NYGirl1002

Thank you so much for your replies. I am going to decorate the room myself. I'll bring stuff from home and a couple of little presents for her to open. Maybe I can get a cake when onboard.

Thanks again

That's where I looked. There's a disclaimer at the bottom of each one listing the ships they are not available on and the Allure is on that list.

Thanks in advance for the replies.

My special needs daughter is celebrating a birthday when we are aboard the Allure of the Seas next week. I was looking into surprising her with getting the cabin decorated and maybe getting her a tote bag or something. I'm shocked to see that you can't do anything like that on the Allure. Is this new? Is there any way around it?

As of now I guess I'll bring my own decorations and presents but we're flying down so it can't be anything too heavy for the luggage.

As the parent of a disabled child I am appalled at the people saying the child doesn't need a leash but maybe would need one if disabled. Do you even think before you post? No child should be leashed up like an animal.

Thank you so much for the comprehensive review. Your pictures are great. I'll be on the Empress to Havana on Aug 26 with a stop in Key West. I'm really looking forward to it, especially after reading your review.

I am presently Gold with 25 points. It's 30 points to Platinum. I am booked for a cruise in August that is 4 nights-5 days. Do I turn Platinum or does that just come out to 4 points?

Thanks in advance.

Hi Kim...great review as always. As you know I love your reviews. Your daughter is getting so big. It's amazing how she is able to scuba the way she does.

Congratulations on the new house and new granddaughter. Can't wait for your next cruise!

I know I'm late to the party but I was not online much during the past couple of months. Last night I realized that you cruised in November so I found this. I LOVE binge reading your reviews.

This one did not disappoint. Love the pictures, love seeing your family. I'm glad you got to scuba dive..you're a natural.

Hope you are cruising again soon!

Very nice review. I was on the Magic from NY in October and loved the ship and the crew.

I got mine when I purchased the water package on the Magic.

Thanks for sharing your cruise experience with us. I loved the review- Pleased that you both enjoyed yourselves and it looked like your daughter was having a Fab time. Happy Cruising. :)

Thank you so much bazbov. We really enjoyed this one especially because we did so many different things on it.

Thank you. It means a lot coming from you :)

Thanks for taking the time to post about your cruise, it looks like you had a wonderful time. We did an itinerary in 2013 that had a WDW day and I think it was my favorite itinerary, although it is an absolutely exhausting day, I know just how tired you both felt!!

 

Great trip report!

Thank you!

You said it... I never thought we'd recover from that day. I was so sorry we had to get up early the next day for the Frozen meet and greet. I'd never have booked that time if I thought about it.

I agree about all 3 of them. Once you ask a question you get an answer almost immediately.

Thank you!

Saturday - Home Sweet Home

We got up around 7:30 and went out on the balcony to find ourselves docked in NYC and it was pouring out! We got dressed and got our carry ons, checked the room and safe and said goodbye to Cabin 5648. We had breakfast at Lumieres at 8:15. I had asked my son to get there around 8:45

We had to go through customs again. We found our luggage right away and a CM got us a great porter. He had a cart and took us outside and even crossed the street with us so we could meet my son. He unloaded the luggage, I tipped him well, and we waited maybe 10 minutes for my son to make it around.

We were home at about 9:30!

Friday - Day at Sea.

The very depressing final day. We had planned of at least going to the final snowball bingo and seeing Tangled. That was about it for the day. After breakfast in Lumiere we went back to the cabin to start packing. We packed and sat on the balcony reading until lunch time. I felt like Cabanas today and Jenny wanted pizza. So we found tables inside. It was cold, rainy and foggy out. Perfect weather for the depressing final day.

After lunch we went to Shutters to finalize our photo book and then back to finish packing.

Bingo was at 4:00 so we left early to get a good seat. Of course Fathoms ended up being very crowded. By the time bingo ended it was almost time for the show so we went to change first. We got perfect seats for the show and I was so excited to see a new show. The show was fabulous!

Our final dinner was Lumieres. Here's a picture of us with our servers

They finally put the pumpkins on the tree. I still don't understand why they wait until the last day to do this. We couldn't enjoy it all week.

We went to the cabin to put our luggage out and then came down to the atrium to get a good spot for the See you Real Soon show.

After the festivities we went to our cabin to sleep.

We really wanted to sleep in and didn't mind missing breakfast. However 9:00 am was a Frozen meet and greet. Bodies aching we got up around 8 and had a quick breakfast up in a crowded Cabanas. We made our way down to Animators and waiting on a short line.

After meeting Olaf and company we headed for Fathoms for our first Bingo of the cruise. I usually get at least one automated card for Jenny to follow and I usually use a paper card. Well believe it or not Jenny got a Bingo! She was so excited. We try and play bingo on every cruise because it's fun and she loves it. I was so happy she won. After the money was put onto our account we went to the stores to do our shopping. Of course we spent all of that money and then some.

We then made our way to our cabin to put on our bathing suits so we could go sit in a hot tub. Our bodies were still killing us from all of that walking on Wednesday. We spent quite a bit of time in the hot tub and missed lunch. So we went to Pete's to get some chicken fingers and fries to bring to the cabin and eat on the balcony.

We also had a quest...we needed to get Daisy and Pluto to complete our character meet and greets. I believe she was at 5:00.

So after lunch we took our showers and made our way downstairs for the Jack's Diaper Dash! I was so excited to see this.

There were 4 babies involved, 3 girls and 1 boy, so they had 2 heats and a finale. Of course one of the girls won.

It was almost time for Daisy so we spent some time watching the Disney Vacation Club presentation, hoping we'd win the $200 OBC. Not gonna happen but it was a fun way to waste some time. I wish I could afford to going but there's no way I could do it.

By now it was almost 4:45 so we started a line for Daisy. While waiting we chatted with the photographer and he was asking me about all the other different cruise line and what were the differences. It made time go by very very fast.

Finally Daisy came. I have to say there were not many Daisy appearance on this cruise and I was wondering why. Here is is:

We went back to the cabin for awhile and then made our way to the theater a little early to catch Dreams. After the show we then changed for dinner since it was semi formal night and made our wait to Cariocoa.

We probably finished around 9:45 and got on line for our final character meet..Pluto.

After that we went to Fathoms for the juggling and comedy of Matt Baker. I do want to say that there were not many people there for that show nor any of the other after 10:00 adult shows in Fathoms. I was disappointed. I remember on our 2012 cruise that it was always crowded in there at night. I thought he was funny.

By the time the show as over we were tired and went to the cabin to read and in Jenny's case watch Hocus Pocus.

Loving your report! I have a special needs sister a few years older than your daughter who's also an ardent Disney fan. She's eager to check out a Disney cruise so we're going to start out with a 4 day on the Dream in May (hitting Universal first because unlike your daughter Teresa loves rides :)

 

She's easy going and loves to travel but I've never taken a big trip like this with just her and me. Am very interested in hearing about your experience, as well as any advice you have to make the trip most enjoyable for us.

Let me tell you my daughter loves cruising and loves Disney. Our server made it his business to cut her meat every night at dinner. She loved it. I was waiting for her to say no..I'm a big girl but she never did. She loved the attention. I have to say the CMs treated her so well. It made me so happy. I felt so bad when the steward didn't give her a trick or treat bag. I was not expecting that and I'm not used to it.

Your sister is going to love the cruise. Trust me.

Thanks for sharing your vacation with us! I'm so sorry your cabin steward was so rude, but I'm glad you didn't let that stop you and you both had a great trick or treat experience!

Thank you! I felt so bad when he said no. That other steward was always working..every time we passed him by he was working. On CC day he even filled up our cooler with ice. I gave him a tip and also mentioned him on the comment card.

Great review! I'm looking forward to our cruise on the Magic out of NYC next year. Hoping that it doesn't get changed like your first one.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Forums mobile app

Thanks for reading. If you have any questions feel free to ask!

Great review so far! Looking forward to the rest!

 

ex techie

Thank you so much!

Magic Kingdom

I want to say that I am starting to wane by now. The heat and humidity gets to me way before the walking. I hate the monorail because of the ramps. I think I'd rather do the steps. Someone told me that it goes directly to MK but that was not the case. We had to go to the transportation center, get off, walk down a ramp and then up another ramp to catch the monorail to MK. Ugh.

I was walking much slower by now. I had already hit 10,000 steps on my fitbit somewhere in Epcot.

But here we are! Finally!

First things first...the 7 Dwarves Mine Train. My son had told Jenny it was not a roller coaster but I knew better. But I also knew it wasn't a bad one so she'd be ok with it.

We used our last fast pass on it and we were put in the first car. As soon as it turned there was the hill and I looked at her. She didn't even say anything. I cannot tell you how much she loved it. As soon as we got off she wanted to go on again. Since I used all our fast passes I quickly got another one for later on. That ride is all she talked about.

We worked our way over to the Haunted House and waited on the stand by line for at least 45 minutes. By then we were starving so we went to Columbia Harbor quick serve for dinner. Jenny had a sandwich and I had a lobster roll.

We made our way over to Pirates of the caribbean and then we shared

By now it was time to use our fast pass so we went back to Fantasyland. Well they put us in the last car this time. We loved it even more at night. She was so happy. Therefore I was happy.

I could hardly walk by now but I wanted to make it to Monsters Inc because it's my grandson's favorite movie. The show was so cute!

By now we have had it. We went to the emporium on Main St to do our shopping. We had all to do to carry all the stuff to the bus to the port. By now it was 10:30 at night. Our all aboard time was 1:00 am so I knew we were good. I think most people had the same thought because there was a long line for the bus however there was 3 buses all in a row.

The bus ride back to the ship took about 90 minutes. I swear the driver was going 30 mph in a 70 mph zone. It was very quiet on the bus. My fit bit battery was beeping the whole time as I didn't have my charger with me. So after walking 22,000 steps we made it back to the ship. Cabanas was open until around 12:30 so we went up to grab a snack to bring back to the room.

All in all our Disneyworld Day was all we wanted it to be..we had a ball.

Epcot!

By now it was starting to get very hot out. I'm guessing it was around 12 noon by the time we got to Epcot. We always eat lunch in China but I figured I can't eat a lot so let's just get a quick serve. I decided on France. The boat took us right between England and France so it worked out perfect.

We both had ham and cheese on a croissant but the only problem was there was no place to sit and eat lunch. We ended up standing up at a counter and it wasn't so bad.

We then worked our way around the countries and we used our first fast pass on Frozen. It was meh..but it was new for us. The air conditioning felt really really good.

I've always wanted to go on the Mexico boat ride but we could never find it. We found it this time and really enjoyed it. I love rides like that. After Mexico we trudged over to Test Track. The line wasn't that bad believe it or not. Jennifer loved it! Here's our car.

By now it had to be around 3:00 so we headed to Soarin and used our fast pass. We liked the new concept and I never fail to duck when it looks like something is going to hit me.

I was very excited as we were exiting Epcot to spot this:

We went to catch the monorail to Magic Kingdom.

We then went over to Star Tours. Let me tell you about Jennifer. She does not like roller coasters or water rides. She trusted my son when he told her that Star Tours was not either one. The line was maybe 30 minutes until we got on the ride. She LOVED it. I loved it too.

We then ran back to catch the march of the storm troopers and it was all it was hyped up to be. I will try and upload the video when I get a chance.

We then went to do my favorite ride for the last time. The Great Movie Ride. My late husband always loved movies so this ride always brings a tear to my eye as many of his favorites are shown.

By now we had seen everything we came to see and ran to catch the boat to Epcot.

Wednesday - Disneyworld Day! (Yay) Hollywood Studios

The day we waited for has finally arrived. Room Service knocked on our door at exactly 6:00 am with our continental breakfast. We were already docked and I can see it's going to be a beautiful day. In between quick showers and eating we were ready for 7:00 am. We had to go through customs as we were returning to the US today. Our bus was scheduled to leave for Hollywood Studios at 7:30 am. Customs was easy peasy and before you knew it we were on the bus heading for Disneyworld.

I had planned our day before time and since we've been there many times I wanted to limit it to stuff we've never done. The park hopper ticket given to us by DCL contained 3 fast passes that could be used on any ride, at any time.

Our first stop was Hollywood because I had never seen the Star Wars stuff. I have 3 sons, 2 of which are in their late 30's and they were and still are big Star Wars fans.

But first....Toy Story Mania!

While waiting on line I purchased the photo pass package for the day. It was $60 and well worth it. We actually sought out the photographers at the parks rather than avoiding them for a change. Once you take the first picture you can activate it. It was relatively easy once you have the Disney Experience app for your smart phone. You can also reserve fast passes on it. You do need to link your admission cards to it and everything stays in one place.

Okay back to Toy Story...before you knew it we were in our cars. I was beating Jennifer by lots of points throughout the whole ride..and then...Missy just pulled the string and held it and boom..she beat me. LOL..We really enjoyed the competetiveness of the ride.

We then went over to the Launch Pad to meet Rylo Ken. As we were waiting to go in 2 storm troopers came out and everybody was trying to get them to pose for pictures but they wouldn't. They said they were protecting the perimeter.

The line was about 20 minutes for Kylo Ren but there were tons of things to look at while on line. We finally got in and met him. He preached to us about the dark force for quite awhile and then called Jenny a traitor. I am going to show you that picture..it's my most favorite picture of the whole trip. Look at her face.

LOLOL!!

So here is my picture with him. I tried to copy his pose but apparently according to my son it looks like I'm asking for money. You be the judge.

Once we were able to convince him Jenny was not a traitor she was able to take a picture with him. You can see how fast she recuperated.