carohs

Lighthouse Point. Many of the following were procured from DH. First you gotta get to the tram stop. Photo op. One of many. First available seating. Not right on the water but really just a few steps away. See the sunny weather? Yay, no thunderstorms! The shore. Lots of lifeguards on duty. This was taken mid morning. By the afternoon the tide was inches from the beach chairs, and often swept under. Keep your belongings off the ground! The first several feet of water were sandy as heck. No way to sit there without sand up your you know what in a quick hurry. The water was quite beautiful but the waves were no joke. Among the things to get lost and swept away were multiple sunglasses (not ours) and DD's goggles. Was it the hurricane causing the surf? Coulda been. Gorgeous beach! Lunch. DS and I did not eat. It was beautiful. DS did enjoy the waves for like 3 minutes before saying no more. I maybe did 10 min. We really did spend most of our time out there sleeping. At least I could compare the two islands. I preferred Castaway. As "fun" as waves can be, I enjoyed the serenity of sitting on shore and let the smooth waves wash over us at CC. The sand is also different. While CC was softer than I had ever expected, LP sand reminded me more like grainy wet dough. We made our way back to the ship in the afternoon and caught a cute parade. I really would have loved this a lot more had I been feeling better. 2024-10-09 11.15.27.mov We used up the absolute last dregs of our energy walking back. DS spent the rest of the day sleeping. I think DD went to club. We for sure missed all the pirate stuff, but oh well. At least it wasn't our first DCL cruise. Dinner was at Rapunzel's again with the pirate menu and DH and DD got to have a father/daughter date then they came back to the room. I don't think we got a towel animal that day. DD watched cartoons while the rest of us slept. About 10 to 10 I woke up long enough to ask if she wanted to see the fireworks, and she said no. 30 minutes later, she asked if we were just taking a nap so we could go to the dance party. Huh? Oh no, miscommunication! Pirate show, fireworks, and dance party are all back to back. I thought we missed it for sure and was guilt tripping. With all the willpower I could muster, all acquired from the last few hours of sleep, I walked out to verandah and heard some boom boom happening. We took the elevator up and sure enough, almost everyone had cleared the deck but DD managed to catch the last few songs and even ran into her new friend from LP.

Thanks! I'm trying to finish up but life keeps going.

Day 3: Lighthouse Point and Pirate Day. Well this day turned out to be a non-starter. DS and I woke up with stomach issues and could hardly stand to be awake let alone get moving for the day. DH waited to see what we wanted to do, but in the end I decided we needed to rest and he should take DD to see LP. Stateroom host here ended up being aces. Besides cleaning our room, he brought DS sickness bags and later on did the occasional wellness check per DH's request. When he cleaned our stateroom though, we went out to the verandah to get some air and eat the green apple I'd gotten from Daisy's De-Lites but as soon as we tried to get back inside we discovered the door wouldn't open! Talk about a freak-out situation. I was sure the stateroom host had locked us out at this point and I hadn't brought my phone out with me. To add, almost everyone had left the ship hours ago and there was no one around to yell to for help. Not to mention, I had no real energy for yelling. Oh no! I did not want to wait for DH to come back, as it was only mid morning and all aboard wasn't until 4:45. Easily 6 hours later. But...way aft there were two crew painting. Try as I might I could not get there attention. I waved, I shouted, I knocked on the verandah wall. Noooo. Then I looked around. No phone, but what else did I have for inventory? An e-book, deck chairs, half an eaten apple. Also, the cutlery and the napkin used to roll said cutlery. I waved that white napkin like some kind of flag out there and still had no luck! I knew they were our only hope, so I persisted. It took what seemed like ages to get their attention but couldn't have been more than 20 or so minutes. It wasn't until one of them turned to look in our direction that they realized anything was up. I tried to mime to them but instead got to watch the very slow progress of ship scaffolding make it's way over to in front of our room. We explained the situation and they made a call over to ship security. Not too long after, our stateroom host was at the verandah door pulling at it. He says it wasn't locked but was just hard to open due to air pressure. Um? That sure made me paranoid for the rest of the trip, but we never had an issue with the door after that. A couple times, yes I had to pull with more force, but never was it closed so tight I couldn't open it (unless it was locked). Phew, anyway, I was just grateful to no longer be stuck out there. Maybe it was the adrenaline or the green apple, but I was feeling better now. I figured I could sleep on the bed, or I could sleep on the sand and at least get to see the water here. DS took some convincing, but I really didn't want to miss out on the opportunity to visit LP. Who knows when, if ever, we'll have the chance to come back. Luckily, the golf cart driver invited us on, and we didn't have to walk the pier. There was also a tram that was getting ready to leave, and we made it aboard just in time. We found DH and made the most of what we could of our day at the beach.

Going back to dinner at Rapunzel's. Going back to DS's question. Hmm, well I imagine the chances would be increased since a lot of people will book a cruise specifically to celebrate a life event, birthdays included. We enjoyed the show very much. It actually reminded me a lot of Tiana's on the wonder with the music and the parading at the end. Between the two, I may give the lead to Rapunzel's. Kids menu Towel animal day 2

First night's surprise Halloween costumes, mousequerade, and Dale doing his thing. Really wishing we had had (arg, can't think how to rephrase double hads here) better weather so we could have seen this on the pool deck. 20241008_194331~2[1].mp4

You're welcome! How exciting! What ship are you sailing on?

On the navigator app I noticed they had events for Monday and Thurs night football listed. Check the navigator and it'll let you know where to go.

Day 2 DD woke us up. She heard a small noise and said "finally you're awake...I've been waiting for an hour!" No way, besides it was still only 730 am. Went outside on the verandah where the humidity promptly fogged up my sunglasses. They seemed to be okay after I wiped them clean but anytime thereafter I stepped outdoors, boom, fog city. The day started out with the announcement that conditions were to windy to dock at Castaway Cay and today would turn into a sea day. Such a letdown! But I had sorta been expecting to hear it. Captain sailed us south to clearer skies and we set out to make the most of our sea day. Speaking of announcements, the whole cruise anytime there'd be one, we heard the melody to Wish Upon a Star first. An announcement of the announcement, if you would. After breakfast, we met Minnie and Chip and Dale. Also ran into Pluto. Then we waited for anyone can cook. I had heard they do these but hadn't yet been able to attend one. It was okay. The presenting chef is a chef from Palo. We had the opportunity to ask questions but only DS had one. He wanted to know why pasta starts out sinking but then floats. Chef says as soon as it does, that's how you know it's done cooking. They have screens so we could follow along but the tech guy often was zoomed into the wrong area. Chef said what ingredients he was using but used no measurements. They did give us a recipe card though. About halfway through they passed around a sample for everyone, except the sample came from the kitchen. Chef only demonstrated making a single raviolo. DS noted that this is the Ratatouille font/logo. He says his favorite scene is when they say "regrettably, we are all out of wine.." Um, why? Is that a snark at me and DH for drinking wine? With some time before the next activity of interest, DS and DD decided it was time to try the pool for a bit. I watched Finding Nemo on Funnel Vision while they swam. Funnel Vision is great and has movies on back-to-back all cruise long. I love having the always on options for entertainment but keep in mind that the pool deck will basically never be quiet. I still find it possible to tune it out to read my book if I want tho. Typical crowds for the pool It was getting hot on the deck so DH and I went back to the stateroom to chill on our verandah in the shade. DD watched to watch Frozen and DS went to Edge for a bit. After lunch, we reconvened for napkin folding. We learned to fold a tuxedo shirt, an ear of corn, and a bird of paradise out of napkins. DH and I attended Mixology sometime in the afternoon. After Mixology we checked DD back out of club and retrieved DS from Edge. They put on their Halloween costumes, and we spent the evening in line for pictures until it was time for trick or treating. Standing in line can be a chore, but it was fun to see all the people around in costumes. We saw so many group costumes! Incredibles, Inside Out emotions, crayons, Toy Story, Star Wars, etc. I think my favorite of the day was the family who went all out in Mighty Duck costumes. While we had been excited for it, trick or treating wasn’t a big ado. Basically, you walked in a line around Cabanas where there were about 5 CMs handing out a handful of candy each. There weren’t even any extra decorations or anything. If the characters were there…well it would have slowed things down entirely… but that would have been cool. Having just walked around the flooded floor of the pool deck I guessed correctly the mouse-querade would be moving to the lobby, too. Remembering the havoc of sail-a-wave, we decided to wait it out in the lobby, getting there about 40 min early. Well apparently not eating lunch and staying out til midnight last night caught up with DS because he fell asleep waiting and even when roused and encouraged to dance, he preferred to go back to the stateroom. I had him wait a few minutes to see if it was grogginess but no. The only one who didn’t take a nap today was DD. Then it was off to dinner. Dinner was very good. Tonight we ate at Rapunzel’s where we had a little dinner show to celebrate her bday. DS said, “what are he chances?” when about 12 other people raised their hand saying their birthday is also today.

Buena Vista Theater where we saw Deadpool and later on Inside Out 2

No post. Dinner menu isn't legible.

Dinner was at Animator's Palate that night. Kids menu Bread service, salmon tartare, dinner, and is that or isn't it another Mickey on that bread basket? After dinner, we had a glass at wine in the stateroom while the kids went back to their clubs. Then we headed to see Deadpool & Wolverine. I profess I'd never seen a Deadpool movie before but hey. It was funny, but in an utterly ridiculous sorta way. DH says they're all like this. By the time the movie ended the kids had made their way back and were already sleeping. It wasn't very long before we were too. All in all a good first day.

7:30 is that time in the evening between the two dinner services, and usually Disney will schedule something during this time which is popular and well attended. Tonight's programing featured the Halloween tree lighting. It was so much fun! I didn't get great videos or pictures but if you ever get the chance, get there early or go up a deck (but still early) for better views. You'll get to see the tree go from this: to this: And you'll be entertained by a story and a song or two. It's cute.

Some stateroom pics. 6106. Something to note with this room is that it's a connecting room, but the balconies are separated by a solid white wall. Kudos to DCL who provides these in the public restrooms and which saved me from another possible sitch, since my supplies were all in the checked bags.

After lunch we got DD registered into club, magic band put on and explored the open house. To me it looks very similar to the Wonder but the kids noticed some few differences. Oceaneer's Club Love the bathrooms, especially the automatic handwash stations! Oceaneer's Lab Edge Then it was off to the stateroom to get our KTW cards and unpack the carry-on. That done, the first activity the kids chose was Disney Trivia. We knew we weren’t die-hard enough to compete but still it was fun to learn some new facts. Like, the Disney Magic is longer than Main St. Magic Kingdom. Not by a whole lot, but technically longer. Since we had some time after, the kids decided they wanted to go back to their clubs, but it turned out they had moved up muster and had less than 5 minutes to play. Aw. Immediately after muster is the Sail-A-Wave party which was moved indoors to the atrium due to weather. It was a packed madhouse. It was difficult to even move past the crowd to get a picture. Rather than fight the crowd, we headed back to the stateroom to find our luggage had been delivered and unpacked. We also saw the sheriff escort us to a point, then the pilot boat catch up to us to pick up the pilot. Embarkation day must-dos completed, it was time to check out evening activities. I opted to go to the shop raffle thing where I got the charm of the day and a bracelet. It was a sales pitch, obviously, but it’s a cute souvenir anyway. Then we met up to go to the theater to watch Twice Charmed. This cast is particularly good, and Disney always impresses with their production and special affects. Twice Charmed is a cute story about how the evil step mother and the two step sisters team up with their Wicked Fairy Godfather to rewind time and prevent Cindy from marrying the prince. The whole cast did a wonderful job at bringing their characters to life and they even had the whole audience shouting “bippidy boppity boo” at one point.

Day 1: Embarkation Day Check in day, at 12am EST, I logged in and attempted to get the earliest PAT available to silver castaway club members. Unfortunately had a little unforeseen sitch that caused a delay getting through the screens, but we still ended up with 11:45 am. Too impatient to wait that long, we packed up, checked out, and had called the uber by about 11am. Fifteen min later and bags handed over to the porters, we showed our boarding passes and were let through to the check in desks. We were checked in right about 11:30 which was also the time they announced the family of the day and began boarding. Groups were called relatively quickly (we were grp 9) and we were in Cabanas having lunch no later than 12:15. From the parking garage where we were dropped off: Alcohol policy. We brought on 3 bottles. Cute mural as we walked in: The search for hidden Mickeys begins. Concierge lounge up there on the 2nd floor. Found One! Photo op here, while waiting to be called: