[00:00:00] Speaker A: I was alone, alone in jellyfish eating, trying to muscle down my salmon donut. I got a couple bites in and then I thought, it's not.
I have nothing to prove to anybody. And I threw it away.
[00:00:23] 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 and also our good friends over at the DCL magazine. If you have not already, please head over to DCL Duo magazine.com to check out the great magazine those folks are putting out over there. We love all of the great articles, all the great people over there, all the great photos.
So please head over there, check them out. That's dcl-magazine.com and if you use code DCLDUO, that's all caps DCL Duo. You can take 10% off everything in the WDW magazine store, including the DCL magazine and a whole bunch of other great goodies. So head over there, check them out. Remember, showing our sponsors some love shows the show some love. So if you love the show, show some love to our sponsors. With that, we're dive right in. We got a lot to talk about today, so I'm going to bring in our esteemed guest and friend. I'm going to call you a friend.
[00:01:19] Speaker A: Wesley.
[00:01:20] Speaker B: Welcome to the show.
[00:01:22] Speaker A: Thank you. Good to be here again.
[00:01:24] Speaker C: Yeah, I mean, welcome back to the show. For those who don't remember, we've had Wesley on a few times.
He goes by version 5571. For those Disney fans out there, obviously you know what 55 and 71 refer to.
He's got great content that he puts out.
[00:01:43] Speaker B: Is that the single year price for a Disneyland annual pass now five, five, seven, one. Okay. All right.
[00:01:50] Speaker A: It could be $55,000 or $71,000.
[00:01:55] Speaker C: But Wesley is on here tonight to talk about this amazing trip he took on the Disney Wonder to Alaska.
Get into that. Two very minor pieces of DCL news. There's not a lot of news this week. There was a ton of news last week.
In other news. Go New York, go New York. Go my throwback. This is from 1992. I just want to say this piece of champion history.
Anyway, going back to Disney news on Disney Cruise Line is doing those, you know, post cruise surveys and the survey that they did of the Wonder. Actually the last couple of surveys have included a question saying, thinking only about the physical design of the Disney Wonder. Example, layout, decor, theaters, halls, public spaces, staterooms, and not about activities or services provided on board. What do you like most and Then the same question. What do you like least? So they're. I don't know. Maybe they're getting feedback for the Meridian class of ships. So that's an interesting question. Or those two questions. They also are asking people to essentially rank their favorite ships. So they're listing all of the ships in another survey question and asking for your rankings, which I think is kind of fun to hear about. The other piece of news, just for the Alaska season this summer. Of course, we know both the Magic and the Wonder are sailing Alaska, and we'd been talking about Koda Bear, who's from Brother Bear, who is typically in past seasons on the Disney Wonder. Well, this year, he has not appeared on the Disney Wonder, and apparently he's not appearing on the Disney Wonder because he is over on the Disney Magic, and he apparently participates in one of the shore excursions that goes to Icy Strait Point.
So just an FYI out there, if you're sailing on the Disney Wonder this summer, meaning summer 2026, you are not going to see Koda Bear on board. But if you're sailing on the Disney Magic, you perhaps will see him wandering on board. But with that, let's dive right in. Wesley, you sailed to Alaska on the Wonder. You're west coast best coast person, so you didn't have to travel too far.
I know why you took this trip, but tell our audience why you took this trip. Why Alaska?
Tell us.
[00:04:16] Speaker A: We took this because when our kids turn 12, we take them on a solo trip. So just mom, dad, and our kid. One of our kids. And so this year, our middle son, Oliver turned 12, and he got to choose where he wanted to go anywhere in the United States. And he's not a dummy. So he picked Alaska because he knows his parents and went to Alaska very quickly. Being a Disney cruise.
Yeah, sorry.
[00:04:43] Speaker B: I don't know where this window came from.
[00:04:46] Speaker C: What window? We're not seeing any other window, Brian.
[00:04:49] Speaker B: Oh, you're not seeing.
[00:04:50] Speaker C: We got the Wonder. We got your. The PowerPoint.
[00:04:53] Speaker B: Oh, okay. Well, there's like. Oh, you know what? This window was covering that PowerPoint and making it look like it was broadcasting out. So that's good, because I didn't really want to broadcast out that window. So there you go. Sorry. Yeah, let's keep going.
[00:05:05] Speaker C: Yeah. So, okay. So Ollie chose for his 12th birthday to go to Alaska, and he knew that that meant that mom and dad were gonna take him on a Disney cruise to Alaska.
Love that. And why the Wonder in particular did you consider sailing on the Magic?
[00:05:22] Speaker A: I really did not. Consider sailing on the Magic. It was Wonder from the beginning and that choice was like reconfirmed time and again as we were on the. As we were on our trip. But after our last sailing on the Magic, I'll probably see her, you know,
[00:05:40] Speaker C: you'll be like, peace out, Magic. So when. When Wesley sailed on the Magic last out of. I believe it was out of Galveston, this is when. Isn't this when they had that whole pipe burst thing from my memory, and then we had a very smelly atri.
[00:05:53] Speaker A: Very. Yeah. There was water, like pouring from the, like ducks and the chandelier in the atrium and they closed off the whole area for like days.
And you know, we weren't. Turns out a lot of people weren't a fan of that.
And.
But on top of that, the Wonder, I. I like the one. It was like the first ship I ever sailed on, so.
And we were missing a particular piece of merchandise from the One, so we had to.
We definitely had to go back on the Wonder to get that one piece of merchandise. So everything just kind of lined up.
[00:06:29] Speaker B: I love the merch decision driving the ship decision. That's a new. That's a new lever to pull in your decision making for Disney Cruise Line. Gotta have merch.
[00:06:36] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. Love it, Love it.
Yeah. Especially.
Especially on like these Alaska sailings. Merch is like a big deal, right?
[00:06:45] Speaker C: Merch is a big deal. And you're at the beginning of the Alaska season, so merch was probably plentiful. I will say there are that are choosing to sail on all the ships again because of those darn chandelier ornaments. Like that's a thing.
[00:07:01] Speaker A: And that was the number two piece of merchandise that I needed. But they didn't like. No. Almost nobody on board had any idea what I was talking about when I asked, so they didn't have it. And so now we're going to have to make the rounds again.
[00:07:15] Speaker C: I love it. I love it. All right. I love you. Gave us this outline. For those watching on video and watching live on YouTube, we've got. Got this great PowerPoint. So if you're listening right now to the audio version, that's great. We'll try to describe what's on the screen, but if you're not, feel free to join us over on YouTube and you can see all these great visuals that Wesley put together. We only do this for our live shows. For those listening. We only do, like, visuals for the live shows for the recorded shows. Our platform just doesn't support doing PowerPoints and whatnot. All right. So we got your Disney diary, your cruise creds, your itinerary, merch hall, packing logistics, daily navigator, and wrap. I love this. Okay, let's start your Disney diary.
[00:07:59] Speaker A: I know you guys usually ask, what's your background? Whatever. You can read this. Someone could pause this later and go through it. But basically, I live in California. I've gone to Disneyland my whole life.
It's the best. Don't argue with me about that. But I do have an appreciation for Walt Disney World. I've worked there. We vacationed there. Me and my wife like to say Disney World is for our family vacations. And Disneyland is where me and my wife go to hang out sans kids. You have magic keys. They don't tell them.
[00:08:31] Speaker B: Well, we can't stop them from watching the show.
[00:08:34] Speaker C: So it depends whether they have access to YouTube or Apple Podcasts.
[00:08:39] Speaker B: Now, instead of a mute pedal, Sam, I need a delay button. So there we go.
[00:08:45] Speaker C: All right, now, you have gone on a whole bunch of Disney cruises. Here's your cruise creds. I mean, it's pretty incredible how many cruises you have. Have been on now. And this is in a pretty short time period. Is that right?
[00:08:59] Speaker A: That's right. I think since the last time I was on your show, we've gone on six cruises, which I think I was on your show March 25th. So we've had a busy year.
[00:09:12] Speaker C: You have had a busy year. And. And some of these Royal. Although you. You. I feel like you sail now kind of. Maybe not quite equally, but you've sailing quite a bit on Royal in addition to sailing on Disney.
[00:09:24] Speaker A: Yeah, just. I mean, we did. Me and my wife went on a Mediterranean cruise on Royal like two summers ago, and then we went on Wonder of the Seas in October, and over New Year's Eve, we did Harmony of the Seas out of Galveston. So, yeah, we've done three Royal, and then I've been on nine Disney cruises.
[00:09:43] Speaker C: Love it. And, yeah, and you've been on all of the ships except for the Adventure now.
[00:09:48] Speaker A: Right, and the Charger and.
[00:09:50] Speaker C: Oh, that's right, that's right. All right, well, that's goals. You have to have something to look forward to.
[00:09:57] Speaker A: I figured that'll be my 10. Doing the treasure will get me to platinum.
[00:10:01] Speaker C: I love that. Okay, here's your itinerary. Travel day, land in Vancouver, spend some time in Vancouver. Embarkation day, day at sea, Glacier viewing, Skagway, Juneau, Ketchikan. Day at sea, debarkation.
And then, oh, my God, you had three flight changes going home.
[00:10:18] Speaker A: It looks like,
[00:10:21] Speaker C: that's not that far.
[00:10:22] Speaker B: Oh, my gosh.
[00:10:23] Speaker A: All right.
[00:10:24] Speaker C: And you had to fly through Denver. Wow. Okay.
[00:10:27] Speaker A: It's not good. We had to go through customs, like, four times the day we left because we had to keep going in. It was terrible. Wow.
[00:10:35] Speaker C: Yeah. Wow. All right.
[00:10:37] Speaker B: So the merch. We talked about the merch. Yeah, tell us about the merch.
[00:10:40] Speaker C: I want to. Yeah. I got to hear about the merchant.
[00:10:43] Speaker A: Like. Yeah. I joke that I'm gonna go on cruises to get particular merch, but I thought. But overall, I'm not a big merch guy. I don't really like souvenirs, but I do have a backpack full of stuff.
So just real quick. This is the Castaway Club backpack that you get now instead of the tote.
Right.
Anyway, just. We'll get to it. So I bought. We got this Alaska, like, thing. What is this called? A water bottle.
[00:11:10] Speaker C: Water bottle.
[00:11:12] Speaker B: A beverage.
[00:11:16] Speaker C: Alaska Mini.
[00:11:17] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, we did that. And then we got Mickey.
[00:11:20] Speaker C: Of course, you have to have Mickey if you have many.
[00:11:23] Speaker A: Yeah, right. Okay. So we did that.
This is, like the big thing. Everybody was wearing these on the cruise ship. And, like, they, like. Like, immediately after the, like, mustard drill, people were lined up. The store didn't open for two more hours, but everyone was in line to get, like, one of these things.
[00:11:40] Speaker C: Yeah.
It's a pullover that has a. Says Alaska on the back. And it's got stripes from, like, the midsection down. Yeah. Or not a pullover. I guess it's a jacket.
[00:11:49] Speaker A: Yeah, I like it. It's pretty nice. But it's thin. You know what I mean? But it is kind of soft and cozy. But it's like a spirit jersey. Right. It says Alaska big across the back.
[00:12:00] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:12:01] Speaker A: That's cool. My wife got this shirt.
It's just like your slander, like, cruise line shirt. It just says Alaska. And like those.
[00:12:08] Speaker C: Same one. I haven't seen that one before.
[00:12:12] Speaker A: It's like the same pattern on the.
That's on that jacket that I just showed you. Anyway. Oh, DCL. Oh, Eds.
[00:12:20] Speaker B: Eds saying the stripes. The stripes on the merch are supposed to represent the northern lights. That's. I did not make that connection. That's really cool.
[00:12:27] Speaker A: That's cool. I'm colorblind, so it doesn't matter what color they are.
[00:12:33] Speaker C: And by the way, Nathan's in the comments. Not our Nathan, but Nathan Novak from Adventures and Mousecapades saying, love the toss to the side. He said he was coming. He was going to be on the show or in the Chat live to heckle you. Wesley, I just want you to know. Oh, you got the hat. I love the hat. Knit hat.
[00:12:49] Speaker A: We got the beanie. Yeah, the knit beanie. It just has like cruise shit, like a Disney cruise ship on it with a DCL logo and it's like winter, you know, it's like an ugly sweater kind of design.
Got the gloves.
Oh, like we don't have things like these. I had to look up how to spell beanie on the PowerPoint. I didn't know how to spell beanie.
[00:13:10] Speaker C: You live in California.
[00:13:12] Speaker A: That's right. We have gloves.
What else do we have?
That's pretty much it for the like, souvenirs, like on the ship.
But we do buy a totem.
[00:13:24] Speaker B: Oh, yeah.
[00:13:25] Speaker C: Oh, that's a nice one.
[00:13:27] Speaker A: This is Legend of the Fog Woman. You can look that up. It's kind of. I didn't realize it, but there's a lot of domestic violence in that thing. We bought a Christmas ornament of the same thing and another like Alaska looking native Christmas ornament.
[00:13:45] Speaker B: I will say, if you go to Alaska and you buy those totems, I spent an inordinate amount of time in the shops trying to figure out is this something that was actually locally made or was it just sourced from China?
[00:13:55] Speaker C: And so, yeah, check to make sure it's. It's either made in Alaska or made in Canada, because that then you like. And it's made by sort of the indigenous tribes in Alaska or in Canada, as opposed to being made in Thailand, Vietnam, China, wherever. Right. So you don't. You want something actually made local.
[00:14:16] Speaker A: You do want something that's like authentic and like made by like the tribes for the indigenous people. This one's not. But it was also only like $15. I didn't know.
I didn't know the extent and like the detail and everything that goes into these things and. And how much they would cost, you know, So I wasn't prepared. So when we go. Inevitably when we go back to Alaska, I'll be prepared. I already have one picked out if there's a store in Ketchikan that I'll go back to because they were really informative. They were really nice. It is native made and it'll be like this design or this legend totem, but it'll be real. And I'm excited about that. But that's not for now.
[00:15:00] Speaker B: So, Wes, we have one. Oh, is that the new ornament? Did they have the ship specific chandelier ornaments on the wonder?
[00:15:07] Speaker A: No, nothing.
Oh, didn't even know. And then the other thing that I wanted, that I couldn't find just on my own was one of those blind boxes, boxes of the funnels.
And when I went in, they're like, no, we don't have them. And then, like, I would just, like, was nice. I just kept being nice. And then one popped up.
Like, what is that about? So now I haven't opened it yet, though. I'm. I can't decide what I want to do. I can't decide if I want to keep it or give it away. Like, do a giveaway. But I have it. It's not open.
So maybe we can figure it out. Maybe we can play this together, you and I.
[00:15:42] Speaker B: So. So, Wes, there was one question in the chat I wanted to ask, because I have the same question. The backpack that they're giving out now, how sturdy is it really?
[00:15:50] Speaker A: Oh, no, it's good. This is, like, I don't know, thicker material, but it's, like, thick. Yeah, it's like. And we used it our time in Alaska. It was, like, rainy and cold. And this is like. No, it's like a. I likened it to, like, you know, like a transport backpack. It's probably not the highest quality, but it's padded right here. So these are pad. They have, like, logos on them.
It's just one big compartment, but it has, like, a laptop sleeve in.
Has the front pouch, and then, like, water bottle pouches on either side. I like it. This. This is a huge upgrade from the tote. The tote was like, I'm not going to use a tote. Like, what's a tote? But a backpack. I'll use a backpack.
[00:16:36] Speaker B: I will actually give the. The. There was an amenity that they had for a while that involved this, like, Disney Cruise Line backpack. It's actually a really nice backpack. It white one. I think it was primarily white in color anyway. It was. It was a really nice backpack. I still have it in my closet, and I sometimes take it with me on the cruises. So, yeah, it's a good backpack.
[00:16:54] Speaker A: This backpack is similar to, like, what my wife. My wife's been buying. They have, like, Disneyland ones, and they have Disney World ones, and it's like. It's similar to that. And it's like 60 bucks in the park. And this is just like.
They just give this to you.
[00:17:09] Speaker C: Yeah. So if you're still.
If you're a silver Castaway club member, you get that backpack. And then there are additional gifts if you're gold and if you're platinum, and if you're pearl. And there's pictures of them out on online. We have them on our Instagram as well. And I know that, Wesley, you posted as well.
You posted essentially the silver and gold gifts on your Instagram, I believe, as well. Yeah.
[00:17:37] Speaker A: And we get the wet, dry bag, too, but it's already, like, packed somewhere.
[00:17:42] Speaker C: Yeah.
All right, so logistics. Let's talk about. Okay, so you have to pack for Alaska specific weather.
How. How much, you know, how much thought did you put into the packing process? And like, I mean, we always say layers are what you bring for. Same for Alaska, same for Norway layers. You don't want necessarily super heavy stuff, but you don't want super light stuff. You want some mix of stuff.
[00:18:07] Speaker A: Right. So I learned the term like, dress like an onion.
Again, like my everyday attires, like shorts and T shirts. So at. At the very last minute, I thought, I don't. Should I get a jacket? Should I buy a jacket for this trip? And I was going back and forth, and then I did.
Thank you. Rei, they like, like express shipping. I got here quick, and I probably would have froze if I didn't have it, but I didn't know.
And it's like a puffy jacket. People call them puffy jacket. So I bought a puffy jacket. And then I have this thing that I wear. So I put the puffy jacket over that.
You can see a puffy jacket. Arrange it like something that's waterproof.
Because just looking at the. As we were monitoring the weather, which is something I'm also like, it was gonna rain while we were in Alaska, so I also had a rain jacket. Thank goodness.
But that, that, that was pretty much the extent. And pants. Don't normally wear pants, but I had to bring two pairs of pants.
[00:19:12] Speaker C: Yeah, I mean, you do need.
You need pants for Alaska and you do need puffy jacket. When you say puffy jacket, we're not. We're like talking sort of the lighter weight. Puffy jacket is probably the best thing because you can layer it with other layers underneath. As Wesley was explaining how he does it, I think that's what you need. And you always want a rain layer because if it's going to be rainy, you're going to be wet.
[00:19:34] Speaker A: So, yeah, again, I just did like, like the rei, like waterproof jacket shell, they say.
And it was. But we only bring one bag. We're only. I only allow my family to bring one carry on each and a backpack. So so, you know, is it of what you bring? And a puffy jacket was one of them.
[00:19:58] Speaker C: Do you guys do laundry on board then? Because that's not a lot of stuff to fit into a carry on it for a week long cruise.
[00:20:04] Speaker A: Yeah, it's not a lot of stuff. So we were gone like 10 days. We did laundry twice, like pretty much the second day on the ship. And then like the day before we got off, we did laundry again.
[00:20:16] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:20:17] Speaker A: So as such, we pick rooms that are near the laundry facility so we don't have to like hike up and down the stairs or down long hallways.
[00:20:26] Speaker B: Well, I just want to ask you about the Hyatt Regency in Vancouver on the side, you know, you stayed there. How, how was it, how convenient was it for the port? What did you think of the, you know, the cost in relation to the, the hotel? Because we, I mean the number one question we get asked about is where do I stay the night before the cruise? So. Yeah, how, how was the Hyatt reason?
[00:20:43] Speaker A: Everyone stays at whatever that hotel is. Like right at Canada Place. Right. Because you can just come down and just walk and.
But you know, we, we, we stay at Hyatt's a lot. So like it was, we didn't pay for it. We just used our points to stay at the Hyatt Regency. It was a little less than a mile from the port and we could have walked if we wanted to, but we took an Uber anyway and. But it was great. It was kind of like in the downtown area and we got.
And it was right next to a Tim Hortons, which was a big destination for us.
So it was good. It was like near a lot of stuff that we wanted to check out the day before we go on the cruise. So I'd stay there. Again, it was a really nice room.
Great.
[00:21:27] Speaker C: Yeah, that is nice. I gotta say, I'm impressed also, like Ed is saying in the chat with people packing for either Africa or Alaska with just a carry on.
That's not my style. But I am, I appreciate others that others can do that.
I will give a pro tip though. That's that last full day of the cruise. Cruise, that laundry room. Well, on any of the ships, the laundry rooms get really busy. So you want to like maybe get up early in the morning or find times where others are other places because that's when the laundry rooms are actually the hardest to find a, you know, a machine to use.
[00:22:05] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:22:05] Speaker C: All right.
[00:22:06] Speaker A: There were some concession concessions made and the shoes that I brought like, were not it.
They killed my feet all week and I had to take a few days off just to let my feet chill out. So, you know, it wasn't all good because I only brought one bag. There were some concessions.
[00:22:25] Speaker C: But, yeah, shoes are important. I have a pair of waterproof sneakers. They're on clouds. That's what I wore throughout Alaska. I don't know if they're waterproof or water resistant. Technically. I think they advertise them as waterproof. Those were perfect for me. But they're like. They're just like regular sneakers. But they've got, you know, they're. And they're pretty comfortable. So I like those because I don't like hiking boots. Hiking boots I find to be uncomfortable, but I think, you know, something that's comfortable. But if you bring only one pair of shoes and your shoes get wet. Oh, there's nothing worse than being in wet shoes, in my opinion. So, yeah. All right. You did bring. Make sure to bring Buffalo check, which is that red and black lumberjack pattern, which is as. As he. Wesley's holding up awesome magnets that he made. And Wesley makes great magnets for all of his cruises now. And they're just fantastic. They're kind of this.
Think of classic arcade game design, like, pixelated, but that match the theme of the cruise and the ship and all of that. I love them. I think they're fantastic. I already told Wesley I want one of these, even though I wasn't on this cruise. But you have to have the buffalo check because that's what Donald is wearing. Donald and Daisy are wearing that buffalo check.
[00:23:41] Speaker A: And, like, shout out to my wife because she suggested the buffalo check. I was trying to mimic, like, the plaid that Mickey is wearing, but it just wasn't working out. And she was like, do Buffalo check. And I was like, I don't know what you're talking about. So she had to educate me real quick on what that was. And it was 100% the right choice. It turned out really great.
[00:24:02] Speaker C: Yeah. Well, it's the red and black, which is perfect for Mickey colors, too, so.
[00:24:08] Speaker A: Yeah, right, right.
The state flower is that Forget me not. And I put that on there because I knew this was going to be, like, an unforgettable trip. And so it was kind of a little, like, nod to that.
[00:24:20] Speaker C: I love that. All right, Brian, let's go through a couple of these slides. This is travel day.
I love the pictures of Ollie with his. At the airport.
We've got Tim Hortons, which is, of course, if you don't know, it's coffee and donuts in Canada. They're everywhere in Canada. It's like a 711 or Dunkin Donuts, but. And they're everywhere.
[00:24:43] Speaker B: They also have like, hot breakfast stuff at Tim Hortons because I definitely see the hash browns on the table there.
[00:24:47] Speaker C: So.
[00:24:47] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, McDonald's. So, like, it was kind of. Do we do McDonald's breakfast or Tim Hortons? We went to Tim Hortons and then the next day we went to McDonald's.
[00:24:59] Speaker C: I love it.
[00:25:00] Speaker A: It was awesome.
[00:25:00] Speaker C: I love it. All right, what are we seeing here? Oh, Granville.
[00:25:04] Speaker A: So real quick, we had one day to spend in Vancouver, so we picked three things and we did those three things. The first thing we did was go to Granville island public market.
And you know, it's like in Seattle, right? They have the public market. It's kind of like that. There's like fresh produce and like food stalls. And we got some like candied salmon there. The. What you're looking at here is pierogies and a sausage. I love pierogies.
California's not a big pierogi place. So, like, these were really good.
And then we just kind of hung out, browsed. The second thing we did was we went to Stanley park and we rented E bikes and we drove around or we rode around Stanley park, which I think it was a holiday on this Sunday in Vancouver. So it was very busy. And it's a one way path around the island, so it's. It's a couple miles and I say E bikes. But Oliver wasn't old enough to rent an E bike, so he just had to pedal his way around this.
I thought it was a breeze. He was very mad at me.
But we all made it.
And the reason why I wanted to go, because there's a totem park and there had. There's some totem poles there that I wanted to see.
[00:26:23] Speaker C: What was the age limit for the E bikes? Like, how old did you need to be?
[00:26:28] Speaker A: They needed to be 16.
[00:26:30] Speaker C: Oh, okay. That's good to know.
[00:26:33] Speaker A: Pretty wild, to be honest.
[00:26:35] Speaker C: Yeah, but.
[00:26:37] Speaker A: And then after we did that, we were tired, but we went to Capilano Suspension Bridge park and we walked around across this crazy suspension bridge. And I don't know, this place, this place confuses me. It's just like, it's. It's just feeding your fear of heights for the sake of feeding your fear of heights.
They build these structures, like off the edge of the cliff that you can just go out, look over. There's like glass bottom stuff or like, and these suspension bridges. It's. It was fun. It was fun.
They have like a little treetop course and the big suspension bridge and like this.
I don't even know what to call it but it goes out over like a gorge or river gorge and it was fun.
[00:27:25] Speaker C: Yeah, we love Capilano. It's. I think it's a great place to spend a day there. It is lots of walking. You if it for someone with mobility issues, I would. It's not place I would recommend but if you are fully mobile then it. And have a little bit of stamina. It's not like hiking. It's like. Like a little bit lower I would say in the. Or sort of very low level hiking if you needed to have like a comparison. But walking across the bridge does take a little bit of effort because it's. It moves and it's pretty long.
[00:27:58] Speaker A: Yeah, it moves a surprisingly large amount.
[00:28:02] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:28:03] Speaker A: And people are stumbling, fumbling across the whole thing and everyone's a little unsure about how it's going to end. But everyone I saw made it across.
[00:28:12] Speaker C: Love it. All right. We did get a comment in the chat that they're having a hard time hearing Brian. So we're going to have Brian turn up his gain on his microphone to make sure you all can hear him. And thanks to those, like if you can't hear one of us, you just tell us and we'll do our best to figure it out. There is a bit of a delay of course because we're on an online platform and so just letting you know. So if we cut off each other at times, apologies. It's. Some of that has to do with the Internet delay. All right, so we're looking at embarcation day. You get on at Canada Place. How is the. Is it smooth sailing in terms of check in process and boarding process? I know you go through immigration, of course because you're going essentially from Canada into the US as you're boarding the ship.
[00:28:58] Speaker A: Yeah. They had the same like facial recognition like customs type situation. So you just like go through everything. There was. Was great. There was a little bit of confusion or apprehension on our part because there were several ships boarding from the same terminal this day. So like at some point you have to like the Disney Wonder goes right and like whatever other budget cruise on your own goes left and then.
But it was fine. It all worked out. We got on the ship. The people who weren't supposed to be on our ship didn't go to our ship. And before we knew we were there. It was, it was fast and easy.
[00:29:34] Speaker C: Love it. Love it did. You had been of course on the Wonder before multiple times. But you. But you had more recently Been on the Magic, was it?
Do you. I mean, do you like the atrium better of the Wonder? Like, is it just like a different. I personally like the Wonder better, but, you know, they're both great.
[00:29:52] Speaker A: I do like the Wonder's Atrium better than the Magic, although I think the Wonder atrium used to be even better than it is now. Like, the old chandelier was, I think, more of my liking than the current one, but it's still nice. However, like, two weeks before Alaska, I was on the. I was on the Destiny for the second time. And so there was a bit of.
There was a bit of, like, claustrophobia. Like,
[00:30:22] Speaker C: that makes sense. I mean, the grand hall in a Wish class ship is like. Like multi. Multiple times bigger than the atrium on any of the classic ships, especially the Wonder and the Magic.
That's a big. A big difference.
I'm going to give a quick shout out to our friends over at Adventures and Mascapades, because I know they just put out an episode with you, Wesley, about your Destiny cruise, which is great. I love that you can go on different podcasts to talk about different cruises. And I appreciate that you came to talk with us about sailing in Alaska.
[00:30:57] Speaker A: Yeah.
When I got on that, first of all, talking to Alicia and Nathan was a lot of fun, and it really got me thinking about the Destiny going into, like, come, like, because I had been home from both of them when I. When I talked to them. And so I, you know, I had a real, real clear sense of, you know, what.
You know, what I liked and what was good, what I like, what was good and what was bad about each one. Not that either one.
Yeah, but I did. When I got on the Wonder, I felt like I could, like, lay down and, like, touch both sides of the. Of the atrium at the. At the same time with my feet. Because it was like. It was like, tiny, you know, you know how. You know how smug, like, Walt Disney World people come to Disneyland and they're like, oh, your castle's so small. Yeah, well, that's the Wonder.
There's a small, little, tiny baby atrium for ants.
But it's still cool. I get.
[00:31:53] Speaker C: It's still pretty awesome. It's still an amazing ship. And it's, you know, listen, it's.
There's something warmer about the Wonder than there is about the Destiny. So it's just different, right? Like, there's something warmer about Disneyland.
[00:32:06] Speaker A: Absolutely. Yeah. No, you're spot on with that.
[00:32:10] Speaker C: Yeah.
I love it. Nathan saying Disney Castle, Disneyland. Castle is small. It's cute, though. Okay. All right. Well, you hit up cabanas.
Let's go through some of these slides quicker. Ollie got a haircut. You didn't have time for a haircut at home. So you get him a haircut on board.
Thumbs up, thumbs down, thumbs up.
[00:32:29] Speaker A: I thought they did a great job. And it was kind of impromptu because. Impromptu. Me and Kim decided to get massages.
And so he is thumbsing up his haircut.
[00:32:41] Speaker C: I love Ollie's thumb. I love Ollie's thumb coming in from stage left first.
[00:32:46] Speaker A: And he was like kind of pampered by like a barber. My wife is a hairstylist by trade, so this might have been his first haircut, like outside of the home. I don't know.
[00:32:56] Speaker C: Outside of home. Oh, that's so hilarious.
[00:32:59] Speaker A: He did, he did a great job.
[00:33:01] Speaker C: Awesome. You get dinner at Triton's. Love that. All right, let's keep going.
[00:33:08] Speaker B: Brian, I actually have one question here from the chat about dinner.
Someone asked, they had seen that most people kind of come to dinner. They've heard a lot of people come to dinner more casually dressed on the Alaska sailings than what they might be used to on other sailings. Is that, was that your experience?
[00:33:31] Speaker A: Well, that's my personal experience. I for one, you know, didn't bring. I have, I have crew shoes that I usually come with, like the little boat shoes that I usually force myself and my children to wear to dinner with button up shirts and everything.
Yeah. And what with one bag, it wasn't gonna happen. So we were more casual than we normally are. There was still a fair number of people like dressed up like you would maybe.
But on a seven night, like, yeah, people came a bit more casual a few more days, but like people still got really dressed up for like formal night and all that kind of stuff.
[00:34:12] Speaker C: Yeah. You know, I will say, I think overall in Alaska though, people do tend to dress a little bit more casual because they are not bringing, for example, women aren't bringing sundresses for evening because it's colder. And so we're going to be more bundled up. So I think jeans are a little bit more prevalent on like an Alaska sailing than on like a Caribbean sailing. Right. So I think people do lean a little bit more casual. That being said, there are people who still like to dress up for dinner now. And Disney Cruise Line is still more casual than most other cruise lines. I love that Trey in the comments is saying he's slightly to the left in that picture from Tritons and he can't believe he was sitting next to a celebrity the whole time.
[00:34:54] Speaker A: Yeah, that was kind of a surprise to us. We got sat with another family and by the end we thought, man, Disney, like really like, did like some like, investigative journalism to like, put us with Trey and his family because we were the perfect match for each other. Like, they're super sports oriented. Their son is about the same age as our son and they got on really well and hung out and yeah, we're like pretty much best friends with Trey and his family now.
[00:35:25] Speaker C: Oh, I love that. I love that. Yeah.
[00:35:28] Speaker A: You see how for doing that?
[00:35:30] Speaker C: Yeah. I think it's great when you get matched up with sort of a family with a similar, like ages and structure. Right. It's a really nice thing if you get along really well and then you have some somebody else to talk to at dinner besides your family. Especially if you're on one of the classic ships that don't have as much entertainment during dinner. And I say that because if you're in Worlds of Marvel or you're in Arendelle, right on the wish class, like you've got entertainment that's happening. It's not the best opportunity to talk over dinner. But on those older ships, you have a lot of opportunity to talk over dinner. Yeah.
All right. We got some hot tub time.
[00:36:08] Speaker A: We got some, you know, I'm in there for the hot tub. Alaska wasn't going to keep me out of the hot tub. Ryan, we need more hot tubs. I'll never let it go.
[00:36:20] 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. My Path Unwinding Travel is an authorized Disney vacation planner, which means they are recognized by Disney for their expertise and and service. They have sailed on all the Disney ships, including in concierge, visited the theme parks, Adventured with Disney, Relaxed at Aulani, and so much more. Whether it's a Disney cruise, a theme park vacation or adventures by Disney, or if you are looking to expand beyond the mouse. My Path Unwinding Travel will elevate your next vacation planning experience. Even if you have already booked, reach out for a complimentary consultation to make your vacation even more magical. Ready to talk to the experts? Head over to mypath unwinding.com DCLDUO or email DCLDUO mypathunwinding.com so they know we sent you their way. Thanks. My path unwinding for sponsoring today's show. Now back to the episode.
[00:37:17] Speaker A: And then on Tuesday, our day at sea.
Best show in the whole fleet. So glad this is another deciding factor. Why we went on the Wonder was Golden Mickey's.
You can't talk me out of this one either. This is.
[00:37:31] Speaker C: I know. I can't talk Brian out of it either. Wesley.
[00:37:34] Speaker A: So good.
What do you. Brian, what do you like about Golden Mickey so much?
[00:37:38] Speaker B: I kind of like the review style of show. It really just kind of tugs it, like, the nostalgia a bit. And I just absolutely love for a long time that it still had Bob Iger in it. So, yeah, I like.
[00:37:54] Speaker A: The thing that I like about Golden Mickey's is that it starts before you're in the theater, when you're in, like, the Preludes area. And they got, like, the interviews going on where, like, they're interviewing guests who are going into the theater to see the show and it's being broadcast in the theater and there's, like, little bellhops walking around and there's, like, some audience participation in the show. I just think it's really immersive in a way that we don't think of immersion. Like, these days. It's like invisible immersion. Like, it's there. It's happening all around you. It's why I like the fantasmic at Disneyland better, because you can be on the island and then, like, there's this big production that happens later. It's the same thing with Golden Mickeys. Plus, we gotta put some respect on Ensign Benson's name. She's a hero. She does the best. She wasn't assigned to that role, and she becomes the star of the whole thing. And I think that's fantastic. I love that show.
[00:38:50] Speaker C: I also love Ensign Benson. I think she's, like. She's the best character across all of the Disney variety style of shows. So, yeah, let's put some respect on Ensign Benson's name. I love that. All right, we've got food here. We've got some, of course, great dishes in animators.
We've got pictures with Mickey in his Alaska gear. Did you guys do all of the pictures with all the different characters? That usually happens on Glacier Day.
How did you spend your Glacier Day, Wesley?
[00:39:26] Speaker A: So this was the beginning of Glacier Day. We only took pictures with Minnie. Look, I think it's well documented that I'm not a meter. I'm not a greeter. You know, I'm not.
I like that they're there and they're around, I'll take, you know, pictures from afar. I'm glad other people are enjoying it. I don't know what to do when I meet Mickey Mouse, so.
But I had to.
He's. He's dressed up. He got dressed up, so I had to do it. And so yes, we waited in line. We did do the first one we went to, the one that was about.
I think it was like around 1pm but one kind of bummer thing is that it was cold and raining and so the characters weren't on deck 10. I believe they were on deck nine. And Mickey here, you can see he was under the gazebo, like just by the main. Like Mickey. And that was at Mickey's pool. I don't know whatever the pool is.
But you know, we only waited about 20 minutes and we got our picture.
They were like hustling people through. Hustling people through, which is another like little as, like a photographer, like a little snag for me. And like, you gotta give me a minute, you gotta give me a 45 seconds at least to like set this up. And they were just like, go, go, go, snap, go. And I could have got better pictures. But alas, that's what we got.
[00:40:45] Speaker C: Yeah. Now I will say you would have waited longer if your weather was better though because there would have been an hour long line if your weather was better. So it's a B of like. Okay, so we waited less time. We didn't get as great of a picture and of course, you know, we didn't get the background. You got the. Just the deck. But it's.
[00:41:04] Speaker A: Yeah, a lot of people in the WhatsApp chat were taking their pictures that they got and then just like AI ing them on deck 10. You know, a little, little AI magic.
Yeah, it's, it's. We got what we got. I'm not mad about it. It was, it was perfect the way that it was.
[00:41:24] Speaker C: Well, and you got some great pictures. Obviously. You guys went up Endicott Arm to Dawes Glacier.
You guys also went on the. Did you go on the little glacier boat or not
[00:41:38] Speaker A: Excursions.
[00:41:39] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:41:41] Speaker A: And it was the excursion that we the least excited about because we were like not sure if it's something that we should, should pay extra for or whatever. So these pictures here, you know, you can see from the ship that's about as close as we got to the glacier on the ship, which was great. Everybody was kind of huddled up towards, you know, on the forward part of the deck where they were serving like hot chocolate and Everything.
And, you know, after we got our picture with Mickey, we changed clothes and then we were getting ready. We. We didn't have a veranda on this cruise. We just had a. A porthole. But we still got great views of the scenery and the waterfalls and the cascades and the icebergs. But we did get. We did do the Glacier Explorer. And it was really cool getting on, like, this smaller boat and, like, kind of like pulling away from the Disney wonder was like, really kind of an epic point of view that I wasn't really prepared for and worth the cost of admission to the. To this, to the boat in and of itself. And then we got super close, like, right where the ice just really starts to, like, acute has, like, accumulated and, like, it would be tough to, like, keep going closer.
And like, the deep blue of the glacier and some of the icebergs was, like, something that I had never experienced before. So it was really kind of inspiring to see, like, just the diversity of the glacier, that it's even happening, that it exists, that it's there, that we can get so close to see it. And the guides on our tour were really knowledgeable and gave us good information about what's a glacier, what's an iceberg, what's a. What's a bergy bit, you know, like, all these different things. What's a cascade? How is the cascade different than a waterfall?
Waterfalls have permanent water sources. Cascades are just snow melt from everything that's going on around you.
And so it's like the whole mountain is melting. There's just, like, water dripping down every. Every side of the mountain. It's really cool.
[00:43:51] Speaker C: These are gorgeous pictures that you got, Wesley. I mean, you, obviously, I know you're a great photographer, but you. You got some great shots of just these, as you mentioned, the bergy bits, icebergs, glacier, all the different names, depending upon what size you're talking about. What size? Pie, Ice.
[00:44:08] Speaker B: This. This is a great shot for folks at home if you want to understand what like, this boat looks like in terms of, like, size and scale. Like, it. There's. Head over to YouTube. Watch. Watch this part of the video because Wes has got a great interior shot of the boat here. So.
[00:44:22] Speaker A: Yeah.
Yeah. This was wedding cake.
That's Trey's backpack.
I didn't get consent before I use that picture. I hope. I hope he's fine with that.
That's Ollie. You know this. So we spent, like, a long time out there, and it was.
It was crispy, cold. Crispy cold. Like, like, we kept, like, Moving from the side to, like, behind the structure so we can, like, warm up a little bit.
And like, while we were preoccupied looking at the.
Looking at the glaciers and the icebergs, the wonder turned around and like, hightailed it out of there. She had other things to do. So she was going back out the Endicott Arm. And so we had a really long way to go to like, catch up to the. To the cruise ship to get back on.
[00:45:09] Speaker B: I'll never forget the day we did the glacier boat. Like watching the ship sail by, you're like, oh, my gosh, it's leaving, like, without us.
I did want to ask one of the. So you mentioned this is a long excursion. Like, it's longer than you think it's going to be. Because I remember us sailing in and out trying to find wildlife or something else. Did you see any wildlife from the boat? Because we never saw any real wildlife after we went to the glacier. So I was sort of like, why couldn't we have seen the glacier? Gone right back to the boat.
[00:45:36] Speaker C: We had seen whales like earlier on in the day, but we didn't see anything when we were coming. Actually. We did see, I think a couple of maybe sea lions or seals or whatever those things are.
[00:45:47] Speaker A: Yeah, I didn't. I didn't see anything. If somebody else saw something on our excursion or an earlier one, I didn't know about it, but no, we just saw the. We just basically saw waterfalls, glaciers, icebergs, that kind of thing.
But it was really.
It was raining and it was very cloudy, obviously, and foggy. Like there was one, like when we turned around to head towards the ship, like, we couldn't even see it. The ship was past, like out of our view. We couldn't see it because it was like, in the fog.
It was in the fog.
[00:46:19] Speaker B: All right, so it looks like you had dinner Animators palette that night. I'm going to try and move us through here, Wes, so we could get to all the, the, the fun ports. All right, so we're at Skagway now.
What did you get up to in Skagway?
[00:46:31] Speaker A: So in Skagway, we did the White Pass and Yukon Route train up into the Klondike, as they say. I'm still not 100 sure what that means, but that's what they kept saying. So I'm gonna repeat it.
Yeah, we took this train. It's like. It's like a vintage, like narrow gauge rail train. And you go from basically right near the port.
We took a small shuttle to the. To the Train. Then we got on and it's about 20 something miles and you go up about 3,000ft.
And it's like getting to be summer in Alaska, where it was like, it was about 40, a little over 40 degrees in Skagway this day. But by the time we got to the top, it was like, it was again bitterly cold.
And you can see my wife, she has her hood like cinched up tight to keep warm when we got to the top because it's just snow. They're like. Trees don't even grow here because it's too cold for trees.
They're small bushes and stuff, but not really a whole lot.
But Ollie, he wanted to get in the snow, so we got in the snow a little bit, fell down, immediately got wet, immediately came out. He's from California, has no idea what to do in the snow, but he had fun.
And then instead of taking the train back, we got on a shuttle which took us to.
What do you call this? Is this a town? I don't know. This is.
[00:47:58] Speaker C: It's called.
That's what you do.
[00:48:03] Speaker A: But I don't know.
[00:48:05] Speaker C: It was. It was essentially a gold rush camp. This area was a gold rush camp. I don't know if like what the name of it was, if it was called Liarsville. I don't think so. But it was a gold rush camp. And there's the players who kind of tell you the story of the gold rush. And then it leads into gold panning. I. I know we did this exact same excursion as Wesley. Yeah.
[00:48:28] Speaker A: Yeah. You guys said Nathan really liked this. So I sold it to Oliver that way. And it was spot on.
He really enjoyed the train. At first it was a little boring, but as we climbed higher and higher, it got more interesting to him. There's waterfalls and we were real close. And you go through a tunnel. There's like a broken, like bridge earlier. So he really liked it. And then we got to Liarsville and like, I was a bit nervous, like going driving past some of the scenery on the way in. But once we got there, it was great. It was like a 30 minute little like variety act of, you know, as if they were from like the gold rush days. And it was cute. And then we did some panning for gold and Ollie found some gold.
And then we got out of there and we still had time in Skagway after all of that.
And it's a long excursion. That one was the train ride and the bus and the Liarsville and coming back. And then we had to walk back into town. It wasn't far, but still, you know, it was like five hours, five and a half hours, so.
[00:49:39] Speaker B: So when someone's asking in the chat, did you do the afternoon train? It looks sunnier than when we went in the morning. And I was just gonna say, like, I don't know which train you did, but I was gonna say it could be highly dependent upon time of year as the sunlight gets. I mean, in Seattle, it can get it to be 9pm at the peak summertime. 9, 9:30 before the sun goes down. So in Alaska, I think it kind of also matters time of year. But do you remember, did you do the morning train or the afternoon train?
[00:50:03] Speaker A: It was definitely not an afternoon train. I think it was like a tent. I think we had a 10.
[00:50:08] Speaker C: Yeah, I think if. If you're doing the one that goes to Liarsville, I think it's only offered in like. Like the morning times. There might be more than one time, but I don't One in the. In the afternoon that does the Liarsville and the gold panning all together. Because it does take like five and a half hours, as you mentioned.
[00:50:26] Speaker B: Yeah, this Pizza west is making me very hungry right now. I can see the picture of the pizza from the Red Onion.
[00:50:32] Speaker A: Can't tell if the pizza was really good or if we were just like, really hungry and famished from, like, being out all day.
The. The Klondike Doughboy fry bread was good. That like. Like, got Oliver over being hangry. He was pretty hangry at that point. And then the pizza just hit the spot. The Red Onion is like an old brothel, and they have like a brothel museum and a. It's like a bar and like a place to eat. It was good.
And then we went. Just went back to. And then that was it. That was like the whole day in Skagway.
[00:51:06] Speaker C: All right.
[00:51:06] Speaker A: And then my.
[00:51:08] Speaker B: You got Tiana's place for dinner that night.
[00:51:11] Speaker C: Yeah, that's shrimp and grits.
[00:51:12] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:51:13] Speaker C: Gotta love it.
[00:51:15] Speaker A: That's right.
The next day we went to Juneau. Juneau. And we did the slots.
Excuse me. The sled dog summer camp.
Again, it was like a short shuttle ride right from the port. And we got up there and there was like 120, 130 dogs.
They each have their own doghouse. They each have a name that sounds silly, but, like, their name is on their doghouse. And they're all training to run races. To run, like, Iditarod type races.
And so we met a musher, her name was Abigail.
And she told us all about the Iditarod and like what it takes to run the thousand miles in the snow with these, with a team of 12 dogs.
And how long it would take, you know, to do something like that. It would take like over a week, sometimes two weeks to do it, depending on how good of a musher you are.
About, like the little booties and like what she packs on her sled or what she will pack on her sled. She's hoping to run the identity in about 10 years. She's going to raise her own pups and then get out there. Right now she's just training, so she's learning all the commitments.
So they took us. They had a sled that has wheels on. It was modified for these dogs to train during the summer. And so they rained up some sled dogs and they took us out on a two mile sledding, I don't know what you call it.
Sled sledding run.
Yeah, basically. And then.
Yeah, so we went out about two miles and the dogs were so excited. They were yapping and they're fast, man. There was like 10, almost 10 people on our sled and they were hauling us.
[00:53:02] Speaker C: 10 people on your sled?
Wow, that's a lot of people to pull. Like when we did our sled, we did our sled of course, on the glacier and so it was just us and the handler. So it was just essentially four people.
The, you know, the musher and so. But wow, 10 people. But these dogs love to run. Like, they get excited, they just want to run. It's like, like all they want to do.
[00:53:25] Speaker A: And if you don't, like, if people haven't done this, like you might be expecting like the big fluffy like Siberian type husky. And these are more like a, like a crossbreed between like a husky. These are Alaskan huskies and they're bred with like greyhounds of dogs that are fast.
Siberian huskies are. They have brute strength and they're strong. But these Alaskan huskies are fast.
Anyway, Ollie got to meet the dog he loved, a dog named Dinosaur. He became friends with them. And then of course we met the, the puppies who were just, you know, her just getting started.
[00:53:58] Speaker C: Yeah. And you got to see like three week old puppies. I know from your Instagram stories that you didn't get to pet, but these were like this, the older puppies meaning like a couple months old, essentially.
[00:54:09] Speaker A: Yeah, y. Y exactly.
[00:54:13] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:54:16] Speaker A: Yeah, we went for donuts. We like to have our desserts first. I guess it seems like before our meals.
So, you know, we went to this place Called jellyfish donuts. Someone said they have a salmon donut and 0 out of 10, I gotta be honest, do not.
Do not recommend. I tried. I was like, it'll be fine. I like salmon. It's not fine. It wasn't fine. It was not good. Don't.
[00:54:42] Speaker C: But you did get other sweet donuts that were good, I presume?
[00:54:46] Speaker A: Yep. Regular donut. Yeah, my wife got a regular donut. She got like a chocolate one. I think Oliver got like a strawberry one.
Other way around, he's saying. He's right here. He's like, making sure I get all the facts. He's just like, Austin side. He's my fact checker.
[00:55:01] Speaker C: I love it.
[00:55:03] Speaker A: They didn't even. They couldn't even wait for me to finish my donut. They were like, you're grossing me out. We're out of here. So they left and I. I was alone.
Alone in jellyfish eating, trying to muscle down my salmon donut. I got a couple bites in and then I thought, it's not.
I have nothing to prove to anybody. And I threw it away.
[00:55:21] Speaker C: I will say Michelle is saying in the chat, both the dinosaur, the dog was the cutest, and that the maple bacon donut was fabulous. Which is where what I would go for. I'd go for a maple bacon donut. I highly recommend if you're visiting the Seattle area, that you go to Top pot donut and have a maple bar. So if a donut fan. But jellyfish donuts is where you're. Where you're supposed to go when you're in Juneau.
Love it.
[00:55:47] Speaker B: What? What? I just want to ask. What. What did the salmon donut, Was it like smoked salmon or like, what did it taste like?
[00:55:54] Speaker A: Okay, so basically it was.
Basically it was like a donut. And then it was just.
To me, it just seemed like salmon cream cheese.
[00:56:04] Speaker C: Yeah. Like, it looks like a salmon pate kind of on spread on top of the donut. Not quite a cream cheese, but more of like a sal spread, right?
[00:56:13] Speaker A: Yeah. Salmon.
It doesn't matter. It was not good.
But luckily we walked up the street and we went to a place called Deckhand Dave's where we got some proper, like, fish and chips. And that was good.
I do recommend going up there. It's like a food truck style situation. You eat outside. And it was great. It was great.
[00:56:38] Speaker C: The fish was had.
[00:56:39] Speaker A: I got that.
[00:56:39] Speaker C: You had. You had halibut and chips, right? I love halibut and chips. That's like. That's the best.
[00:56:45] Speaker B: Look at the pool in this picture. It's so crowded.
[00:56:51] Speaker A: We always talk about. You always talk about kids. Soup man. There was. There were people in the pool sometimes, but most, mostly everyone just stuck to the hot tubs because they exist on this ship. Thank you.
[00:57:05] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:57:05] Speaker A: Anyway,
[00:57:08] Speaker C: great food pictures. I gotta say, Wesley, I love these. The food pictures from Tritons. These are great pictures. I mean, all of your food pictures are really good. They make me really hungry.
[00:57:18] Speaker A: Yeah, these restaurants were really doing it for me.
This night in Triton's. Right. We're coming back around now. It was lobster night. And just off the bat, like, if you're at my server and there's lobster night, just.
[00:57:31] Speaker B: Just.
[00:57:32] Speaker A: Let's just cut to the chase. Bring me at least two and then go from there. So, yeah, the lobster. I know you guys have issues with the lobster because sometimes it's not dub at Just Sam.
[00:57:45] Speaker B: Just Sam.
[00:57:46] Speaker C: Just me.
Just me. Brian. I will say Brian is not a big lobster guy in general, so he doesn't. He wouldn't order you. I feel like you are. You order.
[00:57:57] Speaker B: Oh, I love lobster. I just.
[00:57:58] Speaker A: I. I like.
[00:57:59] Speaker B: You just get the serpent all the time. Oh, well, we never go to lobster night on the ship, so I never get a chance to order lobster.
[00:58:06] Speaker C: That's not true. We have gone to lobster night and he orders the lamb dish usually. I will say I have ordered the lobster on Disney Cruise Line a couple of times, and every time I've ordered it, I've been disappointed because it's overcooked. And I love lobster, but I don't like overcooked lobster, so. All right, catch.
[00:58:26] Speaker A: So. So it's good if it's there. It's good if it. If you're gonna give it to me. I like it. Ketchikan.
Ketchikan. We just. We were tired, man, and so we just kind of, like, took it easy. We wandered around town and then we went to the. We got some more food. We got some more fish and chips. We went to a place called Annabelle's Famous Keg and Chowder House. Again, I got more halibut. I really wanted to get the. The crab leg legs, but, like, one crab leg was like a hundred bucks.
[00:58:57] Speaker B: But.
But I'll say this. They're not crab legs like you. I mean, they are like. I mean, I see them at Pike Market here. They're like. It's like one crab leg is like a full meal.
[00:59:05] Speaker A: It's huge.
[00:59:06] Speaker B: But. Yeah, I hear you. The cost is high, but, yeah, they
[00:59:09] Speaker C: are very expensive, but they are also delicious.
[00:59:12] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, ended up Spending more than a hundred dollars on a variety of different things. And I could have just gone to Crab Lake.
It wasn't. I don't know. I should. We'll go back, we'll do it. We'll do it again. It'll be fine. The other place that everyone goes, like near the port, the line was just so long and I didn't. I didn't want to wait in. In the line, so we went to this place.
[00:59:32] Speaker C: We didn't go to that place either. So the, the one that. The famous one, I can't remember the name of it. It's. It's blanking on me right now. But the famous one in Ketchikan that everyone goes to, we didn't go to. We went to one that was actually a little bit closer to the ship that had been recommended and the prices were lower and fresher and it was really, really good. I can't remember the name of it. It was literally across an hour show last year.
[00:59:58] Speaker B: It was literally across the street from the famous place because we ate there and then we walked across the street and saw everyone else eating at the
[01:00:03] Speaker C: famous place in the next shopping center. Yeah, exactly. But it was closer, like a block closer to the ship than the famous. The famous. The famous one is Red Dog. Thank you, Mark. In the comments.
And we went to the one across the street.
[01:00:20] Speaker A: I'm gonna look it up.
[01:00:20] Speaker B: I'm gonna look it up. Keep going.
[01:00:22] Speaker C: We mentioned it on our. We mentioned it on our Alaska show that we did in September, but Brian will look it up. Okay, so this was your day of like souvenir shopping and then did you go to the lumberjack show? I saw the. We know, I know because I mean, the show. Art is Ollie at the lumber with the Lumberjacks. Brian, advance ahead, one slide.
But yeah, tell us you went to the Disney Cruise Line specific lumberjack show. So you had time probably before and after the lumberjack show.
Because it's usually the afternoon one. Right.
[01:00:52] Speaker A: Only before. We only had time before reject show.
We had like 30. 30 minutes to get back. To get back on the ship.
[01:01:03] Speaker C: Yeah. How was the lumberjack show? Did you feel like it was appropriate for like a 12 year old? When I say appropriate meaning, like, I know it skews more towards younger. It's like a better. This show is more for a younger crowd. Did it work for Ollie? And. And how was Goofy's part in the show? Because. Because it's obviously a small part in the Disney Cruise Line specific one. You have a character.
[01:01:26] Speaker A: Yeah. So Goofy came Out at the very beginning. And he basically just did like some calisthenics with the kids. They were like stretching, doing sit ups, push ups. I found it quite odd, to be honest.
Like, I don't know what I was expecting, but I wasn't expecting like stretching.
[01:01:46] Speaker C: Yeah.
So he doesn't actually play a part in the show. He just does like a pre show,
[01:01:52] Speaker A: like little pre show thing. And it was fine. I'm. I guess I'm glad we did it because now we know. You know, he saw it, he liked it. Oliver liked it.
You know, his. Some. His friends from Edge were there. So, you know, he kept like melting jokes to them and laughing, whatever. So it was fun, but would probably skip it if we went back.
[01:02:17] Speaker C: Yeah. So it's not a must do. I mean, there are people who say this is a must do. We've heard from a couple of people. It's not a must do, I think. Choose your own adventure there.
We did the lumberjack show in Grouse Mountain out in North Vancouver because we knew we weren't going to get a chance to do it on this day because we were so focused on going on that bear excursion for Nathan. So.
All right, well, you had time, of course, before to do your souvenir shopping. You're back at Animators Palette this night. Is this animation magic night in Animators or was the first night?
[01:02:51] Speaker A: It was. No, this night was animation magic. Yeah.
[01:02:55] Speaker C: Nice.
[01:02:55] Speaker A: If you haven't animation magic before, you really like it?
I'm probably done with it at this point.
[01:03:04] Speaker C: Hot take.
[01:03:07] Speaker B: I guess I skipped too far ahead. There we go. So, and Sam, some Tracy's was the place that we were thinking of, which is actually in Juneau. That's in Juneau, not in Ketchikan, I think. So that's the place. That's the place where we ate the crab legs. Right across the street from the famous place is. Is Juno. That's that.
[01:03:25] Speaker A: Yeah.
[01:03:26] Speaker C: Okay, well, I don't remember. What was the name of the place we went to that. That I can't tell, like was like fish gill or something. I want. I know that's not. It's not what it is. But yeah, I will. I'll find it. Okay. Sorry. So Animators. What? What? And then your last day was your. Another C day, right?
What did you. Ah, I found it. Twisted Fish Company. Look at that. Twisted Fish Company.
[01:03:55] Speaker A: Wow. Good one.
[01:03:56] Speaker C: In Juno. Yeah. Yeah. I knew it had fish in it. I knew it.
[01:04:01] Speaker A: So our last day, our sea day.
You know, this is about like trivia.
Bingo.
Ice Cream.
You know, I do want to talk about Crown and Finn for a moment. These pubs on these ships, like the Wonder and the Magic are the pubs.
[01:04:23] Speaker C: Yes.
[01:04:23] Speaker A: That Disney should use going forward. Like, like I got. People get really excited about like, oh, it's pirates. It's. It's Pirates of the Caribbean pub. Yeah. But it doesn't matter if it's not good. Like this is good. Like the, like the immersion. Like the.
Let me go back. Like if you go like on a Wish Class ship and you go into a pub, there's a hallway, like a concourse that everyone's walking down. There's a door you go in. It's just one space.
This, a hallway that leads to it and there's a door and there's like a vestibule type thing and then there's.
It's just better place setting overall going in here. And the space is bigger. I don't understand. Like the Wish Class ships are bigger but a lot of the spaces feel smaller on the inside.
[01:05:15] Speaker C: They've broken them up into more small spaces as opposed to making just bigger the same spaces that are on like the Magic.
[01:05:26] Speaker A: Yeah. I get.
I don't want to. You know, it was a good idea. This is a better idea. The original idea was the better idea.
[01:05:35] Speaker C: Yeah. I love, I love the pubs on. On the Magic Class too. I think the, that. Yeah. I think Crown and Finn is. Is the best in. In terms of a real pub feeling. It really feels like you're in a British style pub pub. Yeah.
[01:05:52] Speaker B: I'm gonna dis. I'm gonna disagree. Quietly disagree. I guess my mic is so quiet. Maybe no one will hear my disagreement. But I, I love the direction they headed with the new pubs on the new ships. I love that they, they all have a little bit of theming to them. So I don't get me wrong, I also love the Crown and Femme, but I kind of love Disney changing it up and not just doing like a English pub. So.
[01:06:14] Speaker A: So I'll tell you this Br. Like I, I do agree that the.
For me it's about architecture, it's about layout.
You know, it's about like, you know, the way you get there and how you experience and how the space like kind of opens up and reveals itself to you.
Right. This is a theme with me. You've heard me talk about why I like Castaway better than Lighthouse Point. It's for the same reason. Right. Like when I'm sitting in whatever the other venue is where they do like Match youh Mate. What is this called on The.
[01:06:50] Speaker B: Oh, on the wonder.
[01:06:52] Speaker C: Azure or. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[01:06:55] Speaker A: And, like, there's, like, that back hallway that goes out of Azure. And, like, azure has a very distinct side. You look down the hallway, and you can't see into the pub. And it's not just a door to the pub, but, like, the theming changes. Like the. Like the flooring changes, the texture on the walls changes. And then, like, eventually, you get into the pub later, and if you got in there and it was pirates or it was 20,000 leagues under the Sea, then it might be perfect. It might be 10 out of 10.
So it's not about the theme necessarily, like proper English Pub, but more about how you.
[01:07:34] Speaker C: More about entry and the layout. Yeah, the flow. The flow.
All right, well, Brian, let's head. Okay, so here. Here are the friends we make on Disney Cruise Line. Of course. Right. This. I take this is Trey and family.
[01:07:50] Speaker A: Yep, that's Trey and Lindsay and their son Tucker.
Great table mates, like, the whole time. And we had a really. We had a blast with them. They were on our glacier thing with us and had a great time meeting them, getting to know them, having dinner with them every night, having someone to talk to, see around the ship. We went to Trivia together, and we've. We've even been texting after we left the cruise, so. So shout out to them. Great.
[01:08:18] Speaker C: Yeah.
Cruise friends are the best friends.
[01:08:22] Speaker A: Tiana's just. By the way, I know we're running low on time, but Tiana's like, My take is this is the best restaurant on the fleet as well. It's.
You have your ip, but it's not overwhelming. There's entertainment, but you can still have a conversation. And the food is great, too, because it ends with big.
[01:08:43] Speaker B: By the way, Wes, Trey wants to know if he gets, I think, his name and likeness funds from this episode. So there you go.
[01:08:51] Speaker C: Sorry, Trey, we don't. We don't do that.
[01:08:54] Speaker A: They will get. Yeah. The checks in the mail. Trey.
[01:08:57] Speaker C: Yeah, he'll get a. He'll get it. You'll get a version 5571 magnet. I bet you probably already have one, so congratulations.
[01:09:04] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, silly me. I tried to give it to him twice, but he's like, I already got it. And I was like, okay, so I. I.
[01:09:12] Speaker C: We've got a lovely cast member. Who is this cast member that we're seeing? Is this.
God? I was just making sure it was Ensign Benson. Yeah.
[01:09:23] Speaker A: Like, all the characters come out. Like, all the stage performers and all the Disney characters come out. It's a For meet and greets. Like, right at the. On the last night before we all have to leave the next day. And so, again, I'm not a. I'm not a meet and greet kind of person, but if Vincent Benson's in the house, catch me. Catch me with.
[01:09:42] Speaker C: I love it. I didn't realize that she comes out for a meet. And greet. I have. That's why I was like. That's why I was a little confused. I was like, I feel like that's her outfit. But I was like, but why is she in the hallway? Like, she's not. Yeah, she should be on stage. Right?
[01:09:55] Speaker A: I had no idea either. I had no idea either. I was starstruck.
[01:10:00] Speaker C: I love it.
And. And here you guys are in, of course, the beautiful atrium with eri.
Now, tell us, Wesley, would you do this again? I mean, it sounds like you say you're going to go back to Alaska. Would you do this again with Disney Cruise Line? Would you do it with a different cruise line? Would you consider sailing on a different ship if that was an option? Not necessarily the Magic, because I know your last experience in the Magic was a little less than wonderful, but. Yeah.
What do you think about Alaska and specifically Alaska with Disney? Again,
[01:10:37] Speaker A: I love it. Like, my expectations were, everyone raves about Alaska. I would 100% sail to Alaska again.
We need to take the rest of our kids to Alaska now that we've taken Oliver. So, yeah, it'll happen again in the future. We have some other things we need to, like, check off the list first. But Alaska is.
There's no way. Even in pictures or. Or, you know, even if I was better at language and could describe it to you better, there's like. There's really just no way to accurately, you know, justifiably, like, describe what the experience is like. And the variety of things that are available in Alaska, you know, can keep you coming back, you know, season after season, because there's so many other things to do. There's more adventurous things. We didn't even talk about, like the, like, wildlife expert that was. That was on the ship, and she did lectures and we watched some and we, you know, listened to her on some of those.
It's just. It's like the cruise that's going to keep on giving. It's going to be different every time. The scenery is going to be different, be different. Your experience is going to be different. I would go on, like, a.
Like a fantasy or a dream, you know, if they ended up going up there, or obviously a new class of Ship I would go on. Yeah, I would do whatever. I would go on any Disney Cruise Line ship to go. To go to Alaska. You know, I'm. You guys are 100 to blame for this, like, obsession that I've have, like, recently, in the past couple years.
[01:12:13] Speaker C: Sorry. Not sorry.
[01:12:15] Speaker A: No, I'm not. Like, don't be sorry. I'm not sorry. No. Like, the only person who's sorry is my bank account. But that's fine. They'll get the. All over.
It's.
It's fantastic. Like, we like the people that we've met, the experiences that we've had, the, the friends. Like, my children have made.
10 out of 10, man.
[01:12:37] Speaker B: Nice.
[01:12:38] Speaker C: I love it. I love it.
Wesley. I agree with you. I think there's nothing better than Disney in Alaska, I think. And, and there's. Honestly, like, every cruise that we've taken now kind of pales in comparison to Alaska.
The scenery, the cast, the ship, the dueling pianos at night. Right. Like, there's so much that, I mean, there's so much we haven't even talked about. Right. But we're going to wrap up the show here, Wesley. Tell folks where they can find you, follow you, all of the things. It's on the screen, but tell people who aren't watching on YouTube all of those things.
[01:13:14] Speaker A: You can go to my website. It's version5571.com. Version5571.com you can sign up for my newsletter. I'm, like, sending out deals. Like, Disney is coming out with deals all the time for, like, cruises or for the parks, hotels.
So I'm just trying to, like, get people to know like, like, people talk often about how it's expensive to do these things, and it's true. But there are. If you can become a little bit savvy in how you do this, it becomes more accessible. Don't be scared by the price because there's ways around that. You know, we didn't get a. We didn't get a veranda in Alaska because it wasn't in the budget and we had a great time either way. You know what I mean?
Anyways.
[01:13:59] Speaker C: Absolutely.
[01:14:00] Speaker A: Ram version 5571 threads, whatever, everywhere. And I do have to give a shout out to Best day Ever Vacations. They helped me plan this.
They've kind of. I've partnered with them. You can find them on my website as well.
[01:14:19] Speaker B: And, and we will. We will link all the ways you can find Wes in the show notes both on YouTube and out on Apple Pocker. The podcast channels. Wherever you listen to us on podcasts, if they have shownotes, you'll be able to find them.
Make sure to connect with Wes. We love to follow all of his stuff with that. I think we're going to wrap up here. We're 15 minutes over. Thanks everyone.
[01:14:41] Speaker C: Oh, yes, Brian, what do, what do we have on tap for.
[01:14:45] Speaker B: I was getting to that. Yeah, I was getting to it.
We're gonna wrap up here next week. We will be back at our regular time Monday night, 5:30pm Pacific, 8:30pm Eastern. And we will have the incomparable Danny Schuster and Stephanie Schuster. Sorry, my brain is left in Oslo because I just got back last night from a work trip. To us from Oslo.
[01:15:10] Speaker C: That's right. Danny and Stephanie are, I believe on the destiny right now or they just got off and they're, they're sailing for the first time with a kid. They don't have children themselves but they're sailing with their nephew.
And so it's going to be their first experience on Disney Cruise Line sailing with a child in tow. And so we're going to hear from them. They're the folks who run and own the, the WDW magazine, DLR magazine and DCL magazine. So friends of our sponsors of the show and we're very excited to hear their trip reports, we gotta say a huge thank you to Wesley, a huge thank you to Ollie. Ollie, thank you for letting dad share your birthday cruise with us. Happy birthday. Welcome to year 12 of your life.
And yeah, we're very excited that we got to cover this show and your Alaska cruise. Fantastic. Would you give it two thumbs up, one thumb up. What do you say?
[01:16:05] Speaker B: Two thumbs up.
[01:16:07] Speaker A: All right, well say every day until right now.
[01:16:14] Speaker B: All right, we will see you all next week. Thanks again, Wes and thanks everyone out there for hanging in.
[01:16:19] Speaker A: Yeah, I really appreciate it.
[01:16:27] Speaker B: Well, thanks to everyone out there for listening this week. We really, really appreciate it. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast. You can keep getting great content from us 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 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 DCLDUO mypathunwinding.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 Florida full catalog of the podcast episodes including a searchable catalog for the podcast links off to our vlog a link to our Etsy store where 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 on a few blog articles that we've written. So DCLDUO.com is the best way to connect. 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 a Disney vacation, please contact the great folks over at My Path 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. Good night.
