[00:00:00] Speaker A: It is interesting with smaller ships because larger ships, everybody has one job except for their emergency side job, their emergency muster station job, or whatnot. But otherwise they all have the same.
[00:00:12] Speaker B: Well, it's funny. The one guy with the unique job was the trainer and nobody wanted to see him. So there you go.
[00:00:16] Speaker A: That's true.
[00:00:19] Speaker C: Maybe that's why they gave the exercise trainers other jobs, because people are busy doing.
[00:00:37] Speaker B: Welcome back, everybody, to this week's episode of the DCL duo podcast, brought to you by my path, unwinding travel. And we're going to kick things straight off, no banter with the review because we got an exciting guest, exciting topic. I want to devote as much time to the show as we can for that. So our review this week, our five star review this week comes from. It's the Miller fam who writes great podcasts for DCL fans really enjoy listening to Brian, Samantha, and their guests share about their Disney cruise experiences. The hosts do an amazing job of helping their guests tell their stories. Thanks for creating this show and making this a fun and friendly space to talk about what we enjoy. Disney Cruising signed, Chris Miller. They signed the review. I love it when they signed the review. I don't have.
[00:01:15] Speaker A: Thank you, Chris and Miller family.
[00:01:17] Speaker B: Yes, thank you so much for that. And Chris, I think Chris might also be a patreon. I'm not sure. I'll have to go back and check, but thank you for the review nonetheless. And if you want to leave us a five star review, you can head over to Apple podcast, hit those five stars, leave a written review, and we will read it on the air at the top of one of our shows. Full disclosure, we're still in July of 2023 reviews, so we're year behind. Slowly slowing on it. We're working on it. You guys are leaving us so much love. We're working on it. But Sam, you want to intro our guest in our topic for today?
[00:01:45] Speaker A: Yes, we're super excited to welcome a repeat guest back to our show. Kelly was on with us on episode 249, talking about a mediterranean cruise and a Barcelona short escape on adventures by Disney. And then she came back to talk to us on episode 356 about her Iceland cruise. And now we are again talking about Europe with Kelly. So three times the charm. All Europe. Kelly, do you, do you travel anywhere else?
[00:02:14] Speaker C: Well, this is our third summer in a row going to Europe. So now my kids joke and say we summer in Europe.
[00:02:21] Speaker A: Oh, my God.
I bet if they say that at school they'll get lots of dirty looks.
[00:02:27] Speaker B: They should really say, we summer. I guess this wasn't a cruise, but I would have said we summer in Europe on our yacht.
[00:02:34] Speaker A: Anyway, we're actually going to talk. We're not going to talk about cruising today. We're going to talk about adventures by Disney. And we're so excited to talk about this itinerary with you, Kelly. So I know this is an Italy and Croatia Abd. Tell us what was the itinerary? Or actually, let me back up and say, tell us your cruise credentials. Obviously, you've been on two med cruises, we know, in the last two summers, but what are your other cruises that you've been on?
[00:03:03] Speaker B: And Abds. And Abds.
[00:03:04] Speaker A: And Abds. That's right.
[00:03:05] Speaker C: I think that this. I think we've done 16 Disney cruises so far, but my first Disney cruise was a long time ago on the big red boat, many years ago. So I've been on all five of the ships on, you know, the standard eastern and western caribbean and bohemian, and then star wars day at sea and marvel day at sea and Christmas and Halloween cruises. So we've done a lot. We really do like the Europe ones. We think it's a fun way to Europe.
[00:03:30] Speaker A: Awesome. And how many adventures with adventures by Disney have you been on now? I mean, let's say prior, you went on the Barcelona short escape, and now this one was an ABd. Have you been on any other Abds?
[00:03:41] Speaker C: No, this was just our second one.
[00:03:43] Speaker A: Awesome. Just your second one. I love it. No, it's awesome. Tell us what the itinerary was for this. This Abd trip, and then we'll talk about why you chose this itinerary.
[00:03:54] Speaker C: So this was also a cruise. It was a small ship cruise on ponant, and it was the inaugural sailing of the Adriatic Abd. So it started and ended in Venice, and then we made several stops in Croatia, one in Montenegro, and then we took a road trip to Slovenia as well.
[00:04:13] Speaker A: Oh, awesome. Oh, I. For I had. I hadn't even realized. I was thinking this was a land trip, but this is even better. We get to talk about AbD on the panant. We've talked about Abd on Ama waterways a bunch, but obviously, this is a different ship sailing line. How large or small is the Panaught ship that you all were on?
[00:04:36] Speaker C: So it has a maximum of 184 guests and then about 115 crew. I think there's a little bit over 90 staterooms. So it's much smaller than a Disney cruise line ship. But I. It's still, they still packed in plenty of activities and lovely spaces and restaurants. We really enjoyed it.
[00:04:53] Speaker B: Yeah, I think we talked to John Roberts from in the loop travel. I think it's John Roberts, but from in the loop travel. About penant. Cause he had sailed on Panaught in to Antarctica.
[00:05:03] Speaker A: Galapagos. Yeah.
[00:05:05] Speaker B: No, no, I think he was on Penant to Antarctica, I think. Cause the Galapagos use a different provider. But like, the ship sounds like ultra luxury. End of things. Is that how you experienced it?
[00:05:17] Speaker C: It was a very new ship. I think it's only about three years old. There are six of us in total, my family of five. And then we brought a teenage cousin, so my kids would be happy.
We had three staterooms for two. Most of the staterooms only held two. There's a few that would hold three people. They were very well appointed and lovely. Inside there was a pool that looked out. It had like an infinity kind of pool over of the glass edge looking out over the water. There were multiple restaurants and lounges. There was a small gym. There was an underwater lounge where it had cameras, and at night you could see fish swim by. Oh, cool. The ship was lovely and the staff was wonderful. They were just as good as, you know, Disney cruise line cast members.
[00:05:57] Speaker A: I would say awesome. Now, why did you all choose this itinerary specifically? Was there a specific place you wanted to visit? Was the timing just, like, worked out? Did the teens want to go here, or what was the motivation behind this trip specifically?
[00:06:13] Speaker C: We were interested in going to Croatia, and also it offered a good balance of fun, like water sports and activities, not just all, like, churches and museums, because the teens didn't want to spend a lot of time doing that kind of stuff. So this gave us an opportunity to do a little bit of that stuff and sightseeing. But then there was a lot of, you know, speed boats and snorkeling and swimming and cliff jumping. So I thought it was a really good balance for our family.
[00:06:36] Speaker B: What was the total length of the itinerary? How long were you out there? One week. Oh, seven nights. Okay. All right, great. Yeah, yeah. So I wanna stick with the onboard experiences for a few minutes. Cause, you know, this will be new to folks. The sort of small. We've talked about river cruising. We've talked about Panamp again before, but in a different context. So you said they had several restaurants on board. Like, what were the restaurant offerings that they had on board?
[00:06:55] Speaker C: They were right on top of each other. One was on one deck outside and one was up top. So usually on ponant, the indoor restaurant is. Has a high. A fancy dress code. And on the first day, they announced that. But then the adventure guides got on and said, like, don't worry about that. Everyone was worried, like no one had fancy clothes packed. And it's a typical table service meal, but then there's a supplementary buffet where you can get fancy cheeses and breads. And then downstairs was an outdoor grill with a buffet that was more casual. And then room service was always included, even full breakfast 24/7 so we got room service, breakfast a lot. I know on the river cruises, some people were worried about snacks, like not being able to find food during the day. And they always had some type of fancy midday snack, like crepes or macaroons, cream puffs. But they always had a table out with a lot of different snaps, snacks like chips and nuts and fresh fruit. Plus you could get room service all the time, so I felt like there was plenty of food all of the time.
[00:07:48] Speaker A: Now, you said 186 capacity for passengers. Did you have a full, full ship? Of course. When Disney does it, it's a little bit less than full because they have to actually accommodate the adventure guides as well as the guests. But was it, were you sort of close to full capacity on this sailing?
[00:08:06] Speaker C: It didn't feel like it. I'm not sure. I didn't ask. There are six adventure guides in addition to the ponant staff, but it never felt crowded to us. And then in addition to the restaurants, there were a couple different lounges and bars. There was one main bar that was also served as the specialty coffee shop. And you could always get drinks all day. All of the drinks were included all of the time. So it wasn't like in containers on DCL, you just get drinks from five to ten. You could have alcohol all day long if you wanted to. And then same thing. Specialty coffee was included whenever you want it as well.
[00:08:36] Speaker A: You know, one of the things you and I talked about as we were sort of preparing for this show, Washington, what's included? And I don't want to spoil this, but why don't you tell our listeners what's included?
[00:08:47] Speaker C: Everything's included. So really good high speed Internet was included, so kids were able to watch movies and stuff like that. All the alcohol, as I mentioned, was included. Full room service. So not just like a continental breakfast, but, you know, hot breakfast was included. All of our excursions were included. Even if we would stop for snacks on the excursions, like gelato, that was included. When we were off the ship, they would bring us out to lunch and that was included. Admission tickets to different places that required. That is included. And then all the tips for the ponant staff were included as well. So really the only extra thing that you might purchase would be some spa treatments because they did have a spa on board and then tips for the adventure guides.
[00:09:25] Speaker A: Awesome. That's fantastic. Now, did Abd also take care of your transfers from either hotel or airport to get to the ship?
[00:09:33] Speaker C: If you arrived the day of the start date, they would bring you to the ship or if you stayed at their hotel overnight. We spent a few days in Venice prior at a separate hotel, so we had to get to the ship ourselves that day. But then we did fly home the day that we got off. So they included buses to the airport for everybody.
[00:09:52] Speaker A: Awesome. Fantastic. That's one of, I think, the great things about adventures by Disney in particular is just, it's let, you know, white glove service from end to end. If you, you know, if you arrange it with them, like, everything is taken care of, you really don't have to plan anything.
[00:10:08] Speaker C: They took care of everything and we did have a lot of choice for excursions. It was a little different than a land based ABD, where kind of everybody does the same thing. About two months before we sailed, they sent us all the excursions and then we could call in and tell them what ones we preferred. People were still able to switch, some of us. We switched some things, too when we were on board. So I don't think anyone didn't get what they wanted, but they did want you to plan ahead just so they had a general head count.
[00:10:31] Speaker B: I think that's actually better than the river cruise experience we had where like one of the excursions filled up because they took the interest. Like the day we boarded, the day before.
[00:10:39] Speaker A: Yeah, we had. When we showed up to our hotel, we got like, a note from ABD and it had like a Google form.
[00:10:48] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:10:48] Speaker A: So we actually, we just, like, checked off what we wanted to do on these, you know, on the Google sheet, and then that's how we got signed up and. But there were only, there were just like two choices for each, each day for us.
[00:11:01] Speaker C: How many choices we already given to adventure by Disney insiders. So people who've been on ABD before, so we got to book a couple days earlier, but even the people who were first timers, I think everyone still got what they wanted. They were mostly asking for planning.
[00:11:15] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. And that makes sense. They want to have an idea of numbers so that wherever you're going can accommodate the right number of guests or if they've got. Everybody wants to do one excursion and they're going to, like, split it up for afternoon, morning, kind of, you know, so that everybody can do the same excursion and just flip flop the day. So, yeah, tell us. Okay, so you're in Venice. Where did you all stay in Venice, actually?
[00:11:38] Speaker C: Well, there are six of us, and as you know, in Europe, it's hard to find hotel rooms big enough. So we at the Royal San Marco, and they had a little apartment that held all six of us really close to St. Mark's Square. So it was a crowded section of Venice, but it was a fun section and it was nice. We had a kitchen and everything.
[00:11:55] Speaker A: Oh, awesome. That's really nice. So when you all meet up for the. I'm going to call it a cruise. It is a cruise. It's just a small ship cruising. Right.
When you meet up at the ship, what is the first day? You're still, obviously you're in Venice. You're docked in Venice. What does that first day look like?
[00:12:13] Speaker C: As soon as we boarded, our rooms were ready and we met the adventure guides. They took photos of everybody boarding the ship. And then we had, they called it sip n sail. So we got to sail down the Grand Canal and they served drinks and everyone was out on deck meeting each other. And it was just beautiful to see that, you know, and that was a big treat, too, because lots of cruise ships can't sail there anymore. And then we had, we all met in the theater, and the adventure guides kind of gave us a preview of the week ahead and went to a. And then we had pool time and relaxing time. We had dinner. And then the first night there was a show. They have some, they have on board entertainment. So they have a duo that played the piano and sang. And then they had a lot of dancers as well.
[00:12:52] Speaker A: Awesome. Yeah. Did they bring folks onto the ship, performers at different ports, or did they just have onboard entertainment?
[00:13:00] Speaker C: For the most part, they were just on board entertainment. So the same women who taught the exercise classes and worked at the spa, they were also the dancers at night. Oh, you're always doing something, you know.
[00:13:11] Speaker A: We found similarly on Amma that, like, you would, like, different people would have multiple roles. Right? Like, the person who was, like, the bartender at the bar in the main lounge was also like the sommelier that came around at dinner and serving, serving the wine, you know, and asking you what it was. So it is interesting with smaller ships, like. Cause larger ships, everybody has, like, one job except for their, like, emergency side job. Right. Their emergency, you know, muster station, you know, job or whatnot. But otherwise they all have the same.
[00:13:40] Speaker B: Well, it's funny. The one guy with the unique job was the trainer and nobody wanted to see him, so there you go.
[00:13:45] Speaker A: That's true.
[00:13:47] Speaker C: Maybe that's why they gave the exercise trainers other jobs because.
[00:13:52] Speaker A: Yeah, really busy now. I imagine most of your days were pretty packed. Is that a fair assessment with, you.
[00:13:59] Speaker C: Know, we had one half sea day, so on the first day we woke up, we had till about 02:00 on board. And then after that we were always busy, like constantly doing things. So that day we like, went to the pool. You were always allowed, they had an open bridge and you were always allowed to go tour it. And I had every intention of doing it, but we were so busy that we just never did. And they offered a lot of different activities on board. The adventure guides hosted a lunch for the little kids and a pool party the first day, and then they had a separate lunch for the teenagers. Throughout the cruise, we had karaoke and trivia and bingo and movie nights for parents of littler kids. They had a night where they little kids ate dinner with the adventure guys and then watched a movie with them so the parents could have an evening on their own. Since there was no formal kids club.
[00:14:44] Speaker A: And no, no actual. No babysitters to hire on the ship, obviously. Yeah. Tell us what the demographics look like on this, this ship. You've got, you know, I'm sure over 100 guests on board. Obviously, I'm not going to ask you for exact numbers. I'm sure there's no way for you to know exact numbers, but what would you sort of say the ages looked like to you? Like, were there a lot of little kids or was it mostly older kids and teenagers?
[00:15:10] Speaker C: It was mostly older kids and teenagers. There were some kids in like, that 8910 range and they kept them busy. But there are a lot of teenagers and young adults, so it's a lot of multi generational families. So, you know, young people in their twenties, but they were usually there with other family members as well.
[00:15:26] Speaker A: Right. So their parents in their fifties and then maybe grandparents in their seventies or eighties.
[00:15:32] Speaker C: There are a lot of couples, like, older. There are some couples, like, you know, in the 50 and older range on their own, but it was a lot of families who had, like more than one stateroom all traveling together.
[00:15:40] Speaker A: Nice. Yeah, that seems pretty standard for adventures by Disney, regardless of what kind of trip you're taking. Obviously they do some adult only stuff, but I think they're sort of best known now for multigenerational travel because, you know, having the grandkids, the parents and the grandparents all in one is kind of a great, a great way to travel for everyone. All right, well, let's talk day two. What was your port of call? You said the morning was on. The ship is sailing, you know, sailing out of or away from Venice, but, yeah. What was the afternoon?
[00:16:13] Speaker C: So the first day, we went to Korula in Croatia, and we actually split up. So my daughter and I, we toured old town Korula, and then we had time on our own. And it's a very common theme. It's a lot of walled cities. You know, they were walls to protect from the Turks and the Ottoman and the Venetians, who were all invading at that time. So we took a tour with a local guide, and then we had plenty of time on our own. And we just walked around and we had some coffee, and then the boys and my husband went to a beach. They went to a beach club, and then they had some time on their own in the town, too. But we never ran into each other before we got on the ship. And then they actually had paper navigators. That's how I'm remembering what we did every day.
[00:16:48] Speaker A: Oh, I loved that. Yeah, I love that.
[00:16:50] Speaker C: I wish they had the paper navigators on Disney, but I have to be honest, I started to take pictures of the navigator and just look at them on my phone anyway, so.
[00:16:57] Speaker A: Yeah, because you don't want to carry around the paper because you'll, like, you'll leave it somewhere or it gets crumpled up or whatnot. We did the same thing on our abd. We would take a picture of the whatever, the navigator, because then if we forgot, like, what we were going to be doing next, we could go there instead of, like, bothering the adventure guides and asking them a million questions and.
[00:17:18] Speaker C: Then other ones that day, I think there was, like, they went to visit a winery, things like that. Earlier on, before we got to Korula, they had a water bottle decorating party because everyone got a water bottle, but they all looked exactly the same. So we had a party where they decorated them with Disney stickers and paint so that later on we could all tell ours apart.
[00:17:35] Speaker A: Oh, that's actually very smart. I wish they had done that on our adventure, because we have the black adventures by Disney water bottles that they give every one. And you're right, everybody has the same one, and so there's no way to tell them apart unless you put stickers or I guess, like, paint markers would be another good way to write your name on it or something like that. All right, cool. Well, sounds like a fun day. In Korula. Now, were you all back on the ship for dinner and then evening entertainment, or were you. Was this a later night in Korchula?
[00:18:04] Speaker C: We were back in time for dinner. My daughter and I actually ate dinner off the ship for fun because we saw a place we wanted to over the cliffs that was just lovely. But I think the boys made it back in time for dinner.
[00:18:13] Speaker A: And then how long were you all in port? Did you leave, you know, late in the evening hours, or did you overnight there?
[00:18:21] Speaker C: I think we had to be back on board by 09:00.
[00:18:25] Speaker A: Oh, okay. So, yeah, that's one of the nice things about doing these cruises. Smaller ship cruises in Europe, I feel like they do tend to stay later than the larger ships, typically.
[00:18:37] Speaker C: And everything was so close together, too, that they didn't have to really rush to make it to the next port. So we did have long port days. A lot of our stops, tender ports, but they actually use the lifeboats as the tenders.
[00:18:49] Speaker A: Oh, interesting.
[00:18:50] Speaker C: Every 30 minutes, there would be a tender.
[00:18:52] Speaker A: Oh, interesting. Yeah. Yeah. Well, and the lifeboats are probably fairly large to hold.
[00:18:58] Speaker C: Oh, yeah, yeah. They're a lot bigger than they look. I was always surprised how many of us would fit when we would all get on.
[00:19:03] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah. I didn't even think about tender ports, even, because it's a smaller ship. But I guess there are some ports that are just really, really small. Their docks are even, you know, smaller than even. Even this kind of ship. All right, well, what was your second port of call?
[00:19:16] Speaker C: So split was our second day, and we went to Kraka National park. It's a breathtaking national park full of just a whole bunch of beautiful waterfalls in turquoise water. So we walked through there with a guide, and then after that, we went to a dalmatian, old dalmatian home to, like, we learned about their traditions and how they used to live, and then they welcomed us all with shots of cherry brandy, which is really good. And then we had lunch that was prepared the traditional style there with them before we went back to the ship.
[00:19:47] Speaker A: Oh, wow. That's really cool. What a fun. What a fun experience.
[00:19:52] Speaker C: It was a fun day. It was a good mix of outdoor activities and then a little bit of learning.
[00:19:57] Speaker A: Yeah. Did you all get to, like, go into the waterfall, like, swimming and stuff?
[00:20:01] Speaker C: No. So that national park banned swimming there a few years ago because it was just getting, like, it was bad for the ecosystem. Like, people are killing the plants and stepping on things. So now there's all boardwalks over them so you can get a great view of all of them, but there's no swimming, and it was really hot, so I would have loved to be able to swim.
[00:20:18] Speaker A: Yeah, I love a little dip just to cool off. Yeah. Awesome. And so what time were you all back to the ship that day?
[00:20:24] Speaker C: That day? We had to be back to the ship. I think we had to be back by 09:00 that day.
[00:20:30] Speaker A: Oh, so another long, long port day. That's awesome.
[00:20:34] Speaker C: So we, after we got back, we walked around split. Cause Diocletian's palace is there. So did that on our own. That was an option you could have done if you didn't go to the national park. We did it on our own afterwards.
[00:20:46] Speaker A: Yeah. People rave about split. I feel like everybody says it's such a beautiful place to visit.
[00:20:51] Speaker B: So when you're doing these excursions, these shore excursions. So in the river cruise. Right. Like, an AbD guide would go and then they'd always have, like, a local guide or a local tour provider. I assume it's the same here. You're getting, like, a local expert along with your Abd guides.
[00:21:05] Speaker C: Yeah, we kind of had, like, three levels of guides. We had three Abd guides from the United States, then we had three Abd guides from Croatia. So our six adventure guides are with us the whole time. So usually they would prepare one us guide, one croatian guide, and then a local guide wherever we went, so.
[00:21:23] Speaker A: Oh, awesome. That's the best of both worlds. I mean, we, for our ABD, we had also a mix. It was. We had five guides, and so we had a mix of. We went to three different countries. So we had sort of a mix of guides, three of whom were american, one who was actually from Liechtenstein and one who was from Ramy Bryan from Budapest. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so.
[00:21:49] Speaker B: One of them lived in. Not Salzburg, in Vienna for a long time, right?
[00:21:53] Speaker A: Yes. The one from Liechtenstein lived in Vienna.
[00:21:56] Speaker B: Yeah. So he was there. He was there for his local expertise for Vienna.
[00:21:59] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah. So he was local in that sense. But we didn't. We didn't have. We always just had one guide with us on our bus. And it was so sometimes we'd have an american, sometimes we'd have a local, but then, of course, we had the local, like, tour provider that would take us around and actually do the tour like what you had. But that sounds like a lot of great assistance and direct access, especially in a place where it's not really english speaking.
Did you find that a lot of folks spoke English around Croatia?
[00:22:34] Speaker C: Yeah, everyone that we interacted with did not just the people who were part of the ABD, but restaurants and shops was very good. English.
[00:22:42] Speaker A: Yeah. Oh, that's awesome. That just makes it easier.
Ease of travel. Okay, so let's talk your next port of call after split.
[00:22:50] Speaker C: So next was Dubrovnik, and that was a busy day, but it was awesome. We did so many things. We, there was an option to do an early morning tour of the city wall, so we did that. It started at 745, but it was a great time to do it because it's really hot in Croatia, and that wall has no shade. And as if you've seen on, you know, if you see on social media or the Internet, they get. It gets very crowded. When we were there, there were other people on the wall, but not many at all. So the guide took us around and we could see it outside of the hot time of day. And then we went back to the ship for breakfast, and then we went on small speed boats. They had ribs that met us right at the port. And we went all around the coast. We swam in caves. Our sons did some cliff jumping. And then they brought us to a beach where we had lunch and had some time on the beach, and they had chairs and all reserved for us. Then we went back to the ship to get ready for dinner. And then at night, they had a special show for us. So in Dubrovnik, they brought us to this beautiful theater, and it was private showing just for us, of traditional folk music and acapella singing and dancing, and we could sit anywhere we want in the theater. So my daughter and I just had, like, we sat, won a little box all by ourselves. It was such a good show. And then we had some time to walk around the city, and the adventure guides were really great because people are going to get back late for dinner, and they had the ship extend dinner time for us. So we had time to, like, walk around a little bit after the show and still make it back for dinner. Oh, so that was such a great day with the. All the different things we got to do. You know, I thought that was a day that really felt all the benefits of adventure by Disney. You know, we got to do a lot of stuff. It wasn't crowded. We were on the wall. We had the private show. They. It was getting late. They made the adjustments for us, for our meal time. So I was very. That was such a great day.
[00:24:33] Speaker A: Yeah, well, I mean, a full day, you're out off the ship before breakfast even, and come back for breakfast and all that sort of back and forth. You're right. I mean, without a tour company that is really taking care of all of those details that would. All of that stuff would be hard to accomplish in one day. You probably could accomplish it all in two or three days if you were doing it on your own. Obviously, you only have really one day in each port on any of these, any of these sailings. So awesome.
[00:25:02] Speaker C: It seems like we were in Dubrovnik for more than one day because of all the different things we did.
[00:25:06] Speaker B: I have heard that Dubrovnik is just absolutely stunning. I guess I just want to validate. Did you find it to be gorgeous as well?
[00:25:16] Speaker C: All of Croatia is beautiful. Like, beautiful water, beautiful rocks and cliffs, but the architecture and the city walls and how well preserved everything is and the churches, everything there was just beautiful.
[00:25:27] Speaker A: How did the teens like the beaches and the cliff diving and all of that?
[00:25:31] Speaker C: I think that was their favorite excursion, like, on the little speedboats, and each speedboat only held eight people, so there's a lot of us did that excursion. So we had a whole, like, parade of speedboats that went all around the coast, and they loved that. That was their favorite day. I think their favorite excursion, too, was the speedboats.
[00:25:47] Speaker A: All right, so next day is I. If I'm counting right, is next day. Day five.
[00:25:52] Speaker C: Yeah. I think that's the day we went to Montenegro, which was also beautiful. And so that actually has a fjord in it. It's, like one of the southernmost fjords. So we got to sail up and back that, and we went on a catamaran. We took a catamaran and they brought us, made a couple little stops. We saw this place called Our lady of the rocks and some little sights seeing places. And then we had time to swim, and then we had time to just explore Montenegro and our own. We were in Kodor.
[00:26:17] Speaker A: Awesome. That's awesome.
[00:26:18] Speaker C: And that was another day that the kids really enjoyed. And they think of everything. Like, they gave everybody pool noodles and, like, kickboards so that when you swam, you could relax a little bit more. They had sunscreen for us when we were on the boat, in case you forgot it.
[00:26:30] Speaker A: I love that. Awesome. Now, was that a full day, or were you back on the ship, like, for lunch or back?
[00:26:37] Speaker C: We got back, I think back around, like, 03:00 so some of them, some of the teenagers stayed back on board and just hung out, and then some of us went and explored the town.
[00:26:47] Speaker A: Awesome. Yeah, well, that's the. The hard part of doing, you know, these, like, water based excursions is then you don't get to see the little, you know, city that you're parked in, but if you have enough time to do both, that's. That's even better. What did you think of the town?
[00:27:00] Speaker C: Um, it was another beautiful town, and that's another one where you can walk on the walls if you want to. And we were about to do it, but it was really hot, so we walked a little bit on the walls, but we mostly just explored the town.
[00:27:11] Speaker A: All right, day six, what was your port for? Day six.
[00:27:15] Speaker C: Then we have var. So we're not at day six yet, but, yeah, we have var. Croatia next. And it's hvar, but I'm pretty sure they pronounce it var. And that day we went biking and then to a lavender estate and winery. So the biking was fun. It was a little bit hard. It was a UNESCO World Heritage site, and it's on a road that was originally built by the greek weeks a long time ago.
[00:27:38] Speaker A: Oh, wow.
[00:27:39] Speaker C: But we stopped. We stopped for gelato a little while, and then our adventure guys were in a truck on the side of the road wearing wigs and, like, cheering us on because it's very hot and they had water bottles for us. And then that ended at the lavender estate where we had some wine and snacks. And then they. Then we rode back on a bus back to the. To the ship. And then that was a shorter excursion that was done around, like, 01:00 or so. And then the plan was to go to a beach club in Var, which looked really good, but the water level was high and the captain was worried the tender going there, so we had to skip that. But then they made a little excursion through the little obstacle course. Sorry, scavenger hunt through the town for us. So the guides were hiding in different places and they would give you, like, little souvenirs. And we went to the beach on our own, right, in var. And I liked doing it on our own, too, to see what the locals were doing and everything, instead of just going to a beach club. So. Yep, another busy day.
[00:28:31] Speaker A: Wow, that's. Yeah, that's a packed day. So you were, like, looking for the guides on the scavenger hunt. They were like, the prize, and then they would give you something.
[00:28:41] Speaker C: They gave you, like, little clues where they might be hiding and, like, little sachets of lavender because they grow lavender there. One place they gave you gelato.
[00:28:49] Speaker A: Oh, well, that's always a prize anywhere.
[00:28:52] Speaker C: They gave us gelato.
[00:28:53] Speaker A: Yeah, everywhere in Europe. All right, so next is then day six, right?
[00:29:00] Speaker C: Yeah, that's our last day.
[00:29:01] Speaker A: Oh, my gosh.
Yeah.
[00:29:03] Speaker C: Tell us about that, Rovinj. R o v I n j. I'm never sure if I say it right. And it's beautiful. When I send you pictures, I'll send it to you. It looks like it's like a fairy tale where, like, a Disney movie would be set. It's on a hill with a tower right in the center, surrounded by the sea and all pastel colored buildings. It was lovely. That's the day we went to Slovenia. Everyone didn't, but we did. Looking back, that one I would have done differently. It ended up being a lot more time on a bus to get to Slovenia than the adventure guides had even planned. We saw a castle that's built into the side of a cave. It's called Prejama Castle, if I'm saying it correctly. We didn't get to go in it. We just took pictures and stopped. Then we had lunch at a local farm to table restaurant, and everyone got to pet goats. And that was the biggest.
[00:29:48] Speaker A: That was the highlight, the goats.
[00:29:49] Speaker C: Then we went to the caves there, and people call it the Disney world caves because you take a train into the cave, and then you tour it, and you take the train back out, and the caves are amazing. It's such a huge cave system. It was beautiful and lovely. It was just. We spent so much time of our day on the bus. We did have a little bit of time, though, after dinner to explore the town, which I was happy about. And because the town was beautiful, and.
[00:30:15] Speaker A: I'm guessing that there were other excursion options that would have had you sort of stay in that town for more of the day instead of going over to slovenian. So if you could redo it, is that what you would have done?
[00:30:25] Speaker C: That's what I would have done, yeah. There was one that went to a well preserved amphitheater, kind of looked like a small coliseum, and then to a winery. And then there was one that just stayed right in the town, where they toured the town and went to some museums there. Mm hmm.
[00:30:38] Speaker A: Yeah. So one of those, maybe if you. If you would re. Did a redo. Now, were you. Was that a full day in that town, or did you have a second port that day?
[00:30:47] Speaker C: No, it was a full day in that town.
[00:30:48] Speaker A: Okay, awesome. And then your next day is disembarkation day. You all, is it back in Venice or was it someplace else? I can't remember.
[00:30:57] Speaker C: It was back in Venice.
[00:30:58] Speaker A: Back in Venice. Okay, so it's a. Yeah, there. I'm back, which is. That's nice. Just for ease of travel, for, you know, your plane ticket. It's like nice to embark and disembark out of the the same port. What was your favorite port of call on this trip?
[00:31:13] Speaker C: It's hard to say because I really loved all of them, but I think the Dubrovnik day was my favorite one.
[00:31:20] Speaker A: Yeah. And the teens, what, what would you say was their, I, what was their favorite one?
[00:31:25] Speaker C: Their favorite one was Dubrovnik and then they also liked Montenegro on the catamaran that day.
[00:31:30] Speaker A: Yeah. So the two water sports ones, the ones they like versus the, versus the more either pet bike pedaling or more historical type stuff.
[00:31:39] Speaker C: We did like the caves, but we spent about two and a half hours on the bus each way. So you know that they were kind of over it.
[00:31:46] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:31:49] Speaker B: Are you listening to our show because you want to make the most out of your next vacation. Great news. The fabulous team over at Mypath unwinding travel can help guide you so you don't miss a thing. Their team of professional travel advisors are caring, knowledgeable and experienced. It's why we use them to book our own travel. Mypath Unwinding travel is an authorized Disney vacation planner, which means they are recognized by Disney for their expertise and service. They have sailed on all the Disney ships including in concierge, visited the theme parks, adventured with Disney, relaxed at Alani and sewed much more. Whether its a Disney cruise, a theme park vacation, or adventures by Disney, or if you are looking to expand beyond the mouse, mypath unwinding travel will elevate your next vacation planning experience. Even if you have already booked, reach out for a complimentary consultation to make your vacation even more magical. Ready to talk to the experts? Head over to mypathunwinding.com dclduo or email dclduoypathunwinding.com so they know we sent you their way. My path unwinding for sponsoring today's show. Now back to the episode.
[00:32:47] Speaker A: What about food? We have to talk about the food on the actually, before we talk about food, let's talk about entertainment. On the ship you mentioned they had some exercise folks that also were dancers and there was a duo that did singing and whatnot. Did they have entertainment every night? I know you mentioned there were some movie nights and things like that. What kinds of things did they do in the evenings to keep you all busy if you, if you wanted it, versus just crashing in your room every night?
[00:33:17] Speaker C: The musical duo performed every evening. They had a different theme every night. What kind of music? Then they had a trivia night. They did bingo that the adventure guides ran. It was free bingo. And it was just for, like, little prizes, you know, like beach towels and things like that. But it was so much fun because all of our adventure guides were so charismatic. That was really fun. They had karaoke nights, and I was, like, amazed by how well all the people on the ship could sing. I would be embarrassed to be up there. They had some dance lessons, which I didn't. We didn't make that. And then they showed movies sometimes in the theater. The only thing in the theater they did would be every night there'd be a briefing if you wanted to go where the guides would talk about what to expect the next day. And the croatian guides would kind of give you some insight into the area. And then the movie theaters, like, movies would be shown in the theater, but all the other performances were kind of just in the main lounge.
[00:34:04] Speaker A: Yeah. Awesome. Now tell us, who were your adventure guides? We love hearing about the adventure guides and if there are anything unique about the particular guides that you had.
[00:34:16] Speaker C: So we had. Our us guides were Dusty, Jillian and Sophia.
[00:34:21] Speaker B: Oh, Jillian. We know Jillian.
[00:34:22] Speaker C: Yeah, they were all. They're all so good. They like Jillian and Sophia. I told them their voices sound like they should be like radio dj's when they would talk over the microphone in the theater, on the bus. They had such soothing voices. Dusty has been an adventure guide. I can't remember how many adventures he's gone on, he told us, but it's like an insane number. He's been all over the world. And then we had three croatian guides, so we had auntie. I can't believe I'm forgetting the female guides. I forget her name. But they were all wonderful. And there were a couple times where you could meet with them. It was called coffee with their Croatians, and you could just meet with them and they would tell stories about where they lived and what it's like growing up there. We never had time to go to the. Those.
[00:35:03] Speaker A: Yeah, well, that's. That's a really good point. I mean, how much sort of free time or downtime did you feel like you had on this trip? And. And was it a vacation or was it a trip? You know what I mean?
[00:35:16] Speaker C: Yeah. I think you could have as. You could have more downtime than we did because a lot of times we would pick, like, those all day tours. But there are a lot of tours that were only about half a day, and then you could have a lot more downtime and kind of relaxed. So we were pretty busy. But you didn't have to be, you know, you could be like tour the winery and then come back and relax on the ship.
[00:35:35] Speaker A: Fair. Because I feel like that's the. I mean, it's a positive and a negative about doing this kind of a trip. Right. You get to see a ton if you want to, but I don't know about you. I mean, you chose the full day ones. I would probably choose most of the full day ones as well, because I. I feel like I want to get, like, my fill. Right. I want to see as much as I can possibly see. While I can accomplish some of that walking around on my own, I'm not going to accomplish nearly as much as if I've got somebody taking me from place to place. Awesome.
[00:36:03] Speaker B: Um, so I just want to dive in here. Same with just a couple of things about this trip really fast, since I'm staring at it on the website, because, you know, it sounds like fun, and we should probably.
[00:36:12] Speaker A: Sounds awesome.
[00:36:13] Speaker B: We need. Hey, we need a 2026 podcast cruise. We gotta start seeding the ground now. Uh, who's with us for Penang cruise line on an adriatic expedition. But just a couple of things I just wanted to share with folks. If they're listening to this and they're thinking, oh, my gosh, this sounds amazing, I want to go book it. There is a minimum age requirement, so the minimum age is five. Suggested age is six. So if you've got really little ones, or suggesting at least six years old. And I will say, having taken Nathan over to Europe at, what was he, nine at the time? Ten, I guess he just turned ten. When we took him on that ABD.
[00:36:42] Speaker A: He had just turned ten.
[00:36:43] Speaker B: Yes, he just turned ten. It was a lot of walking. He was a trooper. It was a lot of walking. So just be prepared for that. I do want to let folks know, too, that this itinerary that we're discussing is the itinerary they will also do for 2025. They have two sailings, it looks like, in 2025, and I'm trying to find them now. One is on July 8 to 15th, and one is on July 15 to July 22. I was curious, Kelly, from just a real detail standpoint, what kind of room did you book? And it was four of you?
[00:37:16] Speaker A: No, they got three rooms.
[00:37:19] Speaker B: Three rooms. Okay. Okay. Because I will say that panant on the ABD on the site, it does say that parties of three will be booked as a triple. So you get two rooms with one queen bed and one twin convertible, and then parties of four are booked as two doubles. Two rooms with one queen bed. So it sounds like you have. There is no room that would accommodate, like, three people is what I'm sort of.
[00:37:42] Speaker C: There were a few rooms that would accommodate three, but they were a lot more expensive. So it was less expensive for us to book three rooms of two than it would have been two rooms of three, because there weren't that many on the ship that held three people.
[00:37:54] Speaker B: Well, and then, I guess, to Sam's question, too, how much time did you actually get to enjoy the ship itself?
There's no sea day, which makes sense, because on a ship this size, there's not going to be enough to do to sustain you on a sea day. But did you feel like you got sort of full enjoyment of the amenities on the ship?
[00:38:11] Speaker C: I did, and we could have had more time because we always would spend time on our own in the evenings, exploring wherever we were. But a lot of people, including our two oldest teenagers, stayed on this ship. We had that half sea day, but we were in the pool a lot of evenings and a lot of afternoons. We would eat breakfast on our balcony every morning. So I thought that was, you know, was great. I felt like I did get to enjoy the ship enough. We were kind of like the don't sit down. People keep going all the time, but if you wanted to, you would have had more time on the ship. And they even had things like, sometimes there were movies when we were out on an excursion, so they were prepared for some people to spend more time on the ship. You didn't have to do an excursion if that wasn't your style.
[00:38:50] Speaker A: Right. You could take a day off if you needed a rest day or, for example, and just kind of hang out on the ship, and there would still be movies to watch and food to eat and that sort of thing.
[00:39:01] Speaker C: And I know some people did. Like, later on in the crew, some people were getting tired, and some people did. They're like, oh, we're not going to go out today. We'll stay here.
[00:39:08] Speaker B: So there's two particular spaces on the ship I just wanted to ask about. So one, they have a theater. So you mentioned they played movies. Did they do shows at night in that theater?
[00:39:17] Speaker C: No. The only thing that we. That we used it for were the briefings and the movies and bingo. Everything else was in this main lounge that had kind of an open floor space that could be like a dance floor, but then it was also where the performers would stand when they were performing.
[00:39:31] Speaker B: Okay. And then it does mention it. So I heard you mention earlier something about the kids club, but there is a. There's a space on board noted as a kids club, which I'm sort of now curious, like, did. Did you see something like that on board? It was on deck six, kids club.
[00:39:46] Speaker C: They had, like, activities, but they would just be like, meet at the pool or go to the theater to get it.
[00:39:50] Speaker B: Okay. Essentially, because on deck six, there's a space noted as art gallery, photo video, kids club. And it looks like about the size of four staterooms. So I'm like, I don't know how you fit all that into four staterooms. So fine, okay.
[00:40:02] Speaker C: They use that like, it was kind of like a lounge that no one sat in. I think when you sell on Ponat, not with ABD, the photographers take your picture, and that's where you would go view your, like, kind of, like, shutters. You would view your photos if you wanted to purchase them. But all of our photos are included because ABd include everything. So they took our photos throughout. We saw a slideshow of everybody's photos on the last evening, and then they sent us a big file of everybody's pictures. So that space was set up kind of like shutters when we were on board, but maybe when Ponot does it, that's where they bring the kids.
[00:40:32] Speaker A: Well, that would make sense because they wouldn't have the adventure guides when it's not an ABD, and so they wouldn't have those organized activities. If they're going to have activities that are kid friendly, maybe that's the space that they utilize for, you know, crafts and whatever kinds of activities.
[00:40:47] Speaker C: And I don't think Ponat includes all the alcohol either, because on the very first day in the theater, there are slides, like a slide deck circulating, and it showed how you can buy a drink package and things like that, which we have to do. And then in everyone's room, too, there is always bottled water, like glass bottles of bottled water or seltzer water throughout. And then there were machines that you could fill your water bottle that Pona gave you with either seltzer or fresh water when you're getting off the ship.
[00:41:13] Speaker B: You know, the all important question on a ship of this size, though, is did they have to do a mustard drill? And how was that?
[00:41:20] Speaker C: And we even had to wear our life vests.
[00:41:22] Speaker B: Oh, wow. Okay. Old school. Old school muster drill. Yeah. Wow. Wow.
[00:41:26] Speaker C: It was so much faster because, you know, there's probably, I don't know exactly how many, but I guess, like, 140 guests about. And so it was very quick.
[00:41:33] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, and a small ship. Not too many places where people can hide.
[00:41:36] Speaker C: So there you go, like the DCL.
[00:41:40] Speaker B: Well, we haven't talked about food specifically, Kelly, so I'd love to hear what you thought of the food on board the ship, and then also I'd love to hear some of your more memorable eats.
Abd tends to take you to some places when you're out on excursions. And you mentioned you even stayed in port one day to get lunch or dinner. Sorry, I'm forgetting which one you mentioned. But what did you think of the food on board the ship and the experience on board the ship, and then any standout out eats from your various sports stops?
[00:42:09] Speaker C: Yeah, I thought the food was great. Like, excellent quality. Every night, the menu would be different. There's a, you know, they have different themes. Italian night, french night. But they had a section that was called always available. So it had salmon, chicken, steak, different pasta dishes, like, with different sauces, pesto, alfredo, marinara, all that kind of stuff. Hamburgers and veggie burgers were always available. So it was a wide variety of foods, and they did a really good job marking allergens. You know, I'm an allergist, so, like, next to everything, it would show what allergens were in each dish on their menu. So I thought that was really. Was really good, too. Their coffee was fantastic, and their cappuccinos and everything.
[00:42:46] Speaker A: Ooh, you're speaking my love language, Kelly.
[00:42:50] Speaker C: Good coffee. And then, you know, we're vegetarian, so we're not as, like, big foodie people as other people are. So my favorite thing was probably, like, gelato and cheese that I had all different places and macaroons every night. There was a cookie every night on your bed for you when you came down for turndown service. And so some nights there were macaroons, and they were. They were delicious. They had. They had, like, a caviar day, a crepe day for snacks. So I liked. They had a cream puff day. That was really good. You can see I, like, very into desserts. So I'm talking about desserts and then some of the wines that we had and the cheeses at the different farm to table places were just really good.
[00:43:30] Speaker B: I assume on a ship of this size, it's, like, one dinner seating. They're not doing multiple seatings for dinner or where they're.
[00:43:36] Speaker C: Everyone doesn't have to eat at the exact same time. So there's the casual restaurant downstairs and then the slightly fancier restaurant upstairs, and there would usually be about, like, a two hour window where you could arrive.
[00:43:48] Speaker B: Okay. Yeah. All right, so that's a little different. On the river cruise, it was like, drinks, dinner, you know, like some sort of entertainment done.
[00:43:55] Speaker A: We only had the one dining room. There was just. There was kind of a self serve, like, mini buffet in the lounge. But it was. But, yeah, he really wanted to do the sit down dinner because that was really the main place. This sounds like this has a little bit more, or at least two options for dinner versus the one. So interesting about the dress code issue, though. So it sounds like, and correct me if I misunderstood this from the top of the show, when you're doing it through ABD, there's not a dress code in the main dining room or the fancier dining room, but if you were on Panama and you weren't on an adventure with adventures by Disney, you would have a more strict dress code for dinner.
[00:44:35] Speaker C: And they had announced no shorts in the dining room. And, like, none of the kids had pants.
[00:44:40] Speaker B: Hot.
[00:44:41] Speaker C: So you're like, oh, no, what are you gonna do? But then right away, like, dusty made a big announcement, like, you know, adventurers, we don't get dressed up. And everyone was like, I could tell, like, everyone's face was like, oh, no, people didn't bring it. So it does sound like the downstairs restaurant that's more casual and is all outdoors was what you would have to go to. And if you was penant and you had shorts on, and then upstairs was both inside and outside, but it was the one that was fancier.
[00:45:07] Speaker B: Sam, is there anything that we've missed about this, about this particular snail you want to talk about?
[00:45:13] Speaker A: Actually, I wanted to ask about souvenirs, because Kelly had mentioned doing some shopping in places and had mentioned jewelry specifically. Did you have any favorite souvenirs, or were there specific things that were sort of. This region was known for that. The adventure guides were like, well, if you wanted to buy this, this is where it's the most authentic, or this is what you would. Where you'd want to go.
[00:45:34] Speaker C: We bought, like, probably not very exciting souvenirs when we were in venice. Bought some glass and stuff because we had spent some time in Murano, and then we bought cherry brandy when we were there because we tasted the cherry brandy. And that's a way that they would welcome people, like, in dalmatian tradition. So we did buy that, and we brought some of that home, and then we brought a lot of, like, silver, handcrafted silver jewelry. One pair we did buy of earrings was what we learned about when we were at the dalmatian tour. When men were eligible, married, the more like they had achieved financially. They would get these buttons, they would wear. And then women could see and know, like, how successful the guy was. And the buttons were cool. And then later on, when we were at a different. In a different port, they had earrings that looked just like those buttons. So I got them to remember Croatia.
[00:46:18] Speaker A: Oh, that's cool. That's actually a really cool souvenir. Yeah, that's an interesting custom, the buttons. But, I mean, I guess. I guess it's sort of knowing, okay, that guy is ready for marriage because he can support a family.
[00:46:32] Speaker C: You would get one, but then some people would have double ones down their chest and stuff, he said, and you would know he would be a successful.
[00:46:39] Speaker A: Husband, a successful, very eligible bachelor.
[00:46:43] Speaker B: Did they have any of the. So when I went to Slovenia years ago now, they were known for their. I think it was. I'm going to butcher the name. It was Horuskovitz. It was pear brandy, where they grow the pear in the bottle. Did you see any of that in Slovenia? That was a pretty typical gift.
[00:46:56] Speaker C: The caves in Slovenia.
And then we went to the caves, and then we went back.
[00:47:01] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, if you go back again, that's one to watch out for. Although I warn you, it's very, very strong stuff.
[00:47:06] Speaker C: So beautiful there, though. It's. The mountains and stuff were really pretty when we were driving, so I think it would be a great place to visit.
[00:47:14] Speaker B: Yeah. I love those eastern european countries. They have some really great charm and. Yeah, they're just. They're great places to visit. For sure. For sure. Did you do anything in Venice afterwards? Did you stick around in Venice, or did you just fly home?
[00:47:26] Speaker C: So we spent a few days in Venice before to, like, Murano and Burano, and walked around. And then when we went home, my husband had to get back to work, but we flew on Air France, so my daughter and I took advantage of their free layover. You can extend your layover for a few days in Paris. So we spent two nights in Paris on our way home.
[00:47:44] Speaker A: Amazing. Did you hit Disneyland Paris, or did you just do.
[00:47:48] Speaker B: Come on, Sam. With a couple nights in Paris time.
[00:47:51] Speaker C: In Paris, I wanted to see, like, real Paris now.
[00:47:53] Speaker A: Yeah. Not Disney Paris. I understand. We understand. Yeah. Well, Kelly, I would. I'd love to know. Do you think that, you know, we always like to ask the. The worth it question, and obviously worth it is different to every person. Um, and that's. And we talk about is, you know, concierge worth it. Rav D is worth it. Right? Like, we know these things have a high price tag, and if you wanted to do Croatia and Venice, you could do them on your own, probably for less money or maybe on. I mean, penance is still a luxury line, but perhaps on penance for a little bit less money at least than adventures by Disneyland. Did you find value in doing this as an ABd trip? Do you think it was worth it?
[00:48:36] Speaker C: I do. And, you know, echoing what you said, worth it is different to everybody, but I found a lot of value in it. It was really hassle free. The service was top notch, both from the adventure guides and the po nant staff, and everything was included. So I really think if you added up all of our excursions and our drinks and our food and everything we did, like our private show and Dubrovnik, all that stuff, I don't think it would be that much less than it would be. And this way it was hassle free. And they keep everyone entertained, too. So if you have kids, you know, when there was wine tastings, they would do juice tasting and bocce ball with the little kids. So they make sure the teenagers are happy and the little kids are happy so the adults can be happy. So I think it's worth it. And, you know, a lot of the same people who do abds like DCL concierge. And I felt like it was a better value than that. Right. For six of us to go on a one week concierge cruise on Disney, probably be more money than this, and that wouldn't have included our Internet and our drinks and our excursions and our tips. I thought it was a better value than a concierge cruise on DCO.
[00:49:37] Speaker A: Wow. Yeah, that's, that's a great comparison. I think that you're right. That is the way to compare it because you're talking about this higher level of service. It's also great to hear, though, that penance is as good of a partner with adventures by Disney as on the waterways is. Sounds like for, you know, for any kind of water based excursion through adventures by Disney, they've picked good partners. And that's really important because obviously Disney's service is so high, you don't want it to be a complete difference in service level where you're getting great service from one and not great service from the other. So that's awesome.
[00:50:13] Speaker B: The one thing I'll just say to keep in mind as folks look at this is a Disney cruise is a relaxing vacation. You sort of hinted at this earlier in the show, Sam, when you asked the question, Disney Cruise is a relaxing vacation or can be a very relaxing vacation, whereas I find river cruises and it sounds like these small ship cruises, too. That's really port intensive and port heavy. It's a lot of tourists touring. This actually sounds slightly more manageable than the river cruise, if I'm honest, but, you know, still pretty close to the experience. So it's two totally different vacations at the end of the day. I think the right comparison is concierge on Disney Cruise line, but it is two totally different vacations in many, many ways. So it's kind of what are you up for? Right. Are you coming to see Europe? Are you ready to do a lot of touring? You want to see the sights, then, you know, the cruise ship becomes kind of your home base and you're off to the races every morning. But, yeah, that's the only. That's the only thing I would let folks know is don't like, this isn't a cruise to go. You can do a private boat cruise and go sit in the med and, you know, swim and all of that sort of stuff, but that's not what this is more than likely, I suppose you could turn it into that, but then I suspect the value wouldn't be there.
[00:51:14] Speaker A: Right.
[00:51:15] Speaker C: And they really, they call it an expedition cruise. So it really was kind of. And. But it didn't have to be as active if, you know, if you were older, had, you know, didn't want to be as active, it didn't have to be like the day that we rode bikes and then went to the estate with the lavender and the wine. You could have just taken a bus there. You didn't have a to do the bike ride if he didn't want to. So they had options to keep it a little bit more relaxing. But I love that bike ride. It was beautiful. So I'm glad we did it.
[00:51:37] Speaker B: So are you eyeing a future abd at this point or what's we got to do? Rapid fire. But I'm going to preempt my normal end of show question with, you know, what have you got going on next? Kelly?
[00:51:46] Speaker C: We don't have any more abds right now. My son is going to be a senior, so next summer, we don't know when his college orientation will be and stuff like that. So we haven't planned our trips for next summer, but later this week we're going on a ten night southern Caribbean on the fantasy in just a few days and then we'll be going on the treasure in December, the one right after you. We're going on the second.
[00:52:09] Speaker A: Oh, that's right, though. You're going on the new year's Eve one. Yeah.
[00:52:12] Speaker C: And then next summer in August, we have what you guys call the duo dip on the magic. It's just a short fortnight at the two private islands for one of my milestone birthdays.
[00:52:23] Speaker A: Oh, yay. You mean your 21st birthday, right, Kelly? Yeah.
All right, well, I think we're going to do. We're going to do a little. We're going to do a shortened rapid fire because we're going to keep this focused on adventures by Disney.
[00:52:41] Speaker B: But still some arbitrary questions, arbitrary rules, and dash of judgment. Right. Or the round. We know shock fire. So, Sam, take it away.
[00:52:47] Speaker A: Sure. All right. Well, Kelly, you've been on the show before. I think we did a regular rapid fire with you on your last show where you did a cruise in Europe, obviously. But now we've got to do a little bit of a versus here. We got to do a little Disney cruise line versus Abd. You have two adventurers under your belt now, 16 cruises under your belt. I would say you are qualified to compare them now on a bunch of different factors. So let's start off with entertainment on board entertainment. Who is doing. And of course, obviously, this could be land based entertainment also because you had some entertainment involved in your. In your short escape out of Barcelona. But, yeah. Who's doing it better as far as included entertainment, Disney Cruise line or adventures by Disney? I know they're very different.
[00:53:40] Speaker C: They're very different. But probably Disney Cruise line just because there's so many more options and there's, like, constant entertainment available instead of just like, one or two things a day. Not to say I didn't love the things on ABD, but there's definitely a wider variety on Disney cruise line.
[00:53:55] Speaker A: Of course. That makes sense. Okay, what about shore excursions? You've got very, you know, different. And we'll talk about. Include excursions in the land based AbD. But, yeah, who's doing better in terms of excursion quality?
[00:54:09] Speaker C: So I think probably Abd. I don't. We don't usually do Disney cruise line port adventures. We usually do private ones, but I thought the ones on Abd were great, so I would be happy to go with them again. So definitely Abd has a higher quality, I think, short script.
[00:54:24] Speaker A: Even. Even if you booked the ones through DCL, you're not getting this. This level of guides, like the. The kinds of guides that ABd finds. I'm talking, even local guides, like, are just incredible. I can't. I can't think of a single one from our Abd that was anything less than stellar. I mean, really, really? Okay, what about service? Right. This is. This is a tough question. Right. You've got actually, let's talk about service in, like, dining room service, right? So. Cause you've got pinance servers in their dining room versus, like, Disney cruise line servers. Cause that. That's sort of a better comparison there.
[00:55:02] Speaker C: Yeah, I. I think that's probably a tie. And I was wondering, you know, because the main dining room servers on Disney Cruise line are usually excellent. And I was wondering how Ponat would compare. But I thought they were great. They were just as good. I don't think they were any better, but I really do think it's a tie.
[00:55:17] Speaker A: All right, what about entertainment staff? And I'm thinking adventure guides versus Disney Cruise line entertainment staff. Because, I mean, they're not the same, but those are the closest categories I can kind of put them into.
[00:55:30] Speaker C: I think the adventure guides, you know, I just think they're the top, like, top notch Disney cast members. And the ones on ours were. They were just outstanding, you know, like when we were biking and they surprised us with these, like, wigs on bringden drinks and things like that. And when they run bingo. They're just delightful. So I think that they have an edge over the DCL entertainment.
[00:55:51] Speaker A: You know why? Because they steal the best out of DCL. That's part of it, too. They take the cream of the crop, like, shout out to Rebecca. They take the cream of the crop Disney cruise line cast members and hire them over at adventures by Disney. So that totally makes sense to me. Okay, now the final question is food. Right. This is, I know, also a really hard one, because we think Disney cruise line food is pretty darn good. But smaller ship. They've got a much smaller number of people to make food for. Like, which one? Which one would you give the edge to?
[00:56:25] Speaker C: I would say variety. Probably more on Disney Cruise line, but I think the quality was a little bit better on Panama.
[00:56:32] Speaker A: Yeah, that's. That's a great distinction, and that totally makes sense to me. Well, thank you for playing, actually. No, I have to ask you one last question. Tomorrow, if you are going to go on a Disney vacation, and you could pick any in the world, are you going to pick a Disney cruise line cruise, let's say, in concierge, or are you going to pick an adventures by Disney? Expedition cruise or river cruise or land based vacation?
[00:56:58] Speaker C: I think that I would pick a land based abd. I would really like to. We've never traveled to Asia, and they have, like, the Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia. And I think especially if I travel to that part of the world, I would love to have the guides with me. Cause just, you know. Cause I'm not experienced at all with that. So that's what I would pick if I could pick anything.
[00:57:15] Speaker A: Awesome. I love that answer. We've heard from Danny, one of our adventure guides from our river cruise, that that specific itinerary, the Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, that. That's a fantastic itinerary.
[00:57:27] Speaker B: Although we also heard from him. It's probably not long for this world at this point.
[00:57:32] Speaker A: That was his personal prediction. So.
[00:57:34] Speaker B: That was his personal prediction. Yeah. I would love to hear. If I, if anyone out there has done that particular ABD, we'd certainly love to hear about it. We've just not had much coverage on the asian market, and with a couple of new cruise ships headed to Asia from Disney, it'd be great if you know someone out there who knows the asian cruise market, we'd love to hear from them. So pass them along and I will. Echo Kelly, I think highest value prop things for ABd is going to destinations that you wouldn't know how to plan on your own, or maybe you would know, but you just don't. It's going to take. It's very time intensive. Yeah, you're just, you're, you're passing the planning over to Disney and trusting them with it. And I'd say 99.9% of the time they get it right. So, you know, that's a, that's an easy value proposition, I think, for adventures by Disney. But Kelly, thank you so much for taking some time to come on the show, share this amazing adventure. I was already trying to browse through and figure out if we, we are. I'm in all seriousness, everyone out there listening. I don't know when this episode is going to come out exactly, but we are on 2026 summer for our next podcast group, Sailing Adventure, and we are seriously considering heading over to Europe in some capacity, be it an ocean cruise, a river cruise, who knows, maybe pennant Cruise line. So there you go. But Kelly, thanks for coming on. This is just an amazing adventure. We really, really appreciate you taking the time.
[00:58:51] Speaker C: Thank you so much for having me.
[00:58:57] Speaker B: Well, thanks to everyone out there for listening this week. We really, really appreciate it. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast. You can keep getting great content from us every week. In fact, twice a week we publish shows. So be sure to hit the subscribe button to get all of those great episodes. And if you want to watch us live, we have a live show now every week. Monday nights, 05:30 p.m. pacific 08:30 p.m. eastern over on YouTube.com dclduo so be sure to head over and check that out. If you want to help support the show, be sure to hit those five stars on Apple Podcasts. And if you leave us a written review, a five star written review, we will read it at the top of one of our main episodes. So please head over there and hit those five stars. Of course, you can also help support the show by supporting our fabulous show sponsor, my path unwinding travel. You want to book your next Disney vacation? Head over to mypathunwinding.com dclduo or email
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[email protected] or reach out to us on our voicemail line at 4024-135-5590 that's 4024-135-5590 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 the great folks over at mypath unwinding travel or Disney directly or your own travel agent. Thanks again for listening and we'll see you next time for another fabulous adventure with the DCL duo.
