lborne
It all started with a rabbit
- Joined
- Sep 6, 2006
- Messages
- 1,387
Got back yesterday from a 3 day Wonder cruise and all in all, had a good trip. We were on the ship with Stepharoonie, so it will be interesting to see her trip report.
My wife and I have been on many cruises (the last one 3 weeks ago on Regent in the Med), and we were on the Magic 7 years ago. This is the first cruise with our kids (DS 3 and DS 8). We were meeting up with 2 other familes, each with 2 kids.
We live in Vero Beach and so it was just 1.5 hrs drive for us to the terminal. Check in was fast and easy, and we even got the kids checked in and our beeper.
CABIN:
By the time we were done with lunch, our room was ready. We were in 2118 right outside the aft elevator. Other than the occasional person talking really loudly, we did not hear much noise outside the room and it was really nice being next to the Aft elevators. The Aft elevators have the shortest wait times except when large crowds are coming back on board on deck 1. The room smelled a bit like the enigne room. It got better or we got used to it. We brought a glade plug in for the bathroom, but the shaver outlet in there did not work, so we moved the plug in to the bedroom and this may have masked the smell. The kids loved their beds. The little one was so tired at night, he did not complain about having to sleep in the bottom sofa bed. The split bathroom design is genius.
DECK PARTIES:
The deck parties were kind of lame. Our DS 8 thought they were too loud and so we did not stay for the sail away one. He tolerated the Pirate night party so that we could see the fireworks. He says that was his favorite part of the entire cruise. The buffet looked great, but it did not open until 10:45, by which time, we were ready to go.
KIDS PROGRAM:
This is the primary reason we booked Disney. Another family with 2 kids that were supposed to come with us on this trip, booked with Carnival (I think) because they got a week long cruise for the same price. Their cruise was a couple months ago, and they were very disapointed in the kids program. They said the times in the flyers were not always accurate, so their children missed a lot of fun activities. Anyway, we were not disapointed by the Disney children's programs. Other than sometimes having to wait up to 5-10 minutes to check them in and out, it was perfect. At one point, our 3 yr old stayed for 5 hours in a row and was disapointed when I came to get him. My 8 yr old hates basketball, so when he saw they were going to the sports deck, he did not want to go the the club. But that was the night we were booked for Palo with the other parents we were with, so with some threats of never going to Disney again, we persuaded him to go. I imagined it would be some unstructed time where they would give the kids some basketballs and let the play on the court. But it was actually some type of very well organized game they played because my son wound up loving it.
FOOD:
One of the disapointments on the Magic nearly 7 years ago was the food. We don't remember much else, but we do remember the food being sub standard. So we were very surprised to see this is not so anymore. No, the food is not exotic or highly unusual, but it is excellent. I'm mainly talking about the dinners. Breakfast and lunch were very good but more on par with what other cruises offer and what I had expected. I thought the burgers and pizza by the pool were pretty bad. But, dinners were exceptional. In fact, our meal at Palo was probably the best meal we've ever eaten. Not to brag, but we've eaten at many incredible world famous restaurants, and most recently were on a Regent cruise (voted best cruise line), and Palo was as good as anything I could remember. If there was a negative to that dinner (there were 6 of us together), it was that the waiter brought out the pizza, soup, salad and other appetizers all at the same time. Our table was too crowded. I prefer only having one dish at a time. But, our waiter was excellent otherwise and brought out more food than we ordered. He gave us two extra main courses to try (that no one had ordered), and 3 extra desserts. For some odd reason, he could not give us coffee with dessert. He had to clear the table first he said.
I wish Disney could have open seating for dinner. You really have to plan so much around the nightly dinner time, and as I'm sure you know, this can be problamatic withOUT kids, much less with them. For dinner, we had both boys with us the first night, only the older the second night, and neither for Palo, of course. The best part of the last Regent cruise we went on was the ability to dine at whatever time you wanted.
The lunch on CC was also excellent and much better than I remember from typical beach BBQ lunches. The Mahi Mahi which was served as a sandwich was done perfectly. The ribs - fantastic, and the burgers were good. They were NOT the same ones (or not prepared the same way) as on the ship.
CASTAWAY CAY:
Because of the cold water at CC, my kids did not want to swim, but they really enjoyed the kids club. One of our friends' kids wanted to play on the jungle gym that is out in the water, but for some reason, it was closed. She did not find out why, but that was a BIG disapointment, because it looks so fun. We did a bike ride and that was a hit. Many people I talked to could have skipped Nassau and done CC both days.
ENTERTAINMENT and MISC.:
The Match your Mate game show was fun. Of course this highly depends on the couples answers and how they react to each others answers. We did a flight of Vodkas one night at Diversions which was fun and put us all in a good mood. We felt like we had the adult areas all to ourselves, which was nice. The Cadillac Lounge was too smokey for us, so we never went in there. My wife spent several hours at the Spa doing the rainforest area. This was a deal at only $15.
My DS8 liked watching movies at the theater. He went with the other older kids in our party and we felt very comfortable leaving them alone together.
The nightly shows really set Disney apart from everyone else. They are just fantastic and the sets are amazing. They are like any show done at the theme parks, and keep the adults entertained too. My one complaint - two of the shows (Disney Dreams and Hercules), we'd seen 7 years ago. They need some new shows as another poster has commented on.
OTHER:
The biggest annoyance for me was waiting in lines. Admitedly, they were not huge lines and were shorter than what you find on the larger mega ships. Luckily, our sons have meet prety much all the characters at the parks and did not want to wait for the ones on the ship - these were by far the longest lines. Guest Services could use a few extra staff members and check in/ check out at the children's clubs could be better.
Almost everyone we ran into was pleasent and went out of their way to help us. There were some mixups that were frustrating. One night when we went to the kids club to pick up our DS3, he had lost his shoes and we could not find them. So they told us to come back in the morning since they would find them during clean up. I stopped there when they opened, and they told us they were sent to Guest Services. After a 10 minute wait (at 9:15 am) in the GS line, I finally got up to the counter. They searched around, then finally called to the club. The shoes were at the club.
Another time, we were up at 7:00 am and went to the arcade. Our arcade card did not work, and I could tell it was the scanner system, not our card that was bad. I called GS, and they assured me it was my card and not the scanning system and asked me to come down and have it checked out. So I waited in line (Yes, there was a line at 7:00 am). This line was mainly due to the fact that there was only two CS reps, and one was on the computer the entire time, leaving only one to answer questions. And the lady in front of me decided to have a nice long chat with the CS rep about how Stich is the ugliest Disney character ever and how she can't understand why he is so popular, and that she could draw a better character than that, and the CS rep is too nice to throw her overboard, which is what I would have done since I'd not had my darn coffee yet and my 8 year old keeps asking when he can play his favorite game, that is, for once on the cruise, available. Needless to say, my card was fine and it took at least 2 hours for them to reset the card scanners at the arcade (we tried 2 hours later with no luck, then got off the ship for CC).
The other annoyance is the amount of times we were asked if we wanted to purchase the water and wine package. The whole "nickel and dime" thing is common on most cruise lines, but I'd be willing to pay more upfront to have tips, drinks, and other ameneties included and not to have to sign for every thing.
OK, so I complaned a bit about various things. However, it still was an excellent cruise all around and I hope I did not come across as too negative. As a testament to how much we loved the cruise, we have booked again for next year and are going with MIL, FIL, plus both of my wife's brother's families.
Photos:
http://picasaweb.google.com/Bornefamily
Edit : As someone pointed out, it is a "flight of Martinis", not "Vodkas". I knew that
.
My wife and I have been on many cruises (the last one 3 weeks ago on Regent in the Med), and we were on the Magic 7 years ago. This is the first cruise with our kids (DS 3 and DS 8). We were meeting up with 2 other familes, each with 2 kids.
We live in Vero Beach and so it was just 1.5 hrs drive for us to the terminal. Check in was fast and easy, and we even got the kids checked in and our beeper.
CABIN:
By the time we were done with lunch, our room was ready. We were in 2118 right outside the aft elevator. Other than the occasional person talking really loudly, we did not hear much noise outside the room and it was really nice being next to the Aft elevators. The Aft elevators have the shortest wait times except when large crowds are coming back on board on deck 1. The room smelled a bit like the enigne room. It got better or we got used to it. We brought a glade plug in for the bathroom, but the shaver outlet in there did not work, so we moved the plug in to the bedroom and this may have masked the smell. The kids loved their beds. The little one was so tired at night, he did not complain about having to sleep in the bottom sofa bed. The split bathroom design is genius.
DECK PARTIES:
The deck parties were kind of lame. Our DS 8 thought they were too loud and so we did not stay for the sail away one. He tolerated the Pirate night party so that we could see the fireworks. He says that was his favorite part of the entire cruise. The buffet looked great, but it did not open until 10:45, by which time, we were ready to go.
KIDS PROGRAM:
This is the primary reason we booked Disney. Another family with 2 kids that were supposed to come with us on this trip, booked with Carnival (I think) because they got a week long cruise for the same price. Their cruise was a couple months ago, and they were very disapointed in the kids program. They said the times in the flyers were not always accurate, so their children missed a lot of fun activities. Anyway, we were not disapointed by the Disney children's programs. Other than sometimes having to wait up to 5-10 minutes to check them in and out, it was perfect. At one point, our 3 yr old stayed for 5 hours in a row and was disapointed when I came to get him. My 8 yr old hates basketball, so when he saw they were going to the sports deck, he did not want to go the the club. But that was the night we were booked for Palo with the other parents we were with, so with some threats of never going to Disney again, we persuaded him to go. I imagined it would be some unstructed time where they would give the kids some basketballs and let the play on the court. But it was actually some type of very well organized game they played because my son wound up loving it.
FOOD:
One of the disapointments on the Magic nearly 7 years ago was the food. We don't remember much else, but we do remember the food being sub standard. So we were very surprised to see this is not so anymore. No, the food is not exotic or highly unusual, but it is excellent. I'm mainly talking about the dinners. Breakfast and lunch were very good but more on par with what other cruises offer and what I had expected. I thought the burgers and pizza by the pool were pretty bad. But, dinners were exceptional. In fact, our meal at Palo was probably the best meal we've ever eaten. Not to brag, but we've eaten at many incredible world famous restaurants, and most recently were on a Regent cruise (voted best cruise line), and Palo was as good as anything I could remember. If there was a negative to that dinner (there were 6 of us together), it was that the waiter brought out the pizza, soup, salad and other appetizers all at the same time. Our table was too crowded. I prefer only having one dish at a time. But, our waiter was excellent otherwise and brought out more food than we ordered. He gave us two extra main courses to try (that no one had ordered), and 3 extra desserts. For some odd reason, he could not give us coffee with dessert. He had to clear the table first he said.
I wish Disney could have open seating for dinner. You really have to plan so much around the nightly dinner time, and as I'm sure you know, this can be problamatic withOUT kids, much less with them. For dinner, we had both boys with us the first night, only the older the second night, and neither for Palo, of course. The best part of the last Regent cruise we went on was the ability to dine at whatever time you wanted.
The lunch on CC was also excellent and much better than I remember from typical beach BBQ lunches. The Mahi Mahi which was served as a sandwich was done perfectly. The ribs - fantastic, and the burgers were good. They were NOT the same ones (or not prepared the same way) as on the ship.
CASTAWAY CAY:
Because of the cold water at CC, my kids did not want to swim, but they really enjoyed the kids club. One of our friends' kids wanted to play on the jungle gym that is out in the water, but for some reason, it was closed. She did not find out why, but that was a BIG disapointment, because it looks so fun. We did a bike ride and that was a hit. Many people I talked to could have skipped Nassau and done CC both days.
ENTERTAINMENT and MISC.:
The Match your Mate game show was fun. Of course this highly depends on the couples answers and how they react to each others answers. We did a flight of Vodkas one night at Diversions which was fun and put us all in a good mood. We felt like we had the adult areas all to ourselves, which was nice. The Cadillac Lounge was too smokey for us, so we never went in there. My wife spent several hours at the Spa doing the rainforest area. This was a deal at only $15.
My DS8 liked watching movies at the theater. He went with the other older kids in our party and we felt very comfortable leaving them alone together.
The nightly shows really set Disney apart from everyone else. They are just fantastic and the sets are amazing. They are like any show done at the theme parks, and keep the adults entertained too. My one complaint - two of the shows (Disney Dreams and Hercules), we'd seen 7 years ago. They need some new shows as another poster has commented on.
OTHER:
The biggest annoyance for me was waiting in lines. Admitedly, they were not huge lines and were shorter than what you find on the larger mega ships. Luckily, our sons have meet prety much all the characters at the parks and did not want to wait for the ones on the ship - these were by far the longest lines. Guest Services could use a few extra staff members and check in/ check out at the children's clubs could be better.
Almost everyone we ran into was pleasent and went out of their way to help us. There were some mixups that were frustrating. One night when we went to the kids club to pick up our DS3, he had lost his shoes and we could not find them. So they told us to come back in the morning since they would find them during clean up. I stopped there when they opened, and they told us they were sent to Guest Services. After a 10 minute wait (at 9:15 am) in the GS line, I finally got up to the counter. They searched around, then finally called to the club. The shoes were at the club.
Another time, we were up at 7:00 am and went to the arcade. Our arcade card did not work, and I could tell it was the scanner system, not our card that was bad. I called GS, and they assured me it was my card and not the scanning system and asked me to come down and have it checked out. So I waited in line (Yes, there was a line at 7:00 am). This line was mainly due to the fact that there was only two CS reps, and one was on the computer the entire time, leaving only one to answer questions. And the lady in front of me decided to have a nice long chat with the CS rep about how Stich is the ugliest Disney character ever and how she can't understand why he is so popular, and that she could draw a better character than that, and the CS rep is too nice to throw her overboard, which is what I would have done since I'd not had my darn coffee yet and my 8 year old keeps asking when he can play his favorite game, that is, for once on the cruise, available. Needless to say, my card was fine and it took at least 2 hours for them to reset the card scanners at the arcade (we tried 2 hours later with no luck, then got off the ship for CC).
The other annoyance is the amount of times we were asked if we wanted to purchase the water and wine package. The whole "nickel and dime" thing is common on most cruise lines, but I'd be willing to pay more upfront to have tips, drinks, and other ameneties included and not to have to sign for every thing.
OK, so I complaned a bit about various things. However, it still was an excellent cruise all around and I hope I did not come across as too negative. As a testament to how much we loved the cruise, we have booked again for next year and are going with MIL, FIL, plus both of my wife's brother's families.
Photos:
http://picasaweb.google.com/Bornefamily
Edit : As someone pointed out, it is a "flight of Martinis", not "Vodkas". I knew that
.
Still dreaming of those ribs...... and I'm not a huge rib fan, either!
