Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: So today I'm going to kind of flip things around Connecticut. Tell me what your favorite Disney theme park is.
[00:00:06] Speaker B: Ooh, I'm not ready for that.
I'm not ready for that, man.
[00:00:12] Speaker A: See, if the theme of Sam's rapid fire is judgment, mine is surprise.
Welcome back everybody to this week's episode of the DCL Duo podcast brought to you by my Path Unwinding Travel and yep, wah wah. It's just me one more time. I think that we've got two back to back episodes. Welcome back everybody to this week's episode of the DCL Duo podcast brought to you by my Path Unwinding Travel and yep, wah wah, it's just me one more time. I think that we've got two back to back episodes coming out with just me. But you know what? I think I'm a pretty good host. We're going to find out because we got a really good guest and I want to help him shine. So we'll see how this goes. But before I get to our guest and our show topic, need to read this week's listener review. This week's review comes from JJ Flock, who writes Smooth Sailing with the DCL Duo. Always a great listen, always helpful, insightful and fun. Brian and Sam have built a wonderful podcast community for all to enjoy. I love hearing about their adventures. Thanks Brian and Sam. Jason Flock from Georgetown, Indiana. He writes so just for everyone out there, I think we've probably mentioned at least once or twice on the show. So my, my last name is actually also Flock, but JJ and I are like we might be related but we've never met. So anyway, not coming from like a close family member, let me put it that way. It's just to dispel that myth. In fact, I don't even think my parents have left a review of our show. I'm gonn to get on top of them for that. So anyway, with that I want to dive over into our guest CT and actually before I should mention, just real quick to plug, please, please, please head over, hit those five stars leave us a five star review. If you leave us a five star review over on Apple Podcasts and you leave us a written review, we will read it on the air at the top of one of our main shows as we did with jj. So jj, thank you so much once again for that review. But our guest this evening, no stranger to the DCL Duo podcast, I think he is quickly and rapidly rising the charts as the person who has appeared most on and we're excited about that. I want to welcome ct, AKA Tinfoil Mouse ears, back to the show.
[00:02:12] Speaker B: Welcome ct. Hey, it's so great being on the show again. You know, any chance I get to like talk about cruising? Right, Any chance you get to talk about cruising, especially with Disney and people who also love it as well. It's. Yeah, it's not a bad way to spend some time.
[00:02:27] Speaker A: Exactly, exactly. That's why we started this show. It's a great, great topic to talk about and so much exciting news coming out. Yeah. All right, well, ct, we're here to talk about your very merry time sailing on the Magic out of Galveston. Adults only, which is the way you like to cruise, which is great and fantastic. I love that we have a fabulous adult only couple that loves sailing Disney Cruise Line. You can come on and tell us all about it. But before we dive into your specific sailing, remind folks of your Disney Cruise Line creds because you've got some pretty good ones.
[00:03:00] Speaker B: So we're, you know, we're eight time cruisers with dcl. We try to, man, we try to spread out as far as we can. So we don't, we're not, we're not your like dream and wish out of Port Canaveral, back to back to back to back kind of folks where, you know, we're always looking for the itinerary that is different for us and keep making the cruise line show us new places and have new exciting adventures. Not saying there's not places we want to go back to, but for sure, we love, we love the new experience. So we've done eight now. We're DVC members, so we don't just vacation at sea with Disney. We vacation by land with them as well. So.
[00:03:41] Speaker A: Nice, nice.
What's your favorite cruise you've done so far?
[00:03:46] Speaker B: I think it's got to be Northern Europe. I think it's got to be the one you can't get now. Iceland, Norway. Right. Hopefully they get back there. Hopefully Iceland makes it. Whatever, whatever's causing. Because Disney's not the only one that's kind of come off that. They're not the only ones that have come off that itinerary.
[00:04:01] Speaker A: So yeah, I think it's the Iceland stops, to be perfectly honest, because I think there's just so much like they had to, they couldn't make certain port stops the last time around.
A lot of geological activity, we'll say in Iceland these days. So I have a feeling those Iceland stops are getting a little tricky for the, for the cruise line. But yeah, I'm with you. That was like Top of my list. And when we realized it was no longer on the. On the schedule for them for the release they just did, I was a little bummed. So glad you got to do it. It's one of those cruises that is very unique. So. But we're here to talk about the magic Galveston and very merry time. So, cc, what drew you? Well, tell folks when the sailing actually occurred, and then what drew you to it?
[00:04:44] Speaker B: So it. It departed on December 23rd, returned on, I think, the 29th.
What drew us to it was we were looking at a way to use our upcoming. You know, we had a cruise credit and have got a bunch of different vacation goals right now that don't include cruising, unfortunately, but seeing some national parks both here in the US And Canada, vacationing a lot with family.
So for us, it was, how do we. How do we use our onboard booking credit before it goes? My wife's a teacher. That makes it complicated. I travel a lot for work. So we start now, we really start narrowing down the windows that we can get out and see and go to some of these great places. So it just so happened we were sitting at the Disney's Vero beach resort in spring break and talking about it and trying to decide how we were going to do it. And when Kelsey suggested that we go on a Christmas cruise, I was all in. There wasn't much convincing she had to do. I was. I was ready to buy plane tickets before she was done saying it was okay.
[00:05:51] Speaker A: It does not take too much arm twisting for me to purchase a cruise. I gotta tell you that the dynamic in our household is I gotta twist Sam's arm. So that's. That's great. Well, so you went out of Galveston. I know this. This is not your first time sailing out of Galveston, right?
[00:06:06] Speaker B: Nope, this is the first one. First one we had out of Galveston. We've done, you know, San Juan, we've done Citizecchia, we've done Southampton, Miami. Yeah, this is the first one out of Galveston. A couple out of Port Canaveral. So this is the first one out of Galveston. I'd been to Houston in that area before, but my wife hadn't. So it was different looking at. Through a different optic of. Not that. Right. When I go for work, that's totally different trip than when I'm trying to find new and exciting things for my wife. So.
[00:06:36] Speaker A: Yeah. Nice. So, okay, so you planned for Galveston. Did you go down and stay in Galveston before the sailing? Or did you. Did you, like, get there and get right on the Ship?
[00:06:47] Speaker B: Nope. We went down a couple days before in Galveston. We took in.
We stayed at the Hilton. That's in the. They've got a resort called Galveston Island Resort, and we stayed there. It's right next to a.
It's actually a pretty good touristy area there where there's a lot of great places to eat. There are a few amusement parks on Galveston island, both Moody Gardens and kind of your traditional pier amusement park, if that makes sense. We didn't take either of those in. Instead, we. We did a ghost tour one night and then just kind of walked the town. And, you know, we like hitting local spots to eat and stuff like that. So we hit a couple of local places to eat.
[00:07:31] Speaker A: We.
[00:07:33] Speaker B: The reason why we did the ghost tour. Those are also great ways. If you're a big history buff, you can usually hear a lot about the history of a place from a ghost tour, whether. Whether the ghost part of it is your thing or not. That's actually a great way to dip in to the history of an area. So we did that and had a good time.
There was also a Rainforest Cafe right adjacent to where we were staying, and they've got a water ride there.
[00:07:58] Speaker A: Nice.
[00:07:59] Speaker B: So we. We took that in just. Just to check the box and say we did it. I'd say it's like Jungle Cruise without the storytelling. It's like the Temu version of the Jungle Cruise is probably the best way to describe it.
[00:08:13] Speaker A: Nice. Nice. All right, so how was it. I mean, how was it getting. Where did you fly into to get to Galveston? And then how did you find some of the stuff that you ended up doing? Like, where did you. Where'd you do your research on Galveston pre cruise? And I. I just want to echo, like, I love that you did like, the ghost tour. I love those off, you know, off the beaten path kind of tours, so to speak. The one. It's not just like a city tour. It's like some interesting bent to the tour. So love that you did the ghost tour, but how'd you. How did you find it, and how was it getting to Galveston?
[00:08:41] Speaker B: So getting to Galveston, we flew, you know, from North Dakota. There's not a lot of options. It's either Delta or United, typically. So we flew Delta down to Bush, transferred with Island Breeze Shuttle, which operates out of Galveston to the resort, and stayed at the resort for a couple of days, enjoyed the beach, some of the local places. As far as the ghost tour, we found that, you know, we. I do the Viator thing quite often when I'm Searching for an area that we're going to, looking for, you know, what private tours can I find, what are the top attractions even if I don't end up booking there and I can find.
I, I, you know, I always prefer to find the company direct if I don't have to. I know there's some protection protections that come from Viator, but if I can find the actual tour provider, I prefer to do that. I want to, I, I'm all about supporting the small business is maybe the best way to say it.
[00:09:32] Speaker A: So you also, I think, you know, if you book through the tour operator directly, you might save a little bit of money here and there, depending. But yeah, I think it's great to support the local business. I also think it's really important when you use services like Viator or TripAdvisor or whatever it is. Like one really take a look at the reviews and make sure you understand what you're getting yourself into. And then also leave a review after you use the tour provider, especially if you had a really good experience. I think, you know, reviews tend to trend negative at times because people really only think to leave them if something bad happens. But if you had a good experience, leave them a review. It does help them out and help other people find the tour provider. So that's awesome.
[00:10:10] Speaker B: Yeah, 100 agree. 100% agree on that. So.
[00:10:12] Speaker A: All right, well, let me step back one step further. I didn't ask you about kind of the booking process and you know, getting your onboard activities and such. So, you know, eight time cruiser, you're in the gold category.
I don't know how much you wanted to book. How long was this cruise? This was a, you may have set it up front. This was a four night, five night.
[00:10:32] Speaker B: So was a five night or a six night? Is it five night or six night? It's a five night or a six night. I think it was a, I want to say. Well, no, it must have been a five. No, it was a six night.
[00:10:42] Speaker A: Six night. Yeah.
[00:10:43] Speaker B: Six night, Yep.
[00:10:44] Speaker A: All right. And you sailed over Christmas, which is amazing when you know, some of the very maritime cruises aren't actually over the holiday. So that's great.
[00:10:50] Speaker B: Yeah. That was the other benefit of this is this kind of threaded that my wife's holiday needle, you know, like when we try to book something over the holidays when we go to the parks, it's like, you know, first day of winter, the 21st, until, you know, a week later. And then we got to get back here so she can get back to school. So it this, actually, we'd been looking for years and years to try to catch like Key west on a Christmas cruise and we could never get the dates to line up the right way, so she didn't have to. Just hard for her as a music teacher because they're doing music programs and stuff like that all the way up until they break for the holiday. It's just hard for her to lose those last couple of days because that's like super bowl for her, you know, for some of the stuff a music teacher does in the school. So.
[00:11:30] Speaker A: Nice. Yeah, no, that makes total sense. So booking pre cruise.
As we, as we record today, Disney's been doing some interesting things with waiting rooms. We all know the challenges people have had with online waiting rooms, I should say, and the challenges people have had with booking activities and things like that. Did you get what you were looking to get, pre cruise from a booking standpoint or any challenges there?
[00:11:52] Speaker B: Yes, actually, it was very easy. We got everything we wanted to book. We got the Rainforest Room. I got the Palo reservations I wanted for both brunch and dinner. I was able to get, you know, I did some onboard gift stuff around that window, too. We really didn't have a problem. But I think the reason why is because you have to remember at the same time, the context of this is we're going on a trip to Galveston where there's not going to be a lot of pearl or platinums because we were on the other side of the business for Disney was the Treasure Wave that was eating up some of the big, big fans. And they were right. So there were a ton of platinums and pearls sailing on the Treasure for its inaugural departure and cruise, while we were quietly sailing out of Galveston on the Magic. So it actually worked out really well.
[00:12:41] Speaker A: Nice, nice, nice. So you got what you wanted, it sounds like. Did you. Did you book any shore excursions like we did?
[00:12:48] Speaker B: We booked. We booked two. We booked one through Disney, we booked one privately. And the One privately, we actually, we decided to back out on. The One Privately was to Nachi Kokum, but the weather leading up to it was not great and we were okay eating the deposit, but the weather wasn't great the day we were in Cozumel. So we stayed on the ship, enjoyed the Rainforest Cafe. Just wasn't worth the trouble to get over there with the weather we were having that day. So we just decided to.
The money wasn't nearly as important as having a good time and having the good company, if that makes sense. And I think that's the first time we've ever done that. So for the other one we did Stingray city. And is it Starfish point? I think is what the beach is called now. But there's a Stingray city, if you're not familiar with it, is like a sandbar kind of on the north side of the inlet, Grand Cayman there, where there's a really shallow space for the stingray and they collect there because it's harder for their predators to come into that space. So it's turned into a great spot for people to go and get a chance to snorkel and swim with stingray. I think snorkeling is a little less common there because they worry about people full on swimming and kicking the stingray because of how shallow and there's no place to go. So it's a little more controlled with kind of just wading through like waist chest deep water and taking an opportunity to, you know, hold a stingray. They're very social. They'll come in between the people. They're not shying away from folks at all in that area. So it's a great place to kind of get an experience with them in the wild. And then. And then we hopped over to Starfish Point, which is a wonderful beach that's kind of come in south of. If you've ever been to Rum Point beach there, it's just south of that on the inside of the island. And there's a great collection of some, some really great starfish that have made that area a home that you can see.
[00:14:39] Speaker A: So, so, so do you have. What was your report? What were your port stops on this one then?
[00:14:42] Speaker B: So it was just Grand Cayman and Cozumel.
[00:14:44] Speaker A: Grand Cayman, Cozumel. Okay. So did you. It sounds like. So Nachi Koman was a private beach resort trip. Did you end up doing anything in Cozumel instead?
[00:14:55] Speaker B: No, we just stayed on the ship. We did the rainforest room at the spa and, you know, had a couple of drinks on the boat and just kind of took it easy that day.
[00:15:03] Speaker A: Nice. You mentioned that you decided to cancel because of the weather. How was the weather overall on the cruise?
[00:15:09] Speaker B: The rest of it was fantastic. That was the one day where it was a little. It was. There was rain in the forecast, some lightning storms in the forecast. I'm not quite sure those ever materialized quite as heavy as the forecast had them. But it certainly wasn't the warm beach day we were hoping for, which is why we decided some spa time and some time by the pool and stuff like that just worked out better. For us.
[00:15:30] Speaker A: Nice one. In a porte. Doing some spa time means you save a little bit of money. So that's. That's also nice.
[00:15:35] Speaker B: Well, we had already had the rainforest passes for the. For the duration of the cruise, so.
[00:15:40] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:15:40] Speaker B: So no savings there, but yeah, it.
[00:15:42] Speaker A: Was not booking the list. Yeah. Not booking spot treatments. Yeah. Yeah. Okay.
[00:15:45] Speaker B: This is actually the first time we've ever touched the spa. I haven't been able to talk my wife into it. We did rainforest passes for the duration of the cruise. That's the first time we. We've ever done the spa on a cruise.
[00:15:57] Speaker A: First time across eight cruises.
[00:16:00] Speaker B: Wow.
[00:16:00] Speaker A: Okay, talk. Talk to me about that for a second. What did your wife end up thinking? This was your first time in the rainforest room too?
[00:16:07] Speaker B: Yep, yep. First time for both of us. I decided to book it without really consulting her just because, you know, it was a Christmas cruise. And I just kind of made the decision that after hearing, you know, some great guests that you guys have had on the show talking about it several times and some great folks in the community like Tracy and folks like that that were talking about how great it was, and we just decided. I just decided to trust that, book it, and introduce my wife to it in a way that's, you know, for. It's. I don't know, it just is something neither of us have ever really experienced in our lifetimes. You know, like, I never really done a spa treatment or anything like that. You know, my wife doesn't. She doesn't do Mannies or petty. She doesn't do, you know, that's not. She grew up on a farm in North Dakota and, you know, just a little more practical minded when it comes to doing things. Which is why Disney cruises seem so far outside the realm of reality when we talk to, you know, sometimes the rest of her family, but it works for us. So. And she loves going on the trip. So this was just, you know, as you go on these different things, you find what you like and sometimes you're willing to try something new. And this was a good opportunity for us to try something new. So.
[00:17:16] Speaker A: All right, well, I gotta ask. What did you think the rainforest room and the magic and the wonder are some of the, you know, they're smaller and they're all interior, so you don't get any sort of outside views on, like dream and Fantasy have kind of a deck with the heated loungers that you can in the hot tubs. And then obviously the wish class took it to the next level. But what did you think of your first Experience with the Rainforest Room, it was good.
[00:17:37] Speaker B: We really enjoyed like some of the, like the aromatherapy, like steam rooms and stuff like that. We really enjoyed the loungers. I think that's where we probably spent most of our time as we were enjoying the spa space.
We liked it. I mean, we had a good time with it. I don't know if I would book it for the entire cruise and maybe just find like a good afternoon, you know, a good sea day to kind of have a pass for a single day as opposed for the whole cruise. I don't know for that. It depends on, you know, the trip we're going on, the kind of stops that are there and what's the value proposition of the charge for it. Right. Like it's, it's more complicated than. There's not really a binary yes or no answer for it. We'll just have to see how we are in the future. And then obviously with the bigger ships, I think, you know, as you describe the spaces and we've seen videos of how those spaces are different, it. It's probably more likely if we're on one of the next classes as opposed to the, the Magic class. Right. I think it's more likely for us to do it on the Magic class if we're sailing in a place like Alaska where you're not really getting a lot of pool time anyway. So it's a good alternate to that. Whereas I think if we were, you know, in the South Caribbean on the Magic, we're probably the Rainforest Cafe or the, Sorry, the Rainforest Room is probably less likely, if that makes sense.
[00:18:46] Speaker A: I have found it to be, especially on the Wish class ships where the concierge pricing is just like, just out of hand. Like it's a good substitute for like, you know, sail in a regular stateroom and grab a Rainforest Pass and it's a great substitute for the concierge lounge. And so at least the concierge sun deck, I should say. And your point about Alaska that way.
[00:19:04] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:19:04] Speaker A: And you're. Well, it's the only thing you don't get, which I wish they would actually find a way to provide is like, I think they could send a drink server through every now and again for some of those spaces and let you, let you have a, let you have a drink, especially the Wish class that have the outdoor space. And your point about Alaska is a great one. I love those like indoor kind of Rainforest room experiences in the colder weather cruises.
You know, the only thing is, to your point, buying the whole length of cruise pass in A place like Alaska or Norway, like you're going to be out and about so much like finding the time to actually get into the Rainforest Room is tough. So if you can get a single day pass, it's worth it. Unfortunately they stopped. They used to sell pre sell the single day passes. You could just buy a pass as an onboard amenity ahead of your cruise and now they've pivoted to really pushing those length of cruise passes which are pretty expensive and I agree not always the right value. Uh, and if you want a day of pass you just kind of have to go you know, generally in the morning and see if they have any available and pick one up then. So you know, anyway, it's a great experience. It's saying it's unfortunate they don't pre sell the day passes any longer but you know, kind of is what it is.
[00:20:11] Speaker B: It was you know, on a six night cruise. So say you're using it for what, five days maybe. So it was a, it was about $25 a day was what the cost was for the passenger. So I think I paid 120 per person. So. Yeah, but which is worth it if you use it?
[00:20:28] Speaker A: Yeah, if you use it every day it's great. I mean you can really.
[00:20:31] Speaker B: And I think we missed it one day. I think we missed it one day.
[00:20:34] Speaker A: I'm, I'm the opposite. I buy the seven day pass and then I only get in there one day. So like it's not worth it at all. What did your, did your wife enjoy the Rainforest Room too?
[00:20:44] Speaker B: I think she's kind of where I am. It would depend on the cruise. It would depend on. I don't think it was, I was. Part of me was kind of hoping it was just going to be a. Oh, we have to do this from now on. And it makes it easy for me but I think for her she saw it more as. But she also likes a lot of the activities on the boat.
Also loves, is perfectly happy by the pool sitting out in the sun. So yeah, I think it just depends. Just depends.
[00:21:10] Speaker A: How crowded was your sailing?
[00:21:11] Speaker B: I think it was relatively full. I think it was. I mean it felt for. It felt like it was a full magic class. I mean there were times that like you know, lines for pictures would suggest the, how full the, the theater. I don't think they ever really said, or at least we didn't catch them say how full the ship was. But I, I'm gonna say based on how the dining room looked, based on lines for pictures and character lines. I Would say it had to be at. At least at like 85 to 90% capacity minimum.
[00:21:39] Speaker A: That makes sense. Time of year and the type of cruise. I. Yeah, I'd guess it's going to be pretty full. All right. We're bouncing around a bit, so let me back up and, and just ask about the boarding experience out of Galveston. I mean, Disney sales out of there enough. It should be a fairly well oil. But any, any kinks in the machine for you?
[00:21:56] Speaker B: No. And to be honest, we actually got through there pretty quick. I think, you know, we got there to the port probably around like 10:30. I think we headed down to the shuttle that was provided by the hotel. It was like 15 bucks a person each way, which wasn't too unreasonable.
And then, and I will, I just want to, like, if someone's touching your bag, you should be giving them a tip. That's my rule. Right. So if they're loading up the, the bus, you should be giving them a tip. If they're the porter at the port, please take care of those folks. And think about it in the context of the holidays, right? Like if someone's working two days before Christmas, tip them, like they're giving up a little bit from their family time. Right. Like be thinking about that. So anyway, you know, we were, we had about 15 minutes. We had, you know, bags with the porter at the port. They were showing us which way to go. I think we were on the ship by like 11:20. So from 10:30, stepping down out of our hotel room to being. To walking down the gangway at 11:20 to be introduced into the, you know, the atrium there was not unreasonable at all. It went very smoothly.
[00:23:02] Speaker A: Which, which or what kind of terminal does Disney go out of? Because I know Royal, like built a terminal down there, right? They have their own.
[00:23:08] Speaker B: Yeah, there's a third party one there that is shared by several different cruise ships. I was watching it, you know, in the days prior on some of these. Man. What's the one called that? I like the Marine. There's like a marine tracker.
[00:23:22] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, Marine traffic.
[00:23:23] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. Because we were sitting up in the room a couple of days before looking out because there's a lot of traffic in and out of that port because of the energy industry and stuff like that, as well as the shipping industry. So we were taking a little bit of time one afternoon and looking at my iPad and looking at the different ships in the distance and wondering where they were and where they were from. So a lot of traffic in and out of that port and we we definitely saw. I. I want to say over the course there was Princess that we talked to folks that went out of there. I think we saw Royal for sure almost every day that we were there. Had a ship there. So. Yeah, Carnival, of course has ships out of there. So.
[00:24:01] Speaker A: Yeah. And Port Experience overall was. Was good for you. Let's. Let's talk for a minute about the Magic itself. Had you been on the Magic Post Dry Dock?
[00:24:12] Speaker B: No, this was the first time that we had been on the Magic since the Soul Cat Lounge was added.
[00:24:19] Speaker A: What'd you think?
[00:24:20] Speaker B: It was our favorite spot. I. I had, you know, per the great recommendations I get from the duo, I had, I would call it a top five Old Fashioned that I've ever had. It was. They. They do a really, really good job with the Old Fashioned there. My wife, who is it does not. She drinks on the very rare occasion. So she was enjoying some of the mocktails that they had there and, and actually enjoyed a few of those and thought they were great.
But we, we really enjoyed that lounge. There was a great bartender there. Luis was taking care of us, a great cast member. Great. We just a great experience there. The vibe was good. You know, my wife, being a music teacher, kind of appreciated the vibe there. But we have put a pin in. We have not seen that movie yet. So one of our watch goals here in the springtime is going to be to catch that movie and watch it. So we just haven't had a chance for it yet.
[00:25:17] Speaker A: It's a good film. I think it adds to, you'll understand some of the touches that they put into the Soul Cat Lounge. What I like about Soulcat is it is understated Disney. It's not too over the top. And I think that movie especially lent itself to that kind of an approach.
So yeah, it just recorded yesterday with someone who had the same sentiment where they're like, I think we were in there every night. Like it was just a great spot. And I think they did just such a nice job with the renovation. There's plenty of seating in there now. So I find myself bouncing back and forth between Soul Cat and Cadillac Lounge.
[00:25:50] Speaker B: Is it Cadillac or is it Cadillac Lounge or Keys on the Magic?
[00:25:53] Speaker A: Ah, that's a good question. I should know this. I feel like it's Cadillac Lounge on the Magic and it's Keys on the Wonder. But I could be wrong about that.
[00:26:01] Speaker B: Because we were also bouncing between the two and the Old Fashioned at the other was not nearly as good as it was was at.
[00:26:07] Speaker A: No, that is true. I remember That I didn't. I don't order the old fashions in, in those lounges. I love the.
And actually I really enjoy a gin and tonic and they have like a gen and tonic trolley usually in one of those lounges. But I'll tell you the one thing I hate when Disney now is trying to get fancy with their gin and tonics is they're like putting juniper berries like, like rosemary stuff coming out of it and you're like, I just want the gin and the tonic. So all this other stuff is not fun to drink. Especially if you get like a juniper berry in, in your mouth. It's like having a peppercorn in there. Anyway, I can see CT furiously looking up whether it's Soul Cat.
[00:26:45] Speaker B: Yeah, I'm on, I'm on Scott's blog right now trying to find it and I, I don't see.
[00:26:50] Speaker A: Let's see. Which goes faster. Let's see. What is the lounge? What is the lounge? I should have just asked me a little chat. GPT. Where's the lounges? On the Magic and Wonder deck plans.
[00:27:00] Speaker B: That's probably the right way to go.
[00:27:02] Speaker A: Let's see. Disney Magic, Disney, Wonder, Adams Gills. Disney Magic has keys. You're right, it's keys. Okay, so there you go.
[00:27:10] Speaker B: We had some great into that note. We had it made it easy to spend time in those spaces because all of the, all the acts that they brought on under contract for this cruise were amazing. You know, all the musical acts that were filling the lounges with great music and sound and in the atrium when music was playing there, they all were like, it was phenomenal.
[00:27:33] Speaker A: I feel like that's one of the nice things about the classic ships is Soulcat and Keys are both like music centered bars. So they have music playing bands playing in Soul Cat and they have obviously the piano player for keys. And I love that ambiance of being able to sit in a bar and have the music that, you know, unlike the fantasy class, you don't really get that in any of the adult bars except maybe ooh la la, you get the piano. But there's not really a band space. I guess in the Carousel bar they have that band space for, for music. So but I think these two bars do it really well in terms of the amount of seating and the music and all that sort of stuff. So it's great, great spots for drinks before dinner. Let's talk about, let's shift over to the maritime aspect of the cruise. Ct. I think Disney does it right. How was it in terms of decor and characters and special things going on for Christmas time.
[00:28:24] Speaker B: You know, for years and years and years, my wife and I have gone to the parks for Christmas. And if you go to Walt Disney World, right, for Christmas, for the Christmas holiday, they do Christmas. Right, Right. The. The extra. Or the. Yeah, even the extra shows. The shows. Even if you don't do, like, the Mickey Merry Christmas party. Right. And you just do the parks for the holidays. We love all the trees and all the resort. You know, some days we'll go down and we'll just hop from resort to resort looking at gingerbread houses and Christmas trees up in the resort. Just Disney does it. Right? And Disney Cruise line did not disappoint the very high bar that Disney does. We obviously took in the tree lighting ceremony, which we absolutely loved. We saw the Christmas carolers a few times with the performers from the Walt Disney Theater singing Christmas carols in the atrium, which we absolutely loved. We took in and watched the Mrs. Claus stories when Mrs. Claus had traveled to the ship to read stories to the boys and girls that were on. On that happened to be on the Disney Cruise line for Christmas. We. We loved all the touches of Christmas. They even had, like cookies and cocoa and coffee in the morning. On Christmas morning in the. In the atrium. I'd. I'd gone to get Kelsey some coffee and then grabbed a couple of cookies for her and brought them back. And then we were venturing around on Christmas morning, and it was a great way to celebrate the holiday.
[00:29:47] Speaker A: Yeah, I love the. The warm milk and cookies on Christmas Eve that they hand out that you can, like, take back to your room for. For Santa. I think that's such a great touch for the. The kids and the parents to have. It's so awesome. Did you do any?
[00:30:00] Speaker B: It was also, before we get off of that, the other thing that's great is, like, man, the guests are in such the right mode, right? Like going up and down and seeing all of the Christmas decorations on everyone's stateroom doors. In fact, just down the hallway from us. And we never. Never ended up seeing him. But we dropped a tinfoil mouse ear magnet off for them because we saw a DCL duo magnet on a door a couple of staterooms away from ours and never had seen them and just dropped off a little note that said, you know, merry Christmas. Any. Any friend of the dcl duo is a friend of ours and left the magnet there for him. So we just loved how, you know, more than just the magnets, but, you know, people going all out with Christmas decor. We Had a wreath that we shaped like Mickey ears on our door that we had the Wayne and Lanny from Prep and Landing, if you're familiar with Prep and Landing, hanging from our wreath, which is one of my favorite Christmas specials. It was. Yeah, it was fantastic. The gingerbread house was great and I think looked a lot better than some of the other ships. I think the magic does the gingerbread house pretty well.
[00:31:07] Speaker A: There they go out on the classic decorations, which is great. And I. I was really happy to see on the treasure this year because the maiden was over Christmas. So they actually had like a nice big green Christmas tree as opposed to the white Christmas tree or the gold. Is it gold or white? I forget which. But is not the traditional Christmas tree on the. On the wish. Anyway, what about stateroom decor? Did you. Did you decorate your stateroom at all? Did you get a little tree or anything?
[00:31:30] Speaker B: I did an onboard gift where they. Where I set it up and I didn't. It was a surprise for Kelsey. But, you know, where they kind of hang the banners from the ceilings. She's made a joke that she's going to hang those banners from the ceiling fan above our bedroom and have it, you know, running the spinning wheels of death on me at some point. But no, they had the things hanging in the. Because it was Galveston. It didn't have this year's decor. I think it was last year's or the year before, the one with the Goofy scarf, if people are familiar with, you know, those year over year over year. And then I have a small Christmas tree that's a fake one that has little Mickey gloves and, you know, the shoes and ear hats on it that as decorations that I brought from home along with just a Christmas, a small Christmas Mickey. Because I wanted to put some decor up in the room for my wife to try to make it feel as Christmassy as possible. Brought her favorite, like, little Christmas chocolates that she likes to indulge in a little bit. Because we're on a cruise. And since we're on the cruise, I figured the calories don't count. So whether you bring them from home or they're provided by Disney, there you go.
[00:32:35] Speaker A: And pro tip for folks out there who are considering a maritime cruise, those onboard amenities are a great way to get a little decor in the stateroom for the holidays. We always get questions around, you know, can I put up Christmas lights? You can if they're battery operated LEDs. So we decorate our stateroom door with like a string of LED battery operated lights that is allowed nothing that plugs in is allowed. We also get the question, can I bring a Christmas tree on board? Yes. A little, you know, fake Christmas tree. You're not going to be hauling the box with the six foot tree into your stateroom, so don't do that. But you can bring small little Christmas trees. Disney does typically offer on these sailings like an actual Christmas tree. Like a small tabletop Christmas tree with some Disney ornaments on it. It's more of like a bush. Like it's not actually a. Like a pine tree of any sort. And so you can get one of those in the stateroom.
[00:33:28] Speaker B: We've also used real quick disclaimer on that. Depending on your port and where you're traveling, you may or may not be allowed to take that off the boat.
[00:33:36] Speaker A: Yeah, generally you're not gonna be allowed to bring it back on shore. You can take the ornaments off though. That's kind of the keepsake of that. The other thing that we found is Amazon has these, what they call collapsible Christmas trees. It's really just like a, it looks like a, a wreath but that's like, you know, complete. And then when you hang the top down the, you know, these concentric circles kind of come down on top of like a holder or a stand that also collapses. And so you kind of get like a, it's like a piece of garland wrapped to look like a Christmas tree basically. And some of those come pre lit and you can plug them in with the LED lights and stuff like that. So that's, that's a nice option if you want something just maybe a, a little bigger or you are sailing maybe in like a. We were in a one bedroom and used one of those as our Christmas tree one time.
[00:34:18] Speaker B: So yeah, another tip. And it just happens to be another.
I don't know, another YouTube YouTuber I follow a lot is Linus Tech tips, if you've ever heard of him before. I bought the Cable management magnetic arches from their website and that's what I used to hang my decorations on the door. So I was using magnets instead of. I saw somebody upset because they were trying to use the command strip stuff and someone asked them not to do it because it is an adhesive or.
[00:34:45] Speaker A: Yeah, no, along those lines.
[00:34:47] Speaker B: Yeah, so we did. I did their magnetic arches. They've got them in different sizes. So I had a larger one to hold the weight of the, the Christmas wreath itself and then much smaller ones for the lights that I had around the door and the stockings I had hanging from the bottom. So the Magnetic arches are. That's what I used. I'm sure you can find little magnetic hooks or something like that, but make sure you're doing magnets if you're going to decorate the door with something more than magnets.
[00:35:17] Speaker A: Absolutely.
[00:35:18] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:35:18] Speaker A: They do not want you adhering anything to the door by any means. Yeah. And we use, to your point, we use neodyne hooks. We have hooks of different sizes. So we have these tiny hooks that we use for the string lights and larger hooks for the others. Magnets are fine, adhesives are not. So 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. My Path 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 Aulani, and so much more. Whether it's 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. Thanks my Path Unwinding for sponsoring today's show. Now back to the episode.
Well, it sounds like some good stuff happening. Did you get, did you get to meet Santa and Mrs. Claus on Christmas Day?
[00:36:38] Speaker B: Christmas, of course, of course. We saw them both on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. We absolutely loved it. You know, I got to talk about a couple of these that we did that were besides just Santa, big shout out to. We had this great experience with a cast member. We saw Maribel. Maribel was fantastic on the cruise. So if you've not gone on a cruise yet and had a chance to meet Maribel and Bruno, they just so great to see, so great to spend time with. And Maribel, you know, upon hearing from us that our nieces had a favorite there that recorded a little 30 second clip that we could send off to our nieces with Maribel saying Merry Christmas and then we ran into a Friend of Maribel later, Pilar, and she did such a great job. So, yeah, both the character. Them, you know, both having Maribel and Bruno on the ship was absolutely amazing. Yeah, we. We really enjoyed it. And then who doesn't love seeing Chippendale. Chippendale in any environment that's, you know, they're always up to no good. And even around the holidays, with their holiday, you know, of course, all the characters are all bringing their Christmas best on a cruise like that. And it was great to take pictures with them as well. So. Nice.
[00:37:47] Speaker A: Yeah, I. I love Chip and Dale and their tuxedos. I think they're just so funny in their tuxedos.
Yes, that's great. That's. How is the Christmas menu? That's the other special thing they offer.
[00:37:58] Speaker B: The Christmas menu was good. I did something unconventional for myself. I did. I think I did the.
I did on that menu. Is it the. The sea bass? And then my wife did a more traditional, like, roasted turkey dinner. Appetizer wise, I think they were. We tried the Virginia and white cheddar croquettes, which was. They were okay. Not the best appetizer, but they were okay. And then we really enjoyed. I had, like, we had done the double chocolate yule log, but we had seen the actual, you know, that anyone can cook with Chef Bosco doing a demo of how they make the yule log. So we were looking forward to having that again with Christmas dinner. And then, you know, a big theme for us was not sleeping on the signature desserts on this cruise. The signature desserts ended up being a lot of the stars that we saw as we were doing the various menu. So for Christmas, it was a red Santa tart, which was a white chocolate cheesecake, a berry. I'm not even. I don't even know. A berry something in it, and then a lemon almond cake kind of inside of a tart crust, which was fantastic. It was. It was very good. So. No, yeah, that. We love the. The Christmas menu. And there's a. There's a, you know, a traditional, like prime rib or something like that on it too. That. Whether you're, you know, ham turkey or. Or a rib roast for Christmas, which I think is the bulk of people who, you know, that's. That's a lot of. Or a big portion of what people normally expect out of a Christmas meal. So they had all of that taken care of on the menu.
[00:39:33] Speaker A: Nice. Nice. Yeah. It's funny, the. There's a Christmas menu, the New Year's menu, and the Thanksgiving menu, and they're all fairly similar, and I think you have similar fare to them, but, you know, they usually change, like, one dish into something crisp. You can get like a Thanksgiving dinner basically on New Year's or. Sorry, Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year's. But then they have, like. They'll have like goose or something on one of the menus, I think for New Year's potentially. Or maybe it was. Maybe it was Christmas and then. Yeah. So the rib roast. Right. Is the Christmas menu.
[00:40:04] Speaker B: The rib roast, the turkey, the Virginia ham, and then they do a pumpkin and mascarpone ravioli was on this. And then I had the Chilean sea bass. I just. I like the sea bass that's in the Enchanted Garden. I've always been a fan of that dish. And this was. When I saw this on the menu, I figured it was a good opportunity to enjoy something that had to be similar. And it didn't disappoint. It was very good. So we liked it. We also really, you know, something that was a different touch that we really appreciated and was a touching moment that kind of. That Disney created on the ship that obviously I'm hanging on to as a memory. So they must have done something right. But they chimed over the ship into the. Just the restaurants and the captain gave, like, a Christmas toast, which I really appreciated as well. Just touching words from the captain. And it was. Yeah, it was good.
[00:40:46] Speaker A: Yeah. And they usually have, like, an officer show up as, like, the proxy for the captain to, like, actually, like, raise the glass. So that's.
[00:40:52] Speaker B: Raise the glass. Yep.
[00:40:53] Speaker A: It's a nice. It is a nice touch. It is a nice.
[00:40:55] Speaker B: Yeah, it was a nice touch.
[00:40:56] Speaker A: Yeah. I'm kind of surprised they don't do that. Just once a sailing, like, you know, on a special, on, like, formal night, have the captain just deliver a toast. But it's really nice on those. Those special sailings that they do that. Did you get a.
Sometimes they hand out a special print for.
[00:41:10] Speaker B: We did get a special print, and I don't know what I've done with it now. It's here somewhere. It's here somewhere. Yeah. Normally we're. Because we've got a bunch of those downstairs.
I don't know what we would do with the Christmas one. We're probably. Maybe we need to offer it up to somebody that would enjoy it for more than just sitting in a box, because that's all it's going to do for us.
We're decorated up downstairs.
[00:41:33] Speaker A: So I won't show you the walls of our house and how we have creatively tried to put up most of what Disney has given us. Although some of those prints fall to the wayside. Ye, yeah, for sure. But that's a nice little touch for folks who don't know if you sail over the holidays. A lot of times New Year's Eve, Christmas came, if they gave us one on Thanksgiving, but definitely New Year's Eve and Christmas. We've gotten like, a special print left in our stateroom to commemorate the sailing, and it's usually a Don Ducky Williams print because he does a lot of the artwork for the cruise line, so. Nice little souvenir. Well, Cece, let's shift over and just talk about the adult only aspect of this. The sailing.
Yeah. So what kinds of things did you get up to? Oh, yeah, go ahead.
[00:42:12] Speaker B: Can I hit one thing before we get off at Christmas?
[00:42:14] Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely.
[00:42:14] Speaker B: And less of a brag, but more of a. I just want to encourage people to do something along those lines. And we saw a lot of people, we saw this, man, there was this great young lady.
You know, she must have been, Man, I don't know. My wife would probably be able to like. Yep, she's like 12 years, 3 months old, just because she's around kids that age all the time. But there was this young lady who was just handing out bracelets to every cast member for Christmas, which was fantastic. Right? It was just like the kind of almost like the little T. Swift bracelet. But she had obviously Christmas colors and was thanking everyone and telling everyone, merry Christmas. And I just want to, you know, I talked about it at the port, but, man, make sure you're. If you're going to Christmas cruise, have the thankful heart. Right? At the very least. But if you have a chance to, I don't want to say bring something because their rooms are so small. We did small Christmas cards, and there was either a fifty or a hundred dollar bill in the. The Christmas cards, depending on where, you know, we had a couple with some and a couple with other. And we just, you know, we're handing them out to, you know, bless some of the folks that were crew members that were. Because they're working over the holiday. Right. Like they're giving up their holiday with their family to, you know, to be there with you and try to give you, you know, try to bless the time that you have that you're reconnecting with your family. So I, I just asked you to think about that. You know, we. We kind of. We normally add a lot to our, you know, add a little something to the mandatory or the Suggested gratuity. Maybe that's the better way of saying it. But we really piled on to the gratuities as well as handed out cards to some of the great folks that took care of us. You know, our, our wait staff, Cristiano and Giovanni did such a great job. And we caught up with Maribel's friend Pilar later and gave her a Christmas card with something extra in it. So just encourage folks to do that during those types of cruises.
[00:43:56] Speaker A: Yeah. 100. It is such a great tip. It's something we try to do as well. And I, I would echo, I would not bring stuff because to your point, their rooms are full of stuff already and we've actually had like, we've sailed concierge once and we were just asking about a print from another sailing and the concierge is like, oh, I have one in my room. Do you want it? Because I am not going to use it and I don't need it taking up space. So like, their, their storage is tight. So I usually say don't bring stuff. We try to bring. We always over tip on the holidays. To your point, they are spending their time making our time at the holidays magical and not with their own families. And so I think it's like a really important thing to really over tip the, the crew on those, on those holidays. The other thing they do like is candy. So if you can like, you know, figure out something like when we've sailed concierge, we'll bring bags of Reese's peanut butter trees or cups or something like that. And just recent trees. Yes, yes, Reese Ms. Trees. Exactly. The odd shape. Reese's cups are the best. I'm just gonna put that plug out there. So it's, it's. We're entering Easter right now and so the eggs are out. The original, the og non standard Reese's treat. And I can't wait to get my hands on some. But yeah, we, we bring candy, favorite candy. And we've even like, if we know particular crew members on board, we've interacted with them before. Sometimes we'll know something that they really like, candy or a food item and we'll bring that for them so that they, they can, they can enjoy that.
[00:45:20] Speaker B: Yeah, I think we did a card that was like, I bought some smaller ones off of Amazon that were like maybe 2 inches by 2 inches it folded open that we could write a personal message in and really thank them for, you know, making our holiday special and, you know, the sacrifice that they were doing so we could have such A great holiday. And like I said, just putting a little something extra in there. And yeah, it was. It's good for your own heart too, right? That's like the kind of gift that you also, you know, so.
[00:45:44] Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. Well, look, I mean, it endears you to the crew, which, you know, at times can, you know, who knows, that can pay dividends later or something's going wrong and a crew member leans in to help you out a little bit extra. That, that. That's, you know, not a bad thing. So, you know, think about how the. It comes. What goes around comes around is kind of the strategy here. So agree those crew. Really nice. All right. Adult activities on board. See, did you get a. Did you get in a, you know, a trip to Palo?
How was the adult pool?
[00:46:12] Speaker B: Two Apollo trips, two, you know, like. Yeah, brunch and dinner. For brunch, we went and we actually, we worked it out. David, the manager there at Palo was fantastic. We even moved back our brunch by a half hour so my wife could see the Anyone, because we didn't want to miss it. So we linked up with him the first day after we saw the Navigator and he pushed our reservation off by a half hour, which was great. And then after we had such a great experience at brunch with Ellie, which this is the first brunch we've done since our first sailing. We. We kind of have gotten away from doing brunch on the cruise ships and kind of just went to doing dinner because we both loved the souffle so much and the dinner experience. But we did the brunch again, and this is the first time because it was a pre Covid brunch the last time we had done brunch. So it was a totally different experience. I don't think we'll book a trip without brunch again. It was. It was that great. And Ellie, our server, had done such a great job. We talked to David and he had made sure that Ellie was going to be our server. Then when we came back on the last night of. We always do Paolo dinner on the last night of the cruise. It's a good way for us to say, you know, to. To kind of bookend what is a great trip for us and a great cruise for us. So we. We like doing that. And then we'll usually hop down and see our wait staff and, you know, give them, you know, with a little envelope with the tip in it when we're done and stuff like that. But, man, we love Paulo for brunch. We had my wife had the pizza, the wild mushroom ravioli and the warm amaretto chocolate fondant. And I did a cheese and ham frittata, the chicken parm and the warm apple cinnamon sticky bun, which was fantastic. I mean, all of it was so great. Every dish I had was just like, you could have died. I could have died in that moment and just been happy. You know, it was, it was so good that it is the best meal I think I've had on a. A Disney cruise ship. Was that that brunch that day? It was fantastic. And then we had a little something special. If you. I know this is going to air much later, but if you haven't had a chance to listen to the Valentine's live episode that we did earlier this, I guess it was just a couple of weeks ago for us, but by the time this airs, it'll be a few months ago. But go check it out. We talked about adult only cruising there and things you can plan for your significant other. And we. I had a great gift that I was able to give my wife on.
On our Apollo brunch. And we'll leave it there. We'll leave it there. We'll point people in the direction of the other show and they can go. Yep, they can go. Check it out.
[00:48:31] Speaker A: So I love it. I love it. What about the. What about other adult stuff on board? Anything stand out? That was really fun. I can't, I can't think of like a special adult activity they do over the holidays. Like, they don't have like a Christma themed match or mate or anything like that. But.
[00:48:45] Speaker B: Yeah, no, we didn't really, you know, and we didn't do a lot of the match or m. We did some of the. We went and watched some trivia. We didn't really participate in trivia. We just kind of. I, I would say the biggest adult only one we did was the. The anyone can cook was an adult only for that one. Because some of those are adult only and some of them aren't. We had done those and I know that's my wife's favorite. She gets the little recipe card. You know, I plan these trips and I think I do a good job, Brian, but I can't get her to make any of. She's bringing recipe cards home for. So I must be doing something wrong. I gotta figure out like, what the. What am I missing that I gotta get her to like, you know, make the apple strudel in our home or the risotto. I think they've done the mushroom risotto from Palo before for the. Anyone can cook that we've sat through. So yeah, I need to figure out what I'm. What am I missing that I gotta do that?
[00:49:33] Speaker A: You know, the number of recipes I've collected from very nice restaurants we've been to or like the cookbooks from like a Michelin starred restaurant. They're not really cookbooks, they're just food pornography is what I call it. Cause it's like these beautiful dishes you're never gonna make. They give you the recipe and it's like I'm never gonna like, you know, turn something into a foam and make it at home. Like that's just not gonna happen. But I love going back and looking at the things I've eaten. But yeah, the other thing is that's funny is we've gotten a few cruise line, you know, recipes and they're always written from the point of view of the kitchen. They've gotten better about this from the standpoint that the kitchen is making stuff in bulk. And so like you would get a recipe off the cruise line and it'd be like, you know, go find a number six can of, you know, this thing. Cause you're getting ready to make, make it for 150 people. And so you have to like sit there and con and the recipe, they've gotten better with a lot better with that over time and giving kind of individual recipes. But yeah, it's, it's. I've definitely got a lot of them collected myself too.
[00:50:26] Speaker B: Yeah. As far as the other adult only we did spend a lot of time every day at the pool. The COVID Cafe is always a favorite spot for us whether it's just outside the cafe. After we've gotten a, you know, we're having a couple of drinks inside the cafe that's, I mean that's the adult only pool in the, the space that's there by the COVID Cafe is always kind of a mainstay for us. Like coffee. Good quote Ted Lasso like coffee is life. Right, Right. So we just, I've got, I've got.
[00:50:55] Speaker A: My short cortado right here to prove that.
[00:50:58] Speaker B: Yeah, we just, we, we love the, the illy blend even we've picked up for our machine at home from time to time. Uh, we have one of the original line Nespressos and we, we pick up the Ilies online because we just love that coffee so much. So we spent some time there and they, you know, they've gotten more creative with it with the characters that they put on that new machine that they have. And yeah, she had a great time with that. So, yeah, we just. That was kind of the adult only type things that we did. I know we spent some time watching because it was Christmas Day at Sea. We did watch. They had the Christmas parade or the Disney Christmas, like, special. I guess it's a parade slash advertisement for the park. But they had that going on Funnel Vision for a while. We also caught. They had the football game that day that was off of what the Chiefs were playing the Steelers. Maybe we. We caught some of that game was also on Funnel Vision. As we were going about our day. That day for Christma was between character meet and greets and taking pictures in front of the tree and so.
[00:51:53] Speaker A: Nice. Nice. Well, it sounds like a fabulous time. Ct. What have we not talked about that you wanted to be sure to highlight? I guess I would be remiss in asking. Sam's not here. How are the shows on board?
[00:52:07] Speaker B: The shows were great, so. Oh, wow. We almost missed it. The best show, the best variety act at sea was on the cruise.
[00:52:13] Speaker A: Oh, which one?
[00:52:14] Speaker B: Buckets and boards. Have you done buckets and boards before?
[00:52:17] Speaker A: We have been on 30 Disney cruises and they have never been on one of our sailors. Oh.
[00:52:23] Speaker B: So we. I think we first saw them on our South Caribbean sailing on the Magic and they were fantastic. Then we saw them on one other one. I think either it was the dream or the fantasy. We saw them on after that, but they actually arrived in the middle of the cruise. They arrived because we even saw one of the gentlemen with his wife the night we were at Paulo on our last night on the. The cruise ship. They. They came on. They're one of the best variety acts at sea. We also saw Eric Jones, the magician and he was also fantastic. The acts were on point for the shows. Tangled is a. How do you not love that one? Right? It's got the, you know, it's got the thugs and the. We. We love Tangled, so we enjoyed that one. We also saw. We watched Dreams, which my life. My wife likes Dream. She kind of likes the variety song ones. I don't think she likes. What's the one. Is it. Is Believe the one that talks about the garden growing?
[00:53:17] Speaker A: Is it Believe or dream? I think it's Believe.
[00:53:20] Speaker B: Don't Believe Dreams is the one with the girl sleeping and she's got, you know, the clock's ticking down or whatever. But man, where does the garden grow? Get stuck in my wife's head like no other. So she. We probably would avoid that. They also have the kind of the Remix of the end of Cinderella. What do they call it? Twice Charmed, which is an interesting one that the villain in there's over the top. Over the top and ridiculous. But yeah, we took in all the shows. It's, you know, I think the Walt Disney Theater is my favorite thing to do on the ship. And I'm not a big, like, musical person, but. But what the cast members do and the magic they put together in those theaters, I can't wait for when we can go on the Treasure or the Destiny in these new advanced theaters that they have on that class, the extra things they can do, they. They just do a fantastic job in that space, for sure.
[00:54:05] Speaker A: So, yeah, I mean, they've, they've just a hundred percent, like, raised the bar on the entertainment on, on those two ships. So, yeah, I can't wait to see what they do with Hercules and the Destiny. But like, they, they've. The problem is they've raised the bar on themselves, so they can't, they can't go backwards anymore.
[00:54:20] Speaker B: But, yeah, I'm going to venture a little off brand. I'm actually seeing what Royal does with Back to the Future.
[00:54:26] Speaker A: Yes. Although I have heard, I will say this because we loved Back to the Future when we saw it in London. And a huge part of it is, look, it is, it is not the best Broadway theater that you're going to see. Right. Let me just put it that way. This is not like, this is an adaptation of a movie into Broadway. And they stayed very true to the storyline in the movie. There's not a lot of originality. There's a couple of new songs, although there's nothing in the music that is like, like, you know, the music that already hit for Back to the Future is the same music that's going to hit for the musical.
[00:54:53] Speaker B: Right.
[00:54:53] Speaker A: Like Huey Lewis in the news, Power of Love, like, great song, but, like, can't go wrong.
[00:54:57] Speaker B: Can't go wrong.
[00:54:57] Speaker A: Can't go wrong. But there's not an original song or an original, you know, take on the show that, like, makes it better. What, what is the original take is how you bring that show to a stage production from a staging perspective. And unfortunately, we've. We have some friends who went to the traveling show that's been going around the Broadway theaters, and it is sort of nothing like what the more permanent installation can be on like a Broadway or the End in London. And so some of the stuff that made it, like, super special in London just didn't make it into the traveling show because you just, like, you Just can't. You can't make it. You can't adapt it to every possible stage you're going to be on. So I do wonder, it's interesting, like, can Royal pull off any of that kind of a staging? And, and, and I know I'm being like, you know, vague about this because I don't really want to give it away, but let me just say, like, what they do with the DeLorean from a staging perspective is like, blew my mind. Like, I'm still trying to figure out how they did some of the stuff they did on the West End of London with that car. But whether Royal can copy that into its theater or whether it goes something more like the traveling show that doesn't have some of that stuff to it, it'll be interesting to see. But I still think it would. It's a great stage production for a cruise ship theater, just from the standpoint of the kind of music it is, the story it tells, it's, you know, that, that sort of thing. So. Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure, for sure. Well, ct, I feel like we ought to do a rapid fire round. I had to do one of these yesterday, but we're going to do a Brian style rapid fire where I'm going to ask you some arbitrary questions, apply some arbitrary rules, but, you know, I just don't have a lot of judgment to give. So there is no judgment in my rapid fire round. And I'm going to try to, you know, ask you some unique questions, perhaps that Sam hasn't asked before. So we'll just, we'll see how this goes. Let me start with, for those of you who have not had the pleasure of listening to some of our other episodes of ct, we have already done kind of a main rapid fire round with him. So if you want to know a favorite Disney character movie, all that sort of stuff, head back in the catalog. There's plenty of opportunities to hear that.
So today I'm going to kind of flip things around Connecticut. Tell me what your favorite Disney theme park is.
[00:57:01] Speaker B: Ooh, I'm not ready for that.
I'm not ready for that, man.
[00:57:06] Speaker A: See, if the theme of Sam's Rapid Fire is judgment, mine is surprise.
[00:57:11] Speaker B: I think I've got to go with the Magic Kingdom. That's what reminds me of my childhood. That's what makes us the Disney fans we are today. I can step onto Main street usa and, you know, I am taken back to holding my dad's hand, waiting in line for Pluto when I'm five years old. You know, like I just. And I think that's why. And I know I'm probably more the odd one out, but if there's a chance to take a picture with characters, I'll do it. And that's because that's what I remember from my childhood. The rides are. Most of the rides that I hang on to aren't like 20,000 leagues under the Sea is not there anymore. Snow White Scary Adventure isn't there in Florida anymore. So the rides, I remember, but I love Peter Pan, but also that wine. They've got to do something about capacity in that ride. But, yeah, I just. The Magic Kingdom. Yeah. Epcot's a close second. I love the restaurants at Epcot, but the Magic Kingdom.
[00:58:01] Speaker A: Nice. All right. Since we mentioned Epcot, I wasn't gonna ask this, but let's go for it. What is it? Do you go to. Do you go to. Do you start in Canada or not Canada. Do you start in France or Mexico?
[00:58:12] Speaker B: I think the answer is always Mexico. Although sometimes we stay by the international gateway, so we can't help it. But by default, in the great debate of Canada or Mexico, you start in Mexico and end in Canada.
[00:58:21] Speaker A: There you go. There you go. All right. Favorite Disney villain.
[00:58:24] Speaker B: Oh, it's Hades hands down. Cannot wait for Hercules. Hades has been, you know, just that character. The way it was brought to life by James Woods. Like, it just right. You can't. You can't. It's Hades hands down. I want a Hades Bar on a ship.
[00:58:40] Speaker A: I would be cool. That would be cool. Especially what they're doing now with, like, flaming drinks and stuff. Like, it'd be cool. I guess it's harder to do cruise ship, but still, it'd be really cool.
[00:58:48] Speaker B: Real bright. Dr. Name. Pain and Panic. Right? Or whatever. Yeah, right. But the two henchmen, like, yeah, I want to. We need a Hades Bar now that we've got a haunted mansion in a Corella de Vil. And there's the Urso one. They're working for the adventure. Like Imagineers. Give me a Hades Bar.
[00:59:03] Speaker A: Well, you know, the problem is, right, they're going to put the bar on the ship that doesn't have the Hercules musical. So there you go.
[00:59:08] Speaker B: Well, yeah, that happens. Anyway. Yeah.
[00:59:10] Speaker A: Continuing the trend. Favorite. Like Disney or Disney Cruise Line. Or you can give me one of each. Souvenir.
[00:59:16] Speaker B: I'm a sucker for the pins. I just got the first tinfoil Mouseketeer club pin in the mail this week. I'm a sucker for the pins. I like. Matter of fact, I have them here. We Picked up. This is the first time we'd seen this one. The. The magic card pin.
[00:59:32] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, it's a great one.
[00:59:33] Speaker B: Yeah. So I'm. I'm a. I'm a sucker for pins. I also, I can't turn the camera to it. It would make it just a mess. But we have magnets from all of the resorts and the different years we've been on Disney cruise and, you know, stop we get off of, we grab a magnet for the location that we're at, and then an honorable mention is we have the Starbucks. You've been there. Mugs from so many places.
[00:59:57] Speaker A: We've had to put the brakes on the Starbucks mugs because I think, Sam, like, the. The cabinet is full now and there is no more room. So.
[01:00:04] Speaker B: Yeah, so. So we started. We retired some to a. My wife found something we could hang them on in one of the rooms. So we've put something up on the wall and retired some to the wall. So some of the more exotic locations we've been. Have been retired to. To the wall, so to speak. So.
[01:00:18] Speaker A: Nice. Nice. Yeah. And I love that for those of you out there, when CT mentioned the pin he has, it's a key to the World card replica pin.
It's a really fun pin. We picked one up on our last cruise and really loved it. Let's see, what do I want to ask next? Favorite Disney cruise line, Port Stop.
[01:00:35] Speaker B: That one's really, really tough. That one's really tough. Ketchikan is one of the most charming towns you can stop in on a cruise. And I would almost tell everyone your first time to Ketchikan. Don't book anything for Ketchikan. Can just go into town, take in the lumberjack show, walk the shops, and then go to Annabelle's for crab legs and chowder towards the tail end of your day before you go back on the boat. When you're in Ketchikan, just the. The town is so great. The other one is we did, you know, the Cherbourg and saw Normandy, which is a real, you know, outside chance that you get to see and. And make that stop on a Disney cruise. And that one was fantastic. And then the last one, I'll say is Olson. And it's such a picturesque, like, European city. Like, I just. It was so good. I mean, to be honest, I. I love them all for different reasons, you know, like, I guess other than Nassau, unfortunately. I just. I'm not a fan of Nassau. But, you know, we did the South Caribbean and those stops all are unique and Great. Yeah. I. Ketchikan would be the one. I tell people just taking the town of Ketchikan because it's more than enough without doing something special there.
[01:01:39] Speaker A: Allison is great. I loved Allison. You nailed it with picturesque. Yeah, it's just picturesque. What about. Let me ask you one last one.
Most memorable crew interaction on Disney Cruise Line.
[01:01:51] Speaker B: Man, I don't know. They're all so good. You know, the one that's most recent in my mind is Pilar, who's friends with Maribel, you know, because it's the most recent one. But, you know, all those crew members I mentioned today did such a great job. I'd say. Yeah, those would be. Yeah, that would be the one. I would say right now. But we've lost. Loved our every dining staff we've had. You know, we have loved a number of the man. We had Nemo and Aaron on this last cruise as part of the photo team. We always. We always end up making quick friends with the photo team because we spend so much time doing the pictures and. And they can tell we're having fun doing it, so they always hop right in kind of to the experience with us and. And always make it a good time. But, yeah, pull our. Taking the extra, you know. Yeah, I would have to say went the extra mile. This last trip was fantastic. Yeah.
[01:02:41] Speaker A: Well, ct, we always like to wrap up with what's next. You got another cruise planned in the.
[01:02:47] Speaker B: Books, so I do have a placeholder right now, but the next one is. Man, Brian, I am so far down the trail on planning this abd. So we're going to take the ry. Next summer. We'll be going for my wife's birthday. She doesn't know yet. She doesn't listen to the podcast because she doesn't have time, thank God. But we're going to. We're going to hop. We're going to go over to Switzerland for a few days. I'm looking at the Lindor Lindt Museum and factory. That's there in Zurich. Zurich's a little pricey, but I found some pretty good rooms in the area town we want to be in. We're going to do the Glacier Express, which is a train through the countryside. We're going to see Lucerne, take a couple of days just to chill in Zurich and then go out to Basel to hop on the ABD river cruise. And then, you know, that's Heinberg Castle and a bunch of other castles that are on that route. And the countryside of France, the cathedral in Cologne and then stopping in Amsterdam. And I don't know what we're going to do once we hit Amsterdam. I have some friends in Germany that I served with that we may go out and see in Germany. I'm looking at maybe Disneyland Paris. We'll see. We'll see. I'm looking at a lot of different options on the tail end there based on some folks are available to see or not. If they're not. Yeah, we'll figure out how to divert. But that. That's the next one. That's the one I am way down the road and planning. We're going to the parks this summer. That'll be really great. And then headed out to vero beach for a little bit. So a land and beach, not a land and sea. But it's that. That is going to be a fantastic trip with my sister, her kids, and my mom. But the next cruise cruise will be that abd. And then I am going to try to maybe land the destiny sometime. My wife has like an October break, so not over thanksgiving, but maybe in October after we're done with the abd. We'll see. I think if I hit that window, it'll be just after the hurricane season. It'll be before it gets really expensive. And we'll be able to get down there for, you know, we'll fly just into fort Lauderdale itself and it'll be easy.
[01:04:40] Speaker A: Well, you know, you are always welcome to come share any of your adventures with us. We love hearing them.
[01:04:45] Speaker B: And, yeah, we need an adventure with you guys is what I need to figure out. The abd didn't work out because the timing for some stuff we have next summer, but for sure we're going to be talking and figure out how to lane one up with you guys.
[01:04:56] Speaker A: Well, keep us posted on your October destiny. We might be able to make something happen there because, yeah, we're. We're excited to get on the destiny for her maiden, but we. We have not planned anything beyond our own ABD for 2026. Because I'm waiting on the next round of itinera from disney for the November, you know, Thanksgiving and christmas cruises. So. Yeah, but that'll be a long.
A long dry spell for us on Disney cruise line between. I think our last sailing on Disney cruise line will be actually the destiny maiden voyage. And then we have no plans to be back on the cruise line until late 2026. So that's gonna be.
[01:05:31] Speaker B: I mean, you're gonna have an abd. I know that's not. With all the characters and everything, but those trips are, you know, it's still A great Disney experience. So I'm excited for the live show for sure.
[01:05:42] Speaker A: Well, thank you CT for coming on. As always, love having you on. If you have not had a chance to check out CT's Project Tenfoil Mouse Ears, make sure you do. So CT, let folks know how they can find and follow along with you because we are big supporters of the tinfoil mouse ears over here at the DCL duo.
[01:05:57] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. And I appreciate it so much, Brian, like giving me a spot to like share all my crazy ideas on the substack. So the best place to go is go to the substack and from there you'll find everything else. So we're on X a lot more on threads lately. Loving the community over there. So X threads in Facebook, Instagram and it's all tinfoil mouse ears or tinfoil M errors if you can't find mouse ears in that location. But for sure check out the substack. We're working two articles right now. One is talking about what from the parks needs to come to the ships next, which I'm excited about. That article is a great member of the community that reached out, was talking to me and is a fellow veteran and he's going to be our tinfoil Mouseketeer for that article. And then we're working on what is the last Wish class ship looks like. Because we've all been so excited about the meridian, we've stopped talking about the next one that is coming and that's going to be a wish class sometime in 27. So we'll have some predictions about what that's named and what that'll look like. We may even do about a Stern article like we did for the meridian one we just did recently.
[01:06:57] Speaker A: So yeah, that's a good point. There's so much emphasis on the new ships and not enough on that Wish Class ship. But yes, head over support CT is just so fun. He's such a unique voice in the community and such a great creator and so love, love, love having him as a part of our listenership and just really appreciate you coming on CT and sharing your fabulous, very merry time cruise with our audience.
[01:07:20] Speaker B: Yeah, thank you for the time today. Thank you for. Man, all the shows have been so good lately, all the episodes, all the live shows. So they said we're coming up on a big live show this week that I just cannot wait for. So yeah, super excited about it. Super excited.
[01:07:33] Speaker A: Awesome. Well, thanks again man. See you later.
I want to dive over into our guest CT and actually before I should mention, just Real quick to plug. Please, please, please head over, hit those five stars. Leave us a five star review. If you leave us a five star review over on Apple Podcasts and you leave us a written review, we will read it on the air at the top. One of our main shows we did with jj. So jj, thank you so much once again for that review. But our guest this evening, no stranger to the DCL Dual Pie, is quickly and right rap rising the charts. As the person who has appeared most on the show and we're excited about that. I want to welcome CT a, a tinfoil mouse here.
[01:08:14] Speaker B: Talk about cruising, especially with Disney and people who also love it as well. It's. Yeah, it's not a bad way to spend some time.
[01:08:21] Speaker A: Exactly, exactly. That's why we started the show. It's a great, great topic to talk about. So much exciting news coming out.
[01:08:26] Speaker B: Yeah.
[01:08:27] Speaker A: All right, well ct, we're here to talk about out of Galveston adults only, which is the way you like to cruise, which is great and fantastic. I love that we have a fabulous adult only couple that loves sales and cruise line. You can come on and tell us all about it if you're Disney cruise line creds because you've got some pretty good ones.
[01:08:46] Speaker B: So we're, you know, we're eight time cruises with dcl. We try to man we try to spread out as we can so we don't, we're not, not, we're not your light dream and wish out of Canaveral. Back to back to back to back kind of folks where you know, we're always looking for itinerary that is different for us and keep making the cruise line show us new places and have new exciting adventures. Not saying there's not places we want to go back to but for sure we love with the new experience. So we've done eight now we're DVC members. So we, we, we don't just vacation at sea with Disney, we vacation by land with them as well. So nice.
[01:09:27] Speaker A: What, what's your, what's your favorite cruise you've done so far?
[01:09:31] Speaker B: I think it's got to be northern Europe. I think it's got to be the one you can't get now. Iceland, Norway. Right. Hopefully they get back there. Hopefully Iceland makes it. Whatever, whatever's causing Disney.
