We were on that cruise as well. Not impressed with the food at all. In fact, my dh has been going around telling everyone that he had a better meal at the Doubletree Oceanfront on Cocoa Beach before we cruised. I can't argue with him..he's pretty much right.
I also prefer the Wonder to the Dream. The Dream is a gorgeous ship...incredibly beautiful. But it is huge. And the CMs were hard pressed to give the same high level of service that I have come to expect when cruising with Disney. Our restaurant servers seemed frantic most of the time. There was little personal interaction with them...at least until the last night. And then, on disembarkation morning, we had asked to change over to the earlier seating. Nikola told us it would be fine...just arrive 15 mins early so they could find us an empty table with our usual servers. But, another host came along and took us to another table..further away from Ivan and Lisette. They weren't too happy when they found that they weren't serving us our last meal of the cruise. Nikola was a bit peeved that someone else had taken us to a table when he was going to do it. But, stuff happens.
I was sure there were lots of families that were thrilled with the addtl stop at CC. Normally I would have been as well. But...my dh and I were looking forward to brunch at Palo. Something special for our late 20th anniversary. And that got cancelled due to the second day at CC. A lot of unhappy cruisers when that happened. No shops were open, food wasn't great on the ship. It was not a good day for many of us.
And the day before, when we did go to CC, we found it to be way overcrowded. The thing that really annoyed me was to see how much beach was taken up by the private cabanans! Once again, Disney gives you what you want if you pay enough for it. There were few people using that beach area...maybe 4 or 5. All while everyone was crammed into the 'public' beaches. We did an excursion that morning so by the time we got to the beach, there were no seats. We had to hover, and wait until someone left.
I just don't think Disney has the hang of servicing that many people yet. I know they will figure it out though. The really funny thing??? When I sent an email to
DCL, telling them of my extreme dissatisfaction with the cancellation of Palo brunch, but that I did enjoy other parts of the cruise...I got a return email stating that they were ' haapy that my granddaughter and I had some good times during the cruise even while being disappointed with some aspects..and that they hoped my granddaughter and I would be back to cruise with DCL again.'
Seriously??? My granddaughter??? Nothing was ever said about a granddaughter. It was myself, my dh and my 17 y/o dd....this grouping was mentioned several times. I really wanted to reply to that email saying that I now understood how some of the problems could occur. They can't even read an email correctly.
Ah well...still love Disney. I will probably cruise with them again but on one of the smaller ships.
NO BUFFET at the Pirate party! My Husband was so bummed!!!!!!! He was looking forward to a turkey leg the size of a baseball bat!
Thanks again for the info... when are you cruising again??? or did you make plans yet???
Maybe I will now look at the Fantasy as well. I agree, Castaway was less crowded the second day but we only stayed on the island until lunch since the kids wanted to catch the movies that we would have seen at sea.
