Not cold but refreshing! - 4 nights on the Dream

[MommaoffherRocker]

Day 3
Castaway Cay

I am going to start this day off by saying Castaway Cay is another reason why I am willing to pay more for a Disney cruise. It is my guaranteed beach/relaxation day on every cruise!

The day started off when DH and I woke up early and ran upstairs to grab a quick bite to eat at Cabanas and bring back donuts and milk for the kiddos. This day was very special to us because we started training for the Castaway Cay 5k as soon as we booked our cruise 9 months prior. The last time we were there I remember seeing all of the people with their numbers on and thinking I wanted to do that some day. So as soon as we booked I told DH that I wanted to do it and he agreed it would be fun. While training for this 5k we got bit by the running bug and have done numerous races since, but this one was the race that started it all. We were so excited that we made our way to the lounge a little early around 8am. We got our bib and waited for instructions. The ladies that were in charge of the run were so great. The 5k starts near the bike rental goes down the landing strip make a right go around the bike loop then at the end you take a right, loop around down at Serenity Bay, run back take a left go around the bike loop take a left out of it and then run back down the landing strip and finish at the start. They have a clock at the beginning/end so you can keep track of your own time. I used my garmin watch and it said the course was 3.11. My watch is always over mileage so I think it might not be a true 5k but it was still a fun run. The race started right at 9 and they had a water station in the middle of the course that we passed 4 times. The weather was perfect for a run, 66°f was what the captain said the temp was when we were getting off the ship. I couldn't imagine running it in the summer! The best part was it was all free and we got an awesome medal out of the deal too!

After the 5k we headed back to the ship to get ready to spend the day on the island. I was starving so first Grandmom and I headed up to the buffet for breakfast. Then we decided that DH would stay back in the room while Sam slept and we would take the other kids to the beach. As you can imagine DH was so disappointed he had to lie around and watch movies all morning by himself.
When we made our way off the ship we grabbed towels and decided to walk to the beach. It is a nice walk but kinda far, if you have little ones I would suggest the tram. Before getting to the beach Grandmom bought the kids sand toys at the shop She sells sea shells and then we went to find a spot on the beach. The beach was not too crowded and we were able to find chairs no problem. I have concluded that kids do not feel cold because the water so cold. Not as cold as Jacksonville Beach gets in the winter but it was still too cold for me. As soon as they got out of the water though they were shivering and we had to wrap them up in towels. It was a fun morning building sandcastles, looking for shells and making friends. We saw some fish and a hermit crab in the water. After the kids had their fill of the beach we met DH and Sam at Cookie's BBQ for lunch. It was 1:30ish by this time and the food was a little on the cold side. They had all you can eat cheeseburgers, hot dogs, chicken sandwiches, chips, cookies etc. Plus unlimited soda and ice cream.



After lunch we walked over to the pier that had Heads up bar at the end. From there you can see tropical fish in the water and watch the snorkelers. Their wasn't as many fish this time as the last time, I'm not sure if it has to do with water temp or maybe tide?

Here is my selfie from the end of the pier please excuse my thumb!


Then we walked back over to where the 5k started and did some shopping at that store. I got a Castaway Cay Tervis tumbler and a 5k sticker for my car. After shopping We caught the tram and headed back towards the ship but Liam asked if we could go out on a paddle boat so we got off at the first tram stop and rented a 4 person paddleboat. Grandmom, Liam, Nathan and I went out on the boat while DH stayed back with the smaller kids. The cost was about $20 for 30 mins. There are only paddles in the front so Grandmom and I sat in the front and the boys were in the back by themselves. I was a little nervous but they were in life jackets so they were fine. About 5 mins out in the water the kids wanted to go back. I told them no way, we were getting our money's worth and we stayed out the entire 30 mins. We didn't see any fish but it was a good time exploring. By the time we were done it was 4 and we had to get back on the ship so Nathan wouldn't miss his appointment at the Pirate's league. ​

 

[MommaoffherRocker]

At around the 90 day mark we asked each of the older kids what they wanted to do as an extra treat onboard, Liam choose the Atlantis excursion, Dylann wanted BBB and Nathan decided he want to do the Pirate's league. He was super excited and talked to me everyday about how he was going to be Boney Pirate. He had an invitation waiting for him at our room on the first day and he made sure to keep it in a special place.

So at 4:40 Nathan, Grandmom and I went down to the BBB which had been transformed into the Pirate's league for pirate night.

He was so happy, but as soon as we stepped inside he shut down and wouldn't play along. It was so sad. I think he just got overwhelmed. He did get dressed up and our stylist was really great at trying to get him to come out of his shell.

Sorry I forgot to take a picture of the Pirate's league menu. I know for boys he had the choice of face paint either Jack Sparrow, Captain Hook or Blackbeard. Nathan's look was Blackbeard. The costume choices were Jack Sparrow, Captain Hook or Boney pirate(pictured). I felt Pirate's league was just not up to par with BBB. The girl that checked us in was not friendly. At the front when we paid (before you get made over) we felt rushed and did not feel like the packages were explained to us properly. I don't know if this was due to Nathan shutting down or what. My other complaint was the hat that went to the costume he got was ridiculously small. The stylist told us it was "one size fits no one." She said if he wanted to wear it they usually cut the front and 2 people shove it on. Come on Disney you can do better than that! The rest of the costume fit great. I send an email when I got home asking them to look into it. I mean if it was just my son I could understand but the fact that it fits "no one" is upsetting. We finally got him to snap out of it by taking him over to the ship's wheel right outside of the BBB. The wheel is actually a video game and it controls the ship in the picture on the wall in front of it. Here is a picture of Dylann playing it


After pirates league it was time for dinner. Our dining room for that evening was the Enchanted Garden. The menu for the night was pirate themed since it was pirate night. I started with the Pirate's treasure for my drink and it was hands down the best drink of the cruise. The kids got blinking skull cups filled with shirley temples. They thought they were hot stuff. And the waiter made sure to add lots of cherries! Dylann and Lemon fell asleep at dinner on this night too. For Dinner I had the potstickers and The Dutchman's Dijon-Crusted Sirloin of Beef and everything was quite tasty! For dessert I tried the chocolate rum cake but it was not very good I didn't even finish it.

After dinner we did our usual drop the kids off and head to the show. Before getting to the nursery we ran into Stitch who was just roaming the ship promoting pirate night and we got to get our picture with him.

It was so funny because Dylann left the kid's club early the night before because stitch showed up and it kind of scared her but on pirate night she loved him.

Dylann really want to go to the show this time so she came along. We stopped to shop before the show but this time we decided to splurge a little. I got an Alex and Ani bracelet that has a rebel symbol charm, a star wars backpack, a star wars cruise magnet and a mystery pin (Tinker Bell in a life ring). DH got a coffee cup for work. Then we went to wait for the doors to open for the show. While we were waiting I spied someone with a boba fett mug and I had to have it. I had been looking for one at HS but never did find it. I was lucky enough to snag the last one onboard! The show this time was an illusionist named Greg Frewin. The last time we were on the Dream the performer was a comedian so I was very interested in seeing an illusionist this time. I must say he did not disappoint! Dylann was really into it too. At the end he made snow from a napkin and she is still talking about it. Poor Florida child she thinks that is what snow really is, LOL.

After the show I noticed on the Disney cruise app some of the characters were doing meet and greets so I took Dylann to see Daisy Duck in her pirate outfit.

Daisy was really great and she loved Dylann's hair. DH helped grandmom get the older kids and go back to the room and then he met back up with us. We went up to the atrium balcony to wait for pirate Mickey and while we were waiting we got the best show. We watched Donald make his way down the staircase to switch with Daisy. He stopped halfway and waved

Then when he got to Daisy he gave her a kiss and then they danced!

It was the cutest thing ever!

After a few minutes of waiting we got to meet pirate Mickey.

We headed back to our room around 10:30 and when we got there Nathan and Lemon decided they were hungry. It was perfect because we had been wanting to try the pirate buffet at Cabana's. When we got up there the fireworks were going off. I tried to watch them from the outside deck at the back of Cabana's but they were too loud for Lemon. It would have been a nice place to watch them away from the crowd if you are looking for such a place. We grabbed our food and not 5 mins later the crowd from the party poured in, I guess the fireworks had ended. The buffet was awesome with turkey legs, tacos, wraps and all kinds of desserts. After we had eaten until we couldn't eat any more we went back to our room. When we got back grandmom told us they had a perfect view of the fireworks from the room.

It was another great day aboard the Dream! Coming up next will be our sea day, my favorite day of the cruise!

One last thing for the day I mentioned the Disney Cruise app in this post, if you have never used it before it was such a great thing to have on board. It has everything you need to know about the cruise on it like restaurant menus, character appearance times etc plus it has a way to text through it so DH and I could communicate when we needed to, I highly recommend downloading it before you leave port.

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[MommaoffherRocker]

Day 4

Day at Sea

Our last day on board We were hoping to sleep in this day but we had tickets to meet the princesses and Anna & Elsa. That's ok it was totally worth getting up for. We did a quick breakfast at Cabanas and then made our way to the atrium with Lemon and Dylann. Grandmom was not feeling well that day so she stayed in the cabin most of it. We got in line for the princesses at 8:50 and I would say we were probably 10 families back. Right at 9:00am Cinderella, Belle, Snow White and Rapunzel made their grand entrances from the Royal Palace restaurant. While the princesses were waiting for the first little girl to make her way to them they came up to the little girls in the line and greeted them. All of the ladies were so sweet to our girls. We never felt rushed and they listened to everything Dylann had to say. Lemon was a bit shy but did give them all hugs.

Cinderella even asked Dylann about her fairy godmother in training. We were done with this meet and greet right at 9:15 and then we headed over to Animator's Palate for the Anna and Elsa meet and greet.

When we got to Animator's Palate they had transformed the restaurant into a winter wonderland with pictures of Elsa's ice castle and snow covered trees on all the screens.



They even had a snow statue of Jimney Cricket.

The line went quickly for this meet and greet too. But again I never felt rushed and Anna and Elsa took their time with the girls.



We then decided to go back to the balcony in the atrium to meet princess Sofia and princess Minnie.

Both of these girls were great too but there was less interaction since they don't talk.

After we were all princessed out we went back to the room to get the boys. We took the kids to get a bite to eat at Fillmore's favorites on deck 12. After that it was time for mom and dad to do the chocolate and alcohol tasting in the Pink bar so we dropped the kids off in the club and the babies in the nursery and made our way to the bar. When we got inside Pink this is what awaited us






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[MommaoffherRocker]

We had booked the tasting on embarkation day at guest services for $35. The cast member there didn't know much about it and said they were all full but looked in the computer anyways and said they must have opened a second seating. On the day of the tasting they said they only had 9 people scheduled for it and were taking walk ins. In Our group there only ended being 12 people and it felt like a nice size. Ross was in charge of the tasting and he was magnificent! He told us that the Pink Champagne bar is made to feel like you are inside of the champagne bottle.

Those are blown glass bubbles behind the bar.

There are also bubbles on the wall and every so often you see pink elephants in the bubbles.

The elephant is the logo for the bar and it comes from Dumbo, when Dumbo has too much to drink.

We really learned a lot about chocolate and the alcohol we were tasting. The alcohol included pink champagne, a red wine (from John Lasseter's vineyard), a port and a scotch whisky. My favorite pairing was the melted milk chocolate and the pink champagne.

First he told us which chocolate (milk, dark, or white) or cheese (parmesan) went with which alcohol and then he encouraged us to try different combinations. The whisky that they give you is normally $30 alone so you almost make your money back with just that drink. No one really liked the whisky and Ross begged everyone to drink it because he said he cries everytime he has to pour it down the drain. Luckily DH loves whisky so he got to drink mine as well. He was offered more from the other people there but he turned them down so he didn't drink too much. Afterall it was was only noon at this point.

The tasting was one of my highlights for this cruise and I would loved to do it again next time we cruise.


After the tasting we picked up the kids from the kid's clubs and decided it would be fun to play mini golf. So we headed up to the very top of the ship. We all had fun golfing but it got a little crowded.


Afterwards we decided to do the Midship Detective Agency that we had seen other kids playing all week. There was a desk near the kid's club so we made our way over and picked out which mystery we wanted to solve.

There were 3 cases to choose from, we chose the missing paintings case but I won't give anything away. They give you a map of the clues and a special card to hold up to the pictures to get your clues. We had a blast running all over the ship.

After we solved our mystery we went back to the room for movies and a much needed nap!

When we woke up we decided that we were going to skip dinner in the dining room for the night and just grab a quick bite at Fillmore's. It was hard decision because we love eating in the dining room but we just felt like we were running out of time to do everything. DH decided to stay back with Sam and Grandmom and I took the other kids to dinner. After a quick dinner we dropped the kids off at their club (except Dylann, she came to the show) and then waited outside of the theater for the early show of Believe. Grandmom had wanted a balcony seat since the first show so we made sure we were outside of the theater 50 minutes before show time. They opened the doors 30 mins prior and we rushed in and finally got a balcony seat! We loved Believe! When it was over we went to the art gallery on board because grandmom want to buy me a print I had been eyeing.

This picture does not do it justice! The cloud in the left hand corner is actually the DCL logo. We then went by the vacation booking desk to get information real quick for our next cruise and then went back to the cabin. When we got back to the cabin the kid's club staff had left a surprise for Dylann. Apparently when she was in the club one day they did an art project and they liked it so much they gave her an award. Here are the pictures of what they gave her

A certificate, bag and hat. I had no idea that they even did that kind of thing! It made her night
Since it was our last night and all we decided we needed to make one last call to room service. We let everyone pick something and also got a bunch of Mickey ice cream bars!The food was great, except the chicken noodle soup it had no chicken and no flavor. By the time we finished our snack it was time to pack up and put our luggage outside of our room so it would be taken off the ship for us the next morning. Then it was off to bed one last time aboard the dream.

It was a perfect day to end our cruise!

Coming up next will be debarkation and The Magic Kingdom.




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[MommaoffherRocker]

Day 5

Debarkation/ Magic Kingdom

On the day of debarkation we had decided we wanted to head over to the Magic Kingdom for the day. We just became annual passholders at Christmas and grandmom had a one day ticket from years ago. The night before we put our luggage out so we would not have to take 5 kids and 5 bags off the ship ourselves. We were up at 6:00am got everyone changed and made our way off the ship at 8. We took 528w and did not realize there were so many tolls!! We had two cars and it was around $6 each. We ran out of money for the last 2 tolls and they gave us tickets so we could mail it in. So if you're going this route make sure you have enough cash. We finally got into Magic Kingdom around 10:30. This was Lemon's first time at the Magic Kingdom since she was a baby and it was priceless! Our fastpasses for the day were Peter Pan, The little mermaid and 7D. The day started out miserable, windy, cold and rainy. That ended up working to our advantage. We first rode Peter Pan and it's a small world. Then we ate at Pinocchio Village Haus, we were the first ones in there and we were able to snag a table by the window overlooking It's a Small World. The kids enjoyed that and waved at every boat. Lemon then wanted to the carousel after we ate.

We walked over to Dumbo next and it started to rain. As we waited in line they had to stop the ride because a lady had opened her umbrella while in the air?! We rode Dumbo even in the pouring rain and had a blast! After we got off it really opened up so us and everyone else at Disney ran for cover in the Big Top Souvenir shop. There we all picked out one goody to eat. Mine was marshmellows dipped in milk chocolate rolled in crushed oreos, mmmmmmm. It was so good. We then decided the gift shop was just too much temptation for the kids and ran over to the Dumbo playground. After the rain died down the kids said they wanted to ride the barnstormer rollercoaster. It was Dylann's first ever coaster and she was not too thrilled.
After riding that twice it was time to use our fastpasses for the Little Mermaid. We probably didn't even need them at that point but we used them anyways. After that we rode the Haunted Mansion. I have to say Disney, I think there has to be a better way to do that queue. Trying to make a huge crowd go into a one person line like that is just asking for trouble. But I do have to stay a couple did stop and politely tell us to go ahead of them when going into the one person line but we insisted they go first because we were so many people. It was such a nice gesture in all the pushing and madness. After that ride it was almost time for the Festival of Fantasy Parade. I was dying to see it since the last time we were there it got rained out. I think because of the rain no one wanted to sit down early for it so it was perfect for getting a good spot and not wait for hours. We sat on the wall in front of Peco's Bills. Grandmom ran and bought us some rain ponchos to sit on since the wall was wet. They started the parade 10 minutes early, I think they were afraid the rain was going to start again. While us girls did the parade the boys did Pirates and Jungle Cruise. We loved the parade! When it was over we all met back up and then went for a Dole whip and then ate at Casey's corner, I know a little backwards. We always eat at Casey's Corner, everyone just loves the mini corndogs. Then we headed over to Tomorrowland. Unfortunately Space Ranger Spin was closed so we just did the people mover. Next was Tea Cups and Winnie the Pooh. Finally it was time for 7D!!! This was the first time I ever got to do that ride because every time before then I was pregnant! When we got our fastpasses I had to stagger the times. It was the end of a very long day so DH said he didn't want to wait around to ride so Liam, Nathan, Grandmom and I just went. The ride did not disappoint! and I loved the video they put up on MDE of us riding it. The kids really wanted to ride it again but we were not waiting 70 minutes for that. We have passes so we will be back! Everyone was beat at that point so we decided it was time to head home, after all we still had a two hour drive back!

We had such a great trip and I would not change a thing. I know Disney cruises are expensive and they keep going up but we do so much more on Disney than we ever do on any other cruise line. I just booked our next Disney cruise through Dreams unlimited for the first time. We are going to do a 5 night western caribbean on the Magic next January. We are super excited to experience a new ship! I hope everyone enjoyed my first trip report! I had fun writing and reliving it.

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[crichardson11]

Great read. Thanks for sharing!

 

[Quellman]

Thanks so much for sharing your report. You guys seem to do such a wonderful job balancing special time for each of the kids with things just for them. We are going to do the chocolate and liquor tasting on our upcoming cruise, and are quite excited as it will be our first tasting experience. The pictures of yours looked awesome!

 

[MommaoffherRocker]

Thanks so much for sharing your report. You guys seem to do such a wonderful job balancing special time for each of the kids with things just for them. We are going to do the chocolate and liquor tasting on our upcoming cruise, and are quite excited as it will be our first tasting experience. The pictures of yours looked awesome!

I'm so glad you enjoyed it! I think you will love the tasting, that was our first time and we can't wait to do another one on our next cruise.

 

[sara1215]

Sounds like a wonderful trip. I am considering cruising in January in a few years, since it's cheaper, and I'm glad to hear it wasn't TOO cold. I know it will be chilly but it doesn't look like anyone was uncomfortable.

 

[MommaoffherRocker]

Sounds like a wonderful trip. I am considering cruising in January in a few years, since it's cheaper, and I'm glad to hear it wasn't TOO cold. I know it will be chilly but it doesn't look like anyone was uncomfortable.

It was not uncomfortable at all. We really wanted to do the water activities on board but we ran out of time not because it was too cold. I wouldn't let the fear of it being too cold stop you, even if it was colder there is still plenty to do.

 

[TCB in FLA]

Joining in from the Run Disney page. Thanks for sharing your report! So glad you were able to get your CC5k medal since that's what started it all.

 

[MommaoffherRocker]

Thanks for sharing your report! So glad you were able to get your CC5k medal since that's what started it all.

Thanks for reading!