Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: But there were three other ships in port. There was a Royal Caribbean or Norwegian. Royal Caribbean. Norwegian as a carnival ship. The carnival in the Norwegian left that night in the bad storm, Royal Caribbean. And Disney stayed. I don't know what that says, but that's just kind of a fun fact.
[00:00:14] Speaker B: Well, I wonder if their itinerary was significantly different and maybe they felt like they could get out of the bad weather and still get to where they were going.
[00:00:22] Speaker C: I think different cruise lines have a different definition of risk. That's what I think is going.
[00:00:27] Speaker A: I mean.
[00:00:27] Speaker C: Cause I've seen the videos of like, the carnival cruise ship that's like, like this and stuff coming in water, all that sort of stuff. So, like, I think there's just a different definition of risk depending on which cruise line you sail.
Welcome back, everybody, to this week's episode of the DCL duo podcast, brought to you by my path, unwinding travel and Sam, mail call, mail time, all that fun stuff again. We've got another five star review to read on the air, which I know you always excited about. This one comes from Audrey L. Robertson, who writes a really great resource. What a great, honest, detailed, knowledgeable podcast. Very helpful with like four exclamation points. So there you go.
[00:01:16] Speaker B: Ooh, four exclamation points. Next time we should go for five exclamation points. What do you think?
[00:01:21] Speaker C: Detailed and knowledgeable. I'm not so sure about honest. We strive for great Israeli. Just Sam, I'm just here. So anyway, Sam, do you want to intro our guests in our show topic for today?
[00:01:33] Speaker B: I would love to introduce our guests. Our guest is a first time guest to the show, but longtime listener who went on a cruise that maybe not everything worked out so perfectly on. But you know what? We like to cover these experiences because not everything is always going to go 100% right on your Disney cruise. So I'd love to. Welcome to the show, Gabe. Welcome, Gabe.
[00:01:57] Speaker A: Thank you so much for having me.
[00:01:58] Speaker B: Yeah, thanks for joining us. So, Gabe, why don't you tell our listeners how many cruises you've been on previously? And were they all Disney cruises? Have you sailed other lines and what kinds of itineraries and which ships have you done?
[00:02:15] Speaker A: Sure, I'd love to. So to start off, so I, this was my 11th cruise that we're talking about today. I've been on, this was the 6th on the fantasy. It was the. I've also been on the dream once, the magic twice, and the wonder twice, which makes a total of eleven.
And then my parents have been on 13 they've been on the dream one more time and the wish another. My brother's also lemon and my sister's 10th cruise with Disney.
[00:02:40] Speaker B: Oh, my goodness. So you have literally grown up on Disney Cruise line, I'm imagining.
[00:02:46] Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely. Been lucky enough to.
[00:02:49] Speaker B: Awesome. Well, this cruise, tell us what the itinerary was, what ship you were on, and this was your whole family cruising together, is that right?
[00:02:59] Speaker A: Yes. So this was my family of five cruising together. So this was a seven night, very maritime western Caribbean. On the Disney fantasy, it was a stopped at Cozumel, grand Cayman and Falmouth and Castroy Cay with two sea days. So this was our first time doing a maritime. We've done one in 2014, but this is our first time in a while doing one of the Christmas cruises.
[00:03:20] Speaker B: Yeah, well, and first time post pandemic doing the maritime, which I know there are kind of differences between what they used to do and what they've sort of brought back and not brought back. Well, let's start off with the booking process. I'm guessing your folks were the ones who are mostly taking care of that process. But anything notable about this cruise or the booking process or any difficulty in it being a maritime cruise and getting everything that you guys wanted to do?
[00:03:50] Speaker A: Yeah. So this was kind of a last minute for us kind of cruises. We do like two years in advance. My parents are celebrating their 25th wedding anniversary this past year. So then we did kind of the combo Christmas and 25th anniversary for them cruise, which was nice. It kind of came as a surprise to me. So we booked about April of 2023, I believe everything went fine. We. Because my siblings and I are order now, we did two different rooms. We were both on the 6th floor of the fantasy, but. But we were actually in room 6000, so it kind of had like a slant to it. And there were only three people for the occupancy of the room. So it was a little different for us. It was our first time up there. So it was an interesting kind of different cruise for us, for sure.
[00:04:34] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. Well, and your other cruises, did you all share one room? Was this your first time going into two separate rooms, or is that kind of typical for you all?
[00:04:43] Speaker A: So we had done a cruise in the beginning of 2022. It was like a weird six night cruise, right, for New Year's, and we got adjoining rooms. But that was just like a guarantee, made us happen to be that way. And it was cheaper, given the pandemic and the different policies in place. So that was our first time doing that since our second time doing kind of the split room just because we're bigger. And we used to do the five person veranda rooms and trying to get them on the Murphy bed and trying to make all the storage work for five people just is kind of impossible, especially for like a week long cruise.
[00:05:10] Speaker B: So that definitely makes sense. Well, let's talk about, you know, boarding. Any issues with boarding? Was this. This was out of Port Canaveral then, since you were on the fantasy, I imagine, fairly smooth boarding process.
[00:05:23] Speaker A: It was pretty smooth. It was a little weird for us. So we hadn't cruised, like I said, since the beginning of 2022. So things are kind of back to normal. But I don't know, somewhere in the mix. We got, like a later arrival time than usual, which was fine. We got a 1215 arrival time. Usually we got like an eleven with platinum, but we think with pearl and just it being a maritime cruise, just things kind of got pushed back, which is totally fine. We came a bit early. 1215. We always kind of do that just to kind of get the way we usually take a. Some kind of ban will drop us off just because we're from Pennsylvania. So it's not an easy trek to get down to Port Canaveral. We got in fine. We did get a letter when we arrived into the port saying that we would be staying in Port Canaveral overnight and leaving midday Sunday due to a big weather storm. Like a low pressure storm that was going over Florida. So it was kind of a surprise to everyone. And because of that, we also found out that our Cosmo day on that Monday would have to be canceled and changed to a sea day.
[00:06:17] Speaker B: Oh, interesting. Okay. So you were basically going to. Or you were going to embark an entire day late and just basically the fantasy was going to be your hotel in Port Canaveral.
[00:06:28] Speaker A: Yeah, it was a little weird. It was kind of interesting how that all worked out. I'm sure we'll get into it. But there were three other ships in port. There was a Royal Caribbean, a norwegian royal caribbean origin as a carnival ship. The carnival and the Norwegian left that night in the bad storm. Royal Caribbean. And Disney stayed. I don't know what that says, but that's just kind of a fun fact.
[00:06:49] Speaker B: Well, I wonder if their itinerary was significantly different and maybe they felt like they could get out of the bad weather and still get to where they were going, you know, whereas maybe, maybe royal and Disney had a similar itinerary and we're going, you know, going to, like, the same part of the Caribbean. I'm, I'm just trying to give.
[00:07:06] Speaker C: I think different cruise lines have a different definition of risk. That's what I think is going. I mean, because I've seen the videos of, like, the carnival cruise ship that's like, like this and stuff coming in water, all that sort of stuff. So, like, I think there's just a different definition of risk depending on which.
[00:07:23] Speaker A: Cruise line you sail.
[00:07:24] Speaker B: Well, I would love to know how they handled the sail away party, Gabe. I mean, you weren't sailing away on embarkation day. So did they do a sail away party and what kinds of things did they do, considering that you all were not leaving port Canaveral?
[00:07:43] Speaker A: Yeah. So that first day was just weird. I'll be straight up about that. Like, it kind of set the cruise off to be kind of a weird vibe. So we actually left about midday, twelve 01:00 on Sunday. But there was about 02:00 p.m. On Sunday, there was the same normal party for sailing away. So that worked out fine. During that first day, we also had lunch at Amherst Palate. I finally tried the Oreo cheesesteak, Sam, so thank you for that recommendation.
[00:08:10] Speaker B: You're welcome. Did you love it? Was it good?
[00:08:13] Speaker A: Yes, it was good, actually. We had a great. The lunch was a little long, but it was fine because we were just in court anyway. There wasn't a lot happening. The rain was bad. We went back to the old muster, but we were in the Walt Disney theater, so that was fine, no issues. And then we actually ended up seeing, they showed the movie wish that night in the Walt Disney theater, the new animated movie, and we actually enjoyed it. So my sister, my mom and I went to see that that night, but that was about it for the first day.
[00:08:36] Speaker B: Yeah. Well, I mean, I'm glad they didn't do the sail away party on the first day because it doesn't make sense when, I mean, it's already weird enough when they do it and you have to leave port late. Right. Like, they do it at five and then you end up on some cruises. Although most cruises you leave shortly after sail away, there are the occasions where they don't leave for, like, three or four more hours and it's just strange. But I'm glad that they didn't do it. But the one negative about that is there isn't a whole lot open and a whole lot of activities planned for that first day because people are exploring the ship. I wonder if they added the movie as, like, the evening activity or if that was already planned or what? Did you get any sense as to whether or not they were, like, adding activities for that day or even for the next morning since you weren't going to be sailing away until, you know, midday on Sunday?
[00:09:24] Speaker A: Yeah, there seemed to be a lot of, like, jumbling of activities to add some more stuff in. It was. It was just a little bit weird. I think the crew was kind of waiting to hear what was going to happen because there was this big storm coming, and people were just kind of waiting to see the effects. And it was not unprecedented, but it was definitely odd for the fantasy to stay in port like it did. So I think they were just kind of scrambling in the moment just to try to get some more activities. But I would say were a little bit more reactive than I think they could have been because I think people just kind of end up being a little bit bored, given you can do much outside and you're kind of just stuck inside for a little bit with the rain.
[00:09:56] Speaker B: Oh, yeah. With the rain, you're not going to, like, spend time on the pool deck where. And that's a big thing on embarkation day also that people, you know, there are some people who come on, they're already wearing their bathing suits, want to get into the pools and on the water slides and whatnot. So, yeah, that makes sense. Well, tell us what other parts of the itinerary and when I was talking itinerary of what parts of, like, the ports were, were changed because. So you missed Cozumel. Did you miss any other ports or were any other ports, you know, changed because of the weather situation?
[00:10:28] Speaker A: No. So Cosmo ended up being a little bit different, and I think they changed it. So usually you do. So, sorry, not Cosmo. Whenever we start, Grand Cayman ended up being a little bit different. Usually they do the Cosmo, then Grand Cayman, then Jamaica, and then a C day, and then cast away for the western caribbean sailings. But with Grand Cayman, they were going to have some issues trying to tender, but we had already missed Cozumel, so they ended up having us go, I believe it was Montego Bay, and it was about a ten minute shuttle into Georgetown, which is where they usually go into. Yeah. This kind of created some kind of scrambles with different excursions because where you had to meet kind of changed. So that was kind of interesting. But we did, we kind of heard some mumblings that Disney really tried hard to make sure that we got a spot in the smaller bay because we had missed Cosmo the day before and made a lot of guests on this week before Christmas cruise.
[00:11:17] Speaker B: Yeah. People would have been pretty upset if you missed two ports, because obviously, missing one port is bad enough. Missing two ports is worse. So. Okay, so normally in Grand Cayman, you're in one bay, and so instead, you're in a different bay. You're in Montego Bay instead. And then they're still. But they're still tendering you, right?
[00:11:39] Speaker A: Yeah. Correct. They're still tendering you. And then they had, like, a shutter service. Take us to Georgetown. So we just walked around that day. It was fun. It was actually great weather. So it was nice to finally see the sign because we had kind of been in the dark for a couple of days.
[00:11:50] Speaker B: What other changes or mishaps happened on board for you all? Because I know when you wrote to us, it sounded like there was, you know, you had a different cruise than normal, basically.
[00:12:04] Speaker A: Yeah. So I'm kind of. We kind of have the assumption, my family and I, that the kind of weather changes and just kind of everybody kind of scrambling to figure out what to do kind of had a domino effect on the other part of the cruise. They were worried about getting a cast away. Luckily, we did. But a couple weeks before, they just couldn't get into there, which happens. It's just the way the port is. But we also. We kind of had some issues with room service because everybody was ordering room service, and then my parents ended up just not having room service come one night, so they had to deal with that. Luckily, Disney was very combinating, and they ended up giving them lots of gifts and stuff in return because they just didn't end up showing up just due to the amount of, I think, demand they had that one particular night because there's a lot of motion sickness on this cruise, which also caused a lot of havoc the weeks leading up to the cruise, I believe, in a norovirus outbreak that was really bad. And we were worried about that ourselves, luckily. Like, we had different issues. I mean, good or bad, but. So we worried about that ourselves, but luckily, we ended up being okay. But I think they were still kind of doing with repercussions of the weeks before, and the kind of cruise before in this weather situation definitely did not help.
[00:13:08] Speaker B: Yeah, well, interesting you say that, because when we were on over Thanksgiving, and you probably listened to our episode on that, when we were on board the. What ship were we on, Brian? Now we're on the magic. The magic. That's right.
Yeah, of course we were on the magic because we had the issues with the. Yeah, well, with the room and the updates to the room. But anyway, there was an outbreak of norovirus, and it was really bad. We were lucky to have escaped it. And then we got sick, of course, when we were in Europe, like, just weeks later. So there. I mean, there's lots of stuff going around. Did you all get sick on board? I know you said you didn't get norovirus, but did you guys catch a cold or anything? Or COVID or anything like that?
[00:13:49] Speaker A: Luckily, no. So we actually just got a lot of motion sickness. Like I said, our room was at the very front of the shit, which you think on a normal sailing is cool, because you. I. We could see out the bow of the ship, my siblings and I. My parents went a veranda down the hall. They were doing five. Um, but we kind of got, like, the cheaper room at the front of the ship, which was fine, but it was a lot of motion sickness. And on especially rough nights, we had to close our curtain because, like, you could see the bow just going up and down. It was bad.
[00:14:15] Speaker B: So that view is actually worse sometimes having a view of the water, like, the water line going up and down, that can be. Oh, my good. Now, what did they have around the ship? Did they have, like, barf bags out in places? Cause I've seen that before.
[00:14:29] Speaker A: Yeah, they were out. You could see a lot of cleaners cleaning up people's messes from the different nights. There was one that I could tell was bad, because there was one night that my brother just ate asparagus for dinner, and it was the weirdest thing, but I was like, he must be sick of some sort because he's not one to do that. It was just. It was kind of weird. I don't know. It was. It was a weird, for sure.
[00:14:52] Speaker B: Eating asparagus for dinner. That is an. I mean, I love asparagus, but that would be an odd thing if that's all you ate for dinner.
Did you notice in the dining rooms, like, missing people? I mean, so when we were on this cruise that had the norovirus, one of the things we noticed, of course, there were people who had gotten sick in the dining room, and you'd see, like, them covering it up and trying to clean it. Right. Without bringing too much attention. But we also noticed a lot of empty tables at dinner. Did you guys experience that as well?
[00:15:24] Speaker A: Yeah, we experienced. I think it was partly seasick. Could have been partly just different illnesses on the cruise. There were a couple, like, staff now, for us, we could see some staff changes, and then the table next to us, there was just an older pair of friends, and I think a couple of them got, like, really seasick and just, like, sick in general, and they were kind of on and off. Like, different. Like, pairs of them are coming for different nights, so that could happen. The last Mary time cliche went on, we went with our grandparents, and my grandparents ended up not doing well motion sickness wise. So I understand, especially if you're ordering. Sometimes that's a issue that you may face.
[00:15:57] Speaker B: I wonder, though. I mean, this is in December, right?
So it's not. I mean, you're usually out of hurricane season, and so the seas, I mean, they're not maybe the smoothest in December, but they're not known for being sort of the roughest. Did you hear anything from the crew about whether or not this was sort of, like, normal or. Or abnormal for them?
[00:16:21] Speaker A: The crew had said there was probably one of the rougher cruises, like, recently for them. I guess there's just, like, a big, like, low pressure storm that went through Florida, and it kind of affected the seas around it, which was difficult for us to kind of. We were kind of worried about a little bit. Luckily, everything worked out. But I feel like before any cruise, like, for our last cruise, there was, like, some COVID issues beforehand, like the cruise before, and I kept being like, very, like, not. Oh, no. Being like, we should keep aware of this, that sort of thing. So for this, I kept looking at the weather being like, okay, let's keep an eye on this. Going to pack our raincoats and that sort of thing and pack our Jeremy. We got a lot of Jeremy to get ready.
[00:16:56] Speaker B: So now, did you end up having good weather at any of your ports? I mean, where was the entire cruise really? Just, like, rainy and not. Not good in that way.
[00:17:06] Speaker A: Um, so, yeah, so basically, from days from Graham Cayman on, it was great. We also were in Jamaica, which was pretty nice weather. That was crazy day. I can go into that eventually, but that was a good weather day as well. Castaway was kind of cloudy, but our second sea day was actually pretty good. But it was really windy still. That was the one thing for sure that made it hard, even on the pool deck on the nice days.
[00:17:27] Speaker B: Yeah. So you're. Yeah. You're not really wanting to lay out too much on the pool deck, um, or swim in the pool if the wind is really going. Did they shut down the pool deck on any of those windy days? I know. Cause they tend to, if you look at the pools on some of those really windy days, like, you'll see, like, it sloshed from side to side and you'll see the kid soup kind of moving back and forth. Um, did they, did they have to close the pool, the pools down for any of that?
[00:17:51] Speaker A: Yeah, at the beginning, the pools were pretty much closed. Like, I remember, like, the nets that I kept seeing because they were simply just closed. And my brother, it was kind of little, kind of not great. My brother likes to do a lot of the, like mini golf and the basketball and stuff up on deck, and that just wasn't happening. Like, it was rough. And for that stuff, like, they'll literally just like, not have the basketballs out. They won't have the golf clubs out for, like, the dream of the fantasy class ships. So that was a little wet for him, for sure, just to try to get through those rough sea days and not really doing the things that he, like, loved to do on cruises.
[00:18:21] Speaker B: So he's going to have to go on the wish or convince your folks to go on the wish, because on the wish, you can still do some of those things indoors in that hero zone.
[00:18:31] Speaker A: Yeah, that's nice. That's a nice perk for sure.
[00:18:33] Speaker B: So let's talk. You mentioned Grand Cayman was kind of a crazy day. So you have, obviously, you're in a different bay. You're going to be tendering into Grand Cayman. Tell us about that day. What was weird or crazy about it that day?
[00:18:46] Speaker A: They kept having issues with excursions. It seemed like we tendered in and out fine, but people had issues like meeting up for excursions because you had to either meet on the ship or if it was a later excursion or excursions kept going kind of like shifted. At least that's, we heard anecdotally from a lot of the guests we were with on the tender boats. You were just trying to figure out how to make stuff work. But besides that, they made the day work, which is important given that we cancel plaza mouth.
[00:19:09] Speaker B: Yeah, that makes sense. Well, let's talk about some of the highlights from the cruise, because obviously there are some. There's some negative, but there's always some positive. I mean, where there, you mentioned the room service. The room service was ordered, but it never came for your parents. And so I imagine they were seasick or something and didn't want to go out into the dining room that night. So what kinds of things did Disney, did Disney cruise line do to make it up to guests or make it up to your family specifically?
[00:19:39] Speaker A: They tried their best to accommodate, like with my hatch, with the room service issue. They kept bringing, like, treats. And that sort of thing each day, which was very nice of them. They were just trying to kind of pick up, I don't know, like lost pieces with some of the issues that were going on. We did hear, I don't know, just kind of anecdotally, people were just not happy with the compensation. But I know, Brian, you've talked about it before, like, with weather, there's nothing that Disney can do. I think they did the best with what they could. I think they could have maybe been more proactive with some of the issues and thought a little bit more out about how to add more activities inside because that was kind of an issue because things like bingo were very crowded. But I think in terms of highlights, I think we just had, it was a good time of just like family time together that we really enjoyed and we spent a lot of time, ended up in the adult only area, which was really nice for my family, just kind of hang out together. My sister lives in California, so we don't all, I'm in college currently, so we don't all get to see each other. So it's a nice way during our breaks to kind of be together. So, you know, I was going to.
[00:20:34] Speaker C: I was gonna say, um. So, Gabe, you mean did they actually offer some kind of compensation? Sorry if I missed that. Did they, do they provide like an onboard credit or anything?
[00:20:43] Speaker A: Yeah, no, there is nothing of that sort. I think there are just too many people to do that sort of thing with.
[00:20:48] Speaker C: So I know we've had, we've talked in the past about this, but just for new listeners out there, like, just put my soapbox out for 1 second and stand on it, which is just, you know, read the cruise contract that you're signing.
Gabe, I think you mentioned this, like, weather is weather, and as much as Disney is like a huge company, they can't control for that. And so there's only so much they can, they can do. And so in my experience, they're typically not going to compensate you for a missed port because of weather. Now, the last show we did this around, or talked about this around was when the, I forget which ship it was. And was it the fantasy that got trapped in Nassau due to an engine issue?
[00:21:25] Speaker B: It was wish. It was.
[00:21:26] Speaker C: Wish. That's right.
[00:21:27] Speaker B: But it was an engine issue, it wasn't a weather issue. And so they got trapped overnight. And NASA.
[00:21:32] Speaker C: Yeah, and I would say it's slightly different when the problem is within Disney's control. And if I'm remembering correctly, they offered compensation on that cruise, but people didn't like it. They didn't think it was enough. Right. I think they offered a future cruise credit, and there were a bunch of people sort of saying, like, why may never sell Disney again because of this problem they had. Which, okay, fine. Or it was, you know, this is the only cruise I'm ever going to go on. I understand there, when it's their problem, they should do something to help you out. What that something is, you know, just is going to depend on what the issue is. Uh, but for weather, I would say, you know, look at it sailing at particular times of the year, and the weather's becoming even more and more unpredictable at normal times of the year. Like, sometimes you just gotta, you know, roll with it a little bit. So, uh, anyway. Yeah, yeah.
[00:22:18] Speaker A: Um, also, in terms of highlights, I wanted to highlight, we haven't gotten to Jamaica yet. We had a fun experience there. With the amount of people there. I don't know. I can go into that for me, too, Sam.
[00:22:28] Speaker B: But, yeah, no, we'd love to hear. Tell us about. Yeah, tell us about Jamaica.
[00:22:33] Speaker A: So we did. I don't know if you guys are aware that Dunn's River Falls ultimate adventure excursion.
[00:22:39] Speaker B: We have heard about this excursion. We have not been to Jamaica ourselves, or I've never been to Jamaica. We've not been on to Jamaica on a cruise. We've heard really good things about this excursion. Yeah, tell us about it.
[00:22:51] Speaker A: Yeah. So it's a kind of, you do a ziplining, you do waterfall, the dunge river falls themselves. You do a lunch, and they do it through a company called Checkra Tours. So they've been working with them a lot. We just had kind of another weird experience that ended up being a weird highlight for my brother. So we arrived at 745 at the Walt Disney theater, like you do for those kind of bigger excursions. We waited for a while, but we kept seeing people sign waivers, and we had, like, the most adventurous thing, and we just didn't have a waiver to sign. So that was really interesting. And then they had a scam to leave. Realized that we did not have waivers. They made us turn around. There were, like, 75 of us quickly signed five waivers. Like, it was weird. And then we eventually did walk off the ship. It was the debacle to get us kind of on the bus. And off the bus it was a mess for 75 people. There was lots of traffic. There was the state of 1 hour, ten minute bus ride to get there. It was a very busy day in Jamaica, though. There are five ships in all of Jamaica. Which is a busy day. And a lot of them were going to Duns river falls. So it took us about 2 hours to get there. So in about after eleven, they had us throw up to ziplining. All like 51 of us was on the bus that I was on. They told us that we couldn't do ziplining because it was too full. We went down to Dungeon River Falls. It was very fun. It was ton of fun because I had done this excursion before in 2019 like my mom and I had. So we kind of led the package with all of us through these. Duns River Falls is. You definitely need, it's a, it can be a rough adventure for some people, depending on your mobility level. Definitely a heads up for that. But we were running really late with all of this and then we, all, 51 of us, after we finally got through the falls, had to go through the zip line, which was kind of left to get 51 people quickly through the zipline because we were supposed to be back by 215 and we didn't get done with the zipline until after 230. So we were running late. But usually there's also a lunch with this particular excursion. It's called Stachis is where they usually have lunch because we were running late. Our great, she read a great guide. I will say her name was Braise Ann. She kind of called ahead because she knew we were going to be busy that day. Had us give our orders already on the bus, which actually ended up being perfect. So we ate our lunch on the bus and then we ended up getting a police escort from scotchies for about ten minutes and we made a two lane road three. Having our big 51 person bus go through this, this traffic to get back to the ship we were speeding through. You know that scene in Harry Potter with the bus?
[00:25:19] Speaker B: The night's bus?
[00:25:20] Speaker A: The night bus. Yeah, it felt like that. So it was kind of a crazy little adventure that we went on. It still took us a while, but we were speeding past. It was kind of terrifying in the moment, but my brother was having the best time. He found him so, like kind of crazy and fun that we were just on this, like, crazy bus back. And then we ended up getting pulled over about three minutes from the port because we were going so fast and getting a ticket. Our bus got a ticket like three minutes from the port and granted, this was like 415 and the boat was supposed to leave at 445, so we were all stressing, but luckily we did get make it back in time.
[00:25:54] Speaker C: So wait, they gave you a police escort? Part of the way and then dropped and then some police officer pulled you over down the road. That seems like a massive failure. Yep, exactly.
[00:26:03] Speaker A: It was crazy. Yeah, it was a weird day. So, um, yeah, that was. But we kind of have. We all, like, it was almost like collective trauma, but in like the best vacation way. I don't know.
[00:26:15] Speaker B: It was.
[00:26:15] Speaker A: It was a good time, but it was definitely. It was something else. It was the first time we've had that kind of crazy excursion we've done. We did the same excursion in 2019, so it's not like we had been foreign to this kind of excursion before. But it was a little crazy for us, though.
[00:26:30] Speaker B: Well, before I move on to my next question, I just want to tell our listeners Brian is going to drop off the rest of this recording. The reason you won't hear his voice is he has to take a work call because we had to shift the time of this recording because of our own stuff. And so I'm going to let Brian go and continue on. Just Gabe and I.
[00:26:54] Speaker C: Hey Edcl duo fans, we get the question all the time. Should I use a travel agent to book my next Disney cruise or should I just book with Disney directly? And I'm going to tell you, you have that question in the back of your mind right now. You should stop what you're doing and head over to mypathunwinding.com dclduo. The folks over at Mypath Unwinding provide an amazing service. They are so knowledgeable and so friendly. We rely on them ourselves to book our family vacations and they provide an amazing service. And the best part is you don't pay anything extra for it. Disney, other tour providers and other cruise lines have built the cost of their commission into their pricing. So if you're booking directly, you are just paying that money back to the provider when you could be spending it on the kind of service you would get. From my path unwinding travel. You've heard from their agents on our show. They are so knowledgeable, so giving of their time. They know so much about Disney Cruise line, sailing, concierge, other cruise lines, other all inclusive vacations and adventures by Disney that if you have a vacation in mind, they are the ones to book it for you. So again, head over to mypath unwinding.com dclduo so they know we sent you their way.
[00:27:56] Speaker A: Thanks.
[00:27:56] Speaker C: My path unwinding for sponsoring the show. And with that, back to our episode.
[00:28:02] Speaker B: So Gabe, why don't you tell us how or tell me since Brian has left us, why don't you tell me, how were your other port stops? I know you had Castaway. Did we have one? Did you have one other one, or am I.
[00:28:16] Speaker A: No, it was just castaway because Castaway got canceled.
[00:28:19] Speaker B: Okay, so, castaway, tell me about the. How many? Or did it take you a long time to get docked at Castaway? I know you mentioned that they were worried it was going to be difficult and that they hadn't been able to dock on, you know, some previous sailings, but did it take longer than usual to dock? Did it take multiple attempts or how did that go?
[00:28:38] Speaker A: I mean, actually, I think we were maybe delayed about 30 minutes, but besides that, it was fine. And we actually were able to. Yes, we were delayed because we got, like, into, like, a walk off before the excursions started because they, like, pushed those back a little bit. So it worked out well for us because we are. We've done casting many times, so we don't really do the excursions anymore. Sometimes we did about a bike there. The weather was pretty good. It was a little cloudy, but it was actually pretty enjoyable. It was a good highlight at the end of the cruise, for sure.
[00:29:03] Speaker B: Yeah. Well, and I feel like, you know, any day at Castaway is a good day. Unless it's raining all day. Like, you can get showers and it's fine, you know, if it clears up, you know, then. Then it's fine. And frankly, a little bit cloudy is not terribly bad at castaway because it can also just be really, really hot there, so.
[00:29:23] Speaker A: Yeah, for sure.
[00:29:24] Speaker B: Yeah. So you guys are just hang out at castaway. You mentioned you did. You rented the bikes to do a little bike ride around the island as well.
[00:29:32] Speaker A: Yeah. That's one thing that we've actually found that we really like to do now is we'll kind of go to the beach in the morning, we'll eat lunch, and then we'll take a little bike ride before heading back when it's empty in the afternoon. Since you've been to castaway? A lot of times. My parents, like the merch at castaway, like to see the different things since the last time we've been there. We're a big turvus cup family, so we like to collect the different services that they have on the ship and on castaways. So, yeah, that's how we do it.
[00:29:57] Speaker B: Yeah, they always have different ones. I think people don't realize, like, the merchandise you get on the ship is all, like, branded Disney cruise line, and it might be branded for your particular ship. So for this. In this ship, you know, being the fantasy. But then on castaway, there is merchandise that is specifically castaway key branded and sometimes even some five k merchandise as well. And, of course, sand toys and things that you would use on the beach. But, yeah, like, looking at. I like going and shopping. She sells seashells and by the seashore, the two shops. People may think those are. I'm not making it up, but for those who haven't been, those are the names of the two shops. Now, you all are. I mean, I know your parents, kids, but you are all, you know, over 18 in your family. Right? So were you able to spend some time at Serenity Bay?
[00:30:45] Speaker A: We did not. So we could spend some time at Serenity Bay if we wanted to. My brother's actually 17, so he wasn't old enough to do that. We don't. My parents had gone, so my parents went on the wish last November, I think, in 2022, if I believe. Right, and they didn't love it there. So we decided to stay on the family beach, especially because my brother typically is old enough to go over there. So we decided to stay on the family beach.
[00:31:08] Speaker B: Well, I will tell you, I mean, we. When Nathan is with us, we have to go to the family beach anyway, since he's only ten. But I actually prefer the beach. I think the beach is a nicer beach at the family beach than the one at serenity. I mean, it's been a while since I've. To be fair, it's been a while since we've been to the Serenity bay beach, because it's been a while since we have cruised and gone to Castaway without Nathan.
And, you know, the day that we're on Castaway, we don't tend to put him in the kids club like he. Even though he likes the kids club, we like to spend the day as a family together out on the beach, and so we just haven't had the opportunity. But the last time we were there, I feel like so much of the beach had eroded away. It was like, such a narrow, like, strip of sand, and it was really kind of, like, steep. Very different than at the family beach, which most of it is, you know, kind of pretty flat and has, like, a slow slope down. Yeah, yeah.
[00:32:04] Speaker A: I think that was their issue, is why we decided not to go over there.
[00:32:08] Speaker B: Well, you mentioned the adult only areas.
You know, as a young adult, do you, like, go to the adult areas with your folks? Do you go, like, I don't know, with the 1820s society, like, how is it that. How do you enjoy your cruise?
[00:32:23] Speaker A: Yeah, I had tried. I went to the first year of the 1820s society and Ford scholarship. I'm an RA at my university, so I deal with a lot of like, those ten age kids. And I was obviously just looking for a break kind of on my own. So I had bought a good book. So I just kind of enjoyed a good book out in the sun on the nice days. And that's kind of how I enjoy that area for me. And with my sister and my mom especially, we kind of, my dad likes to kind of walk around and do that kind of stuff, but my sister, my mom and I like to just kind of relax and read a book and kind of soak up the sun when we can. So that's kind of our way of using the adult area.
[00:32:57] Speaker B: Now, does your brother go to the vibe club now that, you know, he's a 17 year old? I'm sure you have gone to those clubs in the past. Obviously, you can't once you're, for those who haven't ever traveled with kids or teenagers, once you're child reaches the age of 18, they're no longer allowed in the edge club. It's, it's strictly for teenagers under the age of 18. But they do have 1820 society, which is just really like a group that meets up. It's, they don't, they don't have their own, like, club or, you know, space, but they do tend to, you know, have meetups and activities to do around. Yeah. So, yeah. What is your, was your brother into the, the vibe crowd?
[00:33:40] Speaker A: Yeah, he said it was, he didn't love it. He went a couple times, but I know people that do. I think it just depends on the cruise that you're on. We were on like a really busy cruise, and it was kind of just an interesting crowd because it was the week before Christmas. There was a group of guys, I guess, just in the club who just kind of were clouding havoc throughout the ship. We'd heard anecdotally, and those were there like a couple of times that he was there. He was. So I ended up kind of hanging out with him. We could do like, shuffleboard and we ended up playing mini golf. So the two of us, like, when we can do those kind of other activities, we like to do them just on the screws. It was kind of hard a couple of days.
[00:34:12] Speaker B: Now, do you go to the evening adult activities like batch your mate or pop or majority rules or, you know, any of the other adult game show type shows or frankly, the adult entertainment shows where, you know, for example, the ventriloquist or juggler or what have you.
[00:34:30] Speaker A: Yeah. So I'm actually glad you asked because I was like, these were a highlight for us. We didn't think there were enough of them, just given them out of people and just the weather we had. But, well, we went to the different trivias. There's a lot of different trivias between the two dining times. We really enjoyed those. My parents especially, like the, like eighties and nineties trivia with the music. Those are really fun. My sister and I, they actually did. They have a, so we had Ashley as our cruise director, who was the first on the wish. She was great. And then we also had Sean as an assistant cruise director, and he's very into musicals and Broadway and so is my sister. So we ended up going to that trivia and we almost won. We were very close and it was kind of unique. And they were kind of trying out some new things, which I think is important because I think, at least for us and for cruisers who have been on for a long time, sometimes it's difficult. Sometimes you get the same trivias over and over, similar topics. So they did actually, trivia wise, and a lot of them, they're often crowded, but I think they had a good amount of topics, if nothing else.
[00:35:25] Speaker B: And what did you think about, like the main stage performers doing their adult shows? Like in the tube? Yeah, the tube. I was trying to remember which ship you're on, but yeah, in the tube. Did you get to go see any of those shows as well?
[00:35:41] Speaker A: Yeah, we saw a couple of them we actually watched with. Before the Broadway trivia, there was also the Broadway visiting artist I know you talk about a lot.
[00:35:50] Speaker B: Yes. I love that. Did you go to that?
[00:35:52] Speaker A: Yes. So we caught the last half of it.
He played Jafar in Aladdin. I forget the man's name. I apologize. But he was in Anastasia on Broadway and he was in a bunch of shows on the west end, so he was very interesting. At first I was like. Cause it kind of came in halfway through. We were like, who is this? But then we finally got it. It was a cool kind of backstage thing because in our past cruises, like the sisters gotten to see on the magic when they did, like the twice charm show, my sister got to see a backstage thing because we went on a special canadian cruise like six years ago ish. So we've done those kind of fun things. So it's cool to get those kind of background with the crew, for sure, which is an important thing. I think it's cool to highlight their abilities, for sure.
[00:36:33] Speaker B: Absolutely. I love when they do that. They don't always do them on the shorter cruises. They tend to do it on the longer cruises. But all of the ships in the Disney fleet. Usually, I say usually because I'm sure there are times when they don't, but they usually have one Broadway visiting artist who, if you've heard me talk about this before, is somebody who has been either in a national tour, has been on Broadway, or has been in a production in the west end in London. So, yeah, fantastic performers. And they will often do a daytime sometimes, and sometimes also an evening performance in, like, evolution or the tube or azure or fathoms, depending upon what ship you're on, or Luna and do like a short performance. When I say short, usually like 30 minutes, highlighting, you know, Disney songs and non Disney songs as well. And so. And they're usually just super duper talented and really fun to watch. Yeah. What, what are. Were there any other highlights for you? Um, you know, on this cruise? I mean, I'm thinking food. We, you know, we haven't talked about food, and food is always, I mean, we love to talk about food and food is always a thing, um, on a cruise, whether you're on Disney or any other cruise line. But, yeah. Any highlights and do you do any of the adult dining?
[00:37:52] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:37:52] Speaker B: Perfect.
[00:37:53] Speaker A: Actually, this is one of our highlights for sure. On the cruise, we went to Palo, so we don't like you guys. I think we don't like the pirate night menu. Great. It's not our favorite. So decided to do Palo. My brother got, I think he just got room service that night because he's not old enough to do Palo. So we did.
[00:38:09] Speaker B: Poor kid, by himself one more year and then he'll be able to go to Palo, too.
[00:38:15] Speaker A: Yeah, for sure. But since we were platinum, it was nice to kind of get on the cruise and enjoy that dinner. I had gotten the Dover soul, which is my first time getting that at Palau, which was actually really good. And then we, of course, got the calamari and, like, the chocolate souffle and that sort of thing. We had a great dinner there. We had a great service. One key thing, not for me, but for my parents and for my sister, they don't. We had, like, a weird thing with our grand Cayman day where we left later. And they can't serve alcohol until they're out of certain waters. They can only serve it like 1 bar. And that bar is. I think it's the one that's in the adult only area from my understanding. So my parents were looking to get a drink before the dinner, and we couldn't. We had to, like, kind of wait a little bit because of just how the ship was that day with the weird stuff after Graham came in. So sometimes you have those weird kind of flukes where the timing doesn't end up great if they're delays or that sort of thing.
[00:39:04] Speaker B: Oh, interesting. Did you go see the shows in the Walt Disney theater? I always, of course, have to ask that because that's one of my favorite things on board Disney cruises.
[00:39:14] Speaker A: Yeah, we did. So we saw wish, like I said, wishing to show we didn't end up seeing. I wanted to see frozen, but the seasickness was really bad that night, so we decided to skip out. My sister and I ended up seeing, oh, my sister, my brother, my mom and I ended up seeing Aladdin. And we enjoyed it. We had seen it right before, in 2019. We'd seen it right before. They, like, changed it up, I believe, with the new movie that come out. So we enjoyed it. It wasn't, like, our favorite show by any means, but we thought it was good. I remember we saw frozen in 2022, and we enjoyed that show a lot, too, just like with the, we had weird nights with the seasickness. So sometimes this stuff didn't work out as great as we'd hoped.
[00:39:50] Speaker B: Oh, yeah. I mean, sitting in the theater is probably one of, like, the worst experiences. When you're really seasick, you really, you see the curtains move and then the stage is feeling like it's moving. You know, it's. Yeah. I think sitting still in a theater, unfortunately, during, you know, during bad weather, is, is rough. And I have noticed on occasions when I've been in the theater run, there's more movement. Not, thankfully, not as much movement as what you're describing, but I've noticed even they have to sometimes alter the show. So, like, I'm not sure if they would have. Well, they might have. For Aladdin, there's some parts in the show, I'm thinking, when he's going into the cave of wonders where he's on wires, right? So Aladdin is on wires, going up the stairs or down the stairs, I can't remember, into the cave of wonders. And so I've seen, you know, in other shows where they've had to sort of alter those parts and not, you know, not have a person hanging on wires.
I'm thinking on the wish, goofy can't hang on wires when there's a lot of movement of the ship. So things did you notice anything, like, different. I know it had been a while since you'd seen Aladdin, but did you notice anything like that, or did you hear of anything like that from the other shows?
[00:41:09] Speaker A: We didn't notice anything. I mean, I guess with the wires, that makes sense. Like, things were definitely a little off. I think for safety wise, they definitely were changing things a little bit. Another fun fact, I guess, on longer cruises, I've found they've started to do those, like Aladdin, the frozen, those kind of clever shows three times a day. So those are really important, especially, like, it kind of disperses the kids, depending on how, I don't know, their activities are for the day. So I found that was actually great because we were able to get. There's, like, side balconies that we like to look out of, so we were to get one of those because it wasn't necessarily as busy as they always can be if it's only two shows.
[00:41:44] Speaker B: That's a really good point, Gabe. I love when they add a matinee, and it's not because I go to the matinee. I usually don't go to the matinee. I usually go to the early. The early show because I've got late dinner. But it definitely disperses the crowd. It makes it so it's not. The theater is not as full for either of the late shows because a lot of the families have gone. Yeah. During the early shows, Gabe. Well, you know, it sounds like despite a lot of issues, it was a good cruise. I'm not going to say it was a great cruise because, I mean, seasickness is no fun. And, you know, was. Was there anything you said you guys use dramamine. Was there anything that you wish you had done differently or just. Did you. I just wish that the weather didn't turn out the way it was. I mean, would you have prepared in a different way, like getting a patch? You know, the. The patch, the seasickness patch or anything like that. Did you see other people faring better with that? Maybe. I don't know.
[00:42:44] Speaker A: I think a pouch could have been a better option for us. We just, like, we haven't really had issues before, so this is our first time really dealing with it. We prepared a little bit, but mostly towards the end. It would almost, like, kind of bite you at the end because, like, you wouldn't like you towards the end of the cruise. You're like, oh, we're doing good. Like, we were feeling better, and then suddenly the ship would be walking and you'd be like, okay. And honestly got some points just because the room that we had at the front of the ship where, like, we decided to just, like, try not to be in our room, which kind of sucked. But, like, it was just hard to stay in there for a long time if you weren't sleeping just because of the location. I think that's important for people, especially if you're doing, like, hurricane season or that sort of thing. I wouldn't recommend anywhere, like, towards the very front of the ship because it can be rough, depending on how bad the seas are for your given cruise, so.
[00:43:29] Speaker B: Well, and that's a good point. You know, we tell people usually the back of the ship is kind of the worst for movement, but that's really because of the engine movement. That's not. That's not sea movement. The front is probably worse for sea movement, you know? So if you're. If you've got, like, pretty calm seas, it's going to be the worst in the back. If you've got rough seas, it's going to be the worst in the front. And then also not great in the back. I think really, if you're somebody who really has a bad bout of seasickness, the middle is going to be your best bet. I mean, regardless of the sea conditions, it's.
[00:44:03] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. For sure.
[00:44:05] Speaker B: Well, anything that we haven't talked about, Gabe, before, I let you go for the day, and thank you for coming on the show.
[00:44:13] Speaker A: Just quickly. It was a very maritime cruise. It was obviously the week before Christmas, and I was talking to my family about it last year, reflecting compared to before we gone on one in 2014, we thought the decorations were still great and that sort of thing, but we just remember there were more activities surrounding the holiday season and this cruise, at least in particular. There were not many. We had the new holiday deck party, which I just saw glimpses of. It seemed fun. It seemed like a good addition, but I don't know if that ended up cutting, like, some of the more, I don't know, smaller kind of activity, like the gingerbread houses and like that sort of thing, just to kind of bring more cheer. They had, like, Christmas music throughout, but I heard that italian Christmas donkey song probably, like 30 times. It was driving me insane.
[00:44:56] Speaker B: Dominic's the donkey. I'm with you, Gabe. I hate that song. And you hear it over and over again on the ship. I don't know why that's in the road. They should just take it out. It's just terrible.
[00:45:06] Speaker A: It was like the same. It felt like the same like short rotation, like constantly. So if anything I've asked maybe just like kind of to add some other. I don't know, add some. Maybe add back some Christmas Disney music. Excuse me. Just to kind of make it more of a complete thing because it was a little. Sometimes it was a little rough in that way. Just more activities. They had the Santa Claus, they had the new character outfits, which we met some of them in those. It seemed like there was definitely some lacking elements in those. They give you a card, I believe, for all of the seasonal reasons that are. Those activities specifically made sure to note that at the end when you're doing your surveys and that sort of thing, because it was a little disappointing in that way, especially because of the upcharge. It didn't feel like you got this value out of it for the seasonal opportunities and that sort of thing.
[00:45:51] Speaker B: Yeah, that's a good point.
They used to do cookie decorating, I think, and gingerbread housemaking. And they have not brought that back, as far as I can tell, on any of the ships. And while they've brought back, like, you know, misses Claus doing story time, it seems like it's only, only happens a couple of times. They're typically only in their Christmas outfits, like once or twice on the cruise, always once, at least on one of the days. But then they might have, like, one other time where they're in their outfits. But you're right, there isn't a ton of Christmas stuff. They. They could do more, like Christmas themed trivia. They only usually do one Christmas themed trivia. They could do more Christmas themed crafts. I think they only do one.
[00:46:38] Speaker A: Right.
[00:46:38] Speaker B: Like, there's. There are definitely opportunities for Disney to improve, particularly when they're. They're giving, you know, that big. That big up charge. Gabe, I, you know, I would be remiss if I didn't give you at least an opportunity to do a little rapid fire. I know Brian left us, so I'm going to have to introduce myself on rapid fire. But as you know, this is the part of the show where I'm going to ask you some questions about your favorites, and you might get some arbitrary judgment from me about your favorites. I'm going to ask you first some Disney favorites, and then I'm going to ask you some Disney cruise line favorites. You are now a platinum cruiser. Welcome to the world of platinum. And so you have enough experience that you should be able to answer these questions super easily. But we're gonna start off with who is your favorite Disney character?
[00:47:26] Speaker A: It's technically two. My favorite is chip and Dale.
[00:47:28] Speaker B: Ah, two. I love it. That's, listen, that's a perfect answer. Even though it's two. I totally accept that because they come as a pair. All right, what is your favorite Disney movie?
[00:47:39] Speaker A: That's a good question. I really like the emperor's new groove. That's kind of, it's a weird one, but I like that one a lot.
[00:47:44] Speaker B: That is a weird one. But, you know, people, people love that one. Okay. Your favorite Disney song, hawaiian roller coaster.
[00:47:51] Speaker A: Ride from Lula and Stitch is actually my favorite because I remember hearing it on the cruises a lot. Like when you walk through the hallways, not on this last one, but in past ones for sure.
[00:47:59] Speaker B: I love that. Okay, what is your favorite Disney cruise line stage show?
[00:48:05] Speaker A: I think it's frozen. I do like frozen. I didn't see it this time, but when I saw it the last time, it was very good.
[00:48:10] Speaker B: It is really good. It's a really top notch, I would say. Okay, favorite onboard activity?
[00:48:17] Speaker A: Usually it's bingo. Maybe not this past cruise because it was pretty crowded, but we really like bingo. We've been a bingo family for a long time, so awesome.
[00:48:25] Speaker B: All right, favorite rotational dining.
[00:48:28] Speaker A: I'm going to go with animators palette, but I'm going to give an honorable mention. There used to be a restaurant called karaoke on the magic that I actually liked a lot. So that was only there for a short little spite of time. I thought it was a fun, different theming, but yeah, anime was palette. A good sound.
[00:48:43] Speaker B: Nice. I think you're the only one who will like to carry.
Maybe not the only one. I'm just teasing, but it didn't last very long as you mentioned. So, um. Okay, favorite bar space on a Disney cruise?
[00:48:58] Speaker A: I really like the tube. Just Disney had a lot of activities there this time. Um, I think it's cool. I know it's different names on different cruises, but the one with the big stage, not but like the smaller stage for those kind of performances. I just like the London theme that's on the fantasy with the two.
[00:49:12] Speaker B: I do too. I would say the theming is really, really good. I like the Europa theming in general.
I think it's really well done and better than the alternatives on the dream. All right, we got to talk food. A favorite sweet item and a favorite savory item. Start off with the sweet. What's a favorite sweet item on Disney cruise?
[00:49:35] Speaker A: My favorite sweet item is definitely the chocolate lava cake. I like the chocolate souffle at Palo, but the chocolate lava cake, we had it on the last night, my brother and my dad and I all got two portions because we just love it so much. It was a good end of the cruise, so it worked out that way.
[00:49:49] Speaker B: Oh, perfect. All right. A favorite savory item.
[00:49:52] Speaker A: I really like the ahi tuna tower in the enchanted garden. I don't know. Sometimes I'll get two of those, too. I like that.
[00:49:59] Speaker B: I don't like.
[00:49:59] Speaker A: I don't get seafood a lot in central Pennsylvania, so it's a nice little change.
[00:50:04] Speaker B: I don't understand why you wouldn't get good seafood in central Pennsylvania. Not to mention there's no water surrounding you.
Love it. Okay. All right, important question. You have. We have or have not been on the wish yet? I can't remember.
[00:50:18] Speaker A: I have not been yet.
[00:50:19] Speaker B: You have not. Okay. But you have been on the magic and you have been on the other ships. So aqua dunk versus aqua duck.
[00:50:26] Speaker A: Aqua duck. I did not like the one time I was on the dunk.
[00:50:30] Speaker B: It's terrifying. Okay, important other question. Which one is your favorite ship?
[00:50:36] Speaker A: I think it's the fantasy. We're. We may be switching it up soon, but I don't. The fantasy. We've been on six times out of the eleven of my eleven, so I think it's a pretty solid one for us.
[00:50:46] Speaker B: Awesome. Okay. And the last question of rapid fire always is, what is your bucket list cruise? If you could go on. If you could go on a Disney cruise anywhere in the world. Where are you going?
[00:50:59] Speaker A: We want to do a mediterranean cruise. There are always crazy prices, but I think it would be a really cool experience, for sure. So that's the one that is a bucket list in the future. We'll see, though, with that cast and club bull. We'll see how that works out.
[00:51:11] Speaker B: Yeah. Well, I will tell you, you know, we. We believe, and this has not been announced by Disney yet, but we believe, based on the itinerary releases that precede 20 summer 2025, that the fantasy will be going over to Europe instead of the dream. So, you know, you can quote me on that. I am betting on that, that that's going to happen. So your favorite ship might actually be where you want to go. So, I don't know, start Steve for sure. Yeah.
All right. Well, thank you so much, Gabe, for reaching out to us and agreeing to be on the show to tell us about how sometimes cruises don't always go how we expect. Sometimes not everything goes how we'd want it to be, but they're still, you know, enjoyable parts to a Disney cruise. Even when I don't know. Sometimes you have to miss dinner because you're seasick.
[00:52:03] Speaker A: Yes. Thank you so much. Thank you for having me. Sam and Brian as well.
[00:52:10] Speaker C: Well, a big thank you to all of you out there for listening this week. We really, really appreciate it. Please be sure to subscribe to the podcast so you can keep getting great content from the DCL duo each week. We'd also love it if you'd head over to Apple podcasts and leave us a five star review. If you hit those five stars, that's great. If you leave us a written review along with a five star review, we will be sure to read it on the air at the end of one of our main episodes. If you're hovering over anything less than five stars, we really want you to reach out to us so we can take your feedback. Best way to do that? Head to dclduo.com to find all the ways to connect with us. It links to our podcast, our vlog. Our blog has all the ways you can connect with us on social media, has our Etsy store where you can find our fun beach bags and magnets that we designed as enthusiasts of each of the Disney cruise line ships. Has a link off to our Patreon if you'd like to help support the show. We really, truly appreciate each and every one of our patreons for helping to support the show. Each and every month has a link off to our show sponsor, my path unwinding where you can get more information about booking a fabulous vacation, which also really helps to support our show. All the things are there, including a way you can sign up to be a guest on the show if you'd like to share your Disney cruise line experience. Most importantly, you can always email us at dclduo mail if you'd like to connect with us, or you can call our voicemail line if you'd like to leave us a message. We love to include the voices of our listeners in our show. Just dial 40 241-355-5590 that's 402-413-5590 and that will head straight to our Google voice voicemail line. The DCL duo podcast is not affiliated with Disney Cruise Line, the Disney Company, or the Disney family of theme parks. The views expressed on the show are solely those of the individuals on the podcast and in no way reflect the views of the Disney Company or Disney Cruise line. If you have questions about a Disney Cruise or a Disney vacation, please contact Disney directly or your own travel agent or the great folks over at Mypath unwinding travel. Thanks again for listening. And we'll see you next time for another fabulous Disney adventure with the DCL duo. Goodnight.
