Our Cruise Aboard the Carnival Dream, 3/22/14 - 3/29/14

[krdougan]

I am going to try to write a fairly in depth account of our cruise aboard the dream. It might take a few days to finish, but let's get started....

 

We cruised on the Carnival Dream from Saturday, March 22nd to Saturday, March 29th. Here is a review of our cruise:

 

My family of 4 was part of a group of 44 people from just north of Cincinnati that decided to go on the Carnival Dream for our Spring Break cruise. We are a group of 11 families that consisted of 21 adults ranging from around 40 to early 50s. We also had 2 young ladies of age 20 and 24. In addition we had 4 16 year old girls, 1 15 year old boy, 3 15 year old girls, 6 14 year old girls, 1 13 year old girl, 2 12 year old boys, 2 11 year old boy, and 2 8 year old boys.

 

To give you a little background on me. This was my 7th 7 night cruise with Carnival. I have never cruised with any other cruise line. Two of those cruises have been with just my family. One was with one other couple and no kids. Another was 3 other couples and no kids. One was in a group of about 19. Another was last year in a group of 28. I have previously cruised aboard the Conquest, Glory, Splendor, Valor, Glory again, and the Magic.

 

Of the 11 families going on the trip, 3 families elected to fly to Orlando on Thursday prior to the cruise. Of those that drove, 7 of the families left on Thursday night to drive to Port Canaveral and the other family left on Friday. The night before the cruise 10 of our 11 families stayed at the Radisson Resort at the Port. They offered us a good deal due to the size of our group and we were able to park there for the week as well as get a shuttle to and from the airport.

[gregg204]

Looking forward to your review. Sailing on the Dream in June out of New Orleans.

[krdougan]

We arrived at the Radisson Resort at the Port before 11:00 AM and shockingly, our room was ready. We went to our room to unload our bags and then we drove down to the beach. We hung out for several hours at the beach enjoying a nice warm day. We walked over to the Sandbar Sports Grill for lunch. It was a hopping place, but the NCAA tournament games were on, so we enjoyed watching them. The service there was abysmal. We were probably there for 2 hours just trying to get a few drinks and lunch. The food was a mixed bag. Most people really liked what they got, but a buddy and I decided to split two appetizers. We got some shrimp-filled jalapeno poppers, and when they finally arrived, they were very good. However, we also split some conch fritters, and they were without question the worst conch fritters I had ever had. We went back to the beach for a while and then headed back to our hotel. We hung out that evening at the hotel and enjoyed the nice pool. There are several places very close by to eat, so some people in our group got Subway, others ordered pizza or pasta from the Italian place, while I walked across the street to a Thai place and got some Thai food for my family. The food was good and the hotel was very nice and we enjoyed a nice evening before heading to bed.

[krdougan]

We were all able to get a decent night of sleep to recover from the long drive to Florida. Most of us didn’t bother eating breakfast because we knew we were in for a week of gluttony on the Dream. We had pre-ordered 2 busses to take our group to the port at 11:00 AM. They were there and ready to go, so we boarded the busses around 11:00 AM and went straight to the port. It was only about a 5 minute drive, so we were there in no time. The driver unloaded our bags and handed them straight to a Carnival employee he loaded our bags on their vehicles that would take our bags to the ship. I can’t say enough good things about the Radisson. They did a great job in everything they did, the rooms were nice, the pool was nice, and the service was outstanding. I would strongly recommend them.

 

Overall embarkation was very easy. We walked to the terminal and were able to get through security very quickly. The one big complaint I have is that Carnival decided to take our very small portable cooler on wheels. They said it was too big to take aboard. I can tell you that on my 2 previous cruises I took bigger coolers than that at Miami and Galveston. However, this one was a hard plastic cooler and the previous one was softer and somewhat collapsible. We were not very happy as it was a fairly new cooler and we just couldn’t understand any reason why they would take it from us. We had planned to use it for at least 1 of our port days when we were just going to hang out at the beach all day. After a bit of arguing about it, we had to give up the cooler, and we headed on down to check in with Carnival. Check in went very smoothly and we were immediately released to go on board. Other than the fiasco of Carnival stealing my cooler, this was by far the smoothest and quickest embarkation we have ever had.

 

Once on board the ship, we went right straight to the Lido deck to hang out. We found a bunch of chairs at the back of the boat and hung out there for the day. We ate lunch and just enjoyed being on the ship. I am not one for the lunch buffets. I think the food is decent, but I much prefer the other dining options for lunch. I ate some very good Indian food from the India bar. It was very good and a favorite of mine that I was visit on most days. I also got a quick sandwich from the deli. They have great sandwiches on board. I stood in line quite a while to get my Bottomless Bubbles sticker and my wife, who was officially staying in a different room got her Cheers sticker. After an hour or so, I heard that the rooms were ready, and I went down and checked out our room. I was in 9433 while my wife was officially in 9429. I was supposedly staying with my youngest daughter and her friend, while my wife was staying next door with our oldest daughter and 2 of her friends. We both had typical interior rooms. They really were identical to those on the Magic the year before. I then headed down to guest services to get my wife an extra key to my room. I stood in line for nearly an hour when they closed the line for the Muster drill. That was upsetting as I was almost to the front of the line.

 

I went up to deck 4 to our Muster Station, which was in Club O2. I like them so much better now that we don’t have to stand in the sauna-like heat outside. After the muster drill I went back to guest services to get that key card and shockingly the line was long once again. However, it went rather quickly and I had my card in about 15 minutes. At that point we started pulling away from the dock, so I headed back upstairs to watch us pull away. After a few minutes up there, I met up with my family, and decided to go to the room to get ready for dinner. I had to go down to the mid ship elevator area to find a couple of our bags, but we eventually got them all.

 

Dinner that night was very good. I can’t remember everything I ordered, but I know I had prime rib and I think it might have been sweet and sour shrimp. They were both very good. They had our group of 44 all the way in the back of the ship on deck 3 in about 5 tables that were close together. It was a nice setting to look out the back of the ship while we ate. That night they had crème brule for dessert. One of my friends on the cruise just loves that dessert and he ordered 4 of them. That was pretty funny. I think he only finished 3 of them.

 

After dinner several of the men went to explore the ship. A few got lost in the casino, while I went to the first adult comedy show of the week. I can’t recall the comedian’s name, but he was an older guy who was very funny. We really enjoyed it. I was very tired after the show and headed to the casino to watch some of the NCAA basketball games and eventually ended up back and my room around midnight. I was still tired from the long drive from Ohio, and needed a good night of sleep.

[reerun25]

Great start, looking forward to reading more!

[FloridaMomma]

Looking forward to reading your review. You were boarding as we were getting off the ship. I miss it!

[krdougan]

Sunday was our first port day. We had planned as a group to meet at 9:00 AM to head ashore. We didn’t have any big plans for the day. So, we got up early and headed to breakfast. That morning the breakfast buffets were packed. I think everyone got up early due to the port and it was quite a wait to get anything. We found that the area in the starboard aft where the Indiana restaurant usually is had some breakfast items, but didn’t have near the crowds. So, many of us ate from that bar. I had to go get one of the tasty made to order omelets. I prefer them with everything and then put a bit of salsa from the bar on them. They were very good all week. After breakfast, we had a hard time getting our group all together and organized. This worried me a bit because I was kind of in charge for the week and was very worried about getting everyone together for other excursions where we had more of a deadline. Eventually everyone showed up and around 9:15 we headed off the boat.

 

I wasn't too excited about the Bahamas. I had been there several times and was never very impressed. It had been 4 or 5 years though since we had been there. Because we were only in port until 2:00 PM, there really wasn't much time to do anything. So, we just decided to head to the straw market and then to a beach. I was pretty surprised when I got off the ship. The town looked quite a bit different than I remembered. They had moved the straw market about a block and where it used to be was now and nice little park area with a fountain. We visited the straw market for a few minutes and my girls each found a thing or two they wanted. Before long we met up with about half of our group and headed towards Junkanoo Beach. It was about a 10 minute walk, but it was not too bad and we arrived at the beach pretty quickly. I pictured my wife and some of the others complaining about the walk, but they never did. Again I was a bit surprised by the beach. It was a bit cleaner than when I had last been there and there were quite a few people there. It was by no means a breathtaking beach, but it was a nice place to hang out for a few hours. We spread our fabulous towels on the sand and enjoyed the beautiful Caribbean sun. My daughters and many of their friends headed for the water and we just enjoyed a nice low key couple of hours on the beach. There were several food and drink vendors that many in our group visited. After a couple of hours at the beach we headed back to the ship and were on board by 1:00 PM.

 

On board the ship I headed to the burrito bar and enjoyed one of their very good chicken and shrimp burritos. We hung out on the deck for a while and then I decided to go down to the casino bar to watch some more NCAA basketball games while some of my friends played some blackjack. That was the first formal night, so I eventually headed back to my room to iron my shirt and one of my daughter’s shirts. Dinner was once again very good. I can’t remember exactly what I had to eat, but I enjoyed all of the meals for the week, so I felt it was very good. After dinner I headed back to the casino a bit to watch some more basketball and then went to a bar in the back of the ship called the Song to sing a little karaoke. It was a nice evening and I was back in my room by midnight.

[porcupyn]

I am going to try to write a fairly in depth account of our cruise aboard the dream. It might take a few days to finish, but let's get started....

 

We cruised on the Carnival Dream from Saturday, March 22nd to Saturday, March 29th. Here is a review of our cruise:

 

My family of 4 was part of a group of 44 people from just north of Cincinnati that decided to go on the Carnival Dream for our Spring Break cruise. We are a group of 11 families that consisted of 21 adults ranging from around 40 to early 50s. We also had 2 young ladies of age 20 and 24. In addition we had 4 16 year old girls, 1 15 year old boy, 3 15 year old girls, 6 14 year old girls, 1 13 year old girl, 2 12 year old boys, 2 11 year old boy, and 2 8 year old boys.

 

To give you a little background on me. This was my 7th 7 night cruise with Carnival. I have never cruised with any other cruise line. Two of those cruises have been with just my family. One was with one other couple and no kids. Another was 3 other couples and no kids. One was in a group of about 19. Another was last year in a group of 28. I have previously cruised aboard the Conquest, Glory, Splendor, Valor, Glory again, and the Magic.

 

Of the 11 families going on the trip, 3 families elected to fly to Orlando on Thursday prior to the cruise. Of those that drove, 7 of the families left on Thursday night to drive to Port Canaveral and the other family left on Friday. The night before the cruise 10 of our 11 families stayed at the Radisson Resort at the Port. They offered us a good deal due to the size of our group and we were able to park there for the week as well as get a shuttle to and from the airport.

Would you mind sharing the itinerary please?

 

Thanks!

[wrigley80]

Nice review. We leave on the Dream on Saturday for the repositioning cruise. Will you be including photos in your review???

[krdougan]

Sorry, I am not a huge photo taker. After I got back and decided to write this review, I wished that I had taken more. Almost all of my photos were of my two daughters in some capacity and they really didn't show much of the ship, so I doubt I will be posting any.

 

Sorry about that!

[Mysticks1]

I am enjoying your review so far - we sail on the Dream from New Orleans next month. I hate that you lost your cooler. Carnival now has a rule on coolers that they can't be more than 12"x12"x12" and that isn't very big at all. I was looking for information on that a few months back and saw comments from several different people that said some of the ports were extremely strict on it.

[krdougan]

I was not at all happy about that. I plan on complaining about it quite a bit on my review of the cruise. I am still waiting for Carnival to send me an email asking for my review, but I assume it is coming. I really don't understand the rational behind it either. Why would they care how big my cooler is? I didn't sneak anything onboard in it. I wanted to use it for some of our port days. In some fashion, they will hear from me about it.

[krdougan]

This was our first full day at sea and I typically enjoy the relaxation of the sea days. I know that I am going to tick some people off with what I did each morning on our sea days, but let me be honest and get it out there. On this morning, I actually slept in a bit for me. I didn’t get out of bed until 8:00 AM, which for me is late. I immediately got up and went up to the back of deck 10 to find some chairs for my family. When I got up there, several people in my group were already up there. I think at least 3 or 4 other families had at least 1 family member up there that had thrown their towels on some chairs. I found 4 chairs and put my stuff on them. Yes, that is right, I was holding chairs. However, I don’t really have a problem with people holding chairs as long as at least 1 person from that party is there. That is what almost everyone did on the ship, and I think that is ok. There were a few people who would come out, set their towels on chairs, and then leave for hours. Eventually those towels got a sticker on them and then someone, usually another passenger, would eventually remove them and someone else would sit there. I laid in the morning sun and enjoyed the quietness of the early morning on the ship. I spent time talking to friends or listening to my audio book. I did sneak to the buffet to get one of my favorite omelets, a few sausages, an eggs benedict, and some fresh fruit. Another yummy breakfast. That was my breakfast almost every morning. After an hour or so, my wife came out and shortly both of our daughters came out as well. We all enjoyed the morning in the sun hanging out with our friends. Because about 6 or so families in our group had gotten chairs, we all just kind of sat anywhere and there typically were enough chairs for everyone who wanted to sit to sit.

 

Just before lunch, I went up to the workout room for a nice run on the treadmill. I forgot to mention that I had also done that on Sunday as well after visiting the Bahamas. The weight room seemed a bit better than some of the other ships. They had a lot of treadmills an ellipticals as well as quite a few strength machines and some free weights. However, at times it was still difficult to find an open treadmill. Throughout the week I made it to the workout room 4 times. Often several of the treadmills were out of order, so that would make it difficult to find one to use as well. Overall though, it was a very nice cruise ship workout room.

 

After working out, I went down and cooled off a bit before heading downstairs and grabbing some lunch. Again I stuck with my favorites of a burrito, Indian, and/or the deli. I think though that I might have snuck a little bit of food from the actual buffet though. I think this was the day that they had Caribbean food on the buffet and I always love jerked chicken.

 

I spent a little more time in the sun, but by early afternoon I was a bit tired and decided to wander up to the serenity area. However, I couldn’t find a spot in the shade, so I found a chair in the shade close the serenity area. I enjoyed some peace and quiet, listened to my audio book, and took a little siesta.

 

After an hour or two for my little private escape, I headed back to the back of the ship to see what was going on with my group. Some of the guys decided to go sit under cover near the deli and play some cards. We like to play various games of poker and we play with a bunch of quarters. So we played cards for a while before having to head down to our rooms to get ready for dinner. Once again dinner was very good. I wish I could remember what I ate each day. The food on this ship was always very good.

 

After dinner I hung out with some friends while they played blackjack in the casino. I also went to the dance show that night and it was actually quite good. I am not a big fan of the Vegas style shows or dance shows in general, but I thought this once was quite good. It was much better than the murder mystery thing I had gone to the night before which was extremely boring and a waste of time. After the show a few of us guys joined a few of the women at the piano bar. My wife and her friends loved hanging out at the Red Frog Pub on the Magic. The Dream didn’t appear to have a bar like that as the Red Frog was on the lido deck outside. On the Magic, the Red Frog was down on deck 5 and had a great feel to it with live music that was typically country. However, they really had a hard time finding some place on this ship that they liked to just hang out. They tried the piano bar on this night and enjoyed it at for that night. More to come on this later. After a few minutes at the piano bar, a couple guy friends and I decided to go karaoke. I enjoy singing country and my friends were too chicken to get up there, so we stayed there an hour or so, I sang 2 songs, and then we left. As we walked by the disco we saw that several of our wives were in there dancing. I am not a big fan of dancing, but we went in there for a few minutes and danced with them. Then we headed to the casino for a while before heading to bed around midnight. It was a pretty good day at sea.

[krdougan]

Before I go any further, let me apologize that I am really just kind of shooting from my hip on this review. I didn’t take any notes and am just writing as I go. I am also not going back and proof reading this at all, so I am sure I have made plenty of typos. Please forgive me on those.

 

This was our day in St. Thomas. I had been to St. Thomas twice before and absolutely loved it. However, I was there once with just one other couple and the second time with 3 other couples. Both of those times we took a taxi to Red Hook marina and rented a powerboat for the day. We took those over to Cinnamon Bay and snorkeled. Those were awesome memories. However, with a group this big, we couldn’t do something like that unless we get about 6 boats. We had decided that we really just wanted to hang out at the beach on this day. We really wanted to go to Sapphire Beach. It is supposed to be the prettiest beach on the island and many of us wanted to snorkel. However, while doing research I became aware several months ago that Sapphire Beach was not a great option due to the closing of the dive shop and the only public restroom. So, we changed our mind a couple weeks ago and decided not to go there. I really didn’t want to go to Coki Beach because I had heard how crowded it can be and with a group our size, it just didn’t sound very good. So, we decided to go to Emerald Beach in Lindbergh Bay. I had received mixed reports on how good the snorkeling was, but we decided to give it a shot. I had arranged for 2 safari busses to pick us up and take us to the beach. I worked with Islander Taxi. They gave us a good price and worked with us when we changed from Sapphire Beach. They were actually the ones that recommended Emerald Beach to us.

 

So, I got up fairly early as my younger daughter wanted to go to the workout room before we left. So, she and I got up and worked out. Then we went back and ate some breakfast, my usual of course, and it was very good. We got our group together at 11:00 AM and walked right off the ship. Islander Taxi was there waiting for us. They took us to two beautiful picturesque stops to take some pictures and then we headed to the beach. We had a great day at the beach in St. Thomas. Of course, it would have been better if I had had my cooler filled with cold water bottles, but nonetheless, we had a great time. I rented a chair for $7 for my wife, but my daughters and I just sat our towels on the ground. There were two restaurant/bars there and they had beers for $3, so many people really enjoyed that. We also grabbed a bit to eat at one of the restaurants. The food was really good as my wife and daughters had club sandwiches and I got conch fritters. However, it was a little bit pricey at $14 for each sandwich and fries. But, what do you expect in paradise. We rented wave runners for the girls and they had a lot of fun doing that. We left the beach around 5:00 PM and were back on the ship by 6:00 PM. It was a great day.

 

That evening we just ate dinner at the buffet, deli, and pizza place because we didn’t get back in time to go to our 6:00 PM seating. As always for dinner they had several items on the buffet that they also had on the menu for dinner in the dining room. For the life of me, I can’t remember what I ate that evening, but I am sure I had a sandwich from the deli and maybe one or two things from the buffet. That evening I didn’t do a whole lot until one of my friends had said he was going to karaoke Young MC’s Bust A Move. He did, and it was quite entertaining. I also sang a couple more country songs. I didn’t do a whole lot more that night and again wound up back in my room by midnight. Several people in our group went to bed early that night since we had a long day out in the sun and we had an early day the next morning.

[krdougan]

We had to be up early on this day as we arrived in St. Maarten at 7:00 AM. I had worked hard with a company called Bluebeard Charters to setup what should have been a fantastic day for our group. I had charter a big beautiful catamaran just for our group to take us around St. Maarten to some local snorkeling spots and beaches. The day was to include a barbecue launch on board the boat as well. It was really the day all of us were most looking forward to. We were very excited.

 

We got up early and ate breakfast. We met at 8:00 PM to be off the ship to meet Bluebeard Charters by 8:30 AM. We got to our meeting point at about 8:25 AM. No one was there from Bluebeard. We waited a few minutes, and I started getting a bit nervous. It got to 8:45 AM and I was getting sick to my stomach. I knew everyone was really looking forward to the day. Three families had already paid in their entirety, which totaled over $1000 as our deposit for the day. Just across from our meeting point was an information center. I went over there to start trying to figure out what was going on. In the meantime, a couple guys from my group walked down to the marina to try to see if anyone down there knew anything. I was told that Bluebeard was a reliable company and that they were probably just running late. I got word back from the marina that was saying the same thing. But, by 9:00 AM, I was freaking out. I finally got someone at the information center to call my contact. He answered and we quickly realized that he had us down for meeting him the next day. We had had a miscommunication on the dates. His boat was already out with another group and he didn’t have another option for me. He expressed deep regret and was very apologetic about it. He said he would issue a refund to my card immediately. After a bit of work, we were able to find another company there with a boat that was not quite as nice, but it could hold our whole group. The cost was a bit less, but it didn’t include lunch. We jumped on it. We went with a company called Blue Bubbles. They were very nice and got us a taxi to their boat. We got there, got our snorkeling gear, and then had to wait about 45 minutes before their boat was loaded up with supplies and off we went.

 

Blue Bubbles saved the day for me. I was starting to lose that sick to my stomach feeling about the whole screw-up. We road on the boat with music, snacks, and both adult and non-adult beverages to our first snorkel stop. We were there for 45 minutes to an hour and got to see some nice fish and coral reefs. We saw a shipwreck and a helicopter under water. We also saw some caves. It was some pretty good snorkeling. We then got back in the boat and headed to the famous Maho Beach. We tied up a bit off shore as the boats weren’t allowed to get too close to the beach and we watched the airplanes start to come in. It was really amazing to watch them look like they were actually going to land on the beach itself. Most of us got off the boat. Some swam to shore to get some food. Others snorkeled at a reef close by, while others kayaked for just swam to the beach to hang out. We stayed at Maho Beach for 90 minutes to two hours I would guess. A 777 took off from the runway and nearly blew people off the beach into the water. We saw all kinds of things, especially towels, being blown into the water as the jet thrust started on the plane to begin its takeoff. After everyone got back to the boat, we took about an hour ride on the boat back to our ship. They took us right back to the ship, which was very nice. It ended up being another great day. Thanks Blue Bubbles! I also really appreciated how Bluebeard handled the whole screw-up. I checked the next day and my money was already back on my account.

 

Once back on the ship we all got ready for dinner. I haven’t said too much about our servers on the ship, but our servers in the dining room were the worst I have ever had. They were nice and friendly, but they were unbelievably slow. As I said our group had 5 different tables. I think 4 of the tables held 10 people each and 1 held 4. One of the tables of 10 was served by a different wait staff. That staff was great. They were very quick and efficient. The table of 4 was also waiting on by a different staff. That table was also served very well. Unfortunately, I never sat at any of these tables. If we sat at the other three tables, we were in for an extremely long dinner each night. We were typically getting our dessert as everyone else was leaving. However, the food was always good and I enjoyed just hanging and talking with our friends.

 

After dinner we all went our separate ways for a bit and then met up in various places across the ship. My wife and her friends met at the piano bar. However, the main guy in there got really mad at them during a song when they were talking while was trying to play/sing/lead a song. They weren’t talking loud, just having a normal conversation, but he stopped the music and snapped at them for talking. He asked if they would like for him to stop until they conversation was finished. Needless to say, they quickly left that bar and never went back. To be honest, he wasn’t a great singer anyway. From that night on, they ladies mostly hung out at the Blue Iguana bar up on the main deck.

 

Speaking of the Blue Iguana, I believe that night was the night of the Blue Iguana deck party and 11:30 PM Mexican bar. I was wiped out and didn’t make it to either of those. Well, I did walk by and see my girls out there dancing, but I quickly left and eventually just went back to my room by 11:00 PM to go to bed. It was a tiring day.

[MasonsMom]

Good review!

[Baatman]

A very detailed review...thanks.

[krdougan]

This day was my youngest daughter’s 14th birthday. I wanted to get up early to get some chairs on the deck. When I got up I noticed that our floor was covered with balloons. Someone had snuck into our room during the night and put balloons all over our floor. In addition there was stuff on our door telling my daughter happy birthday. I knew she would love that. We even got a happy birthday card from Carnival.

 

I got upstairs to the Lido deck by 7:30, but it was pouring down rain. It rained for about 30 minutes. I found some of my group and they said that it had just started at 7:30 and that prior to that, all of the chairs in the back were gone. However, the rain stopped by 8:00 and many of the chairs had opened up. So, I grabbed 4 of them and stayed there while the sky looked like it could start raining again at any time. Before long I went and got my normal breakfast and ate it at my chairs. I listened to my book and talked with some friends. However, that morning the sky threatened rain and stayed cloudy all morning. Although we never really got any more significant rain. By the afternoon the clouds had dissipated and it was pretty and sunny again. However, I was noticing that the boat was rocking a lot more than in the past. There were still kids playing in the aft pool, but when I walked up to the main pool area, they had it closed due to the rocking of the boat.

 

Now, let me talk for a minute about the main pool area. We had some debate in our group about whether or not we wanted to be there, or at the back of the ship. I very much preferred the back of the ship. The main pool area is the hopping place to be. There is a lot of traffic there and a lot going on. However, it is very loud and noisy. It is often difficult to even carry on conversations due to all the noise. It is fun to watch or participate in some of the contests up there though. However, the big thing for me is that that area gets zero wind during the day, so it is smoking hot. I like to have a breeze and I like things a little more quiet, so the aft pool area is much better in my opinion. My one big complaint about that area is the music that they play back at the aft pool. It is torturous. I think all day they played about 5 songs I had ever heard of. I think they might have played 1 or 2 songs that were recorded in the last 15 years. It seemed the majority of the songs were lost 70s songs that no one knew and no one I knew liked. By the end of the cruise, that must did start to wear on me a bit.

 

In the afternoon, I decided to go play some putt putt golf. They ship had what looked like the best miniature golf course I had seen on a cruise ship to date, and I wanted to try it out. So, a friend and I did. It was a very nice course and we had a lot of fun. It was a little bit difficult at times due to the rocking of the boat, but nonetheless we had a good time playing. Not long after that, I decided to participate in the knockout tournament on the basketball court. There were 30 or 40 people in that and due to the strong wind, it was nearly impossible to make a free throw. The wind would take the ball at least 3 feet on each shot and it wasn’t consistent with the direction. I think of the 300 or so free throws taking during the contest, only 5 were made. I did make one of them, and ended up coming in 5th place. The wind even affected our layups, so the guy that one was a young tall kid that would miss his free throw, get the ball, and then dunk it. This old white guy can’t dunk. After basketball I headed down and the guys were playing cards again. I won quite a bit of money at cards and then headed to the workout room to try to run. It seemed like the waves were getting better, and running was extremely difficult on the treadmill. I had to hold on with at least one hand all of the time. Only one other person was trying to run on the treadmill and they were holding on for dear life with both hands.

 

After running, I only had about 20 minutes to get ready for dinner for our 2nd elegant night. I took a quick shower got dressed and made it down to dinner just in time. It was extremely bumpy in the back for dinner and looking out the window was enough to make you start to feel a little sick. We couldn’t even walk through the dining room without holding on to something as we walked. This night was my favorite dish on the cruise, chateaubriand. It was very good, but I wasn’t overly hungry due to the tossing and turning of the waves. I ordered 2 of my favorite dish, but could barely finish one of them. I did secretly order a very good chocolate cake for my daughter for her birthday. She really like it and shared it with all her friends.

 

After another long long dinner we had to figure out what to do that evening. I headed to the casino bar to watch some of the NCAA basketball games for a while. They had cancelled the dance show that night due to the rocking boat. They announced that they were going to show Gravity in the main theater. I hadn’t seen it, so I decided with a friend to go see the movie. When we got there they did the old switcherooski and showed a movie called The Way Way Back instead. It was ok, but I was disappointed not to see Gravity. After the movie, I headed up to the Blue Iguana to meet some friends and we played some more cards. I was a winner again. Woo hoo! I went there with $0 in quarters and left with around $65. What a big winner I was! After cards I headed to bed around midnight.

[gelo7]

Enjoying your review.

[krdougan]

This day is always the worst one of the cruise. You spend most of the day thinking about how your are getting off the ship, and for us, thinking about the long drive home. It is always kind of a bummer of a day.

 

Once again I woke up early. I set my alarm this time and was up and out of the room by 7:10 AM. I went up to get our usual spot of 4 chairs. I was one of the first ones up there, but soon others started rolling in. Several other families in our group also had someone come up to get some chairs. I sat for a while and when I started getting hungry I went and got my usual breakfast and brought it back to my chair. This was our last day for sun before heading back to cold gloomy Ohio, so we all wanted to get a lot of sun. I enjoyed baking in the warm sun all morning long. I hung out with some friends, listened to my book, and soon my wife and daughters joined us as well as many others from the group. Before long all of our reserved chairs were overflowing as almost everyone in the group wanted to be out in the sun and we didn’t have nearly enough chairs for everyone. It was no problem, some people doubled up in chairs or some of the guys just stood around.

 

It was a lazy day where people were just relaxing all day preparing for our return to the real world. After a morning of doing nothing and some Indian food and a burrito for lunch, that afternoon was another very uneventful time. The thing that really started to get to me was how bad the music was in the back of the ship. It was literally driving me crazy. Eventually towards the end of the afternoon people started heading back to their rooms to pack up.

 

We all went to dinner and I remember I had prime rib for the second time of the week and some panko crusted shrimp. It was another slow, but very tasty dinner. In the evening we went to an adult comedy show that was very funny. Something happened in the middle of the show though. The ships intercom came on interrupting the comedian and it said Operation Bright Star, Operation Bright Star. It then gave a room number and repeated it several times. I didn’t know exactly what that meant, but I had my suspicions. I think I found out the next day.

 

After the comedy show everyone pretty much went back to their rooms to get a decent night of sleep. Most of us were self-assisting, so we were getting up early to go.

[krdougan]

We woke up at 6:00 AM. We wanted to be ready to go by 7:00 AM. They said that self assist would start being announced around 7:00 AM and we wanted to be ready. I enjoyed my last meal on the Dream. It was my usual breakfast and I knew I would truly miss those breakfasts. I savored every bite. We were ready to go by 7:00. However, some others in our group had some excitement. One family was a cruising newbie and before going up for breakfast they put a couple of their bags without any type of tags in the hallway to get them out of the room. They expected to be back in 15 minutes and that they would still be there. However, as we got back from breakfast, their bags appeared to be gone. However, security on the boat wouldn’t allow them to get anywhere near their room. Two passengers that were staying in the room across the hall were being interrogated by DEA agents. Eventually they were led away in handcuffs. It appears that they had drug sniffing dogs on board and that their bags smelled a little funny. I hate to stereotype, but I had seen one of those guys several times on the cruise ship and if you asked me what one passenger on the ship was doing drugs, I would have picked him.

 

While we were waiting one of the 15 year old girls in our group said that last night on the ship a passenger had died. She didn’t’ know much about it, but she had seen some of the ships officers and medical staff dealing with the issue. I was pretty sure that that was what the Operation Bright Star was all about.

 

Our family and about 7 others all had plans to get off together. We were in the back of the boat, so right at 7:00 we loaded up our luggage on elevators and went down to the 4th floor. We then walked from the back of the ship to the front of the ship on deck 4. We knew that wasn’t possible on deck 3, the deck we needed to leave from. We then got to the stairs in the front and carried our bags down 1 flight of stairs. That was a great way to go, because we basically walked right off the ship at that time.

 

Our friends whose bags were taken were told that they would be down where other passengers would be picking up their bags that were not self-assisting. I was really worried about them because I knew it could be quite some time before they could get their bags. The rest of us got through customs, out the door, and were waiting for our shuttle to the Radisson. Pretty soon the other family came out with their bags. The father in the family had had the forethought to take pictures of each of their bags before the trip. He had shown a $20 bill to one of the porters, shown them picture of the 2 missing bags, and told him if he could bring him those bags, he would give him the $20. It took the porter 5 minutes, but he found both bags and brought them to him. That was the best $20 that guy spent the whole trip.

 

When we got out of customs and walked out the building, we were told to head to our right to find the shuttle to the Radisson. They were already there picking up passengers and before long we got a shuttle to the hotel. We loaded up, gassed up, grabbed a few snacks, and were on the road.

 

We had to make a decision which way to drive home. We could drive home up I95 through the Carolinas over the Knoxville and then up I75 or we could go across FL to I75 and take it straight up to Cincy. One of the guys in our group didn’t like the hills in NC, so we opted for the I75 route. That was a mistake. Another family chose the other route. They got home by 10:30 PM. We didn’t get home until 1:30 AM. We hit thunderstorms, tornado warnings, and lots of traffic issues around Atlanta. We got paid back for such a great ride down.

 

So that was our trip. Tomorrow I will wrap it up by telling you the things I really liked and disliked about the trip and the Dream.

[dottyparka]

Great review!

Edited April 3, 2014 by dottyparka

[45014]

kr, what part of Cincy do you live in? We are about 30 miles north of downtown Cincinnati.

[krdougan]

All of our group is from Lebanon.

 

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[tjlj]

I remember u guys in the show. When they were asking where you were from. As I lived in Lebanon Ohio many years ago.. but mostly Monroe.. we had a great cruise ... that first sea day on the way back was rough. But the second was great. Thanks for the review.

Edited April 3, 2014 by tjlj