A first time cruiser's DREAM Report 4/10-4/14

[jenseib]

So does the 4 night have a dress up night? The 3 night doesn't

 

[Morsel (Chris/Lynn)]

I thought it was ridiculous the safety drill was at 4pm and the sail away party was at 4:30. I mean, I know the scheduling is tight with the first dinner being at 5:45 and I know it's hard to fit all these activities in, but by the time we filed out of our safety drill area and back to the pool. There was no spot for us to clearly see the Sail Away party. So after a few minutes, I just sent the hubby with the older 3 kids to the Aquaduck while me and my youngest wandered around the deck. Before you know it, we set sail...and after a bit of waiting, the family finally made it off the aquaduck! So we headed back to the stateroom to get ready for dinner.

Our first restaurant was Animator's Palette. I really wish we had more time here to look around and see all the details of the restaurant. We were lucky to be seated next to a screen so Crush would be able to speak to our kids.

We loved our servers. They were so kind and patient with all the kids in our party (total of 8 kids, ranging from my 11 year old nephew to my 3 year old daughter) They always put ketchup on their plates in the shape of Mickey Mouse and they quickly learned the kids' favorite part of their dinners were the Micky Mouse shaped ice cream bars! haha.

This was the restaurant that had the shrimp cheesecake I read about but was a tad scared of haha...my hubby ordered it and you know, I was pleasantly surprised! I can't say I truly enjoyed my dinner that evening mainly because I was starting to feel the motion of the ship, which I didn't expect.

Soon after the kids finished their ice cream bars, they were asking about Kids Club. So we brought them back up, checked them in, and away we went. Ok, I didn't go away that quickly, I lurked around outside to make sure they were okay. And they were...or so I thought.

TiP: If you have kids in kids club. Ask the CMs there to send a test message to your Wave Phones, just to make sure you receive them!

We carried the wave phones everywhere. That evening we went to watch the Golden Mickeys. I held that phone in my hand the whole show because I was nervous for my 3 year old. As we were leaving, the phone went off and we thought, well, that was good timing. Our 3 year old wanted to be picked up.

Well, we only carried 1 of our 2 phones. We found out later, a text message was only received by the other wave phone in our room...that was sent an hour beforehand! My daughter was fine, she wasn't crying uncontrollably or anything, but I hate to think what if she was?
After that, we had them send test messages to the phones to make sure they were okay. Which they ended up being fine. I guess that one missed message was just a fluke!

My other 3 stayed a bit longer after we picked up their sister. They just didn't want to leave that Kids Club. Eventually we convinced them their red-blood shot eyes meant they needed some rest...that and my hubby wanted to catch the movie that evening! haha

So, that brought Day 1 basically to a close.

Oh...any AAA members? We received a plate of fruit as our welcome gift. Which came in handy when the kids wanted a quick snack while in the room.

More to come, but please feel free to ask any questions...

We, the wife and I, were also on this rotation for the same cruise. Who did you have for servers? We has Ivo as the head dinning room server, Sutas as our table server, and Drenka for our assistant table server. Going again March 4, 2012. Like the idea of CC twice.
Chris and Lynn

 

[Daynuh]

Our server was Ildiko and Assistant was Amp. Our Head Server was Pascal.
I really wish we would've rebooked while onboard, taking advantage of those discounts and credits. We're really considering going again, but since we live West Coast, we're trying the one out of LA. No Castaway Cay, no Aquaduck, but I'm sure we'll survive

 

[Daynuh]

So does the 4 night have a dress up night? The 3 night doesn't

I'm so sorry I just saw this post. How do I get emailed to know people posted?
Anyway...yes, there was definitely a formal night (that we missed!)

 

[modegard]

Thank you so much for all the time and detail you put into your trip report. We are going on our first ever cruise March 2012 on the Dream, and I also have four kids. I have been making notes for months with the tips I find on these boards, but your trip report has been the mostly helpful so far. Hope you get another Dream vacation soon!

 

[Daynuh]

Thank you so much for all the time and detail you put into your trip report. We are going on our first ever cruise March 2012 on the Dream, and I also have four kids. I have been making notes for months with the tips I find on these boards, but your trip report has been the mostly helpful so far. Hope you get another Dream vacation soon!

Thank you, and it was my pleasure to do the report! Just my way of paying it forward. These boards are fabulous, aren't they??
Also, it's always so nice to meet a fellow "4-kid" (or more for that matter) family! How old are your kids?

Take moments during the cruise to just sit back and take it all in. I had to remind myself to do that...it's so overwhelming and crazy exciting that it's over before you know it.

 

[jenseib]

I'm so sorry I just saw this post. How do I get emailed to know people posted?
Anyway...yes, there was definitely a formal night (that we missed!)

I did find it on our navigator finally. It's actually a dress up optional night. I knew there wasn't any formal nights on the short ones, but I never noticed the dress up optional till after I got home, but we actually did dress up that nigh anyways.

We, the wife and I, were also on this rotation for the same cruise. Who did you have for servers? We has Ivo as the head dinning room server, Sutas as our table server, and Drenka for our assistant table server. Going again March 4, 2012. Like the idea of CC twice.
Chris and Lynn

Ivo was our head as well, but we had Brent and Srdjan, who were FABULOUS!

 

[modegard]

Thank you, and it was my pleasure to do the report! Just my way of paying it forward. These boards are fabulous, aren't they??
Also, it's always so nice to meet a fellow "4-kid" (or more for that matter) family! How old are your kids?

Take moments during the cruise to just sit back and take it all in. I had to remind myself to do that...it's so overwhelming and crazy exciting that it's over before you know it.

At the time of our cruise the boys will be 14, 13, 9 and 7. I am afraid the 5 days on the boat will go by too fast! My parents and my aunt and uncle are coming as well, so there will be 10 of us in total. My sister is also trying to convince her husband to come along. We are going to spend a week in WDW before the cruise too. I don't think we will book any excursions and just hang out on the beach or the boat. The boys can play in the sand and water with a football for hours and never get bored. We will bring our snorkel gear along as well. My older two are good swimmers and I love to snorkel with them. The little ones are quite good at it as well, but do not have the interest in looking underwater for more than a few minutes.

I really appreciate the time you took to write up your trip report, it is very helpful. Thanks again!

 

[BuckeyeBarb]

Great trip report! I am usually a lurker, but we have a multi-generational cruise coming up next spring to celebrate my in-laws' 50th Anniversary. It was interesting to me to read about the grandparents with the grandkids. I hope my fil will ride the Aqua Duck with the grandkids, like yours did!

 

[caro]

I'm so sorry I just saw this post. How do I get emailed to know people posted?
Anyway...yes, there was definitely a formal night (that we missed!)

I thought the formal night was just on cruises that were 7 or more nights. Do the 5 night cruises have one? What exactly do people wear?

 

[Daynuh]

Great trip report! I am usually a lurker, but we have a multi-generational cruise coming up next spring to celebrate my in-laws' 50th Anniversary. It was interesting to me to read about the grandparents with the grandkids. I hope my fil will ride the Aqua Duck with the grandkids, like yours did!

It is the Disney Magic in action, I tell ya! I never ever imagined my parents getting in line to take pictures with the characters!! They didn't do it when I was little!! I was genuinely shocked my dad wanted to do the Aquaduck! He said the hardest part of that ride is getting up and out of the raft when it's over. haha.
I hope the grandparents on your cruise enjoy it as much as my parents did!!

 

[Daynuh]

I thought the formal night was just on cruises that were 7 or more nights. Do the 5 night cruises have one? What exactly do people wear?

Ours was 4 nights, so I'm guessing anything 4 nights or longer will indeed have the formal nights. People really do dress up in their fanciest stuff. Of course there's a range, just like all the other nights.
Long evening gowns, cocktail dresses, suits, a handful of tuxes even.

 

[jenseib]

I thought the formal night was just on cruises that were 7 or more nights. Do the 5 night cruises have one? What exactly do people wear?

You are right. Anything less than 7 is "optional dress up". Some do dress up a lot, and some don't at all. No formal nights on the short cruises though, officially. A nice dress and for the guys a suit or even just a dress shirt and pants is fine.

 

[Shell54]

Loved your trip report..we're on a 4 night on the Dream in July so it was nice to get an idea of the activities and events. I hope it's not too hot to do the bike rental on CC..it sounds like a nice way to see the island.

 

[thefist]

This makes me really, really miss my time on the cruise. I plan to be extremely successful only to insure my stay on more of disney's ships.

 

[bridget]

How did you get your passport stamped??? Did everyone have to go or could 1 person bring them?

THANK YOU!

 

[Daynuh]

This makes me really, really miss my time on the cruise. I plan to be extremely successful only to insure my stay on more of disney's ships.

Tell me about it. It's been a whole month now since our cruise and we still talk about it as if it happened yesterday! Even the kids will say, "oh yeah, remember on the cruise..." funny, yet sad..or pathetic

How did you get your passport stamped??? Did everyone have to go or could 1 person bring them?

THANK YOU!

Here's the link to the TR that talked about it.
http://www.disboards.com/showpost.php?p=34477402&postcount=67

I don't think everyone needs to be there. We were all together, and as the guy stamped them one by one, he would ask who was who. But then, a lady came in by herself to get hers and her kids passports stamped and he did it without questioning it at all.

 

[Daynuh]

 

[Daynuh]

How do I resize the pictures so they're not so big when I post them? I don't want to do the thumbnail thing though where it's small and you click on it to get to my photobucket account...help, anyone? thanks!!

 

[verygfy]

click on the picture, underneath you will see Edit. Click on Edit and then click on resize. You can do preset sizes, medium or large is what I pick for details. HTH