After dinner while still in Puerto Vallarta, we decided to deliver our fish extender gifts. For those that don’t know what fish extenders are, they are a pocketed hanging decoration that you hook on the fish by your door (a decoration next to the stateroom door) that extends the fish. The fish is used by Disney Cast Members to put notes for you (such as invitations to Castaway Club parties, DVC information, etc.). One DISer (EpcotKilterFan) decided to get these on the Westbound Panama Canal cruise in 2005 and the tradition has continued. People put all kinds of gifts in the extenders. On this trip we have gotten candy, toys, notepads, pens, pencils, lots of pirate stuff and some other pretty cool gifts.
We got to bed at a reasonable time and slept in for once. After breakfast, I needed to find the Girl Scouts on our cruise because they were doing a patch exchange and worked on a new badge. I talked to the girls about being in the travel industry, answering their many questions.
We took an opportunity this morning to review our folio and found a charge that didn’t belong to us. This is a good thing to do at least once during your cruise. Just go to Guest Services and ask for a print out. Otherwise, you will be standing in a long line on the last day to straighten anything out.
At lunch we met a group of four cruisers that were cruising for their first time on Disney. This is amazing and worth mentioning due to the number of repeat cruisers onboard. We have set a record! There are 2036 Castaway Club members, the most ever!
After lunch it was time for the first wine tasting that we signed up for with Michael Jordan (again, the Master Sommelier not the basketball player!). This was a great seminar because he taught us how to identify wines by their characteristics of sight, smell and taste and then use some general knowledge to make an educated guess as to what kind of wine it is. I was able to successfully guess the 2006 Chardonnay from Napa Valley and won a hat from Napa Rose!
After this we made our way to the booking desk and rebooked the Podcast Cruise and added one more cruise for 2009! Then we went to the shop to buy a couple things for my Secret Mickey. Secret Mickey is something we came up with for the 2005 Eastbound Panama Canal Cruise. Kind of like Secret Santa.
Finally we had the Castaway Clubhouse party. This was different than they have been doing it recently. We had a deck party instead of taking over Beat Street. They served free alcoholic beverages and hors d’oeuvres. Cruise Director Christian went over the fun questionnaire and then introduced Captain Tom. Captain Tom told us that in October the 2010 dates would be announced. Many of us are looking forward to that! At the end of the party, they always pick winners and give them prizes. The current prices are clocks that have the Castaway Club logo on it. Bill and I were lucky enough to win one!
Our next stop will be Acapulco for a short stay plus a deck party. I haven’t figured out the pictures yet, so they may need to be added later.
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