Our Island Hopping, Rain Dropping, Champagne Popping Adventure About This Page:

[shnewell]

Everything sounds wonderful! I am paying close attention, as we are sailing on the Dream next year.

What did Thom think of the 5K? DH wants to do it when we do our cruise.

How cool that Mary Devall got into the Edge. When we cruise, my older DS will be 11, but my younger DS will have just turned 10. He is a little bummed about having to go to the Oceaneer Lab. I think he'll have a blast, but he likes hanging out with his brother!

I am chuckling about the "chaotic river." We vacationed at Atlantis a couple of years ago, and we just the "lazy" river! The waterpark really is so much fun. Glad you guys enjoyed it so much!

[Jillybean]

Monday, June 4 - Day at Sea

Maddie and I woke up first and, after waiting about ten minutes for room service , found the room service order that Thom had filled out, but failed to put on the door the night before. She agreed to go back to Royal Palace with me for breakfast while Thom and Mary Devall continued to sleep.

We had a great breakfast and even had a visit from one of the head waiters who asked how our dining experience had been so far. I was completely honest and told him that everything was . . . great! The woman sitting next to us apparently had a lot more to say than I did because she had gone on and on and on when he had asked her just before he asked me. The problem was that she didn’t speak loud enough for me to hear exactly what she was saying. What’s the fun in that?

After our hearty breakfast, Maddie and I decided to work it off with a little retail therapy. She had been so good about waiting for just the right fluffie, but the time had finally arrived. After much soul searching and fluffie handling, she finally decided on none other than Captain Mickey. My purchase of a scrapbook was a little more boring.

Since Maddie had conquered the Aqua Duck yesterday and she loves a t-shirt, I suggested the Aqua Duck t-shirt, but she declined. As we left the store, I expressed my disbelief to her that she had not wanted the t-shirt. That’s about the time I realized that she thought she had to buy it from her gift card. When I told her that I would buy it, she was all over that and back we went.

Thom and Mary Devall had apparently gone in search of food during our absence because they were nowhere to be found when we returned to the room. When they came back, Mary Devall had done a little shopping of her own and pulled almost every cruise themed vinylmation there was out of her bag. She also had a Mickey rice krispie for her sister, but that was not her only surprise. She was excited in only the way that Mary Devall can be excited . . . clapping, squealing, jumping up and down . . . and wanted us to immediately follow her to something she and Thom had found.

Our destination turned out to be the D Lounge which was essentially a “nightclub” for kids. It was still late morning by this time, so we were the only ones in there. The girls spent about thirty minutes in there dancing around and sitting in every single one of the funky chairs while Thom and I found the comfiest of the funky chairs and just sat there watching them have a blast.

I knew that Monica and Charlie were at the adult pool and I had hoped that we could join them today, but the girls had apparently had their fill of the clubs for the time being and wanted to spend the day with us. I can’t really complain about that now, can I?

The girls had been wanting to do the Midship Detective Agency since the moment we stepped on board, so we decided to do that while we were out and about. It’s pretty cute and quite a workout. We finally got smart and did all of the ones on one end of the ship and then finished up with the other end of the ship because we were doing some major traversing of halls early on. The girls both really enjoyed it.



As luck would have it, we finished up right at the entrance to the balcony of the Walt Disney Theater where the Avengers had started about 20 minutes before. We quickly agreed to go in and easily found a seat. When we sat down and looked at the screen, we immediately realized that it was 3d, so off Thom went to get us glasses. Once we could see the screen, we all really enjoyed it (and Thom and I finally got to see the beginning of the movie on our flight back from California last month ).

We were all pretty hungry by the time that the movie ended, so we headed to the pool deck and each grabbed what looked good to us from the counter service possibilities (I'm normally not one who enjoys counter service, but I can't say enough about the selections on the Dream. To quote Mushu . . . dee-licious! ). I also spotted a temporary bar where I grabbed what looked good to me from it . . . a.k.a. a glass of wine. We also spotted Charlie and Monica who were eating and taking a break from sunning.

Mary Devall and I went back to the room while Thom and Maddie went exploring. Mary Devall never had dessert and I wanted another glass of wine so we decided to order room service. I ordered her chocolate chip cookies easily enough and then asked if I could order a glass of wine. She transferred me to another number where I ordered the wine. The wine showed up about ten minutes later but the cookies never did.

Thankfully, Mary Devall had many leftover snacks in the room to keep her satisfied. We both enjoyed sitting on the balcony and reading for a while before Thom and Maddie returned. They had found an animation class where Maddie drew a Mickey Mouse and then they tried to play Bingo back at the D Lounge but it was full.

Maddie was ready to relax, so she changed into her t-shirt and kicked back with a little tv.



Mary Devall and I threw on our bathing suits for a little late afternoon fun and headed for the Aqua Duck.



By the time we returned to the room, it was time to get ready for the evening. We met up with the Mitchell’s outside of Animator’s Palate and enjoyed another great dinner on Pirates Night. As the pictures show, we had a fun night of food, wine and lots of laughter.



I love these pictures of the Mitchells - - these prove that it was indeed Pirate Night!




Back in our room, the girls loved the kind of scary looking pirate monkey.



We then settled in for a little tv before calling it a night. It was a nice lazy day after Atlantis.

[Dlandmom2]

What an absolutely great day! I especially like that last picture of Maddie with Captain Mickey! Good choice!

[lauriep]

What a nice afternoon and evening. I'm glad to hear the CS options on the Dream are good!

[cubfancolleen]

What a great, relaxing day! Funny about Maddie and the tshirt! Oh, if YOU'RE buying it, well then, thanks, don't mind if I do!

[chezp]

What a wonderful day!

[disney_duke]

What a wonderful day at sea! You sure had fun with the family. Captain Mickey looked to be a perfect choice for Maddie.

[KMB733]

A very nice relaxing day!!

[HiddenMickey]

You make it sound like so much fun, and so easy.

[OhToodles!]

Finally all caught up. I'm taking lots of notes as we hope to go on our first cruise next year. You can tell you all are having so much relaxed fun!
Monica - did you have a special camera for the Atlantis and the other water pics?

[MontiMouse]

Originally Posted by OhToodles!

Monica - did you have a special camera for the Atlantis and the other water pics?

Yes, we have the Nikon Coolpix AW100 waterproof camera.

[OhToodles!]

Originally Posted by MontiMouse

Yes, we have the Nikon Coolpix AW100 waterproof camera.

Thanks! It took great photos!

[shnewell]

Sounds like a relaxing day at sea!

[Jillybean]

Tuesday, June 5

Thom was up and out early again to run yet another 5K. Monica had promised to leave the Baileys on the balcony before she and Charlie left for their early morning fishing trip, so Thom had good incentive (i.e. a happy wife ) to remember to put the room service order out the night before.

After room service arrived, I sat outside on the balcony with coffee and Baileys, read and thoroughly enjoyed myself.



When the girls woke up, they ate their breakfast (chocolate covered doughnuts and cereal ) and I had my raisin bran. Thom still hadn’t returned and it was near closing time for Cabanas so I ran up and grabbed him yogurt. Even though I hate bananas with a passion and don’t even like to touch them , I tried to find a banana for him, but none were to be found. I asked a CM who went into the kitchen to find some and then a chef came out bearing some not so perfect bananas and told me that this was why they didn’t put them out. I took one for Thom anyway (he’s not picky and they only had a few brown spots on them ).

When Thom came back, I ran down to Guest Services where luckily no one was in line. I had two chores: apply the girls’ gift cards on our bill (we had just been paying for their purchases with our room charge) and sign up Mary Devall and me for the stingray adventure. Monica had told me good things about this excursion and I felt it would be good for Mary Devall to go out of her comfort zone a little. Even though some excursions had been cancelled that morning, I was still able to snag two times later that afternoon.

When I checked our photos later, I discovered that Thom had a ton of fun running his 5K that morning.



Once back in the room, we got changed into our bathing suits, sunscreened up and headed outside.



We took the shuttle to the family beach and shopped a little at Sea Shells before we hit the beach - - a t-shirt for me and a Nemo ring for Maddie (this was the best $5 spent on the trip because it was more her size than a raft ).



We easily found a spot on the beach and played around in the water with the girls. We were directly in front of the platform where you can run around and go across ropes (like monkey bars), but Mary Devall wanted no part of swimming to it. I finally convinced her to do it if I swam beside her. That seemed to give her the confidence she needed to reach it, but she only spent about 15 seconds on the platform before she was ready to swim back.

While Thom and Maddie played in the water, Mary Devall and I went back up to our chairs. When a server came by, I ordered a Konk Kooler and, when he returned, Mary Devall decided that she wanted a smoothie, so back he went again.

We sat back enjoying our drinks and watching Maddie having a blast floating in her Nemo ring. When the ring finally started leaking, Maddie was ready to come out of the water. She drank the rest of Mary Devall’s smoothie and then we threw away her sad, deflated Nemo before we headed to Cookies for lunch.



After lunch, it was time our stingray adventure, so Thom and Maddie headed out to ride the aqua trikes.

You can barely see them here - - mainly Thom's yellow t-shirt.



We checked in and then waited a few minutes for the presentation.



After the short talk, we put on our gear and then went to feed the stingrays which was a little on the scary side. The funny thing was that I had planned this to help Mary Devall not be such a nervous Nellie, but it wigged me out a little too. It was so much fun though and I’ll never forget the sensation of stingray eating food out of my hand! After feeding, we did the “stingray shuffle” (that’s how you walk so that you don’t step on one accidentally) in the area and enjoyed looking close up at them. I have to admit that it was also a little nerve wracking to have them swim around your feet. Apparently, I needed this experience every bit as much as Mary Devall did!

Once we had turned in our gear, we went back to ship and ran into Charlie who was waiting on Macy and Gem to finish their parasailing. He was excited that he had run into a childhood friend. Only Charlie! He also told us that his and Monica's fishing trip had been cancelled that morning and that they had spent the day on the adult beach living the big life! I'll let Monica fill you in on their fun (one hint: a bell is involved )!

We didn’t find Thom and Maddie in the room, so we headed up to the pool deck to ride the Aqua Duck a couple of more times. They showed up in the room shortly after we returned and we found out that Maddie had gone on the Mickey slide tons of time. Poor Mary Devall had begged her to go on it before and she finally had - - without her!

We all took showers and got ready for our last evening. Mary Devall even dropped Maddie off at her kids club before heading to the Edge (although she did come back to tell us that they had let her check Maddie in ). When the four adults were ready, we took off for a little pre-dinner bar hopping.

We first went up to Outlook which was publicized as a cocktail lounge and a great place to watch the sunset. First of all, we had a very difficult time finding the entrance (doors were our nemesis once again ). When we finally did find the entry, we saw that it was truly just a lounge without a bar or bartender in sight. If a bartender would have been present, it would have been a great place to settle for a while. Instead, we immediately went back downstairs.

We then headed to Pink where Monica and Charlie were greeted like rock stars by the bartender. Monica and I both had champagne cocktails that were absolutely delicious and potent.



Next, we moved on to Skyline where the bartender once again knew Monica and Charlie and treated us like old friends. Thom and I asked him to come up with his own concoctions for us and later he made drinks on the house for the four of us.



We finally had to pull ourselves away in order to meet up with all of the girls for dinner. Most of the girls, however, had other plans. Maddie had made a friend and wanted to go back to the kids club, so she ate quickly and left and Macy and Gem had been invited to eat with one of their friends and his sister. That pretty much that left Mary Devall with the adults. We had a fun final dinner which was topped off with our server bringing us one of every dessert since we were having such a hard time deciding.



Once back in the room, we discovered our final towel animal and our marching orders.



While we finished getting packed up, Mary Devall crawled up in her bed and spent the rest of her evening reading. That is pure heaven for her.



You might think that our night was over at this point, but you would be highly mistaken. Monica and I decided to head out for a girls night out. First, we went by a photo kiosk so that I could order our cd and then we high tailed it right back to Pink. We spent our final night out sipping Pommery rose, chatting with the bartender and giving Disney advice to our fellow bar mates.

Before we headed back to our rooms, we stopped by the restrooms and were blown away by how they were. So much so that we took pictures.



Everyone was still awake when I got in because Thom had just picked up Maddie from the kids club. We quickly got ready for bed though because it was late and we had to vacate our beautiful Dream early the next morning.

[lauriep]

A perfect last day. I loved feeding the stingrays and sat down in the water so they could swim into my lap. They're so soft! This TR really made me want to sail on one of the new ships.