Putaansuu Post: At Sea on Disney Wonder

The happy Putaansuu family starting their Alaska Disney Cruise from Edmonds Washington! OK, the ship didn't pick us up in Edmonds, but we did catch an Amtrak train up to Vancouver BC where we stayed the night and then boarded the Disney Wonder in the morning.

I remember visiting this pier during the 1986 World's Fair. Didn't realize that I'd be coming back to catch a ship.

The ship has 3 or 4 pools. The Mickey pool is pretty much for kids only. Anyone over 65" can NOT go down the slide. There was a family pool that was a bit more normal and then there was the "No Kids" pool where adults could relax away from the clammer.

I didn't realize it, but each Disney ship has unique characters hanging off the back of the ship. Ours was Donald Duck and Huey.

The first full day on the ship was an "At Sea" day with no Ports of Call planned. The ship cruised up the inner passage where we could enjoy the tree covered mountains shooting up on both sides of the ship. It wasn't long before human influence on the land was no longer visible. Truly beautiful.

Our Stateroom wasn't a fancy one, but it certainly beat the one I had on the aircraft carrier. Not only did we get a porthole, but it was HUGE. You could almost call it a "Window". And if we didn't like that view, we could turn the channel and we could watch the view from the bridge. The room had a double bed and the couch flattened out into a single bed for William. We had a separate shower room and toilet room. A nice feature when the whole family is trying to get ready for the day.

We usually dine in one of the three big dining rooms and rotate which dining room we eat in every night. For the second dinner on board, we signed up for five star dining in Palo's where our truly Italian server guided us through an exquisite Italian dining experience. Where is William, you ask?

At the Oceanier's Lab! Disney Cruise has kid's clubs for many different age groups. The one targeting William was the Oceanier's Lab. This is the Piston Cup where the kid's teamed up to build soap cars (carved bar of soap with wheels and flag attached) and they race them until there is a final winner. William's team won, earning their car a place on the shelf (for the week anyway) and a Magical Moment Certificate. He was pretty proud.

This allows the parents to party it up... Here we're in the movie theater where they run current Disney movies through out the day. It's a quality theatre with most of their movies showing in 3D. We hadn't caught the latest Pirates movie, so we caught it here. I also caught up on "Mars Needs Moms" and "Tangled". I'm about 3D'd out...

Disney characters were available daily and their schedule and location were posted so you could catch them (or in our case, avoid them) except...

... for the Character Breakfast. One of your mornings on board is a character breakfast where all the characters stop by your table for hi-jinx and pictures (Pluto gave me a wet willie while I was trying to butter my toast...) We got a few pictures, but Chip is one of my favorites!

You always sit at the same numbered table (even though you rotate dining rooms) and you get the same servers and you sit with the same people. We were paired up with a five membered family from California that were a delight. Here is William with the three kids.

Lots of activities to participate in. Here is a beer tasting. It wasn't a wonderful selection of beers on board, but certainly drinkable.

Yes, it was a little cold at times, but it was truly beautiful and worth eating outside to see it (or were all the tables taken inside.?)

Here is Jorge from Portugal who was our lead server. He, and the others, were an absolute joy. They catered to the kids and kept us all entertained as well as fed. Here we are in the Animators Palate dining room. The whole room is black and white to begin with and then the whole room slowly gains color (even the server's vests go from black and white to colored).