Magic-al Thanksgiving Cruise- It's Like EPCOT

We climbed the stairs up to the future cruise desk and re-shopped our April cruise. All the while, I was at the desk hoping the cast member wouldn't mention the Christmas present I had booked to surprise Ben that was coming up in February.
Thankfully he didn't, but I was really sweating it for a bit. On looking at our reservation, re-shopping saved us $800, not counting the $200 OBC. Their current promotion saved 20% off for the spring Galveston sailings. I'll take that for sitting waiting for ten minutes. Pretty awesome! I'll get to those  trip reports one of these days! I promise! But the way this one has been going, I'll probably finish those ones sometime by 2020...sound good to y'all? I collected Kylee from the Oceaneer Club to go head out to the promenade lounge and try the door hanger craft. She loved it, but they did not turn out adorable. We still weren't hungry, so we headed back upstairs to the room.

Beautiful Water

View of Costa Maya from our "slightly obstructed" SPH room. Kylee happily collected Ben and Chris to see if they wanted to hit the Disney Trivia back in the lounge with us. They did! We headed downstairs and peeked out of the windows waiting for the trivia to start.

Costa Maya

FYI, if you ever do these trivia things and the trivia asks where all of the Disney parks are located; they want Orlando, Florida, not Lake Buena Vista, so think more general answers... Just for giggles, does anyone else but me know what type of pie Snow White prepared for the Dwarves? Without googling? We learned on the first two questions not to discuss them out loud as Chris and Kylee are quite nearly incapable of whispering. My creative DH started feeding them bad answers knowing they'd whisper them again VERY loudly. Anyway we won! The kids loved running around with the little winner’s medals at Topsiders. After a lovely little lunch, we gathered our party before venturing forth.

Dock

Port side of the Magic.

Goofy is doing a little touch up painting on the Aft.

Heading down the super long dock, the kids loved seeing the ship up close from the outside. They liked hanging out on the dock.

This photo feels super vacation-y to me.

They did not like that the sun was trying to melt them from the outside in. The navigator listed the high as 90...but it felt super-hot since there is no shade.


Beautiful Squeaky Clean Port Area

After walking out to the end of the little touristy area, which seemed Disney clean, and shall henceforth be dubbed "Epcot Mexico" and watching some dancers in the little square, Kylee melted into a little "please carry me" puddle of three year old. So back through Epcot Mexico we walked. As we piggybacked Kylee along, we happened upon a little "take a picture with a lion cub drinking feed the wild animal a bottle" kiosk. The whole thing just felt screamingly sad. Where was the little lion's mom? Why was it being handed about like a stuffed animal to pose for photos with tourists? So sad.

Air Condition!!!

Anyway, after boarding and thanking God repeatedly that we were born in an age and country where air conditioning is the norm, The kids perked up and remembered they hadn't visited the Lab in AGES. Like nearly four hours!

My kids' favorite part of cruising.

Checked them in and headed off to enjoy a little afternoon time in the a/c...maybe with a soy hot chocolate no whip or a frappucino?  Ben opted for the nibble of everything method of snack selection.

 

We wandered a bit and took some semi empty ship photos...



 Blue,blue,blue!

Costa Maya from the Magic

Looking forward from Deck 10

Ben and I goofed around saying, hey it's our second cruise, and could we get you in the shot twice? Yep. Look at that last photo again. We're such Dis-nerds. 

Volcanos at sea.

So while they were in the lab they had time to do "Lava Flow" and it looked like so much fun! I checked on Kylee (Chris had opted for another round of Mario Kart.) I took one photo from outside the check in area before a cast member told us only during open house hours do they allow photography, oh, okay, live and learn!

Sleepy from pirate night.

It was our "show" night in Animator's Palate, so the kids were in it for the long haul and Kylee's late night caught up with her early in the meal and only making goofy faces at the camera amused her for only short periods of time.

 

On the positive side we got some lovely couscous and hummus for dinner. Yummy stuff!

 

Cous

Our last cruise, we managed to somehow miss the big surprise Mickey finish at the end of the AP show...

Ben and I was taken totally by surprise. After dinner, we headed back to the room and Chris crashed for the night, swapping to pajamas to watch classic Disney cartoons and later the recorded version of the stage show.
Kylee and I changed into comfy clothing (like jeans, not pajamas) and headed out to see my second least favorite of the Walt Disney Theatre offerings after Toy Story for "Villains Tonight!" Kylee disliked the dark in the theatre even before the show started but our front row seats were pretty awesome.

Yay we're in the front row and I've had a ton of sugar, thank you FE friends!"

I warned Kylee that all the bad guys from the movies starred in this evenings show but that the dancing really was pretty cool if she made it through. "But it'll be scary, mom!" Once it started, my little ballerina adored all of the dancing with the exception of the scary hyenas dancing in the aisles right by her during "Be Prepared" and her sour straws candy...she loved them when they were dancing on stage, but right by her feet overwhelmed her. After seeing it once though, she insisted on it during the next cruise. At four it's just on the line between scary and fun.

After the ending, carrying Kylee back to 5020, she replayed the dances blow by blow style, happy to hear that the next show would be "more princess-y." Chris snored away blissfully in his bunk while we snuck back in and Ben welcomed us back. I looked through the next day’s navigators while waiting for Kylee to pass out and then went to sleep.
This post is Part 14 of an Ongoing Trip Report Covering Our Thanksgiving Cruise 2012