"Witty Trip Report Title" 2 --Bigger, Longer, Uncut

[MrRay]

This is a sequel to Last January's "Witty Western-Fantasy Trip Report Title" which you can find here

We're Bob and Jenna from NYC.




After completing a fantastic 7 Night Western on the Fantasy Last year, which again you can read about here
we decided to rebook for a 7 night Eastern Caribbean starting January 11th. But then like most sequels we decided to make it bigger and better when we saw that the Magic would have just returned to Port Canaveral. It didn't seem like too much extra money considering we were already flying down so we decided on a 4 night cruise on the Magic January 6-10 and then a 7 night Eastern Caribbean starting January 11th.

Magic and Fantasy...

I found this picture on the DIS right after the Fantasy Launched. I'm sorry whoever I grabbed it from for not crediting you properly.

Like most sequels it wasn't all great though. Some challenging travel plans in the beginning and some terrible weather on the Magic made for a difficult start but things eventually turned our way and we finished strong.



But we'll get there...

January 6th. It's Time! Have a Magical Vacation!. If you can get here...
-----All aboard is in 15 minutes...
-----We're here, lets eat
-----Um...Now what do we do...
January 7th, Nassau
-----Around the ship
January 8th, Castaway Cay
-----Mixology
January 9th, Driving around in circles
January 10th, Wrapping up the Magic
-----An afternoon in Epcot
January, 11th, Port Canaveral...Round 2
-----The First Few Hours
-----Sailing Away
-----Dinner
January 12th, Day 2... At Sea
-----Mixology
January 13th, Day 3...At Sea
-----Odds and Ends
-----What the Heck is that
January 14th, St. Maarten
-----The rest of the afternoon
-----Pirate Night
January 15th, St. Thomas-St. John Champagne Catamaran Sail and Snorkel
-----The Rest of the Day
January 16th, At Sea
-----More Odds and Ends
January 17th, Castaway Cay
-----Fun in the partly cloudy sun...
-----The Last Night
January 18th, Heading Home

 

[Susan121302]

I just read through your TR from last year and loved it. I am REALLY excited for this one now, since we are doing the Eastern next year on the Fantasy. Looking forward to more!

 

[SacCruiser]

Enjoyed your first report and cant wait to hear about this trip! Thanks for posting.

 

[wiigirl]

Following along!

 

[JayhawkFans]

So happy I stumbled upon your cruise reviews this afternoon as I'm sitting at work suffering from PDD (Post Disney Depression). Looking forward to reading all about your recent cruise(s).

 

[totallymickey]

Just recently read your report from last year. Cruised on the Fantasy this past Christmas and am missing the cruising life. We booked the Magic for Thanksgiving, so interested on your thoughts.

 

[Floridagram]

I'm onboard for the adventure!

 

[Janny]

Dear Bob & Jenna,
Feel like I know you by reading your excellent first trip report!!! Thank you
for posting so much great information that I'm studying and writing down for our July trip on the "Fantasy".
Question?
Did you happen to notice any wheelchairs on board and how they navigated?? Our youngest of three children is in a wheelchair and they gave us an accessible room. We have to go through alot of legwork to contact the infirmary to give them a list of her medications, etc. . My husband and I were just curious if there seemed to be a little safe haven to park her out of the way of other guests and how the wheelchairs were in the restaurants. She is a tiny little sweetheart and doesn't make a peep, but I don't want to inconvenience other guests with excuse me, pardon me, etc.
Thanks!

 

[DisneYE]

I read last nite your 1st TR and its awesome...great pictures and the report was excellent all around... LF to this one as well.. Following along.
PS. you guys make a beautiful couple and you remind me of DW and I 10 years ago...

 

[nataliej_vk]

Loved your first trip report and cannot wait to follow your adventures in this new one!

 

[MrRay]

Dear Bob & Jenna,
Feel like I know you by reading your excellent first trip report!!! Thank you
for posting so much great information that I'm studying and writing down for our July trip on the "Fantasy".
Question?
Did you happen to notice any wheelchairs on board and how they navigated?? Our youngest of three children is in a wheelchair and they gave us an accessible room. We have to go through alot of legwork to contact the infirmary to give them a list of her medications, etc. . My husband and I were just curious if there seemed to be a little safe haven to park her out of the way of other guests and how the wheelchairs were in the restaurants. She is a tiny little sweetheart and doesn't make a peep, but I don't want to inconvenience other guests with excuse me, pardon me, etc.
Thanks!

We noticed a few people in wheel chairs. First off you shouldn't feel bad at all. We never felt anything but compassion for anyone we saw wheeling around. The ship seems very accessible. The restaurants all seem very easy to get into.

The only real tip I would have is if Cabanas seems too crazy you can eat breakfast and lunch in royal court which was always pretty empty and much calmer. There are also always tons of staff there to help.

Just don't feel bad or like you are inconveniencing anyone, the overall mood is much more relaxed.

You'll have a great time!

 

[MrRay]

We begin our journey on January 6th in the early hours of the morning. We arrived at the airport around 5:15 am for a 7:10 am flight that was supposed to land around 10. There had been a lot of bad weather in the NY area, and the day before an incident with one air craft sliding off the runway. Throw in new FAA regulations on how much pilots can fly that had started only days earlier and you have a crowded and stressful airport. I tried my best to stay positive.


When we arrived we realized that our flight had been delayed. This is not what you want to hear when you are getting on a cruise that day.

2:20 is definitely cutting it close.


On the total flip side though it made the line less stressful. We checked in online but the line to drop bags was over an hour long. Between that and security I think we spent about 90 minutes to get into the gates. We opted to sit down and kill some time at breakfast.


With all the time in the world to kill I reviewed our travel insurance documents. Our worst case scenario, while still a bummer, was we could fly to Nassau and meet the boat the next day..as long as we could get out of NY. We kept hearing announcements telling people to leave if their flights were canceled because there was NOTHING available for 3 days.

Jenna called DCL and let them know our status, they said we were fine but to call if it got any later.


It was actually on the warmer side but our plane was delayed 5 hours flying in from Salt Lake City.

As can almost always be expected the estimated departure time kept slipping. Now we were looking at arriving close to 3:30. Jenna spoke with DCL again and they said they would try their best, we were using their transfers from the airport so they said they would try and have someone waiting for us at the gate to help get us through the airport faster.

We boarded around 12:15, turned off our phones, and settled in. We had 3 helpless hours to try to relax because once we landed we knew it was going to be a race...

 

[RhondaInMA]

Enjoyed the first... following along.

 

[Grumpy's Wife]

Joining in.

 

[Linda67]

Oh my goodness, I would be so stressed out with that flight delay
Eek, you seemed to stay very calm

 

[pixiedust1125]

Hey I just wanted to say hi I'm Jenna, Bobs wife. Man oh man were we stressed it was a pretty horrible 5 hours. I didn't even know what to do with myself, just all the waiting was a killer.

 

[marciemouse]

Really enjoyed your last trip report and looking forward to this one!

 

[DisneyDreamerMN]

I actually read your last trip report last night! It was great and I am glad you are back.

I am stressing out for both of you! Can't wait to read the next installment. DH and I took a Carnival cruise last year and ended up changing our flight to a day earlier because a big snow storm was coming. Long story short, one of the couples at our table ended up being from the same state as us and took our originally booked flight and made it just fine. Ah, the joys of traveling.

 

[missmdr]

Subscribe!
Oh - my worse case scenario playing out before my eyes!
I bet you were happy to have trip insurance.....just in case!

 

[MrRay]

It was a quiet flight. We both tried to zone out as much as possible, but it's hard not thinking about the options of where you might be sleeping that night.
While still stressful I really can't explain how much more at ease I was knowing that we had coverage from our traveler's insurance. While I've never had to use it before, the peace of mind I got from it was worth the price.

3:30 p.m. we pulled up to the gate. We were in the 7th row of the plane so we didn't feel the need to take the DCL representative's advice of pleading with everyone on the plane to let us off first. As we started to walk up the ramp I saw a woman holding a sign with our name on it and I instantly felt more at ease.

She radioed that she had us and we were off.


It seems small but this is the level of service that I love about Disney, not having to sprint anxiously through the airport looking for the check-in desk was exactly what we needed. It also didn't hurt that our guide reminded us a lot of Jenna's grandmother, which helped put us at ease. From her radio we could hear that other guests were in worse shape than us, one family wasn't supposed to land until 4:10.

We arrived at the check-in desk where we were given Key to the World cards and told a bus would be there any minute. Within 2 minutes a bus driver welcomed us to his bus and said we were waiting for one more family. About 45 seconds after that he said that we weren't going to take any chances on us missing the cruise and we were off. So not that I recommend this ever but if you want a private bus to port canaveral, show up stupid late.



Again you have to hand it to Disney, they didn't want to wait even ten minutes to try and send less busses, they were going to do whatever it took to get us there.
The whole way our driver kept reassuring us that we were going to be ok and kept us informed on the others behind us. There were two more busses after us racing to the ship. At one point he was saying how sometimes busses will start to to the port and then have to turn around and come back because the ship was leaving... We got really silent and he once again reassured us with a smile that we were going to be fine....and we exhaled.



It really didn't seem like a long drive now that we were breathing, the whole day thus far had felt like agonizing slow motion, now things were blurring by.

It was around 4:30 and we made the turn into the port area where the sun was shining on our final destination.


Security was very nice to us but wasn't going to let us through without calling over the K-9 to give our bags a good sniff. The sprinklers were on at this point so the dog had to go the looooong way... You know, no rush or anything.

With a friendly goodbye we headed up the escalators and were greeted with an unfamiliar view of a familiar place.



The terminal was so peaceful with only a few cast members at the desk and the setting sun's light pouring through the wide open space. We didn't really realize we were fully checked in so we tried going to the desk. Again they greeted us by name and said "we've been waiting for you". But the tone was more like a friendly "get the hell on the boat".

As we moved up the gangway we could hear the pounding music from the sail away party. With the last step off of the gangway and into the lobby we were all smiles. It was a long journey but we had made it.

Now we could start having fun...