[00:00:00] Speaker A: But in amongst all the driving around, my kids spotted the bat signal. The bat signal for my kids is the build a bear logo.
And so in between, like, Coliseum and Parthenon and they saw a toy store, and I'm like, they don't have a build a bear in Rome, Italy. Right.
But they asked to go back to the toy store. With our remaining 45 minutes to an hour or so.
[00:00:32] Speaker A: Foreign.
[00:00:37] Speaker B: Welcome back, everyone, to another episode of the DCL Duo Podcast, brought to you by my Path Unwinding Travel. And of course, it's Sam. You could tell my voice is not the same as Brian's. I am solo hosting today. But don't worry, I am not by myself. I am very excited to welcome back to the show. Rob. Welcome back, Rob.
[00:00:58] Speaker A: Hey, thanks, Sam. Excited to be here.
[00:00:59] Speaker B: Yeah, I'm excited to have you back on the show. We had you on the show not too long ago. I remember we talked about your sailing on the fantasy that you guys went on, like, right after a pretty bad car accident, actually.
[00:01:13] Speaker A: Yeah. So that was about. About a year and a half ago. Now, of course, Disney's real good about the, you know, give us money and we'll give you a discount if you give it to us before you get off the boat. Discount. So we did that, and we still had a fair bit of time left on that, but we kind of wanted to do Europe this past summer, so that's how we ended up booking.
[00:01:32] Speaker B: Well, a placeholder is actually a super smart way to book any cruise. Of course, you get that, you know, if you're not sailing concierge and you're not sailing on certain blackout dates, which are usually like the holidays, like Christmas, maybe Thanksgiving, and then, you know, there might be some spring break blackouts or other holiday blackouts, but I think placeholder is a great, you know, a great way to go. And they're good for two years. For anyone who doesn't know you know what I'm talking about, you have to book it while you're on a cruise. You're not actually booking your next cruise. You're just buying the placeholder, which is like a $250 deposit, I believe, and then you apply it to a specific cruise.
As long as you sail within two years of when that you purchase that placeholder, I believe. So anyway, a very smart idea to wait, you know, and very good way to get 10% off of your next cruise, as long as it doesn't fit in one of those blackout dates. And if you don't use that placeholder, guess what. It gets refunded to you. So make sure I tell people don't use a gift card because then you've got to remember where that gift card is.
So use a credit card for a placeholder unless you are somebody who, who tracks your gift cards really, really well because that if you end up not using it, you want that to be refunded back onto your credit card. Well, Rob, this was your second cruise that we're going to talk about today.
Remind folks of your Disney background. Obviously I mentioned you went on a previous CR on the Disney Fantasy. We're going to talk about a European cruise on the Disney Fantasy. But remind folks your, your, where does your love for, for Disney come from? And did you have, I don't think you had any cruising experience before Disney, am I right?
[00:03:15] Speaker A: Well, my, my only technical one was the big red boat.
[00:03:17] Speaker B: Oh, that's nice.
[00:03:18] Speaker A: Many, many years ago. Yeah, so I, I, you know, we, we got down there a couple of times when I was a kid, when I was like I think 7 and 9 and then not really again for quite a while, but went as an adult a couple of times.
And then my kids are super spoiled and so they've been just about every year they've been alive. My daughter is now eight and I believe she's been to Disney World that is seven times, despite pandemic and different country living. And so we wanted to give the cruise a try for a while and then finally got around to it last year.
Loved it, enjoyed it. Weren't sure whether it would be quite as often of a thing for us as the parks. Sort of our religious annual scheduled thing.
[00:04:00] Speaker B: Right at Walt Disney World specifically.
[00:04:02] Speaker A: Right, yeah, yeah. But I mean part of the, part of the consideration for us honestly, we had talked about going actually to Japan this past summer, which has been a dream for me for a long time.
But we have an addition to the family that is now a first time cruiser.
So baby Sam is almost one now and was about nine months on the cruise.
[00:04:23] Speaker B: You named your kid after me, Rob, right? Yeah.
[00:04:26] Speaker A: Samuel.
[00:04:26] Speaker B: Yeah. I'm so flattered.
[00:04:29] Speaker A: Well, it was so funny we were at Disney. This is a story for another time, but we were at Disney shortly before he was born and had waiters in subsequent days. Sam and David. And that was actually names both first and middle that we were thinking of.
[00:04:43] Speaker B: Oh my God.
[00:04:44] Speaker A: And so we figured that was a sign from the Disney gods or someone to name him. So it was very funny. Like a couple a little while before he was born. Samuel David Hunter. So anyway, I love that.
[00:04:56] Speaker B: Do you know that I actually, if I was a boy, I think I was going to be either David or Daniel. So.
[00:05:01] Speaker A: Yeah, there you go.
Well, we just figured taking a nine month old to Japan might be a bit much. Certainly taking a nine month old to Europe was a bit much. But doing it with kids club and the nursery. The nursery to help out with was great. And we actually added another member to our party this time around. So we've got a dear friend, very technically she is our nanny, but she lives around the corner from us and has become a member of the family. So Lisa is her name and she joined us on the trip, her first time to Europe ever and only her second time on an airplane in the last like 30 years. So she, we've gotten her into traveling. It's. It's awesome to, to have her there and have her help and support with the kids. So.
[00:05:45] Speaker B: Oh my God. So wait, so, so then you were a total of five.
[00:05:50] Speaker A: Six.
[00:05:51] Speaker B: Six. So you have three. You have the other older kids. Yeah, yeah. You have two. Yeah.
[00:05:55] Speaker A: And we were smart. I think I must have seen this coming because I did book two of the, the, the prepay option on the first cruise. So we had the two rooms and it was, it was a good idea. You know, I think there, I don't believe the, the only class or room I think six would have fit in even with a baby would have been a concierge suite. So we did book two interlocking rooms which are adjoining rooms, which was, was, was nice to have that space.
[00:06:22] Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely, that. And you're 100% correct if you are a party of six.
The only rooms that could hold a party of six are like the suites in concierge and so, and not even like a one bedroom. You're talking. I don't, I'm, I'm trying to think. I'm not, I'm not sure how many the two bedrooms hold. So it might not even be a two bedroom. I know the Royals will hold six, of course, but you're talking about multiple steps above like a regular, you know, veranda or ocean view rooms or of course inside staterooms rooms. Whereas with six people, you can very easily get to two regular staterooms. And you can of course request or try to get adjoining ones, especially if you book on the early side. Then of course more adjoining rooms are available.
If you do like a gty, you know, one of those guaranteed categories that's a lot harder to get adjoining rooms. You can put it in a request, but most of the time it Won't happen. I mean, it has. There are people who get pixie dusted and they end up with adjoining rooms, but you really got to book your exact room. If you really, if, if it's crucial, like with you all having younger kids and having a baby, it really is probably crucial to have that adjoining room for the six of you.
[00:07:34] Speaker A: Knowing that we probably got a little lucky because I think that the cruise was in July and I think we booked only like February or March. Like it wasn't a super, super early booking this time around. So we were fortunate to get the adjoining ones.
[00:07:46] Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely. Now you, you had been considering Tokyo.
You pivoted to Europe.
[00:07:54] Speaker B: Why did you decide Europe? I mean, why not just do a sailing? You gu. Live, you know, you live in Canada, but you live on the eastern end of Canada. And so why not consider, you know, I don't know, a Bahamian cruise, a Caribbean cruise out of Florida, Much, much closer, much shorter of a flight than taking a nine month old.
[00:08:13] Speaker A: Well, you know, I figured, I figure, you know, the summer we kind of like to do like a big trip. And the previous summer we actually, we hadn't, we'd done a couple of road trips, done, you know, Chicago and done Boston, but hadn't been to Europe with the kids for a couple years. And so we figured, you know, if we're going to do it, you know, take the time, spend the money, let's, let's go big with it. And just knowing that, you know, we could sort of see a lot and be taken around and sort of have our floating hotel room there when we needed it was, was just logistically a lot easier.
You know, we did a Europe trip a couple of years ago with, with the two kids when they were younger, where we did two cities and we had to fly between the cities. And like, it's, it's, it was a lot right with, with the two young, young kids. So this just logistically was a little bit easier to handle even, Even with the baby around.
[00:08:59] Speaker B: Yeah, I think that's a really good point though. I think in general, whether that's on a large ship cruising or river cruising, it is a lot of logistical stuff when you're traveling between cities in Europe, especially with, you know, different, you know, train systems, plane systems, bus systems, different languages, different currencies, even potentially depending, you know, if you go outside of an EU country, you know, so it is a lot of just coordination. And when you're on a cruise ship, all of that is seamless. You don't have to worry about it, yes, you just have to get to your embarkation port and get home from your debarkation port. And for you that was the same port that was Barcelona, which makes it also really easy. You have a round trip rather than sort of a one way.
Now tell us like I assume you, you flew probably out of Detroit. That's probably your largest international airport near you.
[00:09:52] Speaker A: Toronto, Toronto, Detroit, Detroit's usually a little bit cheaper but Toronto has the directs, you know. And so we had pretty smooth departure and return. You know an hour or two delay here and there. But the one thing I'm curious, you know, maybe Toronto just sends bigger airplanes or something. But the one little little annoying and you know again first world problems. But in Barcelona I guess the airplane like does not necessarily come to the gate.
And so you go to the gate and then you take either the stairs or an elevator down literally to the Runway and then you get on a bus and you ride the bus for 15 minutes and then you walk up the airplane. And so that was ah, surprise with you know, little baby and so getting off the plane it was probably a good hour and a half, two hours because we were at the very back and so we had to wait for everybody else to offload, everybody else to ride the bus.
And I'm getting ahead of myself a little bit here but we missed our pre booked transfer when we got in and so some, some good stories to tell about that. But you can imagine three kids and.
[00:11:02] Speaker B: Yeah, three kids, three adults. That's red eye, red eye, you're exhausted. I will say I have found a lot of the larger airports and I don't know if it's a European thing or it's just larger airports like that do that whole bus thing like I feel like we've done that.
I think we did that in Munich when we arrived. When we did our ABD a couple of years ago.
I think we've had to do that maybe even in Heathrow, in London. You know it is not uncommon and it does like add a lot of travel time. Yeah. So, so tell me what, what happened? You, you, you fly in on a red eye. What. How did you deal with your transportation?
[00:11:41] Speaker A: So I had thought I was being very wise and you know, good knowledgeable traveler here and had booked four se I thought were private transfers from airport to hotel, hotel to port, port to hotel and then hotel to airport. And you know what? I, it's, it's on me because I probably could have, could have dug in a bit and realized this. But I think it was one of these just like sort of layer on a layer on the taxi system. And so we had basically like made four, probably marked up three times taxi reservations. Right. And so, you know, we get in and I managed to like call and tell them, hey, like we're on our way, like we'll be there. And then when we got there, the driver. I called again and the driver had left already. And so like, I'm tired and cranky and kind of like, you know, fighting with people on the phone sometimes, but the guy on the other end just says, send us an email.
So, so it was. We were really like, in terms of, of that thing we had paid for out of luck. I guess the good news is we were able. Barcelona has a pretty good like taxi hailing system there and it took a little bit. We, we didn't want to necessarily split up, so we, we did have to wait a bit for something big enough to fit six people and, and all large suitcases, right?
[00:12:55] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:12:56] Speaker A: But we got in just fine. The other three taxis did show up. So it wasn't a scam necessarily. It was just the guy had to wait more than an hour because it was more than an hour from some touchdown to getting there. But here's where I got a little, A little, A little victory because they didn't do anything for us on landing and didn't, you know, we were pretty frustrated, right. We'd pay for this thing. We had gotten there. We called them and said, we're on our way to the taxi.
I did dispute it on the credit card and I got all four rides back, which I think was kind of fair in the grand scheme of things. Right. Like, you know, I tip the drivers in cash well, so they're taken care of. But, but this sort of, yeah, 25% scammy taxi service was, you know, was. I was vindicated. So that was.
[00:13:41] Speaker B: Yeah. Well, I'm glad you got vindicated on that. Yeah, I mean, I will say that's where having travel a travel agent that has a sort of reputable recommendation for private transfers, of course you are still going to little bit more for, you know, those private. So I'm talking usually like, you know, a town car or something like that.
You are going to pay a little bit more, but you are going to have somebody who's going to wait for you and they're going to be tracking your flight and all of that. And they're going to also be familiar with that airport. So I know we've used Black Lane in multiple places and they are a little Bit pricey, but they are really great on the service end of things. So just, you know, I. Everybody you do you. Right. Like, I'm not, I'm not here to, to plug any particular, you know, transportation company or anything like that. I don't have a sponsorship deal with any transportation company.
But there are some, some great reputable ones out there. And if, yeah, if you're working with a great ta, they can, they can.
[00:14:43] Speaker A: Recommend and beware the DIY model. That's my lesson. I mean, there's nothing like showing up when the baby has not slept all night on the red eye, you know, but, but we did manage to get checked in early. We had a hotel for two days and that's not often the case. Like it was available for us.
[00:14:58] Speaker B: Oh, that's awesome.
[00:15:00] Speaker A: Right upon check in. So we were able to get some rest and yeah, we had two days in Barcelona to explore actually on both ends. So we had a nice little Barcelona stopover before and after as well.
[00:15:11] Speaker B: Oh, that's great. I gotta ask you about travel with an infant because you've got, you know, the infants, I mean, nine months, he's still an infant. They need a lot of stuff. Like, did you find, did you like, schlep all the diapers with you? Did you buy them when you, you know, obviously you have to schlep some for the flights and whatnot, but like, did you buy once you landed? Like, what, what did, what kinds of things did you like, leave home versus bring with.
[00:15:39] Speaker A: Well, so we schlepped a lot. And I'm not gonna lie. I mean, getting back on the plane at the very end, riding this bus, I'm carrying the baby and carrying a car seat and carrying everything. I actually like, got a little bit of a shoulder injury, I'm embarrassed to say. Like, I, I believe it. You turn 40 and like, you're. So it's, it's. It's been a couple of months now and it's still there. I will. I would like to turn this around, Sam, and ask you a question.
You're. You're, you know, reasonably well off, but not, you know, not completely budget, you know.
[00:16:10] Speaker B: Right.
[00:16:10] Speaker A: But you, you care about value, right?
[00:16:12] Speaker B: I care about value. I would care about value. Yeah. We, I would say we do not have unlim, so let's put it that way.
[00:16:19] Speaker A: And so you are set to fly from Toronto to Barcelona and you've got three. Two young children and an infant and a helper and a spouse.
Do you book a seat for the infant or not? Because my wife and I had different opinions on that decision, and I won't reveal mine until I hear your thoughts. But, yeah.
[00:16:40] Speaker B: Oh, God.
[00:16:42] Speaker B: This is so hard. That's a really tough decision. Are we flying in coach or are we flying in.
[00:16:48] Speaker A: We're flying. We were flying in coach, I'm afraid.
[00:16:51] Speaker B: Okay. We're flying in coach. I am. I am booking a seat for that infant. I'm going to.
[00:16:55] Speaker A: Well, you are. You are. You are Team Emily then. Because I booked. I booked the flights. Right. I booked everything thinking that it wasn't really a big deal. Right. And, like, we've got three adults to move them around. Right, right.
[00:17:06] Speaker B: Pass them around.
[00:17:07] Speaker A: To pass them around. And it turns out that was not a very popular decision. So. Yeah, thankfully, like, two weeks before we were able to add yet another seed.
[00:17:15] Speaker B: You really had, without much addition, three and three.
[00:17:18] Speaker A: We got three and three. And coming down, we were like. For those that aren't visual, we were like, three in front and three in the back on the left side of the plane. But actually coming back. Back on the way. We were on a plane that had four seats in the middle.
[00:17:34] Speaker B: In the middle?
[00:17:34] Speaker A: Yeah, in the middle. And so I think we were, like, 4 and 2. And that was so much better. That was so much better because we had sort of three exit opportunities here and there. Right.
But.
[00:17:46] Speaker B: Oh, versus just the two. Yeah. And also, it's probably easier to pass the baby across the AIs and everybody backwards. Right. Yeah. Because you have to really stand up to pass the baby backwards or forwards, whereas if you're just passing across the aisle, you. Nobody probably needs to stand up. Yeah, yeah. I'm team Emily there. I mean, I would. I wouldn't book. If I was saying, like, you know, business, like, premium economy, business class, certainly for, you know, lay flat, first class, for sure. I wouldn't book a seat for the baby in there, but, like, it's sort of. The more room I would have, the less likely I would be to book the baby a seat. But in. In economy, I would probably. Yeah, I'd probably book the baby a seat.
[00:18:27] Speaker A: It's a reasonable decision, and it's ultimately the one that got made, so. Yeah.
[00:18:32] Speaker B: Well, good job in listening to your wife. I mean, you know, happy wife, happy life. I'd love to know, Rob, just before we jump to. I want to jump to, of course, to the cruise, but I'd love to know what, like, say. Let's say, like, your two favorite things to do that you guys did in Barcelona. Doesn't matter with the front or the back end, but I'm just curious, what were the highlights from Barcelona?
[00:18:54] Speaker A: Oh, that's a good question. So we did book like a private tour geared towards kids, right. And so we had a lovely, lovely tour guide that just walked us up and down and had little puppet shows for the kids and stuff and just was, was very, you know, sort of interactive. And so I had been to Barcelona once at the tail end of a Kon Tiki tour.
[00:19:17] Speaker B: Oh yeah.
[00:19:19] Speaker A: I was very hungover and did not really get off the bus much on this Kon Tiki Barcelona stuff. So I'd been there, but not, not really seen it. Right. Yeah, so, so that was, that was a lot of fun, just, just that tour.
And honestly, I'm, I'm, I, I should have. I've got great notes on the, the cruise and not so much on Barcelona, but there was, there was one time where I got up early before everybody else, you know, and you can imagine on a trip with three kids and, and three adults, it's like a little bit of self care. Time is nice.
And so I managed to get in a run at about six in the morning before it got too hot and I ran down to the pier and so I actually saw the cruise ships, which is kind of cool. Back to the hotel. And then there was a building that I guess had been there for 5, 6, 700 years, right, forever that was its own museum and it was just around the corner and it was like a manor that someone had lived in for a period of time. And so I was able to kind of tour that and see that by myself.
[00:20:13] Speaker B: And that was, oh, very cool.
[00:20:15] Speaker A: That was nice. And I'll throw, I'll throw in one more.
[00:20:19] Speaker A: My. This is Emily's favorite for sure. There's a, a giant park that is, you know, probably 20, 30 minutes from the city center there. That was just gorgeous and lovely and super, super hot. But that's what you get when you go to Barcelona, right, in the summer and you know, some, some beautiful architecture and art artwork there that, you know, we got to post her some pictures for. And so that was, that was definitely her highlight too.
[00:20:41] Speaker B: Oh, awesome. Where did you guys stay? And did you stay in the same place on the front end and the back end or did you go to two different places?
[00:20:48] Speaker A: I mean, we would have loved to. We were just booking.
Had such a unique party size that we weren't able to. So on the way in and we were more or less the same area both times. But city center downtown, we had what really did not feel like a European hotel. Room.
It was a full suite.
We had, I think, like, three separate bedrooms. And not. I mean, it might have been 3 or €400, but not insane pricing. Right.
For all of us on the way in. And then we did have two separate rooms for the kind of little bit of a swankier spot on the way out.
[00:21:24] Speaker B: What were the names of the two different spots? Do you remember?
[00:21:27] Speaker A: Oh, I should look them up. I'm so sorry, Sam. I didn't write them down.
[00:21:30] Speaker B: That's okay. No worries.
[00:21:31] Speaker A: We can put them in the show notes maybe, but.
[00:21:33] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, perfect. Exactly. We'll do that. All right, well, tell me, you had the taxis booked for the port transfer, right? So I assume that happened.
[00:21:43] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:21:44] Speaker B: Tell. Tell us like. Or I keep saying us because I'm so used to having Brian here with me. Sorry, guys. I know that sounds weird. When I say tell us when, it's. Tell me. Tell the audience. That's us, I guess.
How. How was the transfer? Like, was it, you know, relatively easy to get to the port? How. How far are we talking? Obviously, you were able to run it, but you're a marathoner, so, like, that's not really a good judge of. Of the distance, like, because you might have ran ten miles to it or you might have run two miles to it. I don't know.
[00:22:13] Speaker A: Barcelona's pretty compact for the most part, depending. I mean, depending where you go. But I think we were like 12 minutes, 15 minutes.
[00:22:20] Speaker C: Oh, fantastic.
[00:22:21] Speaker A: It was super close, which was nice.
And so, yeah, pretty straightforward, pretty easy. Driver showed up on time. The only little bit of a. Not even a snag, but definitely a surprise, is that we were used to at least our experience, if I'm recalling correctly, at Port Canaveral was, you know, you can book just about the drop, just about any of your luggage, and it shows up at your room.
And so we had kind of planned and packed accordingly. Right. So we've got like, one or two little bags, and that's, you know, for. For. For pool and stuff. And then plan for everything else to go straight to the room.
Barcelona Cruise Terminal. If it doesn't get checked on an airplane, it doesn't get checked at Barcelona Cruise Terminal.
[00:23:08] Speaker B: So, like, backpacks and stuff. They won't take.
[00:23:11] Speaker A: All of our carry on had to be carried on. Right.
And so you can imagine, like, baby and all that was, you know, a little bit of a surprise. So.
[00:23:22] Speaker B: Oh, my goodness. What about, like, the. So I guess the car seat, probably they could. They would take. Or not.
[00:23:28] Speaker A: They took the car seat. Yep.
[00:23:29] Speaker B: Okay. Well, that's key because schlepping around a car seat is no fun whatsoever.
[00:23:34] Speaker A: But everything else, we kind of had to schlep ourselves.
[00:23:37] Speaker B: Oh, that's a. That's a big difference, though, because, I mean, obviously, like, you mentioned at Port Canaveral, but even at like, like, you know, San Diego, all the other ports, like, if you want to put a backpack on, you can put a backpack on. It just has to have one of those tags on it. Right? You can put a. Doesn't have to be a piece of luggage like a suitcase. It can be a smaller bag. And I mean, frankly, you can. Yeah, you can check anything. Of course, you don't want to check something that they're gonna like, crush because they. You, you know, they're not handling those. That luggage very, like, gently, but. Wow. Yeah, that's a good. Good to know know.
[00:24:09] Speaker A: So thankfully the room was ready and it, you know, it was just a fair bit of carrying. We are. We're Silver Castaway, of course, so we were able to get on a little bit earlier this time.
The. The last one. I think we were frankly one of the last groups getting on, so we didn't get a ton of time, you know, free before getting on, but this time we. We played it right and, you know, got our. Got our aqueduct in, you know, before got too busy. And we're one of the earlier groups on board, which was. Was nice nice.
[00:24:35] Speaker B: Awesome. Now, was the sailing relatively full? And I want to also know is what were sort of the demographics? I. When I say demographics, I mean, like, are these mostly European cruisers, English cruisers, or are we talking still mostly American? I've. I've heard it's been more heavily non American this. This Europe season.
[00:24:57] Speaker A: You know, it's probably severely biased in terms of who we spoke to and chatted with. Right.
At least My. My gut reaction to that is it really didn't feel than the.
Than the Caribbean one, honestly, that we did the year before. You know, we met people from Canada and the United States and that. That was primarily it. Again, it may have been who we were engaged with. Right. And certainly there were many Europeans. Right. But not any. Any more. Not. Not to the extent that, like, it was a dominant, you know, crew there or anything at all.
[00:25:31] Speaker B: Interesting. I wonder if it's been because the ones that have been out of Southampton we have heard from, that we've recorded from this season have seemed to sort of suggest a lot more British cruisers. Right. And some European cruisers, but mostly Brits and then very few Americans or Canadians. Right. So, like, interesting about. But it might be because this is a longer sailing, meaning that, you know, seven night versus sort of like a lot of these shorter sailings are real easy for folks, you know, who live driving distance to Southampton to get on. They're also a little bit cheaper. So if somebody's sort of wanting to try out the cruise line for the first time, it's a. That's a good option opportunity. Whereas if you're talking mainland, you're. You're talking a. A whole week.
You know, a lot of Americans sailing for their summer vacation sort of a thing. Well, interesting. Well, was it relatively full?
[00:26:25] Speaker A: It didn't feel.
Yes, but not to the extent. It was insane, you know. Yes, it was. You know, I. I don't know. I don't know the best metric for tracking that, but, you know, the Aqueduct got up to 30, 45 minutes. Right. And usually not much more than that. But it didn't feel. It didn't feel like uncomfortably, uncomfortably full at all. No.
[00:26:47] Speaker B: Yeah. What about character lines? Did those seem to be long, longer than the, you know, the cruise that you went on?
[00:26:56] Speaker A: I feel. Well, I feel like slightly shorter because perhaps. And again, just a hypothesis, but, you know, you've got some pretty epic stops here, right? Like, you're going to Rome, you're going potentially to Pisa, you're going to Naples, to Sicily. Right. Like, these are. These are stops where you typically are staying on as long as you can.
[00:27:18] Speaker B: As long as you can.
[00:27:18] Speaker A: Right.
And so it didn't. Characters weren't quite as. As long as the last one, I would say. Yeah.
[00:27:26] Speaker B: Oh, interesting. All right, well, let's jump right to the ports. You had four amazing Italian ports after leaving Barcelona.
So you only had a couple of sea days. I mean, this is a port heavy trip. So we're gonna. We're gonna focus on the ports, and then we'll jump back and just hit some onboard highlights. Of course, I got to know how the baby enjoyed the nursery. But let's start with your first port of call.
[00:27:50] Speaker A: Yeah. So the port, I believe, is called Liverno.
And out of Liverno, you've got a lot of options. You can go to Pisa.
I think it's sort of the main one that folks go to, but we saw one of the Disney excursions, and I'm going to butcher the pronunciation of this, but it was a sink terror boat tour. Tour.
[00:28:14] Speaker A: Cinque Terre. Yes.
[00:28:16] Speaker B: I mean, I'm probably not saying it right either, but I got.
[00:28:18] Speaker A: I got a little better than mine. Better than mine.
[00:28:22] Speaker A: And so I. I Believe we, we got on it was a lovely, lovely experience. Beautiful, beautiful islands. It, I mean obviously it's touristy but you're kind of so far removed that it, it actually feels a little bit more local to some extent. My only, you know, not even it's. We knew it going in and there's to complain about it would be foolish but it was a bit of a long haul to get there. Right. So it's, it's a good like 80, 90 minute bus ride.
I think it was like a 6am port like, like call time for the, for the meeting to get off. To get off the port.
[00:28:55] Speaker B: Right.
[00:28:56] Speaker A: So you can't.
[00:28:56] Speaker B: But your kids are probably up early anyway because.
[00:29:00] Speaker A: Can'T be out, you know, at the disco till, till four and then after that like a, a boat like a good hour on the boat to get to island number one, another 20, 30 to get to island number two and then an hour back. So you're probably traveling a good like half of the day.
But it's one of those areas of the world I don't know if you're ever going to get to otherwise. Right.
So just, just beautiful. We did about, about I, I want to say 45 minutes on the first island and then maybe an hour and a half or so on the 2nd and you got some time to wander around to shop. The second stop was long enough. We sat down and had a meal.
[00:29:39] Speaker A: And you know I, I would say definitely, definitely worth it once. You know what I mean? It's not. If I was ever to go back to that area I would, I would like do a week you know, do, do do a day or two on each island and really, really dig in. But for, for the limited time we had it was, it was a fun.
[00:29:57] Speaker B: Oh awesome. Now I've got to ask a question about, about Sam. Baby Sam, not me Sam obviously I'm gonna assume he was free probably on most of or if not all of your excursions because usually it's usually 0 to 2 are not. You sort of can't book for them but you can bring them because they're in your arms kind of.
[00:30:21] Speaker A: And it's one thing where don't believe everything you read on the Internet.
One of the. There was a Facebook group for our cruise of course and I think there was like never got heated but, but there was some, some debate in both directions of like can the baby do this? Can the baby not do this? And I think Disney could be ever so slightly more explicit in, in like can the baby do this or not? Some of them the baby cannot. Some of them the baby can. Some of the baby can and are free. Some of the baby can't have to pay for. I think, I think it comes down to like do they, do they take up a seat or not?
Is is my understanding. So no, I believe Sam was free for that. He was free for the activity we did in Naples.
And I think there are a few depending on exactly what it is where he would have been an added cost. But yeah, we were fortunate there.
[00:31:11] Speaker B: Well, and one tip I'll give for those listening is if you can't book them through the app, like read the description very carefully because and I go actually onto the website because the website usually has the full information about whether or not you can bring someone under the age of three and then it makes it more clear that they just you can bring them but they're free. Right. So you don't book them through the app. You book the other for like for Rob, the other five members of the party and then. But Sam is able to come on on the lap.
But if it's unclear from. It's not going to be clear in the app. Let me be very clear, let me be very clear about that. The app is not going to have this information. You have to go onto the website and actually look up the full description of the excursion or you have to call Disney Cruise Line to figure out, you know, whether or not you can book this for your family if you are going to bring the baby with you. So like that's my tip. It's. It's not as Rob explained it, it's not clear from Disney and there's always debate about this and sometimes it does require a phone call.
[00:32:17] Speaker C: 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 My Path Unwinding Travel can help guide you so you don't miss a the 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, My Path 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 DCLDUoiipathunwinding.com so they know we sent you their way. Thanks. My path unwinding for sponsoring today's show. Now back to the episode.
[00:33:16] Speaker B: Well, let's talk about your second port of call.
[00:33:19] Speaker A: So second one's the big one. Yeah.
[00:33:21] Speaker B: Rome. Right.
[00:33:23] Speaker B: I'm going to butcher it. To Vecchia or chicken?
[00:33:26] Speaker A: To Vecchia. Yes.
[00:33:26] Speaker B: Yeah, there we go.
[00:33:27] Speaker A: So I had been to Rome kind of as my first big European trip ever, what, 22 years ago. So we went grade 12, high school, and so I have a lot of, like, affinity for Rome. We were there about two weeks when I was that age and so really got to see it. So. So 10 hours is not two weeks. So you gotta be picky and choosy. Here's another be wary of DIY travel booking lesson for everybody.
Disney had obviously some good tours on there and Disney also had the ability, I believe, to book a private car.
We wanted both a private car and a private tour. And if Disney does that, I wasn't aware of it because I went and booked something on my own and we booked with a company called Tours Italy that has been around for 25 years, has a great reputation, long time, you know, the, the, the. I tracked down the owner on LinkedIn and like, she exists and it's real.
Here's what had happened and I felt very stupid for this. I work, I work in technology. Like, I, I invest in technology. Like, I, I should not have stuff like this happen to me.
But here's where you've really got to watch the scammers. So I had been in communication with T o u r s-italy.com just about, hey, can we book a baby seat? And, like, can the baby come? And all these sort of logistical questions.
My suspicion is they got hacked because.
[00:34:58] Speaker A: In the email chain, suddenly they start replying and I notice a week later, after we got scammed, that it's t0urs-italy.com and I'm normally good enough and sharp enough to notice that, but it was in response to my emails.
[00:35:18] Speaker B: Yeah, right. So it wasn't. You got an email out of the blue from some other. Yeah, that you. A new email that you might pay attention to the email address. Oh, my God.
[00:35:27] Speaker A: Wow. And so I'm going to pay on their website, which is a legitimate website and has payment processing and everything.
[00:35:34] Speaker B: Right. Looks like everything.
[00:35:36] Speaker A: And this. Actually, I think there was their website, which is why I think they were hacked.
It would not process payment, it wouldn't take it. And so then they asked for PayPal. And that's where I feel really stupid because it was in the email chain and the website was working. So I sent the money on PayPal and then I am smart enough, thankfully, to have noticed this. When they started asking me to like, confirm that it had been shipped or whatever, I'm like, oh, I got got. Right. So I was able. But both to file with PayPal and get every cent back. Right. And it only took a couple of weeks, so all's well that ends well there.
[00:36:12] Speaker B: But probably because you realized it so quickly too.
[00:36:16] Speaker A: Yeah. And I had the back and forth. And then of course, as soon as I initiate the claim on PayPal, they're emailing me saying, please cancel the claim so we can go ahead and put. I'm like, oh.
And then I did actually go to the trouble, like insisting on a phone call with this owner of the. Of the actual agency that is on LinkedIn and been there forever and felt at ease booking again directly with them, not on PayPal.
And they showed up and they were lovely and it all worked out. But a good. Again, lesson in the extent of some of the scams.
I'm sure it's everywhere in the world, but your particular can get really, really good. Right?
[00:36:53] Speaker B: Yeah, well, and I think they do a really good job of copying, making it look like if you link through an email to a website, the website looks the real website. Right. Like they completely copy the real website. And it may only be if you notice like some typos or something. It's really, it's.
[00:37:11] Speaker A: And. And in direct response to my email.
[00:37:14] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:37:14] Speaker A: Right. So they had. Which means they must have gotten hacked something.
[00:37:17] Speaker B: Yeah. At least their email had gotten hacked. Or either. I mean, I guess technically it could have been your email that got hacked, but more likely their email got hacked because they would have. I mean, it's sort of a lot to. They were probably doing this to multiple people. Right. And it was a big investment if they just hacked your email. It's not a big investment if they hacked their. Because then they're trying to do this to a whole bunch of people at once.
[00:37:37] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah. But all's well that ends well. Driver showed up nice and early. Driver brought us into the city center and then had the separate. Have the separate tour guide there as well. And so, you know, we were able to get around to you know the major sites in Rome. My son is named Trevor. And so Trevi, we had to see the Trevi Fountain.
[00:37:59] Speaker B: Oh, for Trevi.
[00:38:00] Speaker A: For Trevi, right.
[00:38:01] Speaker B: Do you have a picture of Trevi at the Trev. Trevi at the Trevi Fountain.
[00:38:05] Speaker A: I will send it. I will send it for sure.
A look.
[00:38:09] Speaker A: But would that be helpful, Sam? I could get pictures up while we're live. If it's, if it's.
[00:38:14] Speaker B: No, because I don't have. I actually don't have a. I don't have a way of screen sharing.
[00:38:19] Speaker A: I'll give you some good. I'll give you some good photos. Yeah, I will say for those that have been to Rome 20 years ago, like me, it's a lot more popular now than it used to be.
[00:38:27] Speaker B: A little more crowded. There's a line at the Trevi Fountain.
[00:38:30] Speaker A: You either gotta like pre book or get in the line. And so we just did a nice little walk by and. And that was, that was fine.
But in some of the driving around.
[00:38:40] Speaker A: Of, of Rome.
[00:38:43] Speaker A: You gotta love young kids, right? You gotta love growing kids. So we saw the Trevi Fountain, we saw some of the big, the big stuff. We saw. We, we did, we did do tour the Coliseum as well, you know, and we were only in there maybe 45 minutes to an hour, right? Like, it wasn't a proper, proper tour, but young kids and limited time, right? And so it was, it was very cool to get in and out.
But in amongst all the driving around, my kids spotted the bat signal. The bat signal for my kids is the Build a Bear logo.
And so in between like Coliseum and Parthenon and.
[00:39:16] Speaker A: They saw a toy store and I'm like, they don't have a Build a Bear in Rome, Italy, right?
But they asked to go back to the toy store with our remaining 45 minutes to an hour. So, and so it's like, okay, mom and dad and Lisa picked everything all day. We'll go to the stupid toy store, right? And they had a Build a Bear in Rome, Italy. And So we spent 45 minutes of our quite expensive Rome day in Build a Bear. By the way, for those that don't know Build a Bear. And now I understand why. Like is one of the top performing stocks in the last five years. It has outperformed like just about any of the hot flying in Nvidia. All these companies, you'd have more money if you invested in Build a Bear. Bear. So we invested in Build a Bear and now we have yet more little Build A Bears that we brought all the way home.
[00:40:00] Speaker B: Oh my God.
[00:40:01] Speaker A: So that was our Rome day.
[00:40:02] Speaker B: You know, I gotta say, I think they, they do a really good job with some of those collaborations that they do. Right. They've got a lot of good Disney and How to Train youn Dragon, Pokemon, Harry Potter and Pokemon. Yeah. So they have all these collabs and it's not just the actual stuffies, right. Like the plushie, the plush, you know, stuffed animals. It's also the clothing and accessories that they sell. And so I think.
[00:40:27] Speaker A: Yeah, those are real cheap. Real, real jacket.
[00:40:30] Speaker B: Oh my God.
You can find some knockoffs online. I'm just saying.
I love that. All right, well, a long day in Italy. Did you, did you guys, did you stop for gelato at any of these places?
[00:40:43] Speaker A: We did. No, I think multiple times. Yeah.
[00:40:46] Speaker B: Especially with the kids. That's the only. You got to keep them sugared and hydrated. Right.
[00:40:50] Speaker A: And actually Barcelona too had some excellent, some excellent gelato too. That was, that was a popular stop for us and you know, was, was able to do that a couple of times. The, the tour guide, I'm, you know, sometimes the tour guides recommend the restaurant that maybe isn't the best that like they just happen to know. Right.
And, and we, obviously that may have happened this time but, but we really did have a nice like late lunch in Rome that, oh good. You know, was a good, good breather during the day there. So. Yeah, I, I thought, oh well, we don't have that much time. We'll just, you know, grab something on the go. But no sitting down and actually having a meal.
[00:41:21] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean that's a long day. Especially with, with 3K.
Very long day. You do need a, you know, a break. And now did the kids like sleep in the car ride back to the port?
[00:41:34] Speaker A: A little bit. A little bit. Yeah. They're, they're pretty early sleepers most of the time anyway. Right. Like even the 8 year old now is like 7:30, 8 o'. Clock, obviously a little later a bunch of times on this trip.
[00:41:45] Speaker B: Sure.
[00:41:45] Speaker A: On the trip, you know, with, with some of the, some of the activities that were going on. But, but you know, and like the good thing, thing anybody with a baby, I will say, unless you've got a challenging baby and there's certainly many of them, but particularly challenging one, a lot of them will just like they'll sleep wherever and if you can kind of train them to do that a little bit, sometimes you wear them, sometimes you get them in a stroller, like they'll just dawn off, you know, don't don't worry about like, oh, it's got to be nap time at 12:47 to, you know, 1:47. Right. Like, they'll, they're, they'll adapt. Right?
[00:42:16] Speaker B: Yeah.
I think the baby wearing is key. That was when, when Nathan was real little. Like, I will say airplanes were kind of a nightma nightmare at that age because when he was. Once he started crawling and stuff and you had to stay in the seat. That's, that's really where it's a pain. But the baby wearing to just like go from place to place or go shopping. Right. Like the, that I can't remember the name of the carrier that I had, but that I would, you know, wear with the straps. And that was, yeah, that was, that was always easier for me, it seemed, than the stroller only because especially in, in cities I feel like in, you know, if you've got, like, if you're in the suburbs and you've got these, you know, and you're going to the grocery store, stroller's great. You're going, you know, you're on big sidewalks is great. But like older cities where like, they're not quite ADA compliance, let's put it that way. Then the strollers actually can, can be, you know, quite difficult.
[00:43:09] Speaker A: The stroller is just nice for us with the. We've got the ride right on board at the back of it. So like one of the other kids will take the back. Right. And then, and then you've got like. I will, I will probably bring a.
[00:43:19] Speaker B: Bunch of stuff under.
[00:43:20] Speaker A: That's the other one, right? That's the other one.
[00:43:22] Speaker B: That's what we did. The parks. Yeah. When we were at the parks, Nathan was like, I can't remember. Like, I feel like he was like 7 or 8 or. I think we, I don't think we, I think we like continued renting a stroller at the parks until he was like eight. Because it was just like. Well, one, it's a lot of walking, but two, all of the, the souvenirs, the, all of the stuff you need.
[00:43:43] Speaker A: To bring, I may never give mine up. I'll go.
[00:43:48] Speaker B: 18 year old. Yeah. Sam will be 18 and you'll be pushing his stroller just for, just, just for the, the storage. Yeah, absolutely. Well, let's talk about your third port of call.
[00:43:59] Speaker A: So third was Naples.
And so Naples was purposefully a little bit of a lighter day. Right.
I think both in terms of port arrival and departure time, but also just. I think everybody by then is kind of, you know, getting tired, exhausted.
[00:44:13] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:44:13] Speaker A: But we did a lovely activity with Disney booked Disney excursion where it was pizza making for the kids.
[00:44:21] Speaker B: Oh perfect.
[00:44:22] Speaker A: And so, you know, got to do a little walking tour of the city and then we had the most, I, I, I, I should have written the, the guy's actual name down. But we had the most lovely cast member that was working in retail on the shop, on the boat, but then also like just sort of the accompaniment on on land.
Dead ringer. And he, he's the one who gives himself this nickname Bubbles from I believe, Lilo and Stitch, right?
[00:44:52] Speaker B: Oh yeah.
[00:44:53] Speaker A: And so like sunglasses and big bulky guys, big arms.
And so Bubbles and Trevor, my middle child was, you know, the eight year old kind of goes off on her own more mom and dad with the baby. Trevor kind of needed a buddy the whole time. And so Bubbles was Trevor's buddy.
[00:45:11] Speaker B: Bubbles was his buddy. That's so funny.
[00:45:13] Speaker A: And so we put in a nice like good card for Bubbles and Bubbles kept joking was like, Trevor, you gotta go make me some pizza. Like I'm gonna be coming for that pizza. Right? How's that pizza?
[00:45:21] Speaker B: Right?
[00:45:21] Speaker A: How's that pizza coming? So the pizza making was great. It was, the only thing is it was in a, of like two stories down in a basement of an Italian restaurant that had no air conditioning and so it got quite, quite hot.
[00:45:35] Speaker B: And those pizza ovens.
[00:45:36] Speaker A: Yeah, that, that too. Right, yeah.
But that was a really fun experience. And you did get some time with other kids that of course then you would later see, you know, at the pool or whatever on the ship and stuff. So we had had that happen quite a bit. But that one was a nice easier day. You know, I think we were off at 8 or 9, back by like 2 or 3.
Had the pizza for lunch obviously.
[00:45:58] Speaker B: Right.
[00:45:58] Speaker A: And that was, and that was, you know.
[00:46:00] Speaker B: Yeah. Lunch is included with your excursion. Well, and, and that's classic. I mean that's a perfect excursion in Naples anyway because as everyone knows, Naples is you know, like the birthplace of pizza. It's the, you know, the best pizza in the world supposedly is from Naples. And so that's, you know, that's what you do in Naples. So when in, when in Naples.
[00:46:20] Speaker A: When in Naples.
[00:46:21] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:46:21] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:46:22] Speaker B: All right. Well, your fourth port of call. All.
[00:46:25] Speaker A: So my, my guess, I, I won't even say understanding. I, I don't know if Disney gets to Sicily very often because there weren't a ton of excursions available. It definitely had like, like 60, 70% fewer than, than the other ones. And we really wanted a beach day Right. Like, we, we took obviously with, with the last cruise, you know, Bahamas and, and, and Castaway Cay and things. Like we, we wanted a beach day here even in Europe, and there wasn't one in the excursion list. And so we kind of had.
[00:46:56] Speaker A: We used a local Sicilian travel company that actually exists and is not a scam to book private transfer from the boat to a beach club. But I was, I was proud of myself here.
The, the travel company had a recommendation for, I think the terminology actually is, is beach club.
And it literally is a club on the beach where you can pre register and reserve day beds and, and, you know, towels and, and, and umbrellas and everything. And so I had done it early enough that we were like right alongside the water. We were the right first front row, which was great for when the kids would go and play and you could kind of sit back and have a drink and the kids go and come back and they had a restaurant on site. But they were also cool if you brought in food from across the road.
And so that was just a very nice, relaxing, chill, you know, sort of day at the beach. And I mean, probably orders of magnitude cheaper than any other excursion that we did. Right. Like, it was just, you know, I think 10, 20 bucks for each umbrella table and then 20 bucks for the taxi. 20.
[00:48:02] Speaker C: But.
[00:48:02] Speaker A: Right. Like it was maybe 100 all in for the six of us. Right. So it was a nice, nice, nice budget day there, but also just a nice, nice relaxing one too. So.
[00:48:12] Speaker B: Yeah. Oh, awesome. That sounds like, I mean, it also sounds like a perfect way to kind of end a, a series of busy port days.
I'm imagining your port days were one right after the other.
[00:48:24] Speaker A: They were. Yeah. No, no rest for the wicked.
[00:48:26] Speaker B: Right.
[00:48:26] Speaker A: It was sea day at the front, sea day at the back.
[00:48:29] Speaker B: It's the same as in Alaska. It's because you're, you know, your distance that you need to cover is at the front end and the back end. And all the ports you're going to are relatively close to one another. And so in fact, you're probably, if you were to look at, you know, what the ship did during the night, it's probably lots of like circles and figure eight and all of that zigzagging because they're really not going that far between, you know, Rome and Naples, for example. Yeah. Even though, you know, it's, it's only a few hours if you were to travel by like train, for example.
[00:49:03] Speaker A: So if you, if you miss your port stop, you can always, you know.
[00:49:05] Speaker B: Right. You can, that Is that is one benefit. I mean, but then you have to deal with train Italia. And I am going to just say, Brian and I have still a running comment comments that if something is just like kind of awful, we just say train Italian.
[00:49:25] Speaker B: And that is from a trip that we took.
Oh gosh, it's 20 years ago now in 2025, following our taking the, the Washington State bar exam, we took a trip over, over to Italy and spent about two weeks. We went to three or four, no, four, four cities basically in, in Italy and did it by train. And it was still a wonderful trip. But do not recommend train Italia. I gotta say, I gotta say. Well, and schlepping large suitcases and all, you know, it's. I would rather do it by cruise. I'd rather do it by ship. Well, I wanna, I wanna ask you, Rob, about the experience on board, especially the experience with an infant on board. Because, you know, the first time you, you cruise was just with the, your two older kids and, and their kids club age, so they're still young, but they weren't infants. And so it's a different experience. How did you find, you know, the staff and the, you know, experience with the kids club, but also even with main dining, because it's a, you know, main dining is kind of long. Babies don't love to sit for that long. Like. Yeah. How, how was sort of the overall experience on the ship with baby Sam?
[00:50:36] Speaker A: Super easy, I gotta be honest. Yeah, the nursery, the nursery is great.
Obviously we pre booked that whenever we could, but there was usually pretty good availability.
I'd imagine that might be a function of where we were. Right. Like there were probably not as many babies on this as there would be a, you know, a bit of a lighter cruise.
And so we, we had a few. Hey, do you have room? Yes, we do drop them off. Right.
But if, if the topic is on board and baby Sam, I, I gotta, I gotta tell this.
So we. One thing we did a bit different this time around.
[00:51:08] Speaker B: Did he, he do the, did he do the diaper dash?
[00:51:11] Speaker A: He sure did. He sure did.
And we weren't sure whether because we, we knew the age it would sort of line up, but we weren't really sure because he wasn't crawling prior to the, to the cruise.
We did a lot of game shows and karaoke this time around. We, we did very few of those last time, but just really launched onto them this time around.
And so in the midst. And, and so I think it's the D Lounge where you've got like a Fair bit of room. And we kind of realize, like, yes, Sam's obviously, he's been out of the stroller and out of whatever, but hasn' had a lot of room anywhere in a while. And so we've got him out of the stroller on the ground and we notice he's moving and he's crawling. And so he crawled for the first time on the boat. And so we figured, you know what, like, that's our calling, right? So that was like, that's amazing, Rob.
[00:51:59] Speaker B: You got to like.
[00:52:02] Speaker B: So now the Disney fantasy will always be the place that baby Sam first crawled in.
[00:52:06] Speaker A: D Lounge forever. Forever and always. Right?
And so that set Baby Sam up for his granddaughter debut in the Jack Jack baby race.
About two days later. There were only, I think two heats of like four or five babies each. So it wasn't. Wasn't a huge population.
[00:52:23] Speaker B: I will tell you. There's. I've been on a cruise for. There was the wish maiden voyage. There were only two babies on their own ship and so there was one heat and then there was one champion. So.
[00:52:33] Speaker A: Well, alas, there were a few more experienced crawlers than baby Sam. I, I will say if baby Sam went now a scant, you know, six, eight weeks, weeks later, I think he'd stand a fighting chance because he can move now. But as a. As the rookie of the bunch, he LS was not successful.
[00:52:49] Speaker B: But you know, the timing, it's funny, the timing has to be just right because there's this, like, you know, there's this time where they're just learning to crawl where they have, don't like they might fall over half the time. They, you know, they can't go very far. There's not very fast. And then like, there's the sweet spot where they're like, I want that thing. They're very like, like one track mind, I will go for that stuffy or that toy and. And we'll race. Right. And then. But shortly thereafter, you start, they start to stand and they start to walk and you can't get them to crawl anymore. So it's like there's this very short window for Jack Jack Cyber Dash. So you're.
[00:53:27] Speaker A: And not only that, if you, if you stand up and walk, you lose. You're out. So that, yeah, you're deep.
They're on that side. But aside from that, it was, it was so much fun. And, and for the dining, we would kind of run into this pattern with early dining, obviously. Right. I would never do. I don't think I'd ever Do late dining anyway.
[00:53:47] Speaker B: You might.
You'd be surprised, Rob. You'd be. So. I mean, it just. It probably depends. Well, you live on, you know, the east coast, so, like, maybe not, but, like, I. When your kids get older, you. You might. You might change your tune.
[00:54:00] Speaker A: Fair enough. Fair enough. We did the early, and we found that inevitably, like, it was actually the older two kids that kind of started to, like, get annoyed and annoying a little bit by the end. So we would. We would eat a pretty quick dinner and then kind of. I would rush them off to the kids club, and then we'd enjoy dessert and drinks, the adults and Sam sort of afterwards.
And then, you know, it would be. There weren't. There weren't too many nights where we. We left Sam at the nursery and then did the night thing. It was usually one of us staying back with. With the baby.
I feel like Pirate Night was the one night where, you know, sort of stayed at, like, where. Where we had Sam at the nursery, and then everybody stayed out fairly, fairly late. But you can't plan a lot of this with young kids, right? Especially Trevor being 5, like, Maisie at 8, like, kind of is up for anything and will stay up late all the time. Trevor's a crapshoot, you know, and if he wants to go to bed, Emily's. Emily's perfectly happy to take him to bed, right? She's. She's seen Pirate Night before. So, you know.
[00:55:00] Speaker B: That's right. Didn't she go on her own to Pirate Night? Yeah.
[00:55:05] Speaker B: So, yeah, no, that's smart. I mean, it is. You have to really play it by ear. And of course, if. If. If Trevor wants to go to bed, then whoever's taking him to bed can take baby Sam back, right, and put him down to bed. And so you only need one of the adults to, you know, be back at the room or rooms because you had the adjoining rooms. That's. The other part is, even if the baby. Even if the kids are sleeping in different rooms with the adjoining, you know, with the adjoining door, that's. That's super, super helpful. You know, I gotta ask. How was it bringing friend and nanny along with you? It was obviously her first time. And you said, I mean, not a lot of experience flying, no experience on a cruise. Like, how was that? I mean, I'm sure it was helpful to have another pair of hands, but. But how was the experience?
[00:55:50] Speaker A: Well, so we've. We've known Lisa now for about five years, and, you know, she's become part of the family. And we did have her to Disney about a year year ago, you know, so not her her first rodeo with us on on the road and she's just super chill and super like almost like a little kid in, in some regard of, of like new and wondrous and you know, trying like I, I'd say probably tried, you know, a dozen or many dozens of different new foods that she had never tried before. Right.
In her, in her travels with us. So it's kind of cool to see that as well. Right. We're actually bringing her daughter who is, is 20 and has never been to the parks before. All we're all going to the parks for the marathon in January, so. Oh, seeing seeing like childhood delight at an adult age is is kind of kind of cool. So. No, she, she's a trooper. She, she, you know, did a bunch of overnights with the baby and you know, was, you know, super super needed and super helpful and you know, couldn't have, couldn't have done it without her. So.
[00:56:48] Speaker B: Yeah. Well, it's a lot, I mean obviously just the travel, just the airplane part of, of travel. It's a lot for you know, if you've got an infant and two elementary age kids that, you know, you're, you're working zone defense if there's only two of you. And so if you can go man on man with, with three adults and three children, it's just quite a bit easier. I mean, I, I prefer the two on one that we have.
[00:57:16] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:57:17] Speaker B: But you know, not, not, you know, know different. Some people want to have more than one child. I totally understand that. Yeah. Well, it sounds like an amazing, amazing trip, Rob. Did I, have we missed anything? Was there any. I mean, how did the kids like the kids club? I forgot to ask about that. Obviously they did it up the previous cruise, but did they, you know, were they, did they warm up to it more or anything change in that regard?
[00:57:41] Speaker A: Yeah. So, I mean Trevor was, was five this time around versus, you know, three and a half last time. And so, and so I mean we had the odd Trevor wants to get picked up text last time and had none of that this time. So he really settled in and it was kind of nice for him to be there for extended periods of time and actually want to be there for extended periods of time.
The one new thing we did this time around that we hadn't last time. We did get to book early enough to do the Royal Court tea, which was super fun.
[00:58:11] Speaker B: Did you do it with all the kids or was it.
[00:58:13] Speaker A: We had everybody there. Yeah, we had Everybody there.
I think we might have had Sam and the ner. I think we might have Sam at the nursery for it.
[00:58:19] Speaker B: But that's the other one, Paul, because you.
[00:58:22] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:58:22] Speaker B: You don't like. Well, he's not going to get the gifts because it's. The gifts are for the 3 to 12 year old crowd.
And I'm not sure if he would get anything out of the royalty at that. At that age. Right. Yeah.
[00:58:35] Speaker A: Our only error with that was I think we had like ended up having a bit of a late lunch and so we really had no appetite going into it, so didn't get to enjoy maybe as much as we would have, but the experience was excellent. You know, the performers are great and, and that was a lot of fun. Maybe not a do it every single time one, but certainly very enjoyable and had a nice family at the table with us. And so that was great. We did Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique again, you know, and I tear up because I know I'm running out of time with Maisie to do it because she's our only girl. Trevor did it too, so, I mean, I've got more time. Listen, there's just not as many outfits right. For that.
[00:59:15] Speaker B: Right. I mean, baby Sam might wanna be Captain Mickey. You know, on the wish of the treasure.
[00:59:22] Speaker A: We did. We only did it once. So we, we didn't do the splurge of, of the pirate this time around, which, which was a bit much last time.
[00:59:28] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:59:29] Speaker A: And then the only other new thing we did this time around, we, we didn't do Palo Remy at night, but we did do the Palo brunch.
[00:59:37] Speaker B: Oh, yes.
[00:59:38] Speaker A: And I gotta say, I think that for me topped either of the, of the, of the dinners to, to be honest, it was, it was amazing.
[00:59:45] Speaker B: It is.
[00:59:46] Speaker A: And we, we had a, we had a server that like, we thought we ordered a lot. Like, I think we had. We had like a couple of appetizers and soup and, and two mains. And the guy's joking like, oh, you got to try the lasagna. You got to try lasagna. He brings out a full, like, full serving of lasagna as well. And like, I found, I found room for it. Right?
[01:00:10] Speaker B: I mean, you can't help but find room for their lasagna with the bechamel sauce.
[01:00:14] Speaker A: I mean, and it's, it's like, oh, lasagna is like their number one. Oh, yeah, it is. Okay. It is, right? It was, it was one of the best. It was. I'd say that was probably the best meal. Yeah. I'd say the trip. I'd say the trip was that Palo brunch for us.
[01:00:26] Speaker B: And so I will say that does not surprise me.
The, you know, I think of the adult dining meals, while I love Remy dinner, I think Remy dinner is just phenomenal.
I think palo brunch puts every one of the other. I mean, it's a completely different experience, right? Like it's. It's very much more accessible food than like a, you know, a tasting menu at Remy's dinner. But it's just so good. Like, the quality is so good, the atmosphere is so good.
I love that. It's, you know, you can order whatever you want. It's all inclusive versus sort of an a la carte. Like, the dinner is.
And, and all of the Italian dishes are just fantastic. I know there are people who like the egg dishes or the, you know, the breakfast stuff. I stay away from that because I think I'm not gonna waste the room in my stomach. I want, I wanna eat the calzone, right? I mean, the calzone is really good, but I'd rather the. I'd rather get one of the flatbreads, the pizzas, than the calzone. Although I think the calzone is actually really good. But yeah, I'm just like, I, I ordered, I mentioned this on a, On a show, I think pretty recently.
I one time ordered the giant Mickey waffle just because I wanted really. The picture of the giant Mickey waffle. I ate one ear of it and I was like, this is completely not worth it. Like, it wasn't even. I mean, the ones you get in cabanas or Marceline market were better. Are better.
[01:01:52] Speaker B: This was just kind of a meh, like dry waffle, even with, you know, even with syrup. So I was like, why would I eat this? I'm. Gimme more of that tomato soup or give me more of that chicken parm or that lasagna or pizza or any of the other. I mean, any of the other amazing, amazing things that Paulo brunch has. And I honestly, honestly think it's quite a good value considering how much, you know, I know there are people who don't want to do any add on dining. I understand that, like, you don't have to. You can get great food that's all included, you know, But I think if you're looking for a meal that is adult only, that is a great value. I think that the Palo brunch is. Is absolutely the way to go.
[01:02:30] Speaker A: Yeah, it was phenomenal. Yeah.
[01:02:32] Speaker B: Well, you know, Rob, we did, we did a, A Rapid fire on. On your last episode. So I'm not going to do a rapid fire except, except to ask you cruising in Europe versus cruising in the Bahamas, if you have to choose between those two. I mean, completely different style of cruising, I would say, but you're on the same ship, so it's really. You can compare them more easily.
[01:02:55] Speaker A: You know, I feel like the cruising in the Bahamas, it's, it's more of a. Like a regular every couple of years kind of thing, whereas the cruise in Europe is, I think, like a once every five, 10, you know, sort of sort of thing.
[01:03:09] Speaker A: I feel like there's just a lot of, I don't know, logistical hacks you get with the cruising in Europe that fit our current situation really, really well. Of, like, we want to see a lot, but we have. It's hard to travel with young kids and so it's easier to get around. So, I mean, I think we'll. I think both were amazing trips.
I feel like we'll probably do the Caribbean a little bit more often.
But this is. Was, you know, trip of lifetime too, so it's hard to say the Caribbean, even though we're going to do it more often, if that makes any sense. I will say too, the fact that we had done the boat already. Right. Like this was our second time on the same ship.
I don't know if I would have booked it otherwise. Right. Like, it. I feel like we wouldn't have gotten. Not our money's worth, but we wouldn't have gotten enough out of the boat if it was a brand new ship that we had never been on before.
[01:04:00] Speaker B: Ah, fair. Yeah. Like, you wouldn't want to necessarily be on the Destiny, for example, in Europe when the, when she comes out, because there's so much you want to experience on the ship. And if you're doing like a port heavy itinerary where you really want to spend, not just you want to go out, but you want to go out for the. You're going out for 10 hours, for example, the whole day.
Yeah. That's probably not the best place to be able to really explore a new ship. So I think that that's a, That's a very smart. Yeah. Judgment call. All right, well, I've got to ask Brian's last question, which is always, what's next? I mean, did you book another placeholder? Are you eyeing, Are you eyeing some other cruise itineraries? I know you've got the Walt Disney World, dopey. You are crazy. You're doing that in just a few Months and actually probably about the time this episode will come out.
[01:04:54] Speaker B: Probably shortly after you'll be running the dopey. So good luck to you on that. But do you have any cruise plans in the near future?
[01:05:01] Speaker A: So we actually have two booked. One One, we're going over the dark side. Mom and dad solo, no kids.
[01:05:10] Speaker B: Oh, wow.
[01:05:10] Speaker A: We just wanted to try. We figured we'd try Celebrity just, just to see.
Part of it was itinerary and timing. I get a week off from my teaching and it was like there was one itinerary that fit really well.
So we'll try that and probably just book Disney even for adults only in the future. But just to give it a shot. Where is that out of, out of Fort Lauderdale and does a quick little Key west, quick little four night.
[01:05:33] Speaker B: So you're going to love Key west if you haven't been already. It's a, it's, it's a really lovely place. We, we did a nice little food tour there. When we sailed on our first time on Virgin, we stopped at Key west and it was, yeah, we were very, we were very happy with our day there. So. Yeah, I'm sure that'll be great. And then what's the other one you've got?
[01:05:51] Speaker A: Well, yeah, and so we did do the placeholder. And then about a month after we got back, we were out at one of the local county fairs with a good friend of mine, actually the guy, one of the guys that was on the Rome trip with me 22 years ago ago in high school.
And he's got an eight year old and a five year old, no baby and probably no baby even in the.
[01:06:10] Speaker B: Future, but no baby in the coming.
[01:06:11] Speaker A: In the future, but same ages, down to like a couple of months difference of my older two.
And I said, hey, Scott, you want to go to Disney cruise? And we had been to Disney World together before four or five years ago. And he said, sure. And I said, well, our window to use.
[01:06:29] Speaker A: Our window to book 20, 27 itineraries as silver is up tomorrow. Like you don't, you know, we can get our money back, but are you sure you want to book? He's like, yes. And so the same day, 60, like, like 24 hours before the itineraries open up to the public, we booked and it won't be till March 27, so it's still quite a ways away, but I guess we've got the five of us. Lisa's got to sit this one out, I'm afraid, but the five of us and Scott and his family so nine of us I guess in total going the Treasure, I believe out of Port Canaveral for a week over. Over March break. So.
[01:07:01] Speaker B: Oh, fantastic. You're gonna love it. The Treasure is such an amazing ship and you guys are parks people. So you're just. Yeah, it's the perfect. And, and it's got all the stuff for, for all the kids. So you're gonna be fine on that front. But you're gonna, as Parks fans, you're gonna love it.
[01:07:18] Speaker A: Absolutely's very excited. Apparently you slide to get to the kids club. That's her understanding. Yes.
[01:07:22] Speaker B: So she's on the Treasure and any wish class ship, they've got a. You can, you can check them in down.
[01:07:32] Speaker B: You can also check them in at the podium which is right in that grand hall and it's. And they slide into the kids club and you adults can actually slide into the kids club only when the whole thing is in open house mode. So day one is the best time to do that because a lot of the time during the rest of the cruise it will be. Even if parts of it are in open house mode, it has to be the whole club because that's where the front check in desk is, is where this slide comes into. And so, so it's. That part is usually, you know, that part is sort of the secure part regardless, even if just one, if one or two rooms are in open house mode, but if the rest of it's very different than the kids club you're used to because they have these different rooms that can sort of be isolated off. So you can have parts of the club in open house mode and other parts of the club that are in secure programming mode. So anyway, but it's. I'm sure you'll have a fabulous time. Of course, Rob, you will have to come back onto the show to tell us all about it. We'd love to have you back again. Your fabulous, fabulous guest. And with that, I'll just say thank you for joining me today. Thank you for all the stories and I'm sorry that Sam's profession as a, as a professional baby racer is probably over. Unless you're going to sail in the next couple of weeks. Probably.
[01:08:46] Speaker A: I mean, maybe we have another baby and have another.
[01:08:50] Speaker B: Baby number four. All right, well, good luck, Emily. That's all. Good luck, Emily.
All right, well, thank you so much. Much, Rob.
[01:08:58] Speaker A: Thank you, Sam. Appreciate it.
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[01:11:30] Speaker A: Sam.
