Day 1 Part 2 (Monday, September 17, 2018): Our First Experience on the Dream
I had previously read reports about how lunch the very first day is the most crowded time, since that's what everyone decides to go do. For us, it was no different and a little overwhelming. It didn't really help that we were a big party of 7 people trying to find a table, but we managed. I don't remember exactly what I had gotten from the buffet and I don't have a picture of it either, but I do remember that it was good and I highly enjoyed it. Turns out that would be only 1 of 2 times that we ate lunch at the buffet on the ship.
We ended up saying there until after 1:30pm, when the staterooms were available. We did see people start to leave Cabanas, presumably going to drop off their luggage and carry-on bags to their staterooms.
As we were heading to deck 2, though, walking down the stairs, we noticed that Cinderella was having an impromptu meet and greet. She was by the elevators on deck 5 midship I'm pretty sure and didn't even have a photography person with her, which I wasn't sure if that was normal or not. The baby wanted to meet her and he did so happily. The picture below is cute with him blinking his eyes in happiness. (We do have other ones with him not blinking but I just thought it was too cute)
Our staterooms, we had connecting ones, were located on deck 2, rooms 2024 and 2026, Oceanview Family Staterooms, or something like that. I wasn't sure if the way we were split up into the rooms was going to stay that way, but there was always the option for people to switch between them since the doors in the middle were going to stay open the entire time, for the most part.
I actually enjoyed being on deck 2. At one point we could walk out and be right at Enchanted Garden to eat or for dinner and there was a staircase right up to the middle of the atrium near the Royal Palace. It felt very convenient to be there. Of course sometimes getting up to deck 11 proved to be a struggle, but we always took the stairs down, since that was easier than going up, and never had a problem.
Everyone always loved looking out the window, we loved watching the water as we were on the move and it was a favorite spot for everyone to sit.
Since we were so tired, or at least most of the family was tired from waking up that early, they wanted to rest. I, however, was itching to explore some of the ship and didn't want to spend my time in the room. So one of my sister's, the eldest of the two younger ones, and the baby went out to explore the decks for a little. The farthest we got was only to deck 4 and we went around the jogging route, even seeing where our muster station was, which was G.
The baby loved looking out over the side of the deck, even though we didn't even start moving yet, and we even managed to see our luggage being loaded on during our adventures.
Soon, though, it was time to return back to the room to get ready to go to the safety drill. I guess it's a recurring theme, but I always thought that things would be more complicated than what they would end up being. I thought that the safety drill was definitely going to be longer, but it actually wasn't that bad. It is true that we were outside and that it was hot out there, but it wasn't too bad and afterwards, we headed up to deck 12 for the Sail Away Party.
The baby had fallen asleep during the safety drill and was awoken to the sounds of the Sail Away Party and since we were standing by a speaker, it was too loud for him. I was mostly there just to hear the horn go off, though, and to see us moving away from Port Canaveral for the first time, which was super exciting. Like I mentioned before, this was the first time that we were on a cruise as a family. I had gone on one with my grandparents when I was 4 and my parents and grandparents went on one together 2 years ago, but for all the rest of my siblings and the baby, this was their very first time.
The Sail Away Party was pretty fun and the one guy that was running it, who would end up running quite a number of things, was hilarious to watch. I don't really remember his name, maybe it was Tony or something? I think I heard someone mention that name before.
But anyway, we had a little time after the party to get ready for our 5:45pm dinner seating and not really wanting to be late, we headed down to begin the process of getting ready. It may seem like we have a lot of time, but with 6 adults trying to get ready and 1 baby, it can be pretty time consuming.
Our dining rotation for the cruise was AEER, Animator's Palate, Enchanted Garden, Enchanted Garden, and Royal Palace. So we were headed to the back of the ship that night for Animator's Palate. Now before this, ever since the ship started moving, my brother had a little issue with the motion but he was stubborn in not getting any medicine so we figured that it just had to be something he dealt with since he wasn't willing to go find and take medicine for it. But since we were eating in the back of the ship, that meant that the boat was definitely rocking more than it would have been anywhere else.
Even when I was just researching about the restaurants on the ship, I fell in love with this restaurant. Needless to say, the baby had a great time with Crush and was highly entertained throughout the entire meal. It was this night that we met our server Leo and his assistant Merrick, I think that that's how his name was spelled. Leo is from the Philippines and Merrick from Jamaica. They were great and we loved having them every night. Leo definitely did his best to make sure everyone was satisfied the entire trip.
While I'm not sure what everyone had every night of the ship, I definitely know what I had since I took pictures of everything at dinner. I did have to consult the internet for the names of the dishes, though. But this night I had:
Baked Potato and Cheddar Cheese Soup
Herb Crusted Pork Chop
Lemon Icebox Pie
Everything was excellent and I absolutely loved it. I would definitely recommend everything that I had. I do know that some of my family had some of the lighter offerings and the tenderloin as some of their main dishes and my youngest sister had the sundae as her dessert.
Since we didn't know the exact timing from dinner to the show, we headed up to the theater early just to see when the doors open, they open 30 minutes before the show, which would put it at 8pm. So we were early, but we saw the snack stand that they have there and my mom spied the Halloween popcorn bucket. Now, let me just say something, my mom loves collecting those things and the mugs, too. We have a whole bunch at our house and actually, when we later went to Disney World and we saw that they had a specific Toy Story one, she just had to get that one as well. So that night was no different and my mom bought the Halloween popcorn bucket, but that wasn't all. They also had the Halloween mug available, so she bought one of those, too. We also took a little look around the shops since the only time they're open is when we're out in sea and not in port.
This is a random picture I got from the internet, but those are the exact designs she got. My mom even went later, 2 days later on Wednesday, and got another popcorn bucket but couldn't get another mug since they were sold out.
But the Golden Mickey's was great. We absolutely loved the show. There was at least one point during the show that the baby got a little afraid and restless, but once the number featuring Woody and Jessie came on, he was loving it all over again. We probably had overexposed him to Toy Story before this trip so that he was his ultimate favorite movie by the time we went. We were blown away by everything and I remember telling my sister that if it was like that for one of their older shows, then we couldn't wait to see what Beauty and the Beast would be like.
I was a little apprehensive going into the cruise, though, that the Golden Mickey's wouldn't be shown. I had seen reports about the Golden Mickey's being replaced for a second showing of Beauty and the Beast. After seeing the line and crowd for Beauty and the Beast, I can surely see why it was like that, but I'm happy that I got to experience the Golden Mickey's and think that it's a great show as well and can see how it's a crowd favorite. I was so happy when we first got our Personal Navigator's when we were checking in and saw that the Golden Mickey's was that night's show.
After the show was over we went up to deck 11 to get some ice cream and late night snacks before calling it a night. It had been a very long first day for all of us and we knew that we would have an early start the following day as we went to our first port, Nassau, Bahamas!