Portrait and Palate

After we’re well on our way, we return inside to dress for dinner. This night we will be in Animator’s Palate – always a great experience – but we’re also dressing up a bit to have our shipboard portrait done.

Once we’re ready we head down to the atrium. I’m hoping the backdrop with the ship against the Mickey sunset is still available. That looked so cool. Alas, when we arrive, the background is a stark white. They’re just going for plain and artsy this time. Bummer.

We start to line up for our picture, but as we look around we see a second photographer one floor up. The background is abstract but colorful, which is already an improvement, but the big difference that makes us go there is the fact that the portraits are being done with Mickey!!

Mickey Mouse is posing with all comers, resplendent in his tuxedo. We’ve had family portraits done on both previous cruises, but never with the Mouse. This’ll be great.

We head upstairs and join the short line, with Becky double-checking the boys’ hair and making sure we’re all photogenic – to the limits of what she has to work with, of course. Soon enough, our turn comes, and we gather around Mickey. The photographer poses us and takes a few shots, and a nearby female crew member is nice enough to take a couple of pictures with our own cameras.

Mickey, of course, doesn’t say much, but he’s still pretty nice to hang out with.

We’re done with pictures at about 5:45, meaning that we have 15 minutes to go until our official dinner time, but we still head down to the restaurant, just down the hall on this same deck, since they usually begin seating early.

Shutters, the photo shop, is on the way, and we stop to look at some other pictures. Since we just had our portrait made, we’ll have to come back by here again, probably tomorrow morning, to buy it. It’s possible it might be here later tonight, though.

When we arrive at Animator’s Palate, the doors are shut and there is a bit of a line already formed. I don’t mind the wait in and of itself, but it’s quickly getting warm and stuffy in this hallway. Brandon is especially feeling the warmth, since he got a little sunburned on the beach.

I eventually step out the nearby double doors to the outside deck for some fresh air. The sun has just set, and the Caribbean sky is absolutely beautiful. It is windy and a little cold, so I cool off in a hurry. After I return, Brandon goes outside himself.

Six o’clock is fast approaching, and the restaurant doors still haven’t opened. That’s odd, especially considering how punctual shipboard activities usually are. Of course, they’re not late yet, but usually people are being seated well before the scheduled arrival time.

At 6:00 straight up – there’s that punctuality! – the Animator’s Palate doors open, and the servers work quickly to seat everyone waiting. There’s no hint of whatever problem might have delayed the opening… Oh, wait. Yes, there is.

The walls are in color.