Ravagers don’t dance- but we do! A Marvel Day at Sea DCL TR Updated 11/21

Grand Cayman was a major factor when we decided on this cruise.
one place I've wanted to go for... decades.
we went to the Buena Vista theatre to get our tender tickets.
Careful! Don't bend it! It's a tender ticket.
Our tour for the day was a Stingray City/Starfish Beach/snorkel tour
That sounded great.
Yes, there is slightly more risk involved but as long as you do your research and make smart choices, there’s no reason to worry.
Noted, thanks. :)
we talked to some nice ladies who actually met on a cruise and became friends. Now they travel regularly together.
Love stuff like that. :)
we got on the boat our guides went over the safety spiel.
Ever seen the movie Open Water? Listen to the safety spiel.
Our guides told us we had 25 minutes to snorkel but really we had about 15.
Yikes! Did you even get wet???
From there we went to Stingray City, which is the part I was most excited for and coincidentally the part that most disappointed me.
uh oh...
Stingray City is really neat. If you’ve never heard of it, it’s a sandbar near the island where a long time ago the fishermen used to clean their fish. They didn’t want to do it closer to shore because of the bugs. Over time, the local stingray population got comfortable with the humans and eventually became quasi-domesticated. So it’s a completely natural, non-captive group of stingrays that just really like people.
I bet that's where this famous meme photo came from:
527221
we just waited around waiting to get photos with it (which weren’t included in the tour cost).
Of course not.
Then when it was finally our turn the guide had a very set routine of poses that he walked you through really fast.
Well... I guess that's better than everyone waiting while someone makes them take a zillion pictures.
We finally found one, grabbed some pictures, and it started to sprinkle
Starfish sprinkle? Who knew!


:rolleyes:
I looked like an absolute swamp rat in all of them.
You do not. You look adorbs. And happy.
The added stops to and from the boat took up precious time on the water, so every part of the tour seemed really rushed.
Not okay.
the guides were constantly shouting at who’s turn it was next and how we needed to hold the animal and blah blah blah.
Ew... this is sounding less and less enjoyable.
So we changed out of our beach wear and went up to Cabana’s
Heh. With a name like "Cabana's", it sounds like you should change into beach wear before you go.
[Lunch views]
Nice!
Yes, my favorite foods generally come from the kids menu.
Why not! Kids get the good stuff. ::yes::
We went through several rotations of pool-hot tub-lounge chairs, just enjoying the beautiful weather and peaceful quiet.
Oh, wow. That sounds so wonderful.... :love:
I ended up enjoying this part of the day more than the excursion.
Not surprised!
I also noticed a teeny tiny ship in the mix.
Looks like a kid running around his parents.
He said something along the lines of, “when you got back on the ship and looked over to the right, weren’t you glad to be getting back on this ship.” Cruise line shade and I am here for it.
oooohhhh… snap.
In the time between dinner we went to Keys, the piano bar, to listen to someone do a Music of Alan Menken show. Keys is super classy and posh and really digs into the art deco vibe.
That sounds great. And probably sounded great, too.
as I checked to make sure the shorts under my dress were in place (fully covered but still in an awkward position) and someone walked into the bathroom. She promptly turned around left but still, the damage was done.
Whoops! :blush:
I investigated the lock - since I knew for sure that I had locked it – and realized that I didn’t actually lock it. This lock was weird in that to unlock it you turn it once to the right, but in order to lock it you had to turn it twice to the left. I only turned it once and what I thought was the click of a lock sliding into place was just the sound of the lock switch turning.
So now you've learned an important lesson. Lock the door... and then test the door.
I washed my hands (for 20 seconds) and when I walked out she was no longer in the vicinity and I grabbed Jon and told him we gotsa go.
:lmao: I bet!!
I started my meal with the Riesling experience, which is basically a flight of 3 different types of Rieslings.
I'd do that. ::yes::
For food we started off with pretzels, which were really yummy
mmmm… love a good pretzel.
 
One big thing you need to remember: Look at reviews.
Oh I read plenty of reviews, and the ones for this were pretty decent. We had to balance that all with the cost and this seemed like the best option. It was still fine, even if it wasn't perfect!

Did you know that the song that Flynn sings solo was written just for the ship by Alan Menken?
I didn't know that- so cool!

Fabulous TR, joining in!
Thanks for reading along!
 
Careful! Don't bend it! It's a tender ticket.
:rotfl:

Ever seen the movie Open Water? Listen to the safety spiel.
I have not, but as an overly cautious scaredy cat I am usually all ears during the safety presentations.

Yikes! Did you even get wet???
Ever so slightly damp is all

I bet that's where this famous meme photo came from:
Can't be, not enough people crowding around in the background

Heh. With a name like "Cabana's", it sounds like you should change into beach wear before you go.
Ha so true!

Oh, wow. That sounds so wonderful.... :love:
What I wouldn't give to be back in this exact scenario...

Looks like a kid running around his parents.
Small, but mature for it's age. It is more comfortable around the adults than ships its own age. It probably already has a taste for champagne and a dorm picked out at Yale.

That sounds great. And probably sounded great, too.
She was delightful! I play a little piano and am always so impressed with people who can sightread that well.
 


Kind of a letdown that your excursions weren't all you had hoped. They do still sound like incredible experiences despite the rush-rush and overcrowded water.

I'm loving the sound of your afternoon relaxing and recharging, and all of the Tangled fun for the evening. AND it's making me desperately want to book a cruise!!
 
Kind of a letdown that your excursions weren't all you had hoped. They do still sound like incredible experiences despite the rush-rush and overcrowded water.

I'm loving the sound of your afternoon relaxing and recharging, and all of the Tangled fun for the evening. AND it's making me desperately want to book a cruise!!
They weren't bad, by any means, just not amazing as they could be. But hey - we still got to play with stingrays and spend time in the ocean! So definitely a good day.
 
I'm so glad I stumbled upon your thread! You are a great storyteller.
 


I have not, but as an overly cautious scaredy cat I am usually all ears during the safety presentations.
:thumbsup2
Ever so slightly damp is all
I KNEW IT!!!!
Can't be, not enough people crowding around in the background
Photoshopped out.
What I wouldn't give to be back in this exact scenario...
<sigh> I'm sure.
Small, but mature for it's age. It is more comfortable around the adults than ships its own age. It probably already has a taste for champagne and a dorm picked out at Yale.
How very posh.
She was delightful! I play a little piano and am always so impressed with people who can sightread that well.
I took just enough piano to know that I can't play piano.
 
Sing to me Palo

After the early morning we had the day before, we decided to sleep in on our second day at sea. We took extra care getting ready since we had ~fancy~ reservations.

That’s right, it’s Palo Brunch time.



Just like the Marvel DAS was the one thing I was most looking forward to, I’m pretty sure Palo was the one thing Jon was most looking forward to. We watched vlogs and looked at blogs while we were planning and lemme tell ya – the hype was real.




[A lovely sea view]

I don’t have many notes from the meal, but we did take a LOT of photos. A drink is included with the meal so I got a mimosa and Jon got iced tea (where the ice cubes were also made of tea so it wouldn’t get watered down). Both were really good.


After our server (who’s name I think was Leanne?) gave us the buffet tour we let were let loose!




















Our first plates were the pastries. The standout was the caramel cinnamon roll, which our server had recommended. Everything else was okay – fine but the cinnamon roll was divine.


We pretty much skipped the seafood table since I don’t eat any at all and Jon doesn’t really care for it (blasphemy, I know). But hey, it means we saved room for all the other amazing food.

The second round for us were the meats & cheeses. I wanted to try one of every cheese, plus some of the meats and fruits. Our server said one of her favorite combos was the garlic-y bread with the fig jam and one of the super soft cheeses (sorry – I did mention my horrible note taking during this meal). Anyway we both tried it and I’m not lying at all when I say I still salivate when I think of having just one more bite.





I enjoyed most of what I picked up this round, aside from the eggplant puree (which I knew I wouldn’t like but just wanted to try).

One thing we both tried for the first time was caviar. It wasn’t as horrible as I expected, although my bites were 90% toast so maybe that helped.



I went up for another round of my favorites from the charcuterie, grabbing some melon and prosciutto (which is a combo I fell in love with in France).


Jon also got a new drink, which was basically a fancy fruit punch.


When it came time to order from the menu we got several things. I went with the zucchini frittata (meh) and lasagna (holy pasta Batman this was amazing) and Jon ordered the chicken parm (delightful) and ravioli (pretty good).










Finally we sampled the desserts.


I don’t have any notes about these, but I think the fruit tart was my favorite.

I totally forgot that they bring out the specialty dessert at the end and by the time it came to us we were so stuffed we hardly ate any. We reached the point where eating was no longer enjoyable and sadly, we knew that was our cue to leave.
 
Like you could keep us away from trivia

So what do you do when you’re stuffed to the brim with delicious food? Step one – change out of fancy clothes and into stretchy clothes. Step two – hit the shops so you can distract yourself with shiny things.










We perused the two main shops to find which goods we (read: I) wanted to take home with us. I finally settled on a super soft long sleeve t shirt, a magnet that said Magic, and some pins. At least, I’m pretty sure that’s all (but knowing me I probably bought more than that). I even used my DVC card for a lil discount.

Next on our itinerary was another round of trivia. When we got there we found one of our dinner couples already there (the same one we did the first trivia with). We didn’t necessarily team up but we did share answers (so basically we teamed up). There were some tough questions and I answered some close but not quite right (they asked where Mt Gushmore was and I said Castaway Cay, then remembered that Gushmore is at Blizzard Beach. Rustmore is at CC.) I was also the only one who knew who was the voice of Quasimodo – do any of you know?

If I remember correctly, we ended up tied with one other team after the final question and went into a final death round where we also ended up in a tie. Since they had four medals and there were two of us on each team we just ended it in a tie. Our awesome host did a Star Wars-style medal ceremony. We gave one of our medals to our friends since they helped us on some questions we would not have gotten right.







We ended up seeing the team we tied with a few other times on the cruise and I regret not going and talking to them because they totally seemed like people we would be friends with.

So on the off-chance you’re reading this and you were on the 2/15 sailing of the Magic and remember tying in Disney trivia with another couple, please be my friend.

There was an afternoon show with a ventriloquist so we grabbed some popcorn and watched the show, which was really funny. I’ll attempt to describe one of the funniest moments, which was totally unscripted, but it might be one of those you-had-to-be-there things.
Anyway, it was a family show and at one point the performer brought some kids on stage. One of the kids was this cute 8-ish year old girl. She did a great job, etc, etc.



Later on in the show, a man comes in (super late) and has to join his family near the front of the theater. The performer noticed and obviously gave him crap for it, then he realized that he was the cute 8-ish year old girl’s dad. So he gave him even MORE crap for missing his daughter’s moment of fame.

Since we spent so much time inside the ship we decided to head out to the adult pool. Jon napped on a lounger and I sat in the super shallow part of the pool and read for a bit. It was wonderful.







Next up: Pirate Night!
 
That’s right, it’s Palo Brunch time.
Exciting!
the hype was real.
Why would it not be? It's PALO!
I don’t have many notes from the meal, but we did take a LOT of photos.
My eyes are ready for photo overload.
We pretty much skipped the seafood table since I don’t eat any at all and Jon doesn’t really care for it (blasphemy, I know). But hey, it means we saved room for all the other amazing food.
Honestly, I don't know why this gets the most hype here, when you can save room for other stuff.
lasagna (holy pasta Batman this was amazing) and Jon ordered the chicken parm (delightful)
These are the two best items at Palo, or so I've heard. Such choices.
So what do you do when you’re stuffed to the brim with delicious food? Step one – change out of fancy clothes and into stretchy clothes. Step two – hit the shops so you can distract yourself with shiny things.
Indeed. Shiny things are good to distract you.
We didn’t necessarily team up but we did share answers (so basically we teamed up).
Yes you did. But that is fair!
So on the off-chance you’re reading this and you were on the 2/15 sailing of the Magic and remember tying in Disney trivia with another couple, please be my friend.
I was not on this cruise. But can I still be your friend? (not in a stalkerish way at all tho)
Later on in the show, a man comes in (super late) and has to join his family near the front of the theater. The performer noticed and obviously gave him crap for it, then he realized that he was the cute 8-ish year old girl’s dad. So he gave him even MORE crap for missing his daughter’s moment of fame.
Shame on him!
 
Why would it not be? It's PALO!
I have seriously never heard one single solitary bad thing about Palo brunch. It is the GOAT.

Honestly, I don't know why this gets the most hype here, when you can save room for other stuff.
::yes:: ::yes:: ::yes::

Shiny things are good to distract you.
I am Tamatoa
532426

I was not on this cruise. But can I still be your friend? (not in a stalkerish way at all tho)
Of course!
 
That’s right, it’s Palo Brunch time.
Your timing on this post is impeccable!! My husband and I recently decided to do a cruise just the two of us for our 15th Anniversary in June. I was thinking what we might want to try this time that we didn't get to on our family cruise in December, and Palo Brunch is at the top of my list for sure!! I am now drooling at all the amazing options you shared (looking at you chicken parm and cinnamon rolls!!)

50090565171_bc63bca7d2_c.jpg
Yay for winning medals!! Super nice of you to share answers (and medals!) with your dinner friends. Trivia is another thing we haven't tried on either of our cruises. I think I would LOVE doing this. My husband would sit back and watch, LOL.
 
Your timing on this post is impeccable!! My husband and I recently decided to do a cruise just the two of us for our 15th Anniversary in June. I was thinking what we might want to try this time that we didn't get to on our family cruise in December, and Palo Brunch is at the top of my list for sure!! I am now drooling at all the amazing options you shared (looking at you chicken parm and cinnamon rolls!!)
Yes! Do it!!

Yay for winning medals!! Super nice of you to share answers (and medals!) with your dinner friends. Trivia is another thing we haven't tried on either of our cruises. I think I would LOVE doing this. My husband would sit back and watch, LOL.
Jon was very proud because he had one answer he contributed that no one else knew, but otherwise was supportive as we answered the rest 😅
 
we had ~fancy~ reservations.
You forgot the word "schmancy"... fancy schmancy.... it just goes together.
I’m pretty sure Palo was the one thing Jon was most looking forward to.

He certainly looks pretty hyped about it!

And you both clean up real nice. :)
I got a mimosa
yummm...
and Jon got iced tea (where the ice cubes were also made of tea so it wouldn’t get watered down).
What??? What a great idea? Must remember this!
After our server (who’s name I think was Leanne?) gave us the buffet tour we let were let loose!
That buffet looks incredible.
We pretty much skipped the seafood table since I don’t eat any at all and Jon doesn’t really care for it (blasphemy, I know).
:sad2:
One thing we both tried for the first time was caviar. It wasn’t as horrible as I expected, although my bites were 90% toast so maybe that helped.
:laughing: "wasn't as horrible"
People kill for this stuff!
(Admittedly, I've only had it once, and that about 40 years ago.)
We reached the point where eating was no longer enjoyable
Ah... all good things...
So what do you do when you’re stuffed to the brim with delicious food? Step one – change out of fancy clothes and into stretchy clothes.
:lmao: Of course!
You bought those, yes??
There were some tough questions and I answered some close but not quite right (they asked where Mt Gushmore was and I said Castaway Cay, then remembered that Gushmore is at Blizzard Beach. Rustmore is at CC.)
Easy mistake to make.
I was also the only one who knew who was the voice of Quasimodo – do any of you know?
Of course!
Tom Hulce. Easy.
He also played Larry in Animal House and Mozart in Amadeus. Anyone who knows how to Google, knows that.


ahem.

:rolleyes2

We gave one of our medals to our friends since they helped us on some questions we would not have gotten right.
Nice of you. :)
Love this shot. :goodvibes
Later on in the show, a man comes in (super late) and has to join his family near the front of the theater. The performer noticed and obviously gave him crap for it, then he realized that he was the cute 8-ish year old girl’s dad. So he gave him even MORE crap for missing his daughter’s moment of fame.
:laughing: He deserved to get in trouble for that!
 
Yikes

After a while I went back up to the room to get pirate-y for pirate night. I wanted to meet some characters but Jon had no interest so he stayed and napped. He got back to the room as I was leaving and said he would join me eventually.

Jack Sparrow was first on my list to meet. I got there 15 minutes early and was the 4th person in line. Only 5 minutes later the line got super long, so that was good timing on my part.



We had a fantastic time, Jack and I. Here’s a snippet of our conversation:

Me: Where’s your rum?
Jack: Maybe the monkey has it? If you find it, bring it here.
Me: Eh if I do that I’ll probably just drink it all.
Jack: You’re as bad as Gibbs!
Me: Hopefully I smell better…
Jack: *sniffs* yes, you do smell better than Gibbs

It was magical. I love Jack.



And rum.

Next up was Hook and Smee! Hook told me I could join his crew if I swabbed the deck. I told him no way in Davy Jones’s Locker would I do that, I’m too fancy. Then he tried to take my earrings and give them to Smee but I told them they had to go get their own treasure.



Minnie was next and of course we talked fashion. She loved my necklace and wanted to know where I got the coins. Of course I found them in some buried treasure and I promised to share my next treasure haul with her so we could make matching bracelets.


The final character on my list for pirate night was Captain Mickey. I don’t have any notes so I think it was a pretty standard pose and shoot moment, but hey he looked pretty great so I don’t mind.


From Mickey, I met up with Jon and we headed to theater to catch the show for the night, which was Matt Baker (who we saw at Fathoms the previous night). This was the family-friendly show but it was still hilarious.


We sat pretty close for this one because Jon really enjoys these kinds of shows, which led to a fun moment. He made some kind of joke about the Midwest and Jon and I laughed and nodded. He asked if we were from there and we said yes, from Kansas City. Then he astounded us by asking if we were from Kansas City, Kansas or Missouri.

Unless you’re from Kansas or Missouri, you have no idea how big of a deal this is. Most people assume Kansas City is in Kansas. While there is a KCK, most of KC is actually in Missouri. The downtown, the sports arenas, the concert venues, all the big stuff. So to have someone actually ask that question is huge.

Anyway, the show was great. Very funny. Lots of kid participation and the kids were kinda dumb (although to be fair, they were put on the spot and I don’t know how well I would rise to such an occasion).

After the show was….another show! Never a dull moment on the Magic.

We made our way up to the pool deck for the pirate night show, which was a big dance party with some of the entertainment CMs leading from the stage. Characters came out, booties were shook, a grand time was had.



Although I remember the show on the Dream being MUCH cooler. Can anyone confirm that this is true??

It all ended with the fireworks, which were amazing.





I miss fireworks.

And dancing in crowds.

And being on a cruise ship.





From the show we bounced down to dinner at Lumiere’s, where there was no pirate menu. I think because they do the special Marvel menu they don’t also do pirate menus (maybe???). Anyway, we were glad because we wanted to eat from the actual Lumiere’s menu.
I think this was another night where we ended up ordering the same things. We started with the fried Brie and French onion soup, then had the lamb for a main. I took exactly zero notes about the quality, so we’re going to assume it was excellent.









We finished it off with the soufflé and crème brulee, which we will once again have to assume were excellent.






Once again filled to the brim, we meandered out of Lumiere’s and down to Fathoms for the adult show of the night, which was a ventriloquist. We sat with one of our dinner couples and naturally ordered some drinks of the day.




He was funny, but we preferred Matt Baker. It was actually the ventriloquist’s last show as he was leaving the ship and going home when we disembarked back in Miami.

I convinced Jon to stay for karaoke, because I love karaoke and don’t get a chance to do it often enough.

And now comes the part of the story I wasn’t sure I would share because it’s super embarrassing.

I was pumping myself up for karaoke the whole trip. I do theater and have played in bands and am used to performing in front of people but for some reason I was SUPER nervous. When they announced karaoke I went over to the song list and couldn’t make up my mind. None of the songs I know very well were on the list and most were from the 80s/90s.

I figured I would do a Disney song but there were hardly any on the list and I didn’t want to be ‘that person’ and ask for a song that wasn’t there. So I settled on Popular from Wicked. Solid song, have sung many times before, could (and probably do) sing it in my sleep.
Except I’d never done it for karaoke so I didn’t realize how absolutely bare the backing track was and when I started to sing I was SEVERAL steps off key and it took me forever to find my way back to the right one. I mean, I’m not about to win any singing shows but I can decently carry a tune. But you wouldn’t have been able to tell from that lovely performance.

Oh, did I mention I was still dressed like a pirate?

The true icing on the cake was that I realized both the comedian and the ventriloquist were in the room, and Jon was chatting with them while he waited for me to go up.

My notes literally just say ‘yikes.’



[At least there wasn't a crowd]

With that, it was time to go hide in the room and pretend I didn’t exist for the rest of the night.
 

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