The Log Dog Blog: December 2019

On October 24, I got a text from our friend Dean asking if we were interested in joining him and his wife on a Disney Cruise. He is a cast member and was our photographer at our vow renewal and has become a cherished friend over the past five years. We also adore his wife, Rose, and we meet up with them when we visit WDW when we can, and we actually met up with them two summers ago when we were in Edinburgh and they were on a Disney Cruise and had a stop in Scotland! The all-important question involved the dates of the cruise, because my teacher schedule is not exactly travel-friendly, but he told me it was the week of Thanksgiving – and I had two personal days available, with the Wednesday through Friday of the week already off for Thanksgiving break! He has invited us on a number of cruises over the past five years and this was the first one where the timing actually worked out!

I don't know about you, but I am always nervous to travel with other people. Even if you're very good friends, there are so many unknowns when you commit to spending many days together! Will you get sick of each other? Will your schedules be compatible? Will you regret the trip? Will you still be friends at the end of it? C and I are very aware that our idea of fun is not always everyone else's idea of fun…we like to stay up extremely late and sleep in until midday…we are equally happy doing lots of things and almost nothing…we derive great pleasure from just wandering around and taking pictures. These are not necessarily always compatible with other people!

However, I had nothing to worry about because we had the best time on this cruise with Dean and Rose. THE BEST. As in, we would go on ANY trip with them again in a heartbeat! We hung out and went to trivia games together, did a mixology class together, and ate dinner together most nights, but we also did our own thing, so it was a perfect balance. Instead of being relieved at the end of the cruise, we were sad to say goodbye and felt like a four-night cruise was far too short!

It was a Merrytime Cruise on the Disney Dream, so the ship was decorated beautifully for Christmas, and there was a tree lighting celebration in the atrium on the first day of the cruise that really put us in the holiday spirit!

We saw two movies while on board, which is always fun; we prefer movies to the live "Broadway-style" shows that we don't bother attending! Maleficent: Mistress of Evil was shockingly good…I was pleasantly surprised by the first movie when we watched it with our godkids, so we thought we'd give the sequel a chance and it did not disappoint! We also saw Frozen 2, which we'd seen at home before the cruise, so it was great to see it a second time and catch some things I originally missed! The best moment of that movie was courtesy of the ten-year old girl sitting in front of us in the theater, though…when Kristoff proposed to Anna, she said, "Oh, brother!" in a very loud voice dripping with disdain and a month later, I am still highly entertained when I think about her reaction!

Our day at Castaway Cay was beautiful; there was a Christmas tree at the dock and the weather was perfect! We've been there before when it's been kind of chilly (March) and far too hot (July/August), but this particular day was just right! The water at Serenity Bay is so lovely that when I'm having a stressful day, I think about being on the beach there and it brings instant peace. True story!

C and I did Disney Villain Movie Quotes Trivia, Ultimate Disney Trivia, and Disney Tunes Trivia and all three times we lost to the same group of four people, which was very frustrating; I am not a good loser when it comes to Disney things! Dean, Rose, C, and I did Movie Quotes Trivia, 80s Music Trivia, 90s Music Trivia, and 2000s Music Trivia, and while we did pretty well at all four, we finally won on the last night of the cruise at the 2000s Music Trivia! Victory!

Overall, it was an amazing cruise and we are so happy to have been able to travel with two awesome friends! I'm hoping there are more cruises in the future together!