[00:00:00] Speaker A: I kind of didn't know what to expect because, like, even on the Treasure, it looks darker on video than when you get there. And so when I was watching the videos, I was like, okay, but we'll have to see. And I think the thing that's really interesting about the Destiny is how it changes. The dynamic of the room changes depending on who is in the room.
[00:00:27] Speaker B: Welcome back, everybody, to this week's episode of the DC CL Duo podcast, brought to you by my Path Unwinding Travel. And Sam, time to do your jingle.
[00:00:36] Speaker C: Yeah, simply the best.
Better than all the rest. All right, Brian, give us that listener review.
[00:00:44] Speaker B: So this week's listener review. We're continuing our trend here. We're going to clear out the Canadian reviews to keep the international reviews going. And so this one comes from Sam L. Hung.
Maybe Samuel Hung, Abbreviated, I'm not sure, but Sam L. Hung, who writes the right. The reason why I started Cruising Disney. I found this podcast after seeing an ad for Disney Cruises. Listening to the podcast inspired me to book my first Disney cruise. All the tips from the wonderful hosts and guests helped me have such a memorable cruise.
It always brightens my workday and gives me happiness to fantasize about my next Disney cruise. Thanks, Brian and Sam for introducing me to the magical world of Disney cruising. Keep up the great work. So there you go, Sam.
[00:01:25] Speaker C: Aw, Merci beaucoup. I love it.
[00:01:28] Speaker B: Well, he. He may not. He may not be from Quebec, so.
[00:01:30] Speaker C: Well, whatever. They have.
Yeah, he or she. They have. They have lots of. I feel like the Canadians tend to both speak English and French, Brian. I guess not all of them, but a lot of them. So thank you. Or merci, depending upon if you speak French also in addition to English.
[00:01:48] Speaker B: Yes. So thank you for that review. I'm just gonna call you Sam. Thank you for that review, Sam.
And as always, and don't worry, I.
[00:01:56] Speaker C: I didn't give myself a review. It's not from me.
[00:01:58] Speaker B: Well, yeah, because you can't review from Canada, so.
But thank you for that review. Remember, as always, one of the best ways to support the show is to head over to Apple Podcasts, hit those five stars. That's the easiest way. But if you want to leave us a written review, we will read it on the air at the top of one of our main episodes. So, Sam, you want to intro our guest and our topic for today?
[00:02:20] Speaker C: I would love to. I'm so excited to finally have Jennifer on our show. To Jennifer. I feel like we rescheduled on you like three or four times. We shifted Your show topic. Like, I'm so sorry but I am so excited to have you come on to our show for the very first time. So welcome Jennifer.
[00:02:37] Speaker A: Thank you. In fairness, we had several to pick from so at least that helped out hopefully.
[00:02:43] Speaker C: Yes, we did. You had like three cruises in less than six months. I want to say less than three.
[00:02:50] Speaker A: I'm almost ashamed to say. But yeah, it was about three or four. We. September, the end of September, December and then the end of January.
[00:02:58] Speaker C: So yeah, I love. Listen, you can never cruise too much Disney cruise line. I mean your wallet, your wallet might disagree. Well, fair. I mean the, it's funny actually a friend of ours told us like the one thing about if you sail too much at some point it tends to lose a bit of its charm and you tend to see sort of the, some of the cracks in the foundation start to show. Right. But I mean we love cruising. So it, I would cruise every month if I, if I could afford it. Both like from the financial side and also on the vacation side, you know, with having a full time job. Yeah, I would love to cruise like every month but. And unfortunately not possible. And of course don't forget school. Can't pull Nathan out of school every month. Yeah, absolutely.
[00:03:44] Speaker A: We are very newly empty nesters. So we have a sophomore and a junior in college and so we're kind of taking advantage.
[00:03:51] Speaker C: Absolutely. That's the best. I mean that's, I imagine a time where we will be able to take, take cruises outside of the regular elementary, middle, high school calendar. Even the college calendar is more amenable because you got a longer break between semesters and then they usually finish earlier. At the end of the end of the school year is usually in May. Not for us, it's like middle end of June. Right. So yeah, I feel like there's a lot more options. In fact, today as we're recording is the first day for Pearl booking for the summer 2027. I know this, this episode will be out probably in a month and a half from now, but the, the Pearl booking window opens today and you know, it's one of those things where there's some really great cruises to in the European season that are like the end of May and early June and they're just not even possible for us to have on our radar because of the school calendar. So I long for the day where we have more flexibility in our schedule. So that's fantastic for you all. Jennifer. Well Jennifer, let's, let's dive into your cruising background. We mentioned you sailed 3, 4 times in just the last few months.
We're going to talk about your January cruise on the Destiny here today. But when did you start cruising? Were you a Parks person first? Like give us a little bit of the history.
[00:05:18] Speaker A: So we were definitely Parks people first.
We actually started cruising in I think it was 2017.
It was one of those last minute deals that they put out and we, I turned to my husband, I was like, we almost can't not go. We can't just like turn this down because it's a ridiculously low amount of money for the four of us to go. And like we just did a three night cruise on the Magic and we were hooked. And so like I think two months later we cruised on the Fantasy here like six months later on the Fantasy.
We have since been on all four ships. And so at the time our kids were middle school, late middle schoolish in age. So we've never had really little Littles on the cruise. But we've kind of cruised all through their high school years, been on a couple cruises with them as 18 to 20s.
And now we're entering the world with a 21 year old. Next time he's on the ship with us.
[00:06:08] Speaker C: So oh my goodness. He'll be able to do all the, not just the adult activities, but be able to drink at the adult activities.
[00:06:17] Speaker A: My husband is super excited because I don't do drink tastings. And so they're already planning on doing a drink tasting together. Cause he does them by himself now and now he's happy to have a buddy.
[00:06:26] Speaker C: So that's nice. I like that. Well, you said so you were on all four original ships. Now you just went on the Destiny. Have you been on the Wish and the Treasure prior to going on the Destiny?
[00:06:39] Speaker A: We have everything but the Adventure, which I guess nobody's been on yet, so.
[00:06:42] Speaker C: Nobody's been on yet. Well, well, except for family and friends of cast members or crew members, I should say, and then some DIS executives. But yeah, nobody, nobody who's just like a regular person has yet been on the Adventure as we're recording.
And by the time this comes out that will probably not be true. There will be. It was, will probably be right after the, right after the Adventure comes out. So. Fantastic. So you have tons of experience. How many cruises have you been on since 2017? You started how many cruises now. How quickly did you rack up your status?
[00:07:16] Speaker A: So this was our 17th cruise.
[00:07:18] Speaker C: Nice. Very close.
[00:07:20] Speaker A: A few little three nights in there just, just trying to get away from brutal Midwest winners. Um, we Have a good mix of those in the longer, like ten nights and eight nights.
[00:07:30] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. Well, you just did the, the ten night Hawaii cruise as well. So you definitely have some really varied itinerary experience in addition to those, you know, three night Caribbean cruises for sure. Well, let's, let's talk about your cruise on the Destiny. Um, first we gotta start with why did you book, did you just. Are you a completionist? Did you have to like hit ship number seven, especially before the adventure comes out, and then, you know, obviously you gotta have ship number eight sitting out there at some point.
[00:08:03] Speaker A: So, yes, a bit of a completionist thing. But we also just wanted to see the new theme and everything like that. So the completionist thing won't drive us to do the adventure really soon just because of the distance. We're gonna probably wait till the Japan ship launches so we can do them both on the same trip maybe.
But yeah, it was, it was a little bit of that. We also went on the Treasure for the first time at the same week in January, the last week of January. And we really liked that timing because it's in the worst part of winter for us.
And this year in particular, it started we took off from the ground as the snow started falling for the big blizzard that hit the Midwest and the South.
And so we were basically waving goodbye to the blizzard as we flew to Fort Lauderdale.
[00:08:44] Speaker C: So perfect timing.
[00:08:46] Speaker A: Yes. And most importantly on a nonstop flight so we didn't have to worry about hitting someplace where it was also going.
[00:08:52] Speaker C: Absolutely. We always prioritize the flying nonstop because we figure less chance of something going wrong with delays.
Of course, that's difficult because we only have a couple of flights direct from Seattle to Fort Lauderdale, Miami or Orlando each day. But at the same time, it's, it's still a priority because you deal with, you know, weather and other places interrupting, especially if you're. Especially if you're coming from the Midwest where weather is already a thing. Flying. Yeah, flying out of there. Okay, so what itinerary did you choose for your first cruise on the Destiny? Did you choose one of the four night options or the one of the five night options?
[00:09:33] Speaker A: We did five. We do the threes and fours sometimes, but we don't like them as much.
It just feels like you get on and you could just get right back off. So since at the time the five night was the longest Destiny one and it worked with our schedule, we just did that one instead. So it went to Nassau and Lookout Key.
[00:09:51] Speaker C: Nice. Yeah. The Destiny's doing a couple of seven night itineraries in the summer. But I think for the rest of the year it's really doing that four, five, five night rotation. So it's a 14 day sort of rotation. So every two weeks it sort of starts anew.
So it's just, you know, there's not a ton of options for obviously new ports on the Destiny, but the destination is really the ship itself. And so I think if you can choose a five night itinerary on the Destiny, that's certainly a much better option because there's just, as we've mentioned on the show, there's so much new stuff to experience on the Destiny. It's really hard to see it all in one cruise, even if you're on a five night cruise. Yeah, well, speaking of, your castaway club status is platinum. So you book the Destiny, you have the second booking window after concierge. So concierge pearl and then platinum booking window opens. You mentioned your husband likes to do drink tastings.
Were you able to book some stuff ahead of time, adult dining, drink tastings, that sort of stuff in advance?
[00:11:01] Speaker A: We were, we got pretty much everything we were looking for. We had Palo brunch.
We got a couple of drink tastings for him. He likes mixology and usually he alternates between like the martini one and the mojito one. He did martini this time. I was really excited because they. Every once in a while you get a bartender that like, I haven't been to them, but he's been to so many. I know a lot about him.
You get a bartender that kind of does really off the wall things and really different offerings. And he got one of those and he was really excited and he doesn't eat cucumber at all. And they made one that had cucumber and so they actually made him a special martini to make up for the fact that he couldn't drink that one. They made him like a totally off the wall martini special so that he could have that one when everybody else was having the cucumber one.
[00:11:48] Speaker C: Nice. I, I have to say I'm obsessed with like cucumber and gin as a combination. So like I, I should have been there to drink his cucumber martini. Cause I read I would have loved that. Yeah, that was one.
[00:12:02] Speaker A: He'll come back from them because I've trained him well and he'll come back from them and sometimes if it's a really good one and the first thing he'll say is like, this person needs to be on your list of the people you put on the survey at the end of the day, because he knows I keep a list so I don't forget people.
And I always know it's a good drink tasting when he comes back to the room. And that's the first thing he says.
[00:12:20] Speaker C: That's a great idea, by the way, to keep a list of the cast members that you encounter that you get, you know, sort of that special service from and that you want to make sure to compliment at the end.
Like, it is hard. You think you'll remember, but it is hard over the course of a cruise. By the end of the cruise, you're like, wait, what was the name of that cast member that was so great at the haunted mansion parlor? Or who was so great at that drink tasting? It is. Yeah, it's a good. That's a really good idea to keep a running list. Now your servers and like your stateroom attendant, you're going to remember because you're going to see them throughout the cruise. But I think those, those sort of more one off where you may or may not see that person again. Yeah, it's a great idea to keep a running.
[00:13:03] Speaker A: All right, so I even got the kids trained. When they come, they tell me the same thing. They'll run back, they'll get your note out. Get your apple note out. Put it in there.
[00:13:11] Speaker C: Yeah, I love that. I love that. That's fantastic. Well, and I bet when they were younger, the kids club, they could tell you like, oh, this is a good. That really like this counselor or something like that. Because those are people you're not as an adult going to ever. I mean, I know they're. They're young adults now, but like, as an adult, you're not going to interact with the kids club staff. Really?
Even the tween teen club staff, your kids are going to be the ones. So you're not going to know, like, who to cast compliments at the end of the cruise.
[00:13:40] Speaker A: Yeah, the weirdest one I ever got was on the Mediterranean cruise. They came back and told me I had to thank this woman that worked in the jewelry counter. And I'm, of course, this is my, like then 15 and 17 year old. And I was like, what were you doing at the jewelry counter and do I need to check my statement kind of thing? Like, they. And then they told me that they were on some scavenger hunt for vibe and this person, like, was like super helpful to them and like help them, like complete it and win. And so they, they thanked for the survey.
[00:14:08] Speaker C: Oh, I love that. Yeah. Nathan has Done. Ed shows some scavenger hunt type things where they. They really just like, give them stuff to do and then they go. They, like, send them out across the ship and. Yeah, and. And he has really loved those kind of experiences. But I do think you're. They're right. You have to, like, go talk to different cast members sometimes to find out, like, what if you're. If you're having trouble finding, like, your clue or whatever picture you're supposed to find. Yeah, but that's super fun. I love that. Now, you were going to. You mentioned Nassau and Lookout. I imagine you were probably not booking much in the way of shore excursions. Or were you?
[00:14:49] Speaker A: No, because this was all about the ship mostly. I mean, because it was a new ship and we knew, and we've been to Nassau a ridiculous amount of times. I'm not even sure how many it is. So we were planning on just like, maybe taking a walk in Nassau to, like, just get off the ship and stretch our legs, but we didn't. That's all we did. We just got right back on the ship. And then Lookout, we did get off the ship, but we didn't. We didn't do an excursion at Lookout.
[00:15:11] Speaker C: Yeah. And, you know, it's funny, we still haven't heard too much about when they're going to be bringing more excursions to Lookout, because I think when they first announced Lookout, there were a lot. I mean, there are some excursions, but there were a lot more than I think we anticipated. Sort of off property on the rest of other parts of Eleuthera, and we still haven't really heard much. If you're listening to this and you've had, you know, some experience with shore excursions on Eleuthera through Disney Cruise Line, like, please reach out, because we'd love to find out more, because we just haven't. I think for most people, they're doing kind of what they do at Castaway, Right. Which is just enjoy this beautiful, amazing, tranquil beach and take advantage of the buffet and the ice cream and all of that Lookout has to offer. And not really taking advantage of what Eleuthera has to offer, which I totally understand, no judgment. That's what we do. But would just love to hear more about other things on Eleuthera that people are able to do through Disney Cruise Line. All right, well, let's dive into your actual travel down to Fort Lauderdale. You mentioned direct flight.
Snow starts. Literally, you take off and snow starting. How far in advance did you fly down to Port Everglade? Or Fort Fort Lauderdale.
[00:16:29] Speaker A: Yeah, this one was a Monday start. The crew started on Monday, so we went ahead. And we had already planned, thankfully, to fly down on Saturday, so we didn't have to worry. A lot of people in our Facebook group were scrambling to move their flights off Sunday into Friday or Saturday to get ahead of the storm. We were already on Saturday, and we even looked into Friday, but it was going to cost. We're like, we'll probably. We'll probably make it. Indianapolis can handle weather, so we didn't need it to be, like, completely nice. It just had to be not yet a foot of snow.
And so we flew down on Saturday, and we had mostly flown down on Saturday because I wanted to see some of the national parks near there.
I'm also a completionist on national parks, so I went to Biscayne national park and Everglades national park on Sunday. So we rented a car just for the day.
I went to check out those two places. I am very into birding, so I basically just went out there with some binoculars.
My husband is not very into snakes, so he refused to go. He stayed home and watched. He stayed at the hotel and watched football playoffs, and I went and looked at birds.
[00:17:31] Speaker C: So were there a lot of snakes?
[00:17:34] Speaker A: I did not see a single snake the entire time, but it is famously full of snakes. So my guess is if he had gone with me, the odds are we would have seen one.
[00:17:45] Speaker C: You're probably right.
It's like a Murphy's Law thing. Right, because he didn't come. You saw no snakes. If he had come, you would have seen dozens of snakes.
[00:17:54] Speaker A: Exactly. So we saw none. I just saw a lot of really good scenery.
[00:17:59] Speaker C: Nice. Nice. Now, was it just the. Was it just the two of you on this cruise with your. Your college students set away at school at this time? I'm imagining.
[00:18:08] Speaker A: Yeah. So both of my kids hadn't gone back to. No, they have gone back to school. I forgot we were in Florida. We were at Epic Universe two weeks before, and they were. They weren't back in school.
They weren't on this cruise with us. They were both back at school. One of my sons is a runner, and so he has to go back really early usually. So usually January. They're already long gone.
[00:18:28] Speaker C: Yeah. No, that makes sense. Well, I think it's a great tip, though. If you are sailing in late January in particular, weather across the country like this is, you know, late January through February. Like, there's a lot of snowstorms. Right. That are going to hit, especially in the Midwest, but even the Eastern seaboard. And so it's a good idea to maybe give yourself even an extra day. We always tell people, at least sail in the day before you or sail and fly into the day before your cruise. Right.
[00:18:54] Speaker B: We have our sailing too.
Sail in also, however you get there.
[00:18:58] Speaker C: However you get there, right? Yeah. If you're driving, like, if you are close enough to be driving distance, and I mean reasonable driving distance, then you are okay to go the day of. But other than that, you have to listen to our DCL duo theme song, Only Fools Fly in on Embarkation Day. Right. Like, we. We do not recommend FL to your port city on embarkation day. Just too many things can go wrong. And even if you have decent travel insurance, you will have missed your cruise. So then now you're going to have to reschedule to another time. And maybe that's difficult with your vacation or with your kids vacation. And of course, it's just kind of a costly mess. Even with travel insurance, you usually have to lay out the money and then get reimbursed for whatever those incidental costs were. So. And that's even with a good, you know, good travel insurance policy. So. Absolutely. If you're. Especially if you're coming during, you know, that part of winter, really smart to get in even an extra day in advance. So Saturday for Monday is, I think, pretty, generally pretty good. You have. You have enough chance to, you know, you should have enough chance if your. If your flight gets delayed to still get there in time for your cruise. All right, so you're in port ever. You're already in Fort Lauderdale. Where did you guys stay in Fort Lauderdale before the cruise?
[00:20:19] Speaker A: Yeah, we stayed at the Embassy Suites. Since. Since we've become empty nesters, that's been kind of our place of choice because a couple times we've gone down early and worked. We were. We are able to work remotely if we need to, and so we worked remotely from there. And it was nice because we each had a room to work in as opposed to all being in the same room. And so now it's just kind of a habit. We're like, it's been working out really well. We'll keep doing it. We usually stay there and then get an Uber over to the port, and the Uber's like five minutes from there.
[00:20:45] Speaker C: Awesome. You haven't even needed a car in that area then?
[00:20:50] Speaker A: No. In fact, we rented that car at the airport and returned it before dinner that day because there's like 10 restaurants in walking distance from that hotel in Addition to the hotel actually has one too. But some really great stuff around there that we've walked to. We actually discovered a little bao place nearby this time and ate there for dinner.
[00:21:10] Speaker C: Yum.
Yeah, we love some bao. Delicious. Awesome.
All right, so your next, you've got your next day obviously is embarkation day. That Monday you catch your Uber to the port. Now what time was your port arrival time and when did you show up?
[00:21:29] Speaker A: We were at 11:15 and we showed up about. We were aiming for 11, but the traffic was less than we thought. So we were there at like 10 till. And by 10 till they were already ushering. The only people they were holding back to wait were like the 11:30 and on. So they were already kind of ushering us into the line at 11:15.
We did have to, we did have to stand in that line for a few minutes, but like we were already kind of in the process at that point.
[00:21:53] Speaker C: That's really nice. They there. We actually experienced a ton of traffic the last time we were headed to Port Everglades. Like getting into the port like from sort of where all the hotels and stuff are. So I totally understand your goal to get there around 11. And then sometimes it's just that traffic, traffic, you just don't, you know, you never know what it's going to be. Did you get a sense of how full the ship was for your sailing? I'm imagining it might not have been full because of the timing of the cruise being at the end of January. So of course less families with the kids all having just gone back to school after the holidays.
[00:22:30] Speaker A: Based on the rooms that showed open when we were like really close to when we sailed, I think it was probably around 60% full. And then we did talk to the cats and cast members.
They said a lot of the rooms were full, but at double occupancy, it was really adult heavy. We saw plenty of kids, so at first we didn't process that, but then we started to realize through the trip as we did adult only activities, just how. How close those ti. Those quarters were and a lot of those things.
And our waiter did tell us, he said that it's really heavy on adults and like older children.
[00:23:03] Speaker C: Yeah. Which means late dining is actually going to be more full than early dining. It's like sort of the opposite of like, you know, during peak times or at late, din will be more full when main dining is usually the more full time. And like the pool deck will not be quite as crowded, but the adult only pool deck will be more crowded and of course, adult only experiences the evening. Some of those evening things will be more oversubscribed. So that's one of the things I think people don't realize. Like just because you go at an off peak time, meaning the time when school is in session doesn't and you have a lower number of people on the ship, doesn't necessarily mean it will feel like a lower number of people on the ship. Because if you're sailing adult only at that time, you will experience really the same crowds as you would on a full ship, except for in things like the atrium. Shows and dining might not be as full, the theater might not be as full. And you'll see less. You'll still see plenty of kids, but less kids than you otherwise would. Would see.
[00:24:05] Speaker A: All right. I suspect that because I was running the fish extender group in our Facebook group and the, the adult ones were filling up like, like we had four or five of them. We had like one kids group. Eventually I think we had two kids groups, but we did not have very many kids groups. But like the adults only ones were like, okay, I gotta start coming up with new character names. I'm running out of space.
[00:24:26] Speaker C: Absolutely. I love it. Well, okay, so that actually that's a great topic to hit, Fish extenders. So fish extenders are organized gift exchanges that happen on board and they're called fish extenders because there is a.
On the older ships, there's like a fish thingamajig outside your door that people hang little pocketed, I don't know, cloth things from. They call it, we call them fish extenders. So I don't know what else to call it.
[00:24:54] Speaker B: But basically like a shoe organizer.
[00:24:57] Speaker C: Basically, yeah. Like a shoe.
[00:24:58] Speaker B: Small. Small shoe organizer.
[00:25:00] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. So you hang a little organizer from your door and that's where people leave your gifts. And so. But they're not organized by Disney cruise line. They're organized by people like Jennifer. Jennifer, how long have you been doing fish extender organizing?
[00:25:17] Speaker A: So I usually when I admin the group, I try to recruit someone to do it. But on this one, the person that was doing it had to drop out. And so I don't usually we have done them before. We did not do them on this one because we have a new. Now that over the last couple years. Our new rule is if you can't carry it on, it's too much stuff, don't take it.
Which also means that you bring home a bunch of fish extender stuffs.
[00:25:40] Speaker C: Right. You can't bring it with you. And you also can't bring it home. That's. That's a really good motto. It'll never work for Brian and I. Not the fish extender part. We actually don't participate in fish extenders anymore. But we are not light packers. We just s. But like, that is a great motto. If you can't carry it on, don't bring it.
I love that.
[00:26:00] Speaker A: So that's our, that's our new thing that we've done. And it has resulted in me having to find a post office before we get on our flight home to mail home things I bought. But I will admit that I have done that. But yeah, I pretty much just organized it. I did do some. I do crochets sometimes, like when I'm relaxing on deck and stuff. And so sometimes I'll crochet some ducks and pixie dust them into little fish extenders in my hall. Especially like people if we're living, if we're in a room next door to some kids that I see a lot, I might like send, stick something in there for them.
[00:26:32] Speaker C: Oh, that's really fun. I like that. Well, so you also then admin the Facebook or Facebook groups. I'm sure not for every sailing that you've done, but for many of the sailings that you're on, tell folks what that sort of entails and how one joins a Facebook group for their sailing. I think this is great information for. Especially for first timers.
[00:26:53] Speaker A: Yeah. So I, I do it generally if there's not already one that exists when we book it, I'll go find one and set it up. But I kind of see my role as more of a facilitator of conversation. So I'll try to pop in some tips just to get the conversation going. Things like that we might do since I usually book really far out. Like a lot of. Sometimes we'll do like here, post a picture with the letter F of something Disney related that you have or something like that. Get people involved in the conversation.
And then I usually tend to be very freewheeling, letting people have their own discussions as much as possible.
We did have. This was one group where there was a brief issue that Facebook alerted me to about something. And so I did have to turn off like, like I had to turn on post approval for a while, which I never do, and figure it out and then turn it back on. So I was kind of like, I don't know what to do with this. But for the most part it's a good place just to share tips and things where people can say hey, I've never been to this port before. How does that port work for this sailing? Because it was so. It was. In the inaugural season, we also set up a thread where everybody could share videos so people who didn't want to see spoilers could avoid it. But the people who were excited and watching, like, every single video that was posted, like, we saw you guys at the Loki thing on one of the videos.
So we were posting a lot of those videos into that feed so that people who wanted to kind of see what to expect and watch them in advance.
[00:28:21] Speaker C: Yeah, it's really funny. We've seen ourselves in quite a few videos from the preview and the maiden voyage, like, at some of those larger events, because we tried to get, you know, you don't know exactly where to stand your first time going unless you've been able to watch videos, of course, in advance. But on the preview, we couldn't. There were no videos to watch in advance. So we're just kind of guessing, like, where might be the best place to stand. And at that original the Atrium show that involves Loki, we ended up standing right behind Loki, so we had a great view of the back of his head for the majority of the show. But of course, everybody else who's filming the front of his head is catching us literally right behind him. Right. Sort of above behind him. And so we're in, like, a ton of YouTube videos.
[00:29:07] Speaker A: I think you were next to Lou Mongello, because I just started shouting, that's Mongello. And I think Sam's next to him. My husband, who never remembers anyone's name is like, what are you talking about?
[00:29:16] Speaker C: Yep, yep.
[00:29:17] Speaker A: I was like, no, that's them.
[00:29:18] Speaker C: It is. It was. It was definitely me standing next to Lou. And then Brian came over during part of it, and he's kind of behind me. Um, but, yeah, Lou and I, funny enough, I feel like every activity we went to on the preview sailing, we ended up, like, standing right next to each other. I don't know if we just had the same sample sixth sense about where to stand. And sometimes we were right, and sometimes we were completely wrong. So it's really. Yeah, it's really, really fun. But Lou is great, and his show is fantastic for. For those who don't know who we're talking about, WDW News. So just look him up. He's got a great podcast. He's one of. One of, like, the OGs of Disney podcasting. Really? Really. So definitely someone that we look up to in the community.
All right, well, we gotta talk Embarkation. You know, your first time walking into the grand hall on the Disney Destiny, you had been on the Wish, you'd been on the Treasure, so you knew what to expect in terms of, like, the scale of the space, because it's very different than on the four classic ships. But what did you think about the space on the Destiny? What did you think about the decor and the theming?
Are you a Marvel fan? Like, were you looking forward to that or were you just more curious?
[00:30:30] Speaker A: The one thing I do, I have some misgivings about parts of the Wish class ships, as most of us do, but one of the things is not the Grand Hall. I love the grand hall on those ships. I would say I kind of didn't know what to expect, because even on the Treasure, it looks darker on video than when you get there. And so when I was watching the videos, I was like, okay, but we'll have to see. And I think the thing that's really interesting about the Destiny is how it changes the dynamic of the room changes depending on who is in the room.
So, like, when you come in, it's kind of neutral, but then through the cruise, it might be really green vibes or, like reddish vibes or, you know, whatever.
And how that changes the mood of the room, I thought was really cool and something they haven't done on another ship. We also really like.
Although I'm kind of Marvel neutral, I will call it, I don't dislike Marvel, but I'm not a huge. I'm still working my way through the movies.
I do love that Black Panther was there.
So, yeah, one of my projects, when I had. I had a knee replacement in July, one of my projects was to start watching all the Marvel shows so I could catch up to what my boys and my husband were talking about.
[00:31:32] Speaker C: Well, and in preparation for the. Oh, that's pretty good. I mean, but in preparation for the Destiny, that's perfect, right? Like, you. You need to have. You don't need to be a hardcore Marvel fan, I think, to enjoy the Destiny, but it helps to, like, know who the characters are and, like, is that a good guy? Is that a bad guy? Have, like, a very basic understanding of sort of where they fit into the mix. Yeah.
[00:31:54] Speaker A: And I think that describes me very well. I had a great time on the Destiny, interacting with characters and seeing them and knowing the gist of who they are and kind of a little bit. I had seen two of the Thor movies, so I had a pretty good idea of Loki, thankfully, because that was. That ended up being helpful. But yeah, I think that is help. It is helpful to have a little background, but you'll still enjoy yourself even if you don't. I mean, it's pretty easy to tell who's villains and who's not on the ship once you get on.
[00:32:20] Speaker C: But yes, although Loki is that interesting character where he is kind of a villain and also kind of a hero. But that gets more complicated in the MCU with the television show. And I feel like you don't need to do that deep of a dive for, you know, to enjoy the Destiny. I think just seeing like even just the first Thor movie, but. But seeing the. Maybe the first and the second is a little bit better. Right. But like, so having an idea who Loki is is really helpful. But yeah, you don't have to have like that deep dive. I've seen every Marvel movie and every Marvel TV show and all of that. It's certainly, certainly not necess. Necessary. Well, Jennifer, I'd love to hear what you thought of the spaces on board the Disney Destiny because of course, other than Haunted Mansion Parlor, which is the same as on the Treasure, they're all newly themed, Right. You've got the Sanctum instead of what is the Bayou and the Skipper Society. You've got the Cask and Cannon instead of the Keg and Compass and Periscope Publishing.
And then you've got. I'm like blanking where. Oh, you've got Devilles, which is instead of the Nightingales and the Aristocats one. What am I Scat Cat on? Yeah, on the Sisters. Yeah. So like, did you have a, like a real. Want to see one of those or all of those spaces? You know, what were you sort of most looking forward to in terms of theming of one of those bar spaces? Because that's where really the new theming exists, other than out in the Grand Hall.
[00:33:52] Speaker A: I was, I was looking forward to the Deville's one just because I love 101 Dalmatians and all of that.
[00:33:58] Speaker C: They.
[00:33:59] Speaker A: We enjoyed the Sanctum a lot. I think the Sanctum was really busy all the time, so I only got to really hang out in Sanctum maybe once or twice.
Most of the stuff I was doing they didn't put in Sanctum. Like, we do a lot of trivias and most of the trivias we went to were adult only, and that's usually the family stuff.
But I did do a couple in there and had a nice one, Had a nice drink there. The IO of. I wrote it down.
Yes, that one was good.
And Then my husband had what he described as the best old Fashioned he'd had on the entire cruise at Devilles, but it wasn't on the menu. He just told them he wanted a rum Old Fashioned and they made him one.
And he said he. He just walked up to it from the lobby bar part because it has the lobby bar side now. He walked up there and got it.
And then Cask and Cannon I did really like a lot. I wish they had had more in there, so some of the events would been in there. But he also enjoyed and Brian, I made him take show to tell me which drink it was because I knew you'd ask. Shivered me timbers. He said, that's a rum Old Fashioned. He actually kept going in there to get that to take it to other places because he liked it so much.
[00:35:10] Speaker B: That was definitely my favorite.
I think we had a number of those.
[00:35:14] Speaker C: Yeah, you. I feel it. I feel like you and Michael and Craig had those several times on the. Between the Maiden and the Second Sailing. I don't know that you tried that one on the preview, so I know we. I really liked the one that came in the. The chest and it was. It was two drinks in the chest, but that. And that one was my favorite in Cask and Cannon. But I. I actually thought the Cask and Cannon had like, overall the. Maybe my favorite drinks. I mean, deville's had some good ones too, but I. I feel like Cask and Cannon had the. The least.
The ones in deville's tend to be a little bit too sweet. The ones in Haunted Mansion are even sweeter. Way, way too sweet.
Yeah, I liked Cask and Canon. I liked Cask and Canon more than I thought I would from the theming perspective too.
[00:35:58] Speaker A: Yeah.
I thought it would be hard to top how immersed 20,000 leagues under the Sea felt, but I thought I liked Cask and Cannon better than that, so I thought that one was really good.
[00:36:09] Speaker C: Awesome.
Any of the theming that you didn't like or thought they could have done differently or better or.
I don't know.
[00:36:19] Speaker A: Because it was really. I don't know.
I was more impressed with the theming than I thought I would be, given that I wasn't a Marvel girl. And I mean, I don't dislike villains, but I'm not one of the people that's all in on the villains. So I kind of went in thinking this theme probably won't necessarily be my theme. But the decorations were amazing. Like the carpets and stuff.
Like walking into the villain side and seeing the maleficent Carpet or we were down closer to the Hero side slightly. So some of our stuff was more Hero is hero y. We were in a Hercules room. But I thought how they carried it. Even. Even like the Hercules hallways, the. The carpet was like the clouds of Mount Olympus and everything. And I thought they really spent a lot of time and attention to detail on those kinds of things. So like everywhere you went on the ship, the art, the carpets, everything kind of tied it together.
[00:37:06] Speaker C: Yeah. I love the artwork. I think that the Treasure and the Destiny are. Are like museums. Right? Like it's. You could literally just spend. I mean I.
An entire day just walking around and looking at the different artwork across the whole. Because you think about the entire ship. Like there's artwork everywhere, like you mentioned, down to the carpets. Right. Like the light fixtures. Right. And then of course, everything hanging on the wall. That is what people tend to think of as art. Right. But there's just so much of it everywhere.
You could probably. I mean, it might take you more than a day if you spent time sort of looking at everything.
[00:37:42] Speaker A: We didn't even get to everything and we had five days. Like we didn't. I mean we did really like Saga, but we spend a lot of time in that room anyway. It would. I don't know that it would have mattered what the theming was because we. I mean on all three of the Wish Class ships, we spend a heavy amount of time there. Unless they put stuff in Tritons, which they did a lot on this ship.
[00:38:01] Speaker C: Yeah, they seem. I think they put a lot of the adult trivia in Tritons because Saga has to be used for so many other things because there's no D lounge. Right. And so Saga, which is Luna or Sarabi on the other ships, the other wishclass ships, it really is such an all purpose space that it gets used for. Bingo. It gets used for Match youh Mate. Right. Like there's so many things that they end up not using it I think really at all for trivial or very little. For trivia, I should say. Maybe not. I shouldn't say at all.
[00:38:33] Speaker B: Are you listening to our show? Because you want to make the most out of your next vacation. Great news. The fabulous team over at MyPath Unwinding Travel can help guide you so you don't miss a thing. Their team of professional travel advisors are caring, knowledgeable and experienced. It's why we use them to book our own travel. Mypath Unwinding Travel is an authorized Disney Vacation Planner, which means they are recognized by Disney for their expertise and service. They have sailed on all the Disney ships, including in concierge, visited the theme parks, Adventured with Disney, Relaxed at 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 favorite 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 DCLDUOYpathunwinding.com so they know we sent you their way. Thanks my Path Unwinding for sponsoring today's show. Now back to the episode.
[00:39:32] Speaker C: Well, I'd love to hear what you thought about some of the greet and play or meet, sorry, meet and play activities if you got to go to all of them because I know there's a lot of them. We've got maleficent, we've got Dr. Facilier, we've got the cruella. There's really two cruella kind of experiences if you think about the fashion show and of course troublemaking in Deville's Lounge.
And then of course we have to talk to you about the Storytellers and the With Great Power show, which I'm guessing you went to since or sailing. Just you and your husband. Even though you're not like all in on Marvel.
Were you able to go to a lot of those things? Because we know there have been lines for a lot of those things, especially on an adult. Heavy sailing.
[00:40:16] Speaker A: Yeah. So the lines were really long on a lot of the things. So in my recovery arc from having a knee replacement, I can't stand for more than 30 minutes or it starts to get to be too much. I'm not quite there yet. So we tried to do Doctors Facilier. I specifically tried to a couple nights. My husband for medical reasons can't usually is bed by 9:30. So like usually after that I'm on my own. So I even tried some of like 1145 ones that they did and it was still like an hour long wait even if you got there really early. So I missed the Dr. Facilier one. But I made the Cruella one one night and that one was fun.
I did. It was really tight because they don't have a lot of space in there.
But I made a lot of the Zane and Gamble shows which was really great. So we did the oh what? It's a recipe one where they do like Tiana's place and they like get the audience to tell them all the Ingredients and then Dr. Facilier shows up. That one was really fun. I wanted to do the Sleeping Beauty one, but I couldn't find it on this. I didn't know what it was called, so I couldn't find what I thought it was on the schedule. And they need to make it so you can search like Zayn and Gamble and find all their stuff.
[00:41:25] Speaker C: Yes, Ziya and Gamble. But yes, I agree with you. Yeah, they absolutely need to. I will tell you the name of the Sleeping Beauty one.
I just have to find it. I know I have it.
It's called Sleeping Beauty Colon because they always have a colon. A mostly accurate tale. So that's the one on the Destiny. There's also, as you mentioned, the Princess and the Frog one.
And I just have to find the name of that one. It's called the Princess and the Frog Colon. Let's cook up a story. So, yeah, and. And those are the two that we have seen on the Destiny. I don't know if they will rotate those at some point to do something else because there is a different one on the Treasure. And I'm blanking on which one is on the Treasure.
[00:42:12] Speaker A: Actually, they have that Aladdin one.
[00:42:14] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:42:15] Speaker A: And then they have another one, the Jungle Cruise.
[00:42:18] Speaker C: Yes. So there's another one I want to say that I didn't get. The original one was the Aladdin and then I think they introduced a second one, but it didn't seem to necessarily be on every sailing. So, yeah, it's the like Tales of the Lamp or something. Something like that, I think is the Aladdin one.
And yes, the Jungle Cruise one is really fun. That's more of an interactive game. On the Treasure.
[00:42:39] Speaker A: I was in the boat.
Do you want to get in the boat? And I'm like, yes, I do.
[00:42:43] Speaker C: Yes, exactly. Absolutely. Yeah. But yeah, Ziya and Gamble from the Destiny cast, the two storytellers are just incredible. The two that are on currently should be heading home pretty soon as we're recording. They'll probably be already home by the time this episode. Episode comes out. But they are really fantastic. I'm crossing my fingers that we'll have two great replacements for Destiny cast number two.
Treasure had similarly amazing cast number one, and then they had great cast number two as well.
I have a thing for the original two, I feel like are always kind of the best, but maybe I'm just biased because they're new and they're the first. And so I'm always Going to have it in my head them as those characters as just. I'm always going to compare everyone to the way that they play that character. I kind of ask.
[00:43:38] Speaker A: I was really worried the original people would be off on ours because on the Treasure last year it was their last week. But, and, but the Treasure launched later than the Destiny. So I was like, well maybe these new people, these people that I've seen on all these videos will be gone. But they were all still on and the original Hercules was still on.
[00:43:54] Speaker C: Yes. Corey J. Bradford, he is just incredible. He is.
I don't, I feel bad for whoever takes over the role of Hercules. Not because they won't be amazing. I'm sure they will be amazing because Disney does a really good job of finding really incredible stage cast. But you know, it's, they're always going to be compared to Corey and there's so much video out there of Corey playing that role from a lot of the promos that Disney did and some of the media that Disney did with him.
So it's just going to be really hard for anyone to like break that.
The idea of filling those shoes is just. Or those sandals I should say is really, the sandals really difficult. Well, I gotta ask about with great power. Were you able to go to that show?
Did you go to the earlier one so your husband could catch it too?
[00:44:48] Speaker A: Yeah, we went to the earlier one. He snuck out of dinner a little early so that he could go get a seats. Because if you don't, for anybody who hasn't been on that ship and on the Treasure, if you don't go to kind of the lounge thing at 7 you pretty much aren't getting seats at the 7:30 show. And so it was pretty much they had seats until about 7:15 and then at 7, by 7:15 they were turning people away at the door. But he, he left just a couple minutes early, got in there about 7:02 or so and we had front row seats.
But yeah, and he, we had a, he had even saved some for some people next to us at dinner. So. But it was, we loved it a lot. I think, I think we liked Indiana Jones more just because you could pick like they. A little bit more audience participation.
But we still really, really loved it. And I even went back for the evening show. I didn't go to it but I was out in the hall in the upper level where you can still kind of hear it and just because I was curious if it was the same or if they switched anything up. And it was pretty much the Same in the evening show too.
[00:45:51] Speaker C: Yeah, it really is the same, with one exception is, you're right, there's not as much audience participation as in the Indiana Jones show on the Treasure, but there is a bit of improvising that gets done in the show in all of those shows that Ziya and Gamble do.
And some of that might have to do with the interactions with the audience and so some of that. Sometimes there's slight differences, but nothing so different in the sense that you've seen a different story, you're seeing the same story. You are just you might have a few extra or different jokes because they might make fun of people in the audience or make fun of themselves based on things that are happening with the audience. So, yeah, it's. It's quite, quite a fun show.
[00:46:35] Speaker A: One thing I noticed was the person who's like the adult host for the week has a part in that show and they're doing like the puppetry and stuff a lot of the times. And the way they played off of her and ours makes me wonder if it would be different depend, like if that dynamic might be slightly different depending on who the. Because the adult host rotates every week or every cruise. And so if it was a different person than who they had for ours, maybe that would. Maybe that dynamic makes it a little different too, because they did play into her. She was very vibrant and they played into her a lot.
[00:47:06] Speaker C: Yeah, and we had a male doing that role, so it was definitely it. It can create a very different interaction and a different vibe for each performance when you have different people doing it and it's that first night. So if you are listening, you haven't been on the Destiny yet. Yet. This show is usually on the first night of your sailing, so pay attention to that navigator app because it generally does not repeat later on in the sailing. This is one where you either have to go to it's a 7:30 or a 10:30, but as Jennifer mentioned, you really have to show up at 7 or at 10 because they have sort of a lounge singer performance before that and the place fills up even, you know, during that and sometimes even before that. So it's really super popular. And you, you if show up right at the time the show is starting, there's a chance you might get in standing room in the back, but it's not, you know, that area might already be full as well.
And then of course, you're standing for the whole show. And that's not the most comfortable thing. It is like a 45. I'm gonna say 45 minute long show. So that's kind of a long time to. To stand. And then, of course, they're seating upstairs and downstairs.
I think the seating is better downstairs, but, you know, people have different preferences on that. I'm sure.
[00:48:27] Speaker A: We love the lounge singer too. She was great. Just a little quick plug for her.
[00:48:31] Speaker C: Yeah, she is incredible. She is incredible. I've been. I've been following her. As soon as I found her on Instagram during that preview, I started following her because she is just incredible and have tagged her in the videos that I posted of her. Cause she is. She's a star.
I mean, there are many stars in that castle cast, but to me, she is like one of the top stars of that cast.
Even she's amused. She's not Negra. She's, you know, she's one of. Yeah, she's one of five muses, which all the muses are incredible. But to me, she's just. Oh, got a voice on her. Is. Yeah, Amazing. All right, well, I know Brian likes to talk about food and likes to talk about dining, so I feel like we should. Brian, do you think we should transition to talk about the dining experiences on the Destiny?
[00:49:21] Speaker B: Sure. But I think there's probably only one experience that really matters, which is the Pride Lands.
[00:49:26] Speaker A: We had requested to have it twice, so we did, because I wanted to get the second menu. So we had it as our second night because originally we had Paulo booked for the pirate night because we didn't want the pirate menu. But there is no pirate menu on the Destiny, so.
[00:49:43] Speaker C: Oh, just on the five night, there is a pirate night. On the four night, there was a pirate night.
[00:49:48] Speaker A: No menu.
[00:49:49] Speaker C: Right. But I mean, the PI. Sorry, the pirate night menu. I believe they pull that out on the four night sailing, but not on the five night sailing, which is a little odd. But it's like the. Is the only ship that does for five nights. You get the second rotational menu at whatever two restaurants you go to. It's very unique. I don't really necessarily. I love that they are doing this because it gives an opportunity for a second menu in Pride Land.
But I'll be honest, I don't really understand it because it means that a lot of the people are not getting that. You know, a third of the people are not getting that second Pride Lands menu. And I wonder if that will create more complaints than. Than satisfaction. So I don't know. But Disney doesn't ask my opinion on what they should do with menus, nor should they. I'm not A food expert. I, although I love, I love food, I'm not a food expert and this is a food podcast.
Even though I feel like we do talk about food a lot. But yeah, curious what you thought of the show. The first night menu, of course. And then of course the second night menu, which has no show, just to be clear.
[00:50:50] Speaker A: Yeah, I, we love the room to start off with it, just the theming. At first there were some comments. So we were at a table with two other couples that we don't know. It was just a. One of those tables with like three couples paired together. And at first a couple people had made comments. Well, it's not quite as exciting as Coco.
Like, yeah, I get that. But like, are you paying attention to the fact that there are animals in all the windows and they're like mocking, like mocking up sunset and everything? And like, once, once we called out a few of those details. Everybody, like, everybody seemed to kind of get into it a little bit more. I think the show was phenomenal, I thought. I really enjoyed the singing and everything. I, I, we ran into a couple people who didn't like it because it wasn't as much of a show. It was more just singing, but I enjoyed that. And I also enjoyed the, in the breaks, the music was not as loud as some of the other places, so you could hear what, you could hear people talking.
We ended up with a really good table. We were right behind the guy with the drums, so we could see most of the stuff. We couldn't see everything because of the drums. Compared to some tables, we could see almost everything.
I loved it. I loved the ambulance of that night. I did like that menu quite a bit. My favorite menu was the second night menu.
That menu was great. I, I really wished I could have ordered like two or three things on that menu.
[00:52:05] Speaker C: Ooh, tell us, tell us what were your favorites on that menu? Because we have not had that menu ourselves. We've seen the dishes. When we went on board for the media preview, they actually had a display of those dishes but no ability for us to taste them. We could take pictures of them but not taste them.
[00:52:21] Speaker A: You could be adjacent to it, but not there. I had, I had the ravioli. I think it was like a pumpkin ravioli or some kind of squash ravioli. It was really good. Good.
And we had, we had like the, I had the hummus or something for. I don't do seafood, so usually I have a couple things I can pick from on there.
My husband did a couple of the spicier dishes and really enjoyed them.
He tried. There was one dish with shrimp I think, that he tried that he really liked. His favorite was on the first menu. He liked the corvina, and he's still talking about the corvina.
[00:52:55] Speaker C: Oh, nice, nice.
Yeah, we really liked the corvina, except our portion of it was overcooked. Like, the flavors were all there. It's just the fish was overcooked. So we had ordered. On our first time, I think we had ordered the corvina and the shrimp curry so that we could taste both.
We might have even ordered a third dish. Brian, did we order the Burber chicken that night also? Maybe.
[00:53:19] Speaker B: Well, I had the Berber chicken at one point.
[00:53:21] Speaker C: Yeah, no, I know we had that. I just didn't remember if we tried to order, like, not a ridiculous amount of food, but an enough to, you know, it's like, I don't want to be the people that order one of everything on the menu, because I know that that's, like, just a lot for the servers. Like, they will do it. They're so lovely. They will absolutely bring you one of everything. But, like, I kind of feel like that's too much. Well, one, also, it's wasteful of all that food, but I did try and order, like, you know, like two of several.
Several courses so that I could just try different things because it's. It's really hard to know with a new menu, like, what you're going to like, what's going to be. What are going to be the stand.
Yeah. But I feel like Pridelands has such great food. I. I'm. I am really impressed with how they've balanced, like, the American palette and the flavors of Africa, you know, because those things aren't always aligned.
[00:54:16] Speaker A: Yeah, I think they did a good job. It was very unique, and we. We like having the different menus and not the same menu that's on every single time that we go. So we really enjoyed that part.
[00:54:26] Speaker C: Yeah, absolutely. All right, well, what have we. What have we missed? We talked about some of meet and play activities, but I'm just trying to think which. What areas of the ship have we missed or entertainment, maybe, that we've missed? Oh, the shows.
[00:54:42] Speaker A: Yeah, we went. So we only.
You're not gonna like this. But we only went to one of the shows, so we went to the show.
[00:54:49] Speaker C: I hope you went to Hercules. Please tell me you went to Hercules.
[00:54:51] Speaker A: Please. Yes, we went to Hercules. They had a matinee, and so we went to that one day, and we did wait a little while for that, but we Got there at a really early time, and we were pretty close in line for that. And we. We don't. We tend to sit in the royal boxes on the side because people forget they're there. And so even if, like, everything else is all full, those are usually still pretty open. And it's a pretty good view. So we got in pretty easily. We just went straight to the balcony, rather. Basically, the line downstairs was, like, way back past the shops up at the balcony. It wasn't even out to Triton's yet. Like, it was only about that far.
[00:55:24] Speaker C: Yeah. And I think that's a great pro tip. Except I will tell you, I hate that view. I hate the side balcony view. I. I think it's a great tip, though, for if you. If you wanting to show up, like, early, but you want to get a seat. You're right. That is a great spot because people forget about it and it is. So you might have more luck finding a couple of seats open in that area. I just. I gotta be center. I can't be that far to the side. I hate that view. So just for theater goers out there, be warned.
[00:55:55] Speaker A: We find that we're fighting all the people trying to get into whatever is left after concierge sits down. And so it's just not. Yes.
[00:56:03] Speaker C: If you don't want to fight, I totally understand. Like, it is absolutely. Like I said, no, no judgment, because you did go to Hercules. So if you had not gone to Hercules, Jennifer, there would have been a heap of judgment.
[00:56:16] Speaker A: Oh, there would have been judgment of myself, too, because that's one of my favorite movies. And that was one of the reasons why I wanted to book this ship was Hercules, which is also why I was in a Hercules room.
[00:56:26] Speaker C: Yeah. Yeah.
You know, I wish that we had. We kept. We ended up in a Merida room. And it was. It's beautiful. And it's funny. We are actually booked in that exact same room on our next two Destiny sailings. And. And actually the same room on one of our Treasure sailings that we have booked.
[00:56:43] Speaker B: Like, we're in the same room for, like, multiple cruises at this point. We are the exact same stateroom number.
[00:56:48] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, we are, like, on the. Like I said, on the Treasure and on the Destiny. It's just because we like that location, but we never do it based on, like, the theming, because we've always picked before we even know the theming. And then we're not willing to, like, switch our room because we just really like the location.
But I wish if I had picked Based on theming alone, I would have picked either Baymax or Hercules, because those of the theming on the Destiny, those are my absolute two favorites. Like, I. And I've seen those rooms, like in person. I got to tour some of them and they are just gorgeous. Like the artwork, the carpeting, everything. Like, just. And like you mentioned the hallways, even all. You know, it's all the way out there.
[00:57:27] Speaker A: Yeah. And to be fair, our other main criteria is does it have a sit down muster station?
[00:57:33] Speaker C: No.
You know, you're not right over the line.
[00:57:38] Speaker B: Is there an app for that? Because I would totally pay for that. Yeah, there's a.
[00:57:41] Speaker A: There's a spreadsheet where someone's mapped it all out and so I can, I can find it and send a link to you. So I just check the spreadsheet now.
[00:57:48] Speaker C: Yeah. And that's. Is that the same spreadsheet that has the theming of the rooms? Because I've seen that one go around in all the Facebook groups. Yeah. I don't know who put it together,
[00:57:56] Speaker A: how many beds, like what kind of beds it has in it, like if it has the dropdown or the Murphy and all that kind of stuff. So, yeah, we use, we use that a lot of times because we don't want to stand out in the hot sun waiting for some person who decided not to show up.
[00:58:09] Speaker C: Our preferred room, of course, on the wish class is, of course, one that has an outdoor muster station. It's just.
Yeah, it's.
We're not smart. This is, this is one area where you don't take the recommendation of the duo. You don't want a room that is ocean view, forward, starboard, deck nine, because that's where. That's where our room is, basically. And it is always outside on deck four. Outside. Just outside the spa.
[00:58:36] Speaker A: Well, in fairness, the wish class is tricky because where it starts, if you go too much further back into those kinds of rooms or too much further forward, you're the furthest you can possibly be from the elevator.
And that's a whole different kind of struggle. So, like, we try to balance it, like, absolutely right.
[00:58:52] Speaker C: We don't mind being far from the elevator. We're actually happy to be far from the elevator just because it's less noisy when you're further from the elevator. But I totally understand, for anyone with any kind of mobility challenges, you had a total knee replacement. Like, it being farther from the elevator makes a much longer walk, especially on the wish class where you only got the two elevator banks instead of the three elevator banks. So that Yeah, I can totally. I can understand why that would make a difference now. Speaking. Speaking of that, actually, did you find it difficult to get around the ship? I mean, you were. You. I mean, you were more healed by this cruise than the previous two cruises that you had been on. Obviously you went sort of right after surgery in September. You went surgery, I think you said in July. Then your first sailing back was in September. That's. That's pretty quick. It was eight. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm guessing this one you had less difficulty getting around. But of course you were on a bigger ship.
[00:59:47] Speaker A: Yeah, it was. I think it was a combination of that first sailing back. We. The immediately first day at sea, we were crossing the Pacific and so. But I did shed my cane on like the second day of it because I. My balance issues were improving dramatically as the cruise went on because I had to.
So this ship obviously was just Bahamas. So it was so much more smooth anyway that it wasn't. It really isn't an issue. I'm pretty much like 95% strength back. It's just the standing is the last thing that I'm working on. So it's.
I've been walking quite a bit and I was walking about six miles a day on the cruise. Like just back and forth activities. So.
[01:00:26] Speaker C: Wow. Yeah, that's a lot. That's a lot of. That's a lot of walking. Well, Jennifer, is there anything that we have missed either, you know, good, bad, ugly, memorable, before we subject you to, or I subject you to rapid fire?
[01:00:43] Speaker A: No, just the only one thing I will say, just a little bragging rights. I did win 70s music trivia, solely solo.
[01:00:50] Speaker C: Solo. Wait, like a team of one.
[01:00:53] Speaker A: And you won because it was the first night on. And so as the week went on, because Rick wasn't at a lot of the evening activities, I met up with some people and was joining them for some things. Plus, like a couple people caught on that I was good at song trivia. So they were like partnering up with them.
[01:01:08] Speaker C: They were like, be on our team, Jennifer. We want you because we want those Mickey medals.
[01:01:12] Speaker A: Yeah, right. But for 70s, I did it solo and, and won.
And that one's. That one's a hard one to win. I. I missed 80s by one and somebody did win it outright. It wasn't a tie. So I, I only ended up winning two trivias. It was movie quotes in 70s, but usually I was down to the last two on a lot of them. So that's my claim to fame. I finally won 70s music trivia.
[01:01:34] Speaker C: That's awesome. If we're ever sailing with you, Jennifer, I'm gonna find you for music trivia because we're. We're decent in maybe like the 90s music trivia.
But we're. We. And I mean, we know the songs in the 70s and the 80s, but we don't know the artists. We never like, we're never going to win on our own. We need an expert like you, Jennifer. So we'll.
[01:01:55] Speaker A: I play what's probably just an inordinate amount of time on a game called song pop where they play like a few beats of a music and you have to guess it.
And so I always joke that that's training for the music trivias.
[01:02:08] Speaker C: No, it is. Absolutely. Absolutely. There is a cool game that. A game show that I was watching for a little. That was. It wasn't to name that tune. It was like finish the lyrics song where. Where they would play like a few beats and then they'd play like some of the lyrics and then you had to finish. Then they'd stop the lyrics and you'd have. The contestant would have to finish the lyrics. I wonder, I wonder if they. If you'd be good at that trivia. I feel like they should do that on Disney.
[01:02:35] Speaker A: They do it for Broadway music trivia. It's hard, and I know a lot of Broadway songs, but it's still hard. That's the hardest one, I think.
[01:02:44] Speaker C: Yeah. No, that absolutely makes sense. Well, Jennifer, I gotta ask, do you give the Destiny a thumbs up, a neutral, or a thumbs down?
[01:02:53] Speaker A: We liked it. We would definitely go on it again if the ports were good and it was a good length of excursion. I think the Treasure.
I'll save that for rapid fire.
[01:03:01] Speaker C: All right, I know where you're going there.
[01:03:04] Speaker A: I know the Destiny is not our favorite, but it's in there. It's definitely one that we would go on again. I'd definitely go on it before the Wish, for example, even though it still has the same layout flavor laws.
[01:03:13] Speaker B: All right, well, Sam, have we reached that point in the show?
[01:03:17] Speaker C: I think we have.
[01:03:18] Speaker B: All right, well, then, Jennifer, we have reached that point in the show where I'm going to hand you back over to Sam for some arbitrary questions, some arbitrary rules, and a dash of judgment in the round we know as rapid fire. Sam, take it away.
[01:03:29] Speaker C: All right, Jennifer, you've been expecting this, anticipating this. Hopefully you haven't been scared of this.
We're going to start with your Disney favorites and then we're going to hit your Disney cruise line favorites. I already know what your favorite ship is. You already previewed it, but we're going to jump right, right into it. So who is your favorite Disney character? And Disney means everything and anything that Disney owns, which is pretty much almost every character in the universe.
[01:03:53] Speaker A: So is Pluto.
[01:03:55] Speaker C: Oh, we love Pluto. That's Nathan's favorite, is also Pluto.
He's a big dog lover. And Pluto's fantastic love. And it was his birthday this year, so happy birthday, Pluto. All right, what is your favorite Disney movie?
[01:04:12] Speaker A: Kind of a tie from old school. It's lady and the Tramp, but lately it's like, between Moana and Encanto. I do love Hercules a lot, too. It usually ends up coming down to the music.
I love the music in both of those films, and I love the music in Hercules. And so it's like it all comes back to that a lot of times. Lady and the Tramp is because I'm a dog lover.
[01:04:33] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. And it's such a classic. It's old school Disney. We love it. All right, well, speaking of music, what's your favorite Disney song?
[01:04:43] Speaker A: Go the Distance.
[01:04:45] Speaker C: So good. And Corey singing it, right?
[01:04:48] Speaker A: I mean, yeah, my husband made fun of me because I teared up, and I'm not usually one of those people that tears up at stuff, but I teared up at that one, so he was poking me.
[01:04:57] Speaker C: Yeah.
I just think it is such a beautiful song.
And when done, live stage performance, it's just that much more magical.
All right, so we're going to shift over to the cruise line, and we're going to stay with the theming of music and go to stage shows. So tell me, which is your favorite Disney cruise line stage show? You have been on all the ships, so you can choose from across the fleet. Any of the main stage shows. Of course, we're not talking ventriloquists and magicians and all of that, but Disney's stage shows.
[01:05:31] Speaker A: I still have not been able to decide if Moana or Hercules is my favorite.
[01:05:35] Speaker C: Yeah, it's a really hard call, I think, like, because I think the story of Moana is a more like.
I don't know, it's like a more emotional story.
Right. But, like, there's such great musical numbers in Hercules, so I will tell you, I have the same debate in my head. So are they just tied because they just keep pushing each other out each time you see one of them?
[01:05:59] Speaker A: Yeah, I think it's because I like different things about different. Different of different ones. And like, with Hercules, the energy of it is so different. And It's. It's really high energy and it's really fun. And the music's good. With Moana, like you said, it's a. It's a different kind of story about someone finding their way. And like all the. All the music and everything. I let both. Moana also, I will admit, has a little bit of a personal tug for me because on our first, like four or five cruises, they were still showing Moana in the theater. Like, they did it for. For a long, long time. And my son, my youngest son and I always would go up and get a plate of cookies and we would go and watch it together. Every single cruise he would leave Vibrant. Well, I think it was Edge Edge or Oceaneers Club and come see that. And that would be like a little thing we did.
And then when they stopped showing it in the theater, we started doing in our room. We get a plate of cookies or a Mickey bar and we would watch it in our room. And so that show always reminds me of him because of that. And so I think there's kind of a heartstring thing there too.
[01:06:54] Speaker C: I love that. I feel like we, like. That's part of why I love Zootopia. Because we watch Zootopia as a family in our scene room pretty much every time we cruise. And so, I mean, it's a great movie, but like, it also just those associations, you know, are so meaningful and so having it in your head in that way. And now Zootopia too, because we saw that on board our last cruise. And so, yeah, it's just. Yeah. Fantastic. I love it. All right, well, we've got to shift over to the rest of the cruise line. So I've got to ask you, favorite onboard activity on Disney Cruise Line, and is it trivia or song or music Trivia? It seems like you really like both.
[01:07:35] Speaker A: It is trivia. So I like all the trivia, but my favorite are the non Disney ones, like movie quotes and music.
And they've been throwing in a few others in there lately, like Broadway and stuff like that. So I'm better at those. So I tend to gravitate more towards those. I do go to the other ones, but in a room full of Disney adults, where I may be partially a Disney adult, I'm not that all in. I don't know every single name of every person on every side series and everything, so.
[01:08:04] Speaker C: Same, same.
We tend to shy away from other than Disney cruise Line trivia, which we will sometimes do. We tend to shy away from the Disney trivias and tend to go to things like brain teasers and music trivia and movie quotes and that sort of thing, because we find that we do better at those kinds of trivias than we do compared to other Disney adults on the hardcore Disney trivias. Yeah.
[01:08:29] Speaker A: And on this cruise, those adult trivias were hopping. The person that they had doing, like, her name was Dominique, spelled Beyonce, and she was. She had the group so tight knit, like, everybody was like, everybody knew everybody. Everybody would talk to each other if people were about to enter a room. Like, she would have everybody start chanting, one of us, One of us. And like, get them to come in. I. I don't think I have ever, in 17 cruises, been on a cruise where the crowd was that much into to, like, into it cohesively together.
It was really fun. So, like, those. Those trivias were even more fun.
[01:09:04] Speaker C: Yeah, I love that. All right, favorite rotational dining. You again have been across the fleet, so any rotational dining you can pick across the. Across the fleet.
[01:09:16] Speaker A: I think mine is.
It's. It's close between Rapunzel's Royal Table and Tiana's Place, but I think it's Rapunzel's.
[01:09:23] Speaker C: Yeah, they're both fantastic.
[01:09:25] Speaker A: I just love that menu and the show.
[01:09:27] Speaker C: Yes. And the. The re. Theming in of those spaces was so successful, both on the magic and the wonder.
And adding those shows, I think added a lot to those ships. Given that there's other things.
I love the original ships, but there are other things sort of lacking that are on the Fantasy, the Dream, and of course, the wish class. And so adding some theming to the dining experience, I think have really leveled up those experiences and made those ships maybe more attractive, especially to a younger audience. So. Yeah. Yeah, really, really well done. All right, speaking of food, we got to talk. A favorite sweet item and a favorite savory item. We start with the sweets because I love the savories the best.
So let's start with favorite sweet item on Disney Cruise line.
[01:10:15] Speaker A: Beignets at Tiana's palace or place.
[01:10:17] Speaker C: Oh, yeah, absolutely. Or the French Quarter Lounge or the Bayou in On the Wish All.
[01:10:23] Speaker A: I was very happy when they added it to those places.
[01:10:26] Speaker C: Yes, excellent beignets. Absolutely. Okay, now a favorite savory item.
[01:10:32] Speaker A: I think it's probably the fried brie at multiple restaurants. It's at the four fancy ones.
[01:10:38] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. Royal Court. Royal Palace. Although we've been hearing in our Facebook group that the fried brie has been missing from the Disney dream on several cruises, so that wasn't on the menu. It Wasn't available. So just an FYI out there, I don't. I don't know if they've taken it off of the menu or if it just. Maybe they were having issues, Supply issues.
[01:10:59] Speaker A: Yeah, they had fantasy. It was on the Fantasy and the Wonder in December and September. But, yeah, I would be sad. I'd like that.
[01:11:07] Speaker C: Lumiere's right. It's always. It's always on the trains. Lumiere's Royal Court, Royal palace menu, first night menu. Yeah. Yeah. Well. And so look out for it. Let us know if you're not seeing it particularly. The only place I've heard it not being there was on the Dream. The other ships, from what we're seeing in our. At least in our Facebook group, um, that's. That's where the reports have been. All right, we're going to move over to the most important question perhaps which is.
Which one is your favorite ship, Jennifer?
[01:11:39] Speaker A: It's the Treasure. Although I will tell you, we were. We have one of those things on our door that's like, we've been on these ships and it has all the ships, and you can put those little magnets next to it, like, this is our next ship and stuff. My husband and I were having a war during the ship. We kept moving the. Our favorite from the. I would put it on the Treasure and he put it on the magic. And so every time you'd come back, it would be on a different, different ship.
So we have always loved the magic a lot. The Treasure, for me, passed it even with the design flaws, because I just loved it.
And we are going back on that one next year in 2027. But they. It's just. I loved everything about that ship. He's still very stuck on the magic. So we'll probably be back on it again, too.
[01:12:20] Speaker C: I mean, the classic ships are wonderful, but you cannot beat the entertainment and the theming on. On the Treasure and the Destiny. And it's just, I think, a matter of what you sort of gravitate towards. Like, do you gravitate towards Parks theming and the entertainment on the Treasure or the Marvel and Villains theming and entertainment on the Destiny. And then, of course, the itinerary makes a difference as well. Right? Like, some people are like, I like Brian would love to just sail seven nights on the Treasure every time I think at this point. And I'm like, I know, but I want to go. Go on the. I want to go on the Destiny repeatedly and do the entertainment on that ship. So I think it's really what the theming that speaks to you is a big part of that as well. So I completely understand that perspective.
All right, well, the final question, Jennifer, what is your bucket list cruise? You have sailed several bucket list itineraries. So I got to ask one though, that you something you haven't sailed and it can be something that actually exists or can be made up sailing to places that are accessible by water and really that's the only rules.
So yeah, where, what is your bucket list cruise? Where would you love to go on a Disney Cruise Line ship?
[01:13:27] Speaker A: I would really like to go to like Thailand and Bali in that area in Asia. And I was really hoping that Singapore ship was going to go there and then they weren't.
So I'm kind of hoping they open up an Asia itinerary at some point that goes somewhere other than Singapore.
I don't mind going to Singapore. I just want to, if I'm going to fly halfway around the world, I just want to be able to go to more than just Singapore.
[01:13:48] Speaker C: Yeah, well, and I think that that possibility, I think will maybe exist after the five year contract in Singapore for the adventure. Once that finishes, we don't know where the adventure will go. We just know there's a five year commitment there and it's reasonably they're not going to be sailing other places. It's such a big ship and it's, and where it is is kind of somewhat isolated. So it's likely not to do sailings to any place for those five years, although we can't guarantee that. But then when there's another ship in Asia, as you ment mentioned, the OLC ship that will be sailing out of Tokyo, there's more possibilities for what Disney Cruise Line could do. And as the fleet grows, you know, they may send another ship over to Asia if these two ships are very successful in sort of other parts of Asia. So I think that's all tbd. I think there's definitely lots of possibilities. I think there's possibilities in Asia, there's possibilities in South America.
There continues to be possibilities across the Pacific in New Zealand and Australia. Even though they're not going to be sailing the next couple of years. I could see Disney Cruise Line going back there in the future and they may continue, you know, they'll I'm sure continue to sail over in Europe. So yeah, lots of things yet to come.
Jennifer, you did amazingly well.
Despite my trepidation when you were, you know, said I'm going to be disappointed. They only went to see one of the shows. But you, you, you passed with flying colors, Jennifer. I was a little, I was a little worried for you starting, but you, you did just fine.
[01:15:18] Speaker A: Well, thank you.
[01:15:21] Speaker B: Well, Jennifer, we super appreciate you spending some time with us today. What's next for you and your family?
[01:15:27] Speaker A: We've got a couple booked. Not any like in the next two months because we're going to take, since we had three in a row, we actually are going to be on the Wonder over New Year's with the Baja cruise that's going and then the Treasure. We actually are going off Disney for the first time in 2027. We're doing an Alaska cruise on Pretty Princess because it goes into Glacier Bay National Park. Yeah.
[01:15:52] Speaker C: Oh, Glacier Bay. Yeah, yeah.
[01:15:53] Speaker A: And it's, and we got, we got a ridiculous deal on a penthouse suite. So we were like, oh, yeah, you
[01:15:59] Speaker C: know, I can't judge you for that. I mean it's, yeah. We have heard really wonderful things about Princess in Alaska. I think, you know, we, we continue to hear that, you know, Princess, Norwegian, Holland, they all have some really great itineraries to Alaska that are different from what Disney offer.
And so if you're looking for an itinerary that includes like Glacier national park, you're looking for a longer itinerary, you're looking for one of those sort of one way itineraries. Like there's a lot of options outside of Disney and those three cruise lines in particular have been doing Alaska and sort of known as sort of the experts of Alaska. So I, I cannot, you know, no judgment for somebody who decides to sail Alaska in particular on any of those lines. I might have judgment for folks who'd save choose Caribbean, but you know, we
[01:16:51] Speaker A: did, we did Disney on our first Alaska trip. So this is just so that we can go to some different ports mostly. So yeah.
[01:16:57] Speaker C: Yeah. Fantastic. Well, Jennifer, we so appreciate you coming on the show. We also appreciate your flexibility with both scheduling and topics and apologize to you again for having to reschedule you a couple of times. But we, like I said, we really appreciate you coming on. We're so thankful when our listeners become our guests. So I'll encourage other folks out there in the community. If you'd like to be a guest on our show, you can go to our website and there's a link for requesting to record an episode with us. We always love having new folks on. I will caution we are a little slow at getting back to people with email and I'd also caution that if you would like to be on our show, make sure to reach out a couple months before you're sailing. Our schedule actually books up two to three months in advance now for recorded shows. And so we are we don't want to record a show on with you too far after you're sailing because then you won't remember things. You know, it's kind of hard. It's kind of hard if it's like three months after you're sailing for us to record a show. So. But thank you again, Jennifer for coming on the show and you're welcome back anytime.
[01:18:01] Speaker A: Thanks so much.
[01:18:07] Speaker B: Well, thanks everyone out there for listening this week. We really, really appreciate it. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast so you you can keep getting great content from us every week. In fact, twice a week we publish shows, so be sure to hit the subscribe button to get all of those great episodes. And if you want to watch us alive, we have a live show now every week Monday nights, 5:30pm Pacific, 8:30pm Eastern over on YouTube.com DCLDUO so be sure to head over and check that out. If you want help support the show, be sure to hit those five stars on Apple Podcasts. And if you leave us a written review, a five star written review, we will read it at the top of one of our main episodes. So please head over there and hit those five stars. Of course you can also help support the show by supporting our fabulous show sponsor, My Path Unwinding Travel. You want to book your next Disney vacation? Head over to mypathunwinding.com DCLDUO or email them at DCLDUOYpathunwinding.com so they know we sent you their way. If you've got questions or you'd like to connect with us, the best way to do that is to head over to DCLDUO.com it's got link to all of our things. Full catalog of the podcast episodes including a searchable catalog for the podcast links off to our vlog a link to our Etsy store. We sell some fun fan inspired magnets Link to our Patreon if you'd like to help directly support the show each and every month, just head over to the website or patreon.com DCLDUO also has a way for you to sign up for our substack newsletter that we're hoping to start really pumping out monthly here at least and a few blog articles that we've written. So DCL is the best way to connect with us. You can also of course email
[email protected] or reach out to us on our voicemail line at 402-413-5590. That's 402-413-5590. The DCL duo Podcast is not affiliated with Disney Cruise Line, the Disney Company or the Disney family of theme parks. The views expressed on the show are solely those of the individuals on the podcast and in no way reflective. Use the Disney Company or Disney Cruise Line. If you have questions about a Disney Cruise or Disney Vacation, please contact the great folks over at MyPath unwinding travel or Disney directly or your own travel agent. Thanks again for listening and we'll see you next time for another fabulous adventure with the DCL Duo.
[01:20:19] Speaker C: Sam.
