Stove's Birthday Cruise | Disney Wish [Day 1] - SURPRISE!!

On our third day at Disney, we packed up our bags to transfer to the Yacht Club Resort and headed to Epcot to rope drop Remy's Ratatouille Adventure. I secured a virtual queue for Guardians of the Galaxy which wouldn't be until later in the afternoon..... or so Stove thought!

Our biggest worry in pulling off this Disney Cruise surprise for Stove was "transferring hotels." We were worried that he was going to call bell services and have them send our bags over to the Yacht Club, when actually, we'd be headed to Port Canaveral. We needed an excuse not to send the bags down... so we used Landon. He had just gotten in last night and "had to work" (typical Landon vacation activities), so he'd be staying in the room. Stove and Judy could move their bags over to our room, and either we would come back to the room to freshen up, or Landon would call bell services. Stove didn't seem suspicious.

We missed the Epcot rope drop by a little bit, so our wait time for Remy was around 45 minutes. This worked out well because we needed to buy time.

After Remy, Rachel needed to "go back to the room to send an email" (she was actually going to the gift shop and the Boardwalk to buy and chill champagne for the limo), so we got breakfast at Les Halles Boulangerie & Patisserie in the France Pavilion. I've never eaten breakfast here before - I had a quiche which was really good.

Rachel met back up with us, and we wanted to head over to Creations to do some shopping. Stove had heard about this Creations plan, and to our surprise, he told us that he was going to go back to the hotel and send some work emails and would catch up with Landon. He didn't want to make the trek all the way to the front of Epcot in the heat and would rather go back to the hotel and wait in the air conditioning.

This was something we weren't expecting which actually worked out quite well. We were worried about how we were going to convince him to leave the park at 11 when we had only gotten there two hours ago. We still wanted to shop, though, so we headed to Creations without Stove. Aaron had spotted a tote bag and a bucket hat earlier in the trip that he wanted but didn't want to lug around, so it was his last opportunity to grab those souvenirs. (Also, just wanted to note that both the bucket hat and tote bag have become vacation staples for him - great purchases.)

On our trek back to the Boardwalk, I got a call from Charles, our limo driver. He was the same driver that we had for Rachel's Bachelorette! He let me know that he was running a little behind because it was backed up at the porte cochere - no worries because we would be a few more minutes anyway.

Now.... we never actually talked about how we were going to tell Stove that this was his birthday surprise. I think because we thought he was going to figure it out? I turns out, we did a great job of confusing him.

We got back to the Boardwalk and told Stove that we were going to take the bus to Animal Kingdom. Then Aaron and I took our bags out first to meet Charles. Stove and family were behind and saw us loading our bags in the limo. I turned to Stove and said, "they said there's no buses to Animal Kingdom, but we can take this limo." He looked very confused, but didn't ask any questions and got in (really did not think it would be this easy to get him into the limo without questions).

We started driving, and Charles asks, "Where to?" And Stove says, "Animal Kingdom! Or maybe we should drop the bags off first? Yacht Club!"

"We're not going to Animal Kingdom or the Yacht Club. WE'RE GOING ON A DISNEY CRUISE!"

Phew! We pulled off a surprise on someone IMPOSSIBLE TO SURPRISE!

Stove was very surprised, and very excited. He had no idea!!

Also, I've done the limo transportation from Disney to Port Canaveral twice now, and it really is a comfortable way to get to port. Unfortunately, this time the glasses in the limo hadn't been cleaned which was a little odd. I will note that we definitely seemed to get better service as a group of all girls on Rachel's bachelorette than we did with three couples for Stove's birthday...

Stove arriving in style!

The irony of the Budget rental van in the background...

Because I had booked this cruise less than 30 days in advance, I wasn't able to get an early Port Arrival Time. Our PATs were 12:30 and 12:45.

However, I learned that the benefit of a later Port Arrival Time is that means less waiting in the terminal. Whenever we've had a PAT of 11 AM, the terminal has been an absolute madhouse.

Look at this! No line to board - straight to the ship!

The Grand Hall of the Wish is quite gorgeous.

Cinderella and Prince Charming were greeting guests from the balcony.

The Wish doesn't have a dining room open for lunch on embarkation day, so we headed up to Mickey's Festival of Foods for lunch.

I opted for a burrito from Donald's Cantina.

Aaron went to Mickey's Smokehouse Barbecue.

I loved having these poolside casual eatery options on the Wish.

After lunch, we headed down to our staterooms. I had booked three guaranteed Navigator's Verandahs, and we were assigned three Category 4C Deluxe Family Oceanview Verandah Staterooms on Deck 6 (we also booked GTY and were assigned Cat4C on our New Year's Disney Fantasy sailing).

Aaron and I had a stateroom with Cinderella theming.

It was quite spacious with plenty of storage, especially for only 3/4 night sailings.

Our room had a pullman bunk and convertable sofa bed, but did not have a murphy bed (sleeps 4).

The bedding and theming felt luxurious.

I also always appreciate an illuminated vanity mirror.

I am now a Gold Castaway Club Member, so we received three gifts - lanyards with colors corresponding with our Castaway Club level, a zippered tote bag (Silver gift), and a wet/dry bag (Gold gift). I really like these gifts - I actually left the old sling bag gift behind multiple times because I didn't have a use for it, but the tote bag and wet/dry bag are great!

This room had the split bath - one bathroom with toilet and vanity.

And another bathroom with tub and vanity.

It's not quite a full size bathtub, but it's very large for cruise ship standards.

And I really appreciated the night lights under the vanities in the bathrooms.

The closet had plenty of hanging space.

Disney has discontinued H2O brand, but it's seemingly the same products... just with different labeling.

Great for mirror selfies!

The refrigerator is actually a refrigerator drawer, which is interesting.... not sure if that affects the storage/use for anyone.

And the really amazing part of our room was the incredible full length mirror on the wall. My biggest complaint about hotel rooms/cruise ships is usually lack of or poor location of full length mirrors, so this mirror was very appreciated.

Aaron just waiting on me to be finished photographing everything so he can mess up the room....

We also had a sizable verandah, but because it was so hot (and also only a 3 day cruise), we didn't get much use out of it.

Rachel and Landon were in the connecting room next to us. They did not preserve their room for photographs, but I wanted to get a shot of their Frozen-themed headboard.

Our rooms were located at the aft of the ship on the bump-out which was great for views. We were also very conveniently located near the aft stairs.

We headed out to explore the ship.

Rapunzel and Flynn Rider were greeting guests in the Grand Hall.

There is no adults-only district on the interior of the Wish, but instead lounges scattered throughout. Longtime Disney Cruisers generally do not appreciate this change in organization. Personally, I don't mind not having an adult-only district, but having the lounges spread out made them a little confusing to find.

Triton Lounge is located on Deck 5 Starboard.

Walked by World of Marvel on Deck 4 Aft.

I love the artwork near the elevator on Deck 3 aft.

Especially this large section of the ship -

The Bayou is located on Deck 3 mid-ship.

The Walt Disney Theater is forward, on Decks 3 and 4.

We met up with Rachel and Landon who were in Hyperspace Lounge.

The theming in here does feel a little lackluster in comparison to Oga's Cantina in Galaxy's Edge.

The drinks are all very interesting, though! But also all pretty pricey....

it was time to muster! Unlike most other cruise lines, Disney has reverted back to an in-person muster drill. We were assigned the 1923 Walt Disney Dining Room as our Muster Station

On our way there, we passed by Deck 2 which has a lovely small world mural outside of the nursery.

The good thing about our Muster Station is that it was inside, so we sat down at a table for the entire muster drill.

It was absolute chaos after the Muster Drill, trying to get up to the pool deck for the sail away party.

The pool deck was super packed!

But it's okay, this is my typical view at concerts.

Aaron offered to take a better photo for me -

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We had no idea where Rachel and Landon or my parents were, so Aaron and I roamed the upper decks.

We found the rest of the family at the Cove Bar on Deck 13 Aft.

We went back to the room to unpack and freshen up for dinner, and I was able to decorate Stove's door!

Our dinner tonight was in Arendelle: A Frozen Dining Adventure, so I went with a blue dress, channeling my inner Elsa.

We stopped by The Bayou for pre-dinner drinks.

I ordered the Smoked Old Fashioned because I had heard about the unique presentation.

 

Spotted Minnie on our way to dinner!

Arendelle is located at Deck 2 Aft.

I loved the theming in the hallway leading up to the restaurant.

The porthole windows had snowflake graphics.

The dinner menu at Arendelle -

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We were seated on the perimeter of the restaurant, but did have a view of the stage. It was a bit far from us to fully understand what was going on with the show, though.

The performers did make the rounds in the dining room, though.

Jarlsberg Cheese & Rosemary Ham Tart -

I ordered the Frozen Fractals cocktail, it had blue glitter - 

Nordic Cucumber Potato and Carrot Salad - 

Troll Valley Baby Field Greens - 

Aaron, Landon, and I ordered the Garlic & Thyme Roasted Rib Eye, expecting a ribeye steak, perhaps overlooking/not understanding the "roast." Turns out that a ribeye roast is cooked whole, while a ribeye steak is cut before cooking.

Norwegian Pancake Roulade -

Eplekake, Apple Cake - 

Couldn't resist a Frozen bathroom selfie -

After dinner, we browsed the gift shops, not wanting to make the mistake of waiting until the last day of the cruise.

Victrophonics was performing in the Grand Hall. It's a super fun musical show, rag-time style music, with tap dancing.

We watched the show from the balcony above.

After, Stove was ready for bed. We headed to Keg & Compass before turning in for bed.