Forget the $6K Resort: Disney Wish's Star Wars Bar Takes You to the Bahamas
With a luxurious themed-out bar for adults and a cargo hold full of characters and animals for kids, Disney's newest cruise liner has Star Wars fans covered.
- I've been covering technology and mobile for 12 years, first as a telecommunications reporter and assistant editor at ZDNet in Australia, then as CNET's West Coast head of breaking news, and now in the Thought Leadership team.
Hyperspace Lounge is a Star Wars-themed bar on the Disney Wish.
What's better than paying $6,000 to stay two nights in an immersive Star Wars resort? How about paying a third of that price to board a cruise ship to the Bahamas that also happens to have a Star Wars lounge onboard?
Disney invited me to check out its newest cruise ship early, before the Disney Wish sets sail July 14 with passengers on board. You can click here to check out my other first-look photos and biggest questions answered.
The Star Wars Hyperspace Lounge is designed to look like the interior of a luxury spaceship. During the day, families can visit the lounge, but at night it transforms into an adults-only area. The lounge serves space-themed drinks and bites similar to those found in Oga's Cantina in Star Wars Galaxy's Edge at Disneyland and Disney World.
You may forget you're even on a cruise ship at sea -- its one big "window" behind the bar is a screen showing Star Wars locales like Tatooine, Batuu, Coruscant and Mustafar, much like on the Galactic Starcruiser, the immersive resort that recently opened at Disney World. Every seven minutes, there's a hyperspace jump to another system. Different scenes will show ships you recognize, with X-wings and huge, menacing ships floating past while battles happen in front of your eyes.
A holotube in the back of the lounge between booths shows holograms of ships, with the appearing scene always related to what's happening on the big screen.
Though there aren't any characters in the lounge (a big drawcard of the Galactic Starcruiser is getting to personally interact with heroes and villains alike every day), you can hear the ships whizzing past you as faint galactic music plays in the background.
The "window" hyperspace-jumps between familiar planets and ships.
While adults are sipping their galactic cocktails up top, the kids in Disney's Oceaneer Club can have their own Star Wars experience in the Cargo Bay below, where they'll be helping transport creatures across the galaxy.
Kids will learn how to feed, track and take care of creatures via an augmented reality app on tablets. Designed to look like the cargo hold of a spaceship, Star Wars Cargo Bay has hyperrealistic, moving and sound-making porg, Loth cat, worrt and a snail-looking creature inside cages and glass cubes, as well as walls of panels, switches, droid stations, screens with coordinates and dozens of beeping, blinking lights.
They'll also join a secret mission to deliver Rey and Chewbacca, who are stowaways on board the ship, and will get to channel the Force to save the ship from Star Wars villains who make an appearance.
Possibly best of all, when you need a break from the Star Wars themery, you can simply exit those areas and take part in another activity on board, unlike on the Galactic Starcruiser. Go live out your Avengers hero daydreams, or just sit by the pool.
In comparison to that $6,000 price tag on the two-night Galactic Starcruiser experience for a family of four, a three-night cruise on the Disney Wish to the Bahamas and Castaway Cay starts at just under $3,000 for the same family size. A four-night cruise is still more than $2,000 cheaper than the new Star Wars resort.
And if you really want to splash that cash, guests aboard the christening sailing are reporting a Star Wars drink is on the menu for $5,000, but it's unclear if anyone has ordered it or what is in the drink.
At Star Wars Cargo Bay, kids will hang out with Rey and Chewbacca.
