You know your youth is long gone when...

DisneyDebNJ · Oct 2, 2012

sweetpee_1993 said:
Ah! You should! It's incredible!!! We're so hooked on cruising! Tracey can't think of anything other than how to get us back onboard before May next year. In fact, it was mentioned to him when we got back home that he may be asked to take yet another level up into management vs. worker-bee. Normally this is incomprehensible for him. He would rather work his 40 or 50 & go home. Buuuut...if he takes the next level up at work that could entail more money which could fund more voyages.... See?! It's addictive!!!

My DREAM vacation, is a week at my beloved Poly and a week on a Disney cruise!!!!!! (Dream it, DO it!) Someday... but I plan on a Disney cruise SOON!!!! Your pics are fabulous!! Now you have me excited!!!!!!!!!!

sweetpee_1993 · Oct 2, 2012

We walked past the shops to do some window shopping. Here's a bit of info for those who haven't cruised before. The shops are only open when not in port. If you're in any port the shops will NOT be open. It's something to do with laws or agreements or something. Something with taxes, etc. So here's the Duffy's with the cruise line shirts. Wish I'd bought some shirts for my Duffy's. Yes, I have 3 and I don't care who doesn't like Duffy. He's a teddy bear so he's for ME!

The outside of the Walt Disney Theater. This is where the big production stage shows take place:

And a peek at the super-cool restroom outside the Walt Disney Theater:

We ran back up to the concierge lounge for something, forget what, and I snapped some pics. This lounge is on deck 12 forward. You can kinda see the Titanic-esque steerage gate here on the far right:

When you walk in there's a big guest book to sign. We didn't sign it but we thought it was nice:

Across from the guest book is a pretty model of the ship:

A little further in there's some shelves on both sides with some cool maquettes on display.

I thought this one was cool. Admiral Donald!

So we ended up returning to our stateroom to see if our luggage had arrived yet. No such luck. We did get to meet our room steward, Robbi. He was super sweet! We told him as soon as our luggage arrived we'd have some items that needed pressing using the express service. He said he'd keep checking back for us.

It was about 2:00 and we were pretty worn out. We decided to lay down for a few minutes rest before it was time for the muster drill and sail away.

sweetpee_1993 · Oct 2, 2012

DisneyDebNJ said:
My DREAM vacation, is a week at my beloved Poly and a week on a Disney cruise!!!!!! (Dream it, DO it!) Someday... but I plan on a Disney cruise SOON!!!! Your pics are fabulous!! Now you have me excited!!!!!!!!!!

Good! And don't forget, next September we'll be having the first ever unOfficial WDWMagic Dream Girls' cruise that all the ladies are totally invited to jump in on! It's an excellent opportunity for new cruising gals to scope out the fun by sharing the adventure with other gals and saving some money. Definitely way cheaper to room-up and pay for 1 vs. 2 or more people. If you haven't seen the info, mosey over to the cruise section and check us out! We're under a year from sailing! Woot! And an excellent opportunity to escape the testosterone and have some well-deserved girl-time!

DisneyDebNJ · Oct 2, 2012

sweetpee_1993 said:
Good! And don't forget, next September we'll be having the first ever unOfficial WDWMagic Dream Girls' cruise that all the ladies are totally invited to jump in on! It's an excellent opportunity for new cruising gals to scope out the fun by sharing the adventure with other gals and saving some money. Definitely way cheaper to room-up and pay for 1 vs. 2 or more people. If you haven't seen the info, mosey over to the cruise section and check us out! We're under a year from sailing! Woot! And an excellent opportunity to escape the testosterone and have some well-deserved girl-time!

OMG I LOVE this!!!!!!!!!!! DEFINATELY will check this out!!! Thank you!!!!!!!!!!

Ariel484 · Oct 2, 2012

sweetpee_1993 said:
Yo! Time out for a shout-out to my girls cruise chickas out there!!!! Woot! I thought of y'all on the trip and took tons of pics to show you stuff! Like, okay, look at the 2nd to last pic I posted above. See the verandah partition? It has a door in the middle of it. Anyone staying in my room, Tammy's room, or Holly's room will come to love the little partition doors on the verandah. Why? Because our rooms are all 3 right in a row. We'll be able to have these doors opened so we'll all be "connected". Just keep in mind...sloppy drunks shall be banished to the verandah. Just sayin.....

Had to pause to comment on this...I had to stop myself from LOL-ing at the bolded part in my cube!

So excited!

How sweet is your husband to plan this for you?! Yay Tracey! Okay, back to reading...

sweetpee_1993 · Oct 2, 2012

With all the excitement any napping would be very short-lived. Power naps. They rock! At 2:30 we still didn't have any luggage (believe me, there's something in those bags I want very badly that ain't clothes!). A quick check of the Navigator, the informational schedule of events that is handed out for each day, and we spotted a longest drive contest in the golf simulator on the sports deck. This is right up Tracey's alley!

On the way to the sports deck:

Tracey signed in and looked at the other guests' distances. We thought, "No problem" because on a normal day he easily cranks his drives out in the mid 300's, sometimes more, sometimes less. There was a catch, tho. No warm-ups or practice swings. No loosening up. 3 shots and that's it. Your farthest drive is what you score. Ugh! Plus, the clubs aren't your own so there's the awkward factor there, too. His first shot was something like 200 yards or just under. Second shot he topped the ball and it didn't go far at all. Third shot he caught a little better but still not what his norm is. I wanna say it went something like 281 or something like that. He missed the leader by 8 yards. Oh well. Next time he'll get 'em! He liked the simulator, tho. He wants to go back sometime and book a block of time to play.

We ran back to the stateroom to check for the luggage. Nope. Dang. More wandering. Saw the packed pools, got a drink of the day: Paradise Punch. It was more punch than paradise so I don't think I'd waste the money on another drink of the day. Back to the room again and bingo! Luggage is here! It's 3:30 and the muster drill is at 4:00. Yikes! I scrawled out the form to have Tracey's pants & shirt pressed and he ran out to find Robbi to send them off. While he was gone I furiously dug out all our daytime shirts/tshirts and hung them up to de-wrinkle as much as possible. Put away all the shoes, hung the hanging items, seperated the next batch to send out for pressing (not using the express service), and settled a little. I also dug our Tervis tumblers out of the suitcase so we could mix some drinky-drinks asap with the liquor we carried onboard. Oh yes. Pay attention people. Disney Cruise Line is one of the ONLY cruise lines that allows their guests to carry beverages onboard including liquor, etc. But you have to carry it on. You can't put it in your checked bags. If the bottles should break or if there's leakage your bags could make a mess of other guests' belongings so if you're carrying beverages on you gotta carry 'em. And carry 'em we did!

We quickly poured some liquor into our tumblers (mine says "Princess", his says "Honey Badger Don't Care") and ran out to the drink stations. It was almost time to muster! In our haste I poured more sweet tea vodka into my tumbler than Tracey had Crown Royal in his. After we topped with ice and mixers at the drink station he took a sip of his drink and said, "Uh-Oh. Mine is waaaay strong. You might not be able to drink yours." So I finished mixing up my spiky sweet tea, took a sip, and Whoa Momma! I got kicked in the mouth some kinda bad! Woooooo...was that thing strooooong! No time to adjust, it's time to muster!

Here's another reason we were dying to upgrade at the port: we didn't want to be stuck standing on an outside deck for the muster drill. We did that last year. To quote my older brother, obrien III, from the January 2009 trip report: It blows. The upgrade switched us the "B" section located in a nice air conditioned perch in the top right balcony section of the Walt Disney Theater. Double Score!!! But when we got there we were informed we couldn't carry our drinky-drinks with us. Boo! Hiss! No prob, mon. We set 'em down on the little table-y spot right there by the door and promised our lovely monster-tumblers we'd be back soon. This muster drill was nice. I heard everything that was being said. And just to prove that I was paying attention we were told we had two things to make sure we remembered: Station B! Lifeboat 1! Got it!

We retrieved our tumblers and headed back to the stateroom to finish stowing all our junk so Robbi wouldn't have to deal with our piggy mess. We went up to deck 12 to see what we could of the sail away show. As we were passing the deck overlooking the stage Jack & Lisa from the airport spotted us. They waved us over and insisted we stand up at the rail. We had mentioned earlier that we'd never watched the sail away show before and they were on the first leg of a back-to-back (meaning when we got off the ship in 3 days they'd be getting right back on for an additional 4 days). So we all chit-chatted like old friends and had a ball. Here's some pictures of the stage show action:

I was steadily working down that over-stiffened giganto drinky-drink so when sail away was done it was kinda like "Oooooh myyyyy". We don't normally drink hardly ever when we're at home. Let's just say I was feelin' riiiiight... LOL! After the show Jack & Lisa had to hurry off to get ready for the early dinner rotation. We went wandering around a bit and I went into the shops to scope out the Dooney & Bourkes. I thought before the cruise if I got one I'd go with the blue striped cruise line pattern. It was just more nautical. But I was concerned because I thought they were made of the cloth which would get dirty easier. When I actually saw it, it wasn't. And then I saw the pattern that took the place of the original cruise sketch pattern which totally threw me because I didn't think I'd like it. PLUS they had this pattern in a backpack style which I loooove a no-fuss hands-free model bag. Decisions! Ugh! Tracey's solution? Just get both! Whaaaa?! Are you insane, old man!!! Did you not look at the prices of these things??? No stinkin' way was I spending that!!!

No time to think on the bags too long. We needed to get ready for dinner. And goodness knows I needed some food in my belly to soak up some of the alcohol. LOL!

sweetpee_1993 · Oct 2, 2012

DisneyDebNJ said:
OMG I LOVE this!!!!!!!!!!! DEFINATELY will check this out!!! Thank you!!!!!!!!!!

You're very welcome! Get in touch with Tammy. She's keeping a list of gals looking for roommies. She's doing a fab job of matching everyone up and getting everyone taken care of. We're linking together so we can do things together like dining, etc. Definitely give it a shot. Best part? We're all making this bodily sacrifice in the spirit of "research" for our families' future enjoyment. Well, I guess for some of us that won't work as well for an excuse...LOL!

Ariel484 said:
Had to pause to comment on this...I had to stop myself from LOL-ing at the bolded part in my cube!

So excited!

How sweet is your husband to plan this for you?! Yay Tracey! Okay, back to reading...

I know! Right?! Time is flying! Tracey is the bestest ever! I love him! (obviously...guess that's a good thing, huh?)

Disneyfalcon · Oct 2, 2012

sweetpee_1993 said:
Yo! Time out for a shout-out to my girls cruise chickas out there!!!! Woot! I thought of y'all on the trip and took tons of pics to show you stuff! Like, okay, look at the 2nd to last pic I posted above. See the verandah partition? It has a door in the middle of it. Anyone staying in my room, Tammy's room, or Holly's room will come to love the little partition doors on the verandah. Why? Because our rooms are all 3 right in a row. We'll be able to have these doors opened so we'll all be "connected". Just keep in mind...sloppy drunks shall be banished to the verandah. Just sayin.....

Yes. This. Having three adjacent rooms is awesome!!

Cracked up at the bathroom ceiling mirror!

Disneyfalcon · Oct 2, 2012

sweetpee_1993 said:
You're very welcome! Get in touch with Tammy. She's keeping a list of gals looking for roommies. She's doing a fab job of matching everyone up and getting everyone taken care of. We're linking together so we can do things together like dining, etc. Definitely give it a shot. Best part? We're all making this bodily sacrifice in the spirit of "research" for our families' future enjoyment. Well, I guess for some of us that won't work as well for an excuse...LOL!

Yes! Email me! It's going to be so so fun!!

Disneyfalcon · Oct 2, 2012

I haven't figured out how to quote from separate pages, so I will have to post every time I get to the botttom of a page! Or does the quote stay in the reply box when you change pages?

I can't wait to see which Dooney you got!! I got one!

s&k'smom · Oct 2, 2012

Well Sweetpee I thought your pictures couldn't get better and I'm so happy to be wrong.

On a side note, when we buried my dad he went with a chip, meeting list book and a cup of coffee!

sweetpee_1993 · Oct 2, 2012

More lessons learned: being tipsy before you're ready to "go" is not a very good thing to be. Why? Because you have to manage too many knobs. Like the shower. I meant to turn on the handheld shower because washing, drying, and straightening my hair would add an additional hour plus to getting ready. I turned the stupid the wrong way and got my bangs wet with the rain shower. I cursed loudly. Sorry if you were in the next stateroom and heard. Then...OMG...I had to put on eye makeup! Um, not optimal to be working with brushes and things right up by your eyeballs. I was certain I'd either put my own eyes out or end up resembling Tammy Faye's long-lost twin! Me-thinks I just dated myself with that one, huh?

Miraculously, we made it to our 7:00 reservation at Palo on time and looking spiffy/normal. Woot! The view from our table:

Don't worry. I ordered water with lemon to drink. LOL! Much needed bread:

And while we waited between ordering and the first course we did as we were instructed and hauled out the baggy of cards the boys had sent with us. See?

I forget the details of it but this was my appetizer. There's a mushroom risotto under there, I swear. And it was like pure heaven! The parmesean crusty-wedge thing on top with some of the risotto was perfection!

This was Tracey's appetizer. The red thing is a stack of beefsteak tomato slices over the top of something, I think it was fresh mozzarella. The green was some sort of sauce that was tasty as well.

To "cleanse the palette"...believe me, the sophistication in those 3 words wasn't lost on me entirely...we had a lemon sorbet with a single fresh blueberry. This stuff was like lemony-heaven!

This was Tracey's food but I can't remember for the life of me what it was. I think there was scallops under the "weeds" as he calls 'em. My hubby. I swear. If it ain't iceburg lettuce it's called "weeds", "trees", or "grass". LOL!

What's worse is I can't remember what it is I ate either. I shoulda wrote it down. Sorry. Knowing me and looking at this picture I'll go with steak of some sort:

sweetpee_1993 · Oct 2, 2012

Disneyfalcon said:
Yes. This. Having three adjacent rooms is awesome!!

Cracked up at the bathroom ceiling mirror!

I know! Chandler laughed at my observation, too. Just guessing but I think at the end of the day he likes that I'm this goofy and laid-back. LOL!

Disneyfalcon said:
I haven't figured out how to quote from separate pages, so I will have to post every time I get to the botttom of a page! Or does the quote stay in the reply box when you change pages?

I can't wait to see which Dooney you got!! I got one!

For quoting on multiple pages I go down to the quote in the typing box on the first page, copy that bit, go to the next page, hit the reply thing, go to that typing box, paste in the first quote, then go from there. It's long but it makes me feel better. LOL!

I want to spill the beans on the Dooney choice so bad! I'm so biting my lip! I was going to ask if you got one and which one! Don't tell me yet! Let's tell each other together! Want me to text it to you or save it?! You decide! I stink at saving the surprise!!!

s&k'smom said:
Well Sweetpee I thought your pictures couldn't get better and I'm so happy to be wrong.

On a side note, when we buried my dad he went with a chip, meeting list book and a cup of coffee!

Keep reading! Oh my! We haven't even finished day 1 yet!!!

That is so awesome about your dad! I love that! Can't leave out any of those, especially the coffee! My grandparents had a very different approach to their burial plans and laid everything out years before the bridge was before us. Grampa's remains were donated to the University of South Alabama for medical research. We like to think his brain and liver could do some good for studies about alcoholism and it's effects as well as Alzheimers and it's effects. Anything left after what was needed for research was cremated and sent back to my grandmother. Now Grampa sits in a little box on her shelf in the bedroom by a picture of him and she says she talks to him every day. Some days she says she fusses at him for this or that and some days she just tells him how much she loves him or misses him. My grandfather was an incredible man...but my grandmother is beyond words. She's an amazing lady. Still hanging in there but I know she'd be just as happy to go be with Grampa anytime now. I wasn't sad when he left because I knew it was what was best for him. I think it'll be the same when she goes, too.

sweetpee_1993 · Oct 2, 2012

My mother and I both agree that Tracey is a very odd bird, indeed. He doesn't like sweets that much. I know, what planet did he come from, right? Sheesh! He has discovered a total fascination with Tiramisu because typically it's not all that sweet. So here's Tracey's Palo Tiramisu which he liked very much:

He still likes Via Napoli's better. He also ordered, "some vanilla ice cream, plain please." What he got was an elegant portion of vanilla gelatto which he enjoyed as well:

Me? Come on! I'm a chocolate freak! Was there going to be anything other than the chocolate souffle???

I promise you I could roll around in those sauces all day long and be in total bliss! Not one to let such a great dessert menu go to waste, I also ordered the orange almond cake:

The cake was really light and not overly sweet. I liked it. Personally, I feel like if there isn't any frosting involved it doesn't qualify as "cake" but that's just me. LOL!

We were also brought a pretty 'Happy Anniversary' plate. See?

There was nothing on it but that didn't stop my super-sophisticated self from dipping my fingers into both the sauces on there and trying them. Loved the yellowy one. It was mango. The reddish one was raspberry. I'm not a raspberry fan unless it's a flavor with something like chocolate.

Oh! And at the very end we were brought these little lemony zinger frozen things to drink. I want to say there was alcohol involved but I can't remember. I do recall that these were absolutely delicious!!!

fractal · Oct 2, 2012

Loving the report so far and all the little stories! Obviously you have a drinking problem - the problem being that you don't drink enough at home.

sweetpee_1993 · Oct 2, 2012

Dinner at Palo took less than 2 hours. We were out at 8:45. The upcharge cost was $20 each. The DCL website says the tip is included but I've done a lot of reading and I know the servers don't get much out of that. I read something like maybe $5 but I don't think they get the entire $5. Seriously, this is a fantastic meal with impeccable service. We tipped accordingly. For informational purposes I'll be tacky and say how much. We gave an additional $30 bringing our meal total for Palo dinner to $70. Well worth it in every way.

We had another item on our must-do list tonight that we were determined not to miss: the Match Your Mate show. It's a fun, Newlywed game type thing, that only takes place once on the 3 & 4 night cruises. We had also mentioned how much we wanted to see it to Jack & Lisa earlier so we agreed to meet up to watch together. We agreed whichever couple got there first would save some good seats for the other. Yay!

We hurried back to our stateroom to get back into our comfy clothes. This was on our bed waiting for us when we got there:

That's the Navigator for tomorrow, some chocolates, and a DVC thing. Cool!

That's the end of our pics for the night. We did go on to the Match Your Mate show. We tried to volunteer to be the "middle" couple but there was another couple who wanted it. They made us get up and do a dance-off for the spot. Tracey is no dancer and neither of us are good with popularity contests so we got to watch and laugh from our seats with Jack & Lisa. Jack leaned over a few times during the show and said, "Y'all would've been so much better up there!" True. Tracey & I are pretty open and funny. We'll say anything, really. Never hurtful or embarrassing but there's no-holds-barred on some things. It was kinda aggravating to watch because for people who wanted to be on the stage so bad it seemed like all the couples were holding back and playing coy. Maybe the emcee could've done a better job milking the funny out of them. In the end, it was the couple who'd been married for 45 years that won the grand prize (a villa experience at the spa & bottle of champagne) which was really awesome. We liked them best! I still can't believe I shook my tail feathers on a stage in front of a packed club...and LOST...my brother will be so ashamed of me and what I've done...the O'Brien's totally have a reputation to uphold here.... It was all fun, tho, and I'm so glad we went. We had such a blast with Jack & Lisa. Didn't stay too long after the show. It'd been a looooong day....

So off to bed we went. I sunk down into my oober-plush Dream-y bed, gazed up at the soft blue glow coming from the cove in the ceiling, felt the ship rocking gently side-to-side, and fell off to sleep Dream'ing well before the Sandman ever made it around to little ol' me.......

sweetpee_1993 · Oct 2, 2012

fractal said:
Loving the report so far and all the little stories! Obviously you have a drinking problem - the problem being that you don't drink enough at home.

ROFLMAO....this is one of a few "problems" Tracey and I discussed the need for pre-cruise conditioning for the next voyage.... The other will have you in stitches, I'm sure. That's how I arrived at my report title....

You know your youth is long gone when..... ((start the list))

sweetpee_1993 · Oct 2, 2012

Friday, Sept. 28
Originally when this cruise was planned we had the Atlantis Aquaventure booked for our Nassau day. Yes, we just did this excursion with the boys in May. It was such fun. Plus, in reading since, I realize we didn't see a lot of things we wished we had. The problem was this was only a 3-night cruise and there was a lot of the ship I wanted to be sure to see. So I cancelled Atlantis. Since I cancelled it a month or so ago Tracey and I had been back & forth on and off the fence on whether or not to rebook it. I kept track of the availability as much as I did the stateroom inventory prior to cruising. In my mind I decided that depending on how much of the ship we saw on the first day we would or would not go for it at Atlantis on the next day. I bet you noticed all that pounding of the decks yesterday. There's a reason for that. In my heart I wanted to go to Atlantis with Tracey, just the 2 of us "big kids". Tracey had snuck back up to the concierge when I was getting ready for dinner last night so guess what he added on for us today? Atlantis! Oh yeah! Here I come! AGAIN!!!

I set my alarm to get up in plenty of time to get ready to go and have breakfast. We got up at 7:15 and hit Cabanas around 8-ish. Jack & Lisa were there. We said good morning but I didn't want to nose-in on their peaceful meal. They had told us about the obnoxious solo lady who invited herself to their table yesterday for lunch so I didn't want to be that person. We had a quick breakfast and got back to our stateroom for docking. Love that verandah! Nassau docking pics!

Did ya notice what we did there? Basically we sail into the little harbor area and the ship does a perfect pirhouette. They back us into the dock. Cool!

And, I thought of Tammy's blog during our trip. If you haven't seen it already, go check it out! Oh the places Tammy's toes...goes.... I love the concept! So, Tammy, here's one for you. Kelly's toes are goin' to Atlantis!

sweetpee_1993 · Oct 2, 2012

The meeting spot for the Atlantis excursion was the Walt Disney Theater. The tickets didn't say which side or deck (there's actually 4 entrances on 2 decks) so we sorta vegged-out in the mini-atrium area outside by all the shops. Which were closed. No Dooney for me. Yet. Or did I get one. LOL!

We were admiring the light fixture and the elegance of our surroundings.

Gotta love a picture of Uncle Walt:

The more we sat gazing up we noticed something we hadn't before. There's characters in all the ceiling panels around the central fixture!

I tried to capture one for you but it's hard because they aren't really blatant. They're understated to maintain the elegance of the decor...like everywhere on the ship, really. I messed with the color on this pic to try to show you. Isn't it cool???

The process to get checked-in, receive the wrist bands, then line up for the bus calls was very well done on the Dream. It wasn't near as chaotic as what it was on the Magic but then I think the Dream has the luxury of more space. Before long we were walking off the ship...

A look back up at our verandah. Do you see the "bump" way up there? Our verandah is on the portion of the bump that's closest to my vantage point.

Aaaaand, we're in group "Goofy" again! Woot! So appropriate, really...

Disneyfalcon · Oct 2, 2012

sweetpee_1993 said:
For quoting on multiple pages I go down to the quote in the typing box on the first page, copy that bit, go to the next page, hit the reply thing, go to that typing box, paste in the first quote, then go from there. It's long but it makes me feel better. LOL!

I want to spill the beans on the Dooney choice so bad! I'm so biting my lip! I was going to ask if you got one and which one! Don't tell me yet! Let's tell each other together! Want me to text it to you or save it?! You decide! I stink at saving the surprise!!!

Oh, good idea! I'll do that next time!

Ooh ooh. I don't know! I would say we can see who gets to it first in their trip report but you will obviously beat me!

Text me!!

You know your youth is long gone when...

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