Why Disney Destiny, Why This Route

Intro 0:03

Please stand clear of the doors. por favor manténgase alejado de las puertas

Alicea 0:24

Hello everyone, I'm Alicea

Nathan 0:26

And I'm Nathan.

Alicea 0:27

Welcome to episode 239 of Adventures and Mouse Capades. This week we are talking about our destiny. Disney related, of course. Our cruise destiny.

Nathan 0:37

Yes.

Alicea 0:38

Our destiny cruise.

Nathan 0:39

Our cruise on the Disney Destiny.

Alicea 0:41

Yes, that's what we're talking about.

Nathan 0:43

That is what we're talking about. So if you've been following along, we had a pretty mega two-week trip down to Florida from where we live here outside Seattle. We had a stay and a day at Epic Universe. We had all sorts of fun at the Disney parks, both before and after the cruise. And we were on the Disney Destiny for its very first seven-night Eastern Caribbean cruise.

Alicea 1:11

Yeah. Destiny usually does four and five night sailings. And it seems like once a quarter they are doing a seven-night eastern and a seven-night western Caribbean. And we got to be on one of the first ones.

Nathan 1:24

Yes. It was fantastic. They had the Western the week before us. And then we were the first Eastern. And one of the really cool things about this is this is the first time in a very long time that a Disney cruise line ship has called on St. Martin.

Alicea 1:40

Yeah.

Nathan 1:41

Which actually used to be on the regular rotation for the Eastern Caribbean itineraries. And that changed several years ago. I think, unfortunately, it was after a major hurricane went through.

Alicea 1:53

Yeah.

Nathan 1:54

And uh things had to change. That's not to say we don't love where Disney goes now on the Eastern Caribbean, because that is our most frequently uh done itinerary as the Seven Night Eastern. Uh, but it was good to uh to get back to where uh we've been a long, long ago on our very second Disney cruise back in 2010.

Alicea 2:16

Yeah. This cruise hit Lookout, which is on the island of Eleuthera in Bahamas. It's Disney's other private area Lookout Key at Lighthouse Point. This also hit St. Martin and San Juan, Puerto Rico.

Nathan 2:31

Yeah. And we got to do stuff, new stuff at all those places. The kids had never been to Lookout. And then uh we had to have the other ones either. Yeah, they hadn't done any of the other ones. And we got to do some stuff in San Juan that we'd never done before because when we were there, the government was closed, and so all the national parks were likewise shuttered, and we weren't able to visit the castle. So we did that. So without further ado, Alicea, let's dive

Embarkation Day Wins And Mistakes

Nathan 2:59

into it.

Alicea 2:59

All right. Our embarkation was on Saturday, the 27th of June. We had to get down to Fort Lauderdale from Orlando.

Nathan 3:07

Indeed.

Alicea 3:08

So we drove down the um Friday. We had breakfast at Topolino's and then drove down to Fort Lauderdale and stayed at a hotel called Pier 66 per recommendation from one of the friends of the show, somebody we've had on before, too.

Nathan 3:22

Yes. Thank you, Wes.

Alicea 3:23

Thank you, Wes. Yeah.

Nathan 3:24

From version 5571. This is very nice hotel. Very swanky.

Alicea 3:29

Yeah, yeah. It was a great location, good food, good room. We enjoyed it.

Nathan 3:35

The one note if you are considering places to stay in Fort Lauderdale, and this is definitely one of them. It's very near the port. Uh, their pools do close at 5 p.m. Well, I think the pool was still open, but like all of their outside bar service and all the rest of that stuff closes up at 5 p.m. Uh, and we didn't get there until like 4:30 or 5. So um we missed out on all that. Wes went on and on when he was on our show uh last year about how amazing it was for their family uh at that day. It's almost like a little water park, is uh what he was describing.

Alicea 4:12

It's great. Just what they have there is is really nice. We just weren't able to take part in it because of when we arrived.

Nathan 4:18

Yeah, so just note for next time if you happen to be there.

Alicea 4:21

We had breakfast that morning, um, or sorry, on embarkation day at Pier 66. I would not do that again because we missed out on the embarkation lunch because we were too full.

Nathan 4:33

That's true.

Alicea 4:34

Yep.

Nathan 4:35

That's true. Decisions were made.

Alicea 4:37

Decisions were made. Breakfast was very good. Breakfast was fantastic, but we didn't get our embarkation lunch because we were too full. Wow. Now we drove to the port and it took us a very long time to get to the port. Uh Capella University had their graduation at the same time next to the port with three or four ships in the port, and they're using the port garage as parking for the university as well.

Nathan 5:04

It was a nightmare. It was it's literally like over a bridge and like two blocks or three blocks to get from the hotel to the port, and it took us, I don't know, a half hour, 40 minutes. Yeah, like it was it was kind of insane.

Alicea 5:21

It was a long time. I do like the Fort Lauderdale port. Um it has its own little Disney touch to it. They have their own little area and it the decor is nice. There's a good waiting area. We didn't have to wait at all though, because we were we were past our regular time to get on and just went right on the ship.

Nathan 5:39

It was very nice though to be platinum.

Alicea 5:41

Yep.

Nathan 5:42

Uh there was quite a line to check in. This is true, yeah. Uh, and we bypassed the whole thing. Yes. So yay for spending a lot of money with Disney and history.

Alicea 5:53

Yep. Uh, we got on the ship, they said our name, welcome to the Novak family. We got applause, and Spider-Man was greeting people up there at the top of the Grand Hall area. It was it was pretty cool.

Nathan 6:06

Kaitlyn was uh enamored.

Alicea 6:08

Yes. Uh this grand hall, it's gorgeous.

Nathan 6:12

It is gorgeous.

Alicea 6:13

I it's so hard to tell from the pictures, and I knew it was gonna be like that too, because it looks very minimalistic, stark, and plain from pictures. You just cannot get the grandeur of it unless you're there in person. I still prefer the treasure.

Nathan 6:28

Yep,

Alicea 6:28

but this was a nice happy surprise.

Nathan 6:31

Yes. We will do comparisons at the end.

Alicea 6:34

Okay.

Nathan 6:34

I mean, this is a new ship on the Disney fleet for us. We've got a rack and stack.

Alicea 6:39

Yep. You and Kaitlyn went to the sanctum, and I must have gone somewhere with Sterling.

Nathan 6:44

We did divide and conquer. I don't remember what was going on. I think you guys were gonna go check out Edge and Vibe or something like that. I don't know.

Alicea 6:54

I don't know.

Nathan 6:54

It was a while back. We got we kind of really instantly went into cruise mode.

Alicea 6:59

Yeah,

Nathan 6:59

and like plans and forethought and all the rest of that stuff just went out the window. Yeah, and we just kind of went with the flow.

Alicea 7:08

We just enjoyed.

Nathan 7:09

It's what I love the most about cruising. Like Disney parks are great, they're a lot of fun, but your brain must stay engaged to maneuver through lightning lanes and where do you want to go? And which side of the park do you have to be on, and blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. You get on a Disney cruise ship and just like your brain can check out and really honestly have a vacation.

Alicea 7:33

Yeah. I think it must have been vibe, like going to set sterling up at vibe or something like that.

Nathan 7:39

Okay.

Alicea 7:39

Yeah. Um, so you and Kaitlyn went over to Sanctum and got some drinks.

Nathan 7:45

Yes.

Alicea 7:46

And then booked a rum tasting.

Nathan 7:48

We did book a rum tasting, which was very odd. So we had uh something that we haven't done before. We actually did two staterooms on the this Disney cruise. We had an inside stateroom and then we had a veranda room right across the hall. And our reservations were completely and fully linked.

Alicea 8:09

Yeah.

Nathan 8:10

However, when I was perusing the app sitting there in the sanctum, I noticed there was a rum tasting, and I went to book it because it was uh had some availability. Alicea was completely not tied in at all. Uh, it was Alicea and Sterling technically in the veranda room, and it was Kaitlyn and I in that inside stateroom, uh, at least on the books, and I was able to book for Kaitlyn and myself, but Alicea was nowhere to be found in the app for me to book. And that was unfortunate. And I had I had tried texting her to say, hey, see if you can go book this, but you missed that message. And uh so Kaitlyn and I went off to do a room tasting uh a couple nights later and just by ourselves. Sorry, we tried. I love you.

Alicea 8:57

I love you too. The the reason we did Kaitlyn and Nathan in a room and Sterling and myself in a room was because Nathan and I are both platinum, but the kids are not.

Nathan 9:06

Correct.

Alicea 9:07

And when we were setting this up, we wanted to be able to uh book everybody in the party into certain excursions and tastings and stuff like that.

Nathan 9:15

Well, and we also wanted to make sure that we got the two rooms that we got. Yes. That we had an inside state room that was kind of not next door, but right across the hall from yeah.

Alicea 9:26

And that was the way that we could do it was by putting a platinum person in each room.

Nathan 9:30

Now, that was actually very interesting. Um, something I think we should talk about is you know, how do you handle that logistically? Yes. Uh, because obviously uh I was gonna sleep in the veranda room with Alicea and Sterling and Kaitlyn were gonna share the inside stateroom. And so we went to guest services and we basically like Sterling and I just got extra key cards. Yep. Um they didn't have anything printed on them. They just wrote like uh the last two numbers of the room. And then pro tip, have them put a piece of tape over that, otherwise the uh the Sharpie will wear off. Yeah. Uh, but it's just a blank card, it doesn't have your name on it. I didn't even try using it to purchase anything. It may have worked, it may not, but it was basically just a key card for when I got to the room or when Sterling got to the room to use that extra card.

Alicea 10:22

It was just a door card, it didn't have any charging privileges or anything on it.

Nathan 10:26

Got it, got it. So the reason to do that is DCL systems have a tendency, from what we've heard, to dump any reservations that you have booked if you change rooms. Yeah. And there was no way we were going to risk that. So carrying an extra card just for safety of making sure that we kept all those reservations sounds good to me. Yes, worked out fine. Yes.

Alicea 10:52

Maybe that's what I was doing. Maybe I was fixing that.

Nathan 10:55

Oh, yeah, that is what you were you went off to do. I think Sterling went off to go check out uh uh uh Vibe, and then I you went to get in line for guest services so we could do the cards.

Alicea 11:05

That's what we did.

Nathan 11:06

Okay, divide and conquer.

Alicea 11:08

Yes.

Meetups, Muster, Sail Away, Palo

Alicea 11:09

After uh talking about guest services, it was kind of time for us to do a meet and greet with people. Yeah. And uh we put together something called Sips on the Ships on this cruise, which was basically a pub crawl.

Nathan 11:22

Yeah. On brand.

Alicea 11:24

On brand, yep. Um, this was for the first sea day, and we had booklets printed out and a little silicon bracelets for folks to wear. So we had a nice little meet and greet for people at around three o'clock, I believe it was, in the grand hall and gave out a lot of stuff.

Nathan 11:42

Yes. Uh, we had like a hundred bracelets that we went through and like 80 passport books.

Alicea 11:48

Yep, 80 passport books.

Nathan 11:50

So, and we didn't bring very many of those home. So this one was a little less organized uh than the one we did on the treasure last year.

Alicea 12:01

Which there's less scheduled.

Nathan 12:03

Less scheduled, yes. Sorry, not less organized, less scheduled, which quite frankly I kind of liked.

Alicea 12:08

Yeah.

Nathan 12:08

Uh, of not having that all that overhead to worry about during our vacation. We didn't see nearly as many people on the uh kind of the pub crawl day on that first sea Day, just because it was a little bit less scheduled and and uh structured, but we had a WhatsApp group going and everybody was uh enjoyed having uh something to do, a checked uh a box to check off across the ship.

Alicea 12:34

And people were were chatting during the day on the on that what WhatsApp group too, um based on like drinks that they were getting and everything too so it was. That was a lot of fun. Yeah. Our um muster drill, in-person muster drill still uh was a little earlier, it was at 3:30 and it was at saga, although they sat us in Tritons.

Nathan 12:54

Yes, that was odd.

Alicea 12:56

But it was still inside, so yay.

Nathan 12:58

And we had a seat.

Alicea 13:00

And we had a seat, yes. And the nice thing is uh Nathan was walking with his cane and they sat us in a specific spot and basically let us go a little bit earlier so we were able to hit the elevators before other folks.

Nathan 13:14

The rush before the rush.

Alicea 13:16

Very nice, very nice of that. Yes. Kaitlyn wanted to do the sail away party, so her and I went up to the deck to do that and had a lot of fun. That was I'm really glad that we did that. I haven't seen, let's see, I don't think we saw the one on the treasure. Oh no, I did. I did see the one on the treasure because it had um Sage and Coriander in that.

Nathan 13:38

Yes.

Alicea 13:38

This is kind of cool because you get the story, the ship storytellers are involved in the sail away party. So Zaya and Gamble would have been at this one, but we were missing Zaya for our cruise.

Nathan 13:50

Yeah, that was odd. It was very interesting.

Alicea 13:53

Yeah, so Gamble started it off, did an amazing job.

Nathan 13:57

Yeah, and he rode solo on most of the events. Although there was a couple friends who joined Gamble for some of the events where you have to have more than one person, yeah. And those folks, they weren't Zaya, they had uh their own

Alicea 14:16

Venturo and Ventura,

Nathan 14:18

yes, depending on who they could get. Yes, uh and I think all of them were fantastic. Yes, all the the entertainment crew, the entertainment cast that they have on these ships is absolutely fantastic.

Alicea 14:34

So good.

Nathan 14:35

I love that, especially the more interactive stuff that you have on the wish class, especially the treasure, and especially the destiny here with Zaya and Gamble, uh, although no Zaya. I I just I I love it. I absolutely love it. Sage and Coriander on the treasure are the other ones. They just add so much.

Alicea 14:56

They really do. They really do. They do such a great job.

Nathan 14:59

Yeah.

Alicea 14:59

So after the sail away party, we had a little bit of time to unpack, but we had a 645 prima note at Palo that we needed to get to. Yeah. Uh Kaitlyn, Nathan, and myself. I love prima note. Yes. This is first night at Palo, which is an age-restricted restaurant.

Nathan 15:21

Oh, that's a that's a fancy way to put that.

Alicea 15:24

Rather than adult restaurant,

Nathan 15:25

right? It's 18 up.

Alicea 15:29

Yes, age restricted.

Nathan 15:30

Age restricted.

Alicea 15:32

And we do the 645 because we usually do later dinner.

Nathan 15:36

Yeah.

Alicea 15:36

The late dinner seating. And this way we can do Palo, the prima note, and then still go to the later dinner seating with Sterling. And we get to meet like if we have any table mates or anything like that, get to do that too.

Nathan 15:50

And this was actually really nice. Like it prima note, it's appetizers, but they're just small bites.

Alicea 15:57

Very, very, very small plates.

Nathan 15:59

Yeah, one or two bites per plate. There's, I think, four plates you get. We had pours from from five drinks. It's a fantastic way to start off your cruise.

Alicea 16:08

And it was a four-top table, and there were three of us there. So we had an additional person at our table. And um, her name was Monique. She's from Southern California. And we actually um she asked if she could be added to our dinner table. And we're like, yes, bring it on.

Nathan 16:26

Yeah.

Alicea 16:26

So um, yeah, she switched her dining reservation to our table, which was amazing. It was so nice to talk with her and her daughter. Yeah. But for that night, we we just had ourselves at our regular dinner table. We were actually seated next to Hyperion Adventures. Yes. Uh, another podcast that we followed. It was kind of cool to be sitting.

Nathan 16:46

Hello to Tom and Michelle.

Alicea 16:47

Hello, Tom and Michelle. Yes.

Nathan 16:48

The Kraus family was actually on board as well.

Alicea 16:51

Yeah, from Krause Mouse Adventures.

Nathan 16:53

Yeah, they were running the uh cruise group on Facebook.

Alicea 16:57

And they are a um they're a YouTube channel, so they do vlogging so much more than we could ever do.

Nathan 17:03

I know.

Alicea 17:05

At Marvel restaurant that night, let's see, this was Kaitlyn's first time on a wish class ship, so she hadn't done that before. She enjoyed the I thought she enjoyed the meal there.

Nathan 17:16

Yeah, it was too bad.

Alicea 17:17

That's right. This was night two menu on night one. I remember that. That was so odd that they did that. I think they did that at Pride Lands too.

Nathan 17:26

Yes, they did.

Alicea 17:27

Yeah, okay.

Nathan 17:28

I wanna, since we're talking about dining here up front, I want to give a huge, huge shout out to our serving crew uh for uh Anju uh from St. Lucia. Uh, we had Yasmin from Brazil, and especially Elizabeth from Mexico. Like Anju is just a ball of love and care and energy. And I got the biggest, bestest hugs ever every time we had an interaction. Uh, it really felt like family. Elizabeth was fantastic as well.

Alicea 18:04

She's our head server.

Nathan 18:05

And of course, Yasmin was great too. Uh, we just we had a fantastic dining crew, and it was really a pleasure to get to know them and and be part of their little family throughout the cruise. Yeah.

Alicea 18:15

That night, the lobby show, the opening show, I guess in the lobby was at 10 o'clock and it was the legend of Loki. I basically found where the sound booth was and plopped myself right next to there because that's where the best sound is.

Nathan 18:29

Yes, it's on deck four.

Alicea 18:30

Yes. This was a great show, and only Gamble was was telling the story on this one as well. So I think this is when we kind of realized wait a minute, where's Zaya?

Nathan 18:40

Something is amiss.

Alicea 18:41

Something is amiss. I think she was just not feeling well for this cruise, is what the issue was.

Nathan 18:46

Got it.

Alicea 18:47

Um, I think I overheard Gamble talking to somebody who had basically asked him, where's Zaya? And it sounded like maybe she wasn't feeling well. So got it.

Nathan 18:54

Um at least at least that's the the cover sort of thing we're going with.

Alicea 18:58

Yeah, yeah. Uh so Loki kind of took over the grand hall there for a little bit, you know, everybody's favorite god of mischief.

Nathan 19:05

Yes. Of course, Alicea, don't cut yourself short. You're a goddess of mischief too. You've got the t-shirt.

Alicea 19:12

I yep, I am. I do. Let's see. Match your mate was that night as well. Always a must see if you can swing it. This is a hilarious show.

Nathan 19:25

Yeah, it's very fun. Very fun.

Alicea 19:27

18 and up.

Nathan 19:28

Age restricted is the new phrase that we're going to do. Yes.

Alicea 19:31

Yes, yes, yes.

Lookout Key Beach Day Strategy

Alicea 19:32

Uh the next day was lookout key.

Nathan 19:35

Yeah.

Alicea 19:36

We uh we slept in a little bit till nine o'clock or so, which is basically when we were cleared to get to the island. Um, we had breakfast that morning in 1923. We do like to do the sit-down breakfasts if we can, rather than brave the chaos of Marceline Market.

Nathan 19:52

Right.

Alicea 19:52

Um, which you can do. We just like to sit down.

Nathan 19:56

And we also don't typically rope drop, uh, castaway or lookout. Uh we are more than happy to let the crowds flow through and flush out, and we will follow on in their footsteps. Uh I I have a family of redhead delicate flowers, and so the rush to get into the sunshine is a little limited.

Alicea 20:18

Um, one of the things that Disney did offer was a cart for those with limited mobility to get onto the island. You just had to go into saga by a certain time to reserve um a spot. And you could you could go afterwards as well. You didn't have to reserve a spot, but then there may have been a longer wait.

Nathan 20:40

Right. It was about a 10-minute wait. We showed up about 10:35. We got uh towards the end of the pier at about 11. Um, we took the uh the tram over to the other side. We were in the water by 11:20 a.m. and it was glorious. That water is so great. The sand is amazing.

Alicea 21:01

Sand is great, the water is great. We had a good time just hanging out in the water for a while. Then we went to a bar over there to hydrate for a while. Shout out to our bartender over there was Carissa. Um, she was also at Cafe Megara on the ship.

Nathan 21:19

Yeah.

Alicea 21:19

Um, and Nathan, you wanted to get a tropical fashion, but it wasn't on the menu.

Nathan 21:23

It wasn't on the menu anymore. It was on the menu back in November. Uh, and so I I asked her about she's like, oh yeah, I can make one of those.

Alicea 21:32

Which is basically an old-fashioned slushie.

Nathan 21:34

It is, and it's so good.

Alicea 21:37

Now, was that just at the Serenity Bay area, maybe?

Nathan 21:42

I remember getting some at the other bar, the regular bar, too. So I don't think it was Serenity Bay. There was definitely new menus on the island. So, you know, she she made uh pulled one out.

Alicea 21:56

Yep. And of course, as you do, we got. Green tea shots because we had to.

Nathan 22:02

Thank you, Kaitlyn.

Alicea 22:03

Yep. And a couple other libations as well. And uh a little bit later we met up with Monique and her daughter Eliza. They were over in that area too. We just kind of hung out with them for a bit.

Nathan 22:14

We ran into them left, right, and center on this cruise. It was pretty great. It was great.

Alicea 22:18

All in all, it was a good day at Lookout. I enjoyed it and enjoyed introducing the kids to that new area for Disney too.

Nathan 22:26

Yeah. I know Kaitlyn loved it. Do you remember what Sterling thought of Lookout?

Alicea 22:32

Um, well, they were okay with it, but they also weren't hanging out with anybody. So they left a little early, went back to the ship, and we weren't we weren't sure if one of us needed to be there to get them back on the ship right now.

Nathan 22:47

Yeah.

Alicea 22:47

I'm like, well, you can just try it, and if it doesn't work, send us a text.

Nathan 22:52

Yeah. And we never heard from them again.

Alicea 22:56

Alicea 22:56

No, we did. We did. He's he said that he got on the ship. So it's like, yay, okay. Yeah, I think he liked it. He liked the water and he liked the sand, but we're boring.

Nathan 23:07

Yes.

Alicea 23:08

We just drink and talk.

Nathan 23:12

Yep, that's adulting.

Alicea 23:14

Yep. Eventually we made our way back to the ship.

Nathan 23:20

And then that evening, you and Sterling went to the Broadway Stars series, right?

Alicea 23:24

Yes. We had a couple of Broadway stars on the ship. Um, this is a series that Disney does from time to time. Not all the sailings have this, some of them do, and they they announce them ahead of time. And for our sailing, we happened to have Zach Bencal and Michael Maliakel. I probably butchered their names. I do apologize, gentlemen. Um, both of these guys were in Disney's Aladdin on Broadway. Um, Michael was Aladdin, and Zach originated the role of Babkak on the national tour. Uh, there is no uh boo, no monkey in the Broadway show.

Nathan 24:02

Correct.

Alicea 24:02

Instead, there is Omar, Kasim, and Babkak, a trio of friends who are the comedic relief. So Zach and Michael did a bunch of songs, they were all Disney songs, and it was in the Walt Disney theater. It was really cool. They did some songs together and then some songs by themselves. And between the two of them, when they were doing the Broadway show Aladdin, they did something around 3,500 shows between the two of them. It's just crazy. Wow. This was really cool to see and and to hear just the different vocal types and and doing the different songs. Like Zach at one point did Poor Unfortunate Souls, which is really cool. And on the last song, they did Friend Like Me from Aladdin, and it was a duo. They're both they were both singing. Michael came out into the crowd and basically grabbed Sterling's hand and twirled him around. It was really cool. It was a lot of fun. And Sterling got such a kick out of that.

Nathan 25:04

Well, and then Sterling, uh, was it last two years ago now? As part of his musical theater competition stuff, was actually uh one of the the friends there in that trio with a couple of other guys from the studio, and uh they had so much fun.

Alicea 25:22

Yeah, they did the song doing that song for the song High Adventure, which is hilarious.

Nathan 25:27

Yes, very fun. Absolutely leaned into it. Those the those three did fantastic.

Alicea 25:33

Yeah. So we saw the Broadway Stars, that was cool. There was something else happening that night that we wanted to make sure that we saw. And that was something called With Great Power. This is basically the Marvel show that is done by the storytellers Zaya and Gamble. So if you see that on the on your navigator, go to it. Yes.

Nathan 25:58

Uh no, you'll want to go to the show that's actually a half hour before that on the Destiny that's called Elixir Hall, uh, which is just kind of a warm-up act of some vocals and things like that, a chance to get a get your seats and and get a drink kind of thing, uh, before with great power. And it was so much fun.

Alicea 26:22

It was very fun. So this is a two-person storyteller show, like mandatory to have two people. Yeah, we did not have Zaya, but we had Venturo come and help out for this. And this duo of Gamble and Venturo were so funny. Yes, they were hilarious. I would like to go again sometime to see if we could see Zaya and Gamble and see if it's any different, though.

Nathan 26:44

Well, and this is one of the things, like there's just there's so many things to do on the Destiny, and even though we had seven nights on We didn't hit all of it, we didn't hit it all. We definitely didn't, yeah. We're just gonna have to go again.

Alicea 26:58

Yep. We had dinner at Pride Lands that night, and it was menu two, and the not the main show, but they had some music going on, just like some drums.

Nathan 27:09

Yeah, yes, it was some themed African music, uh uh just background music, but there was no uh uh it wasn't the Lion King story. So yeah, but really good food.

Alicea 27:21

Yeah, it was really good food. I think you and Kaitlyn had the rum tasting that night.

Nathan 27:28

Yes, we did.

Alicea 27:29

And uh just talking with her, she prefers her rum in mixed drinks, not by itself.

Nathan 27:35

That's totally fair.

Alicea 27:36

Yep.

Nathan 27:37

But this is how you learn.

Alicea 27:39

Yes, this is how you learn. I mean, I'm kind of the same way too, uh, just because I think it tastes better. I'm okay drinking rum by itself, but I would rather have it mixed with other stuff.

Nathan 27:48

Yeah, yeah, that's fair. Let's

Sea Day Pub Crawl And Spa Time

Nathan 27:51

see. The next day was our day at sea. Yes. Um, again, we slept in, we had breakfast at 1923. You'll sense a pattern there. Uh, we started off doing sips on the ships. Uh, we went all around the ship, uh, mostly got everything on that day. Uh, it was very interesting on our way back to Cove Cafe to uh sample the uh the the morning drinks available there. Caitlin actually got carded and not at Cove Cafe, she got carded on the way to Cove Cafe to make sure she was 18, uh, going back to the adults area. So that was kind of interesting to see. Like he actually wanted to see her state her card. Yeah, she does look young, which is fine, but my history on the cruise has been with with Disney, not this cruise, but in general, they will just ask, or especially like if clearly your parents with them, like we would just say something. But he wanted to see state room card or ID.

Alicea 28:55

Yep. I will note this may be because of some of the other chatter that we heard on our WhatsApp group regarding other teenagers on the cruise.

Nathan 29:05

Ah, good point. That's a good point. Yep. There were some shenanigans going on.

Alicea 29:11

Yes, not good ones.

Nathan 29:13

No, not good ones, not good ones. Are shenanigans ever good?

Alicea 29:16

Oh, they can be. Can be. Never mind. I will uh move on. Yeah. So this was our sips on the ship's day, our pub crawl day, and we had a lot of fun.

Nathan 29:26

I found a new beer that I really like.

Alicea 29:28

Yeah.

Nathan 29:29

This is the Kentucky Bourbon Barrel Ale. It is uh a bourbon-aged beer. Uh it's oh my gosh, it's fantastic. And Alicea liked it too.

Alicea 29:42

I did. I did. I don't I don't know if I could ever do a full glass of beer, though. I I I don't mind sipping here and there, but I don't know if I could ever do a full glass.

Nathan 29:53

So you're saying you'd need my assistance.

Alicea 29:56

Yeah, I mean that wouldn't be too difficult.

Nathan 29:57

Yeah. Okay, that's fine.

Alicea 29:59

And on this day, you and Kaitlyn actually had a massage set. Like yours was a half hour before hers, but yeah, yeah, you both had a massage in the middle of the day.

Nathan 30:07

Well, I'm not gonna do a couples massage with my daughter.

Alicea 30:09

No, I know.

Nathan 30:11

I don't know if you this was Kaitlyn's first ever massage.

Alicea 30:14

Yep. Yeah, she was a little worried. She's like, I don't know what to do. I don't know, like blah, blah, blah, blah. I'm like, just do what you're comfortable with. Talk to the lady, let her know it's your very first massage. She can help walk you through stuff, help you figure out what kind of massage you want to do because there are different types of massage. You can do a deep tissue type massage, you can do a bamboo massage, there's the hot rocks massage. Just talk to them. They're professionals, they will help you out.

Nathan 30:40

Did you debrief with Kaitlyn afterwards what she thought of the experience?

Alicea 30:43

She enjoyed it, but she doesn't know if she'd do it again.

Nathan 30:46

Okay.

Alicea 30:47

She's like me. I think she prefers facials over massages.

Nathan 30:50

Got it. That makes sense. So you're both toxic, is what I'm hearing.

Alicea 30:53

Well, yeah. While you two were off gallivanting in your different massage rooms, I went to the princess and frog retelling in the grand hall with Gamble. This was like a mad libs type story where um people had to fill in the different adjectives or nouns or whatever to retell the story of Princess and the Frog. And this was so stinking hilarious. And there was a visit from Dr. Facillier at the end, and let me tell you, his laugh, amazing villain laugh, just a great villain laugh.

Nathan 31:29

That's cool.

Alicea 31:31

And I also did the 215 Under her spell at saga. This was a maleficent storytelling thing, uh, where she talked to people and I got to do a meet and greet with her. And this was this was really cool. She she called out a couple of people in the audience too, and she actually called on me and asked if I was brave or unwise. And I said, Can I be a little bit of both? Which got a laugh from the audience. And she said, Oh, both will serve me well. Okay.

Nathan 32:03

Yeah.

Alicea 32:04

Then I went up to the rose because it was time to get back doing sips on the ship stuff.

Nathan 32:09

There you go.

Alicea 32:10

And uh there was something on the menu that I thought sounded really good. It was called the Bimbetes.

Nathan 32:14

Okay. I what are the bimbetes.

Alicea 32:17

Well, the bimbetes are from Beauty and the Beast. It is the lady triplets that each have a different color. You you may not remember them. They're called the Bimbetes. Um, and on the on the menu, I couldn't tell what it was. I was like, what is this? They're different flavor sorbets. Uh however, I asked the lady what they were. She's like, Oh, I would not recommend that. Get anything on the menu but that.

Nathan 32:43

Like, oh ready then.

Alicea 32:45

Okay. So I did not order that. I ordered something else and it was delicious. Kaitlyn got the Mrs. T and she liked that.

Nathan 32:52

I think I had an old-fashioned. I know. Shocker. What? Right.

Alicea 32:57

Just throughout the day and throughout the cruise, we saw our head server, Elizabeth, multiple times. She was always very, very happy to see us. Like she greeted me by name multiple times and offered to like find a table for me if I was in the um upstairs on deck in the Festival of Foods, or or get food for me. And I'm like, you don't need to do that. No, do your own little thing. I'm I'm good. But it was always great to see her. She was always very helpful with stuff. Yeah. I think Frozen was that night in the theater. Yeah.

Nathan 33:29

Yes, it was. Such a wonderful performance.

Alicea 33:31

This is great. The vocalists were fire. They're they're very good.

Nathan 33:35

Yeah. This was also formal night. And it was the most packed I have ever seen on a lobby, atrium, grand hall, whatever label you want to put on it for any of our Disney cruises with people trying to get pictures.

Alicea 33:50

Not only that, like the majority of people were dressed up.

Nathan 33:55

Yes.

Alicea 33:55

I've not seen that before.

Nathan 33:56

A great majority. Like probably 80, 80 plus percent of people were dressed up. Yeah. Usually it's like 50-50 on a good time.

Alicea 34:05

And some very fancy outfits. Oh, yeah. Yep.

Nathan 34:08

That was cool.

Alicea 34:09

Yeah. You and I did karaoke.

Nathan 34:11

Yeah, we did. That was an experience.

Alicea 34:14

It was fun. I think we did very well. And um the host that evening was Oliver, and he was like, What is going on? Because everybody was really good.

Nathan 34:26

Really good. There were no like karaoke bombs.

Alicea 34:29

No. Like he's like, I don't know. Am I in an alternate reality? How can everybody can sing?

Nathan 34:34

Yeah, it was pretty great. And for those of you who are asking, we of course sung Love is an open door from Frozen. You know, had to be on theme with the evening. Exactly. Yeah.

San Juan Fort Heat And Casa Bacardi

Alicea 34:49

Our next day was at San Juan, Puerto Rico. And Nathan and I have been here before. The kids have not. Um, we went to El Moro.

Nathan 34:59

Yes.

Alicea 34:59

I'm sure I is that how you say it? El Moro? El Moro? Yeah. I don't know. If you're from America, El Moro. Yeah, it's a fort.

Nathan 35:07

Yes.

Alicea 35:08

And this was really cool. It was same thing. We're going to say this a lot. It was really hot. It was. It was hot. It was very hot. Um, I was not doing super well in the heat.

Nathan 35:20

But there was a fantastic breeze if you were in the right spot.

Alicea 35:23

Yeah, there's a great breeze. We we explored the fort a little bit. Kaitlyn and Sterling went down to the lower level. It was down this ridiculous spiral staircase or very steep ramp. And they went- It was a triangular staircase. Oh, yeah. That's right. It was a triangle staircase, but it was spiral-ish. Yeah. Yeah. Um, they went down there. It was really cool.

Nathan 35:45

I mean, there are parts of that fort that are 500 years old.

Alicea 35:49

Yeah, nuts.

Nathan 35:51

And you know, some of those parts have been built up on top of, but there's some stuff that the kids got to go in. It looks like you're in a cave. And it is that is the original part of the fort that was like from the late 1520s.

Alicea 36:04

Yeah.

Nathan 36:05

Wow.

Alicea 36:06

Yes. This was really neat to see.

Nathan 36:08

Yeah.

Alicea 36:08

Um, after this, Sterling went back to the ship because we went to Casa Bacardi. On brand as well. On brand as well. We wanted to get um, we wanted to bottle our own rum, and that's something that you can do there. And they had a new packaging that we wanted to get. So we did that. It was a lot of fun. It was fun.

Nathan 36:29

I will say we took Ubers everywhere. Yes. Um, had really good luck um with with Ubers and excellent drivers and everything. But uh the the driving in in Puerto Rico, I I would, you know, kind of channel Pirates of the Caribbean and you know, rules of the road or more guidelines.

Alicea 36:46

This is why we were not driving anywhere.

Nathan 36:48

Yeah, I would not ever rent a car in Puerto Rico.

Alicea 36:51

Don't look, don't watch what's happening.

Nathan 36:55

Yikes. Yeah.

Alicea 36:57

That was good. We got back to the ship.

Nathan 36:59

Yeah. They played all the horns.

Alicea 37:01

Oh, yeah, yeah.

Nathan 37:02

All the songs on our way out. And I was trying to get a recording. I think I was out on our deck or something like that. But there were three other ships in with us, and basically all you heard was echo. And it was just this, it was unrecognizable. Yeah. Yeah. So I know there was like 10 or 11 things that they played, no clue what those were and or in what order. I mean, I could go look up online and say, like, here are all the songs that you know that Destiny can play. They were largely indiscernible.

Alicea 37:34

Yeah. Well, we got back and of course went to Haunted Mansion Lounge. Or did you do? Haunted Mansion Parlor. Yes. Yeah. Um, dinner that night was at Marvel again. And that evening we had the world of old-fashioned at Hooks Barbary. Yes. Kaitlyn was very trepidatious about this.

Nathan 37:56

Yeah.

Alicea 37:56

Uh, yeah, she's like, I don't, I don't like old fashions, Mom. I'm like, it's not just a regular old fashion. Like, yeah, this this bartender, he is amazing. You will get all different flavors, all different types of old fashions. He tailor makes them. Like this is this is trust me, it's good. Yeah. She drank all of them. Every single bit of all of this.

Nathan 38:20

So she doesn't like cheap old-fashioned stuff. Yes, yeah. She likes the expensive stuff. She likes the good stuff. Yeah. So this was from uh this was led by a Amit from India. And uh he is kind of famous across the fleet of being the guy uh to go see in Hooks Barbery. He's absolutely amazing. Yep, yeah. If you see Amit in hooks, you know you're getting a good drink.

Alicea 38:46

Yes, yeah. So that was good. That was at 11 o'clock.

Nathan 38:50

Yeah.

Alicea 38:50

That was a late, late tasting. The

St Martin Regatta And A Long Walk

Alicea 38:54

next day we hit St. Martin. This was the first time the destiny hit Saint Martin. So there was there was a ceremony or something, but we didn't see it.

Nathan 39:02

Yes. There was a ceremony in San Juan too. It was also the first time. Got it. Yep. Yep. Uh it's ah, this is so fun. So we did an excursion uh called the 12-meter regatta. And we had done this back in 2010. Uh, you actually get to crew on a racing sailboat. It's a 1980s era America's Cup uh sailing yacht. Uh, it is a the 12-meter class. I'll let you guess how long it is. Um, and you get assigned to different stations to you know grind or pull or or whatever you need to do that they tell you to do. And uh you basically do a little race against another 12-meter yacht.

Alicea 39:47

Yeah.

Nathan 39:48

So when we booked this a few months before the cruise, it wasn't on Disney's excursion list uh like it had been in 2010. Subsequent to that, at some point it was released from Disney because when we got there, they do two uh tours a day, one in uh like at 8:30 or something like that, and one at 11 or something. Um, there was a a group of folks from the Disney ship, because they had the Disney stickers on, getting off. I was like, oh, bummer.

Alicea 40:16

Yeah, it would have been nice to do the earlier one too.

Nathan 40:19

Yeah, exactly. And I had forgotten how far of a walk it was to get down to that place because when you do it as an official excursion, they pick you up at a little pier that's like right next to where the cruise ships dock and drive you in a in a little water taxi, uh another like half mile down the beach to where their main marina is. Uh we walked that. Um that was unfun.

Alicea 40:47

But we did get they did water taxi us back, so that was helpful.

Nathan 40:51

Thankfully.

Alicea 40:51

Yes, thankfully, this was so much fun. Uh the kids were assigned as grinders. Nathan, what were you assigned as?

Nathan 40:57

I was the backstake grinder.

Alicea 40:59

Backstay grind grinder. I was the timekeeper and the bartender, but I could not reach the cooler, so I was the timekeeper.

Nathan 41:08

Stubby arms over here. Yep. This was amazing. And unlike the last time where we had pretty light winds, we had a pretty uh pretty steady breeze going, probably uh uh 15 knots or so, which is about 18 or 19 miles an hour. Um, we had a little bit of uh uh seas to chop through as well. I I was sitting in the very back of the boat behind the helm. I just had the time of my life. I love sailing.

Alicea 41:37

The kids had so much fun too. It was this was a good, a good excursion. I think we would, I think we would do this again, although I really want to see the airplanes.

Nathan 41:50

Well, we'll just have to figure it out. Yeah. Where uh we we do this as like the early morning excursion, and then we'll get a taxi or something over to uh airp uh the uh runway beach. Got it uh there at the St. Martin airport. If you don't know if you've seen people on a beach with airplanes landing right on top of their heads, it would seem like this is in St. Martin there on the on the Dutch side of the island where we were.

Alicea 42:13

Yeah. So we got back to the ship, had a little bit of a break because we were all pretty tired.

Nathan 42:18

Yeah.

Alicea 42:19

Um, and unfortunately, we missed our mixology class. We all like we forgot that we had this completely spaced. Yeah. Oops. But we did have Palo dinner this night. Yes.

Nathan 42:30

So it's very good. You know, you give some, you get some. It's fine.

Alicea 42:35

So we didn't do mixology, but we did Palo dinner instead of a few.

Nathan 42:38

Palo was amazing. Both of them.

Alicea 42:39

Yes, Palo was amazing. Always is, always is.

Nathan 42:43

And then after Palo was the Pirates Rockin' parlay party. Yeah, which was also just a whole lot of fun. Love that show. Having live music uh from the band, and then they they cue uh fireworks along with live band. Like, heck yeah. Yep. Sign me up. It's good, it's good.

Alicea 43:06

Next

Storytelling Hits And Tasting Favorites

Alicea 43:07

day was a sea day, and we got to do all sorts of things. That morning we stayed in line to do Dr. Facillier's parlor. It was uh, I think 9 45 thing, and I got in line at 9 05, and we were like fifth in line.

Nathan 43:22

Yeah.

Alicea 43:23

If you can get in line for this because it is an amazing experience. They pulled maybe 20 people into the room. There's no pictures, no video allowed. It is uh a small group with Dr. Facilier, and he does his tricks, talks to people on the other side. It's it's really good.

Nathan 43:42

It's so funny. He the the the person who is friends with Dr. Facilier is amazing, and is spot on. Yes. Not gonna spoil it, but there's a long line for this for a reason.

Alicea 43:58

Yeah, and it does happen multiple times. Throughout the cruise, not as often as I wanted it to, but yeah, get in there if you can.

Nathan 44:05

And the other thing I would say is it's not just one group that gets pulled in at that time. It seemed like Dr. Fresillier was there for like an hour or so, and I think maybe maybe a little more than that, and probably went through, I'm guessing four to six groups, I think. Because I remember walking past that line uh and it was kind of like very short, and it clearly it was like the last group that was gonna get in. Um, and it was about an hour and 20 minutes or so after um uh we had gone in.

Alicea 44:41

They only keep the line open for 10 minutes.

Nathan 44:45

Oh wow.

Alicea 44:47

So or once they basically run out. It's like they do this with a lot of the character meet and greets too. You will see it on the navigator, they are only there for 10 minutes. But if you are in line during that 10 minutes when it's open, you will get to see your character.

Nathan 45:03

Got it. Okay, that makes more sense. Yeah.

Alicea 45:06

Let's see. We had chocolate and liquor this day as well. This was one that Kaitlyn was very interested in doing, and we love this. Yeah. We will do this, I think, almost every cruise. We just we love it. Absolutely. Just going throughout the ship, experiencing things on there, going to different bars and seeing different things that were on the navigator. Um, there's a a Broadway, another Broadway guest that we that we watched. There was trivias we went to, World Cup games.

Nathan 45:36

Yeah.

Alicea 45:37

Um, we also did Palo Brunch on one of these sea Days. Another one I love doing.

Nathan 45:43

Yeah. We had uh that first uh second sea Day, whatever you want to call it. We had two sea Days at the end.

Alicea 45:50

Yeah.

Nathan 45:51

So um the first one of those two is when we did uh Dr. Facilier. Um we did a bunch of magic shots, chocolate and liquor. Um, and then we had Pride Lands that night, and this was show night.

Alicea 46:03

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Nathan 46:04

And this was I liked it.

Alicea 46:08

Yeah.

Nathan 46:08

Um, I understand where people have comments about how it's being it's too loud. I actually didn't think it was the singing or the drum set. It's the djembes. These are there's two drummers who have djembes,

Alicea 46:23

the hand drums.

Nathan 46:24

These are the hand drums. It's a very high-pitched, very ringy drum, and there's two of them, and they are not holding back on volume. And for those of don't know, I am a drummer. Uh, I have played djembe, I've played, you know, I played drum set and all sorts of other stuff. Like, I I do actually know what I'm talking about here. It was those djembes that they're just too much.

Alicea 46:48

Yeah.

Nathan 46:48

But like the content was fantastic. Like we're just like, I have technical critiques on how it could be a better experience for the guest.

Alicea 46:57

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Nathan 46:58

Um, I also will note, and if you are music nerds, you'll get this. Uh, they did a rendition of Can You Feel the Love Tonight, obviously, from the The Lion King. It was in 6'8.

Alicea 47:08

It was weird.

Nathan 47:09

That was that was

Alicea 47:10

not weird, it was different.

Nathan 47:12

I have that is an interesting interpretation of that song.

Alicea 47:15

Yeah, like both of our ears perked up, like, oh like wait, what?

Nathan 47:19

So, yeah. Uh it's in a triplet feel. Um okay, yeah.

Alicea 47:26

But this cast was very talented.

Nathan 47:28

Oh, they were super talented. Super talented. Yeah.

Alicea 47:32

Um, let's see. Okay, so next day was Palo Brunch.

Nathan 47:36

Yeah.

Alicea 47:36

Another sea Day. I really like ending on two sea Days.

Nathan 47:40

Yes.

Alicea 47:40

This is very nice.

Nathan 47:41

Our our Palo server for uh both uh both dinner and brunch was Eloy from Spain. He was amazing. He had a phrase, I think it was the at the brunch, uh, where Alicea was was covering our our check and uh she paid with her uh with her magic band and he called it the Mickey Rolex.

Alicea 48:01

Yes, I thought that was hilarious. Uh so our last say day was also Hercules Day. It was the big show on the Disney Destiny is Hercules.

Nathan 48:12

Yeah.

Alicea 48:13

And uh they do a matinee show in the afternoon and then two in the evening as well. Right. So normal times in the evening. Yeah. We did the matinee show and then the regular evening show just because we wanted to see it more than once.

Nathan 48:26

Yeah. Yeah. Well, or if it was really horrible, then we'd only see it once and then we'd have something else to do in the evening.

Alicea 48:33

It wasn't horrible. It wasn't horrible, but the family around us was horrible.

Nathan 48:36

Oh at the first show. At the first show. We were in back on the main floor, tucked under the balcony. So we had some restricted sight lines, and we had this very large family uh around us who just they were talking through the whole thing and just their theater etiquette was horrible. And before you get on me and say, Um, excuse me, this is a Disney cruise and these are kids. No, no, no, no, no. I'm talking about the adults.

Alicea 49:05

Yeah.

Nathan 49:06

Like I just mind blown.

Alicea 49:10

Yeah.

Nathan 49:10

Like the the the cruise director, literally, before he says, and here is Hercules, like for the show as he's presenting, he says, and a reminder, there is no video or photography during the show. And here's Hercules. And then the show starts, and the guy sitting next to me from this family, the he just pulls out his phone that he was on and had been like kept being on for most of the show and starts videoing it. And I'm just like, I I can't not say something. I'm just like, hey, no video. He goes, Oh, no video. I'm like, no. Like yeah, yeah, yeah.

Alicea 49:51

So we went back for the nighttime show. Yes. And got much better seats.

Nathan 49:57

Yes.

Alicea 49:58

And uh got to see a lot more of it. We could see the projections uh where we were sitting in the second one. And I really like this. I I think I liked it better than Moana. I like the puppetry better with the Moana show.

Nathan 50:12

Um I actually like the puppetry better in this one. I think the puppets were more impressive. I think they're a little bit more big and sluggish, though.

Alicea 50:21

Yeah, they are they are sluggish, yeah.

Nathan 50:23

I could see with these puppets, like with for the the the was it, the giants and the titans, that's it. I bet you if they're in heavy seas, that's when they're gonna call those off because those performers are kind of on stilts. Um that's probably gonna be a safety issue.

Alicea 50:43

Yeah. I I really loved this show. I loved the last number that they did. I thought that was phenomenal. Yeah.

Nathan 50:51

Yeah, it has a had like a very, very, very gospel feel. It had some incredibly like technical singing and part splitting between the men and the women, um, and rapid staccato succession of just like it was it was impressive the way they pulled this off. Um I liked it. I I think I would put it, I'm with you. I think I liked it above Moana. I don't know that I'd put it above Beauty and the Beast. But that's just me.

Alicea 51:25

There were there were some things about I didn't think the chemistry was there between some of the cast members. The vocal talent was great.

Nathan 51:34

Oh, off the charts. Yeah.

Alicea 51:35

I like that they included Pegasus on this, and I love how they included Pegasus on this. Yeah. Uh like in in Aladdin, there's no Abu.

Nathan 51:44

Yeah.

Alicea 51:45

In Frozen, no, no, not Frozen. There was one other one where where it was like missing a sidekick or something. Oh, it's tangled. There's no Pascal.

Nathan 51:54

Yes.

Alicea 51:54

Um, I like that they included uh Pegasus and How he was included in this.

Nathan 51:58

Yeah.

Alicea 51:59

I would definitely go see this again.

Nathan 52:01

Oh, 100%. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know if I'd go to see two shows.

Alicea 52:04

No, probably just the the evening one. Yeah. Yeah. This was great. This was an amazing cruise. We did not get to do everything.

Nathan 52:11

No.

Alicea 52:11

Like we didn't see any of the Cruella shows.

Nathan 52:13

No.

Alicea 52:14

Oh, something to note. I have a note on here. Yeah. The goodnight kiss in the Grand Hall is usually at midnight on, I think, The Treasure and the Wish. It

Ship Logistics, Crowds, What We’d Redo

Alicea 52:23

is at 11 p.m. on The Destiny.

Nathan 52:25

Is it 11 and midnight or just 11, maybe?

Alicea 52:28

It's just 11. I stayed up till midnight one night for it and it did not happen. And I was not the only person that stayed up till midnight. There were a couple of people in the in the grand hall like, what's going on?

Nathan 52:40

Yeah.

Alicea 52:40

Um, maybe, maybe Disney has changed it, so it's 11 across the ships. Oh, maybe I just was not expecting that.

Nathan 52:46

So we'll have to go sail them all again just to see. We will. These are the things that we do for y'all. Yes. Um, I didn't think the ship felt too busy. I thought, you know, there were definitely some spots where there's a lot of people. I don't love where they do the Dr. Facilliaire meet and greet only because the line really clogs up that hallway next to Saga, not the second or second floor? Yeah, of saga.

Alicea 53:14

The second floor of Saga, yeah.

Nathan 53:15

That's like a logistical issue. It's a wish class ship. I still have a big problem with the um where they put the the the cove cafe and the adult space. Yeah. I I will we have a very nice uh set of pictures and a little video um that exemplify why they don't have any uh Al fresco seating at Palo. Yes, because there is water streaming down onto that deck from the pool above. Uh just uh I can't believe they haven't fixed that yet from a design perspective. But whatever.

Alicea 53:51

For our sailing, there were 3,793 folks aboard and 1,417 of them were kids.

Nathan 53:57

Yes. Max capacity is 4,000. So, you know, pretty good passenger count, lots of kids. Uh definitely different from uh, you know, our Panama Canal cruisings, where it's been uh, you know, uh 2,000 or you know, 1900 or so uh total people and uh a hundred kids. So, but you know, those are unique circumstances.

Alicea 54:21

I would also say I think the kids skewed a little older on this cruise. Yeah. And maybe it's because this is a hero and villains theme, it's it's more Marvel heavy. I don't know. Like we mentioned before, there were some issues with some of the teenagers on board and doing some. I won't go into it. Sorry. Yeah, like I said, there were some issues with some some of the teenagers on board.

Nathan 54:46

Yeah. Parents remind your kids not to be d*cks. There is some some parenting needed. Yeah.

Alicea 54:55

I would I would go back on this ship just because we missed a lot of stuff. Seven nights, while it was great to have a seven-night cruise, still didn't get to do a lot of stuff.

Nathan 55:05

Yeah. I it's funny, we were talking about this after we got off because there was a bunch of stuff that we didn't do. And I actually think it's because this is a Disney ship. I just get into cruise mode. Yeah. And I just yeah, I this this is a place where I don't have a plan. Yeah. I feel like we had a plan of things that we wanted to do, and then I get into cruise mode, and that plan just gets thrown right overboard.

Alicea 55:30

I barely hit any of the lounges.

Nathan 55:32

Yeah.

Alicea 55:33

I didn't really spend any time in Sanctum. And when we were on the treasure, like that was my favorite area was the Skipper Society.

Nathan 55:41

Yeah.

Alicea 55:41

And I had hardly any time in the Sanctum.

Nathan 55:45

I had two of the feature drinks that are basically version of an old-fashioned at the Sanctum. It was not good.

Alicea 55:53

I had the dark hold. I was there for a trivia that was just absolutely packed. They had, um, because this was like right around 4th of July, they had uh an American, America's 250th trivia. And there were a couple of um different specialty drinks throughout the cruise as well that were America-centric. So yeah.

Nathan 56:12

Man, I wish I'd known about that trivia. I'm a history buff. I would have cleaned up.

Alicea 56:15

No, you would not have it. What? Not history. It was weird stuff. This was you guys were at Cask and Cannon, and these this is some of the questions that I told to you afterwards. Like, what state doesn't allow underwater whistling? Yeah.

Nathan 56:32

Um, the state of water. Like the liquid state of water doesn't allow underwater whistling.

Alicea 56:41

I don't remember what state it was, but yeah, that's what West Virginia.

Nathan 56:46

That seems like a law West Virginia would probably make.com.

Stack Ranking Every Disney Cruise Ship

Nathan 57:01

Um Alicea, let's close this one out. We have been on all of the Disney ships at this point in the mainline uh American and European fleet. Uh I am going to discount the adventure. Yep. I think we know that ship will be at the bottom of the list. Yep. But we haven't been on that one. No. Okay, so we have been on all of the ships: the magic, the wonder, the dream, the fantasy, the wish, the treasure, and the destiny. What is your stack rank?

Alicea 57:33

I think treasure is still my top.

Nathan 57:35

Okay.

Alicea 57:36

I don't know if this if destiny pushes wonder out or not. I think because of treasure, it does not. I think wonder is still my number two. And I think destiny is my number three.

Nathan 57:48

Okay. So far, I'm with you. I agree. Yeah. Uh I would actually flip wonder. I would flip wonder of the top and and treasure below. Yeah. I just love the nautical theming and I love the uh dedicated adult space and the bigger lounges. There's fewer of them, but they're better spots.

Alicea 58:06

I really want to do a transatlantic cruise on a wish class ship. Yeah. Part of the problem is we do port adventures in in some places, and we really just need to stay on the ship.

Nathan 58:24

Yep. That's true.

Alicea 58:26

Because in all honesty, the ship is the destination on some of these cruises. Yep. Now it was hitting St. Martin again, and we wanted to do the 12-meter regatta. But yeah, I mean, some of the cruises that we do, we don't really need to get off the ship.

Nathan 58:41

Yeah. Actually, if we did this exact itinerary again, I would be okay skipping San Juan and staying on board. And um, no, I'd still want to go to lookout.

Alicea 58:54

Yeah.

Nathan 58:55

I'd still want to go to Serenity. Although I think I might be interested in trying a cabana on lookout.

Alicea 59:02

Uh, I'm not.

Nathan 59:03

No? No. Actually, no, you don't need it's so yeah. We've found some really good spots to hang out at lookout. Yeah. And they happen to be right next to a bar, which is also very convenient for us.

Alicea 59:14

And the cabanas at lookout are nowhere near everything else.

Nathan 59:17

There's Serenity Bay cabanas at lookout. There's not a lot of them. There's like six of them.

Alicea 59:22

Oh, but they're they're back in the dunes, though.

Nathan 59:24

Oh, that's a good point. Good point. And they're not right next to a bar.

Alicea 59:28

This is true. All right. All right. So needless to say, we will at some point be going on the destiny again.

Nathan 59:35

Yes. Okay. I don't know when. We've got dream class. We've got to finish out the stack.

Alicea 59:40

Oh, sorry. Oh, no. I didn't know I had to do the rest of them.

Nathan 59:43

Oh, okay. Never mind. We don't have to finish out the rest of the stack.

Alicea 59:46

Sorry, magic's at the bottom, though.

Nathan 59:48

Yeah, it is.

Alicea 59:49

Treasure, wonder, destiny.

Nathan 59:52

Dream, fantasy, wish, magic.

Alicea 59:54

I think I do dream wish fantasy magic.

Nathan 59:57

Okay. I mean, we're splitting hairs.

Alicea 1:00:00

Yeah, I know.

Nathan 1:00:01

Yeah.

Alicea 1:00:02

Now, and then the believers.

Nathan 1:00:03

We would go on any of these ships. Yes.

Alicea 1:00:05

Oh, yeah. Yes.

Nathan 1:00:07

Like, just because it's last doesn't mean it's bad. No. Except for the adventure, maybe.

Alicea 1:00:13

We haven't been on that one. We cannot say that.

Nathan 1:00:16

That's fair. Okay. Stricken from the record.

Alicea 1:00:20

But we're not flying out to Singapore to do that.

Nathan 1:00:23

Not tonight. We're not.

Alicea 1:00:25

All right. All right. We're going on and on here.

Nathan 1:00:29

Indeed, we are.

Final Disclaimers And How To Reach Us

Nathan 1:00:30

And as we wrap up, a reminder that we are not affiliated with Disney or any of its subsidiaries. Everything you hear on this show is based on personal experiences, opinions, and questionable snack choices. We are, however, proudly affiliated with fun.

Alicea 1:00:44

And rum. Yes, more rum. If you're planning a Disney vacation, we always recommend working with a travel advisor or reaching out to Disney directly to help make the magic happen. And if you enjoyed today's episode, please take a second to rate and review the show. It really helps other Disney fans find us.

Nathan 1:01:03

If you have a question, a topic suggestion, or a Disney story you'd love to share, please send us an email at podcast at our mousecapades.com.

Alicea 1:01:13

You can also find us on Instagram, Facebook, and Threads at Our MouseCapades, and on YouTube at OurMousCapades Pod. And do not forget to share us with your friends, your family, and Disney fans of all ages.

Nathan 1:01:24

Thanks so much for listening. We'll be back in your ears next week.

Intro 1:01:29

Thank you for flying Star Tours. Bye bye.