the Graham Cracker House

We have been counting down to this trip for over 6 months!  It finally came, and is now, sadly, over.  We had an incredible time on our Disney Cruise with the Murray family.  The memories are sure to last a lifetime.   I did a lot of behind the scenes “travel agent” work for all 15 of us, and I admit I  enjoyed it.  Perhaps I’ll have a budding career in tourism, or maybe I’ll just get to plan every family reunion. 

DAY 0:  Fly to Orlando! Arrived in Orlando  in at midnight, pizza delivered to our hotel, adjusted to the time change, and tried to sleep.

DAY 1:  Boarded the Disney Dream!  Our shuttle picked all the family from our various hotels and airports, and we happily bounced along to Port Canaveral.  Disney Cruise Line has it’s own terminal there, they even have couches and show Disney cartoons in the waiting lounge.  Very nice, family oriented.  Once on board we….. I don’t remember exactly but I’m pretty sure we toured the ship.  Oh wait, we ate lunch first.  Yes. Lunch at Cabanas (the everything you can imagine buffet).    It was great!  We all had a pretty hard time finding each other and finding where things were at first.   A comedy/juggling show finished off the evening (though the 8 year old volunteer ran back to the audience after being told they would juggle bowling balls above him while he laid on the floor).  

me and Mums (crush in background)

DAY 2:  Castaway Cay!  This place is incredible!  Sailing Hobiecats and snorkeling were our favorite activities on the island today.  We people watched, fish watched, and character watched; sat in the sun, played in the sand, and swam in the warm , blue Bahimian water.  For lunch we ate delicious fresh fruit and BBQ’d meat on the island.  Our dinner was at Animators Palette.  I don’t know if I can adequately describe how decked out this place is in animation and constantly changing movie screens.  Crush (the REAL turtle) even swam up to us on screen and chatted with our family.   He is so funny!  Bjorn’s favorite meal of wild boar was tonight.

DAY 3:  Nassau will be a nice city… when they finish it.   Welcome to a developing country.  This place was HOT HOT HOT.  And no pools to jump in.  My sister reminded us repeatedly that tourism is one of the main sources of income for this country, so we diligently toured a famous staircase and bought some unique souvenirs- just to help them out J.   Back on deck, Pirate night was a blast!  I never realized how normal it could feel to walk around a cruise ship with a bandana, earring, striped shirt…..and don’t forget the glow stick bracelets!  Everyone else dressed in similar attire to enjoy the Pirate themed fireworks show and then dance party. What fun!  It was great to be with all my siblings (parents retired earlier for the night), we felt like we were at a Stake Dance again.

Bjorn keeping cool in Nassau

DAY 4:  “At sea” AKA “try to find ways to keep yourself cool”.  We didn’t follow this advice in the morning, but rather caused near heat stroke with a family game of basketball and mini golf on deck 12.  But we stayed indoors in the afternoon.  “Golden Mickey’s” show was followed by family karaoke (Disney songs of course…. Did I mention that we became overdosed with Disney songs daily?  That is all that plays on the overhead speaker, constantly.  Good thing I like these songs!).  Dinner at the Enchanted Garden required some dressing up, which we were glad to do.  Sometimes after three days of swim suits, shorts, and saltwatered hair it feels good to don a dress and  a bit of make-up.  Bjorn and I finally made it onto the Aquaduck near midnight.  I give it 3.5 stars.  Exciting, but not worth too long of a wait.

the girls

DAY 5:  Last chance to stowaway at castaway cay.  It didn’t work unfortunately, but we had an outstanding hobie cat experience.  Complete with people falling off the boat and one true capsize.  Water rushing all around us, wind in our face. Jumping from side to side to keep the boat balanced.  We likely got up to 10 knots!  It was epic.  Yoga on the beach was only so-so… the sand is not quite as comfortable as a yoga mat, and the snorkeling was still stupendous.  Bjorn really came to love snorkeling, he had never had an enjoyable experience before.  It was fun for me to watch him get so excited about it.  We bid our waiters farewell this final evening…. It was akin to an EFY group saying good bye to their counselors!   We weren’t that bad, but some tables around us were in the group hugs and picture taking stage. 

DAY 6:  Disembark our beautiful ship, and sadly, slowly (we hired the cheapest shuttle we could find, which apparently meant the one with the most frequent stops), we made  our way to the condo.  It was actually nice to have a relaxing day, I’ll admit.  And a nice, basic meal of spaghetti that lasted less than 2 hours.  We had a competitive game of volleyball (10 people is such a good number to play with) and then did our souvenir shopping at downtown Disney. 

DAY 7:  I can’t completely describe the insanity of this day.  We “did” (meaning, we hit the highlights of)  all 4 Disney World theme parks in one day.  How we accomplished this , I am still not sure.  We did have a magic phone app. that let us know wait times and fast pass times.  We did have a lot of water and were even given ice chips from the Disney food vendors.  We did go on as many water rides as we could find.  We did drive our rental cars between 3 of the parks, and took the monorail once.  We did hit Expedition Everest and the new Star Wars (lots of rebel spies in our family!).   And we did go on at least 10 thrill rides (roller coasters and drop rides) throughout the course of the day.  We ended up with only minimal blisters, and a boat full of memories.

my favorite park this time around

giraffe at Animal Kingdom

more animals at AK