~ºoº November 27, 2010- Western Magic! ºoº~

[thepeacekeeper]

I'm really sorry not to have spent any time with any of you Dis'ers during the cruise, but we all had a great time. The FE exchange was over the top! I was very impressed by the amount of effort put in by everyone; thank you.

If anyone was ever curious and wondered "who is this peacekeeper guy" and happened to attend the show when Jeff Civillico picked 2 guys out of the audience by the name of Ed and Jeff...I was the latter. Darn kids. Ha!

 

[jd99]

I'm really sorry not to have spent any time with any of you Dis'ers during the cruise, but we all had a great time. The FE exchange was over the top! I was very impressed by the amount of effort put in by everyone; thank you.

If anyone was ever curious and wondered "who is this peacekeeper guy" and happened to attend the show when Jeff Civillico picked 2 guys out of the audience by the name of Ed and Jeff...I was the latter. Darn kids. Ha!

Hey - we saw that show! Who knew? It was hilarious though. Sorry we didn't get a chance to meet!

jeff

 

[jd99]

I am having those post-vacation blues right now (which is making me very crabby). Trying to pick up the stuff I unpacked so we can make room for the Christmas Tree we are heading to get this afternoon.

While the weather could have been better, we had a great time (and the weather was definitely great on CC). We rebooked onboard with a dummy date. We will sail sometime late in 2012 or early 2013. With the iffy weather we had this year (and last year), we may try to cruise more in the middle of the year. We shall see. We also booked a room for my parents, but not sure if we can get them to sail with us or not.

Jeff and Mina - I will miss not running into you guys every day! Hope your 9th cruise was just as magical as your first.

Have a wondeful holiday season everyone...I will be checking back in to see if everyone had a great time and made it home safely.

Hey Darcy!
It was great seeing you every day as well. That's one of the things that makes the DISboard meet threads fun..is finding folks with similar interests who you meet and then get to see around the ship!

We also are hesitant to book this date again - both for the weather iffiness (a bit cool for us) and that it is too close to Christmas and rushes everything a bit upon return. We have actually sailed this week 5 straight years but will look to move a bit earlier in the fall. Kids have some school off in early November for inservice that would require just a couple days out of school too so I think by moving ahead just a few weeks, we can solve the issues.

We had a fantastic cruise (as always) and everyone is right - the FE was amazing. So much cool and creative stuff. Highlights for us were Grand Cayman day where we ended up getting day passes/day room at the Westin and spent the day in the pool and ocean and the weather was perfect. We also visited a restaurant we love - EATS - across the street - where we had visited a bunch of times when we were in GC for a week about 7 years ago. Other highlight was Castaway Cay for sure. The weather was wonderful and I got to try out the new waterslide. A bit cool but very fun!

We came back to COLD weather (it's been in the 20s) and were welcomed by an inch or so of snow this morning with a bit more on the way.

Hope you all are having a great post-cruise experience and that the holidays are amazing for all!

jeff

 

[CKCruising]

We were disappointed that we missed the meet. I had to look at everyone I passed on deck 9 and guess what their screen name might be . We ended up getting a bit delayed with a de-icing in Toronto and didn't get onto the ship until nearly 4:00. I guess we missed out on the upgrades.

Like Darcy, we haven't looked through all of the gifts yet, but there was some really creative stuff. Thanks to everyone. I still smell cinnamon everytime I open the bag.

The highlight of our trip was parasailing in Key West. The wind was enough that they would take us all up at the same time. Nachi was nice, but the rain started just before lunch.

We were looking at rebooking the Fantasy in April, but we decided to join the DVC instead. Who knows were cruising will fit into our plans for the future.

 

[jd99]

We were disappointed that we missed the meet. I had to look at everyone I passed on deck 9 and guess what their screen name might be . We ended up getting a bit delayed with a de-icing in Toronto and didn't get onto the ship until nearly 4:00. I guess we missed out on the upgrades.

Like Darcy, we haven't looked through all of the gifts yet, but there was some really creative stuff. Thanks to everyone. I still smell cinnamon everytime I open the bag.

The highlight of our trip was parasailing in Key West. The wind was enough that they would take us all up at the same time. Nachi was nice, but the rain started just before lunch.

We were looking at rebooking the Fantasy in April, but we decided to join the DVC instead. Who knows were cruising will fit into our plans for the future.

We were at Nachi as well! It was a bummer when the rain started..but a bigger one when it didn't stop. We stuck it out for about 2 hours before giving up and heading back to the ship. Always had wanted to go to Nachi and would go back in a minute.

 

[iloverags2]

Hi Everyone!

We arrived home a short while ago (laundry is already started...ACK!), and I am thrilled to see my furbabies. Klondike (our 13 year old "puppy") was taken so well care of during her stay at WDW's Best Friends Resort. They even sent us pics of her having fun every few days while we were cruising. She had a villa, and I believe spent most of her evenings watching TV and she is a bit more tired than usual! Silly girl! Ebony and Luna (our kitties) have been cuddled up to us non-stop since we came in the door.

It was so much fun meeting everyone, and then bumping into several throughout the cruise. Like Darcy, we will miss seeing Jeff, Mina, and the girls every day. While we liked cruising this week for what seemed to be lower than normal crowds onboard, the hectic pace we have returned to is, well...hectic! Weather is just so unpredictable anytime after October until March, so not sure that will factor into our decision. Hmmmmm...what to do!?!

Thank you so much everyone for the wonderful FE gifts! So many talented folks in our group, and we loved every surprise we found by our door!

 

[mousebrat]

Thanks for all the goodies in the FE. It was so much fun to find all the surprises.

It was neat that someone from our group was able to light the tree. I thought that would be a very neat honor. How did you manage that? My son wasn't off the age that could have done that.

I was sad to have not made it to the meet. I got busy unpacking while my Dh took my older DS to the pool which made his day.

I finally got all the stuff put away. I finished my Christmas shopping (except for my dad). I need to order Christmas cards and start blogging my trip.

I noticed that a lot of people had "sea sickness." I'm wondering if a tummy bug appeared on our trip. My DS got sick in Grand Cayman while waiting to get on the submarine ride but was fine that afternoon. I got sick before we got to Castaway Cay. In fact, I was up all night sick. Anybody else have those issues?

 

[RachIzzyBri2]

Just wanted to say a HUGE thank you for all of te little gifts we received on the cruise! Izzy & Brian were so thrilled and looked forward to looking in their "goody pockets' everytime we went back to the room! We had to look through everything when we finished upacking yesterday and "WOW"...THANK YOU ALL!

We had mixed feelings about the cruise. The actual cruise & the crew were top notch! The weather was a little cool for what we like when we go away....mid to high 80's everyday would have been perfect! Both kids were fighting the ends of head colds and were just not themselves totally. Izzy LOVED the Oceaneer Club, but Brian was not having it! The first day they went in and about 45 mins later, we got a page that Brian wanted to be picked up. When we got there he was sobbing and when we asked him what was wrong, he said that he "kept losing Sissy". From that point on he refused to go. Izzy, on the other hand was there as often as she could!

Bri & I did not get anytime to ourselves (we were just hoping for a little), so it was a tad frusterating. We are going to try another cruise in 2012(hopefully on the Fantasy) when they are a bit older and are gonna take our families for added support & fun!

Overall, though, it was a positive experience & we sure learned a ton about cruising. I wish I had met more of you, but I hope that you all had a super fun time!

Rachael

 

[DLW8]

Thanks for all the goodies in the FE. It was so much fun to find all the surprises.

It was neat that someone from our group was able to light the tree. I thought that would be a very neat honor. How did you manage that? My son wasn't off the age that could have done that.

I was sad to have not made it to the meet. I got busy unpacking while my Dh took my older DS to the pool which made his day.

I finally got all the stuff put away. I finished my Christmas shopping (except for my dad). I need to order Christmas cards and start blogging my trip.

I noticed that a lot of people had "sea sickness." I'm wondering if a tummy bug appeared on our trip. My DS got sick in Grand Cayman while waiting to get on the submarine ride but was fine that afternoon. I got sick before we got to Castaway Cay. In fact, I was up all night sick. Anybody else have those issues?

I think there was a bit of both. E After we got on the bus for the dolphin excursion in GC, I found out a kid had just thrown up. Lovely, and now I'm in a bus with him for 30 minutes. The people I was sitting next to said their DD had gotten some stomach bug late on Saturday and they were quarantined to their room for all of Sunday while in Key West, and they had heard of others that were ill as well.

Hoping we don't get any after affects of that now that we are home!

My DH's seasickness was definitely just that. We sat down at Lumiere's for breakfast and he said looking out to see the horizon moving up and down made him feel even worse, but after the dramamine he was better (although a little tired).

I am not sure on when we will sail again either, due to the weather issues. I know my kids would love to be able to go to the Edge and/or "out and about", and I will probably plan our trip around those ages for them. Edge is 11 - 13, so that would be 2013 for us. Out and About says 10 - 13, so that could be late 2012. I'd love to do fall again, but definitely earlier for the same reasons that Jeff stated. By that school year, they will be in 6th grade, so also would love to time it with some days off from the scholl so they aren't out a full week.

They are getting ready for school right now....hoping they don't have much more work to bring home today. They got thorough all the work they brought home before we left, so that will help.

Have a wonderful holiday everyone...now that we are all scrambling to finish the shopping and decorating and planning.

 

[BealsRwe]

My DD definitely endured sea sickness this time. After the seas Wed night, and on Thursday she had the tummy thing. After a few hours and Dramamine, she was running around the room. I use the sea sick patch, scapalomine. It definitely took the edge off for me. I don't get motion sick on land, but do feel ship movement, and there was a lot of that with that system that came through Cozumel.

We have cruised this week, as well as the first 2 weeks in December. This was the chilliest we have seen in December. It won't stop us from another Dec cruise...we love to walk the ship and Castaway Cay to see and enjoy all of the Christmas decorations. We did book onboard for our first ever Halloween cruise...Dream 10/30/11!

I want to know who sent the cold weather to Florida after our cruise...38 at the bus stop this morning. We are supposed to drop to 29 overnight. I'm from WI, but have lived in FL for 14.5 years. We don't have clothes for chilly temps, and our homes are built for hot rather than cold temps. I wish I was back on the ship today in the Caribbean! Instead I have to stop at wardrobe on my way to Expedition Everest today to get some long pants!

We are busy cleaning the house today, and hopefully getting more Christmas decorations out. The trees went up before our cruise. We got our Christmas cards done on the ship for our 3rd year in a row-so easy this way! Lots of family flying in tomorrow for Dad's memorial service on Wednesday. Busy week for us.

 

[thepeacekeeper]

After a tricky connection and lengthy holdover, (they held a plane for us), we arrived home to our lane plowed in. Fortunately it was a fairly dry snow so I was able to get the van through it and we made it to the house. Guess what the boys and I did for a couple hours on Sunday? It's pretty cold too, upper teens during the day and single digits at night. How can the Caribbean be so close yet so far?

I hate to say it but this was probably the last cruise with the "kids" cuz they're getting old enough to not want to go with us anymore. May even be the last family trip with them. It's sad for us since the boys have always gone with us on vacation; we've never gone without them. Maybe I'll be able to talk them into one last trip to WDW!

 

[mcubit]

Jeff - you were great with your part of the opening night show. My youngest insisted that we get the front row for Jeff C's family show, and yes I was the luckily one who went up on stage. I am Matt from Iowa...

It was a fun experience, but i will never sit up close again.

 

[DLW8]

Thanks for all the goodies in the FE. It was so much fun to find all the surprises.

It was neat that someone from our group was able to light the tree. I thought that would be a very neat honor. How did you manage that? My son wasn't off the age that could have done that.

We walked down the stairs towards the atrium (there were already quite a few people there) and 2 CMs came right towards us and asked DS if he would be the Prince of the High Seas and do the tree lighting. I was happy (and a tiny bit surprised) that he said yes. He is often shy, but he seemed to enjoy it. They said they were looking for a boy that is between 7 - 9 to do the tree lighting. He fit right in there at 8 (9 in a few weeks).

 

[heatherlynn444]

hello! it was so nice to meet some of you! Sorry we didnt get to see everyone, just too many of us!
We too got seasick the night of cozumel. i made the mistake of having alcohol at dinner that night and got so sick. We lounged around the room all the next day and I had sea bands and dramamine and that did the trick and I was ok after that day.

for a southerner, Serenity bay on CC was WAY too cold and windy. I was pretty unhappy with that. the rest of the island didn't seem as cold or windy as serenity. oh well.

Doubt we will cruise this time of yea again, too chilly for us. We are going on the 5 night double dip at the end of may with my parents, looking forward to it!

 

[Va-NanaTink]

Happy we met all of you! We had a fantastic time and so enjoyed the FE!! We were amazed at all of the things you all did! For our first time, maybe we didn't do it right, but next time we will label things! We had a great time on the cruise, and got lots of relaxation and rest.

Now we are here in the frozen......FLORIDA....with our family for a week, then back home and back to work for us!

Thanks for making the trip even more amazing than we expected!
Our next cruise(s) is a back-to-back on the Dream in June 2011 and a dummy cruise booked for March 2012~wanting something in October maybe on the Fantasy.

 

[ukintheus]

Glad to hear that people are making it home safe and sound. The FE gifts were overwhelming!!! For a "non-crafty" bunch, ya'll sure made some VERY nice stuff!! I have shipped them all home and will go through everything more carefully when it arrives back.

The weather could have been better, but we had a wonderful first cruise! Thankfully we picked Cayman to do our snorkeling, and we did the Mexican Cuisine in Cozumel, so it didn't matter that it was raining...plus after the free margaritas I probably would never have noticed anyway!

It was nice to see familiar faces - we ran into Cindy every now and then, and Stephanie was on our Cozumel excursion. Laura was camped out at Serenity bay but it was pretty windy on that end of the island. We toughed it out there but could see on the way back that the family beaches were probably getting the better of the weather.

We booked a 5 night Bahamas on the Dream with 2 stops at Castaway Cay leaving on July 5th. I decided that my DH had WAY too much fun on his birthday on the ship, and I want a birthday sailing myself!

Biggest pixie dust for us was during our stay at the Boardwalk before we left -Disney magically upgraded us to the Steeplechase Suite...it was unbelievable.

All in all a magical trip and despite the rough seas we had a wonderful time - can't wait to do it again!!

 

[BealsRwe]

Sounds like there was some great magic for us DISers on this cruise. We were selected by guest services as the family of the cruise. We had everything from petit fors delivered, fresh cookies, an arcade card, DD got a plush Mickey Mouse, the Castaway Cay getaway Package comped (we used the bike rental, and DD used a float), we had our own hostess who sent us noted each day and even came to dinner the first night to introduce herself to us. Between this and all of the pixie dust we received...DD (and us too) had such a magical cruise! Thank you!

 

[jaurban]

We had a great time, despite some seasickness issues Wednesday and Thursday morning for me (Mom). Loved all the FE goodies, although my DD confiscated most of them. Arrived home to snow and 10 degree temps. Yikes. Makes all the weather on the trip look pretty good. Still unpacking too, this will take a while as we have activities each night this week. Great to meet everyone, and we will be cruising again, but probably during school breaks now. Not sure how much longer I can take DD out.

 

[lisamarch]

We made it back. Going back to work tomorrow and not at all excited about that, but hey, it pays the bills and it will pay for our next cruise. We booked onboard for the Fantasy in August 2012, but would prefer later in the fall so we may change it later.

It was great meeting so many of you. Stephanie and Dave, we enjoyed running into you to talk several times! Thanks to all who participated in the FE. Fun stuff!!

Lisa

 

[aseyrick]

Just want to say a huge THANK YOU for all the amazing FE gifts!! I'm so glad Darcy talked me into it. There are some mega creative folks on our list and it was just so cool to see what surprises were in store for us each time we went back to our stateroom. Thank you thank you!!

I'm sorry we weren't able to meet everyone, but we certainly enjoyed meeting the ones we did. Most of the time it was ... "where are you from ... oh! Are you so and so from the FE list?!!" Loved it. Felt like bumping into old and new friends everywhere.

While we had to pay for it, we felt like we got some pixie dust by being able to upgrade at the terminal. It was sooooo well worth it!! We're forever spoiled by the service received.

Some of you may remember how nervous I was about ... well, everything. I'm so glad to report that everything was just absolutely "magical" for us. The suite was HUGE and beautifully appointed, the service was out of this world, the facilities were wonderfully kept and clean; and we couldn't drag Baron out of the club, which was our biggest concern. And, if they'd build a condo right at CC, I think we'd sell everything and move in. What an incredible place ... not to mention the weather!!

While we did get hit with some rough seas (esp. since we're the 2nd to the last room on 8th floor from the stern), had cooler weather than hoped and Baron and I were still sick from our yucky colds, we still had a fantastic time and booked a future dummy date cruise. Most likely, we'll hit a
CC double dip in 2011 as Baron is still too young to get off on most ports outside of CC, where we literally had to drag him back to the ship kicking and screaming.

Thanks again to all of you for making our 1st DCL experience so exciting and memorable. Hope to see many of you on our future cruise!!

Many hugs,

The Eyricks