Goin' with the Flow- TCD's Disney Dream Trip Report

[Tri-Circle-D 2,059]

Here comes today's second update.

I hope you enjoy it, because there won't be another until Monday.

We will get this thing wrapped up next week if it kills me.

We left off with our arrival on the island and the discovery of a crab.

The clouds cleared nicely, and we had a nice sunny morning.

There were less folks on the island this morning. I don't know if it's because the day started out cloudy, or if folks weren't feeling a second visit to the island. But, that meant there was almost no line for Pelican Plunge. We rode those slides many times. I don't have any photos of that for you because the POC Fuji underwater camera was still dead. And, in case you're wondering it still is. I am going to have to get a new waterproof camera before our next cruise.

Before long, it was time to head over to the crab races.

The girls stopped to play ping-pong, as they needed to check that off their LOF"s.

Here's an action shot. I even got the ball in there. Look right above the center line of the table:

Frank and I had already played, but I guess he was going for bonus points:

Our new friend Simon was running the crab races. I showed him our entry. He thought it was funny (or at least he acted like he did) (also check out my man's watch) :

The ship's official DJ, Marquis was playing some music here at the Gazebo.

I asked him for a photo:

That is me holding the DJ like a baby. Frank missed on this one.

While we waited for the crab fun to begin, a seagull comotion broke out right in front of us:

What is this all about?

Well, one of those flying rats had scored a whole hot dog. And he did not want to share (you can see the hot dog right in the center of this photo) :

Simon announced that it was time for the official sign ups, so I brought our crab up. Simon said one of the real crabs would eat him:

Simon was probably right about that.

So, we let our crab go, and chose one of their crabs. We tried to remember who had won the last time. Was it number 2? That's what we thought, so we chose #2.

Simon got busy pumping up the crowd. And, look who showed up. Over there to the left. It's the lady from the sail away party with the shrunken bathing suit. Unless my eyes were playing tricks on me, that suit had shrunk even more during the cruise:

Next came the introduction of the crabs. I guess since this was the only crab race today, they felt obliged to drag this out for as long as possible:

The crabs were placed in the starting circle, and Simon exhorted the crowd to cheer wildly for the crab of their choice:

The crowd complied:

That suit shrunk more for sure.

The crabs scrambled.

Hey, look at number 2 go! :

Number 2 won the first heat.

This was good.

He could rest-up and then come back for the final round and blow away the competition again!

Finally! I thought. We were on our way to victory!

But, I'm sure you won't be surprised to hear that #2 barely moved in the final round.

He had used up all his energy in that first round, and wasn't crawling any more.

He just sat there.

And we lost.

Again.

Dang it.

The plan was that after we won, I was going to beg Simon to get us some medals instead of the gift bag that they gave out.

I couldn't do that now.

What a bunch of losers.

We headed back to our base camp with our heads hung in shame.

On the way there, we passed this bar:

Wait a second.

Do you see who the bartender is in there?

It's Maria!

We stopped to say hello. Maria said she would be working there all day and that we should come back to see her. We said we would.

We continued on with the walk of shame.

Those amazing details I was talking about are not confined to the ship. Look at this:

We got back to our chairs and I broke out the flip flop and Coronas. Soon, we felt better about our defeat.

Nancy came back shortly after this. She said that power walk took her all over the island. That might be something worth looking in to next time. Nancy also mentioned that she had stopped by and seen Maria, and that Maria had mentioned seeing us. Maria told Nancy that she would like the four adults to come by and see her in the afternoon. We told her she had told us the same thing. Nancy said, no, Maria really wanted us to come and see her, and not to bring the kids. We all agreed that we would head over there later for a Mojito.

I don't have many photos from this part of our day.

it consisted of us swimming, and sunning, and sliding. We went to lunch after a while and then did more of the same. The girls all headed over to the Head's Up bar near us and got some drinks. The 21 year-olds got real drinks, the twins got smoothies.

As the afternoon wore on, there were all kinds of abandoned floats drifting around the swimming area. The girls helped themselves:

Around 3:30, we adults headed over to see Maria. She made us each a Mojito, and we had a nice chat. She told us more about life aboard the ship, and all the bars aboard the ship. She knew the differences between the bars on the Dream and the Fantasy, and we had a nice chat. As we finished our drinks and told her we were heading back the the beach, she stopped us. She said she had something for us. She reached under the bar and handed us four medals! She said we had won the mojito drinking contest. How awesome is that? Actually, Maria apparently is friends with Simon, and she had gone to him and told him about the LOF and asked him to get her four medals. And he did. That called for another drink, and we talked some more. As we talked, we decided that we should come up with a plan to let the girls know that we had poned them with the medals. I didn't really like the plan-I wanted to just wear the medals back to the beach right then- but I got overruled. The plan was that we would hide the medals for now, and wait until dinner to break them out. We would show the girls the medals, and then give them to them. There were four of us, and there were four of them. That was a nice plan, but I did not like it. I didn't want to give up my medal. But I agreed to go along.

So we went back to base camp, and didn't say a word. The wives hid the medals in their beach bags, and nobody suspected a thing.

Oh, and the medals were not the only gifts we got from Maria. Check these out:

Big deal. Corona bottles.

Hang on there. Look again.

Do you see those little funnels up top? Those are plastic bottles. They had those at the bar. They pour a Corona in to them so guests can walk around with a bottle, but not have glass. Have you ever seen such a thing? We hadn't either. When we saw those at the bar, we remarked to Maria how cool they were. Next thing you know, she handed a bunch over to us.

So when I got back to base camp I fixed us some.

See that lady with the straw hat sitting down there by the water? That's Mrs. TCD. See the little chair next to her? That's where I was about to sit. And right after I took this photo, I did:

Oh yes, something else, when we got back from our visit to Maria, the girls all said they were heading back to the ship. Their new BFF, Jerry, was hosting a Karaoke party some time in the early evening, and they all wanted to go and see him there.

Frank and Nancy called it a day too.

So, the beach was pretty empty:

We enjoyed our beers and the quiet.

As we sat there, a boy who looked exactly like Russell from UP! came swimming up to us. It was around 4:15 then. His mom was down the beach some. We were the last ones left on the beach. Russell was a hoot. He asked us if we were from the Dream. We told him yes. He asked if the ship would leave without us. I told him it might. He went directly back to his mom, and asked if they could go. Too funny.

We finished our beers by 4:25, which is when I took these photos. We were the only ones left:

At 4:30, they announced that the beaches were officially closed and that all guests should head back to the ship.

So we did.

We hopped on the last tram:

And rode passed the closed shops:

The ship grew bigger and bigger as we approached:

There were probably 20-30 people on the tram, so we just got dropped off at the tram stop, and we had to walk back to the ship. No golf cart ride for us today.

This small boat was taking off as we walked up. That is some of the employees from one of the local islands heading home:

We took our time walking up to the ship. We were about to leave Castaway Cay, and who knows when we will be back? It had been and still was a beautiful day:

Since we were walking slow, there were not many people behind us.

Maybe we could be last on the island again?

We will see in the next update.

And, don't forget that we will have the big medal reveal coming up too.

As I said, that won't be until Monday.

So, take this opportunity to go back and read the parts you skimmed.

Also, to all you lurkers out there, this would be the perfect time for you to become a member and post. Southern Blessings did it, and look at how much fun she is having!

I'll be back on Monday.

Have a great weekend everyone.

TCD

[AC in A2......Aaron 693]

AGU TCD! I can't wait for the medal antics but I guess I will have to. I am wondering if Mrs. TCD will get the honor of last off the island this time?

[Nicki aka Rebelstand 272]

:jumpforjoy :jumpforjoy :jumpforjoy :jumpforjoy Maria :jumpforjoy :jumpforjoy :jumpforjoy :jumpforjoy

[doodlebug....Cherie 461]

Great update. I was so disappointed for you with the crab race, but then Maria came through! I knew she would!! It does seem to me though that you should get to keep your medal. You earned it, the girls are young and have plenty of opportunity to win a medal. :rofl2:

[mikmouse 3]

Here comes today's second update.

I hope you enjoy it, because there won't be another until Monday.

We will get this thing wrapped up next week if it kills me.

We left off with our arrival on the island and the discovery of a crab.

The clouds cleared nicely, and we had a nice sunny morning.

There were less folks on the island this morning. I don't know if it's because the day started out cloudy, or if folks weren't feeling a second visit to the island. But, that meant there was almost no line for Pelican Plunge. We rode those slides many times. I don't have any photos of that for you because the POC Fuji underwater camera was still dead. And, in case you're wondering it still is. I am going to have to get a new waterproof camera before our next cruise.

Before long, it was time to head over to the crab races.

The girls stopped to play ping-pong, as they needed to check that off their LOF"s.

Here's an action shot. I even got the ball in there. Look right above the center line of the table:

Frank and I had already played, but I guess he was going for bonus points:

Our new friend Simon was running the crab races. I showed him our entry. He thought it was funny (or at least he acted like he did) (also check out my man's watch) :

The ship's official DJ, Marquis was playing some music here at the Gazebo.

I asked him for a photo:

That is me holding the DJ like a baby. Frank missed on this one.

While we waited for the crab fun to begin, a seagull comotion broke out right in front of us:

What is this all about?

Well, one of those flying rats had scored a whole hot dog. And he did not want to share (you can see the hot dog right in the center of this photo) :

Simon announced that it was time for the official sign ups, so I brought our crab up. Simon said one of the real crabs would eat him:

Simon was probably right about that.

So, we let our crab go, and chose one of their crabs. We tried to remember who had won the last time. Was it number 2? That's what we thought, so we chose #2.

Simon got busy pumping up the crowd. And, look who showed up. Over there to the left. It's the lady from the sail away party with the shrunken bathing suit. Unless my eyes were playing tricks on me, that suit had shrunk even more during the cruise:

Next came the introduction of the crabs. I guess since this was the only crab race today, they felt obliged to drag this out for as long as possible:

The crabs were placed in the starting circle, and Simon exhorted the crowd to cheer wildly for the crab of their choice:

The crowd complied:

That suit shrunk more for sure.

The crabs scrambled.

Hey, look at number 2 go! :

Number 2 won the first heat.

This was good.

He could rest-up and then come back for the final round and blow away the competition again!

Finally! I thought. We were on our way to victory!

But, I'm sure you won't be surprised to hear that #2 barely moved in the final round.

He had used up all his energy in that first round, and wasn't crawling any more.

He just sat there.

And we lost.

Again.

Dang it.

The plan was that after we won, I was going to beg Simon to get us some medals instead of the gift bag that they gave out.

I couldn't do that now.

What a bunch of losers.

We headed back to our base camp with our heads hung in shame.

On the way there, we passed this bar:

Wait a second.

Do you see who the bartender is in there?

It's Maria!

We stopped to say hello. Maria said she would be working there all day and that we should come back to see her. We said we would.

We continued on with the walk of shame.

Those amazing details I was talking about are not confined to the ship. Look at this:

We got back to our chairs and I broke out the flip flop and Coronas. Soon, we felt better about our defeat.

Nancy came back shortly after this. She said that power walk took her all over the island. That might be something worth looking in to next time. Nancy also mentioned that she had stopped by and seen Maria, and that Maria had mentioned seeing us. Maria told Nancy that she would like the four adults to come by and see her in the afternoon. We told her she had told us the same thing. Nancy said, no, Maria really wanted us to come and see her, and not to bring the kids. We all agreed that we would head over there later for a Mojito.

I don't have many photos from this part of our day.

it consisted of us swimming, and sunning, and sliding. We went to lunch after a while and then did more of the same. The girls all headed over to the Head's Up bar near us and got some drinks. The 21 year-olds got real drinks, the twins got smoothies.

As the afternoon wore on, there were all kinds of abandoned floats drifting around the swimming area. The girls helped themselves:

Around 3:30, we adults headed over to see Maria. She made us each a Mojito, and we had a nice chat. She told us more about life aboard the ship, and all the bars aboard the ship. She knew the differences between the bars on the Dream and the Fantasy, and we had a nice chat. As we finished our drinks and told her we were heading back the the beach, she stopped us. She said she had something for us. She reached under the bar and handed us four medals! She said we had won the mojito drinking contest. How awesome is that? Actually, Maria apparently is friends with Simon, and she had gone to him and told him about the LOF and asked him to get her four medals. And he did. That called for another drink, and we talked some more. As we talked, we decided that we should come up with a plan to let the girls know that we had poned them with the medals. I didn't really like the plan-I wanted to just wear the medals back to the beach right then- but I got overruled. The plan was that we would hide the medals for now, and wait until dinner to break them out. We would show the girls the medals, and then give them to them. There were four of us, and there were four of them. That was a nice plan, but I did not like it. I didn't want to give up my medal. But I agreed to go along.

So we went back to base camp, and didn't say a word. The wives hid the medals in their beach bags, and nobody suspected a thing.

Oh, and the medals were not the only gifts we got from Maria. Check these out:

Big deal. Corona bottles.

Hang on there. Look again.

Do you see those little funnels up top? Those are plastic bottles. They had those at the bar. They pour a Corona in to them so guests can walk around with a bottle, but not have glass. Have you ever seen such a thing? We hadn't either. When we saw those at the bar, we remarked to Maria how cool they were. Next thing you know, she handed a bunch over to us.

So when I got back to base camp I fixed us some.

See that lady with the straw hat sitting down there by the water? That's Mrs. TCD. See the little chair next to her? That's where I was about to sit. And right after I took this photo, I did:

Oh yes, something else, when we got back from our visit to Maria, the girls all said they were heading back to the ship. Their new BFF, Jerry, was hosting a Karaoke party some time in the early evening, and they all wanted to go and see him there.

Frank and Nancy called it a day too.

So, the beach was pretty empty:

We enjoyed our beers and the quiet.

As we sat there, a boy who looked exactly like Russell from UP! came swimming up to us. It was around 4:15 then. His mom was down the beach some. We were the last ones left on the beach. Russell was a hoot. He asked us if we were from the Dream. We told him yes. He asked if the ship would leave without us. I told him it might. He went directly back to his mom, and asked if they could go. Too funny.

We finished our beers by 4:25, which is when I took these photos. We were the only ones left:

At 4:30, they announced that the beaches were officially closed and that all guests should head back to the ship.

So we did.

We hopped on the last tram:

And rode passed the closed shops:

The ship grew bigger and bigger as we approached:

There were probably 20-30 people on the tram, so we just got dropped off at the tram stop, and we had to walk back to the ship. No golf cart ride for us today.

This small boat was taking off as we walked up. That is some of the employees from one of the local islands heading home:

We took our time walking up to the ship. We were about to leave Castaway Cay, and who knows when we will be back? It had been and still was a beautiful day:

Since we were walking slow, there were not many people behind us.

Maybe we could be last on the island again?

We will see in the next update.

And, don't forget that we will have the big medal reveal coming up too.

As I said, that won't be until Monday.

So, take this opportunity to go back and read the parts you skimmed.

Also, to all you lurkers out there, this would be the perfect time for you to become a member and post. Southern Blessings did it, and look at how much fun she is having!

I'll be back on Monday.

Have a great weekend everyone.

TCD

I'm enjoying this so much, thanks! We went on our first DC last September for our 45th anniversary on the Magic. We booked on board for the Fantasy in Sept. 2013 and a whole bunch of family will join us. I love reading your report...reflecting on what we did and looking forward to going again. We absolutely loved everything about it, and enjoyed CC so much. I can't wait to read more. Have a great weekend.

[alexwyattmommy 181]

Monday won't be here soon enough.

[MetalDad 33]

Holding a DJ like a baby. If that catches on here in the states it could make my job interesting and/or dangerous.

[Momof6....aka Marty 769]

I don't know whether to be sad there won't be an update until Monday, or glad the fun is being drawn out so long. Either way, thanks for sharing!

[dvccamper 32]

I am disappointed you won your medal for drinking a mojito. You should have gotten it for drinking your pink drink. But it appears you were wearing a pink shirt, so close enough.

[PureTcrazy...rita 380]

That Ping Pong shot was awesome! I had a sneaky suspicion that Maria would make sure a Medal came your direction!

[Total Joker ... TJ 203]

I'm thinking the same thing. Screw Stone Mountain. I want to do this!

A cruise sounds good, but it would be really cool if we all owned our own RVs and could all gather at a campground sometime together. That way we could all bring our dogs, sleep in our own beds, and come and go as scheduling permits.

I hear Disney has a nice campground. :rofl2:

Hmmmm....

[Lou... 3,118]

Foul, foul, foul, I'm calling for the "Mickey Cheap Plastic Medal" judge to rule on this bogus and outrages medal fraud.

I say they're pity medals and should be disallowed as real cheap Mickey plastic medals.

Cheap Mickey plastic medals are earned for outstanding achievement involving a totally useless and irrelevant activity.

Drinking Mojitos is not a useless and irrelevant activity.

[Momof6....aka Marty 769]

BTW, who is Maddie? Your shirt says, "It's Maddie Time!" I know I am clueless on pop culture, but my kids are clueless as well.

[Nicki aka Rebelstand 272]

Foul, foul, foul, I'm calling for the "Mickey Cheap Plastic Medal" judge to rule on this bogus and outrages medal fraud.

I say they're pity medals and should be disallowed as real cheap Mickey plastic medals.

Cheap Mickey plastic medals are earned for outstanding achievement involving a totally useless and irrelevant activity.

Drinking Mojitos is not a useless and irrelevant activity.

Foul Foul Foul! Jealous Busman on the loose!

[Lou... 3,118]

Jealous Busman on the loose!

Cheap plastic Mickey medals brings out the worst in people.

[Nicki aka Rebelstand 272]

Cheap plastic Mickey medals brings out the worst in people.

I gave you a few more arrows to make you feel better... :rofl2: :rofl2: :rofl2: :rofl2:

[Southern Blessings 4]

So it was a beautiful day! Monday is too long to wait to hear the rest of the story. Don't you have to actually win a medal for it to count?

[Gots2pitt.. Jeff 64]

So it was a beautiful day! Monday is too long to wait to hear the rest of the story. Don't you have to actually win a medal for it to count?

Well if you want the rest of TCD's story you have to wait, but if you don't I am sure someone will make up the story for you. :)

[Lou... 3,118]

Don't you have to actually win a medal for it to count?

To count with who?

This is TCD's TR, so it's TCD's rules.

[fortpartyof4 108]

This picture is a riot. I laughed so hard. You seem so convinced that your wee little crab is going to somehow overcome that gargantuan one! I think you've watched one too many Disney movies!

I would also like to know what the t-shirt means?

[CCIntrigue...aka Gwen 547]

It's gonna be a long weekend waiting for the update ...

[wak648...Bill 94]

My wife was reading your trip report and now wants to do a list of fun for our cruise on NCCL Liberty of the Seas. I dont know if I should thank you or regret that I let her read the trip report.

[Gots2pitt.. Jeff 64]

My wife was reading your trip report and now wants to do a list of fun for our cruise on NCCL Liberty of the Seas. I dont know if I should thank you or regret that I let her read the trip report.

You will probably have to wait until after the trip to know for sure.

[Hotmamac aka Misty 11]

The pictures of the sunrise and practically empty beach at Castaway Cay are so beautiful and peaceful I could stare at them all day! I was thinking we'd try a cruise in a couple of years, but after this TR, I don't think I can wait that long! Can't wait for the rest.

[4mickey2 41]

oh no i've fallen behind and i don't think i can catch back up..guess next week i'll be reading tcd's tr--i don't even know where i left off... :panic: