I don't want to go home!!!!! *picture me stomping my feet with a frown on my face*
I woke up to the sounds and motions of the ship. Yeah, that was the ship docking at Port Canaveral. I dreaded looking out that window and seeing the continental United States waiting for me. But there it was. And it was wide awake. We were still in our room, thankfully dressed, when there were people ON OUR VERANDAH helping to prep the ship for the next sailing! TWICE I saw dudes go by our verandah! So here's my friendly tip, if you're going to be at all nude, keep the curtains closed now that you're back on land!!
I got ready really fast and made my last walk through the ship to pickup our thumb drive of all of our professional photos. Juan gave me our little envelope. I enjoyed him. He took our fun pictures of Katura and I at the beach with our drinks!
It is a strange feeling on the ship that early in the morning. Some people are already lining up to leave. It was quiet. Everybody seemed sad. It is like this feeling of denial. You want to have the chore of getting off the ship go quick and smooth, but you also don't want to actually get off the ship. You don't see characters anywhere. The stores are closed. You CAN go get food in the main dining rooms or Cabanas. We didn't do that. Had we been allowed more time we would have been having breakfast at Animator's Palate with Ikbal and Noel, but the Disney bus was leaving early and we had to be on that bus or..... or stay on the ship forever???!!!!
Leaving the Dream and getting through security and customs was way too easy. We had a porter help us with our luggage as well, so that was nice. We had just enough tip money left for that. Phew! And then the bus ride....
It was depressing. And went too fast. Too fast? Yes. We were at the airport so dang early. Too early to even check our luggage. We had to hangout in the food and shopping area with 2 large suitcases, 3 roller carry-on bags, 2 backpacks, a duffle bag and a stroller. We weren't alone. The family waiting by us with all of their luggage was the same family we rode to the port with at the start of our cruising adventure!
And then finally the drama of trying to get home... you can watch this video to see how that all played out! At least we didn't have to DRIVE home like we did on our last Florida vacation!
I don't even want to blog about it. I want to pretend I'm still enjoying life on a beautiful ship. But here it is, the final night.
What you don't see in the vlog is Beauty and Beast. There are no photos or video allowed in the theater, so obviously we didn't share that. The show was great! Katura really loved it. It is a legit Broadway style show, with this version being based on the live action movie more than the original cartoon. It was fun to see the same actors that we saw the night before in Believe, just in different roles. Both Shawn and I noticed that Lumiere from Believe was NOT Lumiere in Beauty and the Beast!
The princesses were VERY chatty this evening. And of course Katura, being a little girl, was in heaven. But we parents were ready to get to dinner! I don't like to be late. I feel like that would be rude to our awesome servers, so we did have to kind of shuffle Katura along.
Before cruising I had watched promotional videos of the ships and Animator's Palate always looked like the most incredible experience. And it DOES live up to the hype!! The food is so delicious here, and the atmosphere literally speaks for itself! I cannot wait to take my mom here soon. We haven't experienced it on the Fantasy yet, but I know it is going to be delicious!
The sad part of the night... saying goodbye to Noel and Ikbal. I genuinely felt sad. Isn't it crazy that I am the pickiest eater in the world and could live off of the pizza on the pool deck, but our dinners every night are my favorite part, and I can truly say that Noel and Ikbal were a huge reason for why it was our favorite!
The other sad part, and slightly stressful... packing. On the final morning you can haul all of your luggage yourself and get it through all the customs stuff, but doesn't that sounds like too much work? Yes. So we opt to have our luggage picked up the final evening and we are then reunited with our bags in the customs area after they have already done whatever they have to do. What does that mean for the final night?
Get everything packed!
Do NOT pack what you need to wear the next morning!
Do NOT pack your toiletries that you will want to use that night or in the morning!
Keep your passports accessible since you need those at security.
And get all packed and outside of your room by 10pm.
As you may recall, we do second seating for dinner. We were assigned to show up for dinner at 8:25pm. Then Katura had an evening reservation for the Oceaneer Club. So we had to get all packed up and organized right after getting on the ship at Castaway Cay. Then get us all dressed for dinner, but leaving out the above mentioned things. Hurry to the main atrium so we can do our final evening photos on the way to dinner. Have our delicious dinner. Then get Katura to the Oceaneer Club and back to the room to finalize all the packing so the luggage can be picked up and we can avoid trying to cart it all around in the morning.
So you do hear me panting in the vlog. Running all over the ship in a mask in the heat while talking to the vlog.... how can I not sound like I'm wheezing? But we pulled it off and took care of everything just in time. We slept great, but it was sad to lay down for that final sleep.
Clearly there is one solution.... Go on another cruise!
This post shall count as my Castaway Cay 5K race report for day. It will be short. Here we go:
I did the race again. (Now my 3rd time doing this race.)
It was soooo hot... 88 degrees at the start to be exact.
I was supposed to be doing the Ragnar Trail race in Oregon this weekend, so instead I did these two races back to back. Felt appropriate!
I forgot my headphones and my water.
I let myself stop for selfies at photo spots.
I hoped for more rain because I was dying.
I finished and THEN the storm came back.
So I went to the beach and ordered a drink that was waiting for me when I returned from changing out of my race attire!
And if you watch the video ... I DID save my run.
I started off the day already smelly when I put on my damp race clothes from the day before. Eventually I was adding fresh, new sweat so then I didn't notice the leftover sweat. That's a win, yeah?!? I brought both of my medals with me so I could get my post-race photo with them (although I took them before I actually even made it to the race course).
The storm was freaking awesome!! It really was the highlight of the day. Perhaps it is that we are from Oregon, but the rain didn't phase us at all. It was so hot that the rain was refreshing! And my life in Florida was always enjoyable during storms, so I was in heaven with all of that thunder we had. At one point we were the ONLY people in the water on our entire beach. When can you ever have all of a Castaway Cay beach to yourself?? There was no way I was going to just hide in the ship or under cover somewhere. I was going to be wet in the water anyway, so why not just go for it during a storm?
A highlight of this day was because there weren't any other people there we were able to get VERY up close and personal with some fish. We would just sit still and relax and these very large, almost see-through white sort of clear fish would appear practically touching us as they swam though. So cool!
Last, the bike ride.... We live on a hill. We don't have easy access to flat places for Katura to practice riding a bike. And I can't fit her bike in my car, so we don't just pack it up and head to a park. So when she and I decided to rent bikes for a trip to the observation tower we did it knowing this was going to essentially be her first ever REAL bicycle ride. Yeah, she fell a few times. But she got back up and never got hurt. We walked a lot of it on the way back and she said never again would she do this. I bet she will change her mind some day. I was really proud of her, and we did have a lot of fun on our adventure. And you know what ---- she fell, but I almost did, too! Like mother, like daughter!
Some come along with me and see a stormy day at Castaway Cay!
(I'd like to pretend that rhymes, but sadly Cay is pronounced like "Key".) Oh well.
I cannot change the words to that song. I tried. It was so hard! But shall we back up?
Prior to this cruise we did not know if we would have Pirate Night or not. I had done an online chat with a DCL cast member and that person was really not helpful and said there were no deck parties so there wouldn't be a pirate one. Fine. That's not what I asked. Pirate Night is way more than a deck party!!
It is music in the hallways. It is special photo opportunities. It is our favorite characters dressed up in pirate attire. It is a special menu at dinner. It is all of the dining crew being decked out in pirate attire. The deck party was just one little piece. So being the pirates that we are there was no way I was going to go on this cruise without our pirate attire! I was very happy when I heard our cruise director on the morning report mention there would be pirate activities happening that evening!!
After Castaway Cay (where I raced in my pirate race attire!) we were very excited to get dressed up! First we were in casual dress attire to see one of the stage shows, but once that was done it was time to transform into our true selves.... pirates! Enjoy this little snippet from Wikipedia:
Thomas Tew (died September 1695), also known as the Rhode Island Pirate, was a 17th-century English privateer-turned-pirate. He embarked on two major pirate voyages and met a bloody death on the second, and he pioneered the route which became known as the Pirate Round. Many other infamous pirates followed in his path, including Henry Every and William Kidd.
Like I said, we ARE a pirate family!
And so the party began. So many photos at every spot to get one. And the photos came with sound effects! We even got to see Chip and Dale... which was so awesome because the crew members with them recognized Katura's Uma costume from Descendants and immediately started singing her song together. I loved it! You can hear that at the 2 minute mark of our video. Some photographers even recognized her as Uma!
Our entrance to dinner was quite unforgettable as well. Every dinner should start the way this one did! And dinner itself... that was a nonstop party. A party in my mouth AND all over with the singing and dancing pirates! But dang it how do you expect this pirate wench married to a Navy veteran to switch and NOT sing "drunken sailor" and instead say "lazy pirate"?? It was nearly impossible, but I did it!
We hit the second night of fireworks while Katura was in the Oceaneer Club. Our video doesn't show as much of the party because we were way too busy dancing all night to every single song! And what was Katura doing while we were away? She was hanging out with THE Captain Hook!! Lucky girl!
Pirate Night was one of the big selling points for me before we ever took a Disney cruise, and this night sure did not disappoint! Now if you'll excuse me you can go watch the video and I'm going to continue figuring out our next sailing's outfits! Yaarrrr!!!
I can't even find words to describe this! As Katura declared in a video, I am NOT a good swimmer. I've never passed a swimming test. I went to the lessons. I didn't exactly leave them with passing grades. And when I do swim I don't really go underwater. To go under I HAVE to use my fingers to plug my nose. In Hawaii I tried to snorkel once and I completely sucked. I didn't even do it for a second. I ended up using goggles, plugging my nose and holding my breath while my brother in law guided me around with my lifejacket. So when Katura and I decided to sign us up for snorkeling with stingrays I really had no idea what was going to happen.
Upon check-in we received our lifejackets and snorkel gear. Shawn is pretty much a pro at snorkeling, so he was great and got our goggles fitted for us and taught us how to get all situated. He taught us how to breathe, and Katura had no problem. Breathing should be easy, right?!? But for some reason I could not get myself to become a mouth breather. But I wasn't going to give up!
We had a little orientation with one of the Castaway residents that takes care of the stingrays. They are all female rays and many of them are pregnant. It was really cool to see the pregnant ones and it was easy to tell who was pregnant once we learned how to identify it. Also they assured us that we cannot be stung. They can trim the stingers just like we trim our nails, so there is no pain for the ladies and they will grow back.
Soon we were off to the beach and being presented with a bucket of slimy seafood to feed the ladies when they came up on the platform. You just hold the food under the water on the Mickey head. When they swim up to your hand just move your hand away leaving the food and they will grab it. Also we had to be careful with our feet. They were constantly tickling us when they swam by, and we were taught to do the Stingray Shuffle so we wouldn't risk stepping on any that had buried themselves in the sand.
I absolutely loved them! They felt so soft, and not really slimy, but definitely slick. But not slick in the way the dolphin felt. We even felt their tail area which was NOT soft! You definitely wouldn't want to accidentally step on that. Ouch!!
So feeding was done and we had a lot of time to head out into the closed lagoon area to swim with the stingrays. Time to put myself to the test and see if I could actually snorkel or if I would be floating and looking down into the water. The title of this blog gives it away, I DID IT!!! It was hard at first. I had a huge mental battle, but I looked over and Katura was already gone snorkeling like she does it all the time, so I had to try. I feel like I was always telling myself "breathe in, breath out, mouth in, mouth out". I even got fancy enough that Shawn and I were able to talk to each other underwater without me drowning!
We all loved it so much... so much that we are signed up for it TWO times on our next cruise! This time my mom will be with us and she feels about it the way I did before I tried. So hopefully I can help her be a mouth breather and we can fumble our way through the lagoon together!
I always write a race report after I finish, so we shall count this as that report, although there isn't much to "report"!
It. Was. Hot.
I feel like those 3 words could summarize everything! It was 84 degrees when I began running (and even hotter the next day, but we will do that when we get to it).
So let's back up! The official race was not happening now due to the whole social distancing and experiences being changed thing. You could still do the race, and upon completion head to Guest Services on the ship and collect your medal. I did this race in 2019 and really enjoyed myself, so of course I wasn't going to pass up the chance to do a Disney race and get my Disney medal in one of my favorite Disney places!
Katura and Shawn went to the beach while I went the start line. I had my Garmin getting a signal, my music playing and my water bottle full. I was ready. What I didn't remember to do was load up on sunblock all over my entire body. My head got such a sunburn. My scalp was hurting the next morning. It was tender to the touch. And I even had on my traditional pirate bandana I race in. It slipped back and the Bahamian sun took advantage and fried my part! Like I said, it was hot!
Remember my last post where I said I keep running into the same annoying vlogger everywhere I go? Watch this video. You'll see him dragging his brother along in matching shirts just before I start to run.
And so off I went to run this race apparently all by myself! Wait, no, I took you - the viewer of my vlogs - with me and I talked to you the entire time! Did I mention it was hot? And humid? Uh, yeah.
Running wise, since this is a race report, I was doing great. My legs felt great and were so happy to be running. But the heat was just zapping me. I was racing to get out of the sun and into shady sections so I could try to find any little ounce of slightly lower temperatures. The course was absolutely beautiful. I love all the little things along the way for photos. This time I didn't stop at them really, just grabbed photos as I ran and walked by.
Water stops were few. I think I encountered 2. Where there was another water stop in 2019 I just found empty space. And signage was lacking. Had I not run before I wouldn't have known to turn right after the airplane. I didn't end up doing exactly 3.1 miles because I turned around too early. I just wasn't sure with the misplaced sign I saw earlier on. But you know what? I worked hard! I've run farther and faster many times, but physically this one was the hardest. I haven't raced on the surface of the humid sun before and my body really noticed.
I picked a spot to finish my final walk break and then pushed hard to the end. I got to finish listening to Jimmy Buffett, so that's pretty rad! And I saw someone I knew at the finish line, so that made it even better! Still panting and dripping in sweat (because really I was sweating from the moment we landed in Orlando) I went to the gift shop and loaded up on some essential 5K items like a shirt, backpack and water bottle. Then it was a beeline to my swim suit, sunblock and the ocean! And by 10ish in the morning I was sipping on a delicious rum drink and swimming. Best post-race celebration ever!
*Oh, and I did get my medal back on the ship! I hear they have run out, but I happily didn't race and go home empty handed!
First off... my dinner on night 2 was sooooo good!! I had tofu and couscous and I cannot wait to have it again on the next cruise! For non-tofu eaters that probably sounds gross. I swear to you if I like it it HAS to be good!
This post will not be all about food though, it is the after party that we sort of crashed. I've crashed weddings and high school reunions, so why not a deck party, too?
After dinner Katura had a reservation for the Oceaneer Club. That meant we adults got to have a night alone again! Typically there are fireworks on Pirate night, but because of the current changes there aren't any official deck parties and no pirate fireworks. BUT they didn't skip the nighttime fun all together. Instead there would be two fireworks presentations, the first one being for those that had first seating at dinner. The next night would be for those of us that had second seating.
The fact that I said I crash things might be the big indicator that we ended up seeing the fireworks BOTH times! It wasn't completely intentional. We were alone and did our typical thing of wandering around the ship. We decided to head up to the pool area and see what was going on. Nobody ever stopped us to make sure we were first seating people, and it was very empty. Next thing we knew a lovely crew member was directing us to our big dot that would be our official spot for the evening.
We were all socially distanced, and Shawn and I happened to have an awesome dot right along the water on the same side of the ship that the fireworks would be launched. It was the perfect spot! Not only was it the perfect spot for the fireworks, but also for the people watching!
Let's back up.... Prior to this sailing I just knew we would end up on this cruise with "real" YouTube people. Which ones? I didn't know - but I knew there would be some. The one I didn't want to see ended up there, of course, and I kept running into that douche bag everywhere I went. Katura and I kept running into him in November, too. WHY???? Anyhoo... in the health screening tent I glanced over and was like "Hey, I know that dude! Shawn that's the vlogger we saw just before our last cruise working at The Studios!" Of course Shawn, not being shy AT ALL, asked if I wanted to meet him. Um, NO! Dude, I'll just watch from afar and talk about him like a normal person!
Well now here we are on the upper deck and who is right by us? That vlogger! Could Shawn resist? Oh heck no. So the next thing I know we are chatting about how we are all vloggers (psh, I don't count. I'm not famous. I'm just a mom that makes fun videos with my child) and how our daughter loves watching his videos because he always makes people Jump Around and she always wants to jump as well.
And now her parents have officially been in his video doing the whole Jump Around thing (and he's in ours as we jumped). He was disappointed that she was in the Oceaneer Club so they couldn't meet and she couldn't jump. But she is happy to hear our story of that night at the fireworks and see us in someone else's YouTube video!
*Incidentally I saw a parody video of that douche vlogger and who ended up in HIS vlog? ME! Walking to the 5K start line. He's in my video from the same time. You'll see that in the next blog!
I hadn't planned on repeating this. But I also hadn't planned on canceled cruises and never knowing what was going on. So once it was our window to be able to sign up for port excursions and onboard activities, well, I went a little crazy!
And back to the Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique we went! I'd like to have a mini rant here. It drives me absolutely insane when people say BiPPiTi BoPPiTi. Especially Disney know-it-alls. Is it THAT hard to say it the right way? I mean they say it over and over in the song, so just get the right letters, okay?!? Yes, back to the Boutique....
This round of the Boutique was far from the same as November 2019. Obviously new protocols are changing this, and this experience was one that had an obvious change. Last time we did this Katura not only had her hair and nails done, but also her make-up. This time we DID get make-up, but it was just given to us in her little backpack. We went back to our stateroom to put it on for the tea party. But obviously it is harder to do make-up when you have on a mask.
I think another thing that possibly caused a difference was the fact that the ships haven't had guests since March 2020. This was the very first cruise and Katura got her make-over on the sea day - which was the first full day of the cruise. So the Fairy-Godmothers-In-Training really felt like they were in training. They didn't have the team rapport that the last crew had. I remember Virginia from Italy was the awesome stylist that did Katura in 2019. This time Katura had 2 and I don't remember either one's name. And they were much quieter, so it was hard to interact. With masks on I think they needed to perhaps speak louder so Katura could hear them better to really have the full experience. So no fault of these ladies at all, they just haven't gotten into a fun group groove yet.
Katura loved her time there and left feeling like a beautiful princess, so I absolutely cannot complain at all!
The next repeat item for us was the Royal Court Royal Tea. This had many changes, and I loved all of them! This is, from what I hear, a hard to get into event. It happened only one time on our sailing, and the spots are VERY limited. If you want to do it you pretty much have to make that reservation ASAP when your window opens. Katura was so excited to be able to do this again, and so was I actually!
Katura and I were there early to take some photos of her in her new gown at the entrance. We were pleasantly surprised when it was time to be seated and Katura was the first little girl taken inside. They announce each Princess as they come inside and are escorted to their own table where they are greeted with a variety of gifts.
In the past multiple Princesses shared larger tables, as well as sharing the trays of food. We had our own food last time because we marked that we are vegetarians, so that was a plus. Now we had our very own table which I think helped us feel a little more relaxed and free to interact with each other and dig into the food!
Also different was the array of gifts. The tiara this time, sorry Disney, was disappointing. In 2019 it was legit!! It was solid and had lots of blind. This time it was something plastic you could get from Oriental Trading Company or the Dollar Store. For real. She got the same Cinderella doll that is exclusive to this tea party. She let me have this one since she already has one. That was so darn sweet of her, but I'm not taking it. It is for her! Instead of a Disney Cruise Line princess jewelry box she was given a DCL princess purse, with her bracelet, necklace and charms inside. Last time the princesses came through and presented each girl with their charms. **We will get back to this! Instead of an autograph book and pen the girls received a different princess pen and a princess journal. Makes sense since they can't get autographs right now. Lastly we were given a large DCL princess lithograph. In the past instead each girl got photos taken with all of the princess and then a large print of one was left in a leather holder in our stateroom that evening. Since photos can't be done the same we got this lithograph.
Okay I'll hurry this up! The food was all the same and quite enjoyable! The "show" was different, and I think better. Last time the princesses would come out and then visit each table and do the whole charm thing. Now they came out and each told a little story. Then during dessert they came back one at a time and they had conversations with every single girl there. You could really see these little princesses feeling so special when their favorite princess talked specifically to them and asked them questions. It really made it feel a lot more intimate even though everyone was socially distanced!
So much princess. So many pinkies. So many little sandwiches. So much dessert!
