Iris (my wife) and I decided to take some time off from “saving the world” for a week and enjoy a Disney Wish Cruise vacation to the Bahamas with our grandchildren (we have 10.6 grandchildren now).  For those of you who haven’t taken a cruise, or think they might not like it, I am writing this post to share my first impressions with you to let you know what it is really like. It turned out to be the greatest vacation of my life (and I didn’t even have to pay for it).  I might have even liked it a little too much, after all it had been 10 years since I went on vacation with my family.

The vacation started the first step onto the ramp into the enormous cruise ship. It was huge, almost ¼ mile long and 20 stories high.  I left my tagged suitcases on the side and walked with Iris and a few of my children and grandchildren through the ornate “castle” doors into a the most elegant and spacious three-story reception area I have ever seen.

The announcement reverberated, “Welcome Samuelson Family”, and a Disney prince and princess waved at us from a balcony high above.  Spiraling staircases, twinkling lights, the experience almost took my breath away, like I had returned to some huge childhood fantasy land.  My grandchildren began running around, with many of the other children there.

This impression never faded. Everything was perfect. After a short walk to our stateroom, the key cards were clipped there near the white ship-portal door, and our suitcases magically had arrived before us.  Iris and I shared this stateroom with one of our children and two of our grandchildren.  We took a short look around and decided to take a stroll around the main deck (11^th floor).  Stepping out onto the main deck from the hallway was another experience.

It was a huge open deck, the size of a football field with several pools in the front and a huge 2 story jumbotron screen in the back.  It was filled with deck chairs.  The “party” was already going, people were sitting on deck chairs, relaxing, eating, watching the movie. As we strolled around the back side, there were food stations, just like a large food court in a mall, serving thick fries, thick hamburgers, pizza, soft cones. But it got better, we passed a place serving fall-off-the-bone juicy BBQ ribs, mac and cheese, steamed veggies; then around the other side were cakes, doughnuts, fruit bowls, puddings and custards, an almost unimaginable variety of foods.  Self-serve soda fountains were everywhere.

The best part about it was that to get a serving, all I had to do was point at it.  There were no prices anywhere, and no plastic spoons, just metal utensils.  There was also ample seating on tables facing ceiling-high windows facing out into the open ocean.  We sat down with the kids and filled our tummies with yummies.  After our little stroll, we found that we were just getting started.  On the other side of the deck near the pools, there was a huge indoor restaurant with all sorts of breakfast foods, all for the taking, with seating for many hundreds of people.  We soon came to the realization that we would not have to worry a bit about food during our cruise.  The quality of the food was also excellent, like what you would find in a fine restaurant, and a whole level above what you would find in a mall.  And if we couldn’t make it to a restaurant, there was unlimited complementary room service with food brought right to our stateroom.  This ended the first hour of our cruise, and we had not even left the harbor yet.  Our vacation was in full swing.  We went to our stateroom to rest up and dress up for the disembarkation party.

The party was on the main deck, with literally thousands of people standing and swaying while Disney Characters, and dancers, put on a spectacular show, backed up by music and scenes on the jumbotron. We met the rest of our family there, put the grandkids up on our shoulders to watch.  The captain’s steward came out, there was a countdown, when it reached zero the ships horns blasted the “When you wish upon a star” theme and we were off. The departure was so smooth that no one could even feel us start moving and I didn’t even know we were moving until later when we looked out of our large round stateroom window into the vast ocean moving by.

There was never a sensation of movement whatsoever the whole trip.  When we closed the curtains, it was just like being in a luxury hotel on land.  That evening we passed through a huge thunderstorm, we could see it coming, lightning flashing on the horizon and rain bouncing off our window.  There still was no sensation of movement or sound. We went to our scheduled luxury dinner and a show at the Marvel restaurant, replete with the best scallops I have ever eaten, spiderman, and a funny Ant Man show on the monitors that lined the walls.

The food servers knew our names, carefully memorized our preferences, and playfully interacted with our grandchildren throughout the whole meal.  We found out later that while Ant Man was mistakenly “shrinking our ship” during the show, a huge storm was actually raging outside, with golf-ball-sized hail pounding down on the main deck. The ship just brushed it off, without a scratch. We felt absolutely nothing inside, all felt rock solid, we could barely hear the hail hitting our stateroom window.  What we did notice, however, is that the staff had prepared our stateroom, they put up bunk beds for the grandchildren, a murphy bed for our son, and had made up our bed with beautiful towel art and chocolates.  The beds were very comfortable. We slept like babies all night long.

When we woke up in the morning, we were only a half day into our 5-day cruise.  We pulled up the cruise app on our phone.  There were more than 5 activities every hour the whole day long.  There was no internet, but the app connected to the ship Wi-Fi and we could chat with the other members of our family on the ship.

The whole second day we were at sea and took the time to explore more of the ship.  Breakfast was fantastic, the kids got cute Micky Mouse sugar waffles. There were lounges, restaurants, boutiques, and theaters everywhere. We dropped the grandchildren off at the Oceaneer’s club.  They put on little Mickey mouse electronic bracelets, with glowing lights, to identify them and sent them off down a tube slide where they were supervised and had tons of activities, as they played with other children.  It was their favorite place to go on the whole ship. They stayed there for hours without a peep of complaint.  While the grandchildren were playing, we checked out some of the other entertainment.  We went to the huge gym, exercised for an hour, walked around the outside deck, caught a jazz concert and show, relaxed in the sun on deck chairs around the pool, while watching Disney movies on the jumbotron.  The weather was gorgeous, and the food was as good as it was the first day.  One of the theaters even had free popcorn you could bring inside.  I learned how to draw Goofy.  It was one of the most stress-free days I have ever had.

In the evening, we were assigned to go to another luxury restaurant themed like the movie “Frozen”, where the same servers met us and we again enjoyed a great meal and a show.  The children really loved meeting the Frozen characters, Anna and Elsa, and especially liked the little Micky Mouse chocolate-dipped ice dreamsicles they had for dessert.  Again, we returned to a beautifully made-up stateroom and watched movies on the TV as we drifted off to sleep.  We woke up at Nassau in the Bahamas.

That day was mostly spent exploring the Bahamas until the children got tired, then we headed back to the ship for another dose of rest and king-like pampering.  It doesn’t seem possible, but I even got a little tired of all the free food and lounging on board.  So, we went to the pool with the grandchildren and went down the water slides.  After all the activity, it was really nice to be able to just put a towel over our shoulders and walk over to the food stations to grab a bite to eat.

I was amazed that everything was kept so beautifully in order, there was not a shred of paper on the ground, not a dirty table, or even a wet towel left anywhere without quickly being picked up.  There were so many new places on the ship that we could not even possibly explore everything.  We found a five-star Michelin restaurant with $18,000/bottle wine on our Disney app.  I could have spent a whole year’s earnings in a heartbeat, if I wanted to, but there was no need to even spend a dime.  That evening we again had to endure another luxury restaurant, filled with entertainment and our beloved playful servers.  We went back to our perfectly clean stateroom for another night of blissful sleep. The next day we woke up at the Disney private island, Castaway Cay.

On this tropical island, we really got to spend some great time with our grandchildren at the beach.  They collected shells and went wading in the ocean cove (protected by huge embankments and shark netting off on the horizon).  We all got perfect tans. The food arrangements were just like the boat; you walked by pavilions filled with the same great food.  There were soda fountains and self-serve ice cream machines everywhere along the walk.  The kids went to play at a two-story water park.  And, just like the Bahamas, when everyone was tired, we caught the shuttle back to the ship, rested, and played.

Sadly, this was the last night we would have on the ship.  I forgot to mention, that somewhere in there, we found time to go to a few Broadway-type shows, The Little Mermaid and Aladin.  Some of the grandchildren slept through the show, but loved to catch the confetti that fell from the ceiling at high-points.  The time passed so quickly, like frozen scenes in a beautiful memory.  A luxury meal, fireworks and a pirate party was the last big bang.  The next morning we woke up in Florida, had a luxury breakfast and left the ship.

That was the end of this greatest-of-all vacations. We had so much great family time together with our children and grandchildren. I would encourage anyone of any age to go on one of these cruises at least once, and to take as many people along with you as you can. All of this was possible thanks to Iris signing up for a cruise club two years ago.  We started saving, the club doubled our savings.  After referring our family to the club, we didn’t even have to pay the monthly membership payments. If you want to know more about how to cruise without paying the price, please put “I want to know more” in the comments. Best to you all!