The first night of our 4-night vacation at Disney was at Disney’s Caribbean Beach Resort, with Gina, Tom and the boys!!!The grand entrance to the resort…Tom and Parker making the long walk to our rooms, which we chose to do several times instead of taking the tram…Aaden excited to try out the bed in our pirate theme rooms…

 

An afternoon of swimming in one of the many pools in the resort…the boys and their parents especially enjoyed the water slides!!I found this fascinating…Mermaid Class!!!

 

After an afternoon at the pool, we spent an evening at one of the best restaurants at the Carribean Beach Resort, Sebastian’s Bistro…Parker admiring the workmanship on the hutch in the restaurant…And the six of us, after a wonderfully satisfying meal, which is why we chose to walk instead of taking the tram😉  The next morning we would be off to Port Canaveral to catch The Disney Dream Cruise Ship!!!  Oh, and did I mention this is one more 70th birthday celebration for Victor, he wanted to take the family on a Disney Cruise…later I will explain why!!!

Our first sight of  The Disney Dream as we drove around the corner on our bus!!

It is huge, it looks like a floating city…always takes my breath away!!!Gina got us special Disney tee shirts for Victor’s Birthday, they say “Papa’s 70th Birthday!”  As we entered the ship they took this photo!This is the lobby of the ship…another breathtaking moment when you see it for the first time!!

 

Photos around the ship…the last photo was Parker on Tom’s shoulders trying to watch the Sailaway Party, which was very difficult with 4,000 guests on the ship!!!Since Parker loves books, we thought it was appropriate to take his photo on a giant book in the miniature golf section of the ship!!

 

This was a great feature that runs the perimeter of the top deck, it’s called the “Aqua Duck!!!”  See how Tom and Aaden enjoyed this ride!!

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And this is why Victor chose to go on a Disney cruise for his 70th birthday…

 

The photo on the left is me with Gina 15 years ago…Gina worked on The Disney Magic for 5 years, she was a “performer!”  In those 5 years Victor and I went on the cruise 14 times!!  One time the ship was docked in Spain for 3 months and so we did the Mediterian cruise and another time it went through the Panama Canal to dock in California for 3 months, we did the return trip back to Orlando!!!  So when we took this cruise for Victor’s birthday we qualified as Platinum Castaway Club members!!!  Everywhere we went on the ship the crew would say, “Welcome, so happy to have you back!!”  And we got free gifts in our room too!!  It was very special to go back on a Disney cruise with Gina and her family…she enjoyed showing Tom and the boys where she worked, the shows she was in and the ins and outs she learned working on the ship!!  The photo on the right is Gina, Parker and me with Minnie…Minnie gave Gina a big hug when Gina told her, in code, that she used to be her!!!

 

More photos of Gina, Tom and the boys meeting the characters…the last photo are the princesses, which we didn’t visit, but I enjoyed watching them interact with the guests!!

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Here are more photos of Gina 15 to 20 years ago working on the Disney Magic as a performer…

 

The quality of the photos are not great, it was before cell phone cameras!!  This is Gina in Aladdin, she was a Jeannie dancer and singer, she is the one in pink, one of my favorite parts that she played!!

 

This was a show called “Golden Mickeys,” Gina was a paparazzi in the top left photo with her friend Jen, top right she changed her costume and was a dancer/singer and at the end of the show she came out as the “big guy” all in gold!!

 Gina also played Arial on stage, she was not tall enough to play any of the other princesses, but she was just right to sit as the iconic mermaid!!Victor, me and Gina 15 years ago…

Gina’s son, Parker, with Mickey…

And so it is, The Circle of Life…that Gina’s children came back to visit a very special place in which she worked to spread joy to so many families and now we could all share that joy with her family…That is why Victor wanted to celebrate his 70th birthday on The Disney Cruise🚢❤️

But this is just the first half of our story on the Disney Cruise, the second half is entitled, “The Disney Dream and World Peace!!” on my next post…

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