This is going to be long…
Before you go: the day check in opens, check in that moment, so you can get an early boarding time, and if you want an easy character experience, book the princess meet and greet at that time too. We had finished lunch and had some of our bags while people we still boarding.
We had a 12pm boarding time, dropped our bags in a little early, and they called for 12pm at 11.45am and on we went! We turned our phones on airplane mode with wifi enabled, so we could use the navigator app without incurring charges.
We went straight to Cabanas for lunch, lots of seats at that early time. I had read it is hard to get a seat, I imagine as it gets busier and busier, seats are harder to come by. Food was good, lots of variety. We had a look at our daily itinerary and ‘hearted’ the things we wanted to do. What is awesome about that is they alert you so you have time to get to the next thing you want to do.
Room was ready at 1.30pm.
Bags at 1.45, but one of ours did come along hours later, my daughter was so worried because it was her bag. They will be in your room by 6pm.
I wanted the kids to take advantage of the no queue at the water slide, so they did, a lot! Glad we ticked that off while the sun was shining! My son went on 13 times. This was the only time any of us went in the water on the whole cruise. We walked around the ship, played some games in the outdoor game area.
3pm Disney trivia level 1 for level 1, it was tricky, very Mulan heavy 😂 There is a big trust system with the marking of the trivia sheets, and I honestly don’t trust that people don’t cheat. But it was good fun!
Checked out edge and vibe.
Dinner at Animators Palate, the food was alright, there was a lot of it. My husband is vegan and there was a push to pre order his food, the head waiter expressed that they could make something up for him, but our main server just wanted him to preorder off the menu that already existed. Seemed very strange. He could eat, but it didn’t feel as inclusive as it has been at other Disney experiences. I really enjoyed the starters at all of the restaurants, the mains less so.
The store doesn’t open until we are in international waters, which was 6.30pm on our cruise out of Melbourne. We went in after dinner and it was PACKED! We left, did our FE, some pixie dusting on deck 2, 5 and 7 and headed to the Golden Mickey’s show. We were early (24 mins) and it was almost full! People coming in 15 mins early couldn’t find seats together! There are not enough seats for everyone, make sure you get there early!!! The show was lovely. The crowd talked the whole way through, not really respectful of the performers. My kids thought this was the best show of the 3, my husband and I preferred Frozen.
Day 2 At sea
9am breakfast at Cabanas. There was no seating and you had to queue for a bit to get food. The selection was amazing, really something for everyone, and delicious too! We ate outside, but near the pool as it is under cover, not windy. It worked out better as it was so loud inside.
Went to the shops, opened at 9.30, way less hectic this morning. The merch is very underwhelming if you are used to Disney merch. We managed to find a couple things, but spent less than half of my budget for merch.
We went and pixie dusted our whole deck (6). There were waaaaay more FEs than were in our FE gifting spreadsheet. We also received so much Pixie Dust!
Pixar trivia, these are lots of fun. I doubt we will ever win one, but it’s still good family fun. The thing I loved most about this particular trivia is no one got 20/20 😂
Lunch at Cabanas, it’s hectic. The food is good, lots of variety again, but it’s very busy!
We had the 2pm Frozen show because of the Marvel night time show. We started queuing at 1.20 and there were about 2-300 people in front of us. It’s wild, I knew there would be queues, but I didn’t expect them to be quite as hectic for a show, at this price point. It’s very Disney. Expect queues for everything! Unlike Disneyland, I didn’t queue for the bathrooms at all, so that’s a plus! The show was good, but people were going in and out the whole show, it was very distracting. I am a theatre nerd, so I found the talking and moving throughout the theatre really disrespectful.
Marvel Trivia, damn this was hard! It was also super busy as it was after a craft session. Really hard to get a seat! We ordered the beignets which were DIVINE! The people that won, I don’t think they actually won, our host didn’t think so either. Cheating is massive in these games, everyone wants the medal, but it’s a bit shit. We stayed on for origami, it was excellent!
Somewhere around here my son lost his phone, someone handed it in to lost and found. So grateful to that person. My son kept going off to Edge at every opportunity, we aren’t even sure where he lost it, he thinks doing the Edge scavenger hunt. But what a relief that it was handed in! No clue how they knew it was ours though!
Dinner at Tiana’s. This is a party, this was an excellent time. Good food, good vibes! This was our favourite dinner! Also a photo op with Tiana at our table.
The Marvel show, I was so tired, I dragged myself to this because the kids wanted to see it, it was AMAZING. So clever. We all thoroughly enjoyed it and were glad to be there. Bring a jacket!
Day 3 at sea
Despite the late night, we were up and out by 8am, cabanas was relatively empty, table found easily, no queue. Good food, love the French toast and Mickey waffles!
Straight to the Royal Gathering, photos with the Princesses. By some miracle this free character experience booking had a space when we checked in. We didn’t queue for any other characters because we have hundreds of photos with characters from parks all over the world. I didn’t want to waste my cruise queueing, so we did this, 20 mins start to finish. There was Belle, Cinderella, Ariel and Tiana, all beautiful, making conversation with the kids. Great experience, this is one to book the minute check in opens! Use your own camera or buy their photos, it’s up to you. We only bought one photo.
Chill morning, packing up, a nap because I’m constantly exhausted, so many activities and always somewhere to be. I haven’t lounged, or really read my book at all. Maybe an extra day at sea would bring more time for relax, or maybe we would just do extra activities 🤷🏻♀️
We ordered room service, I needed to try the choc chip cookie and a Mickey bar, grabbed a key lime pie while ordering. We tipped $1usd per item in cash, we brought a bunch of singles for this.
We caught the Jack Jack Diaper Run, where they race crawling babies. This was hilarious! A highlight.
Lots of walking around, looking for Disney Ducks, checking our photos, grabbed a quick bite from Pete’s Boiler Room. It was these things, the Disney ducks, FE and pixie dusting that was probably the most magical thing, and it’s the amazing Disney humans that bring that magic. I had so many awesome conversations with Big Disney Fans, loved that, you see the best and worst of people in these situations, and those people really brought the joy, big shout out to Tabatha who became a touchstone in the cruise. I love when you keep running into the same Disney humans.
More trivia, Disney tunes. The people that were known to us as cheats were in this one (their son told my son in Edge that they cheated when we played the first trivia). It’s a bit of a downer… They did change the scoring system to swapping with a neighbour instead of an honour system, so that was awesome. We are never going to win, but I want someone to win that really knows the answers. Then the celebrity behind the curtain, this was hilarious!
Learn to draw Groot. Unlike in the parks and at Aulani, this is done off a video. A nice relaxing activity though.
Our final dinner at Tritons. We gave our servers their tips. We felt that our assistant server gave the best experience and felt sad she gets the least tips, so we gave her some extra USD. The appetisers and starters here were the best. I didn’t love the main. Dessert was yum! Tritons is beautiful and fancy, the kids least favourite 😅
Our final show ‘Disney Dreams: An Enchanted Classic’, again, we were there 40 mins before and hundreds of people in front of us. Queue for characters and any experience not clearly included, but it would be good if you could show up 15 mins early and get a seat together. They could benefit from making people sit in the order they enter, that would cut all of the seat saving out too! The show was good, but ten minutes from finishing a kid two seats away from us vomited, we finished the show watching from the back of the theatre.
And that is us. Bed early, early morning ahead. We got our pre paid gratuities sorted and delivered, bag tags for the disembarkation morning, feedback form filled out. There were 10.30 fireworks, but we have seen many Disney fireworks, it wasn’t worth not packing our winter jackets for.
Day 4 disembarkation
Our rotating dining crew really wanted us to go to Tritons, but we went to Cabanas at 6.50am, it was pretty empty. Quick breakfast, chilled in the French Quarter until 8 when our luggage group was called, grabbed luggage, and an Uber, we were home by 8.40am!
Pack warm clothes! Even on warm days, the nights are chilly and there will be something happening at 10.30pm. We packed proper winter jackets for the 10.30pm marvel show, and I’m so glad we did! Bring a spirit jersey or jumper for the chilly evenings, or windy moments on deck through the day. We saw lots of kiddos in their oodies at all hours.
The bathroom is awesome divided into two, so showering and toileting can happen at the same time to get those mornings moving! The water pressure is awesome. We bought a motion sensor light for on the back of the toilet door, best move! I have heard other people use glow sticks too.
Bring eye masks or a peg to keep your curtains together, ear plugs for the random hall noise and general ship creakiness.
Take that motion sickness medication before you go. We used it at random times and twice my son needed anti nausea tablets. Bring everything from home! I felt the most motion sick in the shows and at dinners.
There isn’t always a clear conversation about added costs, at check in they fitted my son with a wrist band for the children’s kids club without discussing cost or return for refund. I said no, he said yes and she gave it to him. He lost it while at Edge, guest services weren’t very helpful, so we paid for that. When buying merch they offer you a bag, but only tell you is $1USD for a bag maybe half the time. At dinner they will try to sell you an add on for the kids drinks, but no mention of cost, it’s the same as the parks, around $7.50USD, we also tipped this in cash. We paid for beignets at French Quarter, they were so good, worth it! Tipped in cash.
All in all, it was an awesome experience. I am so pleased we did it! But I don’t think cruising is my thing. I would definitely try out the other Disney ships, but for the wonder, as a family trip, I reckon it’s a one and done. I would prefer to put the $6000 towards a Disney parks trip. I think it’s a great option for people who can’t get to the parks, you have the characters, the magic, the service, some merch, the shows, it’s a taste of the parks. But I would never choose it over a park experience, if it was an either/or situation.
I really craved downtime. After the parks we all go and chill on the internet in our room. I wasn’t prepared to pay for the internet package x4, so there wasn’t that option. My son LOVED Edge and was there at every opportunity, but my daughter had no interest in Vibe or Edge, so she hung with us, so we couldn’t really take advantage of any of the adult options. I think it would have been really different had both kids enjoyed the kids clubs. I think a longer cruise would be better in the sense that maybe everyone would be less hectic about queuing etc.
The afternoon when we got home my daughter had a temp and got quite sick for the whole week. The rest of us had sea legs through the next days too. Then I caught my daughter’s bug and had the whole week off work. Lots of people in our sailing group got covid/gastro or whatever this is. Take your own hand sanitiser, unlike the parks they only have it out before meals.
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