Now that we were legally married, we had just enough time to drop our stuff back at the room, and report to the Muster Drill. Jay and I were both legitimately fascinated with the backstage staircase we got to use to get to Deck 4. (Attractions people, you can’t take us anywhere.) I probably should have paid more attention to the drill than I did, but there were two misbehaving children next to us that were very distracting.
Both sets of parents were in our Muster Station, but my parents were already in place when we got there, and we couldn’t get to them to join them. As soon as the drill was over, we met up with my Mom and headed for Deck 11 for the Sail Away Celebration. We quickly found Emma, Josh, and Zym, and watched the show with them.
The Sail Away Celebration is super cute and high energy. I also quickly learned the Disney Cruise Line has some of the best performers in Disney. Holy vertical Batman! One of the dancers did a kick jump so high, I think he would have easily cleared my head.
We then stuck around for the dance party as the DJ started playing, and wound up on the big screen, which is how most of the others found us.
At some point I was jumping around to a Zumba song and I got scared because the floor moved underneath me, and made a noise. I had no idea I was dancing on top of the pool, until they told me!
I had been trying to find Lauren all day. She was cruising with her parents, and they had taken the Disney Cruise Line bus over from their resort, so they had arrived later than the rest of us, and I hadn’t seen her yet. I refused to move until I did, since my last message to her had been that we were on Deck 11 at the party.
Well, she finally found us, and I screamed so loudly, I think I scared Lacey. I hadn’t seen Lauren since our trip to Disneyland in 2018! (I didn’t do an article on our 2018 trip, but you can read about our adventures with Lauren in Disneyland in 2017!)
Jay and I had to duck back by the room to change clothes for the Golden Mickeys and dinner at the Animator’s Palate before we went to meet everyone at the Walt Disney Theater. Well, I had told everyone to meet on Deck 4 on the Tell-a-Cast, because I thought that would be easier with a large group, but somehow, we wound up having to split up into two groups on Deck 3. Oh well. Everyone who had wanted a seat got a seat, and we got to watch the show.
I’d heard a lot of mixed reviews about the shows on Disney Cruise Line, but I thought the Golden Mickeys were fantastic. Sadly, they don’t allow photos or videos.
A video of Bob Iger popped up with his new title of “Executive Chairman” and our entire group died laughing. This was probably about two weeks after he stepped down as CEO.
The show was about an hour, and we had just enough time to browse some of the gift shops before heading down to dinner. Apparently in all my packing I had forgotten a purse, and we found a really cute one in Sea Treasures. We bought that in addition to purchasing our “Something New”, which was a Disney Cruise Line Pandora Charm. They also had matching Captain and Sailor Spirit Jerseys that we picked up.
We got down to Animator’s Palate, and had to wait outside a few minutes for them to let us in. Someone commented on Michael and Abby’s fancy “concierge” lanyards, not realizing they had nothing to do with concierge, but came from the welcome bags, and I had to force myself not to laugh. They let us in, and Zym and I hurried to put the place cards down on the right tables, even if we couldn’t get them on the right seats. We got everyone to the right table in the end.
Animator’s Palate was the restaurant I was the most excited for, and I wound up really disappointed with it. I did a ton of research on the cruise, but for some reason I didn’t grasp that it was Turtle Talk with Crush, instead of getting to draw your own Disney character. I don’t like Turtle Talk enough to go see it at Epcot, let alone to have Crush talking over me at dinner.
For months everyone kept talking about how amazing Disney Cruise Line food is, and while it was good, it didn’t live up to the hype. I feel like I would have liked it better if I hadn’t been told so much about it. There was nothing bad about the food; it just wasn’t amazing. The Grand Reef drink was pretty good, however, and only $8.
Our waiter kept hovering and making conversation and doing magic tricks, which is cool, and what he’s supposed to do, but I just wanted to talk to our friends. I’m also a slight snob when it comes to magic tricks. I legitimately went to high school with a professional magician, and he was always practicing his tricks with us, so I’m hard to impress.
The high point of the meal came when Crush decided to talk to me, and then asked what an “Orlandoian Greeting” was.
I smirked and said, “Hey Skip!”
Now might be a good time to mention we had a total of ten current and former Jungle Cruise Skippers on this cruise, and four more current or former Walt Disney World Cast Members in this wedding party. God help this boat.
I didn’t know it was possible to see panic on a CGI turtle’s face, but Crush looked panicked at the words, “Hey Skip!”
His response was, “Wingapo!” and we all died laughing.
Wingapo is a phrase used in the movie Pocahontas, and for some reason, has turned into a way Cast Members greet each other backstage. I don’t know why this is, but I’ve never heard anyone but a Cast Member use that phrase.
Dinner was wrapping up, and we were trying to decide what we were doing next. Zym wanted us to go to the 10:30 pm Match Your Mate show to try to get on stage, and I had wanted that earlier in the day, but we were so tired. We knew the next day was going to be a long one too, so Jay headed back to the room to go to bed, and I went to wander the ship with Tess, Morgan and Scott.
Tess, Morgan, Scott and I ended up stopping by their room real quick, and I got to watch them open their Welcome Bags bag so that was nice to see their reactions. Although somehow Scott had a bunch of things in his bag, that definitely weren’t supposed to be there, like the sharpies for the guest book. Thankfully, I was there to fix it!
We wound up going to Deck 12, back behind the adults only section, and watching the sky. Tess, Morgan, and I started singing “How Far I’ll Go” from Moana, except none of us could figure out where in the song we were, so we just repeated the chorus three times.
Jay was fast asleep when I got back to the room. I set my alarm for 7:00 am, made plans to meet the girls for breakfast, and went to bed after I figured out how to work the shower.
One of my only disappointments of the whole cruise was getting to the end of the first day, and realizing we hadn’t met any characters yet. I was determined to change that going forward.
See ya next week for: Day Four Part One: The Big Day! You can check out Gary’s report on Day Three over on Coasting With Culture!
