This Ain't No Disney Cruise, part 2 - My LIVE Trip Report From the Carnival Dream, January 13-27, 2024

[firefly333]

Good night from me too. Its freezing cold here and so windy. Miserable day so didnt enjoy Galveston. I did check into the hotel behind a older gentleman who has 500 pts with carnival and like me disappointed in no priority boarding. Idk if there is 60% priority do it. He said his next cruise will be on rcl. Hes tired of carnival taking away his perks. Lots of us here on dream. Dont know if they booked here because I posted which hotel I booked with parking or what, but I'd say 25 or so some on jubilee and mostly on dream. He said the upside is no kids with these journey cruises lol. Agree. That shuttle needs to be bigger for all this carnival crowd. Lots of us here tonight in this windy cold. Bring on the 85 degree weather. I'm cold tonight. Not Galveston at it's best.

 

Agree it's good you came in Honolulu blue. Lots of flights cancelled. Even dallas cancelled due to high winds this morning. Hope everyone flying in made it. 

[Honolulu Blue]

32 minutes ago, firefly333 said:

Good night from me too. Its freezing cold here and so windy. Miserable day so didnt enjoy Galveston. I did check into the hotel behind a older gentleman who has 500 pts with carnival and like me disappointed in no priority boarding. Idk if there is 60% priority do it. He said his next cruise will be on rcl. Hes tired of carnival taking away his perks. Lots of us here on dream. Dont know if they booked here because I posted which hotel I booked with parking or what, but I'd say 25 or so some on jubilee and mostly on dream. He said the upside is no kids with these journey cruises lol. Agree. That shuttle needs to be bigger for all this carnival crowd. Lots of us here tonight in this windy cold. Bring on the 85 degree weather. I'm cold tonight. Not Galveston at it's best.

 

Agree it's good you came in Honolulu blue. Lots of flights cancelled. Even dallas cancelled due to high winds this morning. Hope everyone flying in made it. 

Thanks for your comments. It was sunny in Houston, but the temperature has been dropping all day. It was 70 at midnight and about 40 now. It should be around 60 by sailaway. Then we get to 85 in Jamaica. I'm looking forward to it. 👍

[Honolulu Blue]

I made it to the shuttle meet point. Breakfast wasn't quite as good as it was yesterday- busier, had an inferior seat, and less selection. Still more than acceptable. 

 

Shuttle came on time and dropped me off in less than 10 minutes. Bus to Galveston should come eventually. No good place fir photos, sorry. 

[princess76021]

@Honolulu Blue I just watched the webcam. Just saw RD  leave followed by the Jubilee. Waiting for you guys to shove off!!

 

have a great trip!!

 

hugs from Texas

Edited January 13 by princess76021
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[princess76021]

Looks like your starting to move!!  Yay!

Have a great time!

Hugs from Texas

[Honolulu Blue]

I wrote a lot, but I foolishly deleted it. Let's try to recreate it. 

 

Our shuttle didn't leave the airport until 1.

 

 

We stopped by the Jubilee first.

 

 

We finally got to the Dream about 2:30. It was smooth and fast except for a couple of hiccups. I passed by the security dog with no issues.

 

The cabin is a standard 1A porthole. The TV is looking a little tiny and out of date these days.

 

 

 

 

I went to my muster station for the briefing. Standard stuff.

 

 

Then I went to Guy's for a late lunch. It was good, better than the one I had on the Magic. It took me a very long time to find a seat in the buffet.

 

After that, Captain Francesco and CD Tyler made their speeches.  The engines have been turned on and we are about ready to go.

 

I met my cabin steward Hery and was offered a choice of early morning (9 or so) or late morning service.  I took early morning, as is my preference. 

[Honolulu Blue]

These are the embarkation day newsletters.  I haven't read them yet, so don't spoil the surprises.  🙃

 

[Honolulu Blue]

Just now, princess76021 said:

Looks like your starting to move!!  Yay!

Have a great time!

Hugs from Texas

Thanks for the hugs. I can really feel them now. And yes, we're moving.  We actually left early. 

[ninjacat123]

Yay!!  Glad you are secure on board and your kitty is having fun!😺 I can hardly wait till we embark on Monday🚢😍

[ChutChut]

So glad you made it to the ship. Love the posts!

[CoasterGuy]

That looks like the old funtimes they used to put in every room. 

 

My last few cruises you could only get a printed copy at the coffee shop, and it was plain black and white. 

[Honolulu Blue]

7 minutes ago, CoasterGuy said:

That looks like the old funtimes they used to put in every room. 

 

My last few cruises you could only get a printed copy at the coffee shop, and it was plain black and white. 

This is the format of the old Fun Times they printed just before the pandemic. Before that they were larger. I never got the small, black and white versions they did just after the restart. I thought those were extinct. 

 

I didn't get one in the mailbox this evening, so I guess I'll have to hunt around for one.

 

P.S. Thank you, everyone, for the kind words!

[Honolulu Blue]

Good morning! I didn't do anything special last night, preferring to hide out in my cabin.

 

I did some recreational reading, surfing, and looking at the calendar for the rest of the cruise. That's one nice thing about the app. Here are some highlights for me that I'll try to get to:

 

* The Wave Morning Show on all sea days. I always have found these fun, even before they added the cutesy name to it.

 

* 90s music trivia this afternoon. I did this when I was on the Magic two months ago and had fun with it. This is in the main theater again, so they're expecting a big crowd. 

 

* There are three elegant evenings on this cruise - one tonight, one on the throwback day, and one near the end

 

* There are singles mixers on several days and even a couple of days with meet ups for independent travelers. I'm highly unlikely to attend any of them, but I thought it important to note. There are also 40+ mixers. I won't be going to those either. 💔

 

* Motor City might be worth a second look; it's one of the Playlist shows

 

* Disco song trivia on Tuesday (Falmouth). Some of my friends would be horrified if I didn't give my best here, so I guess I'll try to make it.

 

* There's lot of trivia on many subjects all cruise long. Chances are if you can think of it, there's a trivia session dedicated to it. 

 

* Pop to the Max is on Friday (Curacao). Let's see if I can make time for this.

 

* The throwback Sea Day is on Saturday. There's horse racing, a social media lecture, and 80s trivia.

 

* We're heading to Colon for the Panama Canal on Monday. I will be missing a couple of music trivia sessions because I have an excursion that conflicts. More about that later.

 

* Rock and Roll trivia on Tuesday (Limon)

 

* I might try America Rocks again; that's on Wednesday 

 

* Billy and Elton trivia on Thursday (Cozumel)

 

* Oh look - The World Works Here on the last sea day. Will curiosity get the best of my this time?

 

As you can see, there's plenty for all of us to do here onboard.

 

The list of comedians performing this cruise: Macio, John Wesley Austin, Rick Izquieta, Cisco Duran, Kim Harrison, Chris Strait, R.T. Steckel, Aaron Thompson. They're performing all over the place - some matinees, some late night, most nighttime, some PG, some adult, some in the main theater, most in the aft lounge. Here's one of them:

 

 

I chose to use some of my hefty OBC on ship excursions in Falmouth, Colon, and Limon.

 

 

 

 

I'll talk more about these as they happen. 

 

Breakfast was OK. Lots of people around,  so I had to search around a long time for a suitable table. The company was good, for once:

 

 

BTW, no bacon today at the trough.

 

I chose to hang out at The Song, one of the small lounges on 5 aft. It's not too noisy and there's not too much company at this time of day.

 

 

And now you're up to date. Ill head to the Morning Show soon.

[mamiamjo]

Have a great sea day, and thanks for sharing your cruise with us 😎

[Honolulu Blue]

The Wave Morning Show is done. It was all right. It did the basic job of informing its attendees about what's happening onboard today and getting people excited about them.

 

Tyler seems to have a fan club. He got two gifts from fans after the show. I can't say that I've seen that before. 

 

 

I also got today's Fun Times at Guest Services. 

 

 

Soon it well be time for the fun ashore,  fun aboard show. Bye for now.

[Honolulu Blue]

I survived the Fun Ashore Fun Aboard show in the main theater. There was a nice crowd for this and I thought Tyler did a good job. Many excursions were talked about and many prizes were given away. I didn't have a ticket and thus didn't win a prize. But he did briefly talk about my Panama City Tour.

 

 

He also mentioned that there were only 19 kids under 18 on this cruise. That's similar to what we had on the Freedom for a similar Journeys cruise in 2019.  

 

Time to rest up for 90s music trivia and who knows what else.

Edited January 14 by Honolulu Blue

[pcvtmom]

I appreciate you doing this Live review! We're Diamond with Carnival, but this is one cruise we haven't done, but HOPE to do in the future!

[Honolulu Blue]

Just now, pcvtmom said:

I appreciate you doing this Live review! We're Diamond with Carnival, but this is one cruise we haven't done, but HOPE to do in the future!

Do you mean you haven't done any Journeys cruises? I'll assume that for now. You can tell me if I'm wrong. 

 

The Journeys cruises are a lot of fun, as I've tried to hint at with these posts. This is my 7th since they came up with these in 2015.

 

[pcvtmom]

We've done several Journeys cruises (and have another scheduled for April). We haven't done Panama Canal, though.

[Honolulu Blue]

Just now, pcvtmom said:

We've done several Journeys cruises (and have another scheduled for April). We haven't done Panama Canal, though.

Spoiler alert: we're not going through the Canal on this cruise either, though Colon is relatively close and there are excursions available to take people through.

 

I've done two partial transits and one full transit, and that's been half of my Journeys cruises so far.

[Honolulu Blue]

So, I did the 90s trivia thing. This was very weird. The theater was closed until 5 minutes before the games began. I hung around elsewhere until I could get in. I found the trophy case on 4.

 

 

I didn't get a pencil or paper, so I  was just playing along for fun. Some of the songs were repeats from the 90s trivia session I attended on the Magic two months ago. But there were some others that stumped me. 

 

I ended up with 25 out of 30 (15 songs, 1 point each for title and artist). Not bad, but two people had perfect scores. They had a sudden death playoff.  They both blew the first song, then one got the second song right. Tyler gave them both trophies.

 

The competition was fun, if a little sloppy. 

 

The best part is Hery and his team made up my cabin while I was out.

 

 

Peace out.

[Honolulu Blue]

Quick notes:

 

* The daily rates for Value and Premium are $25 and $35, respectively.

* Internet speeds are mostly in the 2-4 mbps range. I miss the Magic.

* Had another Guy's burger for dinner because that's what I was in the mood for. Yum yum. 😎

* I feel sorry for the Boys and the fans that root for them - some of whom are on this ship. The Packers were leading 27-0 when I last checked.

[purpleally]

4 hours ago, Honolulu Blue said:

Quick notes:

 

* The daily rates for Value and Premium are $25 and $35, respectively.

* Internet speeds are mostly in the 2-4 mbps range. I miss the Magic.

* Had another Guy's burger for dinner because that's what I was in the mood for. Yum yum. 😎

* I feel sorry for the Boys and the fans that root for them - some of whom are on this ship. The Packers were leading 27-0 when I last checked.

You feel sorry for them after what happened to the Lions in Dallas?  Not me.

[CoasterGuy]

My Browns got beat bad as well

[Honolulu Blue]

58 minutes ago, purpleally said:

You feel sorry for them after what happened to the Lions in Dallas?  Not me.

I do. We should have beaten them, but those are the breaks. The Cowboys have been a disappointment in the postseason for a very long time. And they did it again this year.

 

P.S. Yay Lions for taking care of business a few minutes ago! They have a very winnable game coming up. We'll see if Carnival puts it up on the big screen.