Originally Posted By goodgirl Day Nine of Nine – Saturday – Back to the Real World At dinner the previous night we received tickets which told us where to go for breakfast and at what time. Ours was Lumiere’s at 7:15 am. You take everything you have with you because you won’t be able to go back to your stateroom. Breakfast is ordered off the menu. I had an omelet. We headed off the ship and through the gangway. Wow. What a fantastic vacation this had been. Once off the ship we were guided along--it’s all a whirlwind in my head. We had to go through Customs. My sister-in-law Kay was ahead of me. She handed her form over to the Customs agent and he laughed and asked “What in the world did you spend $500 on!?” She laughed back and said “Lots of souvenirs!” He waived her through. I handed him my form and without even looking at it (I spent a lot more than Kay!) tossed it on a pile and waived me through. Customs was a piece of cake for all of us. Next we went down an escalator and there before our eyes was a literal sea of luggage. Thousands and thousands of bags! All neatly organized—as only Disney can do. We were in the Tinkerbell area. We snagged a guy with a cart to help us. My two bags were easily seen with their new pink pom poms on the handles. One by one we gathered all of ours. The last bag was Kay’s but it turned out it wasn’t Kay’s. It had a green ribbon tied on the handle but Kay had green and gold ribbons. We thought maybe someone had taken Kay’s bag by mistake but she quickly found it in another row over. Whew! With something like 15 suitcases and carryon’s piled high, our guy got our luggage on to our Disney bus and in short order we were heading back to the Hyatt. It was a quiet ride as we all reflected on our recent experiences. Caleb watched the cartoons. I’m so glad we decided to spend the night at the Hyatt and go home the next morning. We were in our room by 10:30 am. I decided to unpack everything and re-organize. I have one of those little scales that you latch onto your suitcase handle and it weighs your suitcase. I got Big Red down to 48 poudns.Turns out one of Kay’s was over 50 pounds so she did some rearranging too. We then headed down to the food court for some lunch. We stopped in front of the Disney store and took some photos in front of the “built in” characters on the exterior walls. Caleb, fearful of even these on the first day of our arrival, now ran up to Mickey-built-into-the-wall and hugged him. We went back up to the room and lounged around. Casey and Diana caught up on emails with their iPhones while the rest of us watched TV, read our books and played with Caleb. Later we headed down again to the Macaroni Grill for dinner. Then back up to the room and to bed. Isn’t it amazing how a relaxing Disney Cruise can wear you out!? The Hyatt staff was really great. The guys who brought our luggage from the Disney bus asked us what times our flights were and what airlines. They arranged for wake up calls for us and were there to pick up our luggage at 6:30 am. They escorted us down and through a back way to check in to our flights. We went through security and then it was time for hugs goodbye. Kay and I headed to our Alaska Airlines gate while the others headed to Continental. It was nice flying home first class. We read our books, watched some movies (Taken and Bride Wars for me), and enjoyed a nice breakfast. Once in Seattle we had about an hour layover before our short flight back to Portland. My sister, Pat, picked us up at the airport and brought us home. We are all going to live happily ever after and I can’t wait to do another Disney Cruise! I’ll try and get links to my photo album up this weekend. I took 1,200 photos so I need to do some editing!
Originally Posted By SuzieQ Hooray for a fabulous vacation, T. You've most definitely earned it. I'm so pleased you got rest, relaxation and a break from everything related to work and the real world. May another cruise by in your near future
Originally Posted By Ursula Okay, questions! Did you have enough on-ship and off-ship time? Meaning, was there anything you felt you missed that you didn't have enough time to do? How does tipping work? Do you tip at the end or during each service? Did you like the verandah room? Were you too high, to low or just right on the ship? Was it hard to just walk away from the verandah to do things? (They look SO relaxing to me!) Was Disney priced about right for what your total vacation experience was for you? Was the bathroom enough for the amount of people in your room?
Originally Posted By Mama Q I loved reading about your cruise and am so glad that you had such a wonderful time. Disney always does everything just right. Thanks for sharing your fun with us.
Originally Posted By goodgirl <<Did you have enough on-ship and off-ship time? Meaning, was there anything you felt you missed that you didn't have enough time to do?>> As I look over the Daily Navigators I see things that might have been fun to do. On the other hand it was nice to say "I'm going to go lay on a deck chair and read my book." It was nice not to rush here and there and just do what looked like fun. If I could have a perfect cruise it would be a day at sea. A day at Castaway Cay. A day at sea. A day at Castaway Cay. Repeat several more days. We had a child under three. Most of island excusions had minimum 3 or 5 for the age. The ones that didn't just didn't look interesting. I loved our day at the beach on Tortola. Maybe next time I would do a tour. I did shopping on St. Thomas. There are great deals for perfumes, jewelry and liquor. Next time I wouldn't need to bother with that. I loved my time with Tammy and family. It was so cool to sit in an outdoor restaurant drinking ice tea and enjoying coconut shrimp chatting with Tammy and John with the Disney Magic in the background. I had to pinch myself a couple times. St. Thomas has some beautiful sites and things to do. Next time with an older child (or none) I would try an excursion or find a beach or con the TiggerPoohs into taking us somewhere. When you step off the ship its a reality check: noise, people hawking wares, people trying to get you to ride their taxi, etc. Its the real world and quite a shock in a way from the clean and shiny Magic where Cast Members smile and ask what they can do for you and you pass Pluto in the hall.
Originally Posted By goodgirl <<How does tipping work? Do you tip at the end or during each service? >> No tipping until the very end. On your last night you get a form and four labeled envelopes. Here is what they recommended: Dining Room Server $28 x # of guests, including children DiningRoom Assistant Server $21 x # of guests, including children Dining Room Head Server $7 x # of guests, including children Stateroom host/hostess $28 x number of guests including children Note that these amoutns are for the 7 night cruise. So basically my share was a minimum of $84. I had done some research ahead of time and knew what this was going to be. Before the trip I put $150 in cash in assorted bills in an envelope. I labeled it tips and put it in our safe. That way I didn't have to worry about it at all. On that last night I put my minimums in the tip envelopes then I added extra to each one (the service by these people was awesome). You can also figure out what you want to tip and go to guest services. They will charge it to your Key to the World Card and give you printed receipts. You put the printed receipts in the envelopes instead of cash. I think Diana did this for the three of them. Another thing Diana and I did was to each bring a lot of $1 bills. I think she brought $100 and I brought $50. If you order room service you can give that person a couple dollars. You can also charge it to your Key to the World Card but that just seemed silly when all they were bringing were some chocolate chip cookies. Palo was different. They bring you a bill which has your $15 for the meal, $1 for the server tip and any additional charges for alcoholic drinks. We each added an additional tip for Laura. This then was charged to our Key to the World Card. Remember, the Key to the World Card is then tied to your debit or credit card that you associated with it at the beginning of the cruise.
Originally Posted By goodgirl <<<Did you like the verandah room? Were you too high, to low or just right on the ship?>>> Loved, loved, loved our verandah. We were a category 5 stateroom. Since the cruise I have asked myself many times if I could step down to a room without a verandah. It would really be hard for me to do. I loved seeing the ocean. I loved sitting out there and drinking a glass of wine and chatting quietly with Diana while Caleb napped indoors. Or reading my book. Or just daydreaming and thanking the Lord that I was privy to such a wonderful experience. The air was warm and comfortable at night. We would return to our room in the evening to find it all made up by Gary. The first thing we would do was open the drapes and open the door. We actually slept with it open at night. We were three adults with one child and frequently Kay and Kathy would be in our room. Having the verandah extended our living area. Deck 7 was perfect. Not too high and not too low.
Originally Posted By goodgirl <<Was it hard to just walk away from the verandah to do things? (They look SO relaxing to me!)>> It was just a natural part of our living space. Really nice in the morning, especially as you approached land. I remember one morning Casey brought me down some pastries and a cup of coffee. I sat outside and enjoyed them.
Originally Posted By goodgirl <<Was Disney priced about right for what your total vacation experience was for you?>> Disney is expensive but it was all worth it. We spent 18 months planning this trip. Diana and I emailed and were on the phone every week (and almost every night the month before). Diana worked with Gayle, our travel agent a lot. We spent a lot of time on Disboards.com. We bought the Passporters book and read it cover to cover. I queried all my LP pals who had cruised before. I think one of the things we did was talk a lot about things we wanted to do and didn't want to do; describing our expectations. We decided not to get stressed out by anything and respect anyone's desire to opt out of anything or do something different if they wanted to. Disney's service is excellent. I don't think I put this in my report but there was only one thing all of us thought was bad: the cheesecake was tasteless. It didn't have a cream cheese flavor. In fact it didn't have any flavor. I guess if that's the only thng we could come up with it says a lot. Also, the Hyatt was extra but so worth it. It made for a stress free arrival and departure. We didn't do any excursions. I had thought about parasailing but then realized that it was a 100 minute experience with only 8 minutes in the air. For something like $150. I passed. I didn't feel we missed out on anything by not doing excursions. Our little Tortola adventure wasn't that much. I didn't do the spa stuff either. I had won $300 in spafinder.com gift certificates last year so I schedule a day of pampering at a local spa the week before the cruise. Also, a one hour massage on the ship is something like $115. My local girl gives a great massage for only $45. Passporter was good at helping you figure out a budget. I figured out my potential expenditures. Increased it by an additional 20% just in case and for 18 months I saved, saved, saved. Gave up Starbucks and avoided fast food for a whole year. I also dropped two trips to Disneyland which I usually take. It was all worth it.
Originally Posted By goodgirl <<Was the bathroom enough for the amount of people in your room?>> There are two bathrooms, one has a shower. They were perfect. We had this routine and it worked great: I would take a shower and then move to the other bathroom to take care of my hair and get dressed. Diana would get in the shower. I would then move over to the desk and put on my makeup while Diana moved to the other bathroom and Casey got in the shower. It was this natural routine that worked great for us.
Originally Posted By smedley Awwwh thanks for sharing such a wonderful detailed report with us! I have thoroughly enjoyed hearing about it. Just makes me want to go even more! My question, did you notice if there were there a lot of couples without children on the cruise? Did they seem out of place if so? We go to WDW as just a couple so I can't see it worrying us but I thought I would ask ;D
Originally Posted By goodgirl <<My question, did you notice if there were there a lot of couples without children on the cruise? Did they seem out of place if so? We go to WDW as just a couple so I can't see it worrying us but I thought I would ask ;D>>> Good question. I saw what was obviously a lot of "adults only" groups as I did families. You could tell primarily at dinner when you scanned over the tables. Lots of tables where there were only adults in atendance. I was always amazed at how few children and teens I saw in general. I chatted with several people and they basically all said that the kids are off at the Oceaner Club or Teen Stack all day long. There are "family" activities and a lot of activities that are more "adults only." I think Disney does a good job of satisfying everyone.
Originally Posted By debtee I'm so pleased you had such a wonderful time T. Reading your great trip report has made me want to do the Disney cruise now too! Thanks so much for sharing with us and I can't wait to see your pix!
Originally Posted By Ursula Thank you for answering my questions! I really, really want to do a cruise next year!
Originally Posted By Kala FANTASTIC trip report! Ursula DO IT!! The Wonder is suppose to port in CA next year is it? I don't know if I'll do a cruise out of CA. Unless they buy and flip an Island like they did with Castaway Cay. CC is so worth a trip to Orlando for us. We are thinking of doing a double dip, 2 days at Castaway Cay, in 2012. Thanks Goodgirl!! I'm off to visit paradise and the Magic through your pics!
Originally Posted By amazedncal2 You write wonderful trip reports goodgirl. Thank you for including all the fun, sweet and YUMMY details! I went to a luggage store yesterday and saw one of "Quilty's" sisters. I thought of you and the wonderful vacation you had
Originally Posted By dlkozy Your trip reports were wonderful and I really enjoyed reading them. Thank you for all the fun details!
