Mediterranean cruise and European adventure - Day 9 - At Sea

At Sea

Aaaah, a relaxing day at sea! Sort of. I feel like we had a nice mix of activities and down time on our sea day. It was a really fun day and honestly, I could have done with another sea day on the cruise. In the future, I think I’ll look for cruises that have more than just one day at sea.

I woke up, as per usual, before everyone else. It was 7:30 so I tossed on my workout clothes and headed for deck four. My preferred ship workout is a run around deck four. It’s so peaceful in the mornings, especially on sea days and I’ve never missed a deck four run (well, except on our first cruise, but it was only a 3-day). In an earlier entry, I briefly mentioned my broken foot. 7 weeks prior to our cruise, I landed badly from a jump and broke my foot. I was in a boot for nearly 5 weeks and was worried about how it would be during the cruise. I hadn’t run since the injury and there are still a lot of things that hurt it. It had mostly behaved during the cruise, but it was definitely a little achey at times.

It was feeling okay on this particular morning so I decided to go for a very slow, very light shuffle/jog/walk. I would shuffle/jog/walk a lap, then do a series of exercises (pushups, tricep dips on the benches, burpees, etc.) then do another shuffle/jog/walk. The sea was beautiful and I was so happy to be out there. In fact, the seas were incredibly smooth and calm our entire cruise. The movement of the ship was barely perceptible. Partly it was the Mediterranean. It was just really smooth and even glass-like at times. It was very similar to Alaska in this regard. But I also think with the close proximity of the ports, we simply didn’t move all that quickly and when we move fast, the ship does have the tendency to have a bit more motion. It’s also worth noting here that while my foot didn’t bother me during the workout, I did pay for it later and it really ached off and on the rest of the day. I regret nothing. It was 100% worth it. (And per my orthopedist, I can't mess it up further. The only repercussion is that it aches, I'm not making anything worse.)

At 8:30 I went back to the room where Roger was just waking up but Emmaline was still asleep. I got cleaned up and she woke up around 8:45 and we all went to breakfast at Cabana’s around 9:15. I didn’t get a call from Palo so I guess that was a no-go. Too bad. I really like Palo brunch.

At 9:45 it was our assigned time to meet Anna and Elsa so I took Emmaline to do that. Then we had time to squeeze Minnie in at 10 (in her princess dress) before our assigned time for the princess meet and greet at 10:15. By 10:20 we were back to the room and I noticed that Edge was having open house and Emmaline wanted to go so she went there, I worked on a trip report and Roger did a small batch of laundry, which ended up being a good thing, because I had apparently miscounted and barely scraped through (I ended up having to wash a pair of underwear in a sink near the end of the trip so I really really miscounted).



At 11:00 Emmaline came back from open house and watched some TV until 11:30 when she went to go meet Stitch. I took a break from my trip report and went as well. He’s always a fun meet. At 11:45 Emmaline and I went to the Promenade Lounge for DCL’s version of Family Feud, which is played with two big teams (of unrelated people). After that was over at 12:15 we went to Cabanas for lunch. By 1:00 we were back to the room to regroup.

Emmaline went to the character dance party at 1:15, which is always a favorite activity of hers. Roger and I hung out in the room (trip report for me, a rest for him) and then we all met up for the 2:00 showing of Incredibles 2 in the Walt Disney Theatre. The movie was fantastic and I’m so glad we got to see it there (vs. the Buena Vista Theatre which is too small and cramped).

After the movie, Emmaline wanted to swim so I took her up there and she met up with some friends. The parents all chatted while the girls swam and had a good time. At some point during this, we were all at a table near the big windows on deck 9 and Emmaline pointed at the water and said, “jumping fish!” I looked and saw that they weren’t fish at all, but a pod of dolphins jumping and swimming along the side of the ship. It was super fun to see and we watched them until we couldn’t see them any longer.

At 5:30 we went back to the room so Emmaline could shower before dinner. Tonight was a special night. Since the cruise was so close to Emmaline’s birthday, we decided to have a little celebration and tonight was the night we designated as her “birthday.” We had a lot of fun the second night in Rapunzel’s Royal Table and she enjoyed celebrating.





Right after dinner, at 7:30 was officer pin trading (dinner wasn’t really over until 7:40, but they were still trading when we arrived there). After that we killed some time in the room again until it was time for the evening’s variety entertainment in Fathoms, a Beatles tribute duo called Just John and Paul. (They were showing the first of two nights of “Disney Dreams” in the Walt Disney Theatre.) Hardly anyone was there, which was a shame because they put on an enjoyable show.



After their show we regrouped in the room (translation: Roger rested, Emmaline watched TV, I worked on the trip report) until Emmaline and I went to a class on how to draw Donald Duck. I thought it was fun, but Emmaline was disappointed with her drawing. I thought she did a great job, however. Back to the room, we tried to start organizing a few things in preparation for the next day’s packing. I was in disbelief that it was almost the last day. This cruise definitely felt like it went quicker than any of the others.

At 10:30 Roger and I left Emmaline in the room in her pjs watching TV to go to see JunNk perform an adult-only show in Fathoms. Again, they put on a really great show that we thoroughly enjoyed. When it was done, we came back to the room where Emmaline was still happily watching Disney TV and we all called it a night.

Click here for Day 10.