Disney Magic 12 nt. British Isles Cruise 2017

We are sailing in March, and they have really changed the "Book Now" for Port Adventures, Onboard Fun etc. since our British Isles sailing. The site doesn't let you see available times now when you already have something booked! This is huge bummer for me, since I am constantly reorganizing my sea days. They have added tastings to the OnBoard Fun, so you don't have to wait until onboard to book!
 
I should have played trivia but we're so bad at it and there are cruise vets who easily run the table. JQ has enough trouble keeping the princesses straight! too funny.
Totally agree about David. He kicked the first night off with that hilarious segment of Magic Quest and it just kept getting better and better. Omg. I'm smiling just talking about it now. I hope we get to cruise with him again. What a talent!!

We aren’t any better, but love playing the game...... our table mates completed our team and they were a BIG help.... we did win 1 session.... probably due to the “ringers” not playing at that time. Lol. Dave was worth the price of admission. I do hope we cruise with him again!

On BINGO.... We only played the last session with the big jackpot that “must go”. Didn’t win, as usual.... but had fun playing. Disney has some pretty talented cast members that really make the activities fun.
 
BINGO is one of my husband's favorite activities on the ship. He has never won but on our last Caribbean cruise he was one number away from the last jackpot. The table next to us for dinner won it in the end!

Enjoying your updates. Going back and looking at my pictures and finishing photo albums for the last of our ports! I am a bit behind..
 
Thank you! I'm really excited. And I'm happy you're going to read my trip report.

Really enjoying it so far.

We are sailing in March, and they have really changed the "Book Now" for Port Adventures, Onboard Fun etc. since our British Isles sailing. The site doesn't let you see available times now when you already have something booked! This is huge bummer for me, since I am constantly reorganizing my sea days. They have added tastings to the OnBoard Fun, so you don't have to wait until onboard to book!

This is a big change! It's good you're sailing in March and found this out. Are you saying, once we reserve Palo or any activity online, we can no longer see the other times that may be available in case we want to make at switch unless we drop our original reservations? Do you know if DCL is now handling modifications over the phone? This is a bad situation IMO. How the heck are you able to rearrange any plans if you're forced to keep whatever you initially booked online to guarantee a reservation? I can't tell you how many times we've gone in and moved things around.

I like that they added the tastings to the online system. That seems to be the only good thing about these changes. Not having to worry about getting on board early enough to do this will help a lot of cruisers arriving later to the port. Especially those using DCL transportation.

Please keep updating on anything and everything you learn with all that's going on. It's a big help and really great to have you here!

We aren’t any better, but love playing the game...... our table mates completed our team and they were a BIG help.... we did win 1 session.... probably due to the “ringers” not playing at that time. Lol. Dave was worth the price of admission. I do hope we cruise with him again!

On BINGO.... We only played the last session with the big jackpot that “must go”. Didn’t win, as usual.... but had fun playing. Disney has some pretty talented cast members that really make the activities fun.

We'll I don't believe our tablemates were playing with us which would have been so much better. it was every man for himself as I recall. omg the pressure!! too funny. At one point we were writing stuff just to disguise our lack of knowledge and so the paper didn't look blank. It was name that Disney tune. We were cracking up at our stupidity and had a lot of fun. We're gonna have to do this in Oct. Iron Man played Tangled bingo with David at one of the bars and said he was hilarious. He was dressed as one of the thugs.

BINGO is one of my husband's favorite activities on the ship. He has never won but on our last Caribbean cruise he was one number away from the last jackpot. The table next to us for dinner won it in the end!

Enjoying your updates. Going back and looking at my pictures and finishing photo albums for the last of our ports! I am a bit behind..

That would have been so great if your husband won that jackpot. We keep trying to win again, but I told IM he was lucky to hit the first time and they probably have his number by now!
Glad you're enjoying the updates. More to come.
 


Yes, once you have booked adult dining say a Palo Brunch no other Brunch times will be visible unless you cancel it first (Check availability is grayed out). Same with Palo Dinner unless you book first night, you can book 1 additional night. I am the same way constantly rearranging onboard plans, and it was very difficult planning our 2 sea days for March. I ended up calling DCL to give feedback on the changes, and was told they can tell you if there is space available for an activity for your party size before you cancel and then pick up the new time. I can't imagine how many calls I would have made back when I was planning our days for the 12 night British Isles. Also, it you have linked reservations with other friends/family and you have booked same activity for the same time you can't just cancel your party from the activity....it is all or nothing at least for onboard fun. The dining seems to be more like MDE where it says "can only be cancelled by person that made the reservation". It is just very awkward and cumbersome. If you go into anything (port adventures, on board fun, adult dining, spa) and don't make a selection, you have to click back on the browser or it takes you all the way out to your reservation.

To rearrange our first sea day, I had to cancel 1/2 activities to book 1 additional and then reschedule what I had cancelled. This is when I discovered the linked reservations cancelling issue. I was using my sister's family profiles to see open times and booked them for one we already had by mistake. They are Silver, we are Gold so I couldn't book for them until their booking window opened.
 
party:HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! party:


Hope everyone enjoyed the holidays. We had a lot of fun just visiting local spots: Historic Philadelphia, NYC pre-New year's eve. Saw Aladdin on Broadway (unfortunately)
It was so bad it inspired JQ to start sharing his negative feelings on the Community Board. https://www.disboards.com/threads/aladdin-on-broadway.3655024/

Sorry I've been a bit absent on the Dis. I just learned @BadPinkTink has an awesome report underway on her London trip. Great info which I hope they pin as a sticky.
I'll be back to read in detail. check it out: https://www.disboards.com/threads/disney-magic-how-to-do-london-like-a-local.3654997/#post-58618133

1 New Year's Resolution is to update faster!!

and in keeping with this promise, new posts are coming right up....

Yes, once you have booked adult dining say a Palo Brunch no other Brunch times will be visible unless you cancel it first (Check availability is grayed out). Same with Palo Dinner unless you book first night, you can book 1 additional night. I am the same way constantly rearranging onboard plans, and it was very difficult planning our 2 sea days for March. I ended up calling DCL to give feedback on the changes, and was told they can tell you if there is space available for an activity for your party size before you cancel and then pick up the new time. I can't imagine how many calls I would have made back when I was planning our days for the 12 night British Isles. Also, it you have linked reservations with other friends/family and you have booked same activity for the same time you can't just cancel your party from the activity....it is all or nothing at least for onboard fun. The dining seems to be more like MDE where it says "can only be cancelled by person that made the reservation". It is just very awkward and cumbersome. If you go into anything (port adventures, on board fun, adult dining, spa) and don't make a selection, you have to click back on the browser or it takes you all the way out to your reservation.

To rearrange our first sea day, I had to cancel 1/2 activities to book 1 additional and then reschedule what I had cancelled. This is when I discovered the linked reservations cancelling issue. I was using my sister's family profiles to see open times and booked them for one we already had by mistake. They are Silver, we are Gold so I couldn't book for them until their booking window opened.

This is a nightmare.

I can't believe you now have to cancel a reservation outright before you can even look at a anything available let alone book something different. They used to let you hold the reservation while trying to retrieve a modification and would ask you which one you wanted to keep. Thanks for posting this. It's invaluable. I'm sure you're swamped with getting ready for your cruise, but if you can manage the time, please keep us updated on any and all information on this.

Hilarious! If it weren’t for our table mates, our paper would have been mostly blank, lol. We had a blast!

You have inspired me to get back in there and play!!! Too funny.

btw - we are a go for Bermuda - late oct. 5nts on the Magic out of NYC. Anybody else want to join in????
 


Disney Magic 12nt. British Isles
Sunday, July 9, 2017 – Dover, England
Night 1 ……...........


(our weather July 9, 2017 – sunny high 77 °F / 25 °C)
(weather Sept 2, 2017 – clear high 64 °F / 17 °C)


Rotational Dining – Take I

If you’re new to cruising, here’s a brief intro per the DCL website:
https://disneycruise.disney.go.com/faq/dining-food-beverages/rotational-dining/

Dining, Food & Beverages – Frequently Asked Questions
Q. What is rotational dining?

A. Rotational dining is the Disney Cruise Line way of making sure that all Guests get to enjoy each of the 3 themed dining venues while on board.

You will receive your restaurant schedule upon boarding. Then, each evening, you, your tablemates and servers will rotate to a different restaurant. As you rotate, the same wait staff—who know your preferences—will serve you each night while you get to experience the unique atmosphere of each restaurant.

Children's menus are available in all the restaurants in your rotation
.

In other words, you are assigned a dining schedule that rotates you and your serving team between the 3 main dining rooms for the length of your cruise.

A few key points worth noting:

I. There are 3 rotation schedules per cruise. (they vary - call the DCL for your sailing)

For this 12nt BI cruise they were:

ACLACLACLACL (our rotation)
CLACLACLACLA
LACLACLACLAC

A= Animator’s / C = Carioca’s / L = Lumiere’s
(note: 2018 changes to the Magic = C will be replaced with R - Rapunzel’s Royal Table)

II. You can request a specific dining rotation with DCL in advance.
(no guarantee - but ours have always been granted)


III. There are themed nights and special menus for most cruises.


Here’s our list from the BI cruise:

themed nights were: Formal / Semi-Formal / Frozen - Freezing the Night Away

Night 1 (At Sea) - menu: Let the Magic Begin
Night 2 (Le Havre) – menu: World of Flavour
Night 3 (Portland) – Standard Rotational #1 ** (Lumiere’s for us)
Night 4 (At sea)Formal NightStandard Rotational #2 ** (Animator’s for us)
Night 5 (Dublin) – Standard Rotational #3 ** (Carioca’s for us)
Night 6 (Liverpool) – menu: Pixar
Night 7 (Greenock) – Freezing the Night Away party - menu: Frozen**
Night 8 (Hebrides - at sea) – Semi-formal Night – menu: Captain’s Gala**
Night 9 (Kirkwall) – menu: Land & Sea
Night 10 (Invergordon) – menu: Prince & Princess
Night 11 (Newcastle) – menu: Seasons
Night 12 (At Sea) – menu: ‘Til we meet again**

** - offered on many Med. sailings (nights will vary)


IV. Formal Night is traditionally held on an At Sea day and usually doesn’t offer a special menu
. (check with DCL)

V. Semi-formal night could happen any night of the cruise and serves the Captain’s Gala menu.


VI. Disney Med. cruises will have at least 3 nights designated as “standard rotational”.


This gives guests the opportunity to dine at each location as you are rotated around to all 3.
Each restaurant serves a different menu - designed unique to their theme and décor.

But only during the standard rotational nights will the menus vary between restaurants.


Every other night is “themed”, where all 3 restaurants serve the same exact menu with identical food no matter which one you happen to dine in.



Ok so why am I talking about all this?

Because many cruisers like to know the rotations and theme nights ahead of time to plan activities around once their booking window opens up.

Whether it's to dine at a particular restaurant on Formal and Semi Formal nights.
or because you don’t want to miss a new restaurant menu on a rotational dining night (Rapunzel’s in 2018) by having it conflict with something else.

But the most common reason is to help figure out which night or restaurant to give up for dinner at Palo.

And with the new website changes @wajones2 has been alerting us to, this information is going to become increasingly valuable. As DCL seems to be making it virtually impossible to modify or change any cruise reservations once they’re initially booked without having you cancel them first. (whether online or over the phone)

So it's important to emphasize this point: Get as much dining information for your cruise upfront and be prepared to keep those original online reservations if you have to.


Ok let’s eat.


When it comes time for dinner, your KTTW card says it all:

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You are Table Number: 48

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Your Dining rotation: ACLACLACLACL

Your Dinner time: 2nd seating @ 8:30pm - which for some cruisers is a little late.
(1st seating was at 6pm)

"What dinner time - Late or early?" - is a constant recurring question on the Disboards.
(And one I tend to avoid since there’s really no right or wrong answer here.)

You have pros and cons either way.
It simply comes down to knowing your family and deciding what works best.

Personally, we prefer the late seating when we cruise.
I’ll share a few reasons why:

  • Late dinner doesn’t cut away from being on deck as you leave each port. (Something we love to do) It will really depend on the departure times.
This is a lot of fun, and not to be missed on a BI cruise. We had so many great sendoffs.
Some of my favorites –

Liverpool (these pics don't do it justice)

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Greenock

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and Newcastle - where they lined up as far as the eye could see.

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Cork being a brand new port for the Disney Magic in 2018, will hopefully bring a special welcome there too!


More reasons for late dining:
  • We like to decompress after a full day of touring. Nobody wanted a situation where we’d have to jump right in and get ready for dinner at 6 when we’re just getting back onboard.

  • For this cruise, we flew in from the US with a 5hr jump ahead to the UK.
So an 8:30pm dinner was the equivalent to eating at 3:30pm back home.
If we picked 1st seating, we would basically be having dinner at 1pm in that 6 pm time slot.

  • 2nd seating has an slower feel and pace to it with everything winding down for the evening.


But there were several cons to that 8:30pm seating on this trip as well:

  • After a full day out, we were usually pretty hungry around 6. Options were room service or grab something from the poolside grill before dinner. Which, if you’re not careful, meant eating too much in a short period of time – like a burger and fries or big steak sandwich right before a full course sit down meal.

  • It was really hard to catch the early shows before dinner. We would always eat then catch a nap around that hour and couldn’t pull ourselves out of it in time to get to the theatre. So we missed a lot of the Walt Disney Theatre entertainment.

  • It’s pretty late by the time you finish dinner. The night activities seemed to fly by at that point and before we knew it - it was the next day already. I kept wanting every day to last longer.

  • You’re assigned 2nd breakfast seating the morning you disembark. This is usually too late for our schedule and we tend to skip it.


So after 9 cruises, and considering all the positives and negatives, late dining is still our usual pick.

But for anyone asking, all I can say is take the time to weigh the options and choose wisely for your situation. You really can’t go wrong. It’s just dinner.


Speaking of dinner, who’s hungry?
 
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Your port pictures are so cute. Greenock looks really pretty. Love Goofy and Mickey waving at people too.

Your breakdown on how the meals work was great too and really informative. Did you do Palo one night?

I was thinking about the dining times and normally I eat dinner early and always pick the earlier seating, but for Europe I feel like it makes more sense to have a later time. When I did a Mediterranean cruise with my friend we were always exhausted getting back on the ship and running to dinner gross from our excursions since we didn't have time to change. Having time to go back to the room and relax would be good.
 
We've done both early and late dinner and prefer the late also: don't have to hurry back from a port (especially Castaway Cay) to clean up and make it to dinner; we prefer to watch the show prior to dinner and we tend to not do much after dinner and I remember a couple times just going to bed almost immediately after. But you're right, there's no right or wrong answer to that one...
 
I'll add my dining experience:
We had the early seating. This was necessary for us since I had a 8 year old who would not have lasted till 8:30 for dinner. And honestly, I would have been majorly hangry by 8:30! At home we eat around 5:30pm most nights and my daughter's bedtime is 8/8:30pm, so a late seating would have been a disaster! I do agree though sometimes it was pretty rushed to come back from our tours, get changed and get to dinner. (We always took time to see the send offs though. They usually happened right before our seating. At least I remember in the case of Liverpool and Greencock, the timing was perfect. Right as we were pulling away we walked in to get seated.) I remember specifically on the Liverpool night, we were watching everyone on the dock and the celebration and I told my daughter "Dakota, look how lucky you are! Look at all those boys and girls out there standing in the cold just to get a picture by our ship and see it from a distance, and you are standing here on this deck! We get to spend 12 days on here! We are so, so lucky and blessed! I hope you see that!") She nodded seriously to me and I gave her a hug with tears in my eyes. It is an amazing feeling and you really do feel how blessed you are to be having such an amazing experience.
Disney has a pretty easy going dress code for dining so a lot of people at the early seating just wore their jeans/touring clothes. But for me, I love clothes and dressing up and am used to dressing up in the evenings on cruises, so I insisted that we at least change into a casual dress or nice pair of pants if we could. Almost every night we had time to freshen up. It just felt more festive for me. We only missed dinner in the dining room on the Le Havre night. We always went right from dinner to Bingo or whatever was happening at 7:30 pm, then to the evening show. I don't think we missed any of the shows except the Le Havre night.
We had the same rotation as you! Of course Animators was my daughter's favorite by far due to the atmosphere and activities, but I liked all three and really enjoyed rotating between the restaurants!
We did not do Palo, but our dinner mates did on two nights (they sent their daughter to dine with us - we were happy to have her with us) and they said it was amazing!
We had the BEST server we have ever had on any cruise: Sebastian. Sebastian was AMAZING - sweet, outgoing, personable, funny, knowledgeable about wine and food, with great recommendations ... I can't say enough about him - he made our cruise! We had Maria as our assistant server and she was adorable and sweet. Here is our amazing server with my daughter at Carioca's:

enhance
 
We had first seating... it just works better for us. I believe we started in Lumiere’s.

Liverpool, we could not believe the people gathering around to see the ship. People were there all day! I’m not sure if that whole carnival thing was just for that day or it was coincidence, but we were impressed.

Greenock, that blowup doll thing that was marching around was hilarious. Hopefully you got to see his shenanigans.
 
Your port pictures are so cute. Greenock looks really pretty. Love Goofy and Mickey waving at people too.

Your breakdown on how the meals work was great too and really informative. Did you do Palo one night?

I was thinking about the dining times and normally I eat dinner early and always pick the earlier seating, but for Europe I feel like it makes more sense to have a later time. When I did a Mediterranean cruise with my friend we were always exhausted getting back on the ship and running to dinner gross from our excursions since we didn't have time to change. Having time to go back to the room and relax would be good.

Thanks so much! Glad you liked the Pics. It's tough to choose which one to post with that 10 picture limit. Yes, Greenock looked incredible with those skies showing bright rays of light shining down in the midst of several rain showers. I have a few more photos I'll share when we get to that port.

Most of the ports really were so beautiful where we docked. There were a few in industrial zones which doesn't photograph so well. But no matter where we went, every place on this cruise is really fantastic. I hope you get there someday.

It was so great to watch the Fab 4 come out on Deck 4 and wave to big cheering crowds in Liverpool and in Newcastle. I don't believe they made an appearance anywhere else.
So be sure to hang out on the Promenade deck if you sail away from either of those ports.

Here they are in Newcastle. We happily gave up our spot for them.

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And we did dine at Palo on our 11th night. Here's a recap of our schedule to show our dinner choices on this cruise.
:thumbsup2 = YES For dinner that night!!
_______________________________________________

Night 1 (At Sea) - menu: Let the Magic Begin :thumbsup2
Night 2 (Le Havre) – menu: World of Flavour :thumbsup2
Night 3 (Portland) – Standard Rotational #1 ** (Lumiere’s for us) :thumbsup2
Night 4 (At sea)Formal NightStandard Rotational #2 ** (Animator’s for us) XX (Cabanas casual dining) / (Palo brunch)
Night 5 (Dublin) – Standard Rotational #3 ** (Carioca’s for us) - XX (dinner in Dublin w/ @BadPinkTink)
Night 6 (Liverpool) – menu: Pixar :thumbsup2
Night 7 (Greenock) – Freezing the Night Away party - menu: Frozen** :thumbsup2
Night 8 (Hebrides - at sea) – Semi-formal Night – menu: Captain’s Gala** :thumbsup2
Night 9 (Kirkwall) – menu: Land & Sea :thumbsup2
Night 10 (Invergordon) – menu: Prince & Princess - IM dined solo (animator's drawing night ) / (cabanas casual dining JQ & PI)
Night 11 (Newcastle) – menu: Seasons - XX (PALO DINNER)
Night 12 (At Sea) – menu: ‘Til we meet again** :thumbsup2
____________________________________________________

I think your thought process with dinner is exactly right. It's a give and take whichever seating you choose so definitely consider everything and pick what works the absolute best for you.

Late dinner did give us a nice amount of downtime. You could shower, nap, grab a snack, and decide on plans for the night without feeling rushed. But we did sacrifice a lot of shows to recharge our bodies for this cruise.

Iron Man on the other hand was burning the candle at both ends after the 2nd day. There were quite a few adults his age (20's - mid 30's) cruising with family who hung out every night after hrs. I think the European cruises attract his generation more than the other itineraries. He can't wait to go back.


We've done both early and late dinner and prefer the late also: don't have to hurry back from a port (especially Castaway Cay) to clean up and make it to dinner; we prefer to watch the show prior to dinner and we tend to not do much after dinner and I remember a couple times just going to bed almost immediately after. But you're right, there's no right or wrong answer to that one...

Exactly. Totally agree on this preference. I will say we seemed much better able to get to shows on every other cruise compared to this. IMO a 12nt BI cruise was so port intensive right out of the gate, we were always trying to catch up on some R&R. The 3 at sea days were brief and jam packed. But we loved every minute and can't wait to go back. We did go right to bed on a few nights too.

I'll add my dining experience:
We had the early seating. This was necessary for us since I had a 8 year old who would not have lasted till 8:30 for dinner. And honestly, I would have been majorly hangry by 8:30! At home we eat around 5:30pm most nights and my daughter's bedtime is 8/8:30pm, so a late seating would have been a disaster! I do agree though sometimes it was pretty rushed to come back from our tours, get changed and get to dinner. (We always took time to see the send offs though. They usually happened right before our seating. At least I remember in the case of Liverpool and Greencock, the timing was perfect. Right as we were pulling away we walked in to get seated.) I remember specifically on the Liverpool night, we were watching everyone on the dock and the celebration and I told my daughter "Dakota, look how lucky you are! Look at all those boys and girls out there standing in the cold just to get a picture by our ship and see it from a distance, and you are standing here on this deck! We get to spend 12 days on here! We are so, so lucky and blessed! I hope you see that!") She nodded seriously to me and I gave her a hug with tears in my eyes. It is an amazing feeling and you really do feel how blessed you are to be having such an amazing experience.
Disney has a pretty easy going dress code for dining so a lot of people at the early seating just wore their jeans/touring clothes. But for me, I love clothes and dressing up and am used to dressing up in the evenings on cruises, so I insisted that we at least change into a casual dress or nice pair of pants if we could. Almost every night we had time to freshen up. It just felt more festive for me. We only missed dinner in the dining room on the Le Havre night. We always went right from dinner to Bingo or whatever was happening at 7:30 pm, then to the evening show. I don't think we missed any of the shows except the Le Havre night.
We had the same rotation as you! Of course Animators was my daughter's favorite by far due to the atmosphere and activities, but I liked all three and really enjoyed rotating between the restaurants!
We did not do Palo, but our dinner mates did on two nights (they sent their daughter to dine with us - we were happy to have her with us) and they said it was amazing!
We had the BEST server we have ever had on any cruise: Sebastian. Sebastian was AMAZING - sweet, outgoing, personable, funny, knowledgeable about wine and food, with great recommendations ... I can't say enough about him - he made our cruise! We had Maria as our assistant server and she was adorable and sweet. Here is our amazing server with my daughter at Carioca's:

enhance

Great pic!! and I couldn't agree more with your reasons for early dining. If we had younger children we would have done the exact same thing.
I'm so glad to hear you had time on deck to sail away. It's a big deal for the British Isles and it's great knowing everyone gets to enjoy this no matter which time we choose for dinner.
Hope that continues for future cruisers.

Very impressed you made it to the shows afterwards. I'm hoping you and some fellow cruisers will share some mini reviews here since JQ and I didn't manage to see any of them. Which I'm still trying to figure out why? I think I was outmaneuvered by the men and before I knew it we were out of time. As you can see, I am regretting this.
(another reason to go back!)


We had first seating... it just works better for us. I believe we started in Lumiere’s.

Liverpool, we could not believe the people gathering around to see the ship. People were there all day! I’m not sure if that whole carnival thing was just for that day or it was coincidence, but we were impressed.

Greenock, that blowup doll thing that was marching around was hilarious. Hopefully you got to see his shenanigans.

First seating definitely has its' benefits and seems to be more popular than late dining. Glad it works for you.

Busybus told us the entire sendoff at Liverpool was "all for us". We took that to include the rides but I can't say for sure either. Apparently, they advertised our arrival well in advance and invited everyone to come celebrate with a big welcome and sendoff. It was the first time I'd every seen anything like this and really made the whole trip come alive!
I will never forget this cruise.

Your Greenock comment made me laugh. JQ has a bit to film to share on those shenanigans. You're gonna love it!!
 
Disney Magic 12nt. British Isles
Sunday, July 9, 2017 – Dover, England
Night 1 ……...........


Time for dinner.

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Rotational Dining – Take II

Night 1 (At Sea)
Let the Magic Begin Menu

Animator’s Palate - Deck 4 AFT
Attire: Cruise Casual

deck4.jpg


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Animator's Palate is adorned with such beautiful artwork that magically changes and comes alive with color at night.

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I just love the design and look of this place.

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Note: you can request a private table – which we did. (call DCL)

Honestly, I was still full from that late buffet lunch at Cabanas.
(I seriously can not eat like these two.)

There's so much food on this ship, yet somehow JQ always looks hungry.

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But I love to participate – especially during dinner. So I order right along with them and donate food to the table.


Our Menu Tonight: "Let the Magic Begin" (same for all dining rooms)

Side I

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Side II


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Notice the “Regional Inspirations” on every page. There were different regional menu offerings every night throughout the cruise. (except Palo)
We tried to make a point and always sample something from this section.

continued in next post....
 
Disney Magic 12nt. British Isles
Sunday, July 9, 2017 – Dover, England

Rotational Dining – Take III

Night 1 (At Sea)
Let the Magic Begin Menu


Animator’s Palate - Deck 4 AFT
Attire: Cruise Casual

........continued from last post

Every night you start off with a nice bread service that changes daily.

Bread Service:

Freshly Baked Carrot and Sourdough Loaf

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with Cucumber and Cilantro Dip

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Starters:

Regional Inspirations:

Scottish Smoked Haddock and Salmon Fish Cake – with spiced Tomato Chutney
(I don't remember much about this - sorry!)

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Soups and Salads: (everything was delicious)

Clam Chowder – with Sourdough Croutons

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Fresh Garden Salad – (not on the menu but available any night)

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Regional Inspirations:

West Coast Lobster Salad – with Iceberg, Cucumber and a Lemon-Dill Horseradish Dressing

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Main Course: (both were really good)

Mesquite Grilled Chicken Breast – with wilted Spinach on crushed Sweet Potatoes with Cream of Corn and Bacon Sauce


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Grilled New York Strip Loin – with Cheddar Cheese and Onion smashed Baked Potato, Roasted Green Asparagus and a Red Wine Jus


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Regional Inspirations:

Scottish Salmon Fillet – with crisp new Potatoes, caramelized Salsify, Asparagus and Truffle Jus
(fish was overcooked and too dry)

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Savoy Cabbage Parcels – with crushed King Edward Potatoes, Artichoke, seared Mushrooms, and Red Wine Dressing
(we ordered this without the dressing and it was good but really needed dressing! oh well, live and learn)

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dessert coming up.........
 
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Disney Magic 12nt. British Isles
Sunday, July 9, 2017 – Dover, England

Night 1 (At Sea)

Let the Magic Begin Menu
Animator’s Palate - Deck 4 AFT
Attire: Cruise Casual

........continued from the last post

That was a ton of food.

Who's ready for the next course?

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Desserts
- Save room for the first 2. They were delicious!

Banana Caramel Bliss Sundae – Mint Chocolate Ice Cream with sliced Bananas, Pecan Brittle and Rum-Caramel Sauce.
(JQ substituted chocolate sauce for the bananas in rum caramel sauce.)

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Chocolate Truffle Cake (no sugar added) - Chocolate Biscuit layered with Chocolate Cream, served with Raspberry Sauce

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Regional Inspirations: (our biggest miss for the night)

Treacle Tart – accompanied with Clotted Cream and Lemon Curd (supposedly Harry Potter's favorite dessert)
Well - not this one. It's not very good. Nothing but butter, sugar and flour. Had zero personality and no real flavor.
(Senol our excellent dining room server hinted to this but we didn’t listen!)

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This concludes our first dinner on the ship. Hope you enjoyed it.

And just like that Animator's Palate changed back into its' old self again.

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But the night was not over. We did hit those two shows I mentioned earlier - Magic Quest and Pete Matthews
Which were awesome!!

It felt bittersweet to walk back to our cabin knowing we only had 11 more nights left.

Until we were greeted with our first FE gift!

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The FE is great fun. We loved participating. We had a small group here on the Dis and it worked perfectly.
(I'll showcase them all) So Fun!!

Here's gift number 1. (we all received this - so there were 3 of each)
We loved it!

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4 handmade coasters and a commemorative cinch sack backpack. What a way to kick off the FE!!
A big thank-you to cabin 6551.

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And who doesn't love that awesome turndown service with warm greetings from our cabin host every night.
(with plenty of privacy for Iron Man behind that curtain)

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Goodbye England - Hello France!
Time to set that clock forward 1 hr.
 
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I was wondering if you did the FE, this is one of the things I cant wait to do when I eventually do a Disney cruise. wowsers all that food, making me hungry now :)

We did! I try to do the FE whenever we can, and I highly recommend signing up when you book that Disney cruise. You will love it. We got so many great gifts. I can't wait to show them.

Gift #1 was really creative and very generous. So great!!

Btw - for anyone curious, this is what we gave:

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A commemorative mug we designed ourselves online (front and back shown) filled with a few local gifts/treats all made from their respective regions:

English crème toffee
French lollipops
Scottish shortbread and crisps
And a Dublin, Ireland pin

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I was wondering if you did the FE, this is one of the things I cant wait to do when I eventually do a Disney cruise. wowsers all that food, making me hungry now :)

OK Tink, you definitely must do the FE exchange on a cruise with us so I can get an Irish gift...hat, shirt, mug or scones will do just fine. I'm not picky!


I don't remember tasting that fish cake at all but looking at the picture, it definitely needed a partner. I look hungry because I AM hungry every time I sit in one of those restaurants. A few snacks by the pool don't hurt the appetite either...can you say Schwarma?
 

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