Dream Review - 4/27

[sparky9016]

Thanks for all the comments! Wasn't sure that anyone would be that interested in our travels... :)

[bubbakirk43]

very nice review ,we are cruising on the dream the end of august on the same itinerary.We also will be in a cove balcony on the port side #2284 ,do you recall if they offer the 102 oz . draft tubes in the red frog bar?Looking forward to reading the rest of your review.

[sparky9016]

very nice review ,we are cruising on the dream the end of august on the same itinerary.We also will be in a cove balcony on the port side #2284 ,do you recall if they offer the 102 oz . draft tubes in the red frog bar?Looking forward to reading the rest of your review.

 

 

Sorry, I don't know about the draft tubes... 102oz? HOLY COW! HA! :p

 

They did have the turvis tumblers in both Red Frog and Blue Iguana for those people that are interested in those. I know they had some larger type of drinks there, but I don't remember them saying anything near 102 oz...

[sparky9016]

Day 5 – Roatan.

 

I had read all the comments about people missing this port due to wind and weather conditions, so I was a bit nervous about not making this port. This port was really the main reason we chose this itinerary (I had read all the stuff about missing the port AFTER I booked the trip!). This trip was an early graduation gift for DD, and she reeeeaaallllyyy wanted to see the monkeys in Roatan. I was really nervous when I woke up this day, because it seemed kind of windy, but we were a little bit out from the island yet. So I was really relieved when we got closer and it seemed calmer. It must have been ok, because soon we were backing in to dock in Roatan.

 

 

 

We hired Victor Bodden Tours to have a private tour. The cost was $25/pp and an additional $5/pp for the monkeys. We had numerous correspondences with Bodden Tours before leaving, and they were very specific on how to get to them. Evidently Mahogany Bay was built by Carnival (according to our guide), and so they won’t let any private tour operators come in to pick people up. So you have to walk quite a distance to get to them, over a pretty big hill too. There are taxi’s waiting that will take you over the hill (all the white cars in the photo below), but I had forgotten to get smaller bills before this trip, so I didn’t want to have to try to make change with the taxi driver.

 

 

The lack of small bills also proved to be an issue with the locals that were selling things. They either don’t have smaller bills or enough to make change, or they just say they don't have change so you buy more. Either way, just a note to make sure you have lots of smaller bills here. (I don’t mean a $50 or anything, they could not break a $20 after you bought $11 worth of items).

 

Side note – our guide did mention that this is their slow season (kind of struck me as strange as I always thought summer cruises were busy) - anyway, he said sometimes they would go from having 5 ships a week to only 1 in the slow season. And when he heard me say something to my partner about them not having change, he said something to the effect of they were probably just trying to make up as much as they can to live on in the slow season; that selling their little trinkets and jewelry is their main source of income.

 

Back to the long walk. Personally, I didn’t think it was that bad… everyone else seemed to think it took forever. :) So anyway, we get over the hill (the above pic I think is pretty much at the top of that hill) and there are about 50 or so people all standing on the right side of the road w/ signs– we spotted the Bodden Tours signs easily (all matched the detailed instructions that Bodden Tours sent to us in advance). They checked our name off their list and introduced us to our guide Victor. He took us to a van and we were taken around the island for a while. He stopped to let us shop at a few places too. (Here at a very scenic stop they have a bunch of little tables set up where you can buy some items).

 

This is the same location - just a different view.

 

 

No more room for photos... more in another post...

[sparky9016]

Roatan Continued....

 

So, apparently, there is only one road running through all of Roatan. And this day happened to be their Labor Day. So, we were driving along this one road, when we ran into a traffic jam. There was about a bunch of people blocking the road – taking up only about ½ block but not letting anyone drive through. There were periodic fireworks being detonated, that my DD thought were gunshots! LOL! After sitting there for an hour and only moving about 2 blocks, our guide had another driver go to the other side of the protest. We parked our car, and walked through all the people to the other car, and the drivers switched so we could move on. It was really kind of crazy.

 

 

 

Another side note to parents of daughters – As I mentioned, we were traveling with two teen-aged girls (16, 17 yrs old). They are both very cute girls, young ladies now I guess! LOL… anyway… so they were dressed as typical teen-aged girls do throughout the trip – shorts, and their cute little tank tops etc. So, I was very aware of MANY men in all three of ports we got off of the ship in and how they were noticing them. They would stare and comment a lot. Now I know this is just mostly harmless looking, and even though that is hard to watch as a parent, it happens. But, as we were walking through this protest, there was a man that was filming it on his phone, and when we walked by, he started filming my girls walking by instead. So, I just stuck myself in between him and them and figured he wouldn’t have any interest in videotaping ME! HA! I felt like I wanted to be a football player blocking someone with my arms out and sort of hopping back and forth to block them LOL! Anyway… just a warning to other parents out there – just keep an eye out on your kids – even older teens. You never know… for all those you can see looking, there are more out there you are not even noticing.

 

After the traffic jam, we went to see the monkeys. This was a highlight for us. You get to go in the cages with the baby monkeys and they climb on you and you can feed them sunflower seeds.

 

 

And my favorite...

 

They are so cute! They also have some really colorful birds, and deer there.

 

They would sit on your shoulder and eat sunflower seeds!

 

 

More to come...

[wannago35]

Excellent review so far, thanks for sharing! We cruise the Dream in October and can't wait.

[Lorie]

Enjoying your review. Can't wait to hear more. Seems like you had a great time!

[sparky9016]

Roatan Continued...

This picture was of nothing specific, it just sort of struck me as we drove by, so I snapped a photo...

After this we went to drive down a beach area, and got out and walked for a bit down a street lined with shops. We were going to have some beach time, but we just decided to skip that part of this excursion.

Some photos of an area on the beach...

We had read before our trip that there are places to help out in Roatan, so we wanted to visit a local children’s home. Victor took us to what he called the “poorest one” and we met the man that runs the household, and he showed us around a bit. We had brought some cookies and treats for them, but after seeing the conditions, it sort of makes you want to do more. We were commenting on that to Victor as we were leaving, saying that maybe we could send some things over later. They have no air conditioning, barely any fans, and most of the beds didn’t have sheets even. Victor said that even with all that being true, they mostly just want/need food donations from people. It’s sad, I know we have needy people here in the States too, but it just tugs at your heart to see kids living like that no matter where they are.

After that, we went back to the port area, did some shopping and roamed around there for a little while before heading back to the ship. We were all hungry by this point, we hadn’t stopped to eat anywhere on the island, so we went to the buffet for a quick bite, followed by a nap.

Today at dinner I had escargot, chateaubriand, and amaretto cake for dessert. It was all very good.

I think tonight was Dancin’ in the Streets. We got there early, and there was going to be Bingo going on first. So, we tried our hand at that… surprise! We didn’t win! HA. Dancin’ in the Streets was a really good show… we usually aren’t much into the shows, but I have to say, this one was really entertaining. Some of those people are very, very talented. DD & BFF enjoyed the Fun Force Dancers in the atrium one night as well. According to them, one of them was SUPER HOT! LOL!

Back to the room, and I believe we ordered room service. We hadn’t eaten for an hour or two, so we were STARVING! Ha Ha! ;) The food was good too.

Up next – Day 6 – Costa Maya.

[KirkNC]

Thanks for taking the time to post a review!

[sparky9016]

Glad you had a great trip, too! We loved the Dream two weeks before you. And we also had great MDR service re: wait staff (Ida, Luis, Iwayne), who called us by name each night. Our drinks took forever though, but we were on the Crimson top floor and late-time dining, so that may have been why. We enjoyed the food as well, especially the warm cinnamon cake with rum raisin ice cream, and the penne. Did you get to dock at Roatan? We had to go to Coxen Hole and was so glad we didn't miss the island altogether. It was beautiful!

 

 

Yes, thankfully we docked in Mahogany Bay. I had read a review of -I guess it was your sailing - saying that they had to dock in Coxon Hole, which I was praying for if the Captain could not back into Mahogany Bay! It was a very beautiful island! I agree! We are thinking of going back for a full vacation there in the future.

[LHARTWICK]

"We deliberately chose chairs the farthest away from the water toys and kids as we could. We were one of only two ships in port that day, so the beach was not crowded, but a family with 3-4 small children decided to sit right next to us, and then play in the water directly in front of us – screaming and being really loud. It was hard to relax with that going on. Then after they moved to one of the beds farther back on the beach, a group of half-drunk 20somethings came and took their place. I know we all paid to be there, and I know I’m probably expecting too much; but I’m just one of those people that will never understand why people claim the space right next to someone else when there are lots of other places to go. (This goes for beaches, elevators, bathroom stalls, etc… it’s called personal space people!)"

 

I'll get flamed along with you - I love it!! And don't EVEN get me started on elevators and the people who absolutely refuse to let others off BEFORE they go in. There goes the blood pressure.....see what you've done? :)

 

I love the monkey pictures - remindes me of Marcel from the Friends series. :)

 

Love your review - we booked the Dream yesterday to sail in December. We sailed on her sister Magic last December and loved it! Thanks!

[sparky9016]

"We deliberately chose chairs the farthest away from the water toys and kids as we could. We were one of only two ships in port that day, so the beach was not crowded, but a family with 3-4 small children decided to sit right next to us, and then play in the water directly in front of us – screaming and being really loud. It was hard to relax with that going on. Then after they moved to one of the beds farther back on the beach, a group of half-drunk 20somethings came and took their place. I know we all paid to be there, and I know I’m probably expecting too much; but I’m just one of those people that will never understand why people claim the space right next to someone else when there are lots of other places to go. (This goes for beaches, elevators, bathroom stalls, etc… it’s called personal space people!)"

 

I'll get flamed along with you - I love it!! And don't EVEN get me started on elevators and the people who absolutely refuse to let others off BEFORE they go in. There goes the blood pressure.....see what you've done? :)

 

I love the monkey pictures - remindes me of Marcel from the Friends series. :)

 

Love your review - we booked the Dream yesterday to sail in December. We sailed on her sister Magic last December and loved it! Thanks!

 

 

Thanks for the thumbs up! LOL! Wasn't sure how that would be taken... the elevators were, frankly, ridiculous. I could not believe how many times people would literally STUFF themselves into an already full elevator. Drove me crazy. I feel bad for claustrophobic people in those situations... I can't even imagine. :eek:

[wannago35]

Thanks for sharing the info about the donations. I had read on here before that Bodden took someone else to a school and those cruisers took school supplies with them. We had planned to fill a backpack with pens, pencils, paper, crayons, etc. and just leave the thing. Did this appear to still be a need? Thanks.

[pmoniz]

Loving your review so far!! We are booked with Victor Bodden as well (Zip and Dip) and can't wait!! Was there a reason why you all didn't get off the ship in Belize?

 

Can't wait to read more!!

[sparky9016]

Thanks for sharing the info about the donations. I had read on here before that Bodden took someone else to a school and those cruisers took school supplies with them. We had planned to fill a backpack with pens, pencils, paper, crayons, etc. and just leave the thing. Did this appear to still be a need? Thanks.

 

 

It depends I think. We went to a children's home, rathern than a school, so they had said they needed other things, mostly food items. The schools may have a different need. Bodden Tours had sent us a confirmation email shortly before our trip that included a lot of detail about our trip, and it included a website that linked to the different places in need, and what types of things they were needing. It was on the familytravelnetwork dot com.

[sparky9016]

Loving your review so far!! We are booked with Victor Bodden as well (Zip and Dip) and can't wait!! Was there a reason why you all didn't get off the ship in Belize?

 

Can't wait to read more!!

 

 

Well, it sort of seemed like the main attraction in Belize was cave tubing, and while that sounds like fun... we weren't up for all the long travels to get there to actually do it. Also, since we only had two sea days, and we enjoy the ship almost as much as the ports, we decided it would be nice to stay onboard and have the ship to ourselves. We also weren't too keen on the long, crowded tender to just be in the port area, which other's had described as not having much to do. It was nice to have the ship be less crowded. :)

[pmoniz]

Makes sense!! I love sea days and was a little sad about only have 2 on this cruise, but oh well. We have cavetubing booked for Belize. Not really looking forward to the long tender!! UGH!!

[sparky9016]

Makes sense!! I love sea days and was a little sad about only have 2 on this cruise, but oh well. We have cavetubing booked for Belize. Not really looking forward to the long tender!! UGH!!

 

 

We watched the tenders from our balcony, sorry to say, they looked VERY crowded. Especially the first ones to go...

[hermitstyle]

Makes sense!! I love sea days and was a little sad about only have 2 on this cruise, but oh well. We have cavetubing booked for Belize. Not really looking forward to the long tender!! UGH!!

I was on this cruise and did cave tubing in Belize. I am platinum, so I had priority tendering, but it was still a bit of a process, but that's the way it is with tender ports - and getting back was worse, was on the last tender to the ship, and on the tender before that, someone actually jumped off the tender to swim to the remaining distance to the ship...so that added some wait times on the tender process. Cave tubing was ok, but since it's not the "rainy" season, the waters were really really calm. Myself and another person in my party had actually fallen asleep a couple of times because the water was soooooo slow :o

[JawjaFatBoy]

Enjoying your review very much! Was just talking to DW a day or two ago about booking this same itinerary for next year, so any info is helpful.

[sparky9016]

I was on this cruise and did cave tubing in Belize. I am platinum, so I had priority tendering, but it was still a bit of a process, but that's the way it is with tender ports - and getting back was worse, was on the last tender to the ship, and on the tender before that, someone actually jumped off the tender to swim to the remaining distance to the ship...so that added some wait times on the tender process. Cave tubing was ok, but since it's not the "rainy" season, the waters were really really calm. Myself and another person in my party had actually fallen asleep a couple of times because the water was soooooo slow :o

 

 

Wow, we didn't see anyone swimming! That's crazy! :eek:

[pmoniz]

I was on this cruise and did cave tubing in Belize. I am platinum, so I had priority tendering, but it was still a bit of a process, but that's the way it is with tender ports - and getting back was worse, was on the last tender to the ship, and on the tender before that, someone actually jumped off the tender to swim to the remaining distance to the ship...so that added some wait times on the tender process. Cave tubing was ok, but since it's not the "rainy" season, the waters were really really calm. Myself and another person in my party had actually fallen asleep a couple of times because the water was soooooo slow :o

 

Thank you for the info!! Wow someone jumped off the tender!! Takes all kinds I guess!! Yikes!! :eek: We weren't sure really whatelse to do in Belize and since we've never been we have to do something! Cavetubing is the big thing so we decided to give it a try!

[sparky9016]

Day 6 – Costa Maya.

We didn’t have much planned in Costa Maya. It was an early port day, and a short one at that. Seems like I remember pulling up to the dock and the sun not even being up yet. So since we are sun-worshipers, we didn’t rush off the ship. We got ready, and went to the buffet first to get a bite to eat, and then got off the ship. We decided to just stay in the port area. So we shopped for a while first and then found some loungers by the swim up bar near Señor Frogs. The loungers are free to use. Almost immediately a bar waitress had come over asking for our order. So, we were planning on just getting a couple drinks and soda’s for the kids, oh and we had gotten a coupon as we walked around for free nachos with a drink order as well. So I ordered two Coke’s, a margarita, and a pina colada. She asked me if I wanted the soda’s to be refillable, so I agreed to that. Then she asked if I wanted large cocktails. I said no, as other times I’ve been in Mexico and ordered large cocktails, they are ENORMOUS!

So she went to get us medium drinks. Here is a word to the wise for anyone that decides to stay in this area. ASK PRICES! LOL! She came back with our drinks, which were all in souviner glasses – the soda had come in those tall plastic “yard” glasses, and our cocktails came in plastic cups that looked like palm trees. Take a guess how much these drinks cost… $52!!! WHAT??!?!? I was so mad at myself for not asking more… I know better. So, after we savored our luxuriously fancy $52 drinks in the sun at the pool, we shopped a little more, did a little tequila tasting in one of the shops… the girls got matching henna tattoos, and then we headed back to the ship.

These are a couple pics of the pool area:

And this is the ship and you can sort of get the idea of the looonnng dock area... There is a free trolly that runs back and forth to take you though.

Since we hadn’t eaten in this port either (I know, it’s hard to believe we made it that long without stuffing our faces!), we headed to the buffet once back onboard. And then… you guessed it… food coma nap! LOL!

Tonight was the second formal night. We got all dressed up and took more photos before dinner. We found that there are a lot more photographers on the Promenade deck. We had a little time to kill after that, so we went to the Taste Bar tonight. I was under the misguided impression that they had this every night, but every time we went to try it, it was closed. Evidently, they only have it on certain evenings. I know they said the last two nights of the cruise they were having it, but as far as the beginning of the cruise, I’m not sure. Tonight they had a meatball and something else I can’t remember (maybe a piece of toast with some cheese?). I do wish they would have kept the sushi bar there though, I really missed the sushi from when we were on the Liberty.

Dinner tonight was Oysters Rockefeller, Petite Filet Mignon, and Chocolate, Raspberry, and Vanilla Crème Cake. It was all very, very good!

Note – seems like I might have my dinners in a little bit of an “off” order. Seems like we had Oysters Rockefeller earlier in the week, but I can’t remember!? Sorry about that! I was much better at putting in my notes in the beginning of the trip! :)

After dinner we went to the Casino again, and then had some Pizza and turned in. Prior to this point, DD and BFF had not really taken advantage of the teen clubs much. I guess they ended up making some friends, as they were out pretty late this night.

Up next… Day 7 – Sea Day.

[iott family]

Thanks for the thumbs up! LOL! Wasn't sure how that would be taken... the elevators were, frankly, ridiculous. I could not believe how many times people would literally STUFF themselves into an already full elevator. Drove me crazy. I feel bad for claustrophobic people in those situations... I can't even imagine. :eek:

 

Im with you on this! The elevator was full and this rather large, 6ft-300lbs, dude was determined to get on the elevator too! He shoved me into the folks behind me, luckily my husband was able to catch me or I was going down. Guess how far he rode? The next floor up! I guess he couldnt walk a flight of stairs! :mad:

[sparky9016]

Day 7 – Sea day.

Today is our last day :(. We ordered room service this morning, and had some coffee and another very dry bagel. After we got ready, we headed up to the Lido deck to sit in the sun. Today, the chair hogs were out in FORCE! Wow, there was hardly any place to sit. It was probably about 8:30 or so, and we could only find maybe 3 places left open. There were very few people actually sitting out there, but the chairs were all “spoken for”. Also, I never saw anyone from Carnival checking on how long chairs were left unoccupied. So we claimed some chairs and hung out there for a bit.

I like the layout of the lido deck, but I did not love that they have umbrellas stuck everywhere. They are put right in the deck, you cannot move them, and it makes it hard to move your chair at all… maybe that was by design. Also, if you’re sitting out there trying to catch some rays, and someone nearby decides they want the umbrella up, then buh-bye sun for you! Shadows got cast right over other peoples chairs, no matter if you sit right by the umbrella or a row over. I just thought that was kind of poor planning. Maybe put some umbrellas all in one little section for the people who don’t want to be out in the sun.

My partner went to get some food from the buffet at one point, and said that there was a huge fight in there. A bunch of guys were beating each other up and there was apparently only one little security guard that wasn’t doing anything until he had more backup. Not sure what the outcome of that was, but I guess the guys were a bloody mess when it was done.

After we hung out there, we gave our chairs to DD & BFF and went to look at all of our photos. We ended up purchasing 4 of them. After that, we went to the Comedy Brunch again. It wasn’t as good today, but we did get our free drinks for being past guests. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not going to say the food was bad at any point on the entire trip. Just some times were better than others.

I think we just took another nap and hung out in the cabin today until around dinner time. Then we had a drink on the Promenade deck and headed to the dining room. Tonight I had two appetizers… couldn’t resist. :p Frog legs, and the crab cake. Both were good, but the frog legs were a little on the bland side for me. My entre was prime rib, and for dessert the Grand Mariner Souffle. Delicious. My partner and BFF got the bacon macaroni and cheese and said it was very good as well. They thought it looked so good they took a picture of it… and this is the only food picture we have from the whole trip! HA!

 

After dinner, we headed back to the room to finish packing and get everything ready since I figured the girls would be out pretty late again, and we had to have our luggage out by 11 PM. We had FTTF, so they had put in our room an envelope with instructions and Zone 2 tags. They had also given us our customs declarations forms earlier in the day. It was also pretty early in the evening when our room steward came to bring our alcohol to us so we could pack it up. All accounted for. :) Last time on the Liberty they had lost some of our alcohol, and it took a while, and a long wait in the guest services line trying to find it. So I was really happy it was all painless this time!

We decided to head out to the casino for a bit then, and the girls headed to Club O2 for a while (a LONG while). After we decided we didn’t want to lose any more money in the casino, we grabbed some pizza and ice cream (last one of the trip :() and headed back to the room.

So earlier on this day, I thought I heard the Captain make an announcement – and could not hear most of it – I wish there was some way for you to be able to hear the announcements in the cabin. If there is, I was not able to find it… course I did not look too hard either! Anyway, I thought I heard him basically warning us of rough seas coming up and something about wearing sturdy shoes when on open decks? Something like that. Anyway, we had seen the Miami news earlier and it looked like there was some weather moving off the coast so that all made sense to me. So about I guess 9 or 10PM the ship started rocking… a lot. Sort of felt like we were bobbing like a cork out there. That always amazes me too, since they are SO BIG! Now, I am prone to motion sickness in cars, so I always take Bonine on every cruise (might have contributed to the daily naps too!). Course, by this time, we had run out! So, on one of the only nights we might have needed it, we didn’t have any! Not good planning! It turned out ok though, none of us got sick. It was a rocky night though. The girls were out very late again… made for a very early morning for them!

Up next… Debarkation.