m3owbox

Mouseketeer
Joined
Mar 15, 2015
Hello everyone! A little background. My name is Brittany, I'm 26. Very big Disney fan, as I'm sure most people who are reading this are as well! Been to Disney World many many times. My husband Lance (29), who is also now a big Disney fan (since the honeymoon almost 3 years ago) came on this trip to the Mediterranean with me. This is my 5th cruise and DH's 2nd. I have been on the Wonder way back for a DVC member cruise with my parents and the Magic 2x for the Caribbean. Just recently I introduced DH to Disney cruising on the Dream back in November. We have never been to Europe before but we are currently/newly living in southern Spain so we decided it was time and we booked the Sept 10th 7night out of Barcelona.

Sept 9

So to start things off we got up at 3am to catch our 6:35 am flight! We drug our tired selves to the airport and we were there about 45 minutes before the Ryanair counter even opened. Everything went very well, we got on our flight and arrived in Barcelona quite early at 835. By 9 am we were into a taxi and on our way to the Hotel!

We booked the Barcelo Raval about two months prior to the stay. We were worried about the location because a lot of people said the location was in a sketchy area. We didn't think so at all! It was actually nice not being in the touristy area because I didn't have to immediately worry about pick pockets the second I walked outside. It was about a 5 min walk from Las Ramblas which was very easy to get to. We checked in but our room wasn't going to be ready. They were able to hold our bags and we checked our bags in then we went to do some exploring. Here's the inside of the hotel.
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First things first, we walked down to Las Ramblas. And went right into a Starbucks (yes I know I know "you're American why are you getting Starbucks in Spain" Well because we can't get it where we live in Spain, we have to drive quite a bit!). And we got some pumpkin spice lattes! Yum! Afterwards we kept walking, North I think. We made it to a large square, which was actually pretty unexciting. Here's a very cheesy picture of us (we were tired but quite caffeinated, an interesting thing to be).
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Afterwards we continued walking and came across Casa Batlló. It was a lot cooler in person. It was something we had on our list to visit. Wish we would have went inside and got a tour though.
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We stared to walk back. Went in a few stores. Bought some things from Kiehls. Here's another cool building we saw on the way back.
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On the way back we made it to the large square we were in before. And what did we do? Went to the Hard Rock Cafe. :P Here are our drinks. Lance got a mojito (this will become a recurring theme for him) and I got something with curaçao and pineapple juice. I forget the name.
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Both drinks were perfect and refreshing as it was 90 degrees and very humid this day. For lunch DH got a pulled pork and I got a chicken arugula salad. Both were very good and hit the spot. Service was very very good, which is something we noticed throughout Barcelona. Everyone was friendly, and everyone we talked to spoke English (in case anyone was curious). Barcelona is also very easy to get around.
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That's it for now. To be continued!:jumping1:
 
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I am looking forward to reading your report! We had booked that cruise at some point as well, but then our travel plans changed. So, it will be interesting to see what we missed!
 
I am looking forward to reading your report! We had booked that cruise at some point as well, but then our travel plans changed. So, it will be interesting to see what we missed!
It would have been cool if you were on it. I always enjoy your trip reports!
 


following, thinking of doing this in September 2018. You sound like my kind of people Starbucks and Hard Rock , lol thats what I do too :)
 


:teeth:Just want to add that this cruise was awesome and everyone that is going on it next year, you're all going to love it! Hopefully I'll be able to get some more up later today! If not then tomorrow for sure. Thank you to everyone following along!
 
Day one continued
After lunch at The Hard Rock, we started walking back to the hotel. We got back to the hotel around 1pm and our room still wasn't ready yet. We were so tired and didn't have anywhere to go so we went upstairs to check out the hotels' roof top bar area. They have a rooftop terrace with 360 degree views of the city.
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There were not many people up there so it was nice and relaxing. Finally our room was ready! Sorry I don't have any pictures. But we had gotten upgraded from the standard room to the next one up. It was very nice and modern just like the lobby of the hotel. And as DH said, its very pink, which was exciting because the pink room means we got an upgrade! So first things first, we took a nap! Then showered and got ready for our next adventure.
We are both big fans of Brew Dog, and there's a Brew Dog bar in Barcelona. DH did the research once he found out where our hotel was and turns out it's only a 15 minute walk. It isn't in the heart of the city or anywhere in the touristy area, so if you're looking to go, it isn't really near anything. But that was fine with us as that was something high on our list. We both got Brew Dog beers and burgers for dinner. Be pre-warned as I get too excited when food is placed in front of me and usually take a bite or two!
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The burgers and beers were amazing! Would recommend this place to anyone who is really into craft beers. The Electric India was my favorite. They had a lot of beers to choose from. After dinner we walked out happy selves home. And of course we were tired again! I wanted to try to get a very nice sleep in before the cruise started because I knew I was going to be too excited to sleep most of the time. So I facetimed my mom for a little since I wasn't going to be able to use my phone once we left Spain.
Up next Boarding the Disney Magic!!!
 
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Oh, that burger looks delicious! I love poppy seeds!

And the roof top bar looks like a cool place to hang out, but maybe not so relaxing when you are just waiting for your room to become available.

Can't wait to read what your first impression of the Magic was!
 
Look forward to following along with this, we were on the same cruise (as you may have picked up from another thread we both commented on)! Strange thing is we arrived in Barcelona on the 9th as well and went to the Hard Rock Cafe (we went for dinner though) and also went to Starbucks for PSLs but on embarkation day!

Was thinking about doing a trip report myself (I've not done one before), be interesting to compare notes! Thanks for sharing :goodvibes
 
Look forward to following along with this, we were on the same cruise (as you may have picked up from another thread we both commented on)! Strange thing is we arrived in Barcelona on the 9th as well and went to the Hard Rock Cafe (we went for dinner though) and also went to Starbucks for PSLs but on embarkation day!

Was thinking about doing a trip report myself (I've not done one before), be interesting to compare notes! Thanks for sharing :goodvibes
Haha yes to Starkbucks and The Hard Rock! You should do a trip report! It would be cool to compare. This is my first one.
 
Day 2, It's Disney Day!!!
I woke up around 8 am, DH around 9. We got some really good sleep which is surprising considering how excited we were. The first thing I did was put some clothes on and run up stairs and see if I could see the Magic. I was quite dissapointed that I couldn't, it was just a little farther over past a big hill. But I could see some other ships that were in the port. Turns out, if the Magic was docked one terminal to the right we would have been able to see it. No bother though, because I was about to get on the ship whether I could see it or not! Here's another picture of the view that I took that morning.
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I went downstairs and Lance was awake. We got showered and got ourselves ready. Our port arrival time was 11:30 and we didn't know how long it would take us to get to port. It was quite nice outside and we decided we would be alright if we had to wait outside of the terminal a little. So at 10:50 we checked out of the hotel, 10:55 we were on our way to port in a taxi! Soon after that (our cab ride was only about 10 minutes) I saw the Magic and started to tear up.

When we got to port we were let our right in front of in the terminal. We were able to go right in, they didn't even ask for our port arrival time. We went through security with no problems. Then we went around the corner and in to a large room with a bunch of chairs to sit in. It wasn't nearly as pretty as Port Canaveral. It wasn't yet very busy even though they weren't boarding yet.

We checked in and got boarding #6, we checked in using the Castaway Club line. There were no lines for check in at any part of the terminal when we were checking in. I think it took us 2 minutes and we had our lanyards (my last silver lanyard!) and were all set. Here is the full page Navigator we were given to look through while waiting to board. Oh the excitement!

This was the only full page Navigator we were given the whole cruise. We didn't really find it a problem because we still got times sheets and we used the app the whole time. We really enjoyed the app. And since we use our phones for pictures we had them with us the whole time anyway.
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Guess who was excited!? Us, and everyone else in the port terminal! They started boarding around 11:30 and at 11:50 they called boarding number 6!

This was my first time on the Magic since 2006 and DHs first time ever. We were a little worried after seeing pictures online that the lobby would be small after being on the Dream. Alas it was not. DH did think it was a little small, but still loved it. We thought it was very beautiful. We loved all the colors and the design of the whole lobby. But first things first, we needed some coffee since we didn't even have breakfast yet (we had been too excited to eat)!! We went up to Cove Cafe (my new favorite place) I got a macchiato and DH got a mocha. The waiter asked me if I wanted an American macchiato or a traditional one... I asked for traditional since I think they are the best! They also gave us punch cards for buy 5 coffees or teas get 1 free. Awesome!

Here were some of the snack offerings...we skipped on these because we were about to go get some serious food!
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After we had our caffeine in hand I asked DH where he wanted to eat, I said "do you want to eat at the big buffet or did you want to eat at the smaller one where there will be less people?". He wanted Cabanas since thats what we did last time and he wants that to be a tradition. So off to Cabanas.
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No one was swimming yet. What I noticed on this ship was that to me it didn't seem too much smaller than the Dream. It just seemed more accessible. Like those lovely padded deck chairs that are available in front of Cove Cafe were almost always available. There was always space by the pool. The ship didn't even fill up on the first day until what seemed like the life boat drill. And even then it didn't seem crowded.

We found a spot right away in Cabanas. I went and filled up my plate while DH sat with all of our stuff. Here is my plate.
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I thought everything was amazing! DH got a smaller first plate and I never got to snap a picot of his second plate.
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Do you all see that?! There is fish on that plate! DH eating seafood, you don't see that every day! He wanted to try swordfish, and I'm guessing he liked it because he finished it all. After a very good lunch we wanted to check to the adult area, so thats where we headed.
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We liked the look of Keys and we decided that's where we are going to be spending some of our time later.
Next up: Getting to our room! And the rest of Day 1.
 
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omg. thank you so much, this is exactly what I was looking for. My planned cruise for September 2018 will be my first cruise ever, and I have so much newbie questions. Your trip report so far is perfect for first timers, cant wait for the rest of the days :)
 
omg. thank you so much, this is exactly what I was looking for. My planned cruise for September 2018 will be my first cruise ever, and I have so much newbie questions. Your trip report so far is perfect for first timers, cant wait for the rest of the days :)
I'm really glad you're enjoying it! And very happy that it will be able to help you out! Let me know if you have any questions about anything.
 

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