Christmas on the Dream (Dec 24-31, 7-night Western Caribbean) trip report

[nzdisneymom]

One of our favorite things about a cove balcony was people-watching. In Cozumel, we were "parked" next to another ship (Costa Atlantica) so in addition to watching our fellow Dream passengers, there was plenty of entertainment from the other ship's passengers as well. Our location was between the two forward gangways, so we got to see everyone coming back onboard, with a steady stream starting about an hour before all-aboard time. We saw some CC friends and called out to them as they were getting back onboard.

 

We opted to have dinner in the Gathering rather than going to the dining room as none of us really knew what we wanted to do for dinner that evening, but the boys and I wanted to be early for the 7:30 All Ages comedy show. At this point in the cruise, you stop caring about food anyway - it's time for a break or they'll have to roll you off board by the end of the week! There was never a line for the buffet at dinner whenever we would go or even just walk through - maybe we just went early enough?

 

We had the boys come back from Circle C by 11 as we had an early day in Belize the next morning. Their "late night" activity was Arcade time and some of the games were going to be "free" for the evening, but nothing that they wanted to play anyway, so there were no complaints about missing it. I just knew we needed to all be in and settled as we had an early day the next day. Z did go to the Encore Lounge to watch the show - it was a "physical comedy" - I joined him after the adult comedy show in the Burgandy Lounge but was not entertained enough to sit through this one, so I left before it was over. The theater was maybe half full (it was a 10:15 p.m. show).

 

Next stop: Belize!

[nzdisneymom]

We've never been to Belize, so that was one of the things that appealed to us about this particular itinerary. Belize is a tendering port and we had booked the Xunantunich Mayan Ruins tour through Carnival. We had read that it was an all-day adventure and that was absolutely true! Our meeting time was 7:45 in the Encore Lounge where we checked in and got tendering stickers and around 8:15 we were called to go to the tendering boat to take us over to shore. The boat ride was about 15 minutes by the time everyone was loaded and we made it to the pier.

 

When we arrived on the pier, we were directed to the tour group - there was another ship in port (Carnival Conquest, I think) so they were getting their shore excursions together, too, but everything went smoothly in terms of knowing where to go. There was a restroom at the pier that we were encouraged to use before boarding the motorcoach that would take us out of Belize City and across the country about 2 hours to the ruins. Along the way, our tour guides told us about Belize, the culture, economics, daily life, and when we go to the ruins, they were knowledgeable about the Mayan culture and history as they led us through the ruins. We've done several similar excursions during our cruise-life and this one we considered to be top-notch. We definitely were satisfied customers and would recommend this tour. We stopped for lunch on the way back and had the most delicious stewed chicken with coconut rice and beans before making the drive back to the port.

 

Our last tender was at 5:15 - but being on a Carnival-booked excursion, I didn't worry about us being late, but some of our fellow tourists were new to cruising and were worried. Our tour guides were in contact with their operations at the pier to keep them apprised of our location and some of us experienced cruisers assured the worriers that we'd be fine, they would wait for us. And our bus driver was a magician and navigated the roads to get us back in plenty of time. But I can see how if you tried to book this excursion on your own, you might be late - as you can't get off the ship until a bit later and it's a good drive over.

 

Anyway, we were back with 15 minutes to spare, got on the tender and waited for it to fill up before heading back to the ship. One of the tender crew used my camera and took this picture (I tipped him, of course):

 

[nzdisneymom]

And a few pictures from our time at the Xunantunich ruins:

 

 

 

 

 

 

[nzdisneymom]

Our excursion was long and we were tired and decided to not go to the dining room for dinner. I had not yet tried anything from the Grill so decided that's what I'd have for dinner. DH and Z joined me - they close at 6 p.m. so we pretty much dropped our things off in the cabin, washed up quick, and went to eat! And I have to say, the hamburger from the Grill was pretty tasty - better than ones I've had on other cruiselines for sure.

 

What I like about the Gathering is that it's open all the time for seating, so if you get food from the Grill or pizza bar, you can take it inside to eat - you don't have to eat outside if you don't want to.

 

No comedy club tonight, but it was Dancing in the Streets night, so Z and I went to the early show. We enjoyed it but I thought some parts were a bit long - and our seats were off to the side (we got there early, however they were doing Bingo before the show so the more center seats were already taken by Bingo players). Speaking of Bingo, my son apparently went to watch Bingo a lot during this trip - or at least enough to be able to explain to me how it all worked! He said it's because whenever he'd go to a show or performance in the Encore Lounge, they had Bingo going on beforehand. I meant to go with him at some point and get a set of Bingo cards to play but the week go away from us.

 

Anyway, the performers did a great job with the show - it was a little long but at the end, it's worth seeing. Or maybe I was just tired from the day. The boys went off to Circle C for the evening.

 

Tomorrow is Roatan - a beach day for us.

[JAXCRUISER]

Great job with your review--Thanks!

[beach410]

Enjoying your detailed review thanks!

 

Just curious if you heard of Paradise Beach in Cozumel, you might want to try that if you have not already, my boys love it there.

[nzdisneymom]

Thanks for continuing to read! I have the fun times for Cozumel and Belize day to see if there was anything I missed or that was going on readers might want to know about.

 

Monday night's Encore Lounge performance was the Action Comedy of Michael James. My 14 y.o. thoroughly enjoyed the show. This was also 80's night and they had 80's activities and dance parties throughout the evening at the various clubs/lounges. The Fun Force also did some acrobatics performances in the Dream atrium and sat around afterward and chatted with guests.

 

Tuesday was the Mardi Gras party and Superstar Live which we didn't see or participate in as it was late.

 

There were specials at the shops all week with watches, jewelry, t-shirts, etc.

[nzdisneymom]

Wednesday morning dawned early - really early as we pulled into the pier at Mahogany Bay before 7 a.m. even though we were scheduled for a 10 a.m. arrival. This is one of those days if you didn't have a shore excursion planned, it was a perfect day to beat the crowd out to the beach just because you were up and paying attention! They began disembarking by 7:30 a.m. ship time - which was really early local time! I watched the sun come up!

 

We did have an excursion to Maya Key Private Island Retreat. We booked the 10:30 one with a return time of 3:30 to get back to the port area in time to have some shopping before getting back onboard. Since we had the early arrival, we probably could've done our shopping pre-excursion but opted to not rush off the ship. The boys said they just needed to be up by 9:15 a.m. to be ready to get off the ship at 10 - nice thing about boys is they really take no time getting ready! We each had a leisurely breakfast and then got ready for our beach day.

 

We met our shore excursion in the port area. The various ones had signs up and were spread out enough that you didn't get mixed up about who you needed to see. If you were on a shore excursion, they issued you a wristband and then showed you where to wait. There was an 11:00 departure for our same excursion which would get back 1/2 hour later than us, so I was glad we booked the earlier one.

 

The excursion had us board a boat to take us about 10 minutes across the bay to a small private island that was ours (along with a couple hundred other people) for the day. It did not feel crowded at all which I was a little concerned about at first. When we got there, the folks who work there gave us an overview of what to do and when to be back at the dock ready to return to our ship - and for the next 4 1/2 hours, the place was ours to roam. We rented a locker and got changed and headed out to the beach. I was expecting a wider beach with clearer water and more sun, but the area they have set up for the beach area is full of chairs (plenty) and a narrow area for the "beach" by the water. We got in the water for a bit to say we did, but we're not big salt water people anyway, so when I told the kids there was a pool, they wanted to go check it out, so we did.

 

 

 

The pool was really nice and there was only one lady and her preschooler in the water, so we had it mostly to ourselves for a while. As it got towards lunch time, more folks came over to the pool but it was never full and there were plenty of chairs in the sun around it. They also had tables and chairs set up to sit near the pool and in the bar / patio area where you eat lunch. Lunch was bbq chicken, salad, coconut rice and beans (not nearly as good as what we had in Belize), and fried bananas. Tea and water were available and anything else to drink was for purchase. DH and I took turns getting lunch while the boys swam (actually just played in the pool) until they were water-logged.

 

I had forgotten to pack a dry shirt for them, so I went to the gift shop and found a couple of shirts for them - we usually buy a t-shirt or two on vacation anyway, so might as well get them then, right? AFter drying off, we went to see what else was there as they had advertised a replica of a Mayan ruin and animal rehabilitation / rescue.

[nzdisneymom]

The grounds at Maya Key were beautiful:

 

 

and there were some birds just hanging out:

 

 

Thank goodness for the ancient Mayan restroom:

 

 

The Dream in the distance:

 

 

And another part of the island - you can walk the whole way around in less than 10 minutes:

 

[sunseeker04259]

I am loving the review! I are doing this trip March 3, 2012 with my boys 13 and 11. We have Maya Key on our radar and wondered two things...first would you visit again and second I have read that they have the option of swimming with sting rays and sharks. Can you tell me if this was an option. Trying to decide if I want to venture here or save some $$$ and hang out at the beach at the port...Thanks for any info! We are patiently waiting...

[pbxtech]

I am so enjoying your review

Edited January 11, 2012 by pbxtech

[nzdisneymom]

After returning to the port, we sent the kids back on board while we did some shopping in the port area. Mostly the same ole shops but they had a few that held local merchandise. I was most excited to find a Christmas shop as I wanted to get at least one ornament from somewhere on our vacation.

 

Back on board, cleaned up, watched people coming back to the ship... love the Cove Balcony for people watching! I had thought about doing the water slide while I already had my swimsuit on, but chickened out.

 

Z likes to eat in the dining room, so he asked if we could go this night after having only been the first night, so I told him I would go with him. I don't know how he or N could be hungry because they'd both been to the Grill after getting back on the ship! But they are teenage boys (LOL).

 

So dinner was in Crimson deck 4 with the other YTDers. We were seated this time at a booth. Now, I love sitting in a booth in restaurants but had discovered that the booths in the Gathering were too low - the seats, that is, and it was no different in the Crimson. It was fine for the one night but had that been a permanent assignment, I would've asked for a change after the first night.

 

Our dinner was good - we like the Everyday Menu although I ordered the pork steak off the day's menu which was good, and the baked potato soup was delicious, too. This was the night that our server suggested double-ice-cream with the warm chocolate melting cake we all had for dessert - good call! It's also the night that we declared our stomachs were "swollen" from all the good food we'd had that week - definitely time to taper off. Definitely time for a walk about the ship after dinner!

 

This was also the night that we discovered that you can get popcorn from the pool bar in the evenings for the movie. We got a box to try - it has no salt on it, so be warned! Speaking of salt, I would say 9 out of 10 times, the salt shakers we tried to use were gunky - clogged, damp, icky. It was rare to find one that actually worked properly. Next time I may just have to bring my own ;)

 

There were some activities/game shows going on in the Encore Lounge that the boys went to see while DH and I just hung out in the cabin - it was a beautiful night to relax on the balcony. I think this was the night of the Mega Deck Party but we didn't attend. We could've watched on the Lido channel, I suppose, but I was asleep pretty early.

 

Tomorrow, last port day - Costa Maya - no plans except to go to the shops in the immediate area.

Edited January 11, 2012 by nzdisneymom

[nzdisneymom]

A few more pictures:

 

 

 

[nzdisneymom]

Thursday morning - our last port day! We had initially thought that four port days in a row would be too much but since we didn't have big plans except for Belize and Roatan, having Costa Maya next was no big deal. We had already told the boys they didn't have to get off the ship unless they just wanted to.

 

I woke up as we were docking, so as usual, I watched the docking process. The weather was a bit questionable in the early morning and the water was pretty choppy between the pier and the shore. Disembarking started early, around 7:30 or so.

 

We'd been to Costa Maya in 2005 when they were just beginning to have cruise ships come in, so we were curious to see what they had done in the immediate port area. DH and I went ashore around 10:15 and spent an hour or so just looking around. We found that the vendors were "pushier" here than those in Cozumel or any of the other ports, but we chalked that up to them giving tourists the experience they think we expect to have. After a while, the booths all started to look the same and most of the merchandise and prices were consistent from space to space.

 

There was another ship in port with us, so when they were docking, our gangway was closed off for about 15 minutes - it was early and they made an announcement so we'd know.

 

There are two big clocks at the port area where the shops are that show local time and Eastern time - this is important because it helps guests know what time it is SHIP TIME if their ship goes by Eastern time or by Local time.

 

We were back on board and enjoyed the quiet of the ship for the early afternoon. DH and I found a quiet spot on Deck 3 in the Dream Atrium where we just relaxed and hung out for a bit - we ended up coming back to this same spot a few more times before the trip was over.

 

Our all aboard time was 2:30 SHIP TIME so we went out around 2 p.m. to start watching people returning. The pier is pretty long in Costa Maya and they have a tram that brings people to the corner of the L - we were on the far end, so once you got off the tram, you still had a bit of a walk. There was a steady stream of passengers until about 2:45 when we could hear the crew talking about there being about 60 passengers still not back. A tram unloaded and a bunch of people came running our way - most of them had shore excursion stickers on, and we heard a few without talking about how the bus driver took forever to leave from wherever they were to head back toward the port. So then we were down to three passengers still not back. Another tram came and one person came running, so we were down to two. It was now about 3 p.m. and we could hear the crew radioing someone to check the cabin. The response was that the passports, money, and medicine were there and they were instructed to bring them out. A few minutes later, a crew member came out with a bright orange purse and gave it to the Carnival portside officer who checked it and then handed it to the Port Official. The crew member who brought it out said "woohoo - i got to go outside today", did a little dance, then got back on the ship :)

 

So we were still waiting and all of us Cove balcony folks were watching and listening. The port official modeled the purse for us and we all got a huge laugh. Until we overheard something about an ambulance and then we wondered if the missing passengers were having a medical emergency and that they were being brought by ambulance to the ship. We felt bad for yucking it up. The ambulance arrived about 3:30 but no one was on - they took a passenger off the ship! About the time the ambulance was turning around, the tractor part of the tram came speeding down the pier bringing two passengers - who were the two who were late. The Port Official gave the lady her bag as she said "oh, are we late?" Geez - they were really lucky that someone had a medical emergency on board or they would've been left behind.

 

Later in the afternoon, we saw one of the crew who had been involved on the pier and commented to her about them collecting the passports, money, etc. She said they try hard to not leave someone behind but if they do have to, they try to get whatever they can to leave with the Port Official to make it possible for them to get home - they get their passports, cash, medicine, and provide a letter to them about what to do. She said Costa Maya is tough to be left in because it's 5 hours to Cancun to fly home. She also said the reason they didn't get left was that the ambulance had been called at 2 p.m. (ship time) and took that long to get there! Yikes!

[MsBrownize]

Great review so far - I am loving all the details!!

 

Sounds like you all had a great time!!

[nzdisneymom]

And a few pictures from Costa Maya day:

 

 

Port Official with the orange purse:

 

 

Here comes the ambulance:

 

 

What would normally be a 3-point turn was a 30-point turn - I wouldn't want to turn around like that with no guard-rails and a patient in the back. And no worries, we didn't take any pictures of the passenger who was sick and being taken away.

 

 

Here come the last two passengers:

 

[nzdisneymom]

After a couple of nights with no comedy performance, we were looking forward to having two new comedians onboard, so we decided to have an early dinner from the Grill. I have to say that I really enjoyed the burgers from the Grill - we liked them so much better than any we had on DCL - and again, it was nice to be able to take them into the Gathering and enjoy sitting inside to eat them where it was quiet. I met the boys at the Burgandy Lounge for the 7:30 show and we stayed for the 8:30. DH was going to meet me for the 9:45 but was feeling a bit off, so he stayed in the cabin. After the 9:45 show, I joined Z in the Encore Lounge for 8 More Seconds which we both really enjoyed. We sat close to the front but on the side - the theater was filled about two-thirds for the 10:30 performance.

 

The Fun Shops were having a sale on t-shirts so we bought the boys one each with Belize on them - two for $20, and we got the collectible spoon and thimble for their collections. That was all the on-board shopping we did for the week.

[nzdisneymom]

Nearing the end now - one more Sea Day - Friday, December 30th - which means packing. I don't like to pack all day but I don't like to procrastinate with it either, so at one point earlier in the week, we'd gotten two of the suitcases out and put the dirty clothes in that had accumulated to that point, then shoved them back under the bed! There is really a lot of storage space under the bed - thumbs up to Carnival for that one!

 

So Friday morning there was no docking and no sense of anticipation that woke me early - I slept later this day than any other on the trip but was still up before the rest of my family. I had breakfast in the Gathering as usual. A word about breakfast -- I never had a back-up at the Omelet station - there were several available - they even make them at the Grill / Pizza area when it gets a little later in the morning. There is fresh fruit, cereal, pastries, oatmeal, grits, eggs (I guess that's what you could call them - I wasn't crazy about the scrambled ones which is why I chose an omelet on the days I wanted eggs), bread, bagels, ham, tomatoes, and a variety of other foods. They have milk of all sorts and OJ and another juice or two are available at the drink station. They have a limited breakfast buffet at the Tandori outside by the Sunset pool where DH found was a nice place to enjoy his breakfast.

 

I had planned to use Friday as my photo-walking-tour of the ship but never got around to it - in fact, about the only pictures we had from Friday were of the sunset. We did, however, hang out in the Dream Atrium and watched folks do the Bean Bag toss. You know, I saw this listed in the Fun Times and it was funny how many people actually stopped to play Bean Bag toss all week - they would set it up in the morning til late afternoon and there was nearly always someone around playing. Kinda like the giant chess boards outside on Deck 5.

 

After our room was made up, the dreaded luggage mat was on the bed so I guess that meant it was time to pack. I got about half the packing done and then it was time for lunch, and then back to finish packing. Because we were pretty organized in the cabin and didn't let things get tossed about, it wasn't too bad packing - just four people for a week is a lot of clothes. The nice thing was that we didn't have many clothes that didn't get worn which meant we did a great job in packing - finally getting that figured out! We made sure to leave out what we needed for the next morning and this evening and the set the suitcases out of the way so we could put them out later.

 

Time to just chill. I actually sat and did a lot of reading this afternoon. DH finished up the books he had from the library and returned them. I spent a little bit of time in the casino (at this point I was up $95) just for fun and when I won another $75 in about 10 minutes time, I cashed out immediately and left! I ended the week up $170 in addition to the $50 from the Mastercard OBC. We figured the $170 paid for the soda stickers for our family for the week!

 

I took the cash and put it onto our Sail/Sign account - I used the kiosk which is so convenient to check your account, add cash or apply payment from another source without having to stand in the Guest Services line. You can print out your statement or just view it on the kiosk screen. They have one on Deck 3 and Deck 5. I had checked my account a few times during the week but didn't realize I could add cash there until the cashier at the Casino told me I could - I was asking about getting the money I'd won applied to my account and he said either take it to Guest Services or use the kiosk. I don't know why they can't just move it over automatically from the Casino since you can "charge" your casino money to the card, but for whatever reason, it was easy enough to use the S/S kiosk.

 

We decided to have dinner in the Crimson dining room for our last night and we really enjoyed it. We went early like usual and had no wait with our YTD. We never did try any of the Didja menu items, but we certainly all found something to eat without having the same thing every night - until it got to dessert, that is! DH and the boys had the chocolate melting cake with two scoops of ice cream, please - while I ordered the butter pecan ice cream. When our dessert arrived, the boys started singing "One of these things is not like the other..."

 

The comedy shows tonight were going to be repeats of the night before - at least we thought they would be, so we opted to not go - at least until our steward came to turn our room down so Z and I went to see - the place was PACKED and it was standing room only - so definitely follow my advice and go early for the 7:30 show. While the 7:30 comedian was not doing a complete repeat of the previous night's show, he was our least favorite, so we decided not to stay - and I checked with Jeff the Fun Dude who said the next guy was absolutely doing a repeat. So Z and I walked back to the cabin through the casino and we watched a few people playing. Z must bring good luck because one person won about $50 and then another guy won over $90.

 

DH and I went back to the Lobby Bar for one more soda - earlier in the day we had left extra tips with the three bartenders who took care of us all week - big shout out to Michele, Neli, and Dirk! There were still two cans of Diet Coke in the cooler so they gave them to us to take with us which was nice because I knew I'd want one in the morning and wouldn't be able to get one!

 

Back to the cabin to get ready for bed. Our disembarking zone was 16 with a predicted time of 8:20 - 8:40 and a note that said please be out of your cabin by 8:30, so we agreed that we should all be up no later than 7:30 to give us all time to get ready and have breakfast and be out on time.

[nzdisneymom]

Happy New Year's Eve! It's also the last morning, time to leave. I woke up about 4:30 and we were pulling into Port Canaveral. I've never been awake when we've docked in PC before, so I stepped out on the balcony to watch for a bit. The Customs officials were all there yucking it up and drinking coffee - it was really really early! Once we were docked and they started boarding, I went back to bed!

 

Before 6 a.m., our ship was cleared and those passengers who were "self-assisting" off the ship were able to disembark. There were a few people up and ready to go - they were probably locals who would be home and done with their laundry before the rest of us got off the ship :) To self-assist, you had to have only carry-on sized luggage - no large bags.

 

I went to breakfast around 6:15 - they started serving in the Gathering at 5:45 that morning and there were already a lot of people there - no big line but just more than I would've anticipated. Breakfast the last morning is a bit surreal - you know you're going back to "real life" in just a little while. I had an egg and cheese omelet that morning and the omelet guy asked if that was all I wanted - I told him I had to "taper off" so no ham or bacon today. Kinda like weaning yourself off - hee hee.

 

I watched the off-loading of the luggage - there is so much luggage! The way it works at the terminal in Port Canaveral is that there are two luggage carousels, so they offload two zones at once - then one zone's luggage goes to one carousel and the other zone goes to the other carousel. They don't call your zone until that group's luggage is on the carousel - then you get off the ship, go through Customs and collect your bags. Be sure to have your passports ready and your declaration form in your hand when you get off the ship. The port folks are pretty organized and show you where to go - they move folks through pretty quickly.

 

So anyway, the rest of the family got up and got ready, I finished the packing, and then we waited until it was time to vacate the cabin. Being on Deck 2, we only had to walk up one flight to wait in the Encore Lounge for our zone to be called. I had noticed earlier in the morning that the elevators had pads hung inside to help protect them from all the banging around from the luggage being hauled off by passengers. I also noticed that on Deck 3 in the Dream Atrium (you exit on the port side), they had taped off the sitting areas that said Please don't wait there - it was nice because on other lines, we've seen folks crowding up so when it's your turn to get off, you can't get through. Maybe because we were 16 and a lot of folks had already left, we missed a big knot of folks, but it didn't seem like it. It was a breeze through customs and luggage collection.

 

So double checking that we had everything before exiting the port (having read reports here at CC about folks leaving something inside and the difficulty they had in collecting it later), we went out and found where to wait for the shuttle back to the Country Inn and Suites and our car. Duane was there pretty quickly to pick us and others up, and we were at the car loading up before 9 a.m.

[nzdisneymom]

And that's that - the end!

 

Thank you for reading and your kind comments. If you have any questions or want more information about something, please ask - I'd be happy to share what I know or experienced. I did write a review to go on the main page including port reviews - I read a lot of those before we left and found them to be helpful.

 

We will definitely keep Carnival in our cruise rotation - we had a great time and enjoyed the cruise and the cruiseline. Thanks to everyone for your tips and information shared on these boards - they definitely added to our enjoyment!

[NeuroQueen]

I really enjoyed your review. We were on the Dream doing Eastern over Thanksgiving and had cove 2288. Weren't those balconies great? We had really rough seas, so the waves were fun to watch crashing over the bow. We also loved people watching from the balcony. We had Dirk as a bartender in the casino bar all week and he was definitely entertaining. The service was great all week. Thanks for the review!

[KrystalWaters]

Thank you for a wonderful review. I too have booked a cove for my upcoming cruise this Fall.:)

[cardplayer]

thanks for the review. we will be sailing on Feb.18 with family and will be staying in a cove balcony. this is our 13th cruise and the first in a balcony room. I have a question about the country Inn you stayed in before the cruise. we also booked rooms there and I was wondering if the pool area is nice. We will be with our teenage grandchildren and was hoping it had a nice pool for the kids. this is our 2nd cruise with the kids and grandkids. we were on RC Freedom of the Seas 2 years ago and family really enjoyed that cruise. I have been reading Dream reviews for months now and can't wait to experience it for myself.

[nzdisneymom]

Cardplayer, yes, the pool area at country inn is nice.

[bigdaddyvoges]

Great Review!!! Kind of disappointed to see that Maya Key (Previously known as Fins n Flippers) is now 100% cruise excursion customers. I was there 2.5 years ago under the Fins n Flippers name and they only allowed 50 people in per day. What a relaxing day this was. Now that you say more people are definitely there, I think it takes away from the "hidden gem" that it was. I am assuming the new owners are generating a lot more profit nowadays so good for them.

 

Glad you had a great time.