Miracle Review 10-22-07

[Charming01]

Great review so far and I love the pictures! I can't wait to read the rest!:D

[chitown cruisers]

before I get started for today......

 

our webshot photos http://family.webshots.com/album/561258575qbTwgs

and the 8 day capers *****miracle_8_day_southern%20capers.htm

and

 

our portrait page........in addition to the 2 formals, we also had a Halloween night where we wore our costumes........there were only a few of us at first seating who dressed up. This just made us have extra luggage and more photo's to purchase. *****miracle_portraits.htm

 

 

 

 

1ST Sea day.......

 

It is what it is, a day to relax and do your own thing. Let me think.......yes, Mom was in the casino, Louise.....shopping, Lorraine was looking for sun/swim, Dad was off relaxing somewhere, Mitch was looking for Camp/swim or put put(too windy), Max was off with friends and I was looking for a shaded place to nap. This of course was after eating LOL.

 

Even though we all had our own things in mind, we pretty much kept together for breakfast and dinner. The omelet station(s) was a hit with everyone. Many custom orders were placed along with the pre cooked standards. They seemed to rotate daily between pancakes and french toast. We never had problem finding a table (and we had 7) and they were always cleaning. We all had our personal "must haves" and found it met or exceeded our expectations.

 

For me this was Hot Chocolate.....nothing I like more than sitting on my balcony with a Hot Chocolate....I did plan ahead and bring my own Nestle's because room service unfortunately only delivers "Dark Hot Chocolate" :eek: Not saying they don't have regular, but I request regular milk chocolate and always get "Dark". I used the breakfast time to get Lido HC since I couldn't possibly sit on my balcony (remember the brutal winds).

 

For the most part I can probably cut/paste the same paragraph(s) for all of the sea days. The iced cream was there after every meal. And for lunch we all enjoyed our Deli sandwiches, asian station, salad and roasted section. Most of us didn't have Pizza/hot dogs until the last day or so.

[Crusin Karen]

**THINKING** of booking the Miracle for next year out of NY, so I am enjoying your journal and the pictures. Very clever way of posting a review. I just can't figure out how you can have a balcony and your boys have an interior and you are next to each other! :confused:

[chitown cruisers]

some sea day photos...........if you can, immagine a cut/paste for all of the sea day photos. Pretty much a sea-standard routine give or take an extra spa treatment or jewlery sale thrown in here or there.

 

 

 

one of the rare times I found Max without his new friends

 

NOTE: The sky.........that storm had us covered most of the time

[chitown cruisers]

**THINKING** of booking the Miracle for next year out of NY, so I am enjoying your journal and the pictures. Very clever way of posting a review. I just can't figure out how you can have a balcony and your boys have an interior and you are next to each other! :confused:

3 of the Spirit class decks have interiors adjoining the first balcony. On the upper deck the balcony is extended with glass at an angle. On the other decks they are standard balconies. I booked a year out to get this.

 

[chitown cruisers]

First sea day was also the first Formal night. I'm one of the dads who believes that an extra effort should be made to follow the dress code. My kids don't dress up at all at home, not even in Dockers and a polo. So this is a great opportunity to show them that there is a time and place for everything. Rules for the older boy.....hang with your friends but 1) you will be at dinner every night 2) you will be dressed appropriately and 3) you will have your hair combed back off of your face (he's a skater wanna be).

 

We did our first cruise in Feb 06, so I thought it would be fun to show you the difference time makes (Max had a friend Max with us for the first cruise....his mother wouldn't let him come this time)

 

Triumpf Feb '06

 

Miracle Oct '07

[chitown cruisers]

More Formals..........

 

 

 

 

I'm proud of these photos but I won't bore you with all of them....to me it is a priceless moment and special................but with kids sometimes you just wanna........:eek:

 

[chitown cruisers]

We had to buy new Tux's for the boys.........e-bay $30 Black w/vest.

 

I called my dad to see if he was going to take his Tux and to see if he had a vest. He was, and did have a vest so I asked him to bring it and I bought a vest and tie set for myself. I thought it'd be great for a guys photo opportunity

 

 

[chitown cruisers]

Whats the other good thing about formal night...................hmmm.........

[chitown cruisers]

.....oh yeah.....silly me....how could I forget?

 

 

 

I think he made her blush:o

 

and she him LOL

[NCTribeFan]

Yay! Males in tuxedos! Good for you.

 

Just making my way through all your pics. It's all so beautiful.

 

Looking forward to what you have to say about St Kitts. I'm looking at a S. Carib. for December 2008.

 

Oh, the color of the water. There's no way to describe that shade of blue!

[logbook]

Thanks for taking the time to post the review and the great pictures. Keep the info coming! We'll be on the Miracle in the Spring and am thoroughly enjoying your review!!

[rebeljohn]

GREAT review and pics............Thanks for taking the time to post 'em.......

[chitown cruisers]

Dining room food.......

 

I'll sum it all up here to ease the anticipation from the rest of the review. I'm not one to take pictures of every plate or note what everyone had. But this is what I know......

 

Dad has been on many cruises and vacations in parts of Europe and said that those were the most perfect lobster tail that he had ever eaten in his life. I have yet to find one that I didn't like. With my families range of taste, I believe we pretty much covered the whole menu. And from what I can remember I'll put into 3 categories Great, Good and well...get something else:eek: !!

 

 

Great: Lobster, prime rib, fillet, hot dogs and C nuggets(Mitch), Shrimp(Max), melting cake, some type of Grand Marnier dessert and the biggest surprise hit......................teriyaki ribs......a few of us had ordered it as an extra side entrée thinking it was a standard rib on a bone in a sauce. It was the most tender melt in your mouth slices of rib meat I've ever had. Had we known.......we could have had multiples every night NO problem. I loved my fillet but this was soooo much better.

 

Good: There was a thread here a while ago about being "EASY"....well we must be easy because most everything fell into the good range....nice meal, no complaints.

 

not-so: We were so "easy", the only few that stood out were the NY strip and chicken breast. The strip was tuff on the first 3 attempts so no attempts were made after that. And that is a shame, because I'm a picky eater and wanted that as an alternative option........I was forced to fill in with other unknowns:eek: ............in hind site, maybe a good thing....I've braoadened my horizons LOL.

 

The alternative chicken selection was on the dry side the few times it was attempted at our table.

 

 

 

BONUS NOTE: The TV had the correct menu display for the first 3 nights or so but then was thrown off.....we all were on time ready to order a dozen things but the menu was for a different night. We all had to scramble to find something else to eat LOL:eek: And then on the correct night the menu was different, so we all only had half a dozen things ready to order LOL

[chitown cruisers]

Still had bad winds from the storm so we were forced to take our walk around Gatsbys Garden for our after dinner/show down time. Mitch went to Camp right after dinner and Max was off with the friends. Camp was good for Mitch. After 10pm they would just start a charge of $6/hour and would keep him until 3am. Most of the nights he was back with us by midnight.

 

 

A couple feeling the results of a few Capt'n N Cokes/Long Islands getting stuck nearly upside down in the window of a rocking ship.............hey, we were entertaining the security staff LOL

[chitown cruisers]

Tired boys..........LOVING this cabin arrangement!!

 

 

and for those who wonder.......AV hook ups on the front of the TV....the far right button switches from TV(we had Denver) to aux........real easy with a yellow/red aux cable

 

[Name game]

I am loving every second of this review. CC was changing the front picture so I couldn't get to the third page and I almost freaked! I'm addicted to this thread. I need more! :D

[chitown cruisers]

Front balcony was pretty much useless to us to this point so far, The others were able to use theirs more frequently. It was a shame because 5108 has a nice size balcony

 

 

 

sorry for the cloudy photos

[chitown cruisers]

My SIL Louise was in the next cabin and brought up a conversation about the dividers. She thought that if we opened the dividers between ours it might relieve some of the wind pressure we seemed to have on ours. That along with the fact that we had 3 port days coming up it might be more tolerable. The ladies put in a call to the pursers desk explaining that we were on the list and the reason why we cancelled (the wind) and that we'd like to try the first divider (I didn't want to chance it with my parents cabin). The desk requested that the two of them go back down to the desk personally to get it done. So the ladies took a walk. Later that afternoon the Maintenence man along with an Officer were out side our cabin with the bracket to secure it to the rail.

 

Hope this is good for all!! Here are a few more before shots!!

 

 

[chitown cruisers]

and the after shots.......

 

 

 

 

[chitown cruisers]

They had a trick or treat scavenger hunt for the kids in Camp......luckily because of CC, we just happened to have a large suitcase with costumes. They had us running from bow to stern, from top to bottom ending up at Horatios for cookie decorating. Only 1 girl and 1 boy (Mitch) had costumes so they had two winners.....

 

....Disney's new movie...."the Mini Ninja's Caribbean Vacation"

 

 

 

[Cruise-aholic]

Great review and I loved that ship, the pictures really helped tell your story.

[carnivalkim]

Craig I'm loving this sooooo much....I can't wait until next year when we are all together again...:D ...

[chitown cruisers]

St Maarten:

 

A port on the horizon? Could it be? Going into this I wasn't going to stress out over making everyone happy or trying to maintain a tight schedule.....we were on vacation right? So I had NOTHING planned (except maybe that beach by the airport for the boys)

 

We were there once before, but my feet were so swollen I couldn't go ashore....for me it was a first. At breakfast we decided we were just going to hang out when onen of Max's friends(and family walked by). After chatting for a few they said they loved Orient beach and were headed that way, so we thought it sounded good. We went and gathered our things.

 

 

 

 

Mitch, Max and Jack

[chitown cruisers]

Louise bailed on us to shop and Mom and Dad had been there done that so they scheduled "ship things"

 

It was the 4 of us along with Jack and his parents.........the 7 person rate was at $6 per person each way.

 

They had a nice beach area to lay out on or you could rent a pair of loungers with an umbrella for $17 for the day. I was trying to aviod getting burned/swollen so we rented a pair next to Jacks parents and the kids took off for the water. They had everything you could need....food, drink, showers, lockers, rest rooms and even thing I didn't need......vendors!!

 

This was the only bad part of the whole experience/beach day. The vendors were walking up or down the beach in a group of 5 or 6 probably about 10 feet apart. They would ask if you wanted to buy beads, beach wrap, towel/tote or palm hat. We just said no thank you and they would walk away................but.............the next one would step up, "would you like to buy some beads, beach wrap......NO THANKYOU!!"..............then the next one would steop up...and so on. After about the first half hour they got the point and would just by pass us.

 

Orient beach......beautiful (but look at the clouds....Noel is commin')