Merry Christmas from the Bahamas!

Okay so it's still a couple of days before Christmas but I don't know my chances of getting online for blogging so here is my festive post. 

Nothing much exciting has happened since I last posted... Well, nick went on vacation last Sunday which has sucked. It's very strange to see someone literally every single day and then for them to disappear almost in a puff of smoke! I keep expecting him to be on the phone when it rings or to come knock on my door. I've kept busy since he's been gone considering its Christmas which is lucky... The 2nd day after he left we had the worst counts session ever because everyone kept getting their numbers wrong and it just sucked... We left at 3pm!! We used to get out around 11-12 even with crew drill in the middle but 3pm is plain rediculous. Then I had less than 3 hours off before going back to work for pirates. Seen as nick has now left and he was the main pirate master, I have done it every pirate night since so after our short break it was time for pirate night... Then after work was done we had midnight gingerbread house making! That was a lot of fun, my house eventually collapsed because I put too much candy on it. The bummer was that cabin inspection was the next day so we were not allowed to take it back to our cabins, hence we stuffed our faces until we felt sick then enjoyed destroying them.

Wednesday was castaway as the itinerary has switched around at the moment and the sea day is on Mondays. I was actually on a Donald in the end because I couldn't have the planned one on Tuesday night as it was pirates. I slept in a bit and then left with Tyler because it was cabin inspection anyway. I went to castaway and got pretty fried in the sun for two hours before having BBQ lunch and then heading back to wash my hair and boring things like that. 

Thursday I saw florida nick as he came to visit. I signed him onto the ship and gave him a quick tour and then we got longhorns for lunch yum.

On friday I got news from my mum that she's booked the Disney fantasy for a week in January when she comes to visit me!! I get to be a guest for 7 days!! I already put in for palo dinner and brunch reservations. My vacation plans are finally coming together, I will spend 4 days in Orlando with Florida nick and his roommate Eric then my mum arrives and we have a day in Orlando before going on the cruise for 7 days then she flies home the day after we disembark. Then i will fly to California on the same day as she goes home to visit nick and then I fly home a couple of days after getting back from that. God knows what I will do at home! 

So I guess quite a few exciting things have happened this week really. 

The weekend was pretty standard. We had a late night meal for merchandise Christmas celebration which was ok... Not as good as the last one though. We have a tacky sweater party tonight in the crew bar then tomorrow is Christmas Eve!! They are putting on a midnight mass which I would like to attend if I get out in time then the crew bar is Christmas music... See how tired I am! Wednesday is Christmas Day but also a sea day so it will be a crazy one...

So I would like to say Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all my friends and family, I can't wait to be home and see everyone again. Not long!

3 weeks to go!

I can't believe I'm finally on the last leg of my contract. Since thanksgiving everything has been reasonably as normal... The seas calmed down a lot so we haven't had any more bad weather like on my last post. I don't know if I mentioned it but Clare moved cabins (to next door actually) so I ended up with my own cabin for a week which was amazing. You never appreciate your own space until you work on a cruise line! Then on the 1st Ana moved in... She's from Portugal and an absolute sweetie. She's so nice and quiet and easy to live with so I'm really happy about that because we will share until I leave. However I was coming down with a sore throat when she moved in and then I had my night off on the 2nd and I literally just slept for the whole evening. It felt like a waste of an evening off but I didn't have any dining reservations, nobody else was off and I felt rubbish so probably a good thing in the long run. In the end, I tried to take vitamins and sore throat stuff for a week before giving in on the Saturday and visiting the doctor for the second time this contract. She said it was an upper respitory system infection, gave me antibiotics and Saturday night off. Again I spent it sleeping and it took a few days but eventually I felt better in the middle of the week.. I think it was just the result of pure exhaustion to be honest. 

The following weekend I talked to my manager and decided to give up stockroom. I had wanted to give it up before Christmas anyway because I'm leaving in January but we found someone that was keen to do it and so it was all swapped before I could catch up with myself. It did mean that I ended up as fairy godmother in training which I saw coming! I had the training 4 months ago but they only just found me a costume so now I'm spending most of my time as a FIGIT. I do makeovers to little girls where they get basic make up, glitter, face gems and pixie dust - it's a smaller version of Bobbity Bobbity boutique as they have at WDW and the fantasy. It's fun but you have to stay in character constantly and really give a lot during your shift... Still I'm preferring it to being in the stockroom. Don't get me wrong, I learnt a lot during my time as stockroom but towards the end I found it very stressful and I didn't really have much support from the rest of the team so it was difficult. The girl that has taken over has done an awesome job so far and whilst making me feel like I was rubbish in there, it's good that the stockroom is getting sorted in time for Christmas, new year and the inventory which happens in February. 

Moving on from that anyway....

We had another late night Nassau. It's unheard of with captain Henry but we passed our inspections and coastguard with flying colours so it was the crew reward. I didn't manage to get palo reservations like I had hoped but Tyler, nick and I went to Hard Rock Cafe and had dinner and a cocktail before going to Señor frogs for another drink which ended up as 3 drinks and a bit of a mad evening. It was hilarious and well needed. Nick and I went back to the ship at 10pm (I know, so late! Hahaha!) and promptly fell asleep. The next day was my first shift back on the island and I started at 8am so that's was fun!

I had to change my shifts off around a bit so I actually only have two mornings and two afternoons left on the island which is exciting because I'm not a huge fan of working there. I love the island don't get me wrong, but working there is different. Including today I have three sea days left (scheduled ones anyway!) and I have welcome line on my very last cruise which is awesome because it means I get that Thursday evening off plus the Saturday off too because I'm leaving on my ESTA so I can't work the day before. So even though now I don't have any evenings off until the 2nd January I'm sure there's lots of fun things coming up with Christmas and new year around the corner....

Turkey Day!

Happy thanksgiving to anyone that celebrates it! Even though I am British, I think it's nice to spend a day thinking what you'd like to say thank you for... So, for me, I am thankful for my parents and how supportive they are in whatever I do, thank you to my family for being there for me, thank you to my friends in the UK for welcoming me back whenever I get back there and for being people to do fun things with. Thank you for all my friends in the States and around the world as well as my new friends on the Cruise Line including New Nick who has been there for me through this crazy roller coaster 4 months. I am thankful for my job on the ship even though it's hard at times it provides me with a unique opportunity to work for Disney and provide memories for the guests on their vacations plus giving me experience for the future as well as obviously giving me money to live haha. 

Also, Thanksgiving means it's less than a month until Christmas! I sent my mum a ship ornament for the tree as well as some chocolate peppermint bark which came in a cute Disney tin but I have bought them presents to take home as well. I'm super excited for my mum to come and visit, fingers crossed a cruise on the fantasy comes up on the discounts list!! We just had a thanksgiving dinner in the mess which was good... Every now and again they do theme or recognition nights to thank the crew when we get good results so today we got a thanksgiving one. There was turkey obviously but I enjoyed the corn bread, real actual cheese, pumpkin cheesecake and PROFITEROLES!!!! One of my favourite desserts so that made me excited. 

This cruise is turning out much nicer than the last one. We switched the three and four day round this week so Sunday-Wednesday was the three day cruise and it was awful. The sea was so rough that everyone was suffering on Sunday and Monday night, we couldn't call at Nassau on Monday because we couldn't dock!! Two other carnival ships also didn't manage to get in either. We had to have an unscheduled sea day so instead of working 8-12 then 6.30-11.30 we actually worked 8am-12midnight ugh!! There was 55mph winds! The saving grace was on Tuesday we did manage to get into Castaway thank God. It was grey and raining in the morning but the sun finally made an appearance in the afternoon. The day turned better because they made a contingency plan incase it was another sea day (god forbid!) so they put on a matinee of Believe at 4pm!! Nick, Tyler, Stephen and I went to see it which was only the second time I have seen that show so that was awesome. Then at midnight we got to sneak into the midnight PremEAR at Sea of Frozen which was amazing!! One of the best Disney movies for a long time. 

Back to normality with the schedule from tomorrow with Friday Nassau (hopefully!). I have life raft training but a lie-in is still on the cards. I also finally booked my regular night off for December and my Donald recognition evenings (evening off!) so I don't work the nights of the 2nd, 17th or 30th yay! 

Makes it all worth it

I have had one of the most enjoyable evenings of my contract so far. As I am now classed as having a backstage role it means I don't do welcome line anymore and instead just end up with a random evening shift off and that was tonight... It was also pirate night! So I worked my morning castaway shift with Tyler and kamiko... We spent most of it sweating as we moved a lot of "equipment" I.e. Shelves and metal units to be taken off the ship in a few days because we have far too much of it. Once we were done at 12, Ty and I went over to the crew beach in the most gorgeous weather to have a (veggie) burger at the BBQ and enjoy some fresh air. We came back and I did some laundry and some sunbathing up on deck 13 which was full of crew as there were barely any guests on board. Once that was done, I washed my hair and straightened it before relaxing with a glass of wine and some nibbles.... I forgot how nice that was!  I felt more relaxed than I have in weeks! I went to deck 14 aft to see us leave castaway and took some photos of a pretty good sunset before going back to get ready for the evening.

Firstly I went to the shops to drop in a form as well as buy most of my Christmas presents... $240 later I was done! And that was after discount!! It should have been more like $380!! I am taking almost all of them home at the end of my contract though. But at least it's done now. I wrote my Christmas postcards today as well! Then I went to deck 11 to watch the cruise staff/fab 5 pirate show... It's so awesome I love it. Then changed into heels and met Claire to get dinner at royal palace. I only realised this evening that they change the menu on pirate night and all the restaurants have the same so it wasn't as good as the French inspired menu I had been expecting. Nevertheless I had pot-stickers for appetiser which were really yummy surprisingly. Then I had a pasta dish with scallops and shrimp which was good and a trio of desserts... Randomly I've had a couple before in the crew mess for late night snack haha! 

After dinner I went back to my cabin and was planning to go and see the pirate fireworks but I decided I was too tired so I got ready for bed instead :-) a lovely night off. 

And then it was Christmas!

The day after the Halloween cruise is done, the ship got transformed into Christmas in an impressive two hours between the cruise disembarking and the new 4000 passengers getting on board. To be honest the decorations aren't as over the top as I imagined... Not like the parks. We have a nice tree and garlands in the atrium as well as lots of wreaths over the ship. Merchandise, guest services, pool deck and housekeeping have to wear these Where's Wally style scarves that are red and white stripe. They'd be great if it was cold outside but inside the ship which is already warm it's not so great especially when you're wearing a jacket and pin lanyard as well.... Cruise staff have new activities for the guests for Christmas which I have yet to see but I'm sure are suitably cheesy!

We have new movies on the on demand including elf, national lampoon Christmas vacation, the grinch and apparently we will get home alone and things like that next month so that's good. I bought a pink Christmas tree for our desk but Clare my roomie doesn't want to decorate until after her birthday which is the 27th so we are waiting for that. 

Other than that, it's been same old same old. We got a massive delivery yesterday which I only got about half way through yesterday which is a bummer because now I have to try and find the time to get through the rest of the boxes whilst also working on stage as well. I only get the first night of the cruise exclusively in the stockroom unfortunately. The only difference of the cruises recently has been the weather. It's got VERY windy the last two weeks - there were gusts of over 50mph the other day. This means the ship has got very rocky especially on the first and last nights of the cruise. We actually had to do a last minute late night in Nassau on Monday of last week because the weather was too crap to leave so at 5pm we were about to get ready for work when the Captain came over the PA to inform everyone we would leave at 2am instead soooo the shops couldn't open hahaha. Night off for us! There was the risk that we would have to do an additional sea day if we couldn't dock at castaway the next day but lucky for us we didn't get an enforced 14 hour day because the weather cleared up enough to dock even though they were giving out ponchos on the gangway!

It probably contributed to working slower in the stockroom because it's harder to be productive when you're losing your balance constantly and bumping into the fixtures! 

Next week I have my night off on Tuesday... As I don't do welcome line anymore I get a night off per month. It's pirate night I think so I'm hoping to do my Christmas shopping, get dinner at Royal Palace with Claire and then see the pirate show. Maybe go take some photos of the Christmas decorations too.

This is my 50 day mark too... 50 days until freedom! It will be so wierd to go where I want, do what I want, not have work and drink as much as I like haha!

Happy Halloween from the Disney Scream!

Even though it is the 1st November, the whole ship is celebrating Halloween tonight as the guests have their Halloween/Pirate night and more importantly the crew have their Halloween party hosted by main stage and character performers which is sure to be very entertaining!! 

Confusingly I have spent the day getting ready for Christmas actually. We received all our Christmas goodies in yesterday during stores so Tyler and I volunteered to go into work today on the sacred Friday sleep-in day to help put it all out. With four of us it still took over three hours but there is some really good stuff and I'm sure it will all sell well. We had all the Halloween stuff on 40% off yesterday so there was lines waiting to go into the store but then I spent the whole evening down in the stockroom battling the movement of the ship which was rather violent last night! 

I'm trying to think what I have been doing and it's hard to remember because it all blurs into one. Generally my week goes something like this:

Sunday: embark day of the 4 night cruise. Start at 7am and receive all the stock onto the ship, sort it to go upstairs or into the stockroom. Spend a couple of hours unpacking stock and hanging/folding clothes then when everyone is done upstairs I finish at 11am-ish. Spend 11-3 either on the ship, using Internet at the terminal or going to Merritt Island Mall or Walmart. Back at 3pm, traffic control for guest drill at 3.40-4.10pm, spare time between 4.10-5.45pm then work from 5.45pm to 11.30pm which for me is in the stockroom unpacking boxes and processing delivery.

Monday: Nassau. Start work at 8/9am until around 12 doing stocktake (known as counts) and every other week we have to do crew drill between 10-11am as well. Spare time in Nassau between about 12-6.20 then work from 6.20-11.30pm.

Tuesday: Castaway Cay. I work doing stock pulls and tidying between 8am-12 and then free time from 12-5.20pm before work 5.20-11pm. If you work as a regular merchandise crew member then you work either 8-12 or 12-5 on the island and start work at 5.30pm or 6.30pm depending and finishing at 11.30pm if you're the later start.

Wednesday: Sea Day. Work in mickeys mainsail from 9am-11pm with two one-hour breaks. It's a killer. If you're the late shift on the island the day before then you work 10am-12 midnight instead on sea day.

Thursday: embarkation day again. Basically repeat exactly Sunday.

Friday: Nassau. Sleep in day!!! We don't start til 6.20pm so we get the whole day off basically. It's amazing. 

Saturday: Castaway Cay. Repeat from Tuesday except we all work until midnight whether you start at 5.30pm or 6.30pm. 

So that explains why I'm so busy! I work about 70 hours a week and I still don't know how I do it! 

Add in the trips to the crew bar, hanging out in the corridors, eating late night snack in the mess or in tonight's case the Halloween party in D-Lounge and you realise I really don't get much sleep. Your body goes into a state of being constantly tired which you get used to. I can't really lie down when I have relaxing time because I always fall asleep! Same goes for watching movies. Even if they put on a movie in the Buena Vista Theatre for us it always starts at midnight so I inevitably fall asleep! Nick has nicknamed me Granny because of my sleeping habits! 

Late night take two, my birthday and dragonflies

I have been so busy the last two weeks!!!!

I have not denied my blog I just literally haven't had time to sit and update.

Okay so... Firstly the stockroom. There's been ups and downs through the last two weeks and its been a steep learning curve especially regarding dealing with managers and peers. I have got quicker at processing delivery and the last three deliveries we have got out between 10-11am so that's good. Sea Treasures stock takes a lot longer than Mickeys because its all clothing so that's a lot of hanging and folding plus the stockroom is jam packed with clothing so it's a struggle to find where to put things sometimes. I am still learning about priorities and what order to do things in order to be most efficient which just takes time. I have learnt how to say no to people which is a hard thing when people call you needing something for a guest... Instead of spending your evening running up and down the I-95 you have to tell them that the guest will have to wait and you can take the product up but not immediately otherwise nothing in the stockroom would ever get done... The guest doesn't suffer because often they can just come back after dinner or the show and it makes no difference to them or we can even deliver it to their room. 

Also, on Thursday last week I had to battle against the ship listing to one side for the whole of stores morning because the tides were weird or something and they had to counteract it so all the trolleys had a mind of their own moving away when you weren't looking! THEN on this past Thursday stores morning, we got attacked by dragonflies of all things! They open up the side of the ship into the loading bay so they can take on supplies and apparently a swarm of dragonflies came in... Thus we ended up with them flying around the I-95, in the loading bay and in the stockroom! Initially I thought it was only 3 or 4 in there but after a coworker got rid of 3 for me and then I found another one (eventually killed 36 hours later by Tyler and I plus help from some packaged clothing and a good aim)... And then I found two dead ones this morning (Saturday morning!) which took me by nasty surprise! Sooo all in all I guess there must have been at least 6 in there! GROSS!

Next... My birthday! Actually it was a bit of a non-event because a) I made it one and b) it was castaway day. This meant that half the crew were on morning like me but on the island (whilst I was on the ship) and the other half were afternoon (including nick and Clare) and then there was only about an hour of us all free at the same time before I had to go to work and then joined at 6.30pm by everyone else. Plus the evening shift was super busy so it really was a non-event. I wore a badge though and it was nice to be wished happy birthday by guests. I did go to the crew beach with Tyler in the afternoon and was joined by Chris and Claire so that was nice, I went in the sea and got sunburnt so it was nice for a few hours. Got some earrings and a charm from my mum and cards from Lauren, Tyler, Clare, the merchandise team and Captain Guus which was cool! 

Other fun things include the D-Lounge party we had (themed as wine and cheese) as a reward for good results from the captain. I wasn't going to go but it was a fun night in the end and we got two glasses of free wine, good times. We also got rewarded with another late night in Nassau! This was only at two days notice so I didn't put in dining reservation or anything. Instead I went to Atlantis with Nick and we played some blackjack and slot machines before meeting Tyler and Clare for dinner. It was very yummy at a place called Olive's. I had a flatbread thing with chorizo and then shared a dessert with Nick. It was nice to eat in the evening not on the ship for the first time in 3 months! We walked around the marina for a bit before going back and then we watched a movie for a while and I fell asleep of course. A few nights ago we also had a broadway night in the bar which was fun, main stage performers were going for it of course which was hilarious and impressive at the same time. I like that about DCL - entertainment crew will happily be friends with and interact with people like merchandise whereas in the parks it would be seen as very strange for that to happen. I guess it's because there's no "separate" area for entertainment on the ship unlike in the parks. There's lots of fun things coming up so watch this space for that!

Lastly something scary happened last night. After a rocky evening because of high winds and it being pirate night so it was busy with fireworks and stuff we all finished at about 11.45pm and went back to our cabins. I knocked on nicks door to say hi because he had finished early as it was pirate night as he is a pirate master and we were just standing chatting about to go to bed when suddenly over the PA with no warning was a "red parties, red parties, red parties" announcement - for real! I have never heard it without "for exercise only" preceding it. Basically there was a small electrical fire apparently and was nothing serious, it didn't impact guests at all but it was nevertheless a bit scary and exciting because we didn't know anything about it and for all we knew we would be summoned to our assembly stations so I had to stay in costume and wait further announcement just in case. They put the message out to the whole ship including guest staterooms so apparently about 20 minutes later there was a stand down and apology from the captain but I never heard anything in the crew areas. So at about 1am I went to bed satisfied I didn't need to be on guard to wear my lifejacket last night! 

So, all of that along with working 70 hours a week means I've been a busy bee!

All pinned out

The rest of the DVC cruise was as crazy as the first two days. I ended up in Whozits for the sea day which initially I was bummed about but then realised that I got a good deal. Firstly because it was less pin craziness. Secondly because it was a great place to have good chats with guests. Thirdly because sea day on that cruise was also pirate night so it was fun to have the pirate masters up there in the evening. However 13 hours in Whozits was super tiring... But I'm pretty sure we took one of the top amounts of money ever in there that day. Everyone on that cruise seemed to want to spend spend spend in all the stores. 

Ooh another huge highlight that day was the fact that my break fell at 11.30am for my lunch. Its a bit early really but then I realised it was perfect timing to get out on Deck 14 (the outside crew deck) and catch the drive by of Castaway Cay... and seeing the Disney Wonder! Last year I briefly saw the Wonder in San Francisco port but it was so amazing to see it from the Dream. Oh, and hear the horn battle!!! Its rare they get the chance to do this so I was super happy I was on break at just the right time. I even skyped my Mum during it so she got to hear some of it too! Anyway, we got out at 11.20pm that day which was nice and early because everyone was exhausted including the leaders. 

Wednesday was the final day of the cruise and we were back at Castaway. I was on the afternoon shift so I got lunch at the BBQ beforehand and then I was at the small store. It was alright just very slow. We got back around 4.30pm so I just bummed around before the last crazy shift of DVC. Finally it was done and I was so happy to crash out that night!

Since then it's been normal cruises full of screaming kids, Spanglish and craziness. On Sunday we had a rediculously small delivery of only 5 pallets (instead of more like 13) and so we all got done by 9.30am! Tyler and I ran to our cabins, changed and then ran to ginger dans car (who came to pick us up) and he drove us to disneyworld!!!! We went to magic kingdom for 3 hours - we saw dream along with Mickey, ate at caseys corner, I sneaked down to deployment to surprise Florida nick and say hi to him and then we saw MiSiCi parade before having a Starbucks and then driving back. Got back on the ship at 3pm perfect timing! It was an amazing day to get out of the ship bubble and have fun although exhausting haha.

 I also finally got confirmation of my newest role that I've been given... I am now going to be taking over the main stockroom for the stores. It mostly revolves around mickeys mainsail, sea treasures (apparel) and white caps (high end merchandise) whilst the crew shop and art gallery deal with stuff themselves. It's been known for a while to me that I would be doing this role but I had to keep it a secret because certain people had to be informed first. But now everyone knows so I can write about it. My role will be most crazy on a Sunday and Thursday because that's when we get our stock deliveries in at Canaveral. I have to start at 7am and we unwrap all the boxes from the pallets before piling them up to be scanned so we can ensure we have everything we should have. Then we sort them into trolleys to take up to the stores or trolleys to put into the stockroom. Tote boxes of clothing and random stuff have to be organised and then that evening/next day they are sorted, hung or folded in the stockroom.  

Its definitely more responsibility as I will be a key holder to the stockroom and have to know everything. I have to expand my knowledge and skills too so it's a challenge. It's gone well so far, I haven't been handed over the keys or wave phone (!) yet though. Thursdays delivery was a beast so we still have stuff to sort tonight from it. I will have less guest interaction but I still have to work in mickeys for show dumps and if we are short so I still get to do the guest thing too. 

I met Florida nick yesterday for lunch, we ended up in cocoa beach and had Thai food which was very yummy. Then he took me to Walmart so I have a cupboard full of snacks once more. My mum also just booked flights to come out and meet me in January when I get off the ship which is really exciting! I'm going to try and get us a few days on the wonder or the fantasy because I think that it would be fun to be a guest not crew for a while! 

It's my birthday in 9 days! 

Can I see your pins??

Well I passed cabin inspection! After all my efforts they spent all of 10 seconds looking so that was lucky. I have another new roommate.... Sadly, Sara had to move to an entertainment cabin which is her department and was only supposed to be my roommate for 2 weeks but ended up being in here for 6 weeks! Now I have Sabrina who is Mexican and in merchandise. I vaguely remember her leaving after my first week. I don't know how long I will share with her though because I think she's putting in a request to move in with one of her friends. The rest of last week was pretty normal, I met some nice guests and it was pretty busy.

Yesterday was the beginning of our DVC cruise. This is a cruise that is ONLY Disney vacation club members so they mostly super Disney fans and a lot of them are gold (6 cruises) or platinum (10 cruises or more) but its been great so far because they're really chatty and friendly. It's a chartered cruise so we can't use any guest areas on this cruise but it doesn't really matter for 4 days... And we went to castaway today rather than Nassau... So we have canaveral, castaway, sea day, castaway and then back. Also, a big plus is that there is only 300 children on this cruise!!! I love kids but its nice to have peace and tidiness for a cruise hahaha! But my goodness have I pin traded a lot already. I ended up actually taking off my lanyard and just lying it down next to my till because I was sick of taking it on and off constantly. Some super hard core pin traders around on this cruise! 

Also we got an end of year appreciation dinner last night after work just for merchandise which was really nice. We had food from the royal palace menu which was a nice change. Our managers gave us a copy of the group photo we had taken a couple of weeks ago and a frame to put it in as well as candy and a Swarovski pen which was so nice and kind of them! I really do feel appreciated in merchandise on DCL I have to say. You feel much less of a number than at Walt Disney World (even though that was the most amazing days of my life obviously...). 

Change is a-foot again soon but I can't reveal what yet.... In other news though I have been here over two months now and only have a couple of weeks before my half way point! Crazy!

Late night Nassau!

Well, the Golden Mickeys was awesome... I've decided it is my favourite show on the dream. Afterwards, I wondered around the stores for a bit but I didn't buy the Vera Bradley bag I was going to get because they didn't have the colour I wanted anymore. It was kinda busy so I just went back to my cabin and chilled out until Nick got off work and then we watched a movie. 

I didn't make it to the masquerade ball :-( it was my own decision not to go though. I was just too tired and seen as we don't get off work until gone 11.30pm I ended up drinking strongbow with Tyler and nick in my cabin for a while before crashing out. In the daytime of Friday I went to Atlantis for the first time though which was great. It is very beautiful there but expensive. The taxi was only $4 each way for each of us which was surprisingly cheap. We went into the casino for a bit and wondered around the shops. I got a Pandora bracelet and three charms for $115 due to a special deal and it being tax-free! Yay! I already had a bracelet but it was getting rather full so now I have two. 

The weekend was pretty standard with Castaway on Saturday and Canaveral on Sunday. I ended up going to Chilis on Sunday with Nick but apart from that it was uneventful.

This brings us to yesterday which was the long-awaited late night day. We still had to go into work for the morning because we couldn't just have the whole day off unfortunately. We usually would have done counts on a Monday morning which is basically an audit and stocktake we do every week. However, it's the last week of the financial year for Disney so we didn't have counts. I changed over the display on the front table and did some cleaning. We had no crew drill so we got done at about 11.30am. A last minute decision lead to going back to Atlantis again... Tyler, nick and I got pizza for lunch, I won $50 playing card games and we got Starbucks. An awesome day! Tyler headed back early to have a nap (he's still getting over his first week exhaustion!) and therefore Nick and I left at about 5pm. We got back and went via costuming before getting ready for Palo!!! 

All I wanted since I found out I was on the Dream was to go for dinner at Palo so I was super excited that it worked out. It was soooo good. It started with a bread service and some antipasti, the prosciutto and Parmesan with balsamic vinegar were my favourite. Then for appetiser I had calamari which were lightly breaded with a tomato and pesto sauce, nick had a portobello mushroom and polenta dish which he loved. For entree I had lobster pasta as well as a side order of the scallops which were amazing. I loved that we could just choose to have two entrees or a side order of an entree and they actually encouraged it because you just pay a cover charge and you're not paying for each dish. Nick had the lobster pasta as well plus a leg of lamb which he said was great. In between the app and entree we had a palate cleanser which was a new experience for me. Sadly we were not allowed wine because we were crew and we can't drink alcohol on stage so that was the only downside for me. For dessert of course we had the infamous chocolate soufflé. It was nice but I was so full by that point that I kinda had to force myself to eat it! I'd happily go back right now and eat one haha. Also, by sheer coincidence, our server was Simone who I was in traditions with so that was really awesome! 

We finished dinner and walked around the outside of the ship a bit, admiring a night view. Remember that we are always working or at sea when it's dark so it was a weird feeling to actually be on land in the night time! I took the opportunity to get off the ship and take a couple of photos of the dream at night time before heading back to my cabin to change out of my dress. Originally we were going to then head out into Nassau to find other people in the bars or go to crew bar but to be honest, I was so tired and full that we ended up watching American football on TV (or in my case falling asleep) and I actually ended up with 8 hours sleep. 

The other reason I wasn't out late was because they scheduled us safety training at 9am today for fire zones 0 and 1 which is what I'm in for traffic controlling. So I went to that which was held in the crew bar (always strange going there in daytime) and then I got breakfast. Now I'm just typing this up whilst I wait for cabin inspection which will be in 10 minutes. They are very strict on cabin inspection here... It makes the Commons housing inspections look like nothing. You have to have everything tidy and bed made with lifejacket on top... Bathroom clean, lights off, no dust, clean the vents, the door, the mirror, the carpet, the fridge... I am pretty sure we are going to fail on carpet this week. But there's no vacuum cleaner to my disposal right this second so it will have to do. Wish me luck!

My day off!

...Well, as near as I can get to one! Today has been an awesome day. I was welcome line which was pretty uneventful, just a lot of clapping and Spanglish really. When I first got to the atrium, there was loads of people around and I realised they were filming a DCL commercial so that was fun to watch for a while. It meant the guests were a little bit later than normal so it was full flow when they let them on and constant clapping! Once we got done, I went to guest drill which was sweaty. Didn't get interrogated by an officer this time (I don't remember if I mentioned it, but I got the Spanish inquisiton last time and hardly knew any answers) so that was good. Had a shower then went to costuming to return my welcome line stuff before FINALLY posting some postcards to my family at crew office. I have a few more people I need to send one to so I will get around to it at some point. 

Then I went to the gangway and managed to get TWO parcels! One was from mum and it was a packet of haribo tangfastics which was good... It was a tester package before my birthday one. Then I also got a gift from a good friend back home called Dan who I was at Disney with, he now works at Harrods so I got a Harrods box with two bears in it - a beefeater and a policeman! I love them and they have definitely British-ified my cabin!

So after changing, nick knocks on my door and he gives me a giant box with a Union Jack on it full of birthday presents?! My birthday is in a month today so yup... One for each day! Yay! :-) so far I got an aero orange and a packet of stickers because I'm always using them for magical moment certificates. I'm lucky :-) 

After a bit of a rush to find out if we had permission, myself and Lorraine who I was on welcome line with got to Animator's Palate for dinner and it was YUMMY. The inside of the restaurant is so cool and there are giant screens where the Nemo characters pop up from time to time. Crush the turtle came and spoke to me!!! They can see and hear you so they interact with you. I had butternut squash soup and this super good garlic focaccia bread. Then I had a chicken meal which was good to have some protein in my life but next time I will probably have the pasta. For dessert I had a white chocolate brownie cheesecake which was good too. One of the highlights of the meal for me was having proper butter!! 

After dinner on my way back I ran into Kristy the CAM (crew activities manager) and she was making masks for the masquerade ball that is tomorrow night so I sat with her and made a mask which hopefully will dry by tomorrow! I hope I make it to the ball and everyone goes because it should be fun. I'm chilling in my cabin now until I go and see the golden mickeys in about half an hour.

On another note, the ship has been crazy rocky last night and tonight. I wear my sea bands but everyone looked drunk last night because we couldn't walk in a straight line and I kept losing my balance. It's very disorienting! I don't know if it's because of the usual gulf currents we feel on our way to and from Florida or whether its coming from the hurricane in the mid atlantic maybe? Either way, it's a strange feeling to be sitting on your bed and slowly swaying hahaha!

Late night!

Well after posting last time about the possibilities of a night off being so low, we had it announced yesterday that we are getting a "late night Nassau" next week for the first time in months. It means instead of leaving at 6pm, we leave at 2am. Well of course the shops can't be open while we are in port so... Guess who doesn't have to work! I've already put in the request for Palo so fingers crossed. We don't find out until the first night of that cruise (which starts Sunday) if we have a reservation. I don't care what I do that night but I really want to go eat there. Everyone knows nassau isn't the safest place ever (which is why I'm surprised they are doing a late night) so we have already had the first couple of many lectures about staying together in groups, being aware of alcohol and knowing there will be breathalysers on the gangway, not having valuables etc. I might just make the most of using the ship in the evening in all honesty. So that's next Monday.

This week has been pretty standard. It poured with rain from 1.30pm at castaway today so a lot of guests headed back and I clocked out at 4.30pm which was good going. Sea day tomorrow ugh! Last night I went and hung out with Claire who was in my traditions group. She has a huge (in comparison to mine) cabin as she is an officer! She has a sofa! No window though and she still has to share. We had drinks and cheese all very civilised. I meant to stay until about 1.30am... But I ended up getting to bed at 4.30am! Oops. 

Thursday will be my second welcome line which is exciting. I will be with Lorraine, a lady from Jamaica who works in sea treasures. We put in a dining request for animators palate so we shall see what happens, again, fingers crossed! I am probably going to go and see the golden mickeys too. 

Generally my mood has improved from the last couple of posts on here. You go through major ups and downs here because there's no escape from the bubble. I'm hoping that Orlando nick will be able to come and visit soon because that would be nice. He just changed job at WDW so I'm not sure when his days off will line up with one of my canaveral days. New nick and I hope to go to Atlantis at some point, maybe on Friday as we haven't been there yet and it's somewhere new. 

Oohhhh the other big thing that happened this week is I finally got my safety duty. Pretty much everyone in merchandise has to have a part in the twice weekly guest drill and I've escaped it for 8 weeks but as Gemma left, I picked up her duty. It's not a good one!! Well, it's a good work out I suppose... So when the emergency alarm goes, I have to leave my location and go to my cabin on deck 1 aft (the back of the ship) to get my lifejacket and traffic control vest and hat (super sexy fluorescent orange, photos soon!) then go up 4 decks of stairs to check in at skyline bar. Then go up a further 6 decks of stairs to deck 10 aft for my station to traffic control... Basically directing people to the stairs and deck 4 to their muster/assembly stations. Then when the abandon ship alarm goes off, we have to go down 7 decks of stairs and to the Walt Disney theatre on deck 3 forward... So basically as far from my station as possible! Then for crew drill we proceed to our life raft which is up another 3 decks of stairs. When we are dismissed I have to return my lifejacket to deck 1 aft, again the opposite end of the ship before returning to my location which, if its crew drill, is back at mickeys mainsail on deck 3 forward! Phew! I was well sweaty after that.

On that lovely note, it's time to get ready for work again!

This and that

Well it's another sea day so time for another blog post. My hour long breaks on the sea day are one of the rare occasions I get to have time to myself without being (totally) exhausted. That's one of the hardest things about working here... Being constantly tired. No matter how much sleep you get, it never feels like enough. What's worrying is I have only been here 7 weeks and I feel like that, God knows what it will be like when I have been here 5 months! Plus lack of sleep makes you misjudge things, get paranoid and generally can make you very grumpy. My dentist will not be pleased to know I have started glugging Diet Coke again (after giving it up for more than 6 months) because I need the caffeine! 

Ship life is same old same old. It rained for most of Castaway Cay yesterday which was sucky for the guests but good for me because it meant I was busy all day and it wasn't roasting hot. We have a new manager who is really nice and she's making a few changes to get the team more efficient. This is mostly a good thing although I feel like my chance to have the same night off with Nick one day so we can go to Palo is rapidly diminishing. Only because of practicalities to do with staffing and stuff, it's not a personal thing. Still, this is a prime example of something that seems very trivial and stupid but when you're tired and living here it makes you more upset than necessary. Still, fingers crossed, maybe it will work out one day.

I'm moving back to Mickeys Mainsail on Sunday as the new rotation is coming in where we move to a different zone of the store every 2 weeks and the tower is included in that. On the up side it means I will be able to do officer pin trading again which I really enjoyed. I should explain that on the Dream there are 4 major merchandise locations; Mickeys Mainsail, Sea Treasures, White Caps and Whozits & Whatzits. You mostly stay in one location for your contract but sometimes they move you around hence my ending up in W&W (the tower). We have the glow table and Quacks which are pop up locations on Deck 11 during pirate night and sea day as well but they just pull someone out of a store for it. Plus the fairy godmother in training or the pirate masters for our makeovers as well. 

Tyler arrives in a few days! It will be really nice to see a familiar face from "the outside"!

Feeling hot hot hot

Wow, it's taken me ages to get round to writing again because I seem to never have enough time to sit down and write. Since I last wrote, it's been pretty much same old same old. The food in the mess seems to have got slightly better as we had jacket potatoes the other day as well as shepherds pie (not that I am a fan) and sometimes we get a smoothie bar! Sara is still my roommate even though she was supposed to move last Sunday, they decided to keep her here for another week or whatever until she moves to an entertainment cabin. We are housed by department so all the merchandise people live in the same corridor etc. We aren't supposed to have other people sharing our cabins but obviously they need the space so people end up with temporary roommates from other departments. 

Anyway, crew bingo was super fun although it was speedy and rather stressful! There were several jackpots but the biggest one was $5000!!! One guy from the dining room won it but I was only three numbers away and so it was nervewracking! Counts went well last week and we were out at 11.30am but then went badly this week and we escaped coming in tomorrow morning to do recounts by the skin of our teeth. 

I've been in the tower for all my shifts and moving into mickeys mainsail if there's time left after I have closed the store and done restock. I'm accompanied by a fairy godmother in training at the moment or pirate masters on pirate night but soon the fairy godmother will be moving back to princess room so I will be alone. Having said that, I've been in the tower almost 3 weeks now and it's supposed to be a rotation so we shall see. The tower is really not that bad actually... Pros are that you get decent time to actually chat to the guests and you can get repeat guests really easily (more on that later) plus its reasonably easy work and I spend half my time being an information desk on where things are and at what time. Also I have window so I can watch out of that and see the weather all day. Cons include it being lonely when there are no guests like during the dinner times and show times plus finding time to restock because I have to be let in by a manager every time I leave and want to go back in later. Plus you feel the ship move a lot more when it's rocky up on deck 11. I invested in some sea bands which are AMAZING and completely stop sea sickness for me as well as the disorientation feeling. I only wear them on the first night of the cruise and sometimes the last night. 

Hmmm what else... I saw a friend from the rose and crown on the last cruise and that was awesome to chat and get the gossip. I meet loads of people who work at WDW so that's cool to chat about and we often have mutual friends (the 7 steps of Disney...). Tyler arrives in just over a week so I am super excited about that!!!

Last weekend was Nick's birthday and so we went to TGI Fridays with Clare and Gemma which was fun. I gave him his presents and he really liked them :-) its hard to know what to buy someone you haven't known that long and also whilst living on a ship so you have to be imaginative or they'd just end up with Disney merchandise! 

Other than that, off the ship time has been pretty standard. Saw Florida Nick last week as well and we went to Olive Garden with Eric his roommate which was a lot of fun... I miss them both. Hopefully I will see them again soon and I am hoping to spend a few days with them at the end of my contract. 

The weather has been extreme recently. The last 3 Nassau days have had rain (some very torrential) and the last Castaway Cay day was so ridiculously hot I hated every second of it. I am hoping it will start to cool off a bit soon now we are into September. 

Well that's all I can think of right now! I will promise to blog again soon! 

Clap clap clap

Well, I got up at 6.45am and walked half asleep to medical this morning to just be asked "are you feeling better?" And then "okay, you can go back to work then". No signature on the form or anything! Nevertheless, I ran into the merch team going to breakfast before doing stock so I went to the mess with them and then exchanged my welcome line jacket (another costume!) for a smaller size which was still too big before heading back to bed for about an hour. Then I got up and straightened my hair (I know, effort!) and then popped in to give my form to Dave and said hi to Claire from my traditions group (she's the cruise directors assistant) before joining the other welcome line people in the atrium. Basically, there's between 6-12 of us at any one time and we stand in two lines along where people enter the ship, their family name is announced and we clap before taking in turns to personally welcome one family at a time, tell them when their stateroom will be ready and give them the opportunity to ask any questions. You really have to know the ship so I was pleased I wasn't caught out on any questions.

I got a 30 minute lunch break and met some nice guests. Reaffirmed my ability to spot British people a mile off too. Afterwards, Iris and I arranged to go and see Monsters University as we had done welcome line together it meant we both had the evening off. It was nice to get to know someone else I didn't know. We saw MU which was good although I kept falling asleep because I was tired, the ship was rocking and I've seen it before! It's still a good movie tho! Afterwards, we got food at Flo's on Deck 11 before walking around the ship a bit and giving me an opportunity to take some photos. Then she went off to meet some Croatian friends of hers so I walked around the shops a bit before going to see Villains Tonight. Normally on the first night of the cruise it is the Golden Mickeys but because the new entertainment cast is coming in it meant the shows order has changed due to dress rehearsals in the daytime. So it was an opportunity I wouldn't normally have to see that show.... Welllll... It was ok. It had a couple of good musical numbers in it but also a lot of bad jokes (that weren't even funny) and it just didn't flow as well as the Golden Mickeys or Believe which are the other two shows we have. My favourite is definitely Believe, I watched that on TV last night as well as having seen the crew showing a couple of weeks ago. 

Afterwards, I bought a photo album which was reduced in mickeys mainsail to $14.99 which is awesome and a birthday present for New Nick as its his birthday next Sunday. I went back to my cabin and wrapped it up and since have spent time chilling with Sara until my merchie friends get off work and we're going to crew bingo tonight... Back to work and counts tomorrow ugh!!

A spoonful of sugar...

The rest of sea day was alright. For the first time, I heard all the Dream's horns in person which was cool! The captain dropped by Whozits and so I told him that he made my day by playing them to which he laughed. Seeing the Captain around the ship is a bit like meeting a celebrity. Thursday was a reasonably non eventful day... Clare and I went to the Mall after work and I bought 3 pairs of shoes... Oops! 

On Friday the catamaran was awesome! There was a whole bunch of merchandise people plus several from Remy and a few other departments. Probably about 30 in all plus the Crew Activities Manager Kristy who is great. We spent about 30 minutes sailing out to the snorkel site and then had an hour to go in the water or sunbathe or whatever. I did snorkel for about 20 minutes and saw some fish! The salty water was stinging my eyes a bit so I got out and lay around the deck with people for the rest of the time. It was nice and sunny and hot. Then we sailed back to Nassau and got back about 3pm so I had a couple of hours to go back to my cabin and get ready for work. 

Now the only downside to the last couple of days was the sore throat I was developing. After the catamaran, it got worse (I think it was the seawater) and I shone a light into my mouth to discover white blotches all over my tonsils. As the medical centre has the worse opening hours ever (ie. 2 hours in the morning and 2 hours in the afternoon... For crew) I had to wait til this morning to go see a doctor. I had to get a form from my manager for permission to go but then it was reasonably simple. He took one look and said it was "textbook tonsillitis" so that was that. I got antibiotics, painkillers, lozenges, mouthwash (?!) and 24 hours off work. So that means I spent the rest of the day sleeping and watching Disney movies, yay. The antibiotics are working magic and the ibroprofen is really helping the swelling and pain so hopefully I will be all good to do welcome line tomorrow. I am to report back to medical at 7am tomorrow so fingers crossed!!!

Flip Reverse It

I need to start noting things down to blog about because it takes me longer to get round to it on the ship rather than at Disney World! Anyway this week has been a bit crazy because just as I was settling down into life here, it all got turned a bit upside down. Firstly, my roommate Cheyenne finished her contact as she was transferred here from the Wonder so she was always only in my cabin for a month. So she left on Sunday morning and I seized the opportunity to get the bottom bunk. No more leg bruises!! There's also slightly more headroom so it's nicer. It's an unspoken rule that the first person in the cabin gets the bottom bunk and you can move once they leave :-) So, I went to do stock and said goodbye to her and by the time I came back afterwards I had a new roommate called Sara who is in entertainment costuming. She is also here temporarily but she is really nice and she's from Connecticut. 

Also during stock on Sunday, I got informed that I was being moved to "the tower"... AKA the store on Deck 11 called Whozits & Whatzits. This is a small store that has Aquaduck merchandise as well as pool essentials. It also has started hosting "Glitter & Go" and "Skulls & Scurry" which is the Disney Dream's version of the Bibbity Bobbity Boutique and Pirates League. They're quick versions of the make over experiences offered in the parks and on the Fantasy. The up side to this is that I am not alone in the tower which previously was the biggest negative of being up there. Other positive things about the tower is that it's my own location that I'm in charge of which is good for my CV. I have to ensure it looks show ready and is fully stocked - things like that. We use the mobile MICROS system which are handheld computers for processing payments and they're a nightmare! So far today it seems to be working but it's very temperamental. I think I'm only going to be up there for a month and then we will rotate and I will go back to a store on Deck 3. On sea day (like today) I get to wear another new costume which is a purple and blue shirt with fish on it! Pictures of all my costumes coming soon... I currently have 4! 

So change of roommate, change of job... That's big changes when you're here! Other than that, we went to see the Lone Ranger during Nassau day and it was the longest movie ever. It was actually quite good but excessively long... Johnny Depp was good in it though! During the other Nassau day I got a subway with Nick and then we walked around and my shoe broke :-( I did manage to buy a tacky Nassau hoodie though because I'm always cold in my cabin. We got ice cream with Amy and Clare as well. On PC day I actually didn't go anywhere because I'm trying to save money before payday tomorrow... I just chilled out and then went outside to get Internet. CC was fun yesterday because I was morning with Nick, Gemma and Manager Dave at the smaller store called By The Seashore so we basically spent the 4 hours playing A-Z games and singing Disney songs to the guests. It was super fun.

Hopefully on Friday we are going to be going on a catamaran trip in Nassau! Tomorrow at PC I think we have yet more Pirates training.... Other than that there's not many plans except doing Welcome Line on Sunday which will be fun!! 

Good Stuff

Well, the good news is that Nick returned from Nassau's hospital at 4pm that afternoon complete with his appendix. They did a million scans and decided it was a weird tissue related problem that was caused by manual handling (probably when we did stock in the morning) and he got dosed up with ibroprofen. That was a few days ago and he feels fine now so that's all good.

I'm pleasantly surprised by the facilities provided to the crew onboard. The medical centre seem to always at least give you some painkillers or medicine if they don't sign you off work for an appropriate amount of time. They were very efficient with nick and the other people I know who got sick to take them to the medical facilities in port and check what's wrong. Other things I've been surprised about is the quality of activities and facilities for crew - we have an awesome crew activities manager called Kristy who organises events and outings as well as being a great person just to chat to. We have two different chill out rooms with computers, games consoles, board games etc. The laundry room is huge so you rarely have to wait for a washing machine or dryer. The Internet is much faster than I thought it would be (although its not really good enough for streaming, I've managed to Skype a couple of times through it, and obviously it costs 10 cents a minute which really adds up!) and the living area is much better than I thought. You get used to the size of the cabin and bathroom very quickly. The shower is always boiling hot and strong enough to wash your hair decently. 

In merchandise we get a good chance to get off the ship a few times per week but I can go into detail about my role in another post :-) 

Anyway, I got sidetracked there. Hmmm what cool things have I done this week? I saw the premiEAR of "Planes" eventually at the crew showing and it was good. It's essentially Cars 2 but with planes. I have to admit I've sacrificed a couple of free afternoons for sleep because I've been tired this week. Lets just say that Pro Plus was a very worthwhile investment before boarding the ship!

Catching up with the outside world

Well, almost at the end of the evil 4 days. This is what they should be known as... I forget if I explained before but Monday to Thursday always seem the longest days of the week. Monday we have to do counts at 8am until whenever we are done which this week wasn't until 1.30pm then a few hours off before work at 6pm. Tuesday is Castaway which is tiring because its so hot and you either work 8am-12 or 12-5pm and then the evening 6-11.30pm as usual. Then Wednesday is the sea day which is usually a 12-14 hour shift. Then finally to Thursday which is today and Port Canaveral so starting at 7.30am until hopefully 11am unless it takes us longer. SO you can imagine how awesome tomorrow will be for the fact we don't work all day until 6pm!!!

Anyway, we managed to get done with stock by 11.30am today so I got changed and after some confusion of how to drive to the terminal, I met Florida Nick for lunch. We got Chilis and I had chicken fajitas. Somehow, I have managed to become even more of a vegetarian than I was before because I just don't end up eating meat unless I'm off the ship at the moment. So... Having chicken fajitas was pretty yummy. Then he drove me to Walmart so I could grab some snacks before getting back to the ship in good time. 

*******

Okay so I wrote that part above on Thursday afternoon once I was back on the ship after guest drill when I was just hanging out with Nick in the corridor. Now it is Friday afternoon and everything went a bit crazy last night...

Okay so, we got ready for work and went for the pre-shift meeting which was fine. I went off to Mickey's Mainsail and he went to Art Gallery (as we work in different locations). Later on in the evening, my manager told us we could go to the guest PremEAR of 'Planes' the new Disney film. So, all excited, I went up to the gallery on my 15 minute break to tell him we could go see it after work... And he wasn't there. Apparently he'd gone to medical which was a bit weird because he was perfectly fine earlier. I checked there but it was locked (if you get escorted with a manager for emergencies you can see them but its locked to everyone else) and then knocked on his cabin door (we live next door to each other) but no reply. So Nick was AWOL. I finished my break and went back to work. I then transpired that he'd been signed off work for the rest of the night and after doing some digging I found out that he'd been told he had suspected appendicitis, given an IV drip of antibiotics and a medical debark notice to go to an ultrasound today in Nassau.

Thus, bang went my nice lie in this morning because I wanted to be up at 8.30am to see what was going on with him :-( I saw him after work last night and he was fine but I strongly suspect the drugs had something to do with that. I gave the Planes showing a miss (we have a crew showing on Sunday anyway) and got to bed by 1am. Woke up this morning and he was in pain again so we walked to the other end of the ship so he could call his mom and then he debarked at 9.30am. Due to the lack of communication with the outside world, I won't find out what happened. Either he comes back at 3pm and he's ok... Or he doesn't and he'll be sent for surgery and then flown home to California. I have no idea how long he'll be off the ship... 

This might seem like an overreaction on my part from an outsiders point of view but what you have to understand is the intensity of the environment here. If you've known someone a week, it feels like a month... The people here are your family whether you like it or not. I really care for him and I genuinely was worried last night when I didn't know what had happened. Anyway, once I'd said goodbye to him this morning I got ready and decided to go out to Nassau while it was quiet instead of going back to bed. I went to McDonalds for some wifi and then got a chocolate milkshake while I walked around the town a bit. I got a bit bored and annoyed with all the touristness everywhere so I went back to the ship and laid out on guest sun deck 13 for a while before going to my cabin where I am now. I think I will watch a movie on my iPad until either Nick returns or I get food from the mess before work. 

P.S. the ship Internet is down right now so this will be uploaded when I can....

Into week 3...

Oh wow, it's been a week since I wrote! Oops! This is what DCL life is like... Crazy.

The pin event went well. I was lucky to have Nick help me for the whole time because I hadn't done it before. It got a bit chaotic and there was loads of pin traders and kids there so I think everyone had fun. A random selection of officers come down to trade too and apparently the captain on occasion although I have yet to see that.

So, as its been a week I will just touch on some highlights rather than go through day by day... The days all blur into one here anyway! 

I have taken on more responsibility now that I also did the pin event again but on my own as well as holding the fort at glow last night. It was pirates night so I was supposed to be on the glow table but there are now two new people (yay, I'm not the newbie anymore!) and they were training so I went on "quacks" instead which is a pop up shop on deck 11. It's right next to where we have just started doing a mini Pirates League (I'll write about it in another post at some point) so that was a lot of fun interacting with Gemma and Nick as they were the pirate masters. After that was done, we had to pack up and then get clocked out ASAP because they put on a private showing of 'Believe' just for the crew... AMAZING!!! I loved it. Great music, story and talent on the stage. Disney at it's best! 

I have managed to get to grip with the guest areas of the ship a lot better now. We've found ourselves taking walks around the Deck 4 loop (it's the open deck) late at night because its a good way of feeling like you're not trapped inside on a ship full of people. The guests all go to bed so its usually almost empty. Last week we went up there particularly late and after a while we realised that the ship had stopped. We were standing mid ship and suddenly, these bright floodlights came on under the water casting amazing bright beams across the sea surrounding the ship... Then we saw dolphins jumping in the water, fish all around and also a couple of shooting stars as it was a very clear night and we were in the middle of the Bahamas with no light pollution. Amazing! A security guard eventually walked around and asked us if we were okay and if we had any bad intentions...I.e. were we planning to jump off. Ummm... That was our cue to go to bed! 

Then a couple of days ago a load of us went to the crew bar (thus known as the crew library) and there was some crazy lightning going on outside so we got into our Disney look clothes and went to check it out... So cool! There was loads of lightning all around even tho it was quite far away and then we actually saw the line of torrential rain approach us and go over us which was a cool experience too. Basically, Deck 4 at night is awesome.

I've done three Castaway shifts now. One in the small store I wrote about before and two in the big shop. I love the island but I don't think I'm so keen on working there... It's so hot, it's a stamina challenge. Plus the guests are hot and this makes them somewhat grumpier than on the ship so it's more challenging. I did a morning shift there yesterday for the first time and that was good because it was vaguely cooler to begin with.

Off the ship I haven't been up to much... Last week we went to Hard Rock Cafe in Nassau and I also saw the Merritt Island Walmart in PC for the first time after going to TGI Fridays. We played glow in the dark mini golf at PC too. Last Nassau I didn't get off because I wanted to sleep. Hopefully tomorrow at PC I will be meeting Other Nick for some food and a catch up... Lets hope stock doesn't take too long! Now, to get through the rest of this sea day...

Arrrrr me hearties!

Well actually the store ended up being pretty quiet last night for pirate night. Apparently it always is for the 4 night cruise. In the daytime, I did my first Castaway Cay in the stores. This started off good because I got a lie in! Well... Until about 9. Then I had to get up and tidy my room for cabin inspection. It's just as well I put in extra effort because it transpired it was the Captain doing it this week!! Several of us were hanging out in the corridor when he came round so we waited with baited breath but we all passed :-) they're strict about it... Everything has to be clean, beds made, no perishable food at ALL, desk clear, floor clear, bathroom clean, everything put away....

After that we had to get ready for CC. I was on the second shift which starts at 12. So you either do 8am-12 or 12-4.30pm and then you start the evening shift on the ship at either 5.30 or 6.30pm depending which CC shift you do. So, Nick was on the late shift too and he showed me where we clock in and stuff and where to eat. We get to have the BBQ food that the guests do but it's in a backstage area. We joined some other merchies to get food... It was very hot. Then we were almost late so I had to run across half of CC with the other girl starting at 12 to get to the smaller shop which is further away from the food area... This was annoying because its not good to start the shift hot and sweaty! Bad enough as it is! There are two shops we work at at CC, I was in the smaller one which the name I forget... It was a good starting point. It was nerve wracking to be in a new location which I knew nothing about with guests asking me all sorts of questions about the island. The other two girls who were there too were a little unhelpful considering its my first shift on the island but Jamie one of the managers, he came to help me for a couple of hours.

So... The things I learnt from CC yesterday were: 1) it's hot, 2) don't wear much make up because it comes off and 3) it's hot. 

Once we were done, we all trudged back to the ship to clock out. Then we had about an hour and a half to chill out which is what we did before showering, changing and then going to work as normal! We finished at about 11.30pm so it was a loonnnngg day.

Followed by today which is another one! Today is my first sea day in the store so it's a 13 hour shift basically but you get two one-hour breaks of which I'm on my first one. I'm writing this and watching twilight from the other day haha. We have already had a couple of interesting things today... It started with breakfast at enchanted garden! It's a guest restaurant but they put on breakfast for the whole crew today as a thank you for good guest feedback which was super nice. We got real butter with toast not the horrible margarine crap they give you in crew mess! That was exciting! I also had a waffle, hash brown, chocolate milk and banana :-) 

Also, we had a quick detour to Freeport today because they had an emergency medical disembarkation so that was fun. We had to close the stores as they're not allowed to be open in port so I got some extra time to put the pins together for the officer pin trading event that I'm doing tonight. 

Everything is good in the hood and I feel like I'm settling in now! I even got to take off the earning my ears tab from my nametag today!

First week: done!

So after PST, we had an island tour of CC... Beautiful!! Disney really have put so much effort into that place. There's an amazing huge family beach even with all 4000 guests there it didn't feel crowded at all. There's loads to do - you can rent jet skis, go parasailing, feed stingrays, snorkelling, biking.... There's even a 5k running route (maybe not for July and August!) There's two big eating places, four bars and an adult only beach called Serenity Bay. Next to the adult beach is the crew beach which looked amazing too. We get a mini BBQ area at the crew beach which is cool too and there's volleyball courts. 

We spent lunch there and then a few of us headed back to the ship because we felt gross having been in and out of the sea etc. So I came back and washed my hair before doing a few bits of laundry because I had a soaking wet towel and swimming costume in my possession. After a while, it was time to go to work. I got my own section to keep tidy and stuff which was good... Highlights of it included pens, hats AND plush! Anyone who has worked in Disney merch will know how great that is!

It was the final night of the cruise so we were open until 11.30pm so it was quite a late night. So, generally once you finish work for the night people head to the crew bar or the 'library' after work to unwind. So Nick and I (henceforth known as New Nick seen as this is going to get confusing...) went to the crew library but as it was the night before PC, it closed early so we just chilled for a while before heading to bed.

Sunday was PC. We had to do stock at 7.30am which I just cracked on with and thankfully we got it all done by 10.30am. After changing and waiting for New Nick to get let into his cabin after he got locked out we finally left the ship! There are always lots of taxis waiting for the crew members so we got one of those and headed to the glamorous Merritt Island Mall. It's a shade above the Prime Outlets on International Drive.... So take glamorous as GHETTO.

Anyway, we got Ruby Tuesdays for lunch which was good and then wondered around a bit with Jamie one of the merch managers. I got some stuff at Bath and Body Works and then we headed back to the ship. I spent half an hour or so using the free wifi outside the DCL Terminal building and then we were running out of time as Nick had to be back for guest drill. So we went back and I chilled out for a while before a few of us headed to the mess for a snack before work.

Work was good, reasonably busy so that was nice. Sunday marked my week-iversary so that was pretty cool!! To celebrate, Nick and I went to the crew library and had a couple of drinks before being joined by my roomie Chey and my manager Dave and then Kristy the crew activities manager who is awesome. We ended up staying there til about 2.15am somehow so then it was definitely time for sleep!

Monday was Nassau... We had to do counts first thing which is basically an audit of how many items of a certain product we have compared to what we should have. We started at 9am and didn't get done til 1pm which was a bit of a slog. It's a reasonably easy job but just slow. I was tired so getting easily frustrated with people and annoying things they were doing so I was glad to get out of there. We got changed and then headed (along with most crew that aren't working...) to Nassau McDonalds for free wifi. This must be one of the only McDonalds that doesn't take credit cards... Crazy! I managed to watch 10 minutes of the Casualty season finale but I kept getting interrupted by people FB chatting me so I did that over watching YouTube... I will catch it another day. Chey left to go and get sleep so Nick and I went to Starbucks and then headed back to the ship. 

Work was fine. As it was a new week, we had switched zones so now I am in the pirate section... That will be fun for pirate night today! It was a pretty low key day and after work we hung out in the corridor for a bit like cool kids and then I crashed out for much needed sleep.

Personal Survival Training

So I'm going to dedicate a whole post to PST Training or otherwise known as Wet Drill. On Saturday morning I get up bright and early to find out that my best friend managed to get appendicitis overnight and ended up in the hospital to have his appendix out...! So after some texting and face booking to find out what had happened, we left at 9.15am and I stepped onto land for the first time in a week at Castaway Cay (CC).

So the first part of PST was a talk through of the life jacket, the raft and the survival suit. Basically a recap. Then we watched a couple of the safety officers demonstrate what we were going to do. They made it look super easy so I felt okay about it. We got into our life jackets and firstly had to jump off the little pier into the sea... It was probably only a drop of about 6 feet/2 meters so that was fine. As you are wearing your life jacket you actually float immediately back up anyway so it's a brief second you're underwater. The sea is so warm at CC at this time of year it was amazing! The only thing I didn't think about was the sea salt and so my eyes were super stingy for a couple of minutes afterwards. 

Next, once everyone was in the sea, we had to float our way into a circle and adopt the "safety position" which is basically linking elbows with the person next to you and hugging your knees. So we all got to know each other quite well hahaha. 

They pulled two people out of the circle at a time to swim away a couple of meters and then prove they were capable of taking their life jacket off, floating in the water for about 10 seconds and then putting the life jacket back on which was actually quite easy. The life jacket is bulky but it's just like pulling apart two big blocks of polystyrene held together with Velcro, easy.

Then came the hard part. They partnered up a boy and a girl together (for strength reasons) to flip a life raft over from being upside down. These things are BIG and HEAVY... About 12 feet across. So the boy first had to lift himself onto the raft (I was paired with Neil, Rob's roommate who is in guest services) and then he helped me onto the raft. That was the hardest part by far... I have no upper body strength and the whole thing would be 100x easier if you weren't wearing a giant life jacket on top. Eventually, rather like a beached whale, I got onto the life raft and then we had to balance ourselves and stand up, holding the two guide ropes and then lean back, using our body weight to pull the life raft over... Swim back out from underneath the raft still holding onto the rope and TA-dah! You were done.

Then just swam out and did a short written test. PST training was complete for 5 years. It was much less scary and difficult than I thought, just a bit tiring. Also, lying on your back in the sea for over an hour with the bright sun reflecting off the sea and your luminous yellow life jacket and into your eyes is both uncomfortable and sunburn-producing! So my number 1 tip for people doing PST is to wear lots and lots of suncream!!! And also, if you wear contacts, to bring spare pair. 

Literally, the £2500 ($4000) I spent on laser eye surgery back in February was worth EVERY SINGLE PENNY for that day alone! 

I survived my first cruise!

Well I manager to survive my first cruise without being late, oversleeping or getting too drastically lost. My sore throat has pretty much become a proper cold although yesterday I felt a lot worse than today. It wasn't a great day to be feeling ill because I had to get up at 5am in order to be at immigration at 5.30am. Basically we just had to take our passport up to the desk with the security officer at it, get them to take out the I-95 card and stamp it and then proceed on our way. DCL look after our passports the whole time we are here on contract so we get on and off the ship in US ports using the I-95 cards. Once that was done we got breakfast in the crew mess and then headed to work at 7.30am.

We were back in Port Canaveral (PC) which meant we had to process the stock that had arrived onboard. I was feeling pretty run down and sore throaty by this point and I didn't really know what was going on but I tried to keep up. Sunday's PC will probably be easier because I can see how it really works... You see, after a couple of hours of stock yesterday we all got dragged off to attend a one-off training session on.... Becoming a fairy godmother in training!!

They have the Bibbity Bobbity Boutique on the Disney Fantasy as well as in the Magic Kingdom and Downtown Disney and they've been a great success so they're hoping to put it on the Dream too. So we got to learn the basics of making a shorted version of the princess makeover as well as four pirate makeovers. We have a pirate night once a cruise on this ship so we all love swords, eyepatches and bandanas! I think this is all kicking off very soon so watch this space but we don't know much detail yet. Needless to say the training was hilarious... Me and Rob had to do scars on each other as well as glitter - everywhere!!

After this was done I had 5 hours off and so I went to Deck 14 and managed to talk to my mum on the phone. As we were in PC I could actually talk to her using my phone not Skype so that was nice. Then I went for a lie down because I felt pretty terrible. I managed to have about an hours nap and felt super rough afterwards. I was supposed to be talking to Nick at 4pm but he got delayed and then my signal was awful so we didn't really get to talk. I got food in the mess and then got ready for work. Work was okay... It was the first time I had my own zone to be responsible for so that was good and felt a bit more purposeful than ambling around like recently. It was also my first closing shift so it was good to see what a real shift is like. 

Afterwards, as it appears DCL life is... You just keep going! We finished at 11.30pm and then went to our cabins to change before going to the crew bar where we had a special merchandise party which had been arranged for a while. We had pizza, mozzarella dippers, nachos and salsa - amazing!!! Oh and the free alcohol lol. You usually pay in the bar obviously but because it was a special party we got it. Once you push through a certain level of tired you can just keep going haha. It was good to have the chance to chat to people though and then I called it a night at about 1.30am and got to bed at 2.

This morning it was back up for a very dull class on Environmentality at 8am, then Castaway Cay overview and Guest Service basics which were okay. Then we had to go to Deck 4 and watch a life raft demonstration which was quite fun to see it in person. Then we were done for training today! I have 6 hours off. Now that my passport is sorted I could have got off the ship today but I have stuff to do and we go to Nassau twice a week anyway. I got lunch with Sarah and picked up a castaway cay (CC) costume for next week when I will be working there and now I'm in my cabin watching High School Musical 3 :-) in a while when my roommate Cheyenne comes back we are going to go and do laundry. As she transferred here from the Wonder it means she doesn't know her way round either! 

Tomorrow is... WET DRILL!! 

Chicken or beef?

So when I posted about the training for my WDW programs I always mentioned the constant word: "termination!" Well... On DCL it's called "chicken or beef?" because that's the options on the plane home...! And basically, the last two days has been constant things to do to avoid chicken or beef (or even bread and water - the drug and alcohol talk!) plus constant repetitive lectures about safety and assembly points. Thankfully, I think it's all in our heads now and we have one more test on Friday to test our knowledge. Tomorrow we are back at Port Canaveral and I will have completed my first cruise! But this means it's embarkation day for the guests so we have a more low key day in terms of training.

So, yesterday I didn't post because I was too tired... But we had a very long day of talks. In the morning it was mostly crew related information about the crew shop, activities, crew office and things like that. We got to have lunch at the guest restaurant Cabana's which was awesome! It was a buffet (standard lunch type restaurant you get on cruise ships but with Non-standard Disney food) and we had incredible views over Castaway Cay. It literally looked like a postcard... In fact, here's a picture!

Not bad huh!!

So in the afternoon we had our second long safety presentation which wasn't too bad. Then I had a brief gap before going to work for my second OTJ training day. As Cara (my trainer) had worked the late shift on the island, I had an hour alone before she came to join me at Mickey's Mainsail which is the store I work at... It was packed when it opened because it was pirate night and everyone wanted to buy their eyepatches and swords! Sooooo... I just jumped on the till. It's what I know haha. I survived with Rob helping me out with tricky guests and it was fun.

When Cara came down, we got to go to Deck 11 to watch the Pirates show with Mickey & Co which was great but hot in our jackets! Then we went back in (I got almost mown down by Mickey, Minnie and Goofy who just came off stage... Goofy showed me an awesome trick with his pirate scarf and Mickey had a very novel way of getting down the stairs, he's one efficient mouse!) and I did more general guest service/till. I finished at 10pm and quickly got changed before heading to the pool deck to go watch the fireworks!! I figured because I will be working every evening for the next 6 months, this was one of my only chances to see it... I finally found my way to Deck 11 after getting slightly lost in corridors of state rooms (I hardly know the guest areas of the ship because I'm never in them!) and got a spot to sit on deck. I watched the pirates show with Captain Jack and then the fireworks which was really good!! I was pleasantly surprised... I thought because it was at sea, it wouldn't be quite so extravagant as normal Disney fireworks but considering that fact, they were awesome and I even got some good pictures. After that, I came back to my cabin (after getting lost again!!! I ended up in the crew bar and then had to have someone guide me back to the I-95!) washed my hair and crashed out. 

Today I literally got up, had breakfast, sat in a classroom ALL day... Highlight was the child protection talk by a hilarious German officer and then we had to have mouth swabs taken for the mandatory drug test. We then had very dull first aid (only dull because I've done it so many times before) and then the Beasty 4 hour passenger safety lecture which was actually okay in the end. I passed the exam anyway. Now I am here chilling in my cabin and just discovered they have Twilight on demand on our TV yay! I am also praying that my sore throat today doesn't develop into a full blown cold....

Muster Stations!

Day two: done!

Today was also a great day, a long day and an information overload day just as yesterday was! It started bright and early at 8am after a great nights sleep in the training room again. Today's lessons were very health and safety heavy... Highlights (!) included 5 safety videos back-to-back which were actually uncomfortably cheesy and dull of course covering things like slips and trips, back injuries and handling chemicals. I know it's vitally important to know this information but it doesn't stop it being pretty non-thrilling! 

We also had a talk about alcohol and drugs as well as our crew member policies and handbook. We had lunch which was okay, found out that Kate & Wills had a BOY (yay for the future king!!! Despite being in the Bahamas I am proud to be British!) and also had my electronics checked off as safe from the  engineers. We got to see inside the engine control room which I found really interesting, they even do engine room tours for crew sometimes! Sounds like nerdy fun to me!

So basically the most hilarious thing that happened today (even though it feels like weeks ago now haha) was the crew safety drill today. We got thoroughly briefed what to do when the announcement was made and I felt confident that I knew what I was doing and how to get there. So... Alarm goes off, we scatter from the training room in all directions to go to our cabins and get our life jackets before heading to our muster station (aka emergency assembly point/life raft) and I confidently head off down the I-95 which is what they call the main long corridor for crew on deck 1 which goes from one end of the ship to the other. 

So, picture the fact that the training room is at the front end of the ship (aka forward) and my cabin is at the back of the ship (aka the aft). I get about 60% of the way down the I-95 and get stopped by a safety officer because the hypothetical "fire" is near my cabin. Bugger. So he tells me I have to go to Deck 4 and along and then down to my cabin. At this point I ran into Rob's roommate Neil who is also looking lost so together we head off to get to our cabins which are a few doors away from each other. Well, after running up 4 decks of stairs, along the outside deck area on 4 and then back down to Deck 1 we are once again refused entry, so we decided to just proceed to our stations. Easy for him, it was just back up to Deck 4 and through a set of doors in the aft end. However, my muster station was on deck 4, forward and starboard - aka right hand side! See I'm getting all the lingo now mum! ;-) but basically as far away as possible. So I leg it down deck 4 outside past everyone else already assembled at their stations in life jackets which was a bit mortifying, ran into an old friend from 2010 (Chris) but didn't have chance to chat obviously (!) and FINALLY made it to my station at point U-3. Well, I felt like I'd turned up to a fancy dress party in plain clothes because I was the only one without a life jacket. Along with the "earning my ears" tab prominently on my name tag and no crew ID card yet... It was all a bit of a fail!!

I didn't get into any trouble or anything but hopefully next time the "fire" won't be two decks below my cabin! 

The other two big things I did today was 1) get Internet access! It's 10 cents a minute and you prepay in $20 blocks so I went up to crew deck 14 to get some actual sunlight and air whilst FB chatting and I messaging family and friends which was awesome! I feel I have so much information I don't know where to start when talking to people! 

The last thing was I got my costume, crew ID card and then had my first OTJ training shift today from 6.30-10pm! I learnt the basics on the till and it felt like putting an old pair of shoes on... Once again, I am a MERCHIE!! :-D 

Day One

Overwhelmed.

That's the tip of the iceberg if we're talking about the amount of information thrown at me today. But... Today was literally one of the most awesome days of my life!!! 

I am absolutely beyond tired right now but I have to write it all down before I forget everything as I have a feeling tomorrow will be similar! I don't have Internet yet because I have yet to buy an Internet card so I will publish this ASAP but for reference... Today was Sunday 21st July 2013 and it all started at 4am this morning. Well actually, I got woken up several times - once by people shouting outside our room and once at 3am when the room phone rang!? I have a feeling this might have something to do with the massive group of Brazilian tour group staying in the rooms next to ours. Anyway, got up just past 4am... Had mostly packed the night before so that was good. Got ready and checked out of the hotel. At 5.15am the bus arrived to take us to the port. We picked up some re-hires from the Sheraton by the airport on the way.

45 minutes or so later we got our first glimpse of the Disney Dream!! I can only compare my feeling to that of when I first saw Main Street USA at WDW after seeing it on TV so many times. It's a really beautiful ship. Next to it was a Royal Caribbean ship and it just looked shabby in comparison! We had our passports checked on the bus and then we had to get our luggage off and line it up for the drug dogs to sniff. Then we went through security just like in the airport and we boarded the ship! We got onboard at about 7.15-7.30ish. 

We got taken to the training room where we're going to spend a LOT of time this week. There was no dilly dallying... A few snacks for breakfast and then boom - straight into training! And it continued for the next 12 hours! We covered everything from cultural differences to personal safety equipment. We had a big portion of the day covering emergency safety... So if there is a fire, flood, abandon ship, man overboard etc and what to do. One of the most in charge people did that talk and he was a bit scary... You wouldn't second guess him ever! He showed a good video with some suitably terrifying real life phone clips of emergencies on cruise ships and things like that to drill it into us.

Another highlight of today was hearing that they don't use the word "termed" so much here for when you get fired but more the phrase "chicken or beefed". Sound strange? Well... Some are the normal options for plane food aren't they? ;-) 

We had lunch in the crew mess and I had a nice salad. I was expecting nothing after the horror stories I heard but it was actually fine. We shall hold out opinion on that tho! 

So then the really fun parts of today... Having our group picture taken with Captain Mickey Mouse on the staircase in the atrium! Watching the sail away party and hearing when you wish upon a star come from the horn! Getting my costume fitted! Meeting my managers and coworkers in Merchandise and discovering my line manager used to work at Disney Store Cardiff and actually trained me 2.5 years ago in a scabby Mall Cribbs training room to do Mission Magic! IT'S A SMALL WORLD.

Oh, and getting to go and watch one of the three fantastic shows in the Walt Disney Theatre - the Golden Mickeys!!! Basically, today has been amazing and if tomorrow is anything like today then bring it on! 

The first two days

So I have a quick moment to update this... I've been hectic! That's actually an understatement!

So Friday morning, we got up super early at 5.45am in order to get Panera for breakfast before Nick dropped me off at the hotel at 7am and he went to work at EPCOT. I went to my room finally and met my roommate who is American, her name is Sharon and she used to work attractions and entertainment at Disneyland in Anaheim which is pretty awesome. I think they paired us together because we are both rehires with the company... Nobody else is. We then headed to the lobby to meet the other DCL new hires in our start date... There is 15 of us, ranging from stage crew to operations to servers to entertainment. People from Jamaica, India, South Africa, one American and four UKs which was a pleasant surprise. We met the DCL facilitator people and they took us by DCL bus (never been on one before so that was fun!) to Celebration. Literally spent an hour of checking our paperwork and getting our IDs before we were done. Back to the hotel, quick change and then 8 of us got the bus to Magic Kingdom!!!

I was super excited because 6 of the group had never been before and I LOVE taking newbies to MK. We got there and their reaction to the castle was priceless :-) MK was packed and full of tour groups... But it didn't matter because I was at Magic Kingdom! We went and did Haunted Mansion after the obligatory million photos of the castle. Then we got fast passes for Thunder Mountain (it's been a long time since I've had to explain that concept!) and got lunch at Pecos Bills. We did Pirates and then Big Thunder. Then I left the group to go and meet Nick as we had previously made plans but I was a bit sad to leave my new friends! 

So it was disgustingly humid with a heat index of around 102F and so we skipped on going to a park and instead went to see a horror movie at Downtown Disney called The Conjouring. It was good, very jumpy. Then we got a car wash, went to Walgreens for me and then over to the Grand Floridian for dinner at Citricos. It was so yummy - we shared a cheese plate, then I had a chicken dish with a each glaze and then the BEST dessert I've ever had in my life... A lemon cheesecake with white chocolate ganache. Oh my goodness. 

It had started to rain then so we were originally going to go to Magic Kingdom and see Wishes but we were both tired and the weather was gross, so we headed home and I crashed out at 10pm as I'd only had about 3 hours sleep in 46 hours! 

So today, Nick dropped me off at 8am. It wasn't that I didn't want to stay at the all stars it's just that I had more space at Nicks house and I love hanging out with him and his roommate. Anyway, we got the bus to Traditions at Disney University (DU). It was great even though it was my 4th time at Traditions! I won't spoil what we did for anyone who is yet to do it... But it's a great (and long) day. Afterwards, I met my old friend Katie from 2010 who also was at DU today and we got the bus to MK to get the monorail to EPCOT. Ironically I met a girl, Emma, on the bus who I talked to over Facebook are she read my last blog so it was an awesome moment!! 

We got to EPCOT and I went to the R&C to see the few people still left there. Sadly my ex-manager had already left so I didn't get to see him but I dropped off some chocolate and Percy Pigs there which went down well. It started raining again but we walked to China and had Orange Chicken before going to do Test Track as single riders and go to MouseGear so I could buy some magnets for my cabin. 

Then it was time for me to come back to the hotel. We were going to stay for fireworks but I had so much to do and it was raining. 

So tomorrow is time to board the ship!! Wake up call at 4am so it's time to get to bed...