elphie101
Left my heart in Tomorrowland
- Joined
- Sep 30, 2008
Monday October 20 - Cruise Day 3
Another day at sea! I apologize that my pictures for the day are a little disjointed and unorganized - a good portion of our sea days were spent napping and/or abusing the heck out of the on demand library in our room and, well, I didn't photograph those moments (had I known that it would take me 8 months to get to this day, I would have taken better notes!)
We slept much later this morning, and rolled out of bed with very little planned for our day - the only real scheduled event was our Champagne tasting at 12:15. Kevin had never been a big wine drinker, but with all the copious bottles of free champagne gifted to us he was starting to come around to it, so we figured the class would be a good way to educate ourselves some more about the drink!
We made it to breakfast around 9:30am, and I only grabbed a photo of my plate (Kevin had - wait for it - pancakes, waffles and hash browns, I promise).
From 12 o'clock: MICKEY WAFFLE! with syrup, a breakfast taco/rollup, sad bacon, a pancake, a hash brown, mini croissant, breakfast potatoes (different from the hash brown!) and some corned beef hash. The breakfast wrap was surprisingly spicy, and the potatoes were yummy!
Now, let me take a minute to wax on about the corned beef hash. I had never really had it before this trip (I sampled it at our Crystal Palace breakfast, but whatever they served there is different than DCL's), and thought about trying it the previous day, but passed. I sampled some this morning because it smelled so good, and OH MY GOODNESS, my world was changed. This became my new favorite breakfast item of the entire trip. Honestly, I think it was starting to make me queasy by the time we got off the boat (god knows how much grease or other nastiness is probably in there) but it tasted so good that I don't care a bit. Expect plenty of corned beef hash on future breakfast plates.
After breakfast we decided to try out the Midship Detective Agency, except we seemingly misplaced our detective badge card needed for the game, so we headed back to Deck 5 to just create a new game. As we walked by the atrium, we noticed the princess meet & greet was taking place:
I have to say, this is brilliant. One line, all the princesses, boom boom boom. Of course Elsa & Anna still demand the hard-ticketed line, but for the other ladies this is a fabulous setup! I wish they would introduce it in the parks!
We selected the Muppets mission (aka the "hard" setting) and set off to find our first interactive art piece for the game. You can sort of tell which pieces of art are interactive/a part of the game because of them being screens instead of regular art, but even if you didn't they have a symbol on the ground in front of them where you have to stand for the game. At the sign up stations is a map showing where each picture is located, so you would know where to go throughout the ship. We only ever ran into other people a handful of times, which was nice! The other great thing about the game is you can pick it up on any day by showing your badge to any of the marked art, and it will remind you where to go to continue your mission.
Right before we woke up a portrait
After about an hour of running around the ship, it was coming close to Movie Quotes Trivia in O'Gills, so we dropped our detective materials off at our stateroom and headed down to Deck 4 to play. Being that Kevin is a self-declared movie buff we figured we'd have a decent shot here.
Well - we were pretty bad at this. A lot of it involved 80s movies which are definitely not my forte, and only kind of Kevin's. He ended up being the one who knew most of our answers, and we only got 13 out of 25 right! Kevin was quite disappointed in himself.
After trivia, we decided to just walk around the Europa and general area a bit, since our Champagne class in half an hour was just across the hall at Ooh La La. Along the way, I noticed something strange had happened to my gel manicure -
My silver-tipped nails had turned gold! There wasn't anything under them either! I think it was because of the chemicals in the hand wipes we used at every restaurant - going forward I intentionally didn't rub the wipes over my nails, and they faded back from gold to silver. So weird!
As we were walking out of The Tube, we bumped into one of the servers from Skyline. "Ahhh hello Michelle! We missed you!" she said, which confused the heck out of us since I'm not Michelle. "Ah no, that is your husband!" She replied, which made Kevin balk even more at being Michelle (or I guess Michel?)
We headed over to Ooh La La then and took our seats at the tables already set up for our arrival. At the beginning of the class the glasses were empty, though they filled them once it was time to start.
View of Deck 4
Behind the bar area
The class was taught by........I'm sorry, but I can't even begin to tell you. I know it was three female CMs, and at least one was from Palo or Remy and she kind of led the class. I can't even remember which kinds of champagne these were! Needless to say, considering I took no notes about the details of either beverage seminar, I think you can tell which we enjoyed more.
That little green, white and black smidge behind the glasses is some panna cotta, made to go with one of the drinks. As it was chocolate, we didn't sample it.
You'll notice we only have 4 glasses of champagne - the 5th was poured right before we drank it: Moet Ice Imperial. According to the CMs, it's the first and only champagne every designed to be served over ice, so they waited to pour our glasses until it was time to drink it (considering each glass came with a description).
Now I remember this one, because it was DELICIOUS! I like my drinks really cold so I loved this one
Overall we enjoyed the Champagne tasting, but won't be going to it again (unlike Mixology). Maybe we'll revisit this when we're older and have theoretically more sophisticated palates!
After drinking, we wanted to try out Satellite Falls, the much-lauded adults only area at the very front of Deck 14, and one of the few things exclusive to the Fantasy (ie not found on the dream). No photos as we were prepared to be swimming but I have to say, we weren't enormous fans. It was crazy windy and the water in the "falls" was FREEZING. We did lay out under the awning for a little bit (well, Kevin read some comics and I napped), but decided we much preferred the heated adult pool a few decks below.
What's that? It's been 3 1/2 hours since we ate?! Quick, to the lunch buffet! I feel it's prudent to mention that Cabanas also has a carving station, fruit buffet, dessert selection, and a rotating dessert like cobbler or ice cream that we never visited, and so you will never see photos of them.
I know I don't need to tell you what's going on here, nor who's plate this is
A bit of fish, pizza (duh), sweet potato fries, sauteed mushrooms, and pork fried rice. This, my friends, is why I love buffets.
And how can you argue with this view?! Ugh, what would I give (if I could liveee out ON these waters.....)
After lunch, we decided to explore more of the ship. One of the places I especially wanted to get to was the Outlook Cafe, inside the forward funnel (since the ships only need one funnel to function, the forward funnel contains Edge on "Deck" 13 and Outlook on "Deck" 14, the tippy top!)
I loved the artwork in the stairwells around the ship - this is in the aft stairwell as you make your way to Goofy's Sports Deck - what themeing! (Same with a portrait of Ratatouille as you make your way to Palo/Remy, and other like-themeing around the ship)
We soon realized that the only way we would be able to get up to Outlook would be by elevator, and only the Midship elevators at that - the only access by stairway seemed to be through the Edge club, and since there was no open house at that time, we couldn't enter. Not only that, but there was only ONE elevator in Midship that actually went up to Deck 14! Needless to say, waiting for that one specific elevator took awhile, but finally it arrived, and slowly we were taken upstairs.....
The elevator doors opened and - Outlook was closed for a private function. Dangit!
We ended up waiting another looooong time for the elevator to come back up to get us. I took a picture to commemorate the moment that the elevator made its way up to us.
And an elevator selfie! The screens in the back show previews of that night's show, as well as highlights from the Navigator
We decided to reward our trek around the ship (shhhhh.....) with some hard-earned ice cream, then went downstairs to poke about the shops some more.
Probably one of my favorite pieces of art from the ship. Man oh man what I wouldn't give to have this in my home. (And with the themeing - this is on your way to the Walt Disney Theatre!)
The screen outside the theatre showed video clip previews of that night's show
We did some more shop-browsing, and then headed over to the D Lounge, where a cooking demonstration on the delicious sea bass I had ordered at Enchanted Garden the night before was being held.
The chef in question was pulled down from Remy, so we were in for a bit of a treat, as told by the Entertainment CM who kind of led the demonstration
Funnily enough, this is NOT the exact meal I had the night before! The sauce or 'glaze' is different. However, when you look up menus to Enchanted Garden online, this is the version of the fish posted. Maybe the chef was trying something different with us in the dining room?
Regardless, we were taught how to make the fish (which.....um.....I can't remember) and all given a small sample. Another CM came around offering a wine pairing - FOR FREE! Take note of free booze on the cruise friends, it's few and far between.
After the cooking demonstration, there wasn't anything else on the Navigator that jumped out at us, so we decided to head back to our stateroom and enjoy some of the leftover beer from beach Club on our verandah.
The obstructed view verandah was awesome for allowing my Irish-Scottish husband a chance to sit outside without burning.
The chairs were pretty comfy too!
I can't begin to explain how relaxing it was to just sit out there, stare at the ocean, and just chat with my new spouse. The ultimate vacation as far as I'm concerned.
Total bliss.
That's awful that the CMs laughed at Kevin on your first night, though 
I'm glad it got better after that!
That looks/sounds SO GOOD. Royal Court really does make me think of Titanic! It looks really pretty. I'm glad to hear that Kevin didn't punch your special honeymoon swan towel animals. Haha.
