Embarkation Day! - Part 1
The curse of coming from the East Coast the day before was that I woke up at 2:30 am. You heard that right! I tried to fall back asleep but was struggling. The rest of my family seemed to sleep just fine. We were all up quite early and pulled all of our blinds open to enjoy the view and watch the Disney Wonder come into port!
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Since we were up so early we were ready to go early. We decided to walk across the street and grab a quick, cheaper breakfast at the food court. We also picked up a few things at Rexall Drugs, which was super convenient. I think we all ate at Mcdonald's. Not great, but it did the job and we knew we had plenty of good food waiting onboard!
When we had checked in the day before they had given us a card with information on getting our luggage to the cruise. We called bell services after breakfast as the gentleman from bell services who took our luggage upon arrival had told us the earlier we call the better. So we called around 9:30 am and they came and got our bags. Then we hung out in our room enjoying the view and Starbucks! Since we were sailing concierge we could arrive anytime, but like most people, we were anxious to get going and left the room around 10 to head down towards the port. We had reduced our carryons to our backpacks with our computers and one carryon bag. I went to do the final check on the room. You know where you check the kids didn't put anything in a drawer, etc and what do I find...all of our formal clothes in the garment bags in the closet! Thank God I checked! I forgot that the bellman had hung them up in there the day before. I knew it was odd we had extra luggage tags! I had thought we had just enough! Fortunately, they were in the carry-on bag we decided to carry with our paperwork in it. I put them on the two bags we had and we brought them downstairs. We could see all of the luggage piled to go to the port. We explained that we forgot them and the bellman double-checked we wanted them in the giant pile of luggage, which we did. He took care of it for us (thank you!) and we headed over towards the port entrance.
I didn't take a ton of pictures of the check-in process and I'm realizing that could have been useful. Masks are required in the port according to Canadian law. First, we lined up outside next to the building. Here, a cast member asked to see our ArriveCAN code so have that ready! Originally someone had told me to ask at the front of the line about being concierge, but they didn't separate the lines until you entered the building. Once inside there was a cast member who scanned your
DCL QR/barcodes and then sent you to the actual check-in line. Here is where it split off to concierge. We went to the concierge line and they sent us to the first available cast member to check in. The people in front of us came back because the cast member said they couldn't check in concierge guests, but our cast member did an excellent job. She gave the boys their Oceaneer's Club bands and gave us gold stickers to demonstrate we were concierge. From here we went through security and then were directed to a concierge waiting area. It was just a smaller roped-off area with some chairs. Nothing fancy. We were one of the first people in the area, but it did fill up quickly. We chatted with a family across from us who recognized me from the Facebook group. Turns out they were our neighbors and in our Fish Extender group!
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So, we were seated in the concierge area comfortably at least by 11:22 when the above photo was taken. So about 20 minutes for us to check-in. Then someone came down to a door on the opposite side of where we entered and ushered everyone to the gangway. This was a bit of a kerfuffle as there were a lot of people in a small area trying to get out, including some large family groups with wheelchairs. We just took our time knowing we'd be there soon enough! The next thing you know, they're announcing, "Welcome to the Disney Wonder, the Istre family!" So we waited about 20 minutes to board the ship in the concierge area/walk to the boat. But we boarded and took the boy's picture with Captain Mickey!
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From the atrium, everyone was funneled into Azure where they helped you set up your phone with the app and get you set up for the muster drill. Once your phone is set up they send you off to your muster location where you check in with a cast member who checks you off the list once you take the picture and show them you've completed the drill. This was super easy to complete, although my husband's wouldn't show as completed and he was freaking out about it. The cast member said it was ok because we'd showed him on my phone and that meant we were checked in. It just took a few refreshes of the app for his to show up. The Marine in him needs to follow instructions and have the boxes checked. From there we headed off to Triton's for the concierge lunch.
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The concierge lunch service was amazing! Our head server for lunch was Coco, who is a Palo server. Unfortunately, I've forgotten the assistant server's name, but he was fabulous as well. When we were seated they asked if we'd like some wine, we said yes and they brought us Layer Cake Shiraz. (There were a few choices he gave us after we said we wanted red.) We enjoy this wine and often get it for dinner in the dining room. Here is the one problem, they are VERY generous with the wine. Every time I turned around he was topping my glass off. I have no clue how much wine I drank with that lunch...so beware the concierge lunch! You will be tipsy, or even toasted, by the time it's over! LOL! I had the lobster salad, which was very good. (Probably a little too light of a lunch for all of that wine though...) The boys had asked for their drinks in wine glasses, and of course, our servers obliged. We joked a lot about being fancy on this cruise so they had pinkies up with their wine glasses! The boys had their first Mickey bars of the trip for dessert! I got carrot cake and the sundae, while my husband got the cheesecake. I thought the sundae was the best of the desserts! So good! Oh, and Angelina from the concierge team came by our table to introduce herself and went over some of our activities for the next day. It was a lovely lunch! We were happy campers afterward!
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I'm realizing our head server Deniz is in this picture of my boys and their Mickey bars. He was a very involved head server and we really enjoyed him throughout the cruise!
I'll leave this update here and continue on with the embarkation day update in another post because I feel like I have a TON of pictures! See you real soon!
We stopped at a Chick-Fil-A on the road from our house to Baltimore for a quick dinner/potty break, then went to check in to our hotel. I have stayed at the Hilton Baltimore BWI a few times before early flights. I really like their park and stay service, and the rooms are clean, spacious and modern. I had never flown on a weekend before though so we arrived to a very full lot and driveway. Apparently, they had two weddings going on. A huge school group also pulled up and unloaded buses on tweens while we waited for my husband to park the car. So a bit of a hassle to take care of the car, but we parked in the garage and my husband thought that was better than outside for our long trip. Our room was quiet, clean and spacious. Beds super comfy. We all settled in for a good night's rest and early morning.
Looking forward to the rest!
