ellcee

That's all that matters.
I dunno if people want to hear about the 8X per day I have a meal or snack when I cruise but that's what I share if I blog, lol.

Another fantastic and relaxing afternoon! I am starting to think this live blog might become too boring for all of you but Hubby and I are truly having the best time doing a whole lot of nothing. It is such a nice change from the business of home. I am starting to miss my girls though. The house is still in one piece, my plants are still alive, and the pool doesn’t look green, but as much as I love my alone time, I miss them. 
 
After lunch at El Loco we spent the rest of the afternoon just chilling. Hubby went to the Flowrider again and I spent most of my afternoon napping on the balcony. 
 
Currently in the Suite Lounge enjoying @Neesa’s recommendation. 

 

Dinner at Giovanni’s Kitchen 

We first tried this on Freedom last July and really liked it. Here on Wonder it is just as good. Service and quality of food perfect here tonight. Hubby and I both had pastas, the tiramisu was super rich, and I love the pizza crust here. 

Izumi lunch 
Something is off with this Izumi. We have gone to enough Izumi’s to know how it is supposed to work. Service was again super slow here today, just like last night. Crew seemed like they were a little disorganized and chaotic. Food tasted the same and was good, but both last night and today something was off.
Even more interesting, we got our rolls and they totally shrunk in size, like half. We even went back to our pics from March to double check. We asked about this and Izumi staff said that in a recent change by Royal, those with the UDP are getting half the size of the rolls. Those ordering a la carte get the old size. The reasoning here is basically cost cutting because the UDP is getting more and more popular. 
 

Dinner for Night 2 was Izumi Hibachi. It was a strange Hibachi dinner tonight. The food was great as usual, however, it was not the normal, loud, Hibachi vibe.
Our table of 8 was the only one there on the Hibachi side, the crew said that the other two tables cancelled. And this was 7pm, prime Hibachi time.
Dinner also moved very slow (compared to other Hibachi’s we have been to). Not sure what was up there tonight.
Another first, tonight was the first night we witnessed our Hibachi cook drop an egg. At first we thought it was a joke, but sure enough, there was clean up needed on the floor. 
 

After Hubby grabbed a bite to eat in the Suite Lounge we headed up to see what the Suite Sun deck looked like. I really like the new additions here. Now if only they would keep the Deck 18 doors locked….
 

PDCC
Great weather today! Very hot but got away from the rain and wind that was around yesterday. No real plans today. I had breakfast in CK and Hubby slept in. Later we wandered around the top decks while it was quiet. Did not get to do this yesterday because of the weather. 

Also, minor gripe from tonight’s 8:30pm showing of Intense. The entire front row was filled with kids under 12. I have no clue where all these kids came from, or who was supervising these kids, or where their parents were but they played with the fountains “during” the show for a good third of it before someone from the tech team said a few words to them. Guess parenting skills go on vacation too? 😒

Speaking of dinner, you know where we went tonight right? 
 
Coastal Kitchen - Filet night! 
 
The food and service here was great tonight. We had our regulars and quality and taste were excellent. Sometimes the cuts of meat or the flavour is off in some CK’s but tonight it was fantastic! 
 
The chicken noodle soup was very different compared to Symphony and Harmony, but it was good! It had more of a Cajun taste to it, slightly spicy 🤷🏻‍♀️

🙋‍♂️ I will be a random stranger if you ever need to share anything.

Sail away….
Mad Hatter’s Purple Potted Shrimp from Wonderland. Marla introduced Hubby to these last cruise and he loved them. So we got some to start off this sailing. 

Off on vacation mode for 1 week!

Crazy storm just rolled in…
Time to go through some room pics 😉
 
 

Backtracking a bit….
Dropping off the car rental at Enterprise on Mullet Road was a breeze. We handed the keys over, headed over the area where it said “cruise shuttles” and someone was there in less than 5 minutes to take us to the port. This was the first time we ever made it to port so early. We were at the terminal just before 10am. 
 
Much like Terminal A in Miami, and like what Hannah said, there is a Star Class podium there. From there, porters took our luggage and the pier agent at the podium checked our names on her list and escorted us through security and upstairs to check in. Hannah met us very shortly afterwards. Both Hannah and Judy (the pier agent) told us that Wonder boards very early. Sure enough, by 10:10am the B2B cruisers headed on and then we did. We were in our room by 10:20am and Hannah sat with us for a bit to chat and review star class benefits. She is quite personable already. Looking forward to getting to know her this week. 

I am so glad everything worked out. You got luggage, your star wars day didn't suck and you had good food. Plus your hubby had the time of his life it seems 😉 By this time tomorrow you will be feeling the star class food coma.

Great (but busy) day at Hollywood Studios today. Most of our day was spent in Galaxy’s Edge as Hubby had no real interest in the rest of the park.
 
It was hot, but Hubby had a great time. As a non-Disney, non-Star Wars fan, I have to say, they did an impressive job with Galaxy’s Edge. 
Genie+/Lightning Lane worked great for us. Allowed us to ride the rides multiples times. Going in at 7:15am for rope drop and early hours helped too. The first hour or so the crowds were pretty thin. 
 
Since Hubby knew that we would be going back again later tonight, we decided to leave around 1:30pm after visiting Oga’s Catina. Had to get out of the heat for a bit. Headed back to the hotel for a short nap & shower and then decided to swing by the Vineland Premium Outlets for about two hours. 
 
I posted videos to Instagram, on my story because they don’t upload well here. Some pics of our day, in no particular order because I am super tired  😉
 

Hubby is having a blast at Galaxy’s Edge! We got here early for rope drop. Have been able to ride Rise of the Resistance twice (once on standby at rope drop and once using our Lightning lane), same with Smuggler’s Run. Will upload pics much later but I’ve been post stuff throughout on Instagram stories (@lovetocruise2002). 

Had to try out El Patron for dinner. One because of the name, you know I love Patron, and also because they have fried ice cream. Dinner was great. The place has a live DJ who Hubby really liked. Food was huge portions! And fried ice cream was yummy. We still miss La Bamba but not a bad substitute if you are looking for a place to eat in Orlando near Disney. 
 

Here we are! Finally where we should have been a bit over 24 hours ago. 
 
Disney’s The Swan Reserve
- beautiful + new + modern
- as “un-Disney like” as possible 
- not as many kids 
- full Disney perks 
We booked a Junior Suite for a bit more room. I love their decor and colour schemes in all their rooms and throughout the hotel. We have been messaging them since yesterday morning regarding our delays. They were helpful, responsive, and very reassuring every time we updated them. 
 
 

Yay! 
 

I don’t even know what to say.  I can’t imagine your stress and fatigue levels.  What a shambles the airline industry has become.  Stay safe.  

Just think... this will be worth it on Sunday! Then you'll be able to relax! ❤️

We sort of knew too. The second they said they did not have a pilot I knew. That is when I moved to switch our Disney tickets and we started looking into rental car options. 
 
 
We are on our way. Praise God we actually got a car. So many flights were cancelled from Atlanta last night. The line at Avis was huge! We saw so many get turned away. Our advantage was booking early since we had a feeling it would be cancelled and we preferred to drive over risking another flight. Hope to arrive in Orlando to get our bags around 11:30am. Going on no sleep, I have been making sure that Justin takes frequent breaks to rest and stretch, so it’s taking just a bit longer. By the time we got the car, it was already past 4am.

Go to bed all. Flight cancelled. Currently trying to rent a car to drive there. Will update in the morning ❤️

No guarantees in this life lol. Full flight. Lots of cancellations and delays. Lots of grumpy people here. 
First it was weather that delayed the pilot. Then they gave our plane away to another flight going to Minneapolis cause they had a pilot for that. Now some other flight has arrived and I think we are boarding that one? 
 
The bags are in Orlando. They beat us there this time. We are the ones who are lost and playing the “Will they make it, will they not?” game 😂

No cocktails today. I can barely think clearly as it is. 
 

Some good news and bad news in the last hour. The good news is that Disney allowed me to move our Hollywood Studios tickets to Saturday for a minimal charge of $5.33/pp. That takes away a lot of my stress. Bad news is that I am truly tired and our flight is now delayed until 11:30pm. At least we can now sleep in tomorrow….