I decided to write up some short comments on our Jan 15 Dream cruise since I have the time today and it might help some future cruisers. The usual facts:
This was our seventh DCL cruise, second four day, and our first on the Dream. It was my second cruise in single parent mode with my DD9 since DW was off teaching a college course in the Galapagos (she is a marine biologist). I have to say that the wave phones make the single parent mode a lot easier. We had them on an earlier Wonder cruise to Alaska which all three of us did and they were great, but when you are the only parent it really helps you have adult time without any worries. We flew down the day before and stayed at Beach Club Villas. That was just ok, as Stormalong Bay, the large theme pool, was under renovation and the room we were assigned was easily the worst one Ive ever got from DCL. It was clean, but very noisy since it was on the 2nd floor directly over the entrance. No big deal since we were there for one night.
We had rented from Budget and the drive over on Sunday was pretty easy. We dropped the car and took the shuttle over. There was a little wait for the shuttle, but it was not long. The drop off area at the port is a little messy and we had to wait about 5-10 minutes before the driver could park and drop us off. There was a porter right there who took our luggage. (On our return, the wait times were much longer about a half hour. Total time to get the car after we disembarked was about an hour, so plan accordingly). We had done the on-line check and selected an 11-1130 slot. This worked very well. There was a small line to get in the terminal (maybe a 5 minute wait) but once inside everything went very quickly. We were given a #3 card and were on board before noon. We were in the terminal such a short time that all we did was get DD her wrist band and never sat down.
CabinWe had cabin 5548, which is one of the 4E (previously 5E) cabins with the extended veranda. The extended veranda was very nice, with two chairs and two smaller lounges. We spent a lot of time on it, usually eating something from room service.
There have been some comments about people being able to look down on year as a problem, but you can just sit back near the cabin if thats a problem. In the end, you have a balcony that is about three times the size of a regular veranda.
This being our first time on the Dream, we were initially surprised by how small the cabin seems compared to the Wonder or Magic. I know from looking at the diagrams that it is only about 30 sq feet smaller, but it seems tight and lacking in drawers and storage for clothes (we had always had a cabin with a steamer trunk). My daughter who is under 5 ft complained that the couch bed was also short. Since we had been on the Wonder in August, I would not be surprised if the couch was also a little smaller. In terms of location, the cabin is great since you can access all the main dining rooms, the kids clubs, and the nightclubs without taking elevators. This came in handy on the last night as my daughter wanted to see the Muppet movie which started at 11 PM. I put her in her pajamas and took her to the theatre which was literally right around the corner. Getting her back to the cabin at 1 AM was absolutely no problem. About the only glitch we encountered was at check-in. We always check to see if there are upgrades after checking in and this time there were some available, although not at the concierge level. However, since we were now a Class 4 cabin, we could not upgrade to a 5A, only a 4A, a deluxe family stateroom, which was not needed for just the two of us.
ShowsThis being our first time on the Dream, we were seeing two new shows, Villians Tonight and Disney Believe, plus the slightly revamped Golden Mickeys. The revised Golden Mickeys replaced the Terk number, Sleeping Beauty, and Pocahontas scenes, with a Little Mermaid number, an extended Beauty and Beast scene, and two Tangled numbers. I dont know why they picked those three and kept the Hunchback of Notre Dame, but they were all well done. We really liked Villians Tonight, which seems to put us in the minority on these boards, but Im a big Kronk fan, and we had a great actor doing Hades, so the fact that almost all the songs are originals did not affect our enjoyment. Disney Believe which is sort of a Disney Dreams clone, was very well done and a great show for the end of the cruise. We had no trouble getting seats arriving about 20 minutes before the show started, even though seat saving was the usual non-enforced rule, with whole rows being saved by one or two people. For some reason, Villians Tonight was on the third night, with the second night being the variety performer. In addition, we did not have a matinee for Disney Believe, which I think we would have done if it were available.
PoolsOK, these are a joke. The Quiet Cove pool is nothing more than an oversized hot tub. While the Quiet Cove has the swim up bar, I never saw anyone use it. Part of the problem is that at that end of the pool, it is very shallow.
When the air temp is on the cool side (as it was for part of our trip), its not much fun to sit on a cold wet seat.
The Mickey pool is overcrowded, even more so than on the classic ships. The family pool has an official capacity of 22 people, which is ridiculous for a ship carrying 4000+ passengers.
However, we never really had any trouble getting chairs no matter the time of day. On the last night, my daughter went into the pool for a few hours after Disney Believe. The deck was nearly empty and she was able to walk on the Aquaduck. However, it is good that they are doing some changes to Fantasy to address this issue and I hope it will be enough, since they are going to have three sea days per cruise instead of one or two.
Castaway CayReally a pleasant surprise. I expected the beach to be crowded with the extra people, but it wasnt. We had no trouble finding chairs and in getting lunch. DCL has done a great job here. The water was a bit cool, but we still got in for a little bit. Most people did not get off till late in the morning and we headed back around 2 PM, so that may have contributed to the lack of crowding we experienced.
PaloI was able to do both the dinner and brunch at Palo. I had originally made a reservation for Remy, but cancelled it, since it didnt look like a single experience. Palo is different on the Dream than on the classic ships. It only occupies a little less than half of the aft starboard section of Deck 12, but has slightly more seats. As a result, very few of the seats are near the windows, and the space lacks the openness of Palo on the classic ships. Both times, being a single, I was seated at the very rear of the restaurant, which was very dark, and of course, I could not see anything outside. Service was excellent (Kudos to Josi, Dragan, and Anne-Marie) and the food was very good in the main courses. However, the appetizers and smaller plates at both dinner and brunch were definitely down a notch. I had the beef ravioli at dinner and they were undercooked and doughy. The pizza at brunch (the only time you can get it) was also undercooked and soggy. At brunch, the food is stuffed into a small dark windowless anteroom instead of being placed in the open as on the classic ships. This again detracts from the experience and also causes backups with people bumping into each other. In addition, the food kept running out and was not restocked promptly, which was really just a small annoyance. I had a drink in Meridian before dinner and quite frankly it was the worst service on the ship. The bartender was definitely not skilled and the Manhattan I ordered cost about $2 more than it did down in Evolution. I guess DCL feels that the experience and view makes up for the less than stellar service in the bar, but they would be wrong.
Main Dining RoomsWe had a very good team in Felipe from Peru and Richard from Indonesia. I highly recommend them. The menus are pretty much the same as on the Wonder and Magic, with just a few new dishes. Our rotation was Animators, Enchanted Garden, Royal Palace, Royal Palace. Although the MDRs are bigger than the classic ships, they were fine and did not seem any noisier or crowded. In fact, I actually liked the layout in Animators Palace better. The Crush show was fine and they take care to seat the children so that they can interact with Crush. The only bad note was the food on the last night. My daughters steak was cold when it arrived and we sent it back (The first time we did that in seven cruises). My steak was equally bad and the lobster medallions were just salty rubber. Everyone has a bad night sooner or later, so after 40 some dinners on DCL, I guess it was just our turn to get a chef who was having an off day.
CabanasWe began and ended our cruise here. I feel this is a real improvement over the buffets on the classic ships, once you master the walk up stations approach. The food was excellent (the lamb chops on embarkation were the equal of the ones I had in Palo) and on embarkation we were able to order drinks from the circulating wait staff or go to the full service bar in the middle. On the last morning, the only item that wasnt available was the omelet station, but they did have eggs made at least three ways that I saw. The windows give the space a lot of light and tables are plentiful both inside and out. If we were on a seven day, I would look forward to having lunch and even dinner here.
Counter service/room serviceWe did a lot of room service this trip, mainly because we liked being on the veranda. It was always quick which was a pleasant surprise We had done an Alaskan cruise on the Wonder in August and the wait time for room service on that cruise was always 30-40 minutes. We waited 20 minutes at the most. The Counter Service is very close to the classic ships. Its all on the starboard side for the food and the ice cream and bar are on the port side. A nice feature was the added drink station on the starboard side which made getting drinks easier. We didnt eat much from there, except for pizza late at night.
On Board ActivitiesWe did a lot more of these on this cruise than in the past. This was partly due to not getting off in Nassau and partly due to their being a lot more offered than I remember on our previous 3 and 4 day cruises. Not getting off in Nassau gave us a nice extra sea day and really helped us choose alternate activities for our real sea day. First, the mid-ship detective agency is every bit as much fun as has been reported. We did it three times, although our first two times we had the exact same storyline. Still its a good workout going up and done and a great way to see the ship. My rough estimate is that we saw about half as many adults doing it as children. We also did a fair amount of activities in the DLounge: Mirror,Mirror, Disney Quest, Bingo, a Pirates Life, and towel folding. All were fun and the drink service was efficient and not pushy.
Miniature golf was also fun, although it was the only activity that had a bit of a wait. Receptions for DVC and Castaway Club were both in Evolution. Both were nice. During the Castaway club reception, I also learned from Captain Henry that the supports that were welded to the aft part of the Dream were indeed placed on after the transatlantic crossing because of excessive vibrations in PALO. He did not know why the Dream got two and the Fantasy got three. I realize that is probably only of interest to Truck1 and a few others, but I did say I would ask.
Overall , a great cruise. Of course, I would have liked it to be longer, but being in single parent mode, four days was just about perfect. The experience on the Dream is different than on the classic ships, much more like being in a very nice all-inclusive resort instead of a cruise to exotic ports, but it is still a great experience. About the only dud was the Family Pirate Party. My daughter disliked it so much she did not want to go back up on deck for the main one later in the evening.
Our next cruise is a five day on the Magic in July, but Im looking forward to our trip on the Fantasy next year and seeing how effective the changes that were made to her address the annoyances on the Dream.
This was our seventh DCL cruise, second four day, and our first on the Dream. It was my second cruise in single parent mode with my DD9 since DW was off teaching a college course in the Galapagos (she is a marine biologist). I have to say that the wave phones make the single parent mode a lot easier. We had them on an earlier Wonder cruise to Alaska which all three of us did and they were great, but when you are the only parent it really helps you have adult time without any worries. We flew down the day before and stayed at Beach Club Villas. That was just ok, as Stormalong Bay, the large theme pool, was under renovation and the room we were assigned was easily the worst one Ive ever got from DCL. It was clean, but very noisy since it was on the 2nd floor directly over the entrance. No big deal since we were there for one night.
We had rented from Budget and the drive over on Sunday was pretty easy. We dropped the car and took the shuttle over. There was a little wait for the shuttle, but it was not long. The drop off area at the port is a little messy and we had to wait about 5-10 minutes before the driver could park and drop us off. There was a porter right there who took our luggage. (On our return, the wait times were much longer about a half hour. Total time to get the car after we disembarked was about an hour, so plan accordingly). We had done the on-line check and selected an 11-1130 slot. This worked very well. There was a small line to get in the terminal (maybe a 5 minute wait) but once inside everything went very quickly. We were given a #3 card and were on board before noon. We were in the terminal such a short time that all we did was get DD her wrist band and never sat down.
CabinWe had cabin 5548, which is one of the 4E (previously 5E) cabins with the extended veranda. The extended veranda was very nice, with two chairs and two smaller lounges. We spent a lot of time on it, usually eating something from room service.
There have been some comments about people being able to look down on year as a problem, but you can just sit back near the cabin if thats a problem. In the end, you have a balcony that is about three times the size of a regular veranda.
This being our first time on the Dream, we were initially surprised by how small the cabin seems compared to the Wonder or Magic. I know from looking at the diagrams that it is only about 30 sq feet smaller, but it seems tight and lacking in drawers and storage for clothes (we had always had a cabin with a steamer trunk). My daughter who is under 5 ft complained that the couch bed was also short. Since we had been on the Wonder in August, I would not be surprised if the couch was also a little smaller. In terms of location, the cabin is great since you can access all the main dining rooms, the kids clubs, and the nightclubs without taking elevators. This came in handy on the last night as my daughter wanted to see the Muppet movie which started at 11 PM. I put her in her pajamas and took her to the theatre which was literally right around the corner. Getting her back to the cabin at 1 AM was absolutely no problem. About the only glitch we encountered was at check-in. We always check to see if there are upgrades after checking in and this time there were some available, although not at the concierge level. However, since we were now a Class 4 cabin, we could not upgrade to a 5A, only a 4A, a deluxe family stateroom, which was not needed for just the two of us.
ShowsThis being our first time on the Dream, we were seeing two new shows, Villians Tonight and Disney Believe, plus the slightly revamped Golden Mickeys. The revised Golden Mickeys replaced the Terk number, Sleeping Beauty, and Pocahontas scenes, with a Little Mermaid number, an extended Beauty and Beast scene, and two Tangled numbers. I dont know why they picked those three and kept the Hunchback of Notre Dame, but they were all well done. We really liked Villians Tonight, which seems to put us in the minority on these boards, but Im a big Kronk fan, and we had a great actor doing Hades, so the fact that almost all the songs are originals did not affect our enjoyment. Disney Believe which is sort of a Disney Dreams clone, was very well done and a great show for the end of the cruise. We had no trouble getting seats arriving about 20 minutes before the show started, even though seat saving was the usual non-enforced rule, with whole rows being saved by one or two people. For some reason, Villians Tonight was on the third night, with the second night being the variety performer. In addition, we did not have a matinee for Disney Believe, which I think we would have done if it were available.
PoolsOK, these are a joke. The Quiet Cove pool is nothing more than an oversized hot tub. While the Quiet Cove has the swim up bar, I never saw anyone use it. Part of the problem is that at that end of the pool, it is very shallow.
When the air temp is on the cool side (as it was for part of our trip), its not much fun to sit on a cold wet seat.
The Mickey pool is overcrowded, even more so than on the classic ships. The family pool has an official capacity of 22 people, which is ridiculous for a ship carrying 4000+ passengers.
However, we never really had any trouble getting chairs no matter the time of day. On the last night, my daughter went into the pool for a few hours after Disney Believe. The deck was nearly empty and she was able to walk on the Aquaduck. However, it is good that they are doing some changes to Fantasy to address this issue and I hope it will be enough, since they are going to have three sea days per cruise instead of one or two.
Castaway CayReally a pleasant surprise. I expected the beach to be crowded with the extra people, but it wasnt. We had no trouble finding chairs and in getting lunch. DCL has done a great job here. The water was a bit cool, but we still got in for a little bit. Most people did not get off till late in the morning and we headed back around 2 PM, so that may have contributed to the lack of crowding we experienced.
PaloI was able to do both the dinner and brunch at Palo. I had originally made a reservation for Remy, but cancelled it, since it didnt look like a single experience. Palo is different on the Dream than on the classic ships. It only occupies a little less than half of the aft starboard section of Deck 12, but has slightly more seats. As a result, very few of the seats are near the windows, and the space lacks the openness of Palo on the classic ships. Both times, being a single, I was seated at the very rear of the restaurant, which was very dark, and of course, I could not see anything outside. Service was excellent (Kudos to Josi, Dragan, and Anne-Marie) and the food was very good in the main courses. However, the appetizers and smaller plates at both dinner and brunch were definitely down a notch. I had the beef ravioli at dinner and they were undercooked and doughy. The pizza at brunch (the only time you can get it) was also undercooked and soggy. At brunch, the food is stuffed into a small dark windowless anteroom instead of being placed in the open as on the classic ships. This again detracts from the experience and also causes backups with people bumping into each other. In addition, the food kept running out and was not restocked promptly, which was really just a small annoyance. I had a drink in Meridian before dinner and quite frankly it was the worst service on the ship. The bartender was definitely not skilled and the Manhattan I ordered cost about $2 more than it did down in Evolution. I guess DCL feels that the experience and view makes up for the less than stellar service in the bar, but they would be wrong.
Main Dining RoomsWe had a very good team in Felipe from Peru and Richard from Indonesia. I highly recommend them. The menus are pretty much the same as on the Wonder and Magic, with just a few new dishes. Our rotation was Animators, Enchanted Garden, Royal Palace, Royal Palace. Although the MDRs are bigger than the classic ships, they were fine and did not seem any noisier or crowded. In fact, I actually liked the layout in Animators Palace better. The Crush show was fine and they take care to seat the children so that they can interact with Crush. The only bad note was the food on the last night. My daughters steak was cold when it arrived and we sent it back (The first time we did that in seven cruises). My steak was equally bad and the lobster medallions were just salty rubber. Everyone has a bad night sooner or later, so after 40 some dinners on DCL, I guess it was just our turn to get a chef who was having an off day.
CabanasWe began and ended our cruise here. I feel this is a real improvement over the buffets on the classic ships, once you master the walk up stations approach. The food was excellent (the lamb chops on embarkation were the equal of the ones I had in Palo) and on embarkation we were able to order drinks from the circulating wait staff or go to the full service bar in the middle. On the last morning, the only item that wasnt available was the omelet station, but they did have eggs made at least three ways that I saw. The windows give the space a lot of light and tables are plentiful both inside and out. If we were on a seven day, I would look forward to having lunch and even dinner here.
Counter service/room serviceWe did a lot of room service this trip, mainly because we liked being on the veranda. It was always quick which was a pleasant surprise We had done an Alaskan cruise on the Wonder in August and the wait time for room service on that cruise was always 30-40 minutes. We waited 20 minutes at the most. The Counter Service is very close to the classic ships. Its all on the starboard side for the food and the ice cream and bar are on the port side. A nice feature was the added drink station on the starboard side which made getting drinks easier. We didnt eat much from there, except for pizza late at night.
On Board ActivitiesWe did a lot more of these on this cruise than in the past. This was partly due to not getting off in Nassau and partly due to their being a lot more offered than I remember on our previous 3 and 4 day cruises. Not getting off in Nassau gave us a nice extra sea day and really helped us choose alternate activities for our real sea day. First, the mid-ship detective agency is every bit as much fun as has been reported. We did it three times, although our first two times we had the exact same storyline. Still its a good workout going up and done and a great way to see the ship. My rough estimate is that we saw about half as many adults doing it as children. We also did a fair amount of activities in the DLounge: Mirror,Mirror, Disney Quest, Bingo, a Pirates Life, and towel folding. All were fun and the drink service was efficient and not pushy.
Miniature golf was also fun, although it was the only activity that had a bit of a wait. Receptions for DVC and Castaway Club were both in Evolution. Both were nice. During the Castaway club reception, I also learned from Captain Henry that the supports that were welded to the aft part of the Dream were indeed placed on after the transatlantic crossing because of excessive vibrations in PALO. He did not know why the Dream got two and the Fantasy got three. I realize that is probably only of interest to Truck1 and a few others, but I did say I would ask.
Overall , a great cruise. Of course, I would have liked it to be longer, but being in single parent mode, four days was just about perfect. The experience on the Dream is different than on the classic ships, much more like being in a very nice all-inclusive resort instead of a cruise to exotic ports, but it is still a great experience. About the only dud was the Family Pirate Party. My daughter disliked it so much she did not want to go back up on deck for the main one later in the evening.
Our next cruise is a five day on the Magic in July, but Im looking forward to our trip on the Fantasy next year and seeing how effective the changes that were made to her address the annoyances on the Dream.
We are on deck 5 in an extended verandah on our upcoming cruise and I'm so glad to hear you enjoyed it!
