You might recall the adorable Hall family who won our Unfrozen Winner contest earlier this year. Check out their adorable snowman submission!
Norrell Service Experts sent the family on a Disney Cruise and paid for airfare for four. Mom and Dad (Rebecca and Bradley) took their two oldest youngsters, Korbin and Brooke, on their Disney Cruise during mid-summer. Korbin and Brooke had never been on a cruise before and Rebecca and Bradley hadn’t been in about 10 years.
“I cannot begin to explain all the fun we had and how absolutely magnificent the whole thing was,” wrote Rebecca. “It was a vacation we could have never done on our own. Disney does cruising right!”
The Hall parents were kind enough to send over their itinerary and some pictures from their awesome trip. If you want to a Disney Cruise, or just curious what it’s all about, read on to see the highlights from the Hall’s vacation.
Monday
We were on the water for two days (Saturday and Sunday) and then ported in Tortola, British Virgin Islands. We scheduled a Catamaran and went out with 4 other families for the day. It was my children’s first time snorkeling and they had a blast. We spotted turtles and stingrays – it may have been the coolest experience of the whole cruise!
Tuesday
We went from Tortola to St. Thomas in the American Virgin Islands, where we got to snorkel even more, got to swim, and hung out on the beach. The water was really that turquoise blue that you see in movies – truly picture perfect.
Thursday
We traveled all day Wednesday and then docked at Castaway Cay, Disney’s Cruise Line Guest-Only Island. The water was incredibly blue and had amazing visibility below, so of course we had to do more snorkeling! They placed a bunch of Mickey Mouses you could look for underwater, which was nice because there weren’t as many fish. They also include an 18 and older beach which we enjoyed while the kids played basketball, pool, and shuffleboard. They had employees everywhere to help take care of the kids so we (Bradley and Rebecca) laid out and drank a daiquiri. It was basically a floating Disneyland!
Aboard
It gives me goosebumps remembering everything on the boat – it was all so fun and extraordinary! The cruise has a “Midship Detective Agency” where you pick the mystery you want to solve and Disney gives you a card so you can write down all your clues. When you place the card up to a painting, the painting comes alive – it speaks to you, tells you about the mystery you are working to solve, and gives you signals and directions. One mystery went on for two hours because we were going all over the cruise ship.
They are always showing first-run movies out around the pool so we got to enjoy Jungle Book. We also got to go on the Aqua Duct, which is a huge slide that zooms you up and down and swings you out above the boat!
All of us went Goofy Golfing and the cruise also has other games and a Tween Club called Edge with events like scavenger hunts, ice breakers, and more.
It’s so easy to meet characters on the ship – you only have to wait a couple minutes versus a half-hour or more at Disneyland. We got to see about two each day, and one day we met five in a row! They also have multiple versions of the characters, like Captain Mickey, Traditional Mickey, etc.
The actual room was awesome! We had an ocean view room with a HUGE porthole and window seat. The stateroom was a really good size and all four of us were comfortable and never felt squished.
Dining
You alternate three restaurants. Enchanted Garden has awesome flower lights on the ceiling that open and close and the colors on the ceiling change throughout your meal and Royal Court was really elegant and made me think of Cinderella. The meals are very gourmet and they have a great selection. Korbin tried everything, even escargot at the Royal Court. (He said it tasted like dirt!)
Animators Palette is animation-themed and they leave markers on your table so you can illustrate a figure. They give you a tutorial on how to draw a figure, then they pick up the drawings and at the very end of dinner, they animate your drawings on big screens. You have no idea it’s coming! They put them to music and put them in Disney films. My daughter is our artist so she did really well with hers and was elated – the rest of us weren’t quite as polished
“We can't thank Service Experts enough for this unbelievable opportunity,” Rebecca told us after they returned home. “I tear up when I think about the experience as a whole. Submitting an entry I never thought would go anywhere, finding out we were a finalist, the nail-biting voting stage, the big reveal, planning and selecting which cruise, the anticipation of going and finally experiencing an unbelievable vacation. It was such a wonderful time living it all. Thank you, thank you!”
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