Trip Report July cruise on the Disney Dream

Hello everyone,
not sure if this is the right forum to post a cruise trip report in? Or if it should go into the cruise forum?
Anyways, we took a 3 day cruise on the Disney Dream in late July.
We are veterans of many Disney world and Disney Land vacations, but had never been on a Disney cruise, or any cruise for that matter!
We decided to only take a 3 day cruise, as we were not sure if we would enjoy it or not.

Who: My Wife, my three kids, and myself, oh and a very large ship!
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When: July 18th to July 26th
Where: Georgia, Florida, Disney Springs, Cocoa Beach, Nassau, Castaway Cay, St. Augustine

We live in Kentucky, and decided we were going to take this vacation slow.
So we left in the morning and stopped overnight in Valdosta, Georgia
Got up early the next morning and stopped into Disney Springs for a few hours, then continued onto Cocoa Beach.
Woke up the next morning and headed for the port.

DAY ONE Starts on next post.
 

bauton

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
DAY ONE

So we decided to park at the parking garage there at the port. It was the most expensive option available, but it is also the most convenient. And we wanted convenient on this trip. Driving to the port, you first catch of glimpse of the ship.
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I have to say, there were a few wet eyes as we pulled into the parking garage driveway. Our family has always wanted to take a Disney Cruise, all the way back to the Big Red Boat days. We never thought we could afford it, but we saved and saved, and the dream (no pun intended) was finally coming true!
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You truly don't realize how big one of these ships are until you get right up on it.
Right as you pull into the garage entry point, they direct you to a numbered curb where porters take your luggage for you. You don't see your bags again until later in the day when they are delivered into your room.
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You can park where ever you want in the garage, and if you park on the one end, you can get some great shots of the ship.
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Our port arrival time was the first time that you are allowed to arrive. So we got into the garage about 30 minutes before our arrival time, and there was already a line to get into the terminal!!! It wouldn't be a Disney trip without some kind of line to stand in. Luckily, this was the longest line of the trip. If we had shown up 20 minutes later than we did, the wait would have only been 10 minutes instead of the 30 minutes that we waited.
But waiting in line, you do get some more pics of the ship.
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We made it thru security and entered the terminal itself. From reading other reports, we expected to check in, and then spend 30 to 60 minutes looking around the terminal before we got on the ship. The line for check-in was crazy busy, but the line did move fast, as there are many check in stations. We received boarding group 2! Which is the second group allowed on the ship. We had just enough time to take a few pictures,
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Get some pressed pennies (the terminal is the only place to get cruise specific pennies), then they were calling our group!! After getting thru security, we were only in the terminal for at 15 to 20 minutes before calling our number!!
So we entered the Mickey ears to get on board
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NEXT POST: The Disney Dream!!
 

DisneyFreak

Well-Known Member
Smart decision on the short cruise for being a first-timer. On our first cruise we did a 4 night on the Wonder. Now that we know we love cruising we have never done anything shorter than a 7-night.
 

bauton

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
After skipping the optional family photo, we went up the ramp and had a crew member introduce our family. Again crying ensued, and believe me, it wasn't the last time there was happy crying. So first we looked around the beautiful atrium.
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The chandelier was beautiful
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We ended up spending a lot of our time in the atrium, as there was always character greetings, or live music going on.
We loved all the artwork on the ships. It seemed like every wall had some kind of picture on it.
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The first thing i noticed was how low the ceilings were. But everything was shiny and clean. We noticed how clean everything was the entire trip.
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Since we got on the ship so early, none of the restaurants were open yet, so we headed to the kids club to check it out.
First was:
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We are all Toy Story fans, so loved looking thru this room.
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bauton

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
When then headed up to the buffet restaurant, Cabanas. The food was good and plentiful, it was just way too crowded. We spent a good 30 minutes walking around trying to find a seat for 5!! The congestion in this restaurant was our only complaint on the trip.
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The whole buffet has a Finding Nemo theme to it.
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Of course, we had to try to drink of the day
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And we hit the soft serve ice cream machines, the first of many visits
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Some more artwork on the ship
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Love the enchanted artwork, the picture below with the thick frame was one of them. If you stood in front of the picture for a few minutes, magical things would happen!
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By now, our room was ready!!
 

bauton

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
What can i say, the rooms are fantastic. We had an ocean view family verandah room.
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The wife and I shared a Queen Bed
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One of the two lamps on either side of the queen bed
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Small blanket on the foot of the bed
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Each room has two bathrooms. The first one has a sink and toilet
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The second had a sink and tub/shower
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We also got some magnets to decorate our door!! This seems like the thing to do for many of the rooms.
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bauton

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
After getting settled in, we had some time to kill before the muster drill, so we looked around the ship some more.
This is the theater where you see all of the Broadway caliber shows
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My youngest thought he might want to spend some time in the teen area, so we went and checked it out.
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I have two guitar hero freaks, and they had a full sized version of it
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View of the Bridge from the teen pool area
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He ended up not even going to the club. There is just so much to see and do, that he didn't have time.
It was now time for the muster drill. We had to gather on deck 4 and line up in a single file line.
The wife managed to snap a pic before the "no cameras" rule was put into place
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The drill only took about 20 minutes or so, then it was up to the pool deck for the Sailing away party!
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bauton

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
The sail away party was awesome. It featured the entertainment cast members singing and dancing, along with Captain Mickey and the Gang. At one point they count down from three, and at one, the ship places their air horns. Another crying moment.
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We have to hand it to the entertainment staff. They were always high energy, and we saw them doing multiple jobs all day long.
There was one guy (I think his name was Brandon) that we just loved. He was a dancing fool, and was always trying to get guests involved. He is the guy on the far right in the blue and red shirt in the picture above.
We then headed back to our room to change clothes for our first full service restaurant.
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bauton

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Loved all of the big round windows throughout the ship.
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We decided to head back to our room before going to the show and ran into some old friends.
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During the evening, members of the crew were always in the atrium. They would sign autographs, take pictures, etc...
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I had always heard that there were no lines to meet the characters on the cruise ships. That is not completely true, there are lines for most of them, but you would only need to wait 15 to 20 minutes to greet each character, instead of the longer lines you would see at the parks.
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The first show we saw was the Golden Mickey's. It was a fun show with a ton of characters. As you can see in the picture above, we splurged and got the popcorn bucket. But refills were only $1.50 after the first purchase. My son splurged on his new drink cup. Luckily the "snapping fingers" option was turned off before purchase.
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bauton

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
After the show, we head up to Vanellope's. This is an ice cream shop based on the Wreck It Ralph movie. Anything in this shop costs extra, but it's worth a visit in just to see the decorations.
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We spent the rest of our evening sitting on the verandah. We debating on whether to save some money and not get a verandah room, but after spending many hours just sitting out there, enjoying the view and the weather, we decided it was well worth the extra cost.

When we returned to our room, we had a towel animal of a wiener dog! Plus chocolates.
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And if you were wondering from the earlier pictures how 5 people stayed in this room. Here is a picture of what they do during turn down service. The couch turns into a bed, another bed drops down from the ceiling, and then there is a murphy bed that folds down. Everyone had no complaints with their beds
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NEXT UP: Day 2 Nassua
 

bauton

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
DAY TWO: Nassau
So we didn't have any excursion off ship planned and after checking out what to do in Nassau, there was really nothing we wanted to see on the island. Plus, we wanted to see and do more stuff on the ship!! We did have a nice view of the island from our room.
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After another good, but way too crowded breakfast in Cabanas, we explored
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You could steer a pirate ship on this painting.
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We got tickets for the Princess meet and greet.
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bauton

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
We even got to meet Princess Minnie!
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We did the Mid-Ship Detective Agency. It was a blast. It gives you a work out and you get a great tour of the ship following the clues. We found Pepe Le Prawn's state room!
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We then headed up on deck to see the sites.
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Donald didn't quite make it thru the AquaDuck!
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Kiddy slide
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I had read stories about staying on the ship, as most guests leave the ship and you have the place to yourself!! I think everyone is following this tip now, as the pools seemed to be packed all day long.
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bauton

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
We headed up to the sports deck next. You could see the Atlantis resort very clearly from the ship. I didn't realize it was that close to the port.
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We played a round of Goofy's Golf
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There was also a multi-purpose court, Foosball, ping pong, and a virtual sports area. Even in port the cast members were hard at work. In the picture above, if you look closely, you can see a cast member painting one of the flags!
We did try to AquaDuck. It was awesome!!! It seemed like the wait time listed was always more than what the actual wait was.
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After spending the day looking around and hanging by the pool, we headed back to our room to get ready for Pirate Night!! Our room steward had a special anniversary towel animal waiting for us. With real flower petals!!
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We got matching shirts to celebrate Pirate night, plus the steward left everyone bandannas to wear!
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The kids brought their own head gear
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bauton

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
On the way to our restaurant, we ran into the Pan! He was concerned about us being pirates, but we convinced him we were good pirates.
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We then met some of the crew
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As we were waiting in line for Minnie, Peter Pan came into the atrium and got 10 to 15 kids together next to the elevators. Capt. Hook and Mr. Smee were doing a meet and greet next to the steps at the same time. All of a sudden, Pan and the kids went running up to the Captain yelling " Hook is a Cod Fish"!! It was awesome watching Hook and Smee react to the taunting. Peter was great.

Our next restaurant was the Royal Palace
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It was also very good. My youngest tried Escargot. He loved it.
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Just loved the level of detail on the ship. There was always something to look at.
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bauton

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
After dinner, we head back up to the pool deck for Mickey's Pirates in the Caribbean show. It featured Mickey and the gang of course. But Hook, Smee and some bad pirates took over the ship!! We had to recite different pirate chants and perform different pirate dances to prove to Hook that we were pirates!! Of course, the ship was saved!! This time.
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Next we went to our Broadway show. It was the Beauty and the Beast show. We had read that it was based on the live action movie, which we are not fans of, so we weren't sure if we were going to skip it or not, but with the amount of money we paid for this cruise, we wanted to get our money's worth, lol. We went and saw the show and loved it. It was a great blend of the original animated version, with some of the live action mixed in. The performers for all three shows were fantastic.

After the show, we headed back up onto the pool deck to see another pirates show. This show featured the entertainment crew doing a show very similar to Whose line is it anyway. It was great fun, and was followed up by the fireworks!! Which were awesome!!
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Captain Jack even showed up to help
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After the fireworks, they had a big dance party on deck. We partied for while and then headed back to our room, where we found another animal!
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NEXT UP: Day 3, Rain and Castaway Cay
 

bauton

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
DAY 3: Castaway Cay
This was the day we were looking forward to the most. We had read and watched videos and pictures of the island and was really looking forward to seeing everything. It was the only day on this trip that we had to get up early.
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Why? To run the Castaway Cay 5K!!
But when we opened our curtains to get our first view of the island, this is what we saw
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Rain, thunder and lightening. We went ahead and got dressed and headed down to the area we were supposed to meet for the run. We were delayed for 30 minutes, then the cast member said, "let's go!" We made it to the exit ramp, when they were told to bring everyone back on board. We waited for another 30 minutes, but then they canceled the run. But we still got our bibs and medals!
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We went back to our room, changed and went to the Royal Palace for breakfast. The food was still all you could eat, but it was table service and you didn't have to deal with those crazy crowds in Cabanas. Every 30 minutes, a member of the crew would come over the loud speaker and give an update. Our waiter kept telling us that if it got too late, they would just cancel the visit to the island. Finally, as we were finishing up breakfast, they announced all ashore!! We ran to our room, changed into our swim gear and took off.
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But it rained almost the entire time we were on the island. But we did get around and see a lot of it.
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The boys and I were able to do the Pelican Plunge slides
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The water was warm, but with the rain and the wind, it was still cold. Luckily they let you take as many towels as you want when you get off the ship.
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We ate lunch at the buffet on the island, which was great. Just don't leave your food unattended, as the birds on the island will snatch anything without warning. We walked around and did some shopping and saw the sites.
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