We flew into Miami the day of the cruise. Mom and Dad had arrived the day before. The check in process went quickly and smoothly, and in no time we we were on the ship!
We had missed lunch, but we still had time to grab some food at the welcome aboard lunch on the ship.
Definitely not suffering ;-)
After fueling up, we went to check out the kids club. Elena loved the Andy's room area with the slinky dog slide and the Mickey cartoon area.
Jeff and Vivian were excited about the items in the Avengers Academy section.
After our fun photo ops, it was time to go back to the top deck for the sail away party.
Good bye Miami, hello open ocean!
On the way to dinner, we stopped to say hi to Pluto.
He got very excited about seeing Elena. Vivian had to get in there to play defense, but even she got chased around a bit, before he calmed down and posed for pictures.
Our dinner was at Lumiere's. They had steak and broccoli for Viv and duck for Jeff. We were off to a good start.
By the time dinner was over though, Elena was pretty much done. It had been a long day. Mom volunteered to stay in the room with Elena (who fell asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow), while Dad came with us to the first show of the cruise, Tangled.
It was great. They really go all out on their shows.
The next day was a regular sea day, although Jeff and Dad were excited that we sailed by Cuba.
We started the day off right with a Minnie photo op.
Then we dropped the girls off at the kids club, and Jeff and I went to the spa for massages :-) We all got back together for lunch at Lumiere's, and then Mom and I took Elena with us on a shopping spree. We found a dance party on our way back to the room.
After a "rest" which mainly involved introducing new toys to old toys,
we went up to the top deck to watch a movie.
Dinner that night was at Animator's Palate, which we decided was our favorite restaurant. The food was good, but the real draw was the show. The screens around the restaurant start the night as black and white sketch pads, showing the evolution of famous Disney characters. After a while, the sketches start to add color, until it gets to the climax where they show some of the happiest and saddest scenes from the history of Disney animated features. At the crescendo, Mickey shows up with his wizard's hat on and goes around the dining room. We all loved it, even though dinner took quite a bit longer than usual, since we were all watching the screens instead of eating.
We got back to our room to find a towel elephant and delicious, Ghirardelli chocolate. Disney spoils us so.
Jeff and Vivian went ahead to stake out seats for the show, and met Tiana along the way.
Elena was in vacation mode and able to stay up, so the whole family went to see Twice Charmed: An Original Twist on the Cinderella Story.
We all enjoyed it. I liked Tangled better, but Vivian said she liked this one better, because she didn't know what would happen next.
The next day we docked in Cozumel, Mexico, waved good bye to the ship, and headed out on a shore excursion.
We didn't stay on land for long though. We headed over to Puerta Maya and got on a semi-submarine to sail around the coral reefs.
We picked the semi-submarine, because it worked best for Elena, but I can't imagine trying to snorkel in that reef. It was FULL of little jelly fish. They were everywhere! There were some cool fish and coral too.
It was a fun way to explore, and it was just about the right length for us. On the way back to the ship, we had some fun shopping around.
My parents did a full day excursion to see Mayan ruins. I think next time we would want to do more, but for this trip, the excursion was just right. When we got back to ship, it wasn't very crowded. We took advantage of this for some fun photo ops.
Then we changed and went up to the pool deck. Elena really liked the splash area, and Vivian went on both the water slides multiple times. She made a line buddy in the process which was nice. Eventually, we got cleaned up and ready for dinner. Vivian had her Uma pirate outfit, so she was the best prepared for pirate night. On the way to dinner, we saw Goofy in his pirate gear.
Dinner that night was at Carioca's which ended up being our least favorite restaurant because it was so loud. The food was okay though, and our waiter, Roland, had put in a special request for apple pie for Vivian, so she was super happy.
This was also the night for napkin head gear. Vivian got a bow, and Jeff and Dad were supposed to look more like pirates.
After Vivian finished her second piece of pie, we went up to the top deck to watch Mickey rescue the ship from pirates with a big fireworks display. It was a lot of fun. When we got back to the rooms we found some very creative towel/blanket animals.
We got the girls settled for bed, then Jeff and I went out to watch part of the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie on the big screen and then Thor Ragnarok in the movie theater to get in the spirit for the next day which was the Marvel Day at Sea!!
We had a full schedule for the day, starting off with special Captain America coffee.
The kids had slept in late enough to try the sit down breakfast at Lumiere's. It was the same good food as usual, but we all agreed that we preferred the buffet for speed and selection. Still, we finished in plenty of time for our 10am tickets to meet some of the Avengers. First up was Spider Man who was really funny and took some time to talk to each person.
Next was Black Panther, who formally greeted each person.
And finally, Iron Man who seemed to be working from a bunch of pre-recorded phrases. When Jeff pulled out the right hook, Iron Man's handler freaked out a little, but all was well.
Vivian insisted on waiting in line to meet Loki.
We didn't have time to wait in line for Thor or Captain America. While we were waiting for Loki, we met a woman with a fantastic Black Widow costume, who agreed to pose for a picture.
A lot of the passengers went all out with their costumes. Elena's favorite movie is currently Big Hero 6, and when she saw a Baymax from the balcony, she dragged me down to the lobby to say hello. Luckily, the guy inside was very nice and agreed to do a picture.
Back up on the balcony, we hit the character jackpot when Mickey and the gang showed up to celebrate superheros.
It wasn't an announced photo op, so only Mickey and Minnie ended up with a long line, and we were able to get through and say hi to everyone else.
We caught Mickey later in the day.
We had tickets to see Groot in the afternoon.
And we found Gamora and Black Widow and Hawkeye walking around.
Even our room had some Marvel flair.
They had a special presentation called Marvel for Beginners, which we took Mom and Dad to. They seemed to enjoy it, although Mom's favorite part of the day was probably the seafood bar at Cabanas.
She had to correctly identify the character on her dessert before eating it though.
There wasn't a regular show that night, but there was a Doctor Strange show during the day which we went to.
It wasn't very good. Kids from the kids club got up on stage to "practice" sorcery, and then there were some special effects. In the evening, they had a full Avengers show on the top deck with stunts and more fireworks, so that made up for it.
The adults had dinner at Palo that night. We attacked the antipasto platter with such enthusiasm that we almost forgot to take a picture.
It was a delicious meal and the service was great too. It's always a fun treat.
The next day we docked at Castaway Cay. We were planning on a beach day, but the weather did not cooperate. It was cool and rainy. We refused to be deterred. We put on the Disney ponchos and went ashore for a barbecue lunch.
By the time we were done eating, the rain had stopped, but it was still a little too cold for wet bathing suits.
The girls were thrilled with their mode of transportation, so we spent some time exploring the island and getting some fun pictures.
I think the weather sealed the deal on doing another Disney cruise. We have to go back and have our beach day ;-)
When we got back to the ship, Vivi went to the kids club, and Elena and I went to say hi to Captain Mickey. She gave him a big hi-five, and they got some dancing in before their photo pose.
We had one more beautiful sunset, and then our final dinner of the cruise.
We were back at Animator's Palate which made us all happy. After dinner, we got some pictures.
The next morning we sadly said goodbye to our wonderful cruise ship. There wasn't a good flight home for us that day, so our plan was to spend the night in Miami and fly back to Bogotá the next day. Mom and Dad came with us for a while.
First we dropped everything off at the hotel and then we walked to the Frost Science Museum which was pretty close by.
It was the most expensive science museum we've been to yet, and the exhibits were just okay. The best part was the water exhibits they had at the top of the building.
We got the simplest lunch we could find and then spent the rest of the evening hanging out in the hotel room.
From our hotel balcony, we could see the science museum and the sunset.
We could also see the Disney Magic.
We heard it blow its whistle of "When You Wish Upon a Star" before it sailed off on its next cruise. It was really sad to see it go, but we know we'll be back for another cruise, not because we wished upon a star, but because we already paid the deposit on board the Magic ;-)
