Also thankful for your details–you are amazing! About the Hero Zone–do they do the Incredicourse only at certain times? Is it in the same space as where one might play basketball? if you know, how easy would it be to just play bball on your own there?
My DS14 is a reluctant cruiser, and I’m hoping the indoor bball court is going to get him on board. Pun intended. 
The Incredicourse does take up the basketball court space, unfortunately. But the hoops are inside which means that they have more time overall to be out (unlike the older ships where they close the outdoor sports court at or close to sunset or anytime there’s windy conditions).
For our sailing the Incredicourse setup 2 days. The first time it was available on our first sea day from 9am-2pm (ish) for everyone, then had some time for the tween and maybe teen clubs to do it just them, so closed off to everyone else not registered for the club.
The second time it was on our day in St. Thomas and we were doing an excursion so I didn’t pay as close attention to the times but I belive it was out a similar amount of time overall but open the whole time to everyone.
And that matched to what I saw on the Navigators I could find online ahead of time. there were also a couple of activities going on in the Hero Zone on the other 2 sea days for about an hour in the mornings that probably prevented the hoops from being out (they were called Tink’s Neverland Challenge and Tic Toc Croc Challenge/Adventure?- we had planned to check out what those were but didn’t get to fit it in so not sure exactly what they entailed but they were something you could register for 30 min ahead of the event and it was in the same space in Hero Zone that the Incredicourse was setup).
So helpful, thank you! It’s probably no ideal for our circumstances, but it will help to be able to set expectations. I told my DS to look up Hero Zone on the Treasure. He said he watched a tour of the whole ship, and it looked awesome. Then, he asked whether we could upgrade to concierge. 
I said when he’s rich, he can book that for ME.
I need to say Thank You for pointing out how often your family eats. I was so annoyed with mine - SO ANNOYED - by the end of our most recent cruise bc I was grossed out by just how stinking often someone was wanting to eat. I am a 2-3 meal a day person with maybe one snack IRL. On a trip, I just think about breakfast and dinner. My family wanted to eat all the things. I was getting so annoyed.
And you show me my family is actually normal.
Haha those concierge perks seem so amazing. But the couple of times I’ve wandered to check pricing, I quickly retreat. I am just not made of the stuff to pay that kind of price for the limited time on the ship it constitutes.
Oh wow, I’m glad it helps you! Our cruise eating is definitely extraordinary to what happens at home, and there are times I get annoyed that we have work in the next meal or snack and miss things (so many times we missed things as meals or snacks took longer than expected).
But in retrospect, I remember that each of those times was partly a nice break too and I always wish I had more of those, even on the ship.
Here comes (part 1 of) Day 3, titled:
Canten A Coro [Sing Along]
A little note on the title of the day. It’s from my favorite song in Coco and was picked before we left home and so before we knew our dining rotation. But as it worked out, this was our first night in Plaza de Coco, so just a little pixie dust on my planning. And I’ll let you be the judge to if it fit the amount of singing along that happened this day.
We had 2 reserved (and 1 definite but did not require a reservation) activities for the day:
Other highlights of the day that I’d mentioned to the family to fill in the time between eating and the above:
It was also Donald Duck’s birthday and so most of us were all onboard with meeting him to wish him a Happy Birthday!
We also still needed to fit in (at some point within the 7 nights): visiting Haunted Mansion, playing the Wishing Star interactive game, getting gelato at the specialty confectionary/gelato/ice cream, and riding AquaMouse.
So onto the day!
Health Care Center
First up, we decided to get S’s clearance for Oceaneer Club early to have flexibility to have him drop in whenever. He had no other symptoms & we were going as soon as it opened, so we were hopeful it would be quick & easy. I also had something going on with my toe that DH insisted I have them check while I was there with him.
The health center was very close to the forward stairs on deck 1 and so was our room on deck 2, so it was a quick jet down right after they opened walking down at 8:36am. At the sign-in, they let me know that S’s incident happened at 9:29pm (it was 8:38am) & he needed to be 12 hours symptom-free before they could give clearance, so would need to come back in (or wait) for 50 minutes.
I had been dealing with an injured toe over the first couple of days (probably contributing to a part of my grumpiness) and this morning my toenail was starting to come loose which was concerning since I wasn’t sure if it would be safe to be in sand/ocean/beach or in the pool without a toenail.
Unfortunately, I learned at the health center, that if I had come immediately when I stubbed it, they would’ve been able to drill a hole in the nail to relieve pressure from bleeding underneath & save the nail. But for me, who did not go instantly (and just decided to take ibuprofen for the pain and the bleeding stopped so quickly it wasn’t ever a huge concern), they could only give me the education that the toenail would come off, and I should let it naturally, and then, in time re-grow (which is exactly what has happened to me).
They were very reassuring that a toenail loss would be no big deal, no risk of infection and perfectly safe to go into the water with. I was still skeptical of it being no big deal, but it was reassuring knowing that medical officials were calm about it.
The stubbing did happen in the stateroom (on the lip of the doorframe that sticks up between the hallway & bathroom), so they called for someone from the security team to take an incident report. And I was informed it would be at no cost/no claim to insurance for me, since it was an incident with a part of the ship.
Anyway, hopefully none of this is anything you ever need to know on a ship (or in real life).
By the time I was finished with the health center, it was 9:08am (so S still needed to wait for his clearance) but I checked my phone and saw X & DH were panicking & blowing up text messages bc they could see that we had Royal Gathering at 9:15am and they didn’t know what clothes I wanted everyone to wear for pictures.
I had completely forgotten while in the health center. So grateful they saw the res in our plans and were reminding me of it!
Royal Gathering
I texted X & DH to just get everyone into whatever they wanted to meet princesses in and dashed up to the room to get myself changed (S & I had gone down to the health center in pjs).
We made it up to the atrium at 9:18am and were absolutely able to get in line, by showing the reservation from our plans that was my prize in the hard-won fight with Disney IT at midnight 30 days before
While in line in the atrium, Donald came out for his first meet of the day, to one the balconies. Being his birthday there was some light applause & cheering from the vicinity. And then I yelled up to the balcony from my place in line at the atrium “Happy Birthday Donald!” His character handler then from the balcony railing, got the entire atrium and guests in the balconies, singing a very grand happy birthday.
It was an awesome moment and of course we all sang along (as the title of the day compelled us to). This made most of us even more excited than we already were to meet Donald today.
But first, princesses. Royal Gathering always reminds me of meeting them the Disneyland Fantasy Faire which is one of my favorite places on earth that makes me inexplicably happy and floaty, no matter who it is I meet in there. For our princesses on the Treasure, we met:
Jasmine
Moana
Rapunzel
Belle
&
Tiana
Trying to Do too Much At Once: Breakfast, Hero Zone challenges, re-visit the Health Center & Why is there no time for Coffee?
Alright, here is where we get to some real-life family vacation moments caused by trying to do too much.
First off, we needed to eat. Breakfast in the busy Marceline Market was our only option at that specific time. My older kids found POG juice (which they had seen once before on a cruise) and were so excited to see again. My one pic of bfast is the proof of POG. 
I skipped out on getting coffee in Marceline (the free coffee on deck is terrible), holding out to find a time to buy better coffee (when I could enjoy it without running around). S & I were attempting to eat quickly to register him (and if he needed, me too) for Tink’s Neverland Challenge, which started at 10:15, with registration for it going on the 30 minutes ahead of that.
We cut it too close and as we got to Hero Zone, registration was over and they were getting started setting up the registrants to play. Instead of staying to watch (I was still slightly interested, but ok to skip too), S decided he’d rather do activities in kids club coming up.
This meant we needed to finalize his clearance with the Health Center. So back down to Deck 1. It was so, so easy. Less than 2 minutes.
The woman at the desk remembered us from earlier, confirmed he still had no symptoms (verbally with yes/no), and then pulled out a fat stack of pre-signed and stamped clearance slips, unclipped the top one from the pile, filled out a few fields. We were off at 10:25am (at 10:24 I had texted DH ‘we’re signing in now’).
I documented the happy moment and S was ready to race right off to Oceaneers!
Around all this we were discussing the plan for the next few hours. DH was with L so he directly talked to her, I was with S so directly talked to him and we were all texting with the older kids to keep us all in the loop.
And then here things eased up a bit and there was just one activity most of wanted to do (12:45-1:30 Disney Music Triva LIVE) and lunch could fit in some time before or after it before our reserved/definite afternoon activities.
We all parted ways. X & E off to Aladdin. Which as it turns out was their first ever time doing a character meet and photos unprompted without us, I was so proud & love their photos!
S & E left down the slide to Oceaneer from the atrium a few minutes after 10:30am.
DH & I chose photos at Marvel. It was a bust. We got there before they closed the line at 10: 45am, but the way it was setup you couldn’t really see it until you were up next, and there were 2-3 parties ahead of us. At 11am, when the line had only moved one party we bailed, with nothing new accomplished & no coffee obtained as I had hoped we could somewhere squeeze in this morning. 
At Oceaneer pick-up, DH insisted, that even though S wasn’t going to meet Donald, he come with us so he didn’t miss the Sage & Coriander show just after or cause more running around to be able to pull it all off.
S said he hadn’t seen the activity he wanted to do (fort-building) and the counselor did unfortunately confirm that it was wrapping up in a different room than S had been in.
We convinced S (grudgingly) to check out.
Once we got into line to meet Donald, S was feeling frustrated and with all the drama he could muster, complained he was “forced” to be there. While he’s my sweetest kid when he’s happy, he’s also by far my meanest kid when not, and right then he was not, so his delivery was very sharp to match.
This got DH & I grumpy with him, and an especially stern look and word from DH, which set S off in in tears. Now I was no mood to meet anyone or see any shows and also now frustrated about how the morning was going (both coffee- and fruitless). So, I huffed away from the rest of the family, with S, to the stateroom where we both had a good cry & were dramatically feeling like we would never sign on to family vacations ever again (for me I was also frustrated to be dealing with an issue with L- she had decided that all the water available to drink on the ship tasted weird and was refusing to willingly drink any of it so we were having to sit and force her to sip and watch her to make sure she actually swallowed it and I was over all of it).
DH stayed with the 3 other kids while they met Donald and wished him a happy birthday. They got great pictures.
They then came back to the stateroom with S & I to talk things out. It ended up being a good talk. And we all reminded S how much we love him, and how wonderful he is because he was feeling bad about saying his piece earlier. And to help him get cheered, we broke out his Spider-Man cupcake from the fridge that he could now enjoy!
And then he checked himself back into kids club for more playtime, while the rest of us headed to the Donald meet that was going 11:45-12pm. So now DH & I, with the 3 kids, could also wish our favorite Duck a happy birthday.
We also were able to catch a bit of the Sage & Coriander show going on in the balcony below & that just gave us super incentive not to miss the last one that would be going on our final sea day.
After Donald (probably while we were catching the end of the show below in the atrium), DH disappeared for a few moments and returned with latte’s! So I got my coffee too, with a character-imprinted foam (DH forgot to get the pic right away and walking disturbed it a bit, but you can still make out a Goofy)!!
And everyone was onboard with the idea of family vacations again. Huzzah! 
Midday Shenangans,Trivia, Lunch & Sitch Matinee
Back on track, we were ready to face Disney Music Trivia LIVE!
For the Treasure, they had it scheduled in the atrium (vs. in a lounge like every other ship/sailing we’ve done). We were wondering how that was going to work as a contained activity without people shouting out the answers and fair scoring.
Well, how they worked it out was they didn’t score it. Everyone listened, seated in the atrium on the floor (or standing around on the sides), and as soon as you knew the song you would put your hand up, and the host would walk around with the microphone to the first hand they saw to name the song being played by the live pianist on the keyboard.
Once the song was named, the pianist would start it up again and everyone sang along, with the pianist playing for as long there were recognizable lyrics being sung. And it was all for fun.
Ultra-competitive & music-loving DH was not amused. He ran over to Skipper Society and snagged a trivia paper and pencil from the trivia that was set to start there soon, and brought them to us in the atrium where I recorded our answers. DH toyed with going to the other trivia in Skipper Society, but he does love live piano music, and the pianist was a very talented one, so he ended up staying to listen.
Each song also had a bonus question (that they also called on by raising of hands to share answers). We ended up knowing all 20 of the songs (including a couple of sneaky ones from Disney parades, Spectromagic and MSEP) and 18 of the 20 bonus questions. And X was called on once when he knew the answer to a song right away.
With a score of 38/40, we declared ourselves the likely winners with a prize of zero real medallions, only our self-proclaimed bragging rights. 
But we all did sing along (again, compelled by our love of singing and the title of the day). And for a lot of the “trivia”, Captain Mickey, meeting at the balcony overlooking directly over the back of the atrium, would turn around between guests, to face towards the atrium & begin conducting our singing, Fantasmic! style. Adding an extra-joyous vibe.
As that ended, DH & E went right up to lunch deciding on pool deck, Festival of Foods over Marceline Market buffet. I grabbed S from Oceaneers and the rest of the kids & I joined DH & E upstairs with just enough time to say hello as they said goodbye to head to their movie.
DH & E picked up some Jungle Juices (their non-alcoholic specialty drink) from Skipper Society and popcorn to enjoy as they watched Lilo & Stitch in the main, Walt Disney theater.
The rest of us also got Festival of Foods, Donald’s Cantina & Daisy’s Pizza for sure, and it’s possible there were some unpictured chicken tenders and BBQ from Mickey’s Smokestack, but we did get some selfies with our view of the ocean, something that will never get old to me.
Then the flavor of the day for the soft serve was mint, so obviously I had to get a chocolate/mint swirl. I will now always endeavor to have as many chocolate/mint swirls on DCL as I can. Bonus: It was a work of art so it needed its own ocean view selfie.
Lunch done, it was time to get ready for tea and also to figure out if S was going to be with us (and therefore changing with us or if he would be running off to his happy place for extra time in Oceaneers).
A quick stop by guest services confirmed what we were pretty sure was going to the be the case at this point, the tea was full and he would not be joining. He was a little sad, until I reminded him, he chose the souvenir spending budget, and extra excited when I reminded him of the amount. So off he skipped to Oceaneers.
Ok, and even though we still have the afternoon/evening to go, I think I’m gonna work on pictures and getting this much posted now and do a part 2 for the rest of the day.
The pics are amazing! You look beautiful even without your makeup bag!
I’ve been dreaming of an Alaskan land and sea cruise. For a colder cruise ocean view might be the way to go since I would probably be too cold to use a verandah anyway! It wouldn’t be DCL though and I haven’t seen any windows like these on other lines!
Thank you for the compliment! I hardly wear makeup in real life anymore so when I packed it to specifically have for specific days on the cruise and then couldn’t find it, I was SO annoyed! 
There has to be one other ship out there that was some nice big Oceanview portholes that goes to Alaska! I’ve heard the same thing about how if you want to see the most of Alaska not to go with DCL. But I dunno, what I’ve seen of DCL going to Alaska looks pretty darn spectacular, so I think whenever I get us on an Alaskan sailing it will be DCL.
I think the ones with the inside passage get recommend the most: HAL & Princess, I believe.
I’d consider DCL, however bc I wouldn’t be going for “all the things.” I’d be happy just seeing some of Alaska. I’d look at all the lines, all the dates, all the rooms, etc.
We did Princess for our Alaskan land and sea cruise. Highly recommend. We loved our balcony. We just took a blanket out with us to wrap up in! I am often cold and I really only found the balcony chilly when we were in Glacier Bay.
We, too, did one, on Royal Caribbean. We had a balcony on the starboard side (we were 7N northbound followed by the land tour), and really enjoyed it. Our cruise was not so cold because it was late June. We were very surprised it was 90F in Fairbanks!
With an Alaska cruise, it seems the ship itself is not as important because the focus is on what is outside/beyond the ship, and what the itinerary is.
I think the one I was looking at was Princess.
@lolabear_la I’m not opposed to DCL for Alaska but the land and sea itinerary is much more appealing as I’d like to see Denali.
