20th Anniversary Baja Cruise and Disneyland Visit - October 2017

Day 3 - Monday, 10/12 - Afternoon at Sea...

Being a bit tipsy and not sure what to do next, we wandered around the area for a few minutes and realized that they were about to start doing Origami in the Crown & Fin pub next door.

We had wanted to go check out the pub anyway so why not? (Just to see it, not to drink anymore at this point. :rotfl2:)



Oh look, a phone booth!



The pub was fairly empty. (It was now about 3pm.)



I'd say that there were about 10 people who showed up for the activity. The instructor was super friendly.



It sure was a lot of folding, but it wasn't difficult to follow along. Eventually, we had our classic cranes ready to show off.



The activity was listed as an hour long in the Navigator, but it probably only lasted about 30 minutes.

"Disney Tunes Trivia" was scheduled for 4pm at the Promenade Lounge, so we planned to head there next. Since we had a few minutes to spare, we stopped to explore the atrium's first floor a bit.

That pumpkin tree is just too darn cool!





And loving the other Halloween decorations too.





It took a little while to figure out what was going on, because every few minutes a princess would come down the stairs… pause for a minute, and then go into Triton's.



It turns out that they were having some sort of tea party for girls inside. I peeked inside the window and it looked really cool. I think you may have had to pay extra for this, but if our youngest daughter had been with us, I bet she would have loved it.

I had my own princess with me. Happy 20 years Stephanie!



Anyway, we spent a few minutes soaking it in before heading on to the trivia.

Here's another 360 degree photo for you to click on…



We arrived for trivia just in time.



Not a whole lot to say about this one. Other than it sounded more fun in theory. They had some technical difficulties at first, so it took a little while to get going. And it turns out, I'm terrible at Disney music trivia, so I wasn't much help to Stephanie. And on the other hand, she's super good at remembering this stuff. And some of it was pretty obscure, where you needed to know the movie (usually easy), the name of the song (the hardest for me), and sometimes the performer (I had no idea on a couple).



We (well Stephanie) got a 46 out of 60. Only a couple teams did better. But they were tables of like 8 or 10 people vs. our table of two (which was essentially one.) Hahaha :rotfl2:


It was now about 5pm, so we decided to head up to our rooms and get ready for dinner.
 
Day 3 - Monday, 10/12 - Pirate Night

It was pirate night tonight… we were assigned to Tiana's Place for dinner again, but instead of the jazz/New Orleans festivities, it was pirate themed. I think we lucked out, because it played well with the Pirate Theme. Or at least, it felt right because you know... Pirates of the Caribbean in Disneyland is part of New Orleans Square and all.



We had decided not to pack along costumes for this trip, but Stephanie did bring a couple small items, including a Goofy pirate ears/bandana from our last Disney cruise



One of the couples at our table didn't realize that they ship had changed its official time last night, so they ended up just eating at Cabanas since they were an hour late. We had a nice dinner visiting with the other couple anyway.

So yeah, pirate themed menus and everything.







We started off with the bread service, which was Johnny Cakes (and rolls) with Mango Dip.





They were fine, but forgettable.

For appetizers, we both ordered Davy Jones' Locker Rock Crab Cake (seared and served with Chili-Cajun spiced Coleslaw and Lime.)



OK... These were excellent. I had wished that I had ordered two of them. So I asked our server if it was too late to order another, and within a couple minutes, he brought a second one out to me. So good!

For the soups and salads course, I had the Carrot and Cilantro Soup (with banana bread croutons.) I took a spoonful or two, and decided to stop there. Not a fan of this one. But no worries, I was fine from eating two crab cakes! :rotfl2:



Stephanie had the Chilled Mango Soup (with Passion Fruit, Ginger, and Coconut.) She really liked this a lot.



For the entrée, we both ordered Jack's Treasure of the Seas (Grilled Shrimp and Seared Scallops served with Spinach, strings of Pasta, Tomato Provencal Sauce, and black Tomato Pearls.)





This was outstanding!

Oh and it's worth noting…. In our past cruises, our head dining room server never really interacted with us until the last day (I guess working us for tips at the last minute.) But this time, our head server was very engaged with us throughout the whole cruise. Super friendly and always checking on us, while the regular and assistant servers were doing their thing. For those of us who ordered this dish, he came around one by one and removed the shells from the shrimp for us. Chatting a bit with each of us as he made his way around the table.

Halfway through the dinner, the pirate party started. The servers circled the room, and encouraged everyone to join in on another parade. With another limbo line at the finish line. It was fun seeing all the guests dressed up in their pirate costumes. (And I'm surprised at just how many adults went all out with their costumes. More than on our previous Disney cruises!)



After the Mixology class earlier in the afternoon, we weren't in the mood to have any other drinks, but the menu was cool.



For some reason, I didn't get around to getting a photo of the other side with the deserts… We weren't as excited about tonight's desert menu, so only one item for each of us. Haha!

I had the rum soaked chocolate cake. It was good, but not amazing.



Stephanie had the Caramel Macadamia Nut Cheesecake Tart. She was pretty happy with it.



All an all, a very enjoyable dinner. And it was fun getting to know our table mates a bit better too.

We finished up around 7:30 and headed back to our room. We were super excited to find the coolest towel animal ever. The facial expression on the monkey was just too cool!!!

We were super excited to find the coolest towel animal ever. The facial expression on the monkey was just too cool!!! (I should have taken a profile photo from the side, because they really nailed the shape on this one!)



And some chocolate pirate booty was stashed on our bed too!





The Pirates in the Caribbean Deck Party was supposed to start around 10pm with fireworks around 10:20pm. We decided to just relax in our stateroom until then. We turned the TV on and flipped through the channels, ultimately settling on the Hocus Pocus movie. Neither of us had seen that since around the time it was new, so we decided to give it a shot… except for I fell asleep about 15 minutes into it. I woke up towards the end of the movie, just in time to head up to party.

Oh, and to be honest, we weren't as interested in the Pirate Party as much as seeing the fireworks. So we arrived a little late. But still had fun watching everyone enjoying the festivities. The swashbuckling Mickey Mouse was pretty darn cool when he zip lined between the smoke stack towers!



I didn't really get any good photos, but the fireworks were a fun treat.





Tomorrow morning was our Cabo San Lucas day, so after the fireworks were over, we decided to pretty much head straight back to the room and get some good rest.

A full, but fun day at sea. Goodnight Moon!
 
Enjoying the Trip Report!

We sailed on the Wonder for the 7 Night Mexican Rivera Cruise, Oct 15-22. We experienced the same issue you did the first two nights with dinner service being slow!!! We were getting served our main course when others were getting there deserts. The table of 8 next to us who had the same wait staff complained, and switched dining rotations. After that our service did improve noticeably.
 
Catching up with your report, we loved the addition of the Shawarma station and ate there almost every day I think :oops:

We had the same fellow for our mixology class (I think he was from Croatia? Or Poland?? haha) We made the exact same drinks, too!

I agree that some of the ship is still showing her age; I'm sorry you had so much wear and tear in the shower, that would skeeve me out. Outside though I think it's worth remembering that the Wonder goes through MANY climate changes in a 12 month period, if we think about how hot and humid the Carribean can be and especially the Panama Canal and then just a few short weeks later she is subjected to cooler temperatures, rain, wind, etc in Alaska. Yes they should be on top of it but it's still hard to catch every single flaw I think.
 


Man this darn site I have been watching for updates but didn't get one again. Glad I actually came to the report and checked. Anyway love the latest updates. The halloween tree and other decs are super cool and loved the pirate night. Food looked really good. Excited to see your shore excursions!
 


Enjoying the Trip Report!

We sailed on the Wonder for the 7 Night Mexican Rivera Cruise, Oct 15-22. We experienced the same issue you did the first two nights with dinner service being slow!!! We were getting served our main course when others were getting there deserts. The table of 8 next to us who had the same wait staff complained, and switched dining rotations. After that our service did improve noticeably.

Too bad you had such slow service on your cruise as well. Ours was pretty bad the first night, we didn't complain, but they were much better the other nights. So they were either having a slow night, or maybe someone at a different table had complained too.

Catching up with your report, we loved the addition of the Shawarma station and ate there almost every day I think :oops:

We had the same fellow for our mixology class (I think he was from Croatia? Or Poland?? haha) We made the exact same drinks, too!

I agree that some of the ship is still showing her age; I'm sorry you had so much wear and tear in the shower, that would skeeve me out. Outside though I think it's worth remembering that the Wonder goes through MANY climate changes in a 12 month period, if we think about how hot and humid the Carribean can be and especially the Panama Canal and then just a few short weeks later she is subjected to cooler temperatures, rain, wind, etc in Alaska. Yes they should be on top of it but it's still hard to catch every single flaw I think.

I don't recall where the fellow was from, but that sounds about right. I think maybe his name was Ivan. He was a pretty smooth cat though.

You raise a very good point about the difficulty in the climate changes making it difficult to keep the outside pristine... and being able to catch every single flaw. For me, it was more about straws on a camels back... a bunch of minor things about the room adding up to be perceived as something significant. But, the issues with the veranda by themselves were indeed minor.

Man this darn site I have been watching for updates but didn't get one again. Glad I actually came to the report and checked. Anyway love the latest updates. The halloween tree and other decs are super cool and loved the pirate night. Food looked really good. Excited to see your shore excursions!

Yeah, I still miss out on email updates sometimes too. But glad you checked back and enjoyed the updates.

Love following along with you and your family! We are booking the 7 night Mexico Riviera 2019 today!!

It's awesome that you are booking the 7 night Mexico Riviera today. You must be super excited!!! Congrats!

This I want to try. Was it just a splash of the Baileys poured on top of the Chambord or the other way around?

It was quite tasty! I'd say it was about half of each. The shot glasses were pre-filled with the Chambord and then they had us each top it off with the Baileys.
 
The mixology class looks like a lot of fun! We've signed up for group classes with our Facebook group for our cruise for both that and the chocolate and liquor class - looking forward to it!

I am sure origami after a bunch of cocktails was a bit more challenging! ;)

I have read from a few people that don't like the pirate night menu but seems like you both enjoyed it well enough and had a nice evening with the fireworks, etc.
 
The mixology class looks like a lot of fun! We've signed up for group classes with our Facebook group for our cruise for both that and the chocolate and liquor class - looking forward to it!

I am sure origami after a bunch of cocktails was a bit more challenging! ;)

I have read from a few people that don't like the pirate night menu but seems like you both enjoyed it well enough and had a nice evening with the fireworks, etc.

Yeah, mixology class was an absolute blast. A couple of people in our class had also done the chocolate and liquor tasting and very positive things to say about it too. Great choices Phil!

Yeah, cocktails and origami. LOL. Certainly made it more fun! :rotfl2:

Yeah, I thought the Pirate night menu was fine. Probably not my favorite meal, but still enjoyable!
 
Day 4 - Tuesday 10/3 - Cabo San Lucas

Yahoo, it's Cabo day!!!!

The ship started pulling into the Cabo area a little bit after sunrise. It sure was fun watching the approach from our veranda.



This was going to be my first visit to Mexico, so I was pretty excited!






Plans for the day? When considering official Disney shore excursions, nothing seemed perfect. We wanted a balance between getting out on the water to see the arches up close, maybe a little swimming and snorkeling, and then some time to explore in town. Some excursions only checked off one thing from the list (just a boat tour, or just snorkeling)… while others did some of these things, but also took you to places we had no interest in (like some random beach resort or a glass blowing factory.) We spent some time googling other non-Disney options and came across Rogers Tour Boats.

https://www.rogerstourboatcabomexico.com

They had outstanding reviews on Yelp and TripAdvisor… so we decided to look a little deeper. Their website was updated recently with new options and prices, but at the time, they had a private 2-hour two for up to 12 people for something like $200 total. It also said to inquire for a couples only private tour, so we did. $150 for a private 2-hour tour in a glass bottom boat, including a tour of El Arco Arch area, Pacific side views, Lovers Beach, snorkeling/swimming, and beverages.

So… $75 per person for a highly rated private tour that leaves us plenty of time to explore in town afterwards? That's cheaper than many of the Disney options, and sounded way cooler. Let's do it!

We interacted with them over email to select the date and time, and then paid via PayPal. We had some scheduling challenges initially, but it all worked out.

So, a boat tour in the morning starting at 9:30 AM, and then lunch/site seeing in town afterwards. Sounds like a great date!


And oh yeah, the ship doesn't dock in the actual port here, instead it floats out in the bay and they use a bunch of small tender boats to cart you back and forth to the marina.

The tender boats were to start at 8:30 am. We figured it would be crowded, and we didn't want to be late for our tour, so we planned to be ready to leave the Wonder right at 8:30 AM.

Anyway…. Once we were up and dressed, we enjoyed watching the ship pass around the corner of the El Arco Arch rocks and settle into the bay.

Some amazing views from our veranda!



And Cabo off in the background below... It was fun watching the tender boats circling around until the Wonder was ready for them.



We decided to head up to Cabanas for breakfast and to just soak it all in!



And around 8:20 or so, we headed down to get in line for the tenders.

The tenders were up in the front of the ship… we decided to head that direction on the Promenade Deck instead of walking inside through the hallways.

Just wow!



And again, haven't we learned the lesson about not rushing? We were only about 5 minutes early, and there weren't even enough people to fill the first tender boat. Ha!



It was probably about a five or ten minute boat ride to the marina. How fun to look back and see the Wonder just floating out there! It sure seems a lot bigger when you step back a bit…



I didn't upload a lot of photos of the marina, but it was packed full of boats/ships. How cool!



We had a good 40 minutes (or more) until our 9:30 AM tour, so we decided to explore a few shops and just walk around the marina for a while.









How cool! The only negative thing, was that a gazillion people kept coming up trying to get us to go on their water taxi or who knows what other excursions. Or to come have a drink or eat at their restaurant. It happened repeatedly and became pretty annoying.

We had a slight mix up with the tour meeting location, but the great thing about Cabo… those pesky tour people are friendly, even when you turn them down.

One of them saw us waiting and offered to let us use his cell phone. Luckily, the Roger's Tour Boat contact had given us the cell phone number of our particular tour guide. There was a misunderstanding, and he was waiting for us in a different location. No problem, a couple minutes later they picked us up and we were on our way!!!

I didn't take a photo of the tour boat here, but I was stoked to see that it was relatively new and very clean. (In contrast to many of the other grimy looking tour boats in the marina.)

We had two tour guides. One to drive the boat, and one to hang out with us, tell stories, and point out the various sites. One was named Miguel and the other was Rogelio (or something like that.) Both seemed to be in their mid-twenties and while not overly fluent in English, we didn't have any trouble understanding them. Super nice guys to say the least! And to be honest, I interacted with a couple of Disney cast members on the ship who could stand to be mentored by these two guys for a little while :-)

We followed the coast line out to the arches. Rogelio pointed out all sorts of features and told stories. I was surprised by how many rock formations had names and stuff… and that most of them weren't too much of a stretch of the imagination. I didn't get photos of everything, but for example, this photo is apparently the profile of a Native American. You can see his face and head dress in the middle of the outcrop.



This one was called Neptune's Finger (I think.)



And looking back towards the Wonder…





I could go on and on here, but I'll try and stick to the bigger highlights.

Eventually, we made our way out to the arches area. Boats were taking turns easing their way into this crack…





Oh, and the other thing… Rogelio wasn't shy about grabbing my cameras for photos. (He asked of course.) Eventually, he took my GoPro camera and put it on about a 6 foot pole and recorded for quite a while with it….

Watch to the end of this short clip to see him put it up in the front of a sea lion. LOL.


And a great view of the arches themselves!



Here's a fun photo using that 360 degree camera…



This rock was the furthest point south of the arches area. How cool!



And then we headed out to the Pacific side of the arches. So on the Cabo side of the arches is Lovers Beach… and the Pacific side is Divorce beach. That's Divorce beach in this photo…



The opposite side of the arches!



After boating around for the while, they asked if we wanted to get out and explore Lovers Beach. Um…. Yes, please!!!

They drove us up and let us off right on the beach. They said take as long as we wanted, and that they'd just float off shore until we signaled that we were ready.

Here's a photo looking back out from Lovers Beach. Right in the center, you can see the Rogers Tour Boat with the blue awning and the Wonder immediately behind it…



And standing back a little further.



After a couple minutes, we decided to walk over the hill to the Pacific side. (And I couldn't pass up on the opportunity to climb up to the top of that big old rock.)



Dude, it was completely empty. We had the beach 100% to ourselves. Crazy!!!





I'm claiming this as my own private beach!



We probably spent a half hour enjoying the beaches and goofing around a bit. I mean, does it get much better than this? Perfect temperatures. Perfect blue skies. Amazingly solitary beach. And my beautiful wife of 20 years. What a way to celebrate an anniversary!!!!!

(OK. I do understand that this is actually called "Divorce Beach"... The irony isn't lost on me, but weird names aside. This was truly one of the highlights of the trip!) :hippie:
 
sounds like a great day and you found a great company!

and, yeah, taken on it's own a summary of the day of "one of the highlights of our 20th anniversary trip was our visit to Divorce Beach" does sound a bit funny! ;)
 
Love the cabo section. Those arches are cool. My parents have a house in Puerto Vallarta and they have arches there as well. They call them Los Arcos and a few hotels and such are named after them. I had to laugh when you talked about the people annoying you about tours and such. PV is a big cruise port and when my ex and I went there we were staying in the condo but they pretty much assume EVERYONE is off a ship. They call them boat people LOL (meaning the cruise people). They kept coming up and pestering us and saying are you from the boat? They wanted to sell us timeshares of course and my parents not only own the house but a timeshare with the home resort being IN Mexico so needless to say we are set LOL. It is super annoying but that was back in 05 and I haven't noticed it on our last 2 trips so maybe they are getting better about it (at least in PV lol).

Loved that boat tour. We have done a few of those down there as well as in Ixtapa/Ziuahtenjo which is where we used to go all the time before we bought our house in PV.

Looks like you had great weather and cool about the beach. Going through those rocks looks pretty tight and crazy LOL.

Will be anxious for the next update
 
sounds like a great day and you found a great company!

and, yeah, taken on it's own a summary of the day of "one of the highlights of our 20th anniversary trip was our visit to Divorce Beach" does sound a bit funny! ;)

:cool1:

Love, love, love your trip report!!! Thank you so much for sharing. Your excursion is amazing so far - the sea lions? Wow :goodvibes.
What a wonderful way to spend your Anniversary! :thumbsup2

Thanks for following along. Glad that you are enjoying the report!!! :thumbsup2

Love the cabo section. Those arches are cool. My parents have a house in Puerto Vallarta and they have arches there as well. They call them Los Arcos and a few hotels and such are named after them. I had to laugh when you talked about the people annoying you about tours and such. PV is a big cruise port and when my ex and I went there we were staying in the condo but they pretty much assume EVERYONE is off a ship. They call them boat people LOL (meaning the cruise people). They kept coming up and pestering us and saying are you from the boat? They wanted to sell us timeshares of course and my parents not only own the house but a timeshare with the home resort being IN Mexico so needless to say we are set LOL. It is super annoying but that was back in 05 and I haven't noticed it on our last 2 trips so maybe they are getting better about it (at least in PV lol).

Loved that boat tour. We have done a few of those down there as well as in Ixtapa/Ziuahtenjo which is where we used to go all the time before we bought our house in PV.

Looks like you had great weather and cool about the beach. Going through those rocks looks pretty tight and crazy LOL.

Will be anxious for the next update

Thanks for sharing about your PV experiences. That must be awesome to have a house there!!! :hippie:
 
Day 4 - Tuesday 10/3 - Snorkeling

After we got back on the boat, they asked us if we wanted to go do some snorkeling…. They gave us two options, we explained that we haven't really done much snorkeling before, so they chose the location for us.

(I've snorkeled at Disney's Castaway Cay, and at the dedicated snorkeling pool at Disney's Aulani, but never in a completely wild environment. And Stephanie hasn't never snorkeled before at all. And… I'm fairly blind without my glasses… so there's that too.)

Anyway, they drove us over to a large roped off area (that I guess is reserved for snorkeling.) Although there were other boats floating around, we were pretty much the only people in the water. So that was cool.

Anyway, we hopped in the water….



And let me tell you… the water was incredibly perfect. I mean, if you had a thermostat to set the water to the idea temperature for the day… whatever that temperature should have been… that's what it felt like. Not too cold, not too warm. Just right!!!



Stephanie decided that the snorkeling gear was too claustrophobic, so she ended up mostly just floating around and soaking it all in. Oh, and Rogelio stayed with the boat... and then Miguel stayed with us in the water. One of the cool things is.... since Stephanie wasn't going under water to see the fish, Miguel would find interesting things and bring them to her…

For example, this cool blow fish. Just wow!!!



If you watch this video, you'll see him go down super deep (like so deep you could hardly see him) and come back up with a starfish. How cool!!!!


The video is two or three minutes long. It gives you a much better idea of just how cool the experience was than the photos do. But here are a few more photos from the GoPro camera….







Not being a sea person, I have no idea what types of fish those are. But there were schools of fairly large ones more out in the open water, and then when you came up close to the rock outcrops below the surface, you'd see all sorts of smaller ones. Little Finding Nemo type fish and stuff. It was pretty darn awesome.

Oh, and when we first got in the water, Rogelio was throwing out bread crumbs around us to attract the fish. They came up in swarms. So cool!

I'd say, we spent about 30 minutes snorkeling and swimming… and then Miguel asked if I wanted to jump off the rocks. Sure, why not!?!?! Stephane headed back to the boat and I followed Miguel to climb up the outcrop. If you went ahead and watched the above video clip, you already have the idea of the jump.

It doesn't look that high from a distance, but I've got to admit, it was a little intimidating from up there. It definitely seemed higher from the top. I'm not going to lie, I had second thoughts… but not having my glasses, I thought it would be much harder to climb back down than to just jump, so I manned up and jumped. Yahoo!!!

38073842936_f30f12a3ae_o.gif


And then of course Miguel had to do a back flip. That dude is crazy, in a good way!!!

One jump was enough for me on this trip! I'm a bit out of shape, and I had previously ditched the life jacket to snorkel down deeper, and I was pretty tired by the time we did the jump. So after treading water for a bit longer, I was ready to head back to the boat too…

And it was great that they had a cooler full of refreshments too. They offered me beer, but a Pepsi sounded more refreshing. You always hear about Mexican coke (with real sugar) being so great, well the Mexican Pepsi is great too. :hippie:

At this point, it was about 11:30 AM and time to head back to the Marina.

So this was our fourth cruise, and hands down, this was by far the best shore excursion experience that I've ever had. It was everything that I had hoped it would be, and more. If you are ever in Cabo looking for something to do, I can't recommend Rogers Tour Boats enough!!!
 
sounds like a great excursion and that you got in a little of everything you might want to do - and still done by 11:30 - so not like one of those things where you are bused 2 hours each way or anything which is nice too

Great job jumping off the rock! Great you got it on film/in gif format!
 
Sounds like a great snorkeling adventure! One of the first times I snorkled was in Ziuatanjeo and it was where you just walked in from the beach. I almost drowned rafting the American River when I was 16 so I am not a big fan of water esp the Ocean. I do like to look at the fish but I too feel claustrophobic putting my head under the water. When I went that first time I took crackers and released them into the water problem was the fish horded around me and it kind of scared me. They were swarming all around my face and head and it freaked me out and a few nibbled at me. I know they were just trying to eat the crackers but still LOL. I also snorkled in PV but the water wasn't very clear. We are going to Nassau next Oct for our work convention and I am looking forward to trying it there with the blue water. You are brave for jumping off the rocks. No thanks!! ;)
 

GET A DISNEY VACATION QUOTE

Dreams Unlimited Travel is committed to providing you with the very best vacation planning experience possible. Our Vacation Planners are experts and will share their honest advice to help you have a magical vacation.

Let us help you with your next Disney Vacation!








Top