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[chezp]

Originally Posted by disney_duke

I would think there would be more diners that eat alone on a cruise than anywhere else. Not everybody always wants to do the same things! Interesting that the servers were surprised by you being alone.

That's how I felt. I was thinking they'd have single cruisers turning up all the time, but that wasn't the impression they gave me...

Your drinks looked absolutely wonderful. It's probably easy to drink a few of those... and rather quickly!

Yes, that is the problem with those!

[SuperDave]

Glad you enjoyed lunch at Triton's and does look a bit upscale as Lumiere's on the Magic does. The app portions do seem a bit small but could be because lunch is being served! Those chocolate martinis you had looked quite good and Mark didn't waste any time with his!

[samogram97]

Love your trip reports!
It was so good to find this one.

[chezp]

Originally Posted by SuperDave

Glad you enjoyed lunch at Triton's and does look a bit upscale as Lumiere's on the Magic does.

They're similar - albeit totally different themes - as each ship has the upscale restaurant by the lobby.

The app portions do seem a bit small but could be because lunch is being served!

Could be, but they were fine for me.

Those chocolate martinis you had looked quite good and Mark didn't waste any time with his!

He definitely enjoyed his!

[chezp]

Monday 6 March – part six: I never thought I’d hear anything by her on a Disney ship!

We headed back to the room, changed, and made our way over to the Rainforest for my second session of the day, and Mark’s first session of the day. It was chaos in the spa. I tell you, they are doing a roaring trade this cruise, and I strongly doubt there’ll be any specials, which is a real shame.

When I got to the women’s changing room, there were no dressing gowns anywhere, so I had to go back to reception in my swimming gear and ask for one. I’m sure that would bother some people, but as I swim regularly, it doesn’t worry me. They said they’d get them restocked. I think they just couldn’t keep up today.

I was the first into the Rainforest, and there was only one hot stone chair left, so I grabbed it, and offered it to Mark when he arrived, but literally as he walked in, the woman next to me left, so he took that. We sat there for a while, and tried to ignore the people who were loitering hopefully, waiting for a chair. I worked on the theory that we were the last ones there, and I wasn’t about to give mine up. After a while, when we had been there the longest, I did get up to use the steam rooms, and said to Mark I was giving mine up. Imagine how annoyed I was to come out of the steam room, and none of the people who had been waiting around had taken up any of the chairs!

I was alone in the mild steam room, then I tried the aromatic steam room, which was packed to begin with. I couldn’t figure out the nationality of the people in there. They were chatting away, and I thought at first they were German, but then I thought Russian. It was still cold near the door, but when they left, I headed to the back of the steam room, and it was warmer there, although I got no aroma. There was more aroma in the mild steam room than the aromatic one, which was a bit odd.

Eventually, I headed back to the women’s changing room, and again that was packed. There was even a wait for the showers! I ended up using a restroom to change, as the changing area was packed, and people were drying their hair, which made it even hotter in there. I just wanted to cool down, and it wasn’t going to happen in there. I have to admit I was quite glad to get out of there, as it wasn’t exactly relaxing at any point. If anything, it was verging on stressful – not good for a spa.

We headed back to the room, and watched an episode of 24: Legacy that we’d recorded before leaving home. As we don’t have “pause TV” (and why not Disney? ), that kept us entertained.

Almost as soon as that finished, we had a message from Captain Gus, and he had said something earlier about he’d keep us updated with our departure time from Nassau. Well, Disney obviously struck a deal with someone, as we wouldn’t be leaving port until after dinner/the show, which I suspect means more like a 10:00pm departure, due to the weather, as once we’re out at sea, we were warned we would be pitching and rolling. I heard from Daryl and Barb earlier that apparently quite a few people at the second dining seating were physically sick in the restaurant, and I imagine that wasn’t pleasant. Equally, with a lot more first time cruisers who don’t have their sea legs (I remember only too well how bad it was for us on our first cruise all those years ago ), they’re much more likely to come down sick, as you do get your sea legs, the more you cruise.

This time though the warning was a lot more explicit about Castaway Cay tomorrow. We were told that they would be trying at the “best possible time” to get ashore, but there would be a lot of thrusters required to get us in, if we could, so we were warned to expect lots of vibration. I think people will be happy with that, so long as we get into Castaway Cay.

Having spoken to Barb and Daryl earlier on about the speed of last night’s dinner service, and knowing that they wanted it speeded up, so they could get to the Frozen stage show, we were determined to be early for dinner. We headed down to Tiana’s Place, and it was still all closed up when we arrived just after 5:30pm, so we went into the Promenade Lounge, and I got a Godiva chocolate martini, while Mark got a beer. Oh my goodness, getting these was painful. It took about 20 minutes!



We enjoyed the duo playing here, and I especially loved hearing them play “Ironic” by Alanis Morissette, one of my favourite songs. I never thought I’d hear anything by her on a Disney ship! I sat there, happily singing along to it.



We also wondered at the state of the palm trees outside, which were still curving in the wind, and marvelled at how hard people were finding it to walk along to their ships. I guess that wind hasn’t eased a bit then…



As we were sitting there, waiting for our drinks, two of our tablemates, Laura and Nicole from Kansas City arrived, and we all sat and stood there chatting, and the four of us ended up going into the dining room together. So much for getting there late – the four of us were actually the first to arrive. I quickly had a word with Jorge to say we wanted the service speeded up, and apparently so did Tracy (the woman in the other couple), so he definitely got the message. I also later found out from Barb that apparently she and Tracy had both complained about the service that morning separately.

Let’s put it this way, it was a lot quicker tonight, so they took that feedback on board, but nothing else really improved. I was left sitting there for some time with empty water that just wasn’t refilled, and I had to ask Emmanuel twice to open a new bottle of wine from our package to give me a glass. It took our head server, Paolo, coming round before it finally happened. This is still not good, and not really the level of service I expect from our servers on a Disney cruise.

So what about Tiana’s Place? Well, the second we walked in, I absolutely fell in love with it. You can tell that the Wonder’s dry dock happened a couple of years after the Magic’s, as they’ve improved in so many ways on different areas – the Rainforest is one obvious example, but also here. Compared to Carioca’s, this just knocks it out of the ballpark in terms of theming. It feels as if it was always here, and I found it hard to remember this place as the awful Parrot Cay. Sorry if some of you liked it, but frankly I never did. You really are transported into the deep south, and the level of detail in here is superb, right the way down to the lily pads on your table, which I didn’t even notice until quite late into the meal.



Next: “who is she?”

[DMA]

Too bad the spa was so crowded. That doesn't seem relaxing at all! :

Glad to hear dinner was speedier, but it's unfortunate that service was still not the best!

[Tara O'Hara]

Sorry about the crowded Rainforest!. That is hardly relaxing! I hope your dinner is yummy!!

[lindawdw]

So nice that you and Mark can split up and enjoy different things on the cruise. Your desserts looked absolutely delicious from lunch and that chocolate martini with Mark is right up my alley. Whenever we go to The Wave Restaurant in the Contemporary, that is the drink I order from their bar! It doesn't sound like the winds have died down very much so I hope the diners were alright at dinner. I loved the decor in Tiana's Restaurant as I just love anything about the South.

[disney_duke]

That is definitely not how a spa is supposed to be. I guess it's good that it's getting used a lot, but I wonder if they could implement a limit to the number allowed per hour or per 30 minutes or something? Doesn't sound very relaxing.

It's good that the speed of things would be improved but a bummer the service is still lacking! (seems to be a pattern with this update.... this is good, but not good!)

I remember Parrot Cay and recall it being more like a Jimmy Buffet type place. Kind of a generic, tropical themed, could be anywhere in the US type place. As I recall, they did a character breakfast in there and it didn't feel right. Tiana's seems to fit better! haha....

[cubfancolleen]

The spa sounds so stressful! Maybe you can answer a question for me that going around my cruisegroup page - is there a sauna and/or steamroom off the women's locker room? In other words, that can be accessed without a Rainforest pass? I can't recall, and also am not sure if there are on the Dream class but not the Magic class.... you'd think I'd know as 75% of our cruises have been on the 'old' ships.

I do love the look of Tiana's. In some ways it reminds me a little of Enchanted Garden. Maybe it's the whites and blues of the chairs?

[chezp]

Originally Posted by DMA

Too bad the spa was so crowded. That doesn't seem relaxing at all! :

Sadly it wasn't. Oh well, these things happen...

Glad to hear dinner was speedier, but it's unfortunate that service was still not the best!

This does seem to be something that's happening more and more frequently on board, which I find really upsetting, given how renowned Disney service is. I just hope we see an improvement on the three cruises we have planned in 2018...

[chezp]

Originally Posted by lindawdw

So nice that you and Mark can split up and enjoy different things on the cruise. Your desserts looked absolutely delicious from lunch and that chocolate martini with Mark is right up my alley. Whenever we go to The Wave Restaurant in the Contemporary, that is the drink I order from their bar! It doesn't sound like the winds have died down very much so I hope the diners were alright at dinner.

We were... because we stayed put throughout dinner. We didn't leave that night until after 10:00pm and neither did any of the other ships, which probably tells you something about the weather that night and how windy it was.

I loved the decor in Tiana's Restaurant as I just love anything about the South.

It's funny, as I'm not really a fan of the Deep South. We haven't visited and, in fairness, I'd probably love it there, but the theme just doesn't appeal. however, having said that, I adored the theming of Tiana's Place.

[chezp]

Originally Posted by disney_duke

That is definitely not how a spa is supposed to be. I guess it's good that it's getting used a lot, but I wonder if they could implement a limit to the number allowed per hour or per 30 minutes or something? Doesn't sound very relaxing.

It's always a problem at busy times, particularly at sea days, but they don't ever seem to have done anything about it. They do limit the number of passes they sell, but of course if everyone who already has a pass decides to roll up at the same time, that doesn't help.

It's good that the speed of things would be improved but a bummer the service is still lacking! (seems to be a pattern with this update.... this is good, but not good!)

You're right, it was a theme sadly.

I remember Parrot Cay and recall it being more like a Jimmy Buffet type place. Kind of a generic, tropical themed, could be anywhere in the US type place. As I recall, they did a character breakfast in there and it didn't feel right. Tiana's seems to fit better! haha....

Yes, they did do a character breakfast there. I think the last time we did it was on the Alaskan cruise back in 2011. You're right, I think it would fit in much better in here, although I don't know if they do it any longer. We were in Animator's Palate the last time we did it and it was just so rushed and the interaction was poor and the food only ok, so we said we'd never bother again.

[chezp]

Originally Posted by cubfancolleen

The spa sounds so stressful! Maybe you can answer a question for me that going around my cruisegroup page - is there a sauna and/or steamroom off the women's locker room? In other words, that can be accessed without a Rainforest pass? I can't recall, and also am not sure if there are on the Dream class but not the Magic class.... you'd think I'd know as 75% of our cruises have been on the 'old' ships.

There's a sauna in the women's changing rooms on board the Wonder. I spent some time in there and I think I may have some photos at some point in this trip report... I'm sure the newer ships do, although I can't find any photos I took to confirm that.

I do love the look of Tiana's. In some ways it reminds me a little of Enchanted Garden. Maybe it's the whites and blues of the chairs?

Yes, I can see what you mean!

[pamcarey]

Tiana's Place certainly does look different than Parrot Cay! Maybe it's just the angle of the picture, but it looks smaller to me, too.

Very cool that "Ironic" by Alanis Morrisette is one of your favorite songs. I'll be seeing a new musical next May based on her Jagged Little Pill album!