Aloha Hawaii! Our 10 Day Cruise to Hawaii on the Disney Wonder, September 7, 2015 Trip Report completed 07/31/2016 - Page 11 - PassPorter - A Community of Walt Disney World, Disneyland, Disney Cruise Line, and General Travel Forums
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By your description of lunch I was thinking "wow I wouldn't expect that out of a buffet" and then you mentioned how varied it was! That's such a nice touch that there was some variety throughout the trip!
Oh yes, I was nicely surprised at how good the buffet always was.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Cam22
The talk on Spaceship Earth sounded incredible. Definitely something I would have chosen to do.
I think it was the highlight of my sea days
Quote:
Originally Posted by Pris
That WDI talk sounds amazing. I would love talks like that.
I used to only have a passing interest in WD Imagineers, but now I may look into some more
Quote:
Originally Posted by chezp
Wow, that talk sounded amazing.
Yes it was! I felt like I was in a "behind the scenes" tour.
Dh and I took a walk after my nail fiasco. I think we both wanted some ice cream at the same time. I had a craving for some fries to go with my ice cream for some reason... On our way to the snacks, we found Keoni and his Auntie. They were making leis from the material they brought with them. They were so friendly and had so many stories to tell. I could've sat and listened to them all day, especially Auntie with her sparklingly dry humor The lei she was wearing was very valuable because of how many shells were used and where the shells are found. It's called a
"Ni'ihau" shell lei as these tiny shells are only found on Ni'ihau island, Hawaii's Forbidden Island. I can't remember the names of the plants they were using to make these leis. I do remember that in today's modern culture, leis can be made of almost anything. The leis that are given for high school graduation are made of flowers of course, but also candy and even soda can tabs. The best ones, however, are literally made out of cash money! (Ingeniously folded into flowers )
Look at her hair ribbons!
Somehow we all met up in time to see the evening show, "The Magic and Illusion of Kyle Knight & Mistie" at the Walt Disney Theater. One word: AMAZING.
Before the show started there was a big box on stage and everyone was allowed to go up and inspect it. Of course our kids, along with a lot of other people, hurried down to see if everything was on the up and up.
Our awesome cruise director Clayton
Of course no photos were allowed during the show, but here's the ceiling of the Walt Disney Theater.
After the show, we just moseyed around taking pictures and playing with the panorama ("pano") on our iPhones. Dh has an older Samsung Galaxy so we compared tech notes.
We went back to the room to chill before dinner. None of us were interested in the "Freezing the Night Away" Frozen party on deck 9. I think there was a movie on that we hadn't seen before.
One of my favorite pics of the trip. I think it's because we're actually all together and there's photographic proof! Titus has lately been in the "make a goofy face for the camera" stage
Just before dinner, we caught this amazing sunset. This photo doesn't do it justice and I think my Nikon would've done better at picking up the colors. It was as if the horizon was on fire!
This little cutie pie was running around in circles, so adorable!
Dinner was at Triton's tonight, and it was very good. The theme was Frozen of course and it was tastefully done with an "essence" of Norway. A very nice dinner overall. It was pretty fun with all the Frozen touches
Sorry about the glare
From the bread service: Liver pâte dip (the bread was Knäckebröd and dark rye bread) I tried it, it kind of tasted like deviled ham a little. I didn't tell the kids what it was. They tried it, but only once They did like the cracker-like Knäckebröd, and I liked the rye.
For my appetizer, the Jarlsberg Tart (with onion and thyme) Yummy!
I also had the Duke of Weselton's Favorites - assorted meats and cheeses with the Knäckebröd, pumpernickle and pickled veggies. I remember more cheese, I must've munched a little before snapping a pic Also yummy! (I love the Duke's name "Weasel Town", lol)
My soup was Sven's Carrot Soup with caraway and sour cream. Sorry, I ate a little before I remembered again... tasty.
This is Rakesh, the best Head Server around! (We got glowing snowflake necklaces )
The Ladies
My Boys
Han's Juniper Wild Boar Filet with Spätzle and Kale. Tasted just like pork roast
Not mine: Oaken Warm Apple Pudding Cake with Butterscotch Cinnamon Sauce and Vanilla Bean Ice Cream
Mine! The Sweet Temptation Trio: Olaf's White Chocolate Floro Dome, Almond Berry Crumble, and Norwegian Pancake. All delicious.
Back in the room, we found this
Dh stayed in the room while the kids went out for some Edge fun. I had a late date with an old friend, my most favorite of all the Star Wars movies, The Empire Strikes Back. The movie started at 11pm. I'm sorry for wimping out on you, old friend - I think I fell asleep before they even escaped Hoth... I woke up near the end, smh.
Love this one!
I love these next series of drawings. Nautical and non-Disney. Well except for the little Mickeys in the monogram.
"Z is for Zephyr"
"X is for Xebec" (a small boat)
"S is for Scuttlebutt"
"P is for Poop Deck" (bwwahhahaha!)
It was super late and I was really tired, in spite of my almost 2 hour nap in the Buena Vista Theater! Tomorrow there will be more magic, more movies and more fun
Interesting that you got the Frozen menu - I somehow assumed that as soon as they left Alaska, they'd stop that. I'm glad they didn't, as that was a neat menu.
I still have that teddy bear towel animal. I got him all the way back here in the suitcase, I loved him so much!
What is it about movies at the Buena Vista Theater that make you wanna fall asleep? I had the same problem when we saw Inside Out - and it definitely wasn't the movie's fault as I loved it - but I couldn't seem to stay awake!
It's funny that liver pate is so foreign to you guys. It is an everyday item here in Germany and I had it all the time before I went vegetarian
I'm loving all your pics! Everything looks awesome and so interesting (as a never cruised person lol!). The leis looked lovely! I have heard of the Ni'ihau lei before...we use a similar small shell lei in our hula about Ni'ihau
The leis are beautiful! Dinner looked so delicious.
I think they are too, not what you'd usually think of as a Hawaiian lei.
Quote:
Originally Posted by cubfancolleen
Weren't Kyle & Misty amazing?!?! We just kept saying 'how did they do that?!'
And that onion tart is something I'm still dreaming of! Loved it!
I overheard them talking by an elevator, I think they were saying that they were going to be leaving the Wonder soon and would be performing overseas, somewhere in Asia I think, I can't remember. They were really amazing and I'm glad we got to see them again later on.
Quote:
Originally Posted by xwewhisper
What a wonderful evening! Movies have a way of putting me to sleep as well
I tried! I tried really hard to stay awake and see ESB because it's my favorite SW episode and I had already missed Star Wars. (Sorry, I have trouble calling it "Episode IV")
Quote:
Originally Posted by chezp
Interesting that you got the Frozen menu - I somehow assumed that as soon as they left Alaska, they'd stop that. I'm glad they didn't, as that was a neat menu.
I still have that teddy bear towel animal. I got him all the way back here in the suitcase, I loved him so much!
I wish we could've kept one of the towel animals! I loved the bear too, but we were so strategically packed, it was impossible.
Quote:
Originally Posted by benchley
Looks like you were having a great time just chillin'
!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Disneybine
What is it about movies at the Buena Vista Theater that make you wanna fall asleep? I had the same problem when we saw Inside Out - and it definitely wasn't the movie's fault as I loved it - but I couldn't seem to stay awake!
It's funny that liver pate is so foreign to you guys. It is an everyday item here in Germany and I had it all the time before I went vegetarian
Yes, I can say that liver pate isn't big for our family anyway
Quote:
Originally Posted by kcamozzi67
I'm loving all your pics! Everything looks awesome and so interesting (as a never cruised person lol!). The leis looked lovely! I have heard of the Ni'ihau lei before...we use a similar small shell lei in our hula about Ni'ihau
********************
Thursday 9/10 - Another glorious day at sea!
Breakfast with some old friends!
Ok, ok, I'll back up a bit. The night before, Jude, our server, told us that we could try to get reservations to the character breakfast the next day. I had totally forgotten about character breakfasts on DCL because I'd never been on a cruise longer than 4 nights. Of course I didn't write this down, but I think I went to guest services to ask if there were tickets available. I'm pretty sure we had to tell them somehow that we wanted to reserve a table because they gave us a time - 9:15.
Anyhoo, breakfast was decent and we got some pretty good character time despite the late reservation. It did feel a little bit rushed (I wasn't surprised, having read Chezp's TRs) but the cast members did take the time to take pictures for us and Mickey signed a plate for me that I had gotten as an FE gift. I'm not happy with how the photos turned out (very dark) and I tried to edit them in Flickr. It was fun to have the Ladies' experience the characters close up, if only for a brief moment. Actually, when it looked like they may have forgotten to make napkin headware for us, Anne was like, "Hey, where's ours?" lol. Actual breakfast was decent, very mainstream, but I know they do that so that breakfast flows faster, kind of like the one you get on the last morning before disembarkation. I'm not complaining - we got a "free" character meal! (You know how much they cost in Disney World!)
Ms. Anne, waiting to be seated.
Yay!
Easy choices
How often does one get serenaded by Auntie with a ukulele at breakfast??
Probably the only pineapple I had on the whole trip! This calls for a do-over... (Oh yeah, there was bread service also. No pic of the croissant with butter I devoured )
(You can see that we were seated towards the end of breakfast. They were starting to set up for the next meal.)
My main man!
My main men!
That's a pirate hat. That's a hook.
Look! It's Jack Sparrah!
He still thinks Mickey is cool, even at 13
Aarrgh!
After a fun breakfast with the gang, we all spread out to the four corners of the ship. I went back to the room, I found the kids later up on the sports deck, and I think the ladies went to the fitness center. (Actually, I think Anne went to take a nap. She let Martha go to the treadmills by her crazy self. I think I remember her saying something like that, lol.)
I found this in the room. It was from Anna and Elsa thanking us for joining them at the party the night before. Thanks girls. BTW, those white chocolate covered rice crispy treats were delicious! And handy - we ate them later on an excursion...
I took a leisurely stroll up to the deck to meet the guys, taking some pictures along the way.
The only decent photo I have of Palo. We had reservations for this night, but had to change because they had switched our dinner rotation.
This is where I found my boys.
The competition is strong in my family (to paraphrase Luke)
He didn't want me to go easy on him. It was tough, but I won
They wanted me to play, ppffftt!
I took a walk instead with my little bubba. He got a quick drink in the mug he got as a FE gift and I showed him the engine room which he thought was pretty cool.
Looks like they were still repairing the cast member pool.
I always wondered where this was...
Seemed like a good place to take a selfie.
Titus and I had lunch at BBB - Today's theme: Barbeque with a Mediterranean flair. Unfortunately, I think the planners didn't realize how popular BBQ ribs would be. There was a big line out on the deck and by the time we got to them, there were only a few left and the cast member doled out exactly 2 scrawny ribs. I gave them to Titus and had some other things from the buffet. I loved being able to enjoy a delicious lunch with my "little one", just the two of us
I love how empty the baskeball courts are! I've wanted to shoot some hoops on board forever but every time we go there, the courts are mobbed with little kids so there's no point to try to play.
Love that they put so many different Hawaiian touches on things - like ukelele seranades at breakfast.
Weren't those white chocolate rice crispy things AWESOME!?!?! I was glad I took a taste, as initially I planned on giving mine away! In the end, I had mine, AND DH and DS's (shhhhh, don't tell on me!) - but not all in one day, don't worry!
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We just kept saying 'how did they do that?!'
I had the same problem when we saw Inside Out - and it definitely wasn't the movie's fault as I loved it - but I couldn't seem to stay awake!
!
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