Copenhagen to the Disney Magic June 6 2015

Today was our final morning of our Adventures by Disney Escape to Copenhagen pre-cruise adventure.  It is a nice morning.  There are clouds in the sky threatening rain, but it actually ends up being the best day since we arrived.

We were scheduled to meet in the lobby and 11:15 a.m.  We were asked to have our luggage outside our hotel room by 9:30 a.m. for pickup.  That is one nice perk of the ABD, you don’t have to haul your luggage around.

Breakfast was included in the package, but I opted to stay in the hotel room and get the last “free” wi-fi that I had before getting on the ship at a high speed.  You never know how successful on the ship with wi-fi you will be.  The Disney Magic has been pretty great the last couple of years, however, it does take longer to download pictures, so you will find I won’t be posting as many pictures when I am on the ship, unless I find free internet in our ports.

Just an FYI-here is the cost for internet.  .25 per mb; or 100 mb for $19 or 300 mb for $39 or 1000 mb for $89.  I have always done the $89 package for megabytes, in that I find 300 is not enough, 600 is not either, and for the best bang for my buck I go with the 1000 mb’s.  Also, when you get on the ship the first day, if you log on before midnight you get 50 mbs free.  It is no longer advertised in the Daily Navigator.  Just sign in and get started.  On your desk in your stateroom are instructions but basically you go to DCLGuest and then log in using your email address and then you enter your birthdate and password.  Just an FYI-Elaine and I are sharing a stateroom, she was able to get 50 mb’s with her email and I was also able to get 50 mb’s with my email address.

For those travelling from the Tivoli Hotel on the Disney motorcoaches in future weeks, you meet in the lobby at 1130 a.m., the buses arrive at 11:45 a.m. and you leave at 12 noon for the port.  The port is 15-20 minutes away from the hotel.  Today there are 3 motorcoaches to transfer the guests.  And, FYI, the lobby is packed because you have guests who just got off the ship showing up at the hotel and then guests checking out heading to the ship.

We got on the motorcoach and took a 10 minute ride to The Little Mermaid statute.  Got my first glimpse of the Disney Magic from the statute.  We got our last ABD pin which of course was of the Little Mermaid.  

We then took a 10 minute ride to the port.  We arrived at the port at 12:15 p.m., went right in through security, to the Platinum check in.  When we arrived, they were calling boarding numbers 1-12 already.  There were quite a few people in the port, but it was not jam packed.  Fyi-if you are doing back to back cruises and wanting to go into Copenhagen on the day you come into port, there is a free shuttle to the downtown area.

Quickly checked in, got our Key to the World card and then went right to the boarding area.  Stopped got our picture and then headed right to the ship.  Boarding is from Deck 1, and there is no one from the Cruise Staff who welcomes you aboard the ship by announcing your family name.  We found it easier to walk up to deck 3 via the staircase since there were lines for the elevators.

On the front of your Personal Navigator is the information for picking up your tickets for the meet n’ greets with Anna, Elsa and Olaf; the Princess Gathering and the Marvel characters (Captain America I think).  Anyway we pick those up at the Port Adventures deck, midship, deck 3, no problem.  Run into my friend Emma, who is on the main stage entertainment staff.  Lots of hugs are shared.

We then head into Lumiere’s to check on our dining server and head server.  All is good.  We have Willie and Luis.  The line for Palo is quite long, so decide to check our Palo reservations later.  There were at least 25-30 people waiting to talk to Palo.

Next it is time for lunch, so head off to Carioca’s for the lunch buffet.  Have a good lunch and run into many of the crew I know so we spend time catching up.  Run into one of my servers Esther.  She makes sure to tell me to say hi to Ken and Shari.  We laugh over my love for Butternut Squash Soup.

After lunch, we head to our stateroom.  Elaine had ordered the Frozen Stateroom Decorations.  They are really cute.  She also got the Frozen blanket and the Frozen pillow as well as the Frozen cooler.  I especially like the blanket.  It is fleece but has a nice fabric on the back to make it a nice warm blanket.

 

Then it is time for the meet n’ greet with our Facebook friends.  Head off to Fathom’s where we all get to know each other for the next hour.  Head back to the room and see that Michael has left some really nice gifts including a Norway scarf for the journey.  By the way, Michael came straight from the airport to the port.  He said it was $90 US and it took about 20-25 minutes.

It is time already for the lifeboat drill.  Lifeboat drill is in English and Spanish.  

Brent is cruise director.  He will be getting off the end of this cruise and then Natalie will take over.  Commodore Tom is the Captain of the ship.  There are quite a few cast members on from the Celebration offices of DCL working on this cruise.

Next it is off to sailaway party.  The weather has been great today and we are able to have sailaway outside.  Earlier in the week it was questionable with the rain, but it ended up not raining at all.  Must be the Magic of Mickey!  We all got bubbles from DCL for the party.

Bill Cecil and his son-in-law Mike.

 Me and Michael with our scarves Michael made for us.

I head off to the store at 6 p.m. to get some limited edition merchandise.  They have quite a few Norway items exclusive to the inaugural sailing.  I get a tapestry throw, a shirt, a couple of Norway mugs, a couple of Christmas ornaments and I think that is it for starters.  The Limited Edition pins will be released the next day at 9 a.m.

Then it is time for the Welcome Aboard show but we decide to finish unpacking since we will have the opportunity to see it on three more occasions.

Dinner times are either 6 p.m. or 8:30 p.m.  We are on the 8:30 p.m. seating.  There are 5 of us.  Michael, Jonas, Steiner, Elaine and myself.  Our rotation is ACL (Animators, Cariocas, Lumieres).  It repeats the same throughout the cruise.  Animator’s is rotation dining and we get the animation show, and of course I get my butternut squash soup.  By the way, the Baked Potato Soup is off the menu and replaced with a split pea soup.

We also have a plate of cheese and crackers as well as mozarella sticks prior to dinner.  Had the chicken for dinner and then had the cookie sundae for dessert.

After dinner we head to Fathom’s for Match Your Mate.  Our friends Katie and Mike won tonight.  They got champagne and a day pass to the Rainforest room.

It is after 11 p.m. and it is still light outside, but time to head to bed, so off we go.  I had our stateroom host bring me some down pillows and an extra blanket because I am always cold.  We’ve got everything unpacked, but still unorganized.  It will probably take us a couple of days to get everything in its’ proper place.

Tomorrow is a sea day!  So looking forward to a day of relaxing.  Once again it is after midnight.  So I am going to wrap this one up.  I hope to not get behind more than a day or so.

Goodnight from the Disney Magic!