St Augustine & Savannah

With a heavy heart, we walked off the elegant Disney Fantasy early in the morning. The seven nights flew by too quickly. At the same time, we were eager to meet up with my parents to start the next leg of our journey. The day was overcast which was a downer after a nearly a full week of sunshine. Perhaps it was meant to be a sign of the series of unfortunate events to come. I called my parents to discover that they had slept in! They had arrived in Orlando from Sydney the night before and had stayed overnight at the airport. The car pick up at the airport was riddled with problems. Despite our chain of emails confirming car type before we left, our 12 seater turned out to be a 15 seater which wasn't configurable! This made loading and unloading suitcases very difficult. The lady offered my parents a Chevrolet Suburban at $99 per day. Err...thanks but no thanks! She also insisted that Malcolm had to be added on as a driver and show his driver's license despite already having registered. They finally arrived at the port an hour later than scheduled but we were happy to see each other and get started. Our quick trip to the local Enterprise, Alamo's agent in the south, turned out to be a waste of time. We were told that we need not have stopped as Malcolm was already registered! Unfortunately, they didn't have any other cars that were suitable. They recommended other offices but warned that most would close after 12pm on a Saturday and remained closed on Sundays.

One last photo on the Fantasy

Malcolm concentrating on driving the 15 seater

Only space for one passenger at the front. Everyone else was right at the very back! There was no way to put the suitcases anywhere else but the front

Not sure how the police did this but it popped up on my phone. We heard later on the news that it was a woman who had kidnapped her daughter in the above mentioned car. For a scary moment, I thought there was some disaster. All I read was ALERT!

A brief stop for refreshments. The orange juice was freshly squeezed and very nice!

A gloomy day...

Crossing over the Georgia

We continued towards St Augustine. Historic St. Augustine is the oldest permanent European settlement in the continental United States. We had intended to visit Castillo de San Marcos National Monument, a fortress which served as the city's outer defenses. However, due to our big delay, we had to settled for a drive through the city instead. We had to hurry on to Savannah for an overnight stay at the Country Inn and Suites. We checked in and then explored the city by foot. It was a shame that it was raining. We walked to the Restored Waterfront area lined with shops and restaurants for some delicious southern dinner. It had been a long day and so we walked by City Market and then returned to the hotel to call it quits for the day.

Glad to finally arrive at our destination

Happy to be with Oma and Opa. At the pretty Savannah

Let's get fried food for dinner!

Malcolm's choice of beverage(s)

Disney Fantasy

With great excitement, the whole family woke up early to prepare ourselves for our transfer to Port Canaveral. We were going on the Disney Fantasy! Since the announcement of the two Disney ships, we had been eagerly awaiting our opportunity to sail on one of them. We were hoping to go on a longer Caribbean sailing, however, a Christmas cruise would more than suffice!

With a big group of 28, we had work out how best to transport everyone and their luggage. For a mere USD$17.15 each (including gratuity) we got ourselves our own happy bus, a 49 seater. Let’s be honest, the bus was budget! But it was clean and got us from Walt Disney World to where we needed to be at half the price of what Disney’s transfers would have cost so no one was complaining! I had factored in some lateness contingencies in my timing strategy to accommodate the co-ordination of 6 families. Everyone surprised me by being on time. As a result, we arrived at Port Canaveral a whole hour early.

Our bus picking us up at Old Key West

Getting ready to check in to board the Fantasy. Don't remember why Jonah was cranky...

Minnie Mouse!

Fortunately, we didn’t have to wait long. Shortly after getting after everyone and their luggage off the bus, the gates opened and our suitcases were taken care off. We made our way into the terminal and proceeded check in. We got the coveted boarding group number 2! Unfortunately, we were allocated a cast member who seemed a little confused. As we boarded, it turned out that she hadn’t checked us in. So we had to spend some time pulled aside to repeat the check in procedure.

Nothing could dampen the amazing awe of entering and being welcomed into the  atrium of the Fantasy. She is a gorgeous ship and looked stunning with Christmas finery on. We joined the rest of the group at Cabanas. We ate our lunch as quickly as possible and split up to cover off a few loose ends, one of the great benefits of travelling in a group. Malcolm and Jason headed towards Remy to co-ordinate brunch for the adults. Sharon and I headed for guest services to sort out key to the world cards and book gingerbread house making for the family. The other adults supervised the children. Thankfully both were done relatively quickly and it was off to join the children for a swim and to go on the Aquaduck, the onboard water coaster! It was awesome! I have to admit it was tamer than I expected but a lot of fun nonetheless.

Boarding number 2!

After the check in blip, we're on way in

The children having lunch together at Cabanas

We were fortunate to have our luggage already delivered to our stateroom when we finished our swim. A quick shower and change and we were off again. A visit to the spa was necessary in an attempt to win a prize at the spa raffle! Young Jonah was chosen to pick out a winning ticket. We had high hopes but alas the young lad picked someone else as a winner. In the remaining time prior to the necessary safety drill, we unpacked and then wandered around the beautiful ship. The children were ecstatic to discover the additional flavours of banana and strawberry at the soft serve dispensing machines. We sneaked in a quick serving before our boogie at the Sail Away Party. That wonderful ship horn sounded and we were off!

In our stateroom after our swim

Our dining rotations and port adventure tickets

The all important wave phones!

Handy gift from DCL

Beautiful details everywhere as per usual

Sailaway party!

Our first restaurant of our rotational dining was at Animator’s Palette. At first glance, it looked more understated than Animator’s of the older two ships. However, on closer inspection, you see many beautiful details. During the course of our dinner, the picture frames changed into tanks and ocean scenery and we were entertained by Crush, Bruce and a few other characters from Finding Nemo. It was very well done and a great way to keep the kids distracted! Unfortunately, one of our servers was rather inexperience. Whilst he wasn’t terrible, we didn’t get that additional “something” that made dining on the Disney ships so special.

I always love watching the shows onboard. As much as I hate to say it, I was a little disappointed with tonight’s show. It was lacklustre, and tried too hard to “plug” the ship’s features which I thought was unnecessary. The whole sequence involving the initially disjointed family finally enjoying time together and having a wonderful vacation was a little forced. Even the children proclaimed that they were bored halfway through. The only highlight was a sneak preview at the entertainment of “Buckets and Boards”, a drumming, singing, dancing, comedic duo. It’s difficult to described exactly what they do, but all the children aspire to do after the show was to be able to play the recorder with their noses…

Waiting for the show at the Walt Disney Theatre

We have two very seasick prone travellers in our group. With the combined powers of the medics in the group, we brought along every known antiemetic with us in all dosing forms. However, it appeared for now that drastic measures were not required. All in all, it was a rather great embarkation day. We retired looking forward to our first sea day on the ship

Great new way of finding your photos at Shutters. When you scan your card, you are allocated a "book". Each book is actually a folder which contains the photo prints. Each book has a location, colour and number eg Minnie yellow 3 so it is easy to find. Much better than the old system of sorting through racks and racks of photos looking for your family...

The elegant public bathrooms.

Jan 6 - Let the Magic Begin!

Today was the day! After 4 weeks of crazy travelling, it was time for a much anticipated change of pace. The Disney Wonder would be our floating home and entertainment for the next 15 days as we cruise towards Los Angeles. Our driver from Cocoa Beach Shuttles came early to take us to Port Canaveral! And to our relief, he was actually friendly and helpful. We loaded up the troops and suitcases and left at 0930 sharp. It was lucky that we did as it took us a while to unload and organise ourselves on arrival at the port!

On our minibus and we're off to the port!

The first of our bags

Making a neat pile.

Jason counting...Surely that's it?!?!

Nope...here's one last one said Malcolm!

Through the gate...

and straight to the terminal

The porters at the gate were great, they took care of our load and we joined the queue to enter the terminal. Check in took longer than expected but was otherwise a relatively smooth process. We took the opportunity to take photos with Mickey and Minnie and completed the all important task of finalising the registration of the children for kids club! I picked up my pre-ordered lanyards from the super organised and motivated group of individuals that belong to the DISboard. Black with customised writing in a lovely shade of lime green, they made for great gifts to mark the beginning our cruise! It was a delight to see the children's excitement upon receiving their bands.

Look who's here!

and got mobbed!

Your turn Minnie...

We belatedly realised that we were not given boarding cards upon arrival. Shame on me! We were unfortunately left with boarding number 6 and had to watch all these other people board before us…Sigh, the only thing left to do was to study the Navigator for upcoming activities onboard the ship.

Studying the all important...

...Navigator!

Our turn to board the Wonder came soon enough. After a group photo, we were announced onto the Wonder as "The Bahari Bunch". Yay!!! I felt like the matriarch of a grand tribe....It felt great to finally be on the ship. The Wonder had a similar decor to the Magic and I had forgotten how beautiful it was inside. The group went into line for our buffet lunch at Parrot Cay and I lined up to make a reservation for Palo. The line was CRAZY! Apparently the computers were down. After being in line for just over an hour, I finally got to front only to be told that I had to line up see the supervisor as our dining party was bigger than 8! So I politely told them that I couldn't wait any more and left my name and cabin number for them to contact me regarding our dinner reservation. The cast member was very obliging and I left hurriedly to rejoin my family.

Thankfully I was able to find them easily. It didn't take long to locate a group 19 with a bunch of noisy children. Apparently, it took them a while to get seated so I was able to have some lunch together. By the time we finished lunch, our staterooms were opened and so we went to check them out. We started to get our suitcases delivered in dribs and drabs over the afternoon. We managed to unpack completely before the mandatory safety drill. They had changed the requirements such that Jonah and Samuel did not have to wear their sexy orange romper down the hallway anymore. What a shame!

Time to go through the Mickey Ears

Getting ready for our group photo

And on to the ship!

An ice sculpture to mark the ports that we will be visiting

We headed up to Deck 9 for the sail away party and to hear that magnificent horn. Later that eening, we met our serving team of Savio and Jakov at Parrot Cay. I think Jakov may be new. Although they were very friendly, their service was not as slick or nor as fast as our previous servers on the Magic. I received a very special surprise during dinner. My dearest friends had bought me a bangle from Tiffany's and organised for a group spa treatment for the ladies! This was their thank you for co-ordinating the trip. It came complete with a home-made Disney card! I felt very special and extremely blessed to have been given this wonderful opportunity of Fellowship. How lucky was I to be able to share my greatest love with my family and friends!

Deck party anyone?

Try stopping these party animals...

My beautiful envelope with a special card inside...oh and a Tiffany bangle...and a massage...

The theme for tonight!

We shuffled onto the Walt Disney Theatre after dinner to catch our nightly entertainment. Tonight, it was aptly called "Let the Magic begin". It was a combination of an all out Disney stage production along with a live act. We watched Bronkar Lee, a juggling beat boxer (yes you read that correctly) with great amusement. He was awesome! It was a great way to end the first day on our cruise.

Let the Magic Begin

Our very first towelgami...amazingly not destroyed by Jonah getting into bed!