🚢 Should I dream a Dream?

Disney Cruise Line
21

Yup I can agree with this and if you do a fancy meal go for the brunch. It won’t interfere with dining rotation and it’s cheaper I believe.

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22

You’re giving us too much credit.

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23

(I do remember your cruise trip report though. :wink:)

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24

Clip a fancy clip on ear ring to a flip flop and viola! Sandals- which are acceptable as casual dress wear. :sunglasses:

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25

Luckily for me I’m not the fancy dining type!

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26

DH and I reserved a cruise in 2024 to the new Disney Island and I appreciate the comment about exploring the ship on your first cruise instead of a big focus on port calls. Since we stop twice at the island we will get off once. We reserved a room w/ a veranda, it will be our first cruise ever.

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27

First of all, yes you should do DCL once & the Dream was my choice for our first ship & now that the Dream took over the Europe sailings for the summer, we cannot wait to get back on it hopefully for a European cruise (we are first on a quest to first try each class of ship if not every ship before we repeat the Dream).

A 3 night will go fast, but as mentioned if you don’t get off the ship that will help immensely and you will not have kids to run around with on the pool deck & kids club like I was doing so that will save you tons of time. I was still able to get in a lot, so with 2 full days, one half day (embarkation) and a debarkation morning you should be able to get a good taste.

With 3 nights you’ll get one of each main dining room for dinner and I also recommend not booking dinner at either Remy or Palo so you get the taste of each of included main dining restaurants. I had been open to & willing to go to Palo brunch but it ended up that there were no Palo brunch openings for first timers (like we were) on spring break cruise. And my DH is like you, put off by dress codes. Even though he owns and would wear clothes that fit the dress code if we went out for our anniversary at a nice place at home or to a wedding. It’s the principle of having a dress code on vacation that bothers him. If I had pushed a little that I really wanted to, he would’ve done it & been happy with the food. But I would’ve had to hear about the absurdity of dress codes while on vacation again before the experience.

Also with 3 nights you’ll get one night of each of the main theater shows. We loved all of them but Believe & Beauty & the Beast were especially wonderful and we’d watch either of those ad nauseum if they were available in Disneyland. The Golden Mickey’s was cute as well & definitely enjoyable for a fan of Disney movies/music and definitely worth seeing once but wouldn’t be one we eagerly repeat the same as the other two.

As for verandah’s, it was amazing to have fresh air & sights of the ocean so easily accessible but by the time I got home & evaluated, I felt that the verandah compelled me to be more in the room than I had anticipated & that came at the cost of never enjoying most of the adult only areas. I highly recommend getting coffee to enjoy on your verandah, that was beautiful. Room service can bring it the night before (in a thermos that keeps it hot until morning) OR you can put the room hanger on by 3am and they’ll deliver the coffee at whatever time you specify on the card plus any continental offerings. Also, I had 2 bottles of wine for enjoying in the evenings but I only did that the final evening just to say I’d done it because I also got the wine package at dinner & had enjoyed as much wine as I’d wanted to by then each night.

And then if you have the time between shows, dining & lounging on the verandah to any of these other things, we tried & loved: Midship Detective Agency (we chose the Muppet story but there is also a 101 Dalmations story we didn’t have time to do as well), mini golf on Deck 13 aft, meeting Mickey in his captain suit above the atrium, and lounging by the pool with free soft serve & counter service food from Flo’s right next to the pool. Also, if you’re at all interested in checking out the kids spaces, look for open house time & I believe they allow adults in after midnight (when it closes to the kids) to look around the space as well. The Dream has the Millennium Falcon space that is pretty fun and there are some cute other things (Andy’s Room, the Disney Infinity space, the magic light-up floor, Pixie Hollow).

They also do plenty of scheduled activities in the lounges that you can attend. My two older kids attended a towel folding class with their aunts and had a blast doing that. We also were traveling with extended family who are WDW experts and so with all our powers combined we couldn’t resist doing some trivia. We won 1 out of the 3 and almost one a 2nd (lost the tie-breaker) that I specifically went to with the whole group. My DS11 helped win another one with other families that I wasn’t there for (I was too busy stuffing my face with crab while enjoying an oceanview at Cabanas lunch).

Some things that we didn’t get to try but would’ve time permitting: watch a movie in the ship’s theater, play Bingo, attend a making of the Dream presentation, meet ALL the characters, take all the photo opps offered in the evenings around the atrium, spend time at the adult pool areas & lounges after they were open to adults only, sit with a coffee from Cove Cafe inside Cove Cafe, take a walk and play a little shuffleboard on Deck 4 promenade. There was no shortage of enjoyment & relaxation on the cruise.

Also, a note on the affordability, if you plan way ahead and wait until they release the next set of itineraries (would be for next summer when the Dream is expected to be in Europe again) you can book the day booking opens up to first time cruisers and likely get a better price than last-minute sailings. And you may be able to afford a couple of more nights to more interesting ports. I looked at some of the sailings this summer out of Southampton just in a day dreaming mode once off the cruise this spring & even though there’s no way we would be able to make any sailing that far away from us that soon, I found myself down a rabbit hole of researching excursions in two ports in N. France & speculating about how much time we’d need to do a little bit of London AND some time in Southampton before/after the sailing.

Happy planning & I am excited to hopefully get more updates of your planning & eventual sailing!

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28

Skip Palo/Remy and the port. Go to all the shows and to bingo and definitely go to the kids club during open house, the theming is impressive just got a quick walk through. We are on the 7n N Europe this summer and it will be our second time on the dream. It’s a great ship. The verandahs are nice but the magic portholes in the interior rooms are also really cool. Live video feed of outside but Disney characters fly or scoot or swim by. Pooh floats by holding his balloon, the starfish from Nemo appears stuck on the screen, etc.

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29

We had a verandah but I told my kids about the inside rooms on the Fantasy & Dream and my DS that just turned 6 keeps asking when we will get one of those rooms for those characters. We booked inside rooms for our next cruise and he was so disappointed when I told him it was going to be on the Magic (cuz he’s managed to lock in & memorize that only the Fantasy or Dream have them).

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30

Have only been on one cruise in my life, and it wasn’t Disney, but I’m here to say that Verandas are MAGIC and worth it!

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31

LOLLOLLOLLOLLOL!
Bot is telling me above is not a complete sentence, i disagree! Lol!

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32

This was a hugely unhelpful post.

You totally sold me on the idea of taking the cruise. The problem is: I had started persuading myself against the idea. It’s £2,000 for three nights. That’s crazy money. Just think of all the other trips I could take for that money.

Now I’m confused.

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33

Forum doesn’t like all caps.

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Counterpoint: The price tag includes your accommodations, entertainment & meals entirely covered for those 3 nights. Once you start thinking in terms of all that it covers and factor in the fact that gives you Disney level entertainment, it hopefully eases some of that.

The extras on top of that price would be mostly travel expenses to the port (and likely a night’s hotel unless Southampton is close enough that you don’t consider it risky starting from home that morning), and tipping (14.50/person/night is the standard recommended amount that covers all your waitstaff and stateroom host).

Once onboard there are extras you could get that would supplement the already mostly provided food but you could set a limit/budget & have a lovely time even if you didn’t indulge much on any of them: alcohol, specialty drinks (smoothies, coffees from the two cafes), anything purchased in Vanellope’s (ice cream, gelato & confectionary treats), popcorn at the theater & any canned soda or water. Also there some tricks to help lessen any of those costs (a popcorn bucket can be refilled at a discount, including a Disney bucket you bring on board purchased from a previous sailing or in the parks). If you will get specialty 6 coffees between the two of you, you can do a punch card that gives you the 6th one free (and you can keep to use for future sailings). Instead of popcorn & canned soda purchased from the theater, you can fill up a tumbler with soda from the beverage machine available 24 hours & not an extra charge and grab a free treat from Vista Cafe on deck 4 to snack on instead.

There is also 24 hour room service (the menu is somewhat limited BUT not listed on the menu are Mickey bars & cake of the day; we did Mickey Bars at midnight 3 nights when the kids came crashing back to the stateroom after closing down the kids club & it was a highlight for us all). We did tip room service too & that was the only time we really needed cash for anything on the cruise. Everything else could be charged to the room & settled later on the payment method of our choice.

So yes there is some sticker shock to the price of a cruise, but we felt that with all it included it was well worth the price and it’s a vacation we are eager to repeat. Both on DCL and other lines based about what we’ve started to learn about other lines being great and much more affordable.

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35

Also available via room service - milk and warm cookies. IIRC the cookies are on the menu, but you can request they be warm.

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36

Yes, I forgot all about these until we were home. Luckily, we have another cruise booked to remedy this severe oversight.

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37

Is this plan still a possibility with your new WDW trip booked?

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Paul really wants to do it, so I think we might?

But I currently have analysis paralysis. How do I choose a stateroom?

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39

I’ve never had a bad stateroom bc they are all on the ship! :ship:

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40

So I found this room.

It’s classed as a family verandah but it’s an 04E, meaning it’s a regular room but with a giant verandah. It’s Dream 7192.

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Advantages

  1. Price. Verandah rooms go from ÂŁ2,000 (obstructed view), to ÂŁ2,050 (regular), to ÂŁ2,400 (all kinds of hoopla). This room is ÂŁ2,100: so only ÂŁ50 for the giant verandah.
  2. Location. Right at the back, so great views. And quiet from foot traffic.
  3. Verandah. Giant. I already told you. Do keep up.

Disadvantages

  1. I’m reading reports of noise and vibration, mostly when the ship leaves port. Also soot. And wet balcony in the morning.
  2. Maybe not optimal for seasickness.

Thoughts?

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