Today was Day 4 of the cruise, which meant it was time for a stop at Disney’s private island of Castaway Cay.

 

Along the way, Nancy passed by the equipment rental area.

 

Nancy took a few photos during the race.  The 5K starting point is near the bike rental location, and takes runners/walkers the length of the old airplay runway and bike path loop (2x) before heading back toward the starting point. 

 

While Nancy was busy exercising, the girls and I got ready.  We always have to put on a lot of sunscreen for Castaway Cay because the sun is quite strong in the Bahamas and it’s easy to get burned if you’re not careful — we’ve gotten sun burns before when we visited.  Once we were ready, we stopped by Cabanas to grab a quick bite while we waited for guests to be allowed ashore.  Once we heard the announcement, we made our way downstairs and out onto the island.  We grabbed some towels at the end of the gangway.  We decided to get some water and a cooler as well since it was a bit hot. 

 

We rented a float and spent the morning enjoying the sun and water.  I went to the restroom and walked by Cookie’s Too BBQ, one of the two dining locations on the family beach.  There are four different serving lines that can be used when lunch is served.

There is a large beverage station with four different soda dispensers.  On the other side of the soda dispensers are the soft serve ice cream machines.

 

After we had lunch, Nancy wanted to head over to the Heads’ Up bar, which is located at Pelican Point.  Scott Sanders of Disney Cruise Line Blog had talked about a drink that is served there that she wanted to try, the Pelican Mule.  Nancy thought it was pretty tasty.

Around 3 pm, we were pretty much done with the beach, so we decided to start making our way to the ship.  Our trip back takes some time because it involves looking at EVERYTHING on the way to the ship, including all the shops and other attractions.  It also involves stopping for ice cream as well.  Our first stop was the Spring A Leak splash pad for little ones.  We had never actually looked inside since our kids were older by the time we started cruising.

 

 

Our next stop was the combination of Monstro Point and Scuttle’s Cove Activity Center.

 

Monstro Point is a giant dig site that has a giant buried whale skeleton.  Unfortunately, we didn’t get a picture of it.  It was a giant sand pit.  I don’t imagine I would be very happy to sit here for an extended period of time while my kids dug in the sand, since there is not a lot of shade.  Luckily, we are past those years.

 Scuttle’s Cove is the kids club on the island that takes the the place of the Oceaneer’s Lab and Club.  There are lots of activities that take place in this space, all under the supervision of the counselor staff.  Plenty of shaded areas are provided as well.  Parents can check their kids into Scuttle’s Cove and go on to enjoy the adult beach if they would like.  I don’t have a lot more details because our kids have never been in this area.  When they were young enough to go here, they wanted to stay with us for the day.

After checking out the kids area, we continued back to the ship.  We always take a long time to get back to the ship because we spend so much time stopping and taking pictures.

 

As we approached the ship, we coordinated with our older daughter to make sure she was headed back to the ship as well.  We don’t get back onto the ship (both adults) until everyone is ready to get back on board.  Just a safety thing for our family even if we aren’t all together during the day.

Since everyone got back on at the same time, there was some congestion for the shower.  I decided to head up to get some soda from Deck 9.  While up there, I went up to Deck 10 to take a few pictures.

 On the way back to the room, I was greeted with this sight.  I’m not sure exactly what was going on, but it looked like a take over of the elevator.

I also meant to mention earlier that I activated TravelPass while I was on the island.  TravelPass is an option you can get on your Verizon Wireless account with no sign up fee.  When you are in another country, you can connect your phone to the local carrier and you will get charged $10 a day (per device).  You will get 1/2 GB of high speed data.  I wanted to test this functionality before we tried it on a future trip to Europe.  When we arrived at Castaway Cay, I turned off airplane mode and it connected right to the local cell carrier.  I received a text letting me know I just spent $10.

For the rest of the day, I was able to use my cell phone without any issues.  Unfortunately, I forgot to turn off podcast downloads as well as app updates, so my data got used up before the end of the day.  I received this text to let me know that my high speed data allowance was done.  I did get a little data after that, but it was REALLY slow.  If I had been more careful, I could have easily have spent the entire day using data, including for navigation. 

 

After cleaning up, Nancy and I headed to Deck four to watch the Wave Goodbye as we left Castaway Cay.  It is one of Nancy’s favorite things about cruising to Castaway Cay.

 

One of the things that excited us about this cruise was that Castaway Cay wasn’t the last night of the cruise.  Usually we have to return to the ship and start packing up, which kind of puts a damper on the Castaway Cay fun.  Since we had another night, Nancy and I decided to check out some of the entertainment on the ship.  The first one was the Latin music band.  We had watched them in another venue earlier in the week.

 

After the Latin band finished, we headed up to the adult area to catch the acoustic band from Rapunzel’s Royal Table, this time without their costumes.  They were really good.  Tonight was the Pirates in the Caribbean show at the main pool area, but we missed it.  We did get to see the fireworks from the adult area though.

Tonight’s dinner for us was in Lumiere’s with the traditional Pirate’s Night menu.  While the dinner was good, everyone was pretty tired after a long day in the sun.  The kids did manage to head off to their clubs, but Nancy and I barely made it back to the room.

 

Tomorrow would be a sea day as well as the last full day of the cruise.

If you have enjoyed this article, please be sure to check out our Disney Cruise Line information page, which has useful hints in addition to our cruise trip reports!