Trip Report Halloween on the High Seas and Some Not So Scary Fun with Friends - All Just a *Dream* Away!

Well it's been a little over 24 hours since I've returned back from my adventures from the past week. It's a gloomy, chilly day here so I figured it's a great time to start my trip report.

First, let's introduce ourselves. Here are the four cruisers who together make up the awesome-ness that is known as "Table 65."

Left to right - Yours truly (Jessica), Shalon, Aurora and James. Just a little backstory - up until recently I spent the past 4 1/2 years as an agent for Kingdom Konsultant Travel. Unfortunately, life is a bit crazy right now and I needed to step out of it for a bit (but still remain close friends with my KK family!). Shalon was actually one of my very first clients I ever worked with in 2009. Since her trip, she relocated to the Orlando area and we have become close friends. Aurora and James are husband and wife, also living in Central Florida, who are good friends to Shalon. There would also be a few appearances by some other friends during the trip.

At the end of September Shalon texted me saying that there was an awesome FL resident rate out for the Dream, but she didn't want to go. I called my oh-so-wonderful husband and asked if he would mind, and he encouraged me to go (he's awesome-er than awesome, I tell ya). I texted Shalon and she got us booked and ready! And not long after we had two more cruisers join us - Aurora and James. They would be celebrating their anniversary during our cruise. When all was said and done, we had about 31 days to wait. Not too shabby of a countdown

We would be on a 4-night Bahamian on the Disney Dream, with stops in Nassau and Castaway Cay. Our actual sail dates were 10/27 - 10/31. I booked my air to fly in on the 26th. Originally I was set to fly home on the 31st. Then I decided that flying home on the 1st of November would be better. Then I discovered that some friends who I've known for a couple of years via social media would be in WDW and I really wanted to see them, so I decided to come home on November 2nd. The friends who would be making appearances would be Danielle, Nicole and Deb (aka @DisneyDebNJ ), as well as my friend Tommy and his family all the way from Canada!

So, after all was said and done, here is what my plan was:

10/26: Arrive in Orlando, some park time at MK, spend the night at Shalon's.
10/27 - 10/31: Disney Dream-ing!
10/31 - 11/2: WDW time!

This would be my first cruise after years of peer pressure from @Disneyfalcon to get my behind on a Disney cruise Totally kidding. Tammy's been telling me for years I would love it, but I was so afraid to tear away from my beloved WDW. I was nervous that I would end up regretting going on the cruise and feel like I wasted precious time that I could have spent in WDW. Now I laugh, because the only regret I had was not doing it earlier!

So I guess now's the time to stop rambling and get on with the show!

 

[Disney_Belle]

It was time for our first dinner on the Dream! Of the three rotational dining experiences, I have to admit, I was least excited for Royal Palace. Animator's and Enchanted Garden appealed to me more than Royal Palace, so I was happy that we had it the first night.

If you see seafood pictures, it's not mine. I dislike seafood very much. It's never been appealing to me.

This appetizer belonged to Shalon:

I believe this was fried brie of some sort. I can't have a lot of dairy, so this also didn't belong to me:

This was mine - the Farmhouse Salad. It was yummy! Thankfully I love vegetables and salads!

I had the beef for my entrée. So good! And I had a Coke with it. I took a page right out of @Disneyfalcon 's cruise eating habits.

Shalon went with Lobster Mac & Cheese - two things I can't and won't eat. It did look good though!

Rora's Strawberry Shortcake Sundae had Mickey looking like he made his way into a horror film:

Shalon and I both ordered the Sweet Temptations trio for dessert:

L-R: Mango Cheesecake (eh), crème brulee (best!) and a peanut butter/chocolate mousse (it was good, but I'm not crazy about chocolate and PB together):

I think James, Shalon and Rora each ordered the Grand Marnier Souffle, but it may have only been two of them:

Our servers were wonderful. We adored them right from the start. Roland was from the Philippines and Cosimo was from Italy. I can't say enough about how much we loved them. Cosimo never failed to pull out some tricks every night. The first night he brought out a plate of water and poured pepper in to the water and asked us how to get the pepper to the outside of the plate.

Rora and I tried and tried. All we had to do was stick our finger straight in to the middle of the plate. It was pretty cool.

I loved the glass slippers on the chandelier!

After dinner, we did some photos in the atrium lobby. I'm not a fan of photos of myself, so I'll keep mine tucked away...

When we got back to the stateroom, we had some fun stuff waiting for us!

 

[Disney_Belle]

Monday, October 28th - A Day at Sea

Today was our sea day. I woke up around 7:00. I headed out on the verandah to catch the sunrise. The sun was up pretty high already so no spectacular shots this morning. It was still beautiful, though!

I checked the Bridge Report to see our location. I became obsessed with this channel:

Shalon got up and headed out for a run (she will be doing the Wine and Dine 1/2 this upcoming weekend). I headed up to Deck 11 for a mini-breakfast. We had brunch at Palo, but if I don't have something small shortly after I wake up I get a bit queasy.

On my way up to Cabanas I took some pictures of the pool area while it was almost empty:

This was my nutritious pre-breakfast breakfast:

And with a Coke!

 

[lbrad]

Enjoying tour TR!!!
Great pictures

 

[Tiggerish]

Great photos! I didn't get to eat at Royal Palace because I ate at Remy that night in my rotation. Based on its menu, I think my hubby might not like it, so we'll try to get Palo for that evening on our upcoming cruise. It sure looks pretty, though! Maybe we'll try it for lunch one day.

 

[Disneyfalcon]

Not red suitcase cracked me up!

Quite possibly the creepiest photo of the entire trip:

Not gonna lie. I may be a bit traumatized by that.

Deck 4 Shuffleboard toes for Tammy!

Toeses!!

I had the beef for my entrée. So good! And I had a Coke with it. I took a page right out of @Disneyfalcon 's cruise eating habits.

Coke and meat. Ain't nuthin' wrong with that.

 

[Disney_Belle]

Not red suitcase cracked me up!



Not gonna lie. I may be a bit traumatized by that.



Toeses!!


Coke and meat. Ain't nuthin' wrong with that.

From now on I'll pay closer attention to the suitcase I pack in. The look on the agent's face when she told me my gray bag was priceless. I'm sure my expression wasn't too far off.

Yeah, it's traumatizing. It was also unsettling while sitting in Animator's and he took the head off and set it on the ledge behind him and it just stared at us the entire meal.

 

[tiaragirl]

Loving your TR and your pictures, Jessica!

So excited for all the Halloween goodness (assuming, with cat ears as a unique item..).

Laughing away at your suitcase debacle - sounds like something I would do, fore sure!

Also LOVE the pictures of James wandering around with Duffy under his arm. What a guy!

Also enjoying the way you write immensely - it reminds me of my TRs.. especially that you wrote "sans EMH" in one of your posts. Nothing like throwing a little french in to keep you on your toes!

 

[Disney_Belle]

Enjoying tour TR!!!
Great pictures

Thank you, lbrad!

Great photos! I didn't get to eat at Royal Palace because I ate at Remy that night in my rotation. Based on its menu, I think my hubby might not like it, so we'll try to get Palo for that evening on our upcoming cruise. It sure looks pretty, though! Maybe we'll try it for lunch one day.

It was very pretty! There just wasn't anything that stood out to me. It was beautiful though. I loved the princess portraits around the restaurant and the glass slipper chandelier!

Loving your TR and your pictures, Jessica!

So excited for all the Halloween goodness (assuming, with cat ears as a unique item..).

Laughing away at your suitcase debacle - sounds like something I would do, fore sure!

Also LOVE the pictures of James wandering around with Duffy under his arm. What a guy!

Also enjoying the way you write immensely - it reminds me of my TRs.. especially that you wrote "sans EMH" in one of your posts. Nothing like throwing a little french in to keep you on your toes!

Thanks for reading! I tend to talk a bit too much, but I guess that can come in handy when doing trip reports haha I've finally been able to sit down and go through more pictures so hopefully I can post more soon.

 

[ginadee]

This is great! The Disney cruise is by far the most gorgeous Ive seen. Love seeing your pics. I love my Vera travel stuff.

 

[fractal]

Enjoying the report and great job on the pictures!

That really is a creepy Stuff-Puff mask.

 

[Disney_Belle]

Woohoo! Finally back to getting my trip report done! We're in the process of moving and shut the internet off at our house, so I haven't been able to update. And here we go!

After wandering around deck 11, I headed back down to our stateroom to get dressed for Palo.

Being a newbie to cruising and having read DCL trip reports before, I learned when in Palo, this is an obligatory photo:

Confession: I've never had Mimosas before until today. And it lasted all of 3 sips for me to learn I did not like them. Gah-ross. But at least they make for pretty pictures

A beautiful view from my chair:

Plate #1:

Warning: If you're hungry, look away

 

[Disney_Belle]

I forget what everyone else ordered for entrees, but I kept it simple and went with pancakes with rum syrup. They were yummy!

Oh, and Strawberry Soup!

This was Shalon's plate:

Stunning:

I really enjoyed the Palo brunch. And for the price it was completely worth it! I would do it again in a heartbeat. I only had one complaint, and that was the sound of basketballs being bounced right over our heads the entire meal was kind of annoying. But it wouldn't stop me from doing it again.

After brunch Shalon, Aurora and James headed upstairs to get some sun and swim. I on the other hand stayed inside to catch the first of two Mickey's Mouse-querade parties. Super cute. It was so fun seeing so many people having fun together. There were also Cast Members standing around the atrium on floors 4 and 5 with candy for trick-or-treaters.

Lots of people packed in to party!

Oh and look - the Halloween Tree grew some pumpkins since yesterday!

Some of our favorite friends came out to party with us!

And of course, no party is complete without these two:

 

[Disney_Belle]

After round one of the Mouse-querade party, I wandered. I felt bad that I spent more time wandering on my own than with the other three I was traveling with, but being my first cruise I really wanted to see as much as I could on the ship.

I decided to take my wandering up to Deck 11 and grab a drink. And maybe some Eye Scream (even though I shouldn't, ice cream is my weakness).

While wandering by Flo's, these two asked me to take their picture:

I grabbed a seat and stared out at the ocean for a while before heading back inside.

As I was walking back through the atrium, I noticed that Jack-Jack's Diaper Dash was getting ready to begin so I watched. So funny. Some of those babies can move!

It was almost time for the second Mouse-querade party and I wanted to switch over to my zoom lens so I headed back to the stateroom. Shalon met me back there shortly after, along with Aurora and James.

James got into his Stay-Puft costume. I was standing on the fourth floor in the atrium lobby and they were one floor below me. Every time I looked over, someone was poking James' costume haha. It was so funny.

After the party I did some browsing in the shops. I bought a frame that I'd been eyeing since @derelicte19 posted a picture of it on Facebook!

Here's the frame after I unpacked it when I got home:

Guess what tonight was?! The Golden Mickeys! Wahoo!

Just a sad reminder that I had missed 15 years of awesomeness.

I'm kicking myself for not buying this:

 

[Disney_Belle]

After some browsing, I dropped my stuff off back at the room. The girls and I headed up to Flo's for some fruit and some delicious chicken Caesar wraps. I could have eating them the entire trip and been completely happy.

I tried the Greek wraps, too. They were really good, but those Caesar ones are just scrumptious

After our snack, we headed back to our rooms to get our costumes on. About 75% of the people on the ship had been wearing their costumes all day, so we were kind of late to the party. Rora went as a Ghostbuster, James was obviously Stay-Puft, Shalon went as a runner (and wore her Princess 1/2 Medal).

Here is a picture I stole from Shalon. It was taken when they all went to the couple's trivia game, which I stayed behind for.

I didn't get any photos of myself with my costume (it really wasn't much of a costume though). However, this is from when I did my trial run of my makeup a couple of days before the cruise...

Yep. Grumpy Cat. That was my costume. I also donned cat ears (which came in handy when describing unique items in my not-red suitcase ) and I made a sign that just said "NO." and wore it like a necklace. Unfortunately, not many people "got" my costume. Sad.

 

[Disney_Belle]

We headed out to watch the Golden Mickeys. Loved it. Loved it. Loved it. Such an awesome show. After the show we made our way down to dinner.

After the Golden Mickeys, we went to a 90's music trivia being held in 687. While walking along Deck 4 we ran in to Christian, the cruise director. We chatted with him for a few minutes. Such a cool guy, that Christian. Our trivia host was Jo, who was from the UK and was absolutely hysterical. Especially when it came time to play a snippet of "My Heart Will Go On" from Titanic. Just a tad eerie to listen to on a cruise Aurora and James are trivia royalty and won a nice little keychain, which they already have, so they gave it to me! Yay! Thanks Rora and James!

Yay! Animator's!

I had this for my appetizer, the Black Truffle Pasta Purseittes:

And this for my entrée:

And the Cookies and Cream Sundae for dessert:

Shalon asked for a Mickey Bar (which I contemplated doing until the guy at the table next to use got the sundae and it looked so good!)

But Roland brought her out two

And then he brought this out for her, too. A chocolate mousse spider:

This is Roland. How I adored him. And my heart is aching for him now as he and his family are from the Philippines. He's been in my thoughts a lot, and I really hope for the best for him.

Animator's was all I thought it would be. So much fun. I didn't get much time to look at the whole restaurant. We were right under one of the "tanks" and Crush had a good conversation with Shalon. I didn't take many pictures because I knew we'd be there again the next night. Unfortunately, I should have taken them the first night

After dinner I was feeling sleepy, so I headed back to the room and sat out on the Verandah again. It was such a beautiful night! And we had this little guy waiting for us:

 

[Disney_Belle]

Tuesday, 10/29 - Nassau Day!

I woke up a bit early when we were docking, peeked outside (I was sleeping on the sleeper sofa) and saw it was still dark out, so I fell back asleep for a bit. Not too long after I woke up and saw the sun had risen a bit and I poked out on to the verandah. I went back in to change up and grab my camera but by the time I got back outside, this was in my way:

We noticed that the ship next to us (Carnival Ecstacy) was the one that Shalon's relatives were on! So after I took a few pictures, I put the zoom lens on my camera and Shalon scoured the ship looking for them. She ended up not finding them (yet).

Here comes another ship!

I was staying on the ship today. I didn't really have any desire to see Nassau. I figured I'd relax on the ship. The other three were heading off to explore, but before they did, we had breakfast at Royal Palace:

The name is slipping my mind, but I ordered the plate with the French toast, pancake and Eggo Belgian Waffle. (The waffle was almost as thin as the pancake).

The shadows makes it look like the light is going really fast

There's my girl - Belle!

I said my "See ya laters!" to the rest of my party and took some pictures (because what else would I be doing?)

I watched the princess mingle with their friends for a bit. At one point there was a little girl sitting with Aurora and she just cuddled up to her for a long time. Aurora rocked her and held her and oh man did it take every fiber of my being not to turn into a blubbering mess. Those are the little moments that truly make Disney vacations so magical.

 

[Disney_Belle]

Heading outside to Deck 4:

I thought of @Disneyfalcon 's daughter when I saw these chairs

 

[Disney_Belle]

The temperature was quickly rising so I went back to my room to change in to something a bit cooler and headed upstairs.

Ship after ship...

I have to admit - we really did have the prettiest ship

Atlantis!

 

[Disney_Belle]

After falling asleep in a deck chair for a bit I went down to Cabanas and had some lunch. I was sitting outside and there was a mother and daughter at the table next to me, along the railing. The child was maybe 3 at the most. The mother decided it would be a good idea to go inside and refill their plates and leave the child STANDING on a chair against the railing. The people next to me, along with myself were horrified. A Cast Member took notice immediately and stayed with the child. When the mother came back out, the CM gave her a bit of a talking to. I just don't understand the logic some people use (if they use any at all).

I popped back in to the stateroom for a bit to see if Shalon and the crew had made it back yet. They hadn't yet, but look! It's Pirate Night!

I took some pictures from the verandah while I waited for them to come back.

The trio showed up not long after. Shalon said she ran into her family members in Nassau - yay! We decided to head down to guest services and sign up for the 4:00 Mixology class. Shalon headed back upstairs. I'm not sure what she did next. I think they all went swimming maybe? I on the other hand was headed to animation class in D Lounge!

Halloween Tree!

 

[Disneyfalcon]

I thought of @Disneyfalcon 's daughter when I saw these chairs

Oh yes, she always uses those chairs!!