MickeyEarrings
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Jul 1, 2012
CELEBRATE THE THINGS YOU HAVE IN COMMON! – April 24, a day at sea
Today would be our first full day, and it was a day at sea. I love sea days! I love waking up when I want to, doing whatever I want, whenever I want… But today was a rather structured sea day!
Mark’s alarm went off at 6:30. I snoozed while he showered and I eventually got up around seven, because we had a breakfast date with Mickey and pals!! Mark went to the Cove Café for his cappuccino(s?) while I showered and dressed, then we made our way down to Animator’s Palate for our Mickey and Pals Character Breakfast. This is a ticketed event, and we signed up for it when we did our online check-in 105 days before sailing. We were meeting Fred and Kathy and their friends Susan & Tom. We were taken to a table for eight, and shortly thereafter two young ladies arrived to complete the table.
This is a limited breakfast menu, but you’re not really here for the food, are you? You’re here for the characters.
But I have to admit, it was kind of a love-‘em-and-shove-‘em kind of character experience. We were advised to have our cameras on and ready to go when the characters arrived, and while they did sign autographs the whole experience was kind of a letdown, compared to the awesome, random character interactions you have onboard. Mickey left our table so quickly Susan and Tom didn’t get autographs, so they had to have him brought back out! But we did get some cute pictures! – you’ll note Mark couldn’t stand his hat and he ditched it pretty quickly!
After breakfast I went back to the room to catch up my journal notes while Mark went walking. We agreed to meet in the Walt Disney Theater for Captain Ken Puckett’s 11:00 lecture on the Panama Canal. Cpt. Puckett is a retired Panama Canal pilot, and has taken almost 1500 ships through the Canal. (A ship’s captain relinquishes control of his vessel to a trained Canal pilot for the transit – the Canal pilot tells the ship’s captain what to do and he carries out those commands.) Today’s talk was about the Age of Exploration, and the need to have a shortcut through Central America to prevent ships having to go around the tip of South America to get from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Again, I’m not a history fan, but this background was important to understanding the bigger story behind the Canal, and I thought he did a great job trying to pack a lot of information into a forty-five minute presentation. He is also a very entertaining speaker, and I enjoyed all of his lectures, which were also shown on TV for those unable to see him live. He estimated that our fee to make the transit was in the five to six hundred thousand dollar range!
After Captain Puckett’s presentation it was time to eat again – really! Deb is an avid quilter and she had organized a fabric exchange. Eighteen of us signed up to exchange a “fat quarter” of batik fabric with a beach or ocean theme. We would then take those pieces home and make a special piece to remind us of our cruise. Lunch was at noon in Triton’s, and I was surprised to see the lunch menus now on a horizontal card, with small plate offerings. Maybe they finally realized we don’t all want a three-course lunch. Didn’t stop me, though…
Lunch was Mexican Tortilla Soup
Tomato Glazed Meatloaf (not near as good as MY meatloaf!)
And the Italian Style Ice Cream Sundae
Kathy was at the luncheon too, and she said our husbands were meeting up for lunch at Cabanas. Afterward, I took my fabric back to the room and took a good look at it; I think the colors all go great together!
There were so many fish extender gifts on the bed when I returned! I didn’t know if Mark or Agung brought them in, but my poor fish extender must have been bulging at the seams!!
I tied up a few more FE gifts (we gave a fabric grocery bag with the bow of the ship and the dates on the front – Mark designed it!) before heading upstairs to see Pixar Short Films on Funnel Vision at 2:45. But they never showed it! 2:45 came and went and they didn’t show it; after a while they showed a little cartoon with Pumbaa and Timon teaching pool safety. Bummer… Mark eventually caught up with me there, and we went up to deck ten to admire the ocean. We found two loungers in the shade and turned them around, toward the water. We had just commented that a drink would be nice when Bert the bar waiter walked by. Mark had a beer and I had the second-best Pina Colada I’ve ever had in my life!
Soon enough, it was time to dress for dinner – tonight was Formal Night and the Captain’s Welcome Reception!
I was still having big troubles with that darned blister, and my dress shoes were killing me, but we slowly made our way through the reception in the atrium on our way to Triton’s for dinner. The reception offers free cocktails, and Bert the waiter called me by name to offer me a drink. Now, I know I’m a pretty generous tipper, but I didn’t expect him to remember my name!
We had a lovely dinner at Triton’s. The roving photographers took our photographs, but frankly the ones on our camera were just as good.
Some of my food photos from tonight were a little fuzzy. I had to borrow the menu photos from the Disney Cruise Line Blog.
We both started with the Breaded and Deep-Fried Brie
And while he had the Potage Parmentier (leek and potato soup)…
I had the Iced Lobster and Jumbo Shrimp as my second course.
My entrée was the Chateaubriand-Roasted Filet Steak
And Mark had the Conchiglie Pasta (with roasted lobster)
He chose the Classic Opera Gateau for dessert, which didn’t seem to wow him.
I chose my favorite dish from Triton’s: the Grand Marnier Souffle!
We had asked our service team to speed up dinner a little bit tonight, because one of our prearrange group activities was a group photo in front of Triton’s at 7:30. We left dinner with ten minutes to spare, and taking the photo was a hoot! We had one person in the line as our placeholder and the rest of us were milling around in the atrium. When she got to the front of the line the rest of us ran up, fanning out around the steps and halfway up the stairs! It’s a wonderful way to remember the group – and look at the poor entertainers in the back left! They probably wondered what the heck was going on!
As the group broke up after the photo, we were walking back toward our room when another member of the group walked up to us and asked “Isn’t there supposed to be a photo tonight?”…. Oh no!! - You literally just missed it!
Tomorrow we would be in Cozumel and we had an excursion planned, so despite the Cruise Director’s promise that the comedy show tonight was not to be missed I decided my sore feet and I needed to stay in this evening. Mark took some gift cards and rewards points to Guest Services to put on our account, and I had asked him to increase the gratuities for our service team. He said they couldn’t do it yet; it wasn’t in the system yet. That seems like a very un-Disney thing. The answer is always yes! And how unlike them to refuse to take our money… Anyway, I watched the last half of Beauty and the Beast on TV, and the beginning of Toy Story 3. Bart texted me to arrange to meet in the morning to share a cab for our excursion. Mr. Turtle was our towelie tonight, and he reminded us to turn our clocks back before we turned in.
Ah!...extra sleep! I set a timer for X amount of hours, in addition to turning back the clocks on our phones. Mark tried to turn back the room clock but decided it was impossible. The ship’s gentle rocking lulled us off to sleep.
Today would be our first full day, and it was a day at sea. I love sea days! I love waking up when I want to, doing whatever I want, whenever I want… But today was a rather structured sea day!
Mark’s alarm went off at 6:30. I snoozed while he showered and I eventually got up around seven, because we had a breakfast date with Mickey and pals!! Mark went to the Cove Café for his cappuccino(s?) while I showered and dressed, then we made our way down to Animator’s Palate for our Mickey and Pals Character Breakfast. This is a ticketed event, and we signed up for it when we did our online check-in 105 days before sailing. We were meeting Fred and Kathy and their friends Susan & Tom. We were taken to a table for eight, and shortly thereafter two young ladies arrived to complete the table.
This is a limited breakfast menu, but you’re not really here for the food, are you? You’re here for the characters.
But I have to admit, it was kind of a love-‘em-and-shove-‘em kind of character experience. We were advised to have our cameras on and ready to go when the characters arrived, and while they did sign autographs the whole experience was kind of a letdown, compared to the awesome, random character interactions you have onboard. Mickey left our table so quickly Susan and Tom didn’t get autographs, so they had to have him brought back out! But we did get some cute pictures! – you’ll note Mark couldn’t stand his hat and he ditched it pretty quickly!
After breakfast I went back to the room to catch up my journal notes while Mark went walking. We agreed to meet in the Walt Disney Theater for Captain Ken Puckett’s 11:00 lecture on the Panama Canal. Cpt. Puckett is a retired Panama Canal pilot, and has taken almost 1500 ships through the Canal. (A ship’s captain relinquishes control of his vessel to a trained Canal pilot for the transit – the Canal pilot tells the ship’s captain what to do and he carries out those commands.) Today’s talk was about the Age of Exploration, and the need to have a shortcut through Central America to prevent ships having to go around the tip of South America to get from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Again, I’m not a history fan, but this background was important to understanding the bigger story behind the Canal, and I thought he did a great job trying to pack a lot of information into a forty-five minute presentation. He is also a very entertaining speaker, and I enjoyed all of his lectures, which were also shown on TV for those unable to see him live. He estimated that our fee to make the transit was in the five to six hundred thousand dollar range!
After Captain Puckett’s presentation it was time to eat again – really! Deb is an avid quilter and she had organized a fabric exchange. Eighteen of us signed up to exchange a “fat quarter” of batik fabric with a beach or ocean theme. We would then take those pieces home and make a special piece to remind us of our cruise. Lunch was at noon in Triton’s, and I was surprised to see the lunch menus now on a horizontal card, with small plate offerings. Maybe they finally realized we don’t all want a three-course lunch. Didn’t stop me, though…
Lunch was Mexican Tortilla Soup
Tomato Glazed Meatloaf (not near as good as MY meatloaf!)
And the Italian Style Ice Cream Sundae
Kathy was at the luncheon too, and she said our husbands were meeting up for lunch at Cabanas. Afterward, I took my fabric back to the room and took a good look at it; I think the colors all go great together!
There were so many fish extender gifts on the bed when I returned! I didn’t know if Mark or Agung brought them in, but my poor fish extender must have been bulging at the seams!!
I tied up a few more FE gifts (we gave a fabric grocery bag with the bow of the ship and the dates on the front – Mark designed it!) before heading upstairs to see Pixar Short Films on Funnel Vision at 2:45. But they never showed it! 2:45 came and went and they didn’t show it; after a while they showed a little cartoon with Pumbaa and Timon teaching pool safety. Bummer… Mark eventually caught up with me there, and we went up to deck ten to admire the ocean. We found two loungers in the shade and turned them around, toward the water. We had just commented that a drink would be nice when Bert the bar waiter walked by. Mark had a beer and I had the second-best Pina Colada I’ve ever had in my life!
Soon enough, it was time to dress for dinner – tonight was Formal Night and the Captain’s Welcome Reception!
I was still having big troubles with that darned blister, and my dress shoes were killing me, but we slowly made our way through the reception in the atrium on our way to Triton’s for dinner. The reception offers free cocktails, and Bert the waiter called me by name to offer me a drink. Now, I know I’m a pretty generous tipper, but I didn’t expect him to remember my name!
We had a lovely dinner at Triton’s. The roving photographers took our photographs, but frankly the ones on our camera were just as good.
Some of my food photos from tonight were a little fuzzy. I had to borrow the menu photos from the Disney Cruise Line Blog.
We both started with the Breaded and Deep-Fried Brie
And while he had the Potage Parmentier (leek and potato soup)…
I had the Iced Lobster and Jumbo Shrimp as my second course.
My entrée was the Chateaubriand-Roasted Filet Steak
And Mark had the Conchiglie Pasta (with roasted lobster)
He chose the Classic Opera Gateau for dessert, which didn’t seem to wow him.
I chose my favorite dish from Triton’s: the Grand Marnier Souffle!
We had asked our service team to speed up dinner a little bit tonight, because one of our prearrange group activities was a group photo in front of Triton’s at 7:30. We left dinner with ten minutes to spare, and taking the photo was a hoot! We had one person in the line as our placeholder and the rest of us were milling around in the atrium. When she got to the front of the line the rest of us ran up, fanning out around the steps and halfway up the stairs! It’s a wonderful way to remember the group – and look at the poor entertainers in the back left! They probably wondered what the heck was going on!
As the group broke up after the photo, we were walking back toward our room when another member of the group walked up to us and asked “Isn’t there supposed to be a photo tonight?”…. Oh no!! - You literally just missed it!
Tomorrow we would be in Cozumel and we had an excursion planned, so despite the Cruise Director’s promise that the comedy show tonight was not to be missed I decided my sore feet and I needed to stay in this evening. Mark took some gift cards and rewards points to Guest Services to put on our account, and I had asked him to increase the gratuities for our service team. He said they couldn’t do it yet; it wasn’t in the system yet. That seems like a very un-Disney thing. The answer is always yes! And how unlike them to refuse to take our money… Anyway, I watched the last half of Beauty and the Beast on TV, and the beginning of Toy Story 3. Bart texted me to arrange to meet in the morning to share a cab for our excursion. Mr. Turtle was our towelie tonight, and he reminded us to turn our clocks back before we turned in.
Ah!...extra sleep! I set a timer for X amount of hours, in addition to turning back the clocks on our phones. Mark tried to turn back the room clock but decided it was impossible. The ship’s gentle rocking lulled us off to sleep.
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