room, with a lot of the other seating, you might miss parts of the show. We finished up and made our way across the hall to our next pub, Skipper Society for our next drinks

I went with the Safari So Good (Bumbu Xo rum, Chila Orchata, Banana, Coconut, Cream). This might've been my favorite drink in all the pubs, it was very creamy and tasty. I don't know if I've mentioned this previously, but a lot of the drinks came with edible straws. I usually didn't use them or eat them, but this edible straw worked perfect with this drink! DH went with Skipper Sipper (Goslings Ocean Aged Rum, Angel's Envy Bourbon, Kahlua, Lime, Vanilla, Cinnamon, Honey). This was also a very good drink, I wish that we had spent more time at Skipper Society, the drinks were really good, they had some other ones that I wanted to try as well. While enjoying our drinks, we tried our hand at another round of Disney Movie Quotes Trivia. After another loss, we headed to Sarabi to play final jackpot Bingo. I love Bingo and we used to play several sessions during our cruises, but DH and I have compromised, and I play one round and that's it. The only session that worked with our schedule was Jackpot Bingo and of course that one was the most expensive

I think during the normal sessions; the family pack is like $80-$85, but they jack up the pricing for Jackpot Bingo! We got a family pack to help increase our chances, did it help? Nope, we didn't even really come close, but the couple right next to us were the solo winners of the coverall jackpot so it was kind of cool to be right next to that!

After Bingo, it was almost time for Beauty and the Beast, but first, another trip to the Grand Hall

This chandelier is so beautiful! We then grabbed some seats in the Walt Disney Theater. I was very excited to see Beauty and the Beast, we saw it when we were on the Dream, but it was a sneak peek (which was really cool, we thought we were just missing it, but then they decided that they would show it on our cruise). It was a great show, but there were some technical difficulties when we saw it on the Dream, especially surrounding the Beast's transformation at the end. The show was really good and the Beast's transformation went off without a hitch!

It was then back to Sarabi for Paul Zerdin's adults only show.

This show was hilarious, even better than the family show because it was more risqué! It was then off to dinner, while we were making our way to our dining room, we had an impromptu meeting with Daisy

Tonight was semi-formal night, and Daisy was dressed in her finest! It was then time for dinner, we were finally in 1923 since we missed the first night due to us being in Palo. And shocker, our tablemates weren't there again. I figured at this point they were never coming (and they never showed up), but I felt a little bad for our dining team. Every night they would bring up that they weren't there and would give us an update about how they tried reaching out to them or talked to them and how they were supposedly coming to dinner. I wonder if they were worried about their tips, not really sure, but they seemed rather distressed about it.

We placed our orders and waited for our food to arrive

We both started with the Chervil-Dill Marinated Shrimp. I'm not a fan of the slaw that's served with the shrimp, but the shrimp are very good.

DH also ordered a side of the baked oysters, he said they were okay. I don't eat oysters, so I didn't try them

DH went with the Baby Iceberg Salad, once again, he complained about the lettuce itself, but he enjoyed the flavors

 

[Kari0180]

A Happy Birthday Day at Sea, part five

Up next, we both got the White Onion Soup

This was a little different version than what we've had before, previous versions had smoked salmon, but this version had cheese. I really liked it with the cheese, I'm not sure which version I prefer, they're both pretty good. I hate to say it; I forgot to take a photo of our main entree. We both got the Oven Baked Lobster Tail, I mean its lobster, where you can go wrong? It was then time for dessert and again, we both got the same thing

The chocolate lava cake topped with vanilla ice cream; this was perfect! The cake was warm and chocolatey, and the vanilla ice cream was really good too. It wasn't needed, but I didn't get a birthday dessert, nor did our dining team wish me a happy birthday. I know it was noted on my reservation; I got the birthday pin earlier in the day and something must've come up when my magic band was scanned because whenever I used it, I was told happy birthday. Looking back, I realized that I never really heard anyone singing Happy Birthday on any day of the cruise, I think I only heard it once and it was on the final night. I know from our Facebook group there were a lot of birthdays on our cruise. I wonder if it's a Treasure thing or are they not celebrating birthdays like they used to?

After dinner, we continued on with our evening, it was back to Sarabi for Ultimate Disney Trivia, where we took home a personal record for a loss, we only got 9 out of 20, didn't even get 50% on that one. We decided to stay and watch Paul Zerdin's second adults only show. It was the same show as earlier, but different people (including me) participating. I'm happy to know that I can get hit on by a puppet in his 90's After the show, it was bedtime, the next day would be the best (Castaway) and the worst (it's our last day) day of the cruise.

Until next time...

 

[Kari0180]

I forgot to post our vlogs for our sea day

 

[Kari0180]

I can't believe that I'm writing about our last day! If you're still with me, I really appreciate you following me along and for the likes and comments

Castaway Cay, the happiest and saddest day of the cruise, part one

I'm going to start with saying we're not really beach people, if you've read previous trip reports or watched our vlogs, you'll see we don't really do a whole lot of beach excursions, if we do, it's usually along with another excursion. But with that being said, we love Castaway Cay, it's really my happy place. When I'm having trouble sleeping, I envision myself on Castaway, in a hammock (even though I almost never have the opportunity to use a hammock) and I'm almost instantly relaxed. Our plan was to get on the beach as soon as we could, so once we got up, we headed to breakfast. Before we went to breakfast, we went up to the pool deck to see th island

DH and I had a minor disagreement about breakfast, I just wanted to go to Marceline Market, he wanted to do 1923 because we hadn't eaten there yet. I caved (big mistake) and we headed to 1923. We were seated quickly and given our menus and offered beverages and our server said he would be back. And then we waited, and waited, and waited. I was getting impatient at this point (I know, I have a problem) and wanted to leave, but then our server showed up, so we placed our order and thankfully, our food started coming out pretty quick. Our server brought the pastries, DH passed, but I grabbed one

I ordered a fruit platter to start

I will say that all the fruit was super fresh, everything tasted great! Our entrees arrived soon after

I went with the Eggs Benedict with Rosemary Ham and Tomato. This tasted very good, I really enjoyed the addition of tomato with everything.


DH went with the Hash and also the Blueberry Pancakes. He enjoyed the hash, but he thought the pancakes were pretty tough, but he ate all his hash first and then went with the pancakes, so they were pretty cold by the time he started eating.

We also shared a side of bacon and hashbrowns. These were pretty good, both the bacon and hashbrowns were nice and crispy.

We enjoyed our breakfast, but as I said before, I prefer going to the buffet. I feel like every time we do sit down, it takes forever and I'm just wanting to get going. Maybe I should try to go on a sea day when there's not as much going on. The main downfall with going to 1923 on this morning was that I MISSED THE CHURRO WAFFLES!!! I was so sad; I figured that they had served them the previous day when we were in Palo.

Anyway, after breakfast, we refilled our water and headed out on the island. It didn't appear to be many people getting off the island at that time, we had a peaceful walk

We were headed toward Serenity Bay, so we took our time walking to the tram stop

Of course, I had to take a photo of Mount Rustmore and then I headed in to do some shopping, but I didn't find anything that I was interested in purchasing (probably a good thing for my wallet). We eventually made our way to the Serenity Bay tram stop and got on the tram. Once we got to Serenity, it was time to find some chairs. This is where we found the crowds, EVERYONE was here! We were able to find some chairs about halfway down and got ourselves comfortable. I started reading my book and DH headed to the bar, once he returned, he had my beloved Conk Cooler

I've got a chair, my book, and my Conk Cooler, life is good!

 

[Kari0180]

Castaway Cay, the happiest and saddest day of the cruise, part two

After spending some time relaxing on the beach, we decided to head out into the water. There weren't a whole lot of people in the water and once we got in, I could see why...the water was freezing! It took a long time to acclimate, but we finally got to a point where we got a little more comfortable.

While we were hanging out in the water, we started hearing the horns blowing. It was a little odd because it was early, and we were on Castaway. It was fun to listen to, even though we couldn't see the ship, but a few minutes after we stopped hearing the horn, a Disney ship was sailing past us. We couldn't tell which ship it was, so DH ran back up to the beach and grabbed his camera. He was able to see that it was the Disney Dream, we had heard a horn battle! This was our 14th cruise, and we've never come across another Disney ship on any of our previous trips and now, we've come across 2 of them in different ports, it was pretty neat!

Eventually, the water got a little too chilly, so we headed back to our spot on the beach and relaxed. We were starting to get hungry, so we headed to the Serenity Bay BBQ for some lunch. This place was packed! The line went all the way back to the shuttle stop and even with 2 separate lines, we were in for a little bit of a wait. Once we grabbed our food, then it was off to search for a place to sit, this was proving to be challenging as well, thankfully, a couple was leaving and offered me their spot.

I went with a cheeseburger, a hot dog, some fruit, coleslaw and a bag of chips

DH went with a burger, steak, ribs, fruit, pasta salad and coleslaw. Everything we ate was good, I really wanted a twist cone, but the vanilla ice cream wasn't working, and the chocolate was kind of messy, I made myself a cone, but it wasn't really that great.

After lunch, we decided to take the tram over to the family beach, DH wanted to go snorkeling. Once we got to the snorkeling lagoon, DH headed out to the water, and I found a chair and proceeded to read my book. It was a chilly day, so a lot of people had headed back to the ship, there really wasn't anyone around me. I was a little cold, so our towels became my blankets, and I got nice and cozy. DH had a lot of fun snorkeling, he saw a lot of fish and went around and found all the statues, he took mostly video, but he shared a couple of photos with me


After DH finished snorkeling, it was time to head back to the ship, we had a martini tasting coming up that we needed to shower and get ready for.

Until next time

One last Castaway selfie

We made our way back onto the ship and started to get ready for our evening, we had a busy night ahead of us!

 

[Kari0180]

Castaway Cay, the happiest and saddest day of the cruise, part three

Our first stop once we left our room was to Scat Cat Lounge, we had a martini tasting to attend. We checked in, got seated and our tasting was underway. Our bartender for our presentation was Kelvin and he was fantastic!

Our first drink was the traditional vodka martini, not really my thing (I enjoyed the olive). Kelvin had us taste the martini as is at first and then asked if any of us wanted olive juice added to make it a dirty martini. This helped a little, but still not my favorite drink. I really liked the addition of the potato chips to snack on during our tasting, of course, DH ate almost all of them right away, but they did come by with refills!


Our next martini was a blue gin garden martini. After we took a first sip, Kelvin asked us to tell him what we thought was in the drink, we guessed the blue curacao, but nobody guess that it had gin (Hendricks). I was really surprised by this drink, I'm normally not a gin drinker, but I loved the combination with the blue curacao.

Third martini was an appleflower martini and I really enjoyed this as well! It had POG juice which you know is a favorite of mine and was paired with tequila.

Number four was an espresso martini, I'm not one to order these on my own, but I thought this was very good. It was even better once Kelvin came by and added Baileys to it!

One of the great things about Kelvin is that at the beginning of the tasting, he asked if anyone had any allergies or if there were any drinks or mixers anyone didn't like and offered to make an alternative martini for them. Now DH detests coffee, can't stand it (I know, I try my hardest to live with it), so when Kelvin mentioned we were having an espresso martini, DH asked if he could have an alternative. I didn't take a photo, but he was made a French Martini, which DH loved, he even thought it was his favorite martini of the tasting!

Our final martini was the Creme de la creme martini, also known as a Brandy Alexander. This was my favorite of the tasting; it was so creamy and even though I'm not a huge bourbon fan, I'm now obsessed with bourbon cream. After our first sip, Kelvin came around with ground cinnamon and nutmeg that you could add, I added both and while I think I actually prefer the drink without, it was still pretty good! This was my favorite martini tasting, Kelvin and his team were awesome, the drinks were amazing, and we actually learned something!

After our tasting, we were lucky enough to head right next door to watch another Coriander and Sage show

They started with a storytelling of Encanto and then for the second story, they did a "mad libs" style story using words from the audience to tell the story of the Jungle Book. Once again, it was very entertaining, and we had a good laugh! While the show was going on, we noticed that the lines were starting to form to get in the Walt Disney Theater. The tale of Moana was showing and of course, everyone wanted to watch. They had announced earlier in the day that the matinee was cancelled, so we knew it was going to be busy! When Coriander and Sage were finished, there were 2 lines on both sides of the Grand Hall and the lines stretched back almost to 1923. We decided to head up to deck 5 to see if we would have better luck, the lines were still long (we got in line by Sarabi), but it was better than deck 4. Crew members were coming around and telling everyone that your whole party needed to be together, that you couldn't save seats, that the theater would be completely full, and to please pick a row and to move all the way down. By the time we made our way into the theater it was pretty full, we managed to get two seats on the end of a row and the place filled up soon after. I felt bad for people coming in and not being able to find a spot. It was unfortunate that they cancelled the matinee (I'm assuming there must've been some sort of issue), there were a lot of people in our Facebook group who wound up missing the performance because they got to the theater too late.

Our view of the stage, we wound up having pretty good seats! And what can I say about Moana....it was amazing! The cast was so talented, especially the grandmother! The best part was the battle at the end and the transformation of Te Ka to Te Fiti, it was so cool! This is probably my current favorite show on DCL (this opinion will probably be changed next year after we watch Hercules on the Destiny, but for now...).

Watching Moana from deck 5 was also an advantage as next was a trip to Triton's Lounge for our final trivia and everyone appeared to be heading here. It was a very packed trivia, of course, it was 2000's music trivia, which is always a popular one.

This trivia is so popular and I'm assuming people cheat at this one, because we had to trade our papers with others to have our answers checked. We got a 33 out of 40, but the winning teams (2 of them, got a perfect 40). Once again, no medals for us at trivia. I sadly must relinquish my trivia crown, I no longer know everything

It was then getting to be time to head to dinner so we passed through the Grand Hall to see who we might meet (it was right before dinner that we usually came across the spontaneous meet and greets). And who did we find this evening....Coriander and Sage! We had a great chat with them, I let them know that they were my favorite entertainment throughout the week, and we got a photo with them!

It was then time to head to dinner!

 

[Kari0180]

Castaway Cay, the happiest and saddest day of the cruise, part four

Our final dinner was held in Worlds of Marvel and tonight was the Groot show. We were seated and even though the table was set for them, our tablemates were a no show once again. I kind of wonder what they did every night; I would think that room service and Mickey's Festival of Foods would get boring after a while, and I would've wanted to see the dinner shows that were unique to the Treasure. But who knows, maybe they had done one of the preview cruises or were on a back-to-back? DH had asked one night if our dining team would know if they had switched dining rotations or times and they said yes, the head servers know that stuff. Table mate drama (or lack of drama, I guess) being over, we placed our orders and started watching the show.

Without giving too much away, the Guardians show was cute with Rocket and Groot and in between snippets, they had the quantum cores out and there was Marvel trivia going on, we were having a good time! Our appetizers came out soon after ordering

I started with the Heirloom Tomato Caprese, always a solid choice, love the mozzarella and tomatoes. I was missing the basil and the balsamic dressing, but I didn't need either, just give me cheese and tomatoes and I'm a happy girl!

I also had to try the Porcini Sacchetti, these are very similar to the black truffle pasta that's served in Animator's Palate, but I liked these a little better, I thought that they had a better flavor too them and they weren't as heavy.

DH went with Ahi Tuna Poke, he enjoyed this, I don't know how he can eat tuna (and sushi) without any soy sauce or other accompaniment. I would've needed some soy sauce for this. Next up, it was time for the salads

I went with the Iceberg Wedge salad, I enjoyed the flavors of the salad, but my "wedge" was actually the core and was pretty much inedible, so I ate what I could of the lettuce and enjoyed the olives, cheese, tomatoes and cucumbers.

DH went with the Dill-Lemon Marinated Shrimp Salad; this was probably his favorite salad of the trip. He said the flavors were good and how can you go wrong with shrimp?

I wasn't in the mood for soup this evening, but DH got himself a cup of the Lobster Bisque. I'm not a fan of lobster bisque, but DH enjoys it. He was very impressed with the amount of lobster that was in his soup, he had a gigantic piece of lobster in the soup, which made him very happy. It was then time for our mains

I went with the Linguini Nero; I was a little thrown off by the black pasta (we were warned), but I enjoyed the flavor of everything, especially the shrimp.

DH went with the Beef Wellington, he's had it in the past and hasn't been a huge fan, but our server really talked this up, so he had to try it again. He thought it was pretty good, better than ones he's had in the past.

We also split the Tamari and Honey Glazed Salmon Filet. I really enjoyed the salmon; it had a great flavor, but I thought the soba noodles served with it were pretty gross. I had one bite of the noodles and that was more than enough. DH enjoyed the salmon and didn't think the noodles were as bad as I thought. For our final desserts of the cruise

I went with the Orchard Peach Tart; I tried this for the first time on our last cruise on the Wonder and had to have it again. I liked everything about this dessert but only wish that it was served with vanilla ice cream instead of the dulce de leche.

 

[Kari0180]

Castaway Cay, the happiest and saddest day of the cruise, part five

DH and his love for blueberries had to order the Double Blueberry Cheesecake

He liked this, but didn't love it, but it had a lot of blueberry flavor, so he enjoyed that. Dinner ended with the dining teams parading around the dining room, it was a perfect way to end our dining experiences. After dinner, we headed back to our room, we had to finish up our packing. We finally got everything sorted and got our luggage out in just the nick of time. It was then time to head to the Grand Hall for our final event of the cruise, Treasure Found. This was the typical good-bye show; a bunch of characters are out, and you had about 15-20 minutes to meet and grab last minute photos. They don't do autographs and there are no photographers, but it's a great time to get those last-minute photos. We had pretty much gotten photos with everyone we wanted except for Donald and Pluto, Pluto, unfortunately was on the upper deck and on the opposite side of where we were, and the place was packed, so we went without a photo with Pluto on this cruise. But Donald was right behind us and after a short wait, we were able to get our photo with him

After photos, Coriander and Sage came out and had a nice send off to the cruise. We then headed to bed, dreading being kicked off the ship the next morning


Debarkation Day

Morning came way too quick and before we knew it, it was time to leave our home for the past 7 days and leave. First, we headed back to Worlds of Marvel for our final breakfast. I started off with some fruit

I also got a ham and cheese omelet with a side of bacon

DH went with the Eggs for the Road

He also ordered some waffles

It was then time to say goodbye to our dining team, they were very good to us, and we would miss them! We spent a few minutes wandering the ship one last time before leaving and I finally found the magic carpet!

When we did the ship tour, our guide told us about the carpets and how on deck 13, there was the actual magic carpet. I had kind of forgotten about it, but I found it just as we were leaving.

The rest of our day, although sad, went pretty smooth. We got off the ship and through customs very quickly. We took DCL transportation to the airport and once we arrived, we headed to Delta to check in. Once we got our bags tagged, we learned that at MCO, Delta now has a secondary baggage check if your flight is more than 3 hours from the time of arrival. We had to head downstairs and wait in a very, very, long line. We were in the line for over an hour (thankfully, we had plenty of time to kill) but were finally able to drop our bags off. We then headed upstairs, did some shopping and went through security (thank you TSA precheck). We then took the fake-o-rail one last time to our gate, where we grabbed some lunch at Outback before getting on our flight back home, which thankfully was uneventful and landed a little after 7:00 pm. DH's dad picked us up from the airport, gave us an update on mom and before we knew it, we were snuggling with our puppy and kitty and back home!

Up Next: Final thoughts and what's next!

 

[Kari0180]

Our final vlogs

 

[Kari0180]

Final Thoughts

Now that we've been home for a couple of months (I can't believe it's already been that long), I just wanted to share a few thoughts.

I'll admit, I was a little nervous about sailing on the Treasure, we weren't huge fans of the Wish and since we knew the layout was similar, I was worried that we would feel the same. I'm happy to say that the Treasure was amazing! Even though the layout was the same, they definitely made some changes. I do think the longer itinerary helps a little, but I really loved the Treasure!

We enjoyed all the bars, I wish that we had gotten a chance to actually enjoy a drink at Scat Cat, especially after our amazing Martini tasting. Haunted Mansion Parlor was so much fun, I loved the atmosphere! I think if we sail the Treasure again, I would like to spend more time in the bars just hanging out, absorbing the atmosphere.

The AquaMouse was a ton of fun! I especially loved that we were able to ride over and over again without getting off because everyone was either at dinner or the show that evening. There are two different "scenes", we were only able to see "The curse of the golden egg", but it was entertaining!

The random character encounters were so enjoyable! We managed to see most of the characters with little line because of this. The lines for the characters that we did meet were pretty short. It helped that there were several meets throughout the week. The only character meet that I really wanted to do that we missed was with Antman and the Wasp. I think they were meeting during my massage, I don't remember for sure, I just remember we had something else going on. I also liked how they did the Royal Gathering, we had 5 princesses, and the lines moved pretty quick, but the princesses did a great job making everyone feel special!

I can't say it enough; Coriander and Sage were one of the best parts of the cruise. They were so entertaining, and both the adults only and family shows were amazing! I highly recommend going to every show, but especially the Choose Wisely show in Sarabi. Speaking of shows, I also can't praise Moana enough, the cast was so talented! I definitely recommend getting to the theater early especially if they cancel a matinee or if it's no longer offered, it's well worth the wait in line!

Now for the not so great...

I hope that Disney puts more trash cans around, especially in the Grand Hall. It was kind of disgusting that people would just leave their cups and other crap all over the place vs putting in a trash can, almost every time we walked past Genie's lamp, it was covered in cups and other stuff. We also saw garbage just being left on the floor; trivia papers being left behind, etc. But I think a big part of the problem was the lack of trash cans and I hope they add some more in the future to avoid this problem.

The spa experience was probably my least favorite. This probably doesn't reflect on the Treasure, but Senses as a whole as I've been hearing this happening fleet wide. The pressure to add things to your treatment and the upsell at the end was out of control. For previous treatments, I could write "no upsell" on the form and they would honor your wishes. Not this time, my masseuse went really into the sales pitch at the end, I felt very pressured to purchase products, especially the $250 eye cream. And not only the sales pitch, but there was also the pressure to book more treatments while on board, DH really felt this with his acupuncture.

Our dining team took care of us, but they weren't as great as other teams we had in the past, I especially felt this with our assistant server. Most evenings, our server was the one who brought us our drinks and our refills, I didn't know where our assistant server was. While I played it for laughs with my trip report, it was kind of annoying how our dining team (including the head server) had to keep talking to us about the absence of our table mates. Every night, we were provided with some sort of update about them, like that was the topic of conversation every night. Not "how was your day" "are you enjoying your cruise" or other conversation starters. It was always, "your tablemates haven't arrived" "we left a message for your tablemates" and "your tablemates said they're coming to dinner tonight". Also, they didn't acknowledge my birthday at all, which I still think is rather strange.

Lastly, the one main thing I dislike about the Treasure (and the Triton class as a whole) is the amount of concierge staterooms and how that plays into booking activities. Even being Platinum, we couldn't get a lot of the activities/meals that we wanted. By the time our booking window opened, Enchante, Palo dinner on Pirate Night, Mixology, and Chocolate and Liquor were all booked. We were very lucky that we were able to get Palo brunch, other Platinum members (and lower) couldn't get it at all. We spoke with a couple different Pearl members and even they couldn't get Mixology. This is one of the things that I will continue to appreciate about the classic ships, it's much easier to book these things because there are less concierge rooms.

All in all, I loved the Treasure and can't wait to sail her again! The Wonder still has my heart as my number one ship, but the Treasure is probably number two. I loved my time on board and I'm hoping to sail her again sometime in the future! For those of you with future cruises on her, I hope that you have as wonderful of a time that we did

So, what do we have planned for the future? In a few short weeks, DH and I will be taking our first non-Disney cruise. We'll be cruising on the Celebrity Infinity and doing a Greek Isles cruise. We're going as part of DH's job, so he will have to work part of the time, but hopefully, we'll have plenty of time to explore outside of him working. We're departing from Athens and visiting Rhodes, Ephesus, Turkey, Santorini, Hydra, and Mykonos. The Infinity is an older ship, and I worry we won't enjoy it as much as Disney, but with such a port heavy cruise, we probably won't be spending that much time on the ship. I probably won't write a trip report for this one since it's not Disney and they don't sail to any of the ports we're visiting. We will for sure be vlogging, so if you're interested, you can certainly watch our vlogs!

Our next Disney cruise will be in October, we're sailing on the Magic and we're doing the Southern itinerary from San Juan. I'm very excited about this cruise, I've been dying to do a southern and I'm so excited for our ports. We'll be stopping in St. Kitts, St. Lucia, Barbados, Dominica, and Antigua. We've been to St. Kitts and Antigua, but the other islands will be new to us. We're thinking of flying in a couple of days early to enjoy San Juan, but still debating that part, we'll figure that out once we return from Greece.

Lastly, we're booked on the Destiny for next January. We're on a 4-night that will stop and Castaway and another first for us, Lookout Cay (very excited for Lookout). 4-nights is too short for us, so we're trying to figure out what else to do. We're waiting for Disney to release their 2026 packages to decide for sure, but we're debating between taking the Brightline and going to Disney either before or after the cruise, doing a back-to-back with the 5-night on the Destiny, or doing a "side-by-side" and doing a 4-night on the Dream after. I know DH really wants to do Disneyworld, but that will definitely be the most expensive option. I'm liking the idea of going on the Dream, we haven't been on her since 2017 and it's stopping at Lookout as well, so we get another chance to explore the new island. Time will only tell what we wind up doing, I have a placeholder burning a hole in my pocket and I need to use it on something.

I appreciate all the likes, comments and messages that I've received. Writing this report is such a great way to relive our trip and I thank you for following along.

Until next time!

 

[Nicnicnic.nic]

Thank you for the read!

What makes the Wonder your favorite? So far I've sailed on the Magic....and booked again for the Magic. I'm nervous about crowds with bigger ships but your report makes it seem like not a big issue.

 

[Kari0180]

Thank you for the read!

What makes the Wonder your favorite? So far I've sailed on the Magic....and booked again for the Magic. I'm nervous about crowds with bigger ships but your report makes it seem like not a big issue.

I've heard people say before that your first ship will always be your favorite and it definitely fits for me. Every time I'm on the Wonder I feel like I'm home. I love how small it is, we really get to know the crew while we're on board and I feel others are more social on the Wonder, we always make new cruise friends!

I think the restaurants are great, especially Tiana's and the shawarma station is a favorite too! I'm going to be in the minority here, but I actually prefer the adults only pools on the Wonder and the Magic over the other ships, spending time in the hot tub with a cocktail in my hand is a great escape.

I also think it's easier to get drink tastings/Palo/other activities, we've never had any issues, and I know from our last cruise that first-timers were still able to take advantage of a lot of things. With everyone flocking to the newer ships, it's harder to book those unless you are concierge or Pearl.

We didn't feel the crowds that much on the Treasure, we were always able to find spots at trivia and we never had a problem finding spots at any of the bars. I also feel like they did better with the table spacing in the restaurants. The Wish was where we really felt the crowds, people had to sit on the floor and in the hallways for trivia, and we felt like we were sitting on top of each other at dinners. I hope that's gotten better!

 

[buteraa]

Final Thoughts

Now that we've been home for a couple of months (I can't believe it's already been that long), I just wanted to share a few thoughts.

I'll admit, I was a little nervous about sailing on the Treasure, we weren't huge fans of the Wish and since we knew the layout was similar, I was worried that we would feel the same. I'm happy to say that the Treasure was amazing! Even though the layout was the same, they definitely made some changes. I do think the longer itinerary helps a little, but I really loved the Treasure!

We enjoyed all the bars, I wish that we had gotten a chance to actually enjoy a drink at Scat Cat, especially after our amazing Martini tasting. Haunted Mansion Parlor was so much fun, I loved the atmosphere! I think if we sail the Treasure again, I would like to spend more time in the bars just hanging out, absorbing the atmosphere.

The AquaMouse was a ton of fun! I especially loved that we were able to ride over and over again without getting off because everyone was either at dinner or the show that evening. There are two different "scenes", we were only able to see "The curse of the golden egg", but it was entertaining!

The random character encounters were so enjoyable! We managed to see most of the characters with little line because of this. The lines for the characters that we did meet were pretty short. It helped that there were several meets throughout the week. The only character meet that I really wanted to do that we missed was with Antman and the Wasp. I think they were meeting during my massage, I don't remember for sure, I just remember we had something else going on. I also liked how they did the Royal Gathering, we had 5 princesses, and the lines moved pretty quick, but the princesses did a great job making everyone feel special!

I can't say it enough; Coriander and Sage were one of the best parts of the cruise. They were so entertaining, and both the adults only and family shows were amazing! I highly recommend going to every show, but especially the Choose Wisely show in Sarabi. Speaking of shows, I also can't praise Moana enough, the cast was so talented! I definitely recommend getting to the theater early especially if they cancel a matinee or if it's no longer offered, it's well worth the wait in line!

Now for the not so great...

I hope that Disney puts more trash cans around, especially in the Grand Hall. It was kind of disgusting that people would just leave their cups and other crap all over the place vs putting in a trash can, almost every time we walked past Genie's lamp, it was covered in cups and other stuff. We also saw garbage just being left on the floor; trivia papers being left behind, etc. But I think a big part of the problem was the lack of trash cans and I hope they add some more in the future to avoid this problem.

The spa experience was probably my least favorite. This probably doesn't reflect on the Treasure, but Senses as a whole as I've been hearing this happening fleet wide. The pressure to add things to your treatment and the upsell at the end was out of control. For previous treatments, I could write "no upsell" on the form and they would honor your wishes. Not this time, my masseuse went really into the sales pitch at the end, I felt very pressured to purchase products, especially the $250 eye cream. And not only the sales pitch, but there was also the pressure to book more treatments while on board, DH really felt this with his acupuncture.

Our dining team took care of us, but they weren't as great as other teams we had in the past, I especially felt this with our assistant server. Most evenings, our server was the one who brought us our drinks and our refills, I didn't know where our assistant server was. While I played it for laughs with my trip report, it was kind of annoying how our dining team (including the head server) had to keep talking to us about the absence of our table mates. Every night, we were provided with some sort of update about them, like that was the topic of conversation every night. Not "how was your day" "are you enjoying your cruise" or other conversation starters. It was always, "your tablemates haven't arrived" "we left a message for your tablemates" and "your tablemates said they're coming to dinner tonight". Also, they didn't acknowledge my birthday at all, which I still think is rather strange.

Lastly, the one main thing I dislike about the Treasure (and the Triton class as a whole) is the amount of concierge staterooms and how that plays into booking activities. Even being Platinum, we couldn't get a lot of the activities/meals that we wanted. By the time our booking window opened, Enchante, Palo dinner on Pirate Night, Mixology, and Chocolate and Liquor were all booked. We were very lucky that we were able to get Palo brunch, other Platinum members (and lower) couldn't get it at all. We spoke with a couple different Pearl members and even they couldn't get Mixology. This is one of the things that I will continue to appreciate about the classic ships, it's much easier to book these things because there are less concierge rooms.

All in all, I loved the Treasure and can't wait to sail her again! The Wonder still has my heart as my number one ship, but the Treasure is probably number two. I loved my time on board and I'm hoping to sail her again sometime in the future! For those of you with future cruises on her, I hope that you have as wonderful of a time that we did

So, what do we have planned for the future? In a few short weeks, DH and I will be taking our first non-Disney cruise. We'll be cruising on the Celebrity Infinity and doing a Greek Isles cruise. We're going as part of DH's job, so he will have to work part of the time, but hopefully, we'll have plenty of time to explore outside of him working. We're departing from Athens and visiting Rhodes, Ephesus, Turkey, Santorini, Hydra, and Mykonos. The Infinity is an older ship, and I worry we won't enjoy it as much as Disney, but with such a port heavy cruise, we probably won't be spending that much time on the ship. I probably won't write a trip report for this one since it's not Disney and they don't sail to any of the ports we're visiting. We will for sure be vlogging, so if you're interested, you can certainly watch our vlogs!

Our next Disney cruise will be in October, we're sailing on the Magic and we're doing the Southern itinerary from San Juan. I'm very excited about this cruise, I've been dying to do a southern and I'm so excited for our ports. We'll be stopping in St. Kitts, St. Lucia, Barbados, Dominica, and Antigua. We've been to St. Kitts and Antigua, but the other islands will be new to us. We're thinking of flying in a couple of days early to enjoy San Juan, but still debating that part, we'll figure that out once we return from Greece.

Lastly, we're booked on the Destiny for next January. We're on a 4-night that will stop and Castaway and another first for us, Lookout Cay (very excited for Lookout). 4-nights is too short for us, so we're trying to figure out what else to do. We're waiting for Disney to release their 2026 packages to decide for sure, but we're debating between taking the Brightline and going to Disney either before or after the cruise, doing a back-to-back with the 5-night on the Destiny, or doing a "side-by-side" and doing a 4-night on the Dream after. I know DH really wants to do Disneyworld, but that will definitely be the most expensive option. I'm liking the idea of going on the Dream, we haven't been on her since 2017 and it's stopping at Lookout as well, so we get another chance to explore the new island. Time will only tell what we wind up doing, I have a placeholder burning a hole in my pocket and I need to use it on something.

I appreciate all the likes, comments and messages that I've received. Writing this report is such a great way to relive our trip and I thank you for following along.

Until next time!

Sorry I don't comment often, but I wanted you to know how much I enjoy your trip reports!

 

[missjackiemcg]

I MISSED THE CHURRO WAFFLES!!!

NOOOOOO!! Those are seriously to die for! Such a bummer you missed them, but at least you know you'll be back before too long to enjoy them again.

We couldn't tell which ship it was, so DH ran back up to the beach and grabbed his camera. He was able to see that it was the Disney Dream, we had heard a horn battle

This is so awesome! I bet it was really cool to witness in person. We were sailing on the Fantasy a week or so before the Inaugural cruise for the Wish, and we got to see her sailing in the distance while we were at Castaway Cay, which was really exciting. Also, on my very first DCL cruise on the Wonder in 2000, the Magic and Wonder were both docked at Nassau at the same time, so I got a picture of them both. So fun!

This one is my favorite! We got it on the first night of our last cruise, and I kept him propped up in the bed for the rest of the trip, LOL.

Also, they didn't acknowledge my birthday at all, which I still think is rather strange.

That really stinks. I always feel like Disney does such a good job of making celebrations special, so what a bummer not to be acknowledged at all.

The Wonder still has my heart as my number one ship

Mine, too!! My first and the one we sailed on our Honeymoon. I really wish she'd come back to Port Canaveral. We haven't been on her since 2006!

I have a placeholder burning a hole in my pocket and I need to use it on something.

50 days til my cruise, and I'm already thinking about when I'll use the placeholder I'm going to book!!!!

 

[Kari0180]

Sorry I don't comment often, but I wanted you to know how much I enjoy your trip reports!

Thank you for following along, I really appreciate it!

 

[cgersic1]

I'm another that doesn't comment much, but I've followed many of your trip reports and always have a good time right along with you! Thank you for taking the time to do them!

 

[Kari0180]

I'm another that doesn't comment much, but I've followed many of your trip reports and always have a good time right along with you! Thank you for taking the time to do them!

Thank you so much for following along! I'm happy that you have a good time reading, I have a great time writing!

 

[DMMarla07860]

Fantastic trip report