Trip Report: September 25, 2019 5 Night to Bermuda on the Disney Magic – Day 1, Part 2

You can start this trip report from the beginning by clicking here.

Day 1, Part 2:  New York City

I left off in the previous post with us getting ready to go check out our staterooms. By the way, this is the first cruise where I noticed that the ribbon barrier (I don’t know what else to call it?) to the stateroom corridors stated that rooms would be ready at 2:00, but the Navigator said 1:30. It was indeed 2:00 when the barrier was removed and we went to find ours, which were 2 connecting interior category 10C rooms. You can read full reviews of staterooms 2643 here and 2645 here. Since there are lots of photos in the reviews, I won’t post any here but I will show you some things that we had waiting for us.

Our onboard credit statements and port adventure tickets:

You can read all the details about how I maximize our onboard credit here.

We had booked 1 DCL port adventure for this cruise, the Restless Native Catamaran.  I typically avoid DCL port adventures, but if I find one that gets really good reviews on TripAdvisor, then I will do it. This was one of those cases.

I also remembered to photograph the Navigator that we received when we checked in at the terminal.  The entire set of Navigators can be seen here.  FYI, your stateroom host no longer leaves a copy in your room each night, and we didn’t ask him to.  I just walked by guest services each evening to grab the one for the following day – they had a pile on the counter.

The Castaway Club gift is the same one that it has been for a few years – the sling backpack, and we got the luggage tag as well for being platinum.  Since we had 2 rooms and did 2 cruises in a row, we came home with 4 of these!

The laundry bag in the closet:

If this bag “disappears”, be forewarned that your credit card will be charged for it.  I also remembered to photograph the current laundry prices:

You can read all about the laundry options onboard here.

We also decorated our doors.  I got these magnets from an Etsy shop called Knits or Pieces.  I was very happy with them and the quality was great! There are non-holiday options available as well.

I blurred the girls’ names because I try to keep them off the blog.

After getting settled and meeting our stateroom host, Abhay, we went up to deck 9 for some ice cream. On the way we went back by the atrium and the tree was finished.

In addition to chocolate and vanilla, they had pineapple and strawberry.  I had the pineapple and it was delicious! I don’t recall seeing this flavor on past cruises. I remember seeing pina colada, but not plain pineapple.

We still had some time before the safety drill, so we went to check out the Oceaneer’s Club/Lab. We started in the Lab:

Then we walked down the connecting corridor to the Club:

It was now time for the safety drill.  We were station Q, which meets inside Animator’s Palate.  I love it when our station is indoors, although the weather was quite mild today so being outdoors wouldn’t have been all that bad like it is in Florida. The drill was fairly quick and then it was time to follow the hoards up to deck 9 for the Sail-A-Wave Party. This is the time that the ships feel the most crowded to me – after the safety drill on the way to the upper decks.  We climbed 6 flights of stairs and went to deck 10 to try and get a spot by the railing.  In the past we have always preferred to be on deck 9 right next to the stage, but I knew that the new Sail-A-Wave Party was set up differently that the old version and now they do not let guests stand in the middle, on top of the pool.  So, more people are smashed into the areas on either side and I didn’t want to be a part of that. Here is where we ended up:

I admit I don’t care for the new party nearly as much as the old one.  I used get excited for the old one, but this one I could take or leave. I think I am just nostalgic and don’t like change. If you are interested, I have some video on my Instagram highlights.

I took this photo while we were up there and it shows the terminal parking lot if anyone is planning on parking at the port and wonders what it looks like:

We sailed away at about 5:00.  The weather was beautiful – sunny and in the upper 70’s. Here we have just pushed away and you can see pier 88, where the Magic had been:

Sailing past the city was spectacular and I couldn’t stop taking photos! There were Shutters photographers walking around and we posed for one, but I wasn’t thrilled with it and didn’t buy it.

Note that we were sailing past the city from 5:00-5:45.  Since early dining starts at 5:45, this is one of the reasons we chose late dining for this cruise (at 8:15). Had we been delayed in sailing away (which we were on the next cruise), then those with early dining would not have been able to see this unless they were really late for dinner, which is not kind to your servers, especially on the first night.  So I would say that if seeing the city while sailing away is important to you, then choose late dining or do something else for dinner that evening such as room service or the quick service counters by the pool.  FYI, if you are new to Disney cruises, you can read ALL about the dining onboard the ship here.

Before too long we were approaching the Statue of Liberty so we had to move to the starboard side of the ship.  Here is it in the distance:

The position of the sun right behind it made it hard to get good photos.  This is the best one I got:

The weather was overcast for the second cruise so I was able to get better pictures of it then.

By the time we were past the Statue of Liberty, it was almost 6:00 so we had to rush to the Walt Disney Theater to go see the evening show, Tangled: The Musical.  We were all very excited to see a brand-new-to-us show. I think was also when we discovered that our cruise director was Trent, who was also new to us.

We loved the show and thought it was spectacular!  We were happy to be able to see it a second time on the following cruise.

After the show, we walked around to kill some time before dinner.  The Pumpkin Tree presentation was happening in the atrium:

Finally 8:15 rolled around and we went to Animator’s Palate.  Our dining rotation for this cruise was ARRLA, with A=Animator’s Palate, R=Rapunzel’s Royal Table, and L=Lumiere’s.  

Our servers were Aubrey (main), Agus (assistant), and Mavis (head). They were all very good, and Aubrey is such a sweetheart.

I somehow completely forgot to take photos of the food tonight except for the dessert, and this:

The Black Truffle Pasta Purseittes!  I love these things. I can’t remember what else we got, except I know that my daughter ordered the Pennete Bolognese, which is one of her favorites from any of the DCL menus.  I always taste it and it very, very good.  I just don’t order it myself because it is so filling and I will sit there and eat it all and then be miserable.

For dessert, someone ordered the Chocolate Fudge Cheesecake (great):

The Cookies ‘n Cream Sundae (great):

The Lemon Icebox Pie (good):

And the Crunchy Walnut Cake (good):

We finished dinner about 9:45, and our middle daughter is a karaoke fanatic and wanted to go to Family Superstar Karaoke at 10:30.  I’m not sure what we did in the meantime, but I know we arrived at the D Lounge early and saw the end of “Who Wants to be a Mouseketeer?”:

She had her turn at karaoke:

And then we all went to bed, exhausted. When we arrived at the rooms, some things had been delivered.  This was our Platinum Castaway Club letter explaining our benefits and gift options:

We always choose the truffles (photos in a later post). We also had our reminder for Palo Brunch the next morning:

Abhay had left us 2 towel animals, along with a card to remind us that we were moving the clocks forward one hour tonight. Yuck!

Up Next:  Day 2 – At Sea & Palo Brunch