Sleeping arrangements

Back inside the suite (or should I say, the Suite, capital ‘S’!), I note that the fruit basket is not the only thing left for us – there’s also a cool, useful black and red Castaway Club bag on the bed in the Master Bedroom. It contains a couple of reusable drink bottles, mesh beach bag, notebook and pen, and a few other goodies, all branded with the DCL logo. Every repeat cruiser gets a gift like this – in the past we’ve received pins and a beach towel.

Bob and Linda confirm that there is not another bag in the other bedroom. Just one? That doesn’t seem right. Maybe it’s a “one per stateroom” deal, but I’d think both families should get one – we did book two staterooms initially, after all. It’s not something we’ll press, I’m sure, given that it’s hard to complain that we’re being deprived when we’ve been upgraded to Category 1, but we still might mention it.

Now that we’ve explored, we need to figure out our living arrangements for the next few days. One surprising thing we find is that the Walt Disney Suite, while advertised to hold up to seven cruisers, actually has beds enough for ten! The “permanent” beds – the queen bed in the master bedroom and the twin beds in the second bedroom – sleep four. Above each bed in the second bedroom are pull-down bunks, like those found in many staterooms, so that's room for another two people. The Murphy bed in the sitting room sleeps another two, and then the couch in the living room converts to a bed that also sleeps two. It's kind of mind-boggling to think that ten people, adults even, could sleep in a single "stateroom" aboard a ship in absolute comfort!

We discuss various arrangements of where we'll each sleep. If Becky and the boys and I took the second bedroom together, with Bob & Linda in the master suite, it might be problematic when Becky or I stay up later than the boys, but it would definitely work. We couldn’t put the boys on the living room couch, because Bob likes to rise early and turn on the news. Brandon and Benjamin are most eager to sleep on the Murphy bed, but that would put them next to Bob and Linda if they were in the master bedroom.

The arrangement that seems to work best is to put Becky and me in the master bedroom, Brandon and Benjamin on the Murphy bed, and Becky’s parents in the second bedroom. That will have the larger bathroom for the four of us Randalls, and give Bob and Linda their own private facilities, even though it means sleeping apart in two twin beds. I feel a bit guilty about taking the master bedroom when we wouldn’t even be here were it not for Bob and Linda, but they assure us that they’re fine with this arrangement, so that's what we settle on.

I feel guilty all over again when I sink into the queen-size bed with thoughts of, “Mine, mine, all mine!!!”