[00:00:00] Speaker A: In a nutshell, in the first 24 hours we saw the big five.
[00:00:03] Speaker B: Wow.
[00:00:04] Speaker A: We already knocked out all of the big five.
So a couple incredible experiences though. I'll share three if they have time for that. One was our first game drive. The animal that was a big surprise that doesn't live on the reserve and they only see two to three times a year is the African wild dog, also known as the painted dog.
[00:00:40] Speaker B: Welcome back everybody to this week's live episode of the DCL Duo podcast. Brought to you by my path Unwinding travel. And I still gotta give a shout out, quick shout out to our good friends over at the DCL magazine. If you have not already. Check them out. They put out a really high quality magazine digital imprint. Like not month to month. Not every magazine is month to month. But they cover Disney Cruise Line.
The WDW magazine is the broader umbrella for them. They've got the DLR magazine.
High quality photos, high quality articles. Just great, great stuff over there. If you have not already checked them out, head over to dcl-magazine.com that's dcl-magazine.com today and if you use code DCLDUO ALL CAPS, that's code DCLDUO ALLCAPS, you can get 10% off everything in, in their store over there. So yes, please.
[00:01:31] Speaker C: Brian has been a contributor to every addition thus far.
[00:01:36] Speaker B: I don't, I don't need the accolades. I don't, I don't, I, I don't, I don't accept their sponsorship because they let me write for them. I, I think it's a really great idea.
[00:01:44] Speaker C: It is a great product, but it also is a great product because they get great contributors like host and producer of the DCL Duo, Brian Flock. All right, like I just want to put that out there.
[00:01:54] Speaker B: I don't know if it's that great, but if you like the articles, fantastic. There's plenty of other writers there too who are doing some fantastic stuff. So head over there. Show love. Remember, showing our sponsors some love is showing the show some love. And so just, just head over there, check them out, check them out. And speaking of show sponsors, I got to bring in our fabulous sponsor.
There she is. Hey, Karen. Welcome, welcome back.
[00:02:15] Speaker D: Hey everyone.
[00:02:17] Speaker C: It's so lovely, yeah, so lovely to see you tonight. We've got a great show tonight. We're going to be talking with June and a little bit about adventures by Disney. But before that we wanted to check in on some Disney Cruise news. And there is a bunch of different announcements that happened this week. Some were unofficial announcements Some were official announcements, but I'm going to run through them real quick and then get reactions from Brian and Karen. So, first of all, alcohol policy change. This is a big one. So the alcohol policy of what you can bring on board both at the beginning of your cruise and during your cruise has changed. So it used to be you could bring on two bottles of wine per adult over the age of typically 21, but in some places over the age of 18, like in Singapore, over the age of 18, you bring two bottles of wine or six bottles of beer.
Now they have changed that policy. Now it is only one bottle of wine or six bottles of beer. So per adult.
And you cannot bring on alcohol in between. Well, you can buy alcohol off the ship, but if you bring it on, whether it's wine, beer, whatever, they're going to basically check it for you and hold it till the end of the cruise. That's always been the policy with regard to hard liquor and any amount of alcohol over the limits. But it used to be that you could bring bottles with you each, you know, you bring two new bottles each
[00:03:42] Speaker B: fee in the restaurants, yes, they did
[00:03:44] Speaker C: reduce the corkage fee. We used to be $29 a bottle, now it's $20 a bottle.
That's not, you know, I mean, that's maybe a bonus. But, you know, now you only get one bottle. So it's kind of you're only going change selfie sticks. They used to have a policy that said you couldn't bring selfie sticks that were over a certain length or any kind of stick for a camera over a certain length. They have changed that policy. Now they're allowed on board.
If you keep them folded and under 18 inches in public areas, you're okay in your own stateroom. You could have them in sort of larger or extended version or you can keep them stored in your room so they won't take them at security like they used to.
Another policy change, door decorations.
They have never really been very clear about limitations on door decorations, except for the fact that they need to be magnetic, not sticky. Right. You don't use tape and you don't have like wires that plug in and things like that. Well, now they're saying not only you have those rules, but it has to be confined to your actual door. So you're not allowed to put stuff on the walls next to your door. A lot of people, this got a little bit out of control. I know lot of people really like to decorate with magnets, but it was kind of get going all the way you know, down the halls and people were hanging all sorts of things, and I think it's was just kind of causing a little bit of a hazard.
And so they wanted to reign that in.
The next two announcements are only specific to the Disney Adventure. So if you're sailing anywhere else on any other ship with Disney Cruise Line, not a big deal. But if you're sailing on the Disney Adventure, these will apply to you.
The two changes are kids now ages 10 and older are allowed to dine in Palo. They are the same cost as adults, and it's the same menu as adults, but 10 and up, you can bring your kids to Paulo. And then the other change is a $5 service charge is being charged on room service on the Disney adventure, plus the 18% automatic gratuity on top of that. So if you're ordering room service on the Disney Adventure, you're going to pay a fee on. On all of the other ships, you will not pay a fee. You're just expected to tip whatever a reasonable amount is.
These are big changes. I'm not super surprised by the ones on the Disney Adventure because from what we've heard, people are tending to do the included options and ordering kind of excessively with room service. And so they're kind of Disney Cruise Line being eaten out of house and home on the Disney Adventure. And so I think they're trying to mitigate that with putting these fees and allowing kids to go at Apollo to kind of help compensate for their food issues that they're having. But I'm curious, Karen, what do you think about the changes in general? I think the alcohol, the door decorations, like, let's talk about the ones that are more specific to the sailings out of the U.S.
[00:06:42] Speaker D: you know, I agree with a lot of the comments that I've been seeing and that I see tonight that it just feels kind of petty to me. I really wonder who within Disney revenue sat down and crunched these numbers to result in this policy. We're going to lower the corkage fee, but we're going to limit the number of bottles.
It just doesn't feel like the ease that Disney Cruise Line has been known for. And I just don't get it.
I don't know if at some point they're going to think that they're going to start experimenting with beverage packages. I've seen some speculation about that.
I don't know, is this going to change people's loyalty to Disney Cruise Line? I don't think it's going to make a big difference in the Big picture, but it just doesn't. It feels kind of silly to me.
[00:07:34] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:07:35] Speaker C: What do you think, Brian?
[00:07:36] Speaker B: I echo everything Karen just said. I mean the things that stood out to me the most, I mean they changed it to one bottle of wine but they left it at a six pack of beer. So I like, I don't understand like how they arrived at this conclusion.
You know, I don't. I desperately hope that the Palo change does not come to the rest of the US fleet. I think adult dining on the US Fleet is really sacrosanct and I think that would be a big mistake for them.
[00:08:05] Speaker A: I.
[00:08:07] Speaker B: The service charge on room service on the adventure I get. I hope that doesn't deploy fleet wide. I think it has more to do with the market the ship is sailing in and sort of the tipping culture that may, may happen over there or not, you know, selfie sticks or whatever. I mean like, whatever.
I'd prefer not to have these like massive 360 camera selfie sticks out everywhere. But you know, I, they haven't bothered me. So like I, I don't, I don't mind now. Giving permission to people may make them think about, oh, let me grab the selfie stick.
[00:08:35] Speaker A: Which maybe bolder.
[00:08:36] Speaker B: Yeah, that'd be annoying. I, I do think that door decorating was getting a bit out of hand on board some of these ships. So like, and, and actually no place more apparent apparently than the adventure from what we.
[00:08:48] Speaker C: Really cool stuff, but really a little bit out of hand.
[00:08:51] Speaker B: I always thought it was like it was cool to walk down the hallway and see doors. It got a little bit like annoying when it was like what's taking up walls and ceiling space and stuff like that. Like that, that, that. I think this was a welcome sort of change from my perspective.
But yeah, the alcohol policy feels like a pure cash grab at some level. And it's the kind of like, you know, nickel and diming almost that we sort of, you know, look down upon on the other cruise lines for doing and say dis do.
And so yeah, I, I fundamentally don't. I don't understand that and I desperately. Karen, to your point about the drink package, please, Disney don't. We don't need drink packages on Disney Cruise Line. Like look at what it's led to on other cruise lines over service problems.
You know, there's been all kinds of like, you know, weird conduct on board from people who've been overserved, people who've gone overboard who we think have been overserved. Like it's supposed to be a Family friendly environment. So like, I honestly think that if Disney Cruise Line introduced some sort of a beverage package, it would be so restrictive that it wouldn't really make sense. And I just say, like, don't institute the beverage package. The drink pricing on board is not terrible.
It's not. Yeah, so.
[00:09:58] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah.
[00:09:59] Speaker C: Well, so. All right, well, that's the end of the news segment. I want to, I want to throw this over to Karen because we invited her on today. Karen has a ton of experience with Adventures by Disney bookings like her agency My Path Unwinding Travel books, just a ton more Disney Adventures by Disney adventurers than many agencies out there do. So they have a ton of experience.
[00:10:25] Speaker B: Including our own in July.
[00:10:27] Speaker C: Yeah, including our own in July. Just a couple of weeks.
[00:10:29] Speaker A: Right.
[00:10:30] Speaker C: So they, they have a ton of experience with Adventures by Disney and with some of their competitors. And so we asked Karen to come on and chat a little bit about how one might choose a guided tour like Adventures by Disney.
[00:10:46] Speaker D: And I appreciate it because Adventures by Disney is really one of my most favorite topics.
It's probably one of the things that got me into this industry 11 plus years ago. I took my first adventures by Disney 12 or 13 years ago before I had even an idea of becoming a travel advisor, starting my path unwinding.
And since then I've taken seven Adventures by Disney. And so the one question is always, do I want to be on a guided vacation?
And you know, for your.
For people that are really into cruising and Disney Cruise Line, sometimes it feels like a big adjustment because they're used to the ship, they're used to choosing their own excursions and they have a vision of kind of that bus tour that your grandparents went on or that maybe you did when you were like in high school.
And so it's understanding that these type of guided vacation experiences have changed so much and there's now something really for almost everyone. And so if you are a Disney fan, the Adventures by Disney experience is such a great segue into what Disney has called seeing the magic in the real world. And I love that. Right. So it's like really immersing yourself in still the story, storytelling, the history, the culture, the food, the entertainment, the Disney movie tie ins, all of those great things that Adventures by Disney can offer.
And you're doing it with like minded people. And the vast majority of people that are on board with you, whether it be an Adventures by Disney river cruise or a guided land vacation, have a Disney affinity. Sometimes we get people who have never heard of Adventures by Disney to try it out.
But, but mostly it's because they have some sort of Disney affinity.
And it's also because people want to travel together with their families and to do something that feels secure and comfortable in a new destination.
So I think that's just a great opportunity to have that, a little bit of that Disney bubble and the Disney level of service that you really don't find in too many places.
And all that being said, it's kind of like, okay, well, could I plan this trip myself? And I mean, the answer is yes.
And we, at my path unwinding, we do plan customized itineraries for people that don't want to be on a group vacation. They don't, you know, they just want to do something that's very unique to them.
And we can do that too. But as we say, a lot of times, the VIP access, the behind the scenes, the Disney name opens doors that we can't do a lot of times for you, except unless, you know, without a very high premium, let's put it that way, much higher premium than just paying for the ABD premium.
But there's other options to discuss. And the big one that I've come on and talk to you about is Talc. And, and Talc has been around over 100 years. They celebrated their 100th anniversary last year. They are a guided vacation river cruise, small ship company.
They have Talc Bridges, which is their family friendly itinerary. So I know today your guest is going to be talking about South Africa and the Adventures by Disney South Africa tour. And that is an incredible itinerary. But Africa is an entire continent and there's more to see.
And Adventures by Disney will take you to South Africa or to Egypt, but they won't, for example, take you to Tanzania, which is where Talc Bridges goes on a grand family safari.
So Talc Bridges has some key differences than Adventures by Disney, but in general it is a very high quality product.
The hotels that Tauc stays at across the globe tend to be a notch higher than most Adventures by Disney experiences.
The food, I think for the most part, the general consensus is that the food options may be a tad better than Adventures by Disney. And so it's something to look at side by side. If you're looking at, let's say a Japan itinerary or a Canadian Rockies, wherever it is, that you're looking at a Danube river cruise to look at it side by side.
And then I want to talk about one more thing, and that is Rome by Tauc R O A M. They picked A great name when you're looking at it, but when you say it out loud, you have to spell it.
Rome by Tauc is kind of like those of us that want to do an Adventures by Disney adult exclusive should think about Rome by Tau.
Roam by Tau is a brand new product designed for those in their 40s and 50s. Ish, I would say. Ish. It's 21 and up. You have to be at least 21 to go. Whereas ABD is 18 and up for their adult exclusives.
And it is a, what do they call it, A more flexible, really small group experience. So they average 16 on their land tours and there sometimes they call it half on, half off. So you have kind of a guide but you have a lot of built in time to just do things more lightly guided or on your own or independently. And so when you're talking about South Africa today, you can compare the Rome by South Africa itinerary which also goes to Mozambique and so has that city experience in Cape Town, the penguins, the hiking, the safari experience on the game preserve and then takes you to this incredible like beach destination that just blows my mind.
So there's all these options to consider and you know, I'm just beginning to scratch the surface.
[00:17:28] Speaker C: Yeah, well now because I can keep going.
[00:17:32] Speaker B: Wait, wait, I gotta share one comment from the chat, Karen, which is coming from Ashley. Karen's passion for ABC ABD is directly related to our ABD to South Africa this summer. So there you go. Like if you need an expert on
[00:17:42] Speaker D: abd, I'm excited for that.
[00:17:44] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:17:46] Speaker D: I do want to just share real quickly that we at my path unwinding are leading a group departure on the Douro river in Portugal with Rome by tauc in late October 2027.
So reach out to me if, if that is something that is interested, interesting to you.
A great way to experience T by Talc Portugal. Meet me and Kayleigh and several others of us.
So yes, we're really excited about it.
[00:18:19] Speaker C: Love it, love it. Listen, for those interested in learning more about whether it's Adventures by Disney, Talc, Rome by Talc or some other guided tour, or perhaps you want a custom tour, please reach out to Karen at our show
[email protected] CCLDUO or DCLDUOMYPATHUNWINDING.com those are the easiest ways to get in touch and let Karen know that you have, you know, heard about her through our show and that you're interested in hearing more about one of these amazing vacations. Of course you can always just book another Disney cruise with them as well.
[00:18:53] Speaker A: So that's true. Yeah.
[00:18:55] Speaker C: Karen, thank you so much for joining us. We will say, we'll say farewell for this evening, but we just so appreciate you and all of your support and of course, your expertise on all things Adventures by Disney.
[00:19:09] Speaker D: Thanks so much. I'm looking forward to the rest of the show. Have a good night.
[00:19:12] Speaker B: See you.
[00:19:13] Speaker C: Thanks. All right, we're going to bring June on now. There we go. Hey, June.
Hi.
[00:19:19] Speaker A: How are you?
[00:19:20] Speaker B: Excellent.
[00:19:21] Speaker C: We are so excited to have you back. For those who don't remember, we had June on just earlier this year at the very beginning of the year to talk about her sailing in New Zealand on the Wonder, the Wonder Down Under. And June was sweet enough to bring me back a New Zealand Disney Cruise Line shirt. And I'm so excited to have you back on the show, June.
We're going to talk about your South Africa Adventures by Disney. I know you have one prior adventure that you did. Why don't you tell folks what sort of brought you to Adventures by Disney? And did you start there or did you start with Disney Cruise Line?
[00:19:59] Speaker A: We definitely started with Disney Cruise Line. Started with Disney Parks, then Disney Cruise Line.
We did our first Adventures by Disney a few years ago when we went to the Galapagos Islands on an expedition which has now been handed off off to Nat Geo with all the other expeditions.
But that was amazing. That was a dream, you know, bucket list trip and was our first introduction to Adventures by Disney. And we were spoiled, very spoiled since then and even more so after South Africa.
[00:20:29] Speaker C: I love it. I love it. Now it's just you and your daughter, teenage daughter. Sailing. Sailing. I'm saying sailing because I keep, I talk in cruise talk. Traveling to South Africa for this Adventures by Disney.
Tell us, why did you choose this adventure in particular? Like, did you consider booking with somebody else? Did you consider doing it on your own? Did you consider a different destination?
[00:20:53] Speaker A: I mean, South Africa has been a bucket list trip, you know, for as long as I can remember. So we're sort of checking off these bucket lists and also want to hit all the continents. I had not been to Africa before now and we really only considered Adventures by Disney. I have heard great things about Talk and others, but we really wanted to do another Adventures by Disney. The itinerary was great. I mean, the things I'd heard on the Galapagos trip from other travelers was many people said that Africa was their favorite ABD. I mean, I've heard a lot of different favorite AVDs, but sure, that was up there for sure so it was that, you know, that really got it on our radar and we started trying to figure out when we, when we could do it. So, yeah,
[00:21:42] Speaker C: I love, I love that you, you go for like the farthest one you go for the continent you haven't been to yet.
Speaking of, though, traveling to the continent of Africa, there's some preparation you have to do when you're sailing, when you're sailing, when you're traveling to Africa that you don't have to do when you're traveling other places in the world. Namely, there's a bunch of shots you've got to do. Right. Like tell us what sort of what, what that preparation looks like and are there any like visas or things like that that you also have to plan?
[00:22:12] Speaker A: Yes. So we didn't need a visa for South Africa, but we also went to Zimbabwe on our own after and we needed a visa for there. And we had, we had a 10 hour layover in London and we needed a visa for there, which is a new, new process. I almost didn't realize that one.
So, yes, we needed just a visa for Zimbabwe, but not for South Africa.
We did get shots.
Hepatitis, Hepatitis A, I think one of the. Hepatitis. And also Typhoid. Yeah, hepatitis and typhoid. And we took malaria meds.
[00:22:51] Speaker C: Yeah. Now the malaria meds are pills. If I'm, if I'm correct on this.
[00:22:56] Speaker A: Malaria meds are pills and you, you really only need them for certain regions. And it's more, you know, depending on the time of year you're going where there's higher propensity for mosquitoes. So we took them only when we were in the very north part of South Africa. And really more for our Zimbabwe part of our trip where we were going to Victoria Falls, where it was more wet than even the South Africa part of the trip.
Again, it could be based upon the time of the year and you have to talk with a travel, with the travel health advisor on, you know exactly where you're going, when you're going, you know, what's the situation at that point in time and what's recommended.
So for us, we took, we started the malaria meds during the trip, like two days before we went to that region.
The whole. And then we took them while we were in region and then you have to take them for seven days after you leave the region.
[00:23:52] Speaker B: So, so stepping back for a second, June, what Describe for us the itinerary for this trip. So you, you obviously fly from the US To South Africa and then sort of what's the, you Know, we've only experienced the river cruise version of these. So like, you know, we just, the hotel moves with us, but on the other ABDs, right, you got to move from place. So like what, what just kind of give us the overview of the itinerary that you had.
[00:24:14] Speaker A: Yeah, so you meet in Cape Town and you spend your first few nights in Cape Town. The, the first day that you arrive, you just get, you know, meet the, your, you get met at the airport, you get transferred to the hotel, you sign in and meet your, your guides and you go to bed. And then the next morning we had an orientation after breakfast where we got to meet all of the fellow travelers and they do some icebreakers out, you know, what you're going to do and how everything's going to work for, for your eight days together.
And then we started touring that day.
So you spend the first three days in Cape Town before you move on. So from there we went through the wine region, a town called Stellenbosch and the wine region and then we went on to an area called Knysna near George. And for, for that part you fly, you fly Cape Town to George and then Knysna is kind of a vacation spot for South Africans. So it's on the coast, but it's also lots of woods, mountains, you know, hiking, just beautiful, you know, landscape. We stayed at a nature retreat there that was beautiful. And then from George you fly again up to Kapama near Kruger national park, which is the safari part of the trip. And then we had three days up there at Capama. And then the last day the tour has another flight to take people back to Johannesburg and they say goodbye in Johannesburg. We skipped that flight and instead went straight to Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe.
[00:26:02] Speaker C: Yeah. So you basically have like, what is it, like three different hotel spots or is it four different hotel spots that you sort of are going from?
[00:26:10] Speaker A: Yeah, it's, it's three. So it's Cape Town. You're in the, the Radisson waterfront the whole time in Cape Town. And then we were at the, this Pozola nature retreat in Knysna, which is beautiful, beautiful resort you're in. Basically it's almost, it's almost like a condo that you have to yourself there, like a huge wood burning fireplace.
They put. It was fall when we were there. So the, at the nature retreat, the rooms aren't technically heated though. They have like rolling heaters, you can move around the room and they put hot water bottles in your bed for you at night as part of the turndown service. And then there's a wood burning fireplace and they provide all the supplies to build a fire. But it was, it was as big as like, as a condo like this, the, the one bedroom room that we had. So that was beautiful. And then Kapama, which is just like Kapama is fairly new. It's only, it's been open, I don't know, less than 10 years. I was asking some of the staff there because. But the building we stayed in had just opened in November and enormous room and bathroom. And one side of the whole room is solid glass, floor to ceiling looking out into the bush.
And the only place I've ever stayed that was on par with that was, was the Four Seasons private island in the Maldives.
[00:27:35] Speaker B: Wow.
[00:27:36] Speaker C: Wow. Okay, so we're talking super fancy.
[00:27:40] Speaker B: Actually Sam, let me ask, let me just get to. There's a couple of like good pre trip logistics questions that I want to make sure we get to up front. So someone was asking about your flight. So did you go to Heathrow, then direct to Cape Town?
[00:27:53] Speaker A: That's what we did. There's several ways to get there from the east Coast. I know a lot of people flew through Atlanta. There's a direct from Atlanta to Cape Town.
Obviously from the west coast there's other options.
We, we live in an American hub. My miles are all American.
So I, we flew to London, had a long layover, like a 10 hour layover in London, spent time in Windsor, came back to the airport and then a 12 hour flight to Cape Town.
[00:28:18] Speaker B: Okay. And then.
[00:28:19] Speaker C: I know, Ash, big time adjustment.
[00:28:22] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:28:22] Speaker B: Ashley was asking about packing logistics and as you were talking about hot water bottles in your bed, I was thinking, I don't think of like I conceptually should understand. South Africa is far enough south in the continent that of course it's going to have cold and warm. But, but how did you think about packing for this trip? Did you feel like you got good guidance out of ABD over what to pack and like, was it hard to pack for this?
[00:28:47] Speaker A: Well, we always carry on, so that's always a challenge. Like I never trust the airlines with my bags, especially on the outbound. You know, maybe on the home if I've got bought too much stuff, which was the case this time. But we, so we have to be very strategic and we. I did laundry at every place that we stopped. So I think that's, that's my advice is take advantage of that because you're staying multiple nights at each hotel, you have enough time to get laundry done.
So we did it along. Did that along the way. So I had plenty of clothes. I really probably brought a little bit more than I needed.
It was cooler than I even anticipated. But they gave us good guidance on that. They said it's going to be chilly and in the mornings and on the game drives in the mornings and nighttime when it was cold. They also gave us hot water bottles and blankets for the game drive, which I have this whole new appreciation of hot water bottles. I never realized how, you know, they're not the rubber things that I, we. I used as a kid for a stomachache or whatever. These things, these like are cozy and warm. They're wonderful. So.
But yeah, so they took over good care of us. But you, you definitely need. I mean, for us it was early fall, so it got relatively warm during the. The day, you know, 70s up to 80s up in the north, but it got very chilly across the board at night. So you needed a lot of layers.
[00:30:14] Speaker C: And yeah, California weather, really cold in the morning and then gets really hot at the, you know, at the height of the. The sun in the afternoon.
[00:30:23] Speaker B: How should folks think about. I mean, ABD typically publishes some guidance over ages and activity level and things like that. Did you find that mostly accurate, like how, you know, how active was this adventure and you know, did you see anybody on the tour was, you know, struggling a little bit or did you have any advice around activity level and those sorts. Those sorts of issues?
[00:30:43] Speaker A: Yeah, nobody. Nobody was struggling. The oldest person on the tour turned 80 on the the on the trip and the youngest was my daughter who's 19. It was adults only and def. It wasn't super active. We did a little bit of hiking. We did a lot of walking, but mostly on, you know, kind of more flat ground or slight incline. Not, you know, if there was, if there was something that was very hilly. There was typically an option where you could ride a. In a vehicle or have some other means to. To get to. To where you were going. There even was the option on the saf if you had in one couple had the situation if you had like back problems or something that would hinder you from riding in like a rough terrain and a lot of like really bumpy, you know, situation, which is how it is out when you're driving. Like we were off roading sometimes out in the bush and stuff.
So one couple opted to have a special vehicle that they, that they rode in that wasn't as, you know, bumpy and they stayed on the smoother road roads.
[00:31:48] Speaker C: Yeah. Now, how big was your group and how many adventure guides did you have with you. Now, we know you have local guides as well, but how many adventure guides for the group of travelers you're with?
[00:32:01] Speaker A: Yes, so our group was 34 people. There were two Disney guides, one is from the US and one, it is from South Africa originally.
And then the only other guides we have were really like on the, the, on the safari, like the guides that, you know, took us out on this on the safaris. And then, you know, there might be, you know, people who were giving us lectures or tours or you know, during, during each, you know, location that we went to, but we were primarily with those, those two guides and among one of the. Within the group of 34, as I mentioned, my daughter was the youngest, 80 was the oldest. There was 71% female in our.
[00:32:45] Speaker C: Oh wow.
[00:32:46] Speaker A: There were five mother, daughter, pairs.
[00:32:50] Speaker C: Love that.
[00:32:50] Speaker A: And yeah, they were mostly like the daughters were 20 to 30s, like 20s and 30s. And then with their mother, there were two women that were there together, one female solo traveler. The rest were married couples, mostly around retirement age.
[00:33:09] Speaker C: Yeah. Now I want to let folks know who are listening, we are going to be speaking with Ashley later this summer who is traveling on the same South Africa abd, with one exception in that she's going on the family version of this same thing and with a kiddo. So. And her daughter's a couple a year or two younger than Nathan. And so we will get that perspective later this summer in August from Ashley.
[00:33:36] Speaker B: And Ashley's heavy in the chat right now getting all the downloads from June.
[00:33:39] Speaker C: So yeah, she and June are friends, but she's getting the downloads anytime.
[00:33:46] Speaker A: Walk away from me. So.
[00:33:48] Speaker B: Hey, June, there is, there is a question in the chat, which I think I know the answer. Someone's asking. You mentioned you were able to do laundry on each side. I'm assuming that's sending the laundry out. You, you, you weren't trying to do it the old school way in the bathroom in the sink. Right? So.
[00:34:00] Speaker A: Correct. There weren't any self serve machines like I have other times I've traveled, you know, found hotels that had, you know, self service. This wasn't you had, you had to pay. But the prices were reasonable and they usually had, you know, an overnight or, you know, you know, turnaround. So it was very convenient.
[00:34:18] Speaker B: And I've got to ask a comedic question from the chat. CT wants to know if there's any chocolate souffle available on your adventures by Disney. I'm gonna say ct, the. I'm guessing the answer was no.
[00:34:26] Speaker A: Oh, we didn't actually. Didn't See any chocolate souffle? But the big thing in South Africa is this dessert called mall malva pudding. It's basically their version of sticky toffee pudding, the British dessert. But every single place we ate had a version of malva pudding and they. That they wanted to serve to us. So it's like kind of a running joke of like people say, I can't eat any more malva pudding. I. I happen to love it. So I was pretty happy and just taste testing it from. From everywhere. But. But lots of multiple pudding.
[00:35:02] Speaker C: I love that. Well, you got to, you know, you got to figure out which one's the best one. Right. Of all. Of all the things.
[00:35:07] Speaker D: So.
[00:35:07] Speaker A: So.
[00:35:08] Speaker B: So I was gonna say, see, we probably don't have time to go day by day.
[00:35:11] Speaker C: No, I want to. Yes. I want to start with the highlights from. Let's do like the legs of the trip. Okay. So. Because I want to save. Want to save, like the more of the time to talk about the safari because obviously that's the thing that most people think about when they think about going to Africa.
But tell us like, highlights from Cape Town.
[00:35:31] Speaker A: Yep. So highlights from Cape Town would be District Six tour, which is how we learned about apartheid, the history of the apartheid, history of, of Cape Town and what, what happened there as far as the, you know, people being pushed out of what was called District Six six into territories outside the city and how that disrupted families. And then we went to a museum on that, that got a lecture. Lots of great education around that topic.
And Table Mountain. So I think most people are familiar with Cape Town. You've heard of Table Mountain. It's this high, flat mountain, obviously
[00:36:11] Speaker C: made
[00:36:11] Speaker A: from volcanic earthquake movement. And we were supposed to go. Itinerary says we were going to go on the first day. But this is a good example of Disney pivot. So the weather was not good. You need a clear day to be able to see anything from the top of Table Mountain. And so they rearranged things. So we went two days later and had incredible views at the. At the top of Table Mountain. And then another Cape Town highlight would be Boulder Beach. So Boulder beach is down at the Cape of Good Hope, and that's where you see the penguins in South Africa,
[00:36:47] Speaker C: which is great pictures of the penguins. I love. I absolutely loved that.
You know, one of the things that you get with company like Adventures by Disney and other similar companies is you don't have to do any of the planning and you don't have to do any of the arrangements or the logistics. So one of the things like you mentioned that they pivoted because of weather. Like, they're behind the scenes taking care of all of that. And you're just like, they're just telling you, like, what. Where to show up for breakfast. And when I, I do want to ask, like, where were all of your meals included? I know for Adventures by Disney, usually most of maybe not all of your meals are included. But I'm curious. On this adventure, was everything sort of. Because you're, I mean, kind of with the group probably the majority of the time.
[00:37:34] Speaker A: Most of the meals were. We did have a couple free evenings where we were on our own, I think, like one one night dinner on our own and there might have been a lunch in there somewhere, but it was mostly with the group, for sure. And in Cape Town on our first night, we had an incredible meal where it was a lot of entertainment. Drumming, we drummed, we watched drumming and singing and you know, like a whole family style, you know, tasting of all different, you know, South African foods. And that was really incredible too. Yeah. Awesome.
[00:38:11] Speaker C: How was the food experience overall? Like, did you feel like it was accessible to, let's say, the American palate? I know that obviously yours was an adult only one, so it might be a little bit less chicken nugget focused than maybe the family version. And I'm not saying I'll be curious to talk to Ashley when. After she goes to find out about that, but. Yeah, how would, how did you find the food in terms of accessibility?
[00:38:37] Speaker A: Very accessible and a large variety.
The, the. When we first arrived, they did ask us to pick some of our meals up front for certain days, which I actually appreciated because it made things move faster. You know, when you're trying to serve 34 people at one time, you know, taking orders and, and, you know, just even, just even taking orders and asking 30 what they want to eat and them asking you 100 questions about every dish would waste a lot of time. So that was a very efficient way. Now on at. When we got to a lot of these restaurants, there was some flexibility too.
They would say, you know, we got your order, but we are going to go ahead and put in the appetizers and you get a chance to change your entree if you want. Like, they did that on a couple occasions, which was nice, but it definitely made things more efficient and there was still a wide variety.
[00:39:32] Speaker C: Awesome. All right, well, jumping ahead, you had the sort of. The nature preserve was kind of that second leg of the trip. What were the highlights from that?
[00:39:41] Speaker A: Yes. So in that part of the trip. So on the way there, we stopped. We went to a couple different wineries. So we went to one when we were still in Cape Town, and then one kind of on the way to. To. To travel to George.
So those were lovely. And then we went to a monkey reserve and a bird sanctuary and also a nature reserve called Featherbed, but it's not a bird sanctuary. It was just a beautiful mountainous place along the coast where we did like hiking and saw all the views of the ocean and had a beautiful buffet lunch there on that property as well.
The monkey reserve was really funny because they have something like 600 monkeys in this place in lemurs. And. And when you walk in and they tell you ahead of time, like, be careful of your cell phone, your glasses don't have any food, because these monkeys, you know, are not shy, and they will try to take things.
So we walk in, and immediately, you know, you're surrounded by monkeys and lemurs, like, everywhere. And my daughter was a little ahead. She's probably the most timid. Like, I think she was singled out by the monkeys because she's, like. Like new. Like, she was easy target,
[00:41:03] Speaker C: a little
[00:41:04] Speaker A: bit ahead of me and all the. And I'm not watching her. I'm talking to other people, and I hear her screaming bloody murder. And this little gray, fervent monkey climbed up the. The leg of her jeans to try to get her water bottle from her pocket, and she was terrified and screaming, and then all the monkeys started screaming back at her.
[00:41:27] Speaker C: Oh, my God.
Oh, that would. That. I'll be honest. That would kind of terrify me.
[00:41:32] Speaker A: Oh, my God. She's a little traumatized.
It was really funny.
[00:41:39] Speaker C: Monkey attack. Oh, my God. That's crazy. 600. That I can't even imagine. June, you got to see, like, all of the animals. I know we haven't gotten there yet, but spoiler alert, June got to see all of the big five and on safari as well. All right, what. What about in George? What were some highlights from. From that leg?
[00:42:01] Speaker A: Yeah, so that was actually the Knysna. So you fly into George, and then you go and say at the Pula nature retreat and go to, you know, go to the featherbed nature preserve, and. And that's part of, like, that's when we were like, the bird sanctuary and the monkey stuff is all in. In that George area.
[00:42:21] Speaker C: Oh, in that. Okay. And then you fly again to where you're going on safari. Basically the fanciest hotel you said you've stayed at other than the Maldives. Four Seasons yeah, yeah. Now what, what are the days look like for the safari part of the trip? Like how early or how late or like do you have breaks in the middle of the day? Cause I know you're, I mean you're on these like, like you said off roading kind of jeep vehicles for periods of time.
[00:42:51] Speaker A: Yeah. And I think everybody, you know, thinks about, thinks about the safari and they think about this trip and that's valid because I mean we were enjoying it all but you know, they, they leave that the best for last. Right? That's the, that's the crescendo, you know, at the end.
Because it is incredible when you, you have a travel day to get there and you arrive in, in the mid afternoon the drive, they pick you up in the safari jeeps at the airports that close the airport by Kruger national park, which we were on a private game reserve near Kruger national park and so the guides drove us in the Jeep. So even on the way in you kind of start seeing some animals on your way into, into the, the game preserve. And the game preserve is, is an. It. It has a fence around the game preserve, but some animals can get beyond the fence. Like I'll talk about that when we talk about some of the things we saw. We got, saw some. We had a trade of something very rare that does not live on the game reserve that came in while we were there. And then there's another fence around the resort. So like an electrified fence so like the big animals can't get into the resort area. Though in the resort area we did, you know, there were wandering impala and monkeys and you know, small animals that you would see within the grounds of the, of the resort.
[00:44:15] Speaker C: Yeah, you just don't want to get like trampled by an elephant or attacked by like a lion. Right.
[00:44:21] Speaker B: So yeah, I'm just curious for the safari aspect of it as I think about packing and all that sort of stuff. Like a lot of people are going to want to drag a bunch of camera gear with them. But before they do that, did ABD or the safari folks, like, I'm curious, did they give you binoculars? Were they taking photos and stuff that they would then share with you at the.
[00:44:40] Speaker A: There's a ton of photos. Yes, they had incredible photos that they share with you. They did a. They did and they did this on the Globagos trip. They have a slideshow they do the last night of like all the, you know, like highlights of pictures of everybody and they send that out to you as well. But they share and then we Also, they also encouraged and arranged for all of the guests to have a photo stream that we shared together. All of our photos. And there was one person who had, like, a mega camera one, you know, and she was taking, like, the professional shots. But, I mean, I. I just used my iPhone and got great, great shots. You know, my daughter had a little nicer digital camera, but so there was a lot of small digital cameras and phones. And like I said, really just one person who had that mega camera. But the guides took amazing pictures. They're really talented at that.
[00:45:29] Speaker B: Yeah, we. We have one kind of general question in the chat I wanted to go ahead and get answered, which is someone's asking about currency. I'm gonna up level it here for a second and say, like, what was the, you know, the money situation like? And so did you need local currency a lot of the time, you know?
[00:45:46] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. So the local currency is rand. And I did use a lot of local currency for tipping, primarily. It is a tipping culture.
Not every place is, but this is. I did do a lot of. A lot of tipping. Small amounts like I used. I got a lot of 50 rand bills, and that's equivalent to like, $3.
And that's what I used primarily for tipping if somebody, you know, handled my bag or, you know, showed me to my room or whatever.
[00:46:16] Speaker B: So what was you do.
[00:46:17] Speaker C: Did you get that currency like through your bank at home or. Yeah.
[00:46:21] Speaker A: What was sort of airport atm, so. And so every time I was at one of the airports when we were moving, I would get more rand from an ATM at the airport.
[00:46:33] Speaker B: What was the highlight from the safari for you? Let's go back there. Like, what, what. What was the animal you didn't expect to see that you got to see?
[00:46:41] Speaker C: No, she has to tell us all of the animals, Brian.
[00:46:44] Speaker B: All the animals. What was the highlight?
[00:46:45] Speaker C: Tell us the story of each of
[00:46:47] Speaker A: the animals in a nutshell. In the first 24 hours, we saw the big five.
[00:46:51] Speaker B: Wow.
[00:46:52] Speaker A: We already knocked out all of the big five.
So a couple incredible experiences, though. I'll share three so I have time for that. One was our first. Our first game drive. The animal that was a big surprise that doesn't live on the reserve and they only see two to three times a year is the African wild dog, also known as the painted dogs. They're. They're the most endangered predator on the planet. And on our first game drive, our first evening, we saw a pack of 20.
So we were out on our drive, and the guys are talking to each other all the time, and Sharing if they've spotted something. So our guide had heard that, that they had spotted, spotted these, these wild dogs. But the dogs had gone into the bush. They weren't, you know, near the dirt roads where we were driving. So it's. You can't see them once they go back into the, into the bush. We could hear it, hear them well, because really we could hear the antelope that they were killing.
So we heard this, this antelope.
[00:47:54] Speaker C: So the pack of dogs was like eating or attacking and then eating an antelope.
[00:47:59] Speaker A: And then we heard bones crunching. And we're sitting there in our jeeps just seeing, waiting if they're gonna. And to see if they would come out our direction. They could go any direction. This is like a huge area with, like windy little, you know, paths everywhere. So they could go any way. But all of a sudden all 20 come running out of the bush towards us. And behind them comes three hyena who had overpowered them. And one of them was carrying the head of the antelope around as a trophy in its mouth.
[00:48:32] Speaker C: Holy cow. That. When. That must have been so incredible. I mean, it's kind of gory, right? But that must be so incredible to, like, witness in person.
That's like what we watch National Geographic to see, right? Like that.
[00:48:46] Speaker A: So they said people from Nat Geo come here for a week and they never see that. Like, they come here because hoping to see that and they don't get to see that.
[00:48:56] Speaker C: Yeah, that's crazy. Crazy. What about, what about one of the other ones that you.
[00:49:00] Speaker A: So then the next nine night, our second night, we were on the hunt to see cats. We wanted to see the big cats.
And so we heard that somebody had spotted a leopard. And this, this guide who had spotted. I don't even know how they knew to track the leopard down in this area because it was. You're kind of off roading like you're on a dirt road, but it's one that's not. It hasn't been used much. It's overgrown. And it kind of went down this ravine. It was like the, like a dry creek bed. And we went down in that ravine and I didn't even think these, these jeeps are amazing. Like what they can drive over. Like, know what they are amazing, like what they can get on angles and go. They could go over little trees. They're crazy. But we go down to this ravine and I, I didn't think we could go down. I thought we have to go back the way we came in because that Other side looked even worse. I didn't think it was possible to go up. We see the leopard, just the tail end of the leopard. We got it on video like in the dark, going into the, into the woods. But then behind us was another Jeep that had, was following us in because they were trying to see two that were part of, you know, our group.
And behind them was a large male bull elephant who decided to knock down a tree over the path behind that Jeep.
Oh my God. So we couldn't go back the way we came and so we had to go forward up the other way. And we were totally off roading. Like they were just creating paths to get out of that area back to the main dirt roads for us to get out out.
[00:50:34] Speaker C: Oh my God. That's terrifying. Like, were you at, at any point during, like you're see, I mean you're seeing like a leopard, right? Like that thing could like run and pounce on you. Like, are like what, what are the warnings?
[00:50:49] Speaker A: So when you stay in the vehicle, you look like one entity. All the people in the vehicle, they just see it as one thing.
[00:50:56] Speaker C: Supposedly it's too big for them to attack.
[00:50:59] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean I made eye contact with some animals I feel like saw me. Like I don't know. So. But that, that was the theory.
[00:51:06] Speaker C: Right?
[00:51:07] Speaker A: So. And later that night we saw a male lion and he walked, you know, right by me on my side of the Jeep and I was using my phone and I had my hand kind of out the side of the jeep. And then I realized he was so close I could have touched him. So I like pulled my hand back and I like realized like, I can't be dangling like my hand over the side of the jeep. Well, this, this man.
[00:51:27] Speaker C: Right? Your hand is an appetizer.
[00:51:28] Speaker A: Yeah.
But you feel that comfortable because you're, you're getting so, you're, you're getting so close to them. Yeah, yeah, I check myself on that.
And then the last, the last amazing story I want to share is a leopard again. The next morning we were out and we spotted a, a female leopard who was out hunting. And they said she had cubs that you could tell that she was nursing, you know, and so she was out on the hu. We saw her go into the bush hunting and then we saw her come back carrying a full size hair. It's like feet were barely touching the ground and she's just carrying, carrying it, this dead hair by the nape of her neck and you know, waltzing off to her cubs with the, with the, yeah.
[00:52:13] Speaker C: Bringing it back for everybody to eat. Wow.
[00:52:16] Speaker B: I feel like a South Africa abd is a lesson in the circle of life.
[00:52:21] Speaker C: It just teaches you like how small we really are, right? Like it's that kind of. Yeah, that's incredible.
Want to wait one, one second, Brian, and then I'll let you ask a question. I want to put a comment out there right now. If you are interested in seeing some of these pictures and videos that June is talking about. She has a great Instagram and blog called the Vacation Mouse and it's the Underscore Vacation Underscore mouse on Instagram and you can also link to her blog from there. But it's like the reels that she made and the pictures she has from the these, the safari stuff. I mean other ones are great too, but these ones are like just incredible. I shared some of them in our stories over the last 24 hours leading up to the show.
But go look at her stuff because it's just incredible. Sorry Brian, I know you wanted to ask.
[00:53:14] Speaker B: Well, now I'm curious because Ashley's posted in the chat. How is the baby elephant story not one of the top three?
[00:53:21] Speaker A: What is the baby elephant story?
Yes, we saw a lot of babies. I mean babies. Every baby giraffe, baby rhinos. The baby elephant though there was a couple. So the first morning, so we arrived in the evening to evening and the next morning one of the first things we saw was this whole herd of elephant and I love elephant, and there were a couple young elephants and then a two month old old baby elephant. And this is one of the cases where I think that the elephants knew we were people and they could see us. I mean, I just am convinced so. Because when the baby elephant would get out in front of the. The bigger elephants, a big elephant would always come in between the baby elephant and us and just put themselves, you know, in the way. And then at one point, this really big elephant, you know, the biggest, most mature elephant, which I think was the baby's dad, he came right over to my side of the Jeep, you know, to block the view to the baby. And not only to block the view, he was. And there's a little bit of video of this on there. I had a lot more footage than I put in the reel, but he did this whole performance. So they were all dusting themselves with dirt. And you see some of them are rolling on the ground, some of them are tossing it with their trunks. But he was being especially elaborate in like how he was picking up the dirt and how he was tossing it. You watch it like, he puts his trunk down and he pushes dirt with his foot onto his trunk. And he was doing this really elaborate toss, you know, And I felt so much like he was entertaining us purposely to distract us from that baby elephant.
He was doing just like the one who pushed the tree over the road right behind. Behind that jeep that went in. Like, he. He knew what he was doing, you know, like, they're just so highly intelligent that I definitely, definitely think they. They knew each one of us.
Wow.
[00:55:15] Speaker C: Wow.
[00:55:15] Speaker B: So it's the last. So the last leg of the trip here, June, after the safari is sort of this, like, what you describe as, like, a vacation area. Is. Is this meant to be, like, a time to just relax or did they have, like, a bunch of places to go visit in this area as well?
[00:55:29] Speaker A: Oh, at. At the. Nature. At the. Where we did the game drive. So at Kapama Game Reserve, where we stayed. So we did a drive in the morning, and we did a drive in the evening, and then you would have free time in the middle. And there was a. Some activities. Like, there was a. There's a picture in the. The average. The advertising of me holding a snake, a python, which was part of. We had, like, a reptile experience. And they did archery one day. So you had some little things you could do. But they also asked us a few days ahead who wanted to book spa appointments. And then they took all of our requests for spa appointments and booked all of our spa appointments for us so that we'd work around the. The schedule. So we had that. That. And you had, like, a window for lunch that you would. Could show up within a couple hours to get your lunch. So there was free time in the middle of the day, which was really nice. Like, at that point, you're. You're tired and you're getting up, you know, early and for the drives and things. So it was a nice break in the resort was. Was so beautiful. You wanted that time. Like, there was pool. There was two pools. And I did. I did yoga, like, private yoga class one day and one other person in class with me another day.
And so that. That was really nice for me. So. Yeah. Yeah, it's a lovely, lovely resource resort.
[00:56:39] Speaker B: So let me ask this question, June, because a lot of people look at the price tag for an ABD and they're like, you know, after they stop hyperventilating, you know, after they stop checking, possibly do it. But, like, you know, you've experienced it, We've experienced it. And, like, I think there's. There's actually real Value here.
[00:56:56] Speaker A: I think there is too.
[00:56:57] Speaker B: But one question we'll get consistently asked is so what was included and what wasn't.
[00:57:02] Speaker E: Right.
[00:57:02] Speaker B: And so we know that these land based ABDs don't necessarily include, include like every meal during the day, include a majority. Right. But, but in between your flights, the transfers, there were no admission fees getting charged. I assume you know, your spa treatments obviously probably paid for on your own. But like what was included here and what did you end up having to like pay for yourself?
[00:57:24] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean everything was included except for I guess the night we arrived there wasn't any formal dinner. So the night we landed we were on our own for dinner. One other night in Cape Town, we were on our own for dinner and then there might have been a lunch, like a shopping time. I can't even tell you when it was but at most there was maybe one other time.
The rest of it, breakfast, lunch, dinner was, you know, all included. They, they fed us constantly too, as you know, as ABD does.
Sometimes alcohol was included, sometimes it was an additional charge. It depended a lot of times, a lot of times it would be included with your dinner. But there was a couple cases where the alcohol was additional on your own.
The tips, you know, you have to tip your guides and I tipped you know, other, other people as we went along the spa, which we chose to do that, that, that was out of pocket.
But I absolutely do believe that there's value and it's a big sticker price. We did it, we did use another tour company for Japan just for, because the, the Japan abd didn't fit our, our schedule like the time of year, the dates that we needed to go and, but, and it was play half the price. But I'd, you know, if you can manage it, I'd, I'd much prefer to pay the money and have the type of experience we had.
They take care of everything. I mean it is the private access, right? Right.
Disney gets the best private access, you know, the best front of the line access the best service from the providers because they know it's Disney and they want to keep their business.
The rates, I mean even like Kapama where we stayed, you can, you can go stay there by yourself and that is, you know, for the most part I wouldn't feel comfortable maybe planning a trip around South Africa and seeing all the things we saw. But I could see flying just to Krueger national park and staying at place like Kapama on our own own, but that's still on your own. It's a minimum of fifteen hundred dollars a night as an individual. So if you've. If you looked at. I don't think Disney paid that, you know, for the block of rooms that they got. And then we had a lot of private dinners. We had. I don't want to. I don't want to spoil any surprises for the guests, but there were several surprise events and some of the meals and venues that are, you know, just beautiful and private for us, entertainment that was private for us, and some other surprises that were unique to us that you absolutely, you know, would not have access to if. If you weren't traveling with Disney.
[01:00:10] Speaker B: Let me ask one more question here, and then I'm gonna let Sam kind of, you know, she's probably got a bunch of stuff swirling in her head, but. But the other question I feel like we get asked a lot or that people kind of jokingly say is, you know, well, well, you know, Mickey and Minnie riding around. No, no, Mickey and Minnie are not out on the, you know, the saf with you, setting aside the danger that that would pose.
But what, like, did you feel at any point during the trip? Did you. Did you know, the Disney magic, however you want to say it? Like, you know, like. Like, I'll give you example. When we did the. The river cruise, right, we had this, like, underground lake tour in a salt mine that I won't get into. But, like, our guide was sitting in the back of the boat as we were, and he was, you know, dead men tell no to. Like, he was just. It was a little bit of Disney for an audience of Disney fans. And, like, did you have kinds of moments on this or.
[01:00:59] Speaker A: Yeah, a little bit like, on the. This. Another thing that they did really well when we were on buses or traveling anywhere, they were entertaining us constantly. Like, you were never left to sit alone in silence or be on your phone. Like, you were being actively. And they were actively entertaining you on every bus ride. So there would be, like, a little bit of Disney joke or something, you know, woven in on those rides. And then the pins. So the pins that they gave us every day, obviously, Disney pins. But what was so amazing with that is the creative ways that they would reveal the pins. They didn't just hand out pins. There would always be a surprise that. And again, I'm not going to spoil anything for any future guests, but there were some really creative ways that they revealed the pins every day.
So that that alone was some Disney magic.
[01:01:49] Speaker B: All right, we got to ask Karen's question. In the chat, did they show the Lion King Circle of life. Sing along. Question mark.
[01:01:58] Speaker A: There, there specifically there was in part of the entertainment or last night they did incorporate some of the Lion King songs into the entertainment that was performed by the Kapama staff, which they were doing, you know, their, you know, music from South Africa. And then they did incorporate a little bit of the Lion King music into that.
[01:02:25] Speaker B: What a, a missed opportunity now to just string a sheet up between two trees and project the Lion King in south. I mean, I mean if they can. What. What was it? They watched a Mission Impossible on the top of Pulpit Rock in Norway.
[01:02:37] Speaker A: Like, amazing, amazing.
[01:02:41] Speaker C: June, I I gotta ask you just highlight from Zimbabwe because I know you guys did that on your own.
You know, after your abd instead of going back to Johannesburg, you went straight over to Victoria Falls. Yeah. Tell us like highlight from.
And was it difficult to like, was it jarring to go from like, oh, I'm in the. The perfect white gloved hands of the. And now I'm doing something on my own.
[01:03:07] Speaker A: We did feel a little spoiled. Like, you know, it wasn't quite the same level of luxury as we were accustomed to, but it was a great three days there. So we, we went to see Victoria Falls and obviously that's one of the seven wonders. It was amazing to see. But some other highlights. We did a game drive there in a jeep and we saw the black rhinos. So South Africa has white rhinos, but Zimbabwe has the black rhinos which are smaller and even more endangered. So we were able to see that.
We did what I thought was really fun.
It was my daughter's idea, but she was a little intimidated when we got into it. We went horseback riding on a game preserve and so we saw animals including giraffe. We saw zebra and warthogs, but they ran away so quickly. Actually ran like much faster from us on horseback than in the jeeps.
And. But the, but the giraffe and I haven't posted this yet. This re is coming. But the giraffes let us get close and stay close to them.
But it was like English saddle and you had to like know how to control your horse and stuff. So it was like it was kind of the real deal. And we were with an anti poaching team. So these. It was a people who work for the reserve as anti poaching to.
To protect the animals. So that was really cool. And we did a river, a sunset river cruise on the Zambezi river, which is the river that is part that leads up to Victoria Falls. And that was beautiful.
[01:04:38] Speaker C: That's awesome. Now I got to ask one, one more logistical question.
Any sickness on the trip, any stomach issues, you know, you're different. Water, different. Food. You know, there are people who, you know, you're also on specific medications, particularly the malaria meds. You know, any of those issues that just people should be aware of. I know you mentioned you gotta talk to one of these, like, travel nurse people ahead of time. Which, by the way, is at your own, on your own dime. You might spend hundreds of dollars.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. On vaccines and advice about traveling to Africa. So that's something to be aware of. That's not part of sort of your tour. That's something you're gonna have to do on your own in your local community. But yeah, any of those kinds of things.
[01:05:26] Speaker A: So one thing to ask your, your, your travel doctor for is an antibiotic to take carry with you in case that happens. Ours, you know, recommended it and gave it to us. We had that.
There was zero food problems. And I am very cautious. I lived in India for a year and I had deli belly and I came home from a Disney cruise with C. Diff.
So I have had some horrible experiences and I'm very confused. Careful. But there we were served fruits and vegetables and everybody was eating them.
[01:06:00] Speaker C: Everywhere we went.
[01:06:01] Speaker A: I think everywhere that Disney took us, they said it was safe.
I was still kind of probably overly cautious with the raw fruits and vegetables just because of my history.
But I had sushi and kna. And raw oysters and kna. Before I ate the raw oysters, I asked the guides if it was. If this was a good idea.
They tasted fresh and, you know, were great and I was fine. So everywhere that Disney had us, everything was very safe. There was, and there was. The bottled water was plentiful. There were all the resorts, you know, provided bottled water and Disney had tons of bottles of water on the bus. You could have as much water as. As you wanted everywhere.
They didn't. They told us we didn't have to worry about brushing our teeth with the bottled water. It was fine for that. And I. And I did not thought I might brush my teeth with bottled water, but I. I didn't. I used the tap water to brush my teeth and everything. Everything turned out fine.
[01:06:55] Speaker B: Nice.
[01:06:55] Speaker C: Yeah. Well, that. Good to know. You know, we've got to ask you what's next because you have some great trips planned. I know one is to Asia, another one.
I won't spoil. I'll let you spoil.
[01:07:09] Speaker B: I want to know. I want to know when you headed
[01:07:11] Speaker C: Antarctica at this point, Us with it.
[01:07:15] Speaker A: I want to do Nat Geo. We looked at doing Antarctica December 2027, but the holidays fall oddly that year, and my, my daughter's college break won't. Doesn't line up with the date, so we're still working on that. But we want to get to Antarctica. We. We must get there at some point.
But we have three more trips on the books already. So this December, we are going to sail on the adventure. We delayed that exactly 12 months. You know, sailing out of Singapore on New Year's Eve this next. This coming New Year's instead of last.
But on the way there, we're going to stop at Hong Kong Disneyland for two days because we have to change planes somewhere, so we might as well do it there.
And then after we get off the boat because we're just doing one four nights sailing. I know most people, I guess, or a lot of people I'm hearing doing the back to backs, and I can, I can see why. But we're just doing the one for night. And so we traveled that far, we figured we'd add something else on. So we're gonna go to Krabi Island, Thailand.
Karabi Island, Thailand, for five nights before we come home.
[01:08:27] Speaker B: I was gonna say, please reach out about that adventure trip that you're doing.
[01:08:30] Speaker C: She's. She's been on the show.
[01:08:32] Speaker B: Don't worry, Brian.
[01:08:33] Speaker A: All right, sorry.
[01:08:34] Speaker C: Well, I don't. We don't have. We don't have a. We don't have a date booked, but she knows she's coming. And then. Yeah, tell us the other two trips you've got booked because they're awesome.
[01:08:41] Speaker A: The next summer. A little bit lighter weight, but we're going to do the Norwegian fjords cruise. So we haven't. We haven't done that yet. So that, that'll be. That'll be a little bit of a. Of a break for me financially, too, from some of these bigger ones, which I'm grateful for. And then as part of our. As our bounce back from this ABD, we were inspired to book our next ABD, which will be Dec. Dec. 2027, Egypt. ABD.
[01:09:11] Speaker C: Yeah. Fantastic.
[01:09:12] Speaker A: To the continent of Africa.
[01:09:16] Speaker C: You are travel goals. Let me just say that I am jealous of your travel prowess because you go to all of these really amazing places. But we're so thankful that you came on the show again.
Again, for those who want to follow along on June's journeys, the travel. I'm sorry, the vacation mouse. The underscore vacation mouse.
[01:09:39] Speaker B: And I will make sure to add that to both the YouTube description and the show notes for this show when they go out on our podcast channel.
[01:09:46] Speaker C: But she's got a great blog and a great Instagram so go to both because you can see videos and pictures on her Instagram but you can see blogs and more videos and pictures on the blog as well. So yeah. June, thank you so much for joining us. It's been
[01:10:05] Speaker B: and for everyone out there. We will be back next week at our regular time 5.30pm Pacific, 8.30pm Eastern and we will be joined by none other than Wesley Davenport. You may know him online as was it version 5571?
[01:10:20] Speaker C: You got it.
[01:10:21] Speaker B: Yeah. He's the version tracker for various theme parks. At least that's how his account started. But now he's hooked on Disney Cruise Line so he's he's gonna come join us and take talk about Alaska.
[01:10:31] Speaker C: Alaska. He's actually on the Disney Wonder I believe right now or or he just got off maybe yesterday. But anyway he literally just this past week so he'll be on next week. We'll be on at the our same time, 8:30, 8:30pm Eastern, 5:30pm Pacific.
So join us live next week and with that we'll just say thank you to everybody for watching and listening and we will see you real soon.
[01:11:04] Speaker E: Well thanks everyone out there for listening this week. We really really appreciate it. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast. You can keep getting great content from us every week. In fact twice a week we publish shows. So be sure to hit the subscribe button to get all of those great episodes. And if you want to watch us alive, we have a live show now every week, Monday nights, 5:30pm Pacific, 8:30 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 forward/dclduo or email them at dclduomypathunwinding.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 links 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 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 DCLDuo.com is the best way to connect with us. You can also of course email
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The DCL Duo podcast is not affiliated with Disney Cruise Line, the Disney Company or the Disney family of theme parks. The views expressed on the show are solely those of the individuals on the podcast and in no way reflect the views 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 DC Duo.
