William J. Cullen

We awoke the next morning to a view of Castaway Cay, a truly beautiful location. My wife and I were scheduled for a morning massage on the beach and we chose to place our children in childcare for the roughly two hours that we would need to be alone. We told the children that they would be together and the schedule indicated sand castle building and fun noodles. The kids thought that would be great. They love to make sand castles and play by the ocean.  We began our “carefree day in paradise”, checked the children in, and enjoyed our 10:30AM massage. I then attempted to purchase a soda at the bar and was advised that they were out. We returned approximately two hours later and found our children having lunch…at different tables.

My daughter was sitting alone and pouting and three little boys were jumping on my son as he tried to eat. We then picked up our children as my son sang “Alleluia” and my daughter started crying that they (the counselors) wouldn’t let her sit with her brother and a little boy spat food at her. I chose not to tell her that according to the Disney Cruise Line she was “dining island style”. We also found out that the only water the kids had seen was from a hose being squirted at them to cool them down. My children were also not allowed to remove their tee shirts and shorts in order to get wet in their bathing suits that they were wearing underneath. In other words, they were required to get wet in their clothes instead of their bathing suits. We then decided to snorkel but were unable to see any fish due to the sand being kicked up near the shore. I did swim out approximately 200 yards and discovered fish. However, that distance was far too great for our children to swim. The money spent on rentals was wasted. We contemplated returning to the ship, but instead decided to relax on the beach and do some swimming. We ended our day with a banana boat ride and returned to the ship.

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