Thanksgiving at Disney - A Trip Report - Day 3 - BINGO!

Once back on board the Dream and cleaned up from our time at Castaway Cay, we all decided it was time for some adult time. I treated my sister, LaRae, to some rounds of Bingo. Up until the trip we had both been addicted to bingo apps on our iPads! My brother-in-law, Randy joined us to spend time with us, but he brought comic books to read. I thought that was a neat compromise since everyone should get to enjoy their downtime how they see fit while on a cruise. My parents did... something... and I think the kiddos went to the kids club (or else with their grandparents). I guess was so focused on bingo that I missed where everyone else ended up!

Disney lighting is never boring!

Getting going with bingo confused me a bit as there are a lot of options for buying in to the game. The bingo packages came with combos of traditional and electronic cards. I like traditional cards where I have to look for the number and punch (cover) the numbers myself. My sister was happy to use the electronic cards though, so we both ended up with what we wanted. The Cast Members who ran bingo were high energy and kept the time between numbers called from getting boring. When you're one (or was it two?) away, you stand in place. If they don't hear you call bingo before the next number, you miss out, so this helped the CMs know where to listen, and it caused bingos to be called out with even more gusto than usual! Overall it was a lively environment full of anticipation and excitement!

LaRae and her electronic cards

I used one of these cards of 3 per round and punched my numbers.

While waiting for the rounds to begin, the top of the screens flashed up fun questions for people who had paid to play in the game:  

"Joanna Crawford, will you be one of today's winners?"

Sadly neither of us won, but we did have a good time playing. Honestly one of the larger pots got split by about 17 people, so winning meant they got about $10, so we didn't feel too cheated. After all, it was fun to just play the game and be a part of the excitement!

After playing bingo, I went exploring a bit on my own promising to meet my family for dinner later at Animators Palette.  I took time looking through the onboard Art of Disney Store and did my souvenir shopping.  As you might recall from my shopping tips series, I do all of my Disney shopping at once after I've had plenty of time to look through the shops to decide what I want.  I ended up with some nice items: a Disney Cruise Line Tervis Tumblr, a DCL ornament, some DCL Vinylmation pins for the kids and myself, as well as a few other odds and ends. I also visited the Pink Lounge to finally get a glass of their Pink Champagne. While it was delicious, it was almost $20 a glass, and I forgot that if you drink it in the lounge you get to drink from a crazy fancy flute. I wish I'd stayed there to drink, but I walked the deck with it instead. My family had the camera, so I didn't get any photos of all of this, but sometimes it's nice for the photographer to get away from the viewfinder for a bit. 

Bingo: what do you say? Waste of money or fun gaming event on the ships? (This is the only "gambling" option on board Disney ships.)

Thursday's post will take you with us to our last dinner on board the ship, the one we were most excited about: Animators Palette! 

Thanksgiving at Disney: A Trip Report - Day 3 - Castaway Cay

Sometimes life drags us away from our loves. In this case, my job took precedence over my blog and trip report. Thankfully I finally have the opportunity to start writing again, and I am back to finish this trip report, then share my 30th birthday trip to Walt Disney World, and host another Disney craft giveaway at some point in there! Exciting things are coming!

Day 3 of our Disney Cruise began bright and early since we wanted to get off the ship and stake out our spots on the beach at Castaway Cay. For my readers who have not yet had the pleasure of cruising with Disney, Castaway Cay is Disney's very own private island. It has beautiful white beaches, including an adults only beach, cabanas for rent, areas for swimming and snorkeling, a bit of shopping, and of course some amazing places to dine all keeping with the castaway island theme. You can also rent rafts and bicycles. Hammocks, umbrellas, and loungers are scattered throughout the island, and there is a swimming area, Pelican Plunge, with slides and platforms.

Normally we ate breakfast at in one of the dining rooms, but the view from Cabanas, the buffet, was too gorgeous to pass up. I highly recommend eating your breakfast on the deck as you enjoy the ocean breeze and the view of the beach.  From there we grabbed our things and headed off of the Dream.  Along the way to the beach there were plenty of photo opportunities:

Be prepared to walk the length of the ship to get to the trams to the beach!

Christmas tree on the island in swimwear - it was definitely a fun surprise! 

These "sandmen" were a fun addition to the Christmas theme! 

Can anyone really get these jumping pics perfect? ;-)

Captain Jack Sparrow had a very long line, so I just snapped a pic as we passed him. 

This is one of my favorite shots from the day. My parents happily posed
with Pluto who had practically no line!

After the tram ride to the beach, we were able to grab a red wagon to pull all of our towels and beach bags. That was a thoughtful perk that we were thankful for! LaRae and I made our way over to pick up the snorkels for her, Randy, the kids and me.  My parents, Randy, and the kiddos found a nice spot on the beach. The kids were excited to get in the ocean and try snorkeling, but they had a bit of a hard time with it. They quickly decided to head back to the beach to play in the sand and swim with their grandparents. My brother-in-law is not a big fan of swimming, so he tried to snorkel with us for a while, but he too headed back to the join the kids fairly quickly.

LaRae and I snorkeled for about 2 or 3 hours though! We swam the entire snorkeling area on the family beach! It was wonderful! If you love to swim, this is for you. Your snorkel equipment rental comes with fins, a mask, snorkel, and a lifejacket (which you don't have to inflate much). Throughout the area Disney had placed buoys marking underwater surprises. Sadly I never developed the film from my underwater camera to show you, but it's really more fun if you discover these treats on your own. Be ready to see some of your favorite Disney faces on the ocean floor as well as some sunken treasures. The further out we got, the more fish we saw. Every time we said we were going to swim in, we saw another buoy we wanted to check out!

It was a bit windy... See the hut there? That's where you get your rental items.

This is just the START of the beach!

Loved this souvenir cup and wanted to show off my Disney nails.
Quick tip: buy the cup, but DON'T buy the Coke they offer
to put in it! Just down the walk from where you buy the cup
you can get free beverages at Cookies BBQ! Lesson learned.

Some have asked about weather, water temp, and underwater nuisances at this time of year, so I'll take a minute to address that.  It was warm at Castaway Cay at the end of November.  It did sprinkle rain on us in the afternoon but not enough to need to run for shelter. We were comfortable in our swimsuits and coverups.  The water was chilly when we got in, but we quickly acclimated to it.  On the way out I got a bit shivery, but I was fine after a few minutes. As for underwater creatures: we saw numerous fish and a TON of tiny jellyfish.  I'm sure they brushed against my body multiple times, but they didn't cause stings at least that we felt.  These jellyfish ranged from the size of a penny to maybe a half dollar. While they surprised us, they caused no harm. I don't believe that November is really jellyfish "season," and we saw no evidence of larger ones. We did not have problems with sea lice or sand fleas, but I hear those are worse at other times of the year. Bottom line: will it be warm enough to swim at Castaway Cay? As long as it's typical weather, you'll be fine. (Just know that at sea you may find it too cold to actually swim in the pools on the ship.)

We worked up quite a hunger from swimming so much, so we went to find Cookies BBQ. This was one of our favorite meals! We all had seconds of the mahi mahi.  The food was fresh, hot, and seasoned wonderfully.

The hamburger was typical, and the cookie was nothing to write home about,
but the Cajun mahi-mahi (front center) was to die for, and the ribs on the
right side of the plate were also family favorites. My dad makes
some of the best ribs I've ever had, so for us to love these, that's
definitely saying something!

Gorgeous day!

I am not a "beach person," so once I'm done swimming and eating, I just want to get the sand out of my suit and get my long hair to untangle from the dreadlocks that ocean water puts it in. While my family went on, I headed back to the tram to have a peaceful shower in my nice, kid-free, quiet room. (Remember the kids were staying with me, which I don't mind in the least, but the peaceful room was a nice moment for me.) Randy walked me back to the tram while he returned the wagon (or something).  I was glad he walked with me as he took some photos for me:

This is one of the spots I always see DCL photos from when I'm surfing
the web, so I was glad later that he'd insisted on taking my photo.
See, brother-in-laws really are awesome.

I took my time making my way back to the Dream and took some more photos.

Find the Dream!

The sun was coming in just right for some beautiful shots of the ship.
Did you know the Disney ships back in to the dock at CC?
I guess the Captain has one heck of a rearview mirror! ;-)

There's the AquaDuck! The walk back from the tram is a long one!

One last look at the beach. This one is not accessible to guests.
Fair warning: they check your bags for shells and other beach items
that are NOT allowed to be taken back with you.
Confession: I had a bag of sand in my pocket to use to make
Christmas ornaments later... hehe! 

When I got back to the room, I still got to enjoy a view of Castaway
Cay through our Magical Porthole!

My family joined me back in the rooms for showers just as I was finishing getting dressed. We all got a bit of sun and had a laugh from all of the places we didn't expect to find sand! The ship is fairly vacant on Castaway Cay day making pools, bars, and other areas calm and giving you the ability to enjoy them solo sometimes.  That said, there's a reason the ship empties! Even with everyone on the island, it didn't feel crowded at all. There's plenty of space for everyone on this gorgeous slice of paradise. While skipping Nassau was absolutely acceptable, skipping Castaway Cay would be a missed opportunity.

If you've been to Castaway Cay, what was your favorite part on the island? If you haven't been, what area would you like to go to?

Next post we'll finally make it to the onboard Bingo game and see just how lucky we are!

Disney Magic Outside of Disney World

Last November I finally ventured outside of Walt Disney World as I discovered the joy of the Disney Cruise Line. While I knew that no matter what Disney adventure one goes on, Disney does it right, I didn't quite realize how very right Disney does cruising!

My only cruise experience was a cruise to the Bahamas with my high school band, and while it was neat, it was nothing compared to my Disney cruise! When you board a Disney Cruise Ship, you immediately notice everything is top of the line. The artwork, the cast members, and the royal treatment every guest receives calls back to the time of luxury liners.

Castaway Cay, Disney's private island, could be the only stop on the cruise, and I'd be pleased! In fact, I love the activities on the ships so much that I could happily stay on the ship from start to finish of the cruise. Destinations don't matter to me as long as I set sail with Disney.

I'm going to leave you with some gorgeous photos from the Disney Dream and encourage you to look outside of the parks for Disney fun if you've been to them often as I have. Sometimes Disney outside of the US Parks can be the change up that keeps things interesting!

Before I send you all on your way to the next stop on the Magical Blogorail, I'd like to share that this is my last ride along the Blogorail for a while. I've had an amazing time writing with this phenomenal group of Disney writers. Sadly, my blog has been becoming more and more difficult for me to keep up as work and my personal life demand more and more time away from my laptop. I do plan to continue my most recent trip report when summer begins, and I have a 30th birthday to Walt Disney World to share with you all! I just can't promise that will happen as soon as I'd like. I still love Disney and writing about it. My blog is NOT going away. I'm just acknowledging it's been fairly dormant for too long. Hopefully once I get things going again, I will be able to rejoin with the Magical Blogorail. Until that time, from the bottom of my heart: Thank you, Magical Blogorail, for letting me be a small part of spreading the pixie dust with you! See ya real soon!

My Favorite Disney Architectural Find

I recently found myself pondering my favorite Disney architectural find.  My mind went straight to Spaceship Earth, but I felt that was too easy for me. I mean, this was supposed to be a "find"... how hard is it to find a giant geodesic dome in the middle of Florida?  (No offense if any of my friends on the loop chose Spaceship Earth!)  My sister suggested something from the Disney Cruise Line, so we put our heads together and brainstormed. That's when I remembered the bathroom on the Disney Dream.

In the District area of the Disney Dream (and the Disney Fantasy), there are bathrooms that are a true architectural find. They are so cool, in fact, that my parents went in them and immediately came back out telling me I needed to go look in them!  Folks, everything in these bathrooms are round! The stalls are cylinders! The curves made for a gorgeous public restroom that left me only one option: thank God no one was in the restroom, pray no one walked in, and start taking photos in a restroom (something I swore I'd try to never do).  So without further ado, I give you the bathroom.

Selfies outside the restroom - who knew what awesomeness I was missing!

There's a mirror on the ceiling of the stalls. It took me a minute to
figure out how to capture the full stall.

There it is! See! Total cylinder! 

How can you not want to take this photo? 

Outside of the stalls - the doors are curved, the sinks are curved.
Oh, and the tiles on the wall are shimmery! 

I'll be taking more photos in this restroom on the Disney Fantasy when I get to take a cruise on it.  For now I'll leave you with some Spaceship Earth goodness though because it really is my favorite Disney architectural wonder!

Dressing for Disney World

A few weeks ago I was packing for a trip to Walt Disney World, and I mentioned my packing spreadsheet.  A friend laughed and asked about it.  I patiently explained that packing for Disney isn't like packing for any other trip. If anything, it's like packing for a marathon! You have to be ready for anything. Most importantly, though, you have to be comfortable BUT photo-ready in the parks.

So, yes, I have a spreadsheet to help make sure I get all of my electronics chargers, possibly needed medications, and clothing options to Orlando with me, BUT it's very specific.  For instance, I always pack some shirts I've made just for the trip:

All time favorite shirt I've made

This was the family shirt for the trip that year. 

3 years later, and I still wear this sweatshirt. Photoshop image created
by me, and I hand-blinged it. Total labor of love. :)

The customized t-shirts definitely make the trip more special, and they look really neat in photos.  Which brings me around to being photogenic.  I will NOT leave my resort room in the morning without full hair and makeup done. I do more makeup at WDW than I do most mornings for work.  I know that the second I walk out the door I'm likely to start taking photos of my family, dragging someone to do a PhotoPass picture with me, or taking selfies in front of the Castle.  Either way, I want how I look to match how I feel which is AMAZING!  Oh, and I always have a pair of fabulous sunglasses.  Can't stay in the Florida sunshine without those!  I'm not saying you have to wear makeup, but the photo-ops are numerous when you're in the parks.  I'll leave it at that.

The ironic thing is while I sound like I'm coming of as a pretty, pretty princess here, but my last "what I wear" item is Crocs. I'm recently 30, and I know the biggest fashion crime in my peers' eyes is Crocs (especially with socks), but I can't help it!  They're so darn comfortable, and when I'm strolling 10 miles or more a day around the parks, I need my feet to feel good.  So yes, I do wear Crocs with socks.  Before I show a scandalous pic from WDW, I will say that I don't wear my full on Crocs out in public ever (or at least much) while at home.  I wear the slip ons that people don't realize are Crocs, the ones that are ballet flats, on a regular basis.  I've worn these at the parks recently and like them for touring.  I've started wearing my cute sneakers around the parks as well.  The key is no matter what you wear on your feet, you should over-pack shoes on your Disney trip. You need a pair that you know is comfortable, and then (depending on the length of your trip) you also need one or two backups for when your dependable shoes start making a blister or rubbing funny.  Rotating shoes over the course of the days can be the difference in wanting to hop over to Epcot or wanting to call it a night at 7 pm.

That's right! I admit it! I've worn socks with Crocs! Interested in
dating me? There's the ugly truth! ;-) Good news is
I'm so pale that the white socks blend right in...

So what's in your suitcase when you go to Walt Disney World?

The Character I Love to Find in the Parks

This month I was asked which character I seek out in the parks, and I immediately thought, "oh no! I'm going to have to find someone to write for me because I don't seek out characters!" Then I realized that was kind of a lie... I prefer to happen upon characters, but sometimes being with whoever I'm with causes me to go look for characters, or I'm in a face my fear kind of mood that day.

What? Face your fears?!  Yes, non-face characters (ones that don't talk and have a headpiece) scare me a little.  I just turned 30, and I still have a tendency to wave at characters, take guest-less photos of them, and head the opposite directions.  Over the years, though, I have learned to fight this fear, so let me share some of my favorite characters to find.

 January 2009 I discovered my fear when we went to Chef Mickey's the first night of the trip, and I realized my heart was pounding out of my chest every time the characters came near. In fact, I kept praying they wouldn't come too close!  When I was a little girl, though, we went to Walt Disney World, and the one character I REALLY wanted to meet was Minnie Mouse, and despite having a meal with the characters and Mickey Mouse playing with my curly hair through the meal, Minnie never came to our table.  As an adult, I was determined to get a photo with her:

January & May 2009 Trips

On that trip I also met Stitch (horrible photo not shown - better one there is my redo May 2009) and Tinker Bell who quickly became my favorite character to meet because you never know what she'll say!  Meeting her with other fairies present is one of the best experiences because they banter with each other and guests the entire time!  They're awesome!

 Between our 2009 and 2010 trips, I read a blog post about getting good photos with the characters and how if you ask them to pose with you, as long as it's in their character's nature to do that pose, they will.  I went on our family trip in 2010 determined to face my fear and get a really good pic of me and Stitch surfing together.  I also have one somewhere of the Red Queen and myself, but I can't find it right now.  Having a plan to meet the characters made me shake much less!

November 2010

When I visited Disney World with my friend, Kyle, I couldn't resist grabbing a photo with Minnie Mouse again, but I don't have a good pose to do with her, and Kyle sort of shared my fear of characters with giant heads...

June 2011

On my cruise this last November I had no intentions of meeting the characters, but Tink had a tiny line after dinner one night, and I so love meeting her, so my mom joined me in grabbing a quick photo. 

Disney Dream - November 2012

I think the secret to the best experiences with characters is to interact with them.  Talk to them if they talk, pretend you're a princess or a fairy too, go with the flow.  If your child is like me and scared of meeting characters, talk to them before your trip about ideas for poses with the characters.  "You love Belle - how about pretending to read a book with her?"  Having an idea to focus on helps take the focus off of the fear.

Thanksgiving at Disney: A Trip Report - Day 2 - Dining in the Royal Palace

Sorry for the brief hiatus I took from my trip report! I took a week or two off while I celebrated turning 30! In fact, my sister and I will be at Walt Disney World next week to celebrate together! If you're not already following me on Twitter, I encourage you to click on the link to the right to do so. I'll be posting photos and updates throughout the trip.

Now let's get back aboard the Disney Dream, shall we?  When last we "spoke" my parents and I had gone to explore the Pink Lounge and were headed towards the Royal Palace for dinner.  Along the hallway, we saw some of my favorite art on board. It's simple sketches of various characters. I love this style!

Jasmine and Abu

My awesome mother asked me to take her photo next to her likeness. ^_^

If you arrive early to dinner, you wait in the hallway outside until the doors open.  There were two entrances to the Royal Palace.

Dining Hall being reset

Mom & Dad waiting in one of the giant "portholes" 

Waiting on our beds were Pirate Night bandanas (is that what pirates
call them??). Dad wore his for a bit. The kids had adorable costumes
you'll see in a bit. I decided my giant brown & gold belt on my black
dress was sufficiently pirate wench enough, so I refrained from
the headgear. ;-)

Dinner this evening was good but not my favorite, but I loved the chandeliers (like always).

Without further ado, I'll get to the food photos and descriptions.

My mother's appetizer was the Double Baked Spinach and Cheese Soufflé.
It looked different than I expected.

Because I'm a carbaholic, the bread basket appealed to me, but I
also loved the design of it! Just a little more magic for the table!
The olive spread was not my favorite, so they kindly brought me butter.
Dad bought a couple of light up cups which they filled with
ice and left on to illuminate our table. I'm sure Katelyn and
Josh will love using them when they visit GA this summer!

Most of us got the Iced Lobster and Jumbo Shrimp appetizer.
It was one of my favorites of the entire trip. Every simple but delicious. 
I loved how they put the cocktail sauce on my plate as a Mickey head.
Yes, I eat cocktail sauce on lobster... and shrimp...
and really any fish when I can get it...

I'm a big fan of the idea that you're on a cruise, so try whatever you
want which can mean appetizer and soup. This was Belle's
French Onion Soup. I'm not a huge french onion fan, but
what grossed me out here was that the crouton or bread
or whatever was on top of the soup was totally soggy and
like a wet rag on top of the soup. Ew.

Mom had The Comtesse du Barry's Soup which was a cauliflower cream soup.

This is the Aged Angus Grilled Beef Tenderloin topped with Grilled Shrimp.
This night my dad traded steaks with me. I prefer mine pretty rare, but
this came out medium-well despite what I ordered.  Because I
didn't want to speak up, he kindly traded. It was good but nothing
like the steak from the Enchanted Garden the night before.

Our server, Niks, was always good about making suggestions and helping us decide what to order. The night before he told us the Double Cut Rack of Lamb with a Dijon Crust was his favorite. My brother-in-law ordered it and mentioned that he wasn't a big fan of lamb, but he was willing to try it if Niks said it was so good.  Niks steered him away from it saying he'd be happier with another choice.  I appreciated that honesty.

During dessert time, Randy took the kids out to start meeting some of the characters that were out in the atrium. While there are lines to see nightly and daily characters, they're nothing like at Walt Disney World, AND the characters were in their pirate finery!  I don't have photos of dessert because Randy took the camera. In my mind though, the character photos were 20x better than the dessert this night. I couldn't decide, so I took the Disney Food Blog's advice and ordered two. This seemed to confuse Niks a bit... but he brought both.  Haha!  No idea why he was so confused.

Here are the kids in their pirate finery (something happened with
Josh not wanting to wear his...) with Captain Mickey. 

LaRae, Mom, and I waiting below for Randy and the kiddos 

They spotted Pirate Stitch and took a pic for me since I love Stitch!

I always try to quickly grab pics of characters when they're between
"visitors". I prefer pics of them alone when I can get a good one
over me with them... especially when they're
characters that don't speak.

My exception to the above rule is Tinker Bell. She is
always fun to visit because she says the
darnedest things! Adore her!

After dinner and characters, there was a Pirate Night party on the pool deck and then fireworks at sea.  Mom and Dad took the kids, so LaRae, Randy, and I could have some adult time. I tried to hang back a bit and be their photographer.

Sometimes while walking through the Dream, I felt like I was
walking through a Disney Art Gallery. All of the artwork was
absolutely amazing! 

The Dream had its very own Gingerbread House. When we were disembarking
they were putting out TONS of poinsettias. You can tell by how tilted this
photo is that I or the boat one were listing a bit. Both of
us were guilty of this. Hehe.

The red sundress was fun but not practical. I was so cold that I refused
to take off the sweatshirt even for photos. I regret that a tiny bit. 

The elevators had such old-fashioned glamour!

Walking up to the decks to see the fireworks. I thought they were
sweet all dressed up and walking hand in hand down the corridor.

Waiting for the fireworks

The moon was large and beautiful slightly behind some clouds.

Next trip I shall bring a tripod, so I can do longer exposure on fireworks.

After the fireworks, we were all exhausted, so we went back to the room for bed.  Have I shown you this great little guy that we found on my bed?  I love when they snag thing like sunglasses to use on the towel animals.  All the towel animals were unbelievable!

I so wanted to bring him home with me!

Thursday come back to join my family and I on Disney's private island: Castaway Cay!