A Winter Escape: Dream Edition

Hello all!

I'm sure you've seen me around the boards before, asking weird questions and generally annoying some of you (not too much I hope). I'm Shaun and my B/F Jacob and I have become cruise addicts. Last year we went on our first cruise together (Jacob was on the Inspiration many years ago as a child) on the Elation, and this year we decided to try a longer trip on the Dream.

We love the city of New Orleans, so we are developing a pattern of escaping the northern Indiana winter for a trip to NOLA and a cruise. We loved our trip on the Elation last year and reviewed it here: http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2174671

This year's Dream trip was organized in much the same way. We drove down for 1 day, stayed in the city for one, then took our cruise and drove home on debarkation day. This review will be done the same as my last, breaking up each day into 2 or 3 parts and giving you plenty of pictures, food porn and a detailed review of our journey. We traveled at the same time as a couple of prolific members of this site, so I'm very interested to see how their trips went in comparison.

Before I start my day by day review, I just wanted to summarize a few thoughts, experiences and observations that won't be apparent in the daily journals:

Carnival Comfort and staggered embarkation: Because these things have had a lot of controversy, I don't really want to have them blow up in this thread. My thoughts and your comments are welcome in this one: http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2312195

Dream vs Elation: I found this very interesting. Yes, the Dream has tons of features the Elation does not. Balconies, water slides, the lanai and the Steakhouse are just a few things we enjoyed on the Dream we'd miss on the Elation. However, we were not blown away by the size of the Dream, and aside from the stateroom, didn't think the ship's conditions were very different. Yes, the Dream was the better ship. But the difference was not as dramatic as we thought it would be. To us, the ships were 90% the same. This is not meant as an insult to the Dream at all. Maybe we just didn't think the Elation was as small or broken down as some people believe? Overall, I think this just means we'd likely be happy on just about any ship in the fleet.

Forward vs Aft: After cruising twice, I seriously wonder why the aft is so popular. Even on the Dream we experienced mechanical vibrations in the Steakhouse, the Dining room and Aft pool deck. The same happened on the Elation. I don't get seasick and enjoy the motion of the waves, but those vibrations/shaking can get bad at times and upset my stomach. Thankfully on both cruises our rooms have been in the front half of the ship, where we feel the waves, but not the vibration. I don't think I could ever sleep in the back of the ship. Going forward I will continue to make sure we book rooms in the front half of the ship. I feel for you guys who got an aft room for the view, but were never told about the vibration. It would ruin our cruise for sure.

Crowds: We started calling it "the herd." At certain times the ship was absolutely stuffed in certain areas. The buffet was unbelievably crowded right at the beginning of lunch and dinner. The lido deck was at max capacity from around 11 to 4, and the tiny pools simply couldn't handle the load. However, if we stayed away from these areas, the ship was rather pleasant. We always found good seats at shows, even coming in last minute, the buffets were empty about an hour after they started serving, the Casino always had room to play, the lanai was a ghost town, the water slides rarely had lines and only the loungers in Serenity were full. Chairs and couches were always available. During the evening it felt like half the ship went to bed early, and we always fit into the bars and lounges. We quickly learned to stay away from "the herd" and the ship was very pleasant and uncrowded.

Chogs: Never saw them. We usually were out fairly early in the morning and we never saw anyone setting out towels or items. Either people were in chairs, or they were empty. The only held seats were usually if someone got up to get a drink or use the facilities, and those people returned rather quickly.

Late Dining: Absolutely hated it. For us 8:15 was far too late for dinner (being from the Eastern time zone it felt like 9:15). They also scheduled many shows and activities in a way that we'd either be late for dinner or late for the show. I know it works out great for many of you, so I'm not saying its a bad thing, but for us we ended up skipping dinner quite a bit because we were hungry by 6:30 or 7 and wanted to see a show during that time. Going forward we will either do Early Seating or ATD. Eating after about 7 just doesn't work for us.

And finally a DISCLAIMER: We had a very good cruise overall. As I write out my review, I'll share all of our experiences wonderful, fair and not so great. I'm neither a cheerleader or a complainer and fully intend to tell you what we experienced in the most realistic manner I can. Some of our negative experiences are either our fault, or just our taste. Some of our positive experiences may also be simply our perspective. There are also simply things that in our view this ship does wonderfully, and some things they could improve on. I firmly believe that any cruise is exactly what you make it.

I've got a lot of work to catch up on, so it may be a few day in between updates. You guys seem to enjoy detailed, picture heavy reviews, so I will do my best to deliver! Please ask any questions you have and I'll answer them as quickly as I can. Again, please just ask staggered embarkation or Carnival Comfort questions in the thread I linked above.

Looking forward to your review! I just booked the Dream and will be gobbling up all the info I can on her!

Looking forward to your review! We will be sailing the Dream in 46 days!!

Looking forward to your review! We sailed the Elation right after you (March 2015) and I loved your review right before we left. We actually sailed Dream just before you, over New Years, so looking forward to your take on the Dream. We enjoyed the Dream, but honestly our Elation cruise was one of my favorite cruises we've taken.

Excited to read your review, we're sailing on the Dream in July with our best friends and can't wait!

Looking forward to your review! We sailed the Elation right after you (March 2015) and I loved your review right before we left. We actually sailed Dream just before you, over New Years, so looking forward to your take on the Dream. We enjoyed the Dream, but honestly our Elation cruise was one of my favorite cruises we've taken.

I'll be making a lot of references back to our Elation trip. Thr comparisons are much closer than we thought.

So excited to see your review. We will be on the Dream for the first time September 11th!

Your intro was well written and I am looking forward to your review from the perspective of a beginning cruiser. We have been on both the Elation and Dream many times and have our own impressions, but I want to hear yours.

We sail on the Dream this Sunday. I literally can't wait. The 2nd time for my family on the Dream.

We are on the Dream in March. Just curious of the Fun Force dancers are still on board, my kids love them.

Hubby and I will be boarding her in a few weeks. We are driving to NOLA too. Did you do a park and cruise? If so, which hotel did you use? Thanks and look forward to your review.

We are on the Dream in March. Just curious of the Fun Force dancers are still on board, my kids love them.

Not sure how long they stay, but they are there right now!

Hubby and I will be boarding her in a few weeks. We are driving to NOLA too. Did you do a park and cruise? If so, which hotel did you use? Thanks and look forward to your review.

We were there during Mardi Gras and nine of the park and cruise deals were close to affordable. We used the Extended Stay Hotel in Kenner, then used Fulton Place parking during the cruise. They are usually very good and free us up to use hotels that don't offer packages.

Really looking forward to reading your review. I enjoy the details and photos, and am especially interested as we are sailing on the Dream in three weeks. Thanks for taking the time to write!

Enjoyed your report.

Keith

I've sailed on the Dream three times in the last year, and all three were vastly different experiences but mostly positive nonetheless. I'm looking forward to hearing your take.

Alright, everyone ready?

Background:

As I said before, we love New Orleans. The French Quarter is a yearly addiction that we must continue to feed. We consider it to be one of our "port" stops in a way. It is also "only" a 14 hour drive, where the larger Florida ports come in at 20+ hours for us. After sailing on the Elation last year, we decided we wanted to sail out of New Orleans again, but we didn't want to stop in Progresso. We shortly considered NCL and RCI. The RCI trip was priced way over the other two, and well out of our range, and in the end, the Dream just looked like a ship we were more eager to try than the NCL Dawn.

Time constraints in our personal life left us down to the Roatan/Belize/Cozumel trip, as the other two routes the Dream takes fell on bad weeks for us this year. I consulted these forums and was convinced to try a cove balcony (the cove rates were very reasonable, only slightly higher than the ocean view rooms on the higher floors). We settled on room 2288 which is under one of the small rooms off of the dining room.

Being Mardi Gras time, our hotel options were all extremely expensive and limited within the city. So this year we decided to stay outside of the city and drive in to save money. We were a little sad, as we loved our hotel from last year, but we didn't love it at $288 a night (last year in mid-February it was $120)!!!

Heading out:

We left on a Friday morning at around 5 am from Northern Indiana. My mom and a friend stayed at our place, taking a shopping vacation away from their semi-retired and extremely bored husbands and watching our two dogs. Snow had fallen on Thursday night making the roads challenging, but we purchased a Jeep in the summer, and put it to good use now. We got through Chicago around 6 AM and then another 13 hours of boring, uneventful driving put us just about 50 miles outside of New Orleans.

I hate to admit I don't even remember the name of the small town we stayed in, just that we stopped at a clean, but simple Microtel for $65 that night, ate a small pizza, drank a 6 pack of beer and went to bed.

This is also a good time to mention that both of us were totally unprepared for the culinary assault we were about to put our bodies through. Jacob has spent the last year getting in amazing shape and eating tiny, healthy meals. I had dental surgery about 2 weeks prior to cruising (stupid wisdom teeth) and had only been eating solid food for a few days prior to the trip.

Next up: New Orleans, the start of our pictures and a little Mardi Gras!

New Orleans:

We left the Microtel after a decent breakfast and had a fairly uneventful drive into the city. We drove on a highway over the swampland, which was pretty novel to us. We saw a few early folks out in the swamps in small boats, and even a few boathouses. Around 9 AM we parked a few blocks from Canal Street and headed straight to Cafe Du Monde!

Can you guess what we decided to get? We ate breakfast right on the riverfront within view of the bridge and looking down to the port. A small ship from AIDA cruises was parked at the port, and we wondered just how much bigger the Dream would appear the next day.

We then wondered deeper into the French Quarter where it was fairly crowded but not insane. We stopped in Jackson Square and bought some art from local artists. We've seen artists set up outside Jackson Square before, but today there were artists, bands, magicians and other street performers.

Quite a bit of time was spent wondering around the square before we finally decided to head to Canal Street to watch a parade. We tried to enjoy the parade from Canal Street, but it was full of drunken party goes that were clearly not local, or really doing anything but getting drunk, high or stupid. We decided this wasn't for us, so we headed to Bourbon Street (interesting place to escape drunks isn't it?) and into our favorite little place to eat, Remoulade. Jacob had a rare and extremely local food called a "hot dog" while I just had some common, run of the mill BBQ shrimp.

After lunch we decided to wonder into Garden District where we came upon a fantastic surprise. Many of the parades start in the Garden District where local families and more respectful tourists gather to watch. So we stood there for a while and watched the parades as they passed. It was quite a bit more fun seeing families and children cheering the parade on without the insane party goers and occasional pickpockets on Canal Street.

By the time we had wondered back into the French Quarter it was time for dinner. We had some good, but rather overpriced food at the House of Blues, chatted about our wonderful day and then decided to head to our new hotel in Kenner, La to sleep and wake up to a Dream!

Leaving the city was interesting. Our parking lot was open most of the day, but as we got into the car, they started blocking the street for an evening parade. Thankfully they let us get out before they blockaded it entirely. We headed just down the road to the Extended Stay America in Kenner, where we checked in (at $90 per night) and re organized our suitcases for the coming trip. We would have really loved to stay in the French Quarter all night, but with a cruise the next day and drunken tourists getting more and more sketchy as it grew dark, we decided we had made the right call.

Up next: Embarkation Day!

Looking forward to this. We sail march 6th.

Sent from my SM-G925P using Tapatalk

Following and enjoying so far!! :D:cool:

Embarkation Day Part 1:

The morning of our cruise came, and we woke up excited and a little nervous! We woke up in the hotel, had a quick breakfast (nothing more than coffee, granola bars and apples were offered in the hotel) and then got on the road for the short drive from Kenner, La to Fulton Place Parking, which is very near the port. It was clear as soon as we got on the highway this was going to be interesting.

Traffic was thick, even early in the morning, and our exit into the city was backed up for about a quarter mile. We should have anticipated this. With the Dream and the NCL Dawn docking on a Mardis Gras weekend traffic was going to be an absolute nightmare. Thankfully once we got off our exit, we were able to get into the parking garage with relative ease.

Piece of advice: If you plan on parking at Fulton for your cruise, go online, pre-pay and bring the receipt. The garage is huge, but it has only one lane for entry, and if you are making arraignments there at the door, it is not only more expensive, but takes forever. We spent a few harrowing minutes on a busy street, held up by a few cars heading into the garage last minute as passing traffic honked. Since we pre-paid, it took all of 20 second to get our paperwork in order and proceed to the parking spaces.

We got our car parked and luggage downstairs, and then began the wait for the shuttle. We heard radio chatter from the parking attendants of traffic being insane, and it took about a half hour for a shuttle to finally show up and start loading us. We were a little concerned when we left, because the shuttle passed the port, the lines of traffic and deep into a neighborhood before it finally turned around. But our driver apparently knew a shortcut. He got on a gravel service road that headed into the port, was allowed in by a police officer (who seemed to be on rather friendly terms with the driver) then continued past all the traffic and backed into a spot to unload. From the time we got out of our car to getting out of the shuttle was about an hour. This seems like forever, but we later heard horror stories from other passengers parking at the port itself who waited hours to finally make their way in.

Once we got off the shuttle, the outside of the port was a similar mess. We had intended to arrive at around 10:30, but it was now after 11. There were still Dream passengers trying to get taxis away from the port, and there was a huge crowd sitting outside of the terminal waiting for their check in time. Last year on the Elation, this area was rather clear and a porter walked right up to us and offered to take our luggage. This year we found no such thing and had to wade through the crowd to hunt down employees wearing Carnival uniforms. They had luggage carts and were taking bags, so we handed them to these employees and tipped them, even though we weren't even sure if they were actual porters or not. They seemed a bit surprised at the tip, so we are guessing not...

Heading into the terminal we were quickly greeted by a Carnival employee who asked about our check in time. We showed that we had FTTF, and she quickly escorted us inside. Once inside the mess cleared up dramaticly. There were lines, but they moved fast (even the non-priority ones) and we quickly got through checking paperwork and the metal detectors.

One thing that we found extremely interesting, was upon leaving the metal detectors, we walked to the line where they check your alcohol and drinks. The line was a little long, but we intended to be honest (we had the allowed 1 bottle of wine each). The port employee looked at us and asked "Were you directed to this line?" We hadn't, so we shook our heads. She replied "Unless you really want your bags searched, keep going." So we skipped the line and went right to check in without anyone ever opening our bags.

Check in was an absolute breeze. When we identified as FTTF, the check in employees seemed to be instructed to play this up as a big deal, and got suddenly cheerful, praising our decision, and shuttling us directly to an open counter. The man at the counter listed off all of the benefits of FTTF while working, and was done with his work as soon as he stopped his pitch. He then told us that priority and FTTF was just cleared to board the ship, and to proceed onboard! So from the time we entered the terminal to our first steps inside the Dream's atrium, we barely even stopped walking and never sat down. It took about 15 minutes in all.

The Dream's styling was very interesting. It still had the glitzy Vegas feel, but toned down and a little dark. The style could be best described as "noir." As big fans of American Horror Story, we felt like the interior reminded us of the Hotel Cortez from the most recent season. We really enjoyed the style, but can definitely understand those who feel it's too dark. It stands in very stark contrast with the style most ships are using now.

We explored the ship, and while she is an absolutely huge vessel, we were honestly a little surprised to find that the public spaces aren't as big as it seems people describe. Many of the lounges and the casino are not that much bigger, if any bigger than those on the Elation. The only place inside that the size difference was extremely noticeable was the comedy club, which had seating for miles.

Heading to the outside areas of the ship we were sort of stunned with how small the Lido deck was. The main pool is very small, and we wondered if the Elation's pool was actually bigger. proceeding through to the aft pool deck, we were happy to at least see a second pool, and then the smells of the Deli and the Tandoor reminded us of our tiny breakfast. We took a break from exploring to eat some fantastic food. The Tandoor kabobs were fresh today and tasted fantastic. Jacob had a grilled sandwich from the deli station, and was in awe as the meat and cheese were sliced in front of him before being grilled and served. We sat down for the first time since arriving on the ship and enjoyed the view.

At this point we were tired of carrying our bags around, and decided to take advantage of the FTTF perk of getting access to our stateroom early. We headed to our room, which was ready and were pleasantly surprised to find a larger and much nicer stateroom than on the Elation.

Everywhere else on the ship we weren't sure what people were talking about when they said the Elation was in far worse shape than the Dream. The Dream has some age showing, with a little rust here and there and a few rush paint jobs obvious. And the Elation isn't the rust bucket everyone tries to make her out to be. Side by side, I don't think you'd see much difference in most of the public spaces.

But the difference in staterooms was clear. The Elation's worn carpet, mismatched walls and scuffed windows showed her age. Our stateroom on the dream had no such problems, and we found the bathroom in particular to be awesome, with tons of shelf space and a huge mirror.

We unpacked our carry on bags and continued our tour of the ship. This is again where we began to see the difference between the Elation and the Dream. Unimpressed with the Lido areas, we searched the other outdoor public spaces. Hot tubs are scattered all over the ship, and we never were able to accurately count them. It seems Carnival at least got this note when building the Dream class. The Lanai was awesome with ample seating, plenty of places to watch the sea go by, and the novelty of walking a complete lap on the ship was never lost on us. We proceeded up to the top decks and were happy to find a huge mini golf course, the two story Serenity deck, some very fun looking waterslides (but it was far too chilly to use these yet) and several other areas to sit and absorb sun that were away from the main areas. Small bars are set up in strategic areas around the ship, and we were happy to see one in the Serenity area.

It was in Serenity we decided to stop, check our email and the internet one last time, call my mother to check on the dogs and then turn our phones to airplane mode for a week. Yes, we know internet planes and international rate plans are available, but this is one of the biggest appeals to us for cruising: to escape. We turn off our phones, avoid the news and try to entirely escape from reality for a little while. Our last post online before disconnecting was a little selfie from a hammock on Serenity:

Before I sign off, I wanted to just kind of summarize our impression of the Dream compared to the Elation upon our first walk though of the ship:

We were surprised to see that most of the areas that each ship shares, such as Lido, the Atrium, the Casino and the clubs were not very different in size or style at all. For such a big ship we expected a larger Lido deck, a larger pool and just overall more space. At some points we wondered if the same spaces on the Elation were actually larger. We were also surprised to see the ship's condition was good, but not significantly different than Elation, at least in public spaces. Again, not an insult to the Dream, but we still just can't figure out what people are talking about when they say the Elation looks so run down.

On the plus side, the new spaces on the Dream were fantastic. The lanai, the huge Serenity deck and all of the little alcoves looked very inviting. We already were enjoying the food, and our eyes kept turning to the Waterworks area, wishing it were warm enough to try out the slides. Our stateroom looked very impressive, and we were eager to enjoy our cove balcony.

Coming up: Sail away, dinner and a very foggy (and spooky) night on the Mississippi River.

Enjoying your review! Any chance you saved your Fun Times and are willing to post scans as part of your review? Looking forward to the rest of your journey recap! Thanks!

Enjoying your review! Any chance you saved your Fun Times and are willing to post scans as part of your review? Looking forward to the rest of your journey recap! Thanks!

I saved my Fun Times and will see what I can do. I don't have a scanner, so they will be pics of the Funtimes instead. Ill do my best to provide a decent image of them!

Not sure how long they stay, but they are there right now!

Fun Force is one of the main reasons I want to sail on the Dream!I hope they stay through the rest of the year.

Embarkation Day Part 2:

We mostly rested in Serenity until it came time for the muster drill. We made our way down to the muster station, which was the forward MDR and waited. And waited. It seems quite a few of our fellow passengers didn't want to attend. The funny part was that the drill itself took less than 15 minutes. The drill was the first time we heard our cruise directer, which was Jase. He put everyone through the muster drill with just enough humor to make things feel a little more lighthearted, but without straying from the seriousness of the drill itself.

After the drill let out, Jase announced (jokingly) that every room and lounge would be locked and that he expected everyone on the lido for the sail away party. Sorry Jase, we booked a balcony for a reason. We proceeded straight down to our room where we found our luggage waiting. As we unpacked it, there was a knock on our door.

Opening the door, we met our steward for the first time. He introduced himself as Jimmy and then gave us the standard offerings of the Carnival Comfort program. Out of concern for privacy we opted for the once daily morning service. He insisted he would be sure our room was well taken care of, and we would receive towel animals and Fun Times as usual. We then asked if we could have extra towels (sorry environment, but those white towels are good for a single use only). He said he would supply them, told us to let him know if we needed anything else, and then headed out to greet other passengers.

About now it was sail away time, so we cracked open our first bottle of wine, took the two wine glasses in the stateroom to the balcony and toasted our sail away on our own private little deck. The view from the cove balcony was utterly fantastic. The Dream has to execute a 180 degree turn right off the dock as it leaves, and when she was about halfway through the turn, we were facing downriver, almost right in the middle. As the current caught the nose of the ship, it pulled her downriver, and we began a lazy, low speed journey down the Mississippi. This lead to many great photo opportunities, and one of my favorites was captured right as we rounded the first bend:

I really have no idea what these ships are, they look military, but I'm not sure. They are docked side by side and are some heavy duty transport vessel I believe. They always look like they are about ready to load and leave, but I'm not sure they've moved since last year!

Shortly after the ship set sail we took another lap wondering around. We skipped the sail away show and instead spent time on the lanai, watching the ship drift slowly down the river. We passed quite a few other ships and got some decent video. Jacob shot a pretty awesome picture of the Domino sugar factory, which with a light bleach filter looks pretty awesome:

After a while came dinner time (Late seating), and we headed up to the aft dining room to meet our new table mates! We took a quick detour upstairs to the steakhouse and decided to make reservations for the next day (also formal night) as folks on this forum had suggested we needed to go try it out. And then we got into the line waiting in front of the dining room. Last year on the Elation, we had a fantastic table, and we are still friends with each and every one of them. So we walked to dinner eager to see who else we would befriend.

Sitting at the table when we arrived was a young lady who was cruising alone and after introductions began telling us how amazing the spa was. Ok, decent start. Then came two young women who were cousins, and they introduced themselves and we all started chatting. Great start!

Then sat two New Orleans locals, one young man and middle aged man. They gruffly introduced themselves and began mumbling back and forth to each other. Right after that an older couple sat down. This is where dinner got uncomfortable. The man introduced himself and his wife and took charge as if he was the father of the table. When the wait staff made their way over, he was sure to be addressed first.

We all placed our orders, and then he began talking. And this is where the legend began. He was a longtime cruiser, and announced that the Carnival Conquest was the best ship ever. He was giving the Dream a chance to impress him, but it was pretty clear to him already that the Conquest was a far superior ship. Her majesty, the Carnival Conquest could not be beat. It was the Titanic risen again, the golden standard against what all cruise ships could be compared. And the rest of dinner was a tribute to the majestic, the perfect queen of cruising: Carnival Conquest.

Now I've never sailed the Conquest, and while I'm sure she's a fine ship, I now hate that ship. I hate it with a passion. Not because of anything he said, and certainly not because of anything that actually involves that ship. But all dinner, all I heard was "This is better on the Conquest, this was faster on the Conquest, Conquest, Conquest, Conquest...."

To make matters worse, our food was being served as many other tables around us were either enjoying dessert or leaving. Jacob had ordered a steak medium rare, and it arrived well done. I ordered the sweet and sour shrimp, and it arrived lukewarm, drowning in sweet and sour sauce with a lukewarm and still pre-formed scoop of rice on the side. We picked at our meals until the staff gave us our dessert menus. We both ordered Warm Chocolate Melting Cake, ate it quickly when it arrived, then excused ourselves from the table. As we walked away we could hear "Conquest, Conquest, Conquest..."

We should have right then asked for a different table or dining time. But we liked the girls at our table, and hoped that our next meal would be better. The next day would be the steakhouse, so we decided by then that the bad taste in our mouths would have worn off, and we'd give it another chance. So we headed back to our room to take in the view from the balcony again.

Sitting on our bed was a pair of extra towels as requested, but also a blanket that we did not request. We set both items on the couch, and then opened the curtains to the balcony. Since nightfall, a heavy fog had fallen upon the river, and we could barely see 10 feet past the ship. Fascinated by the view, we opened the door and instantly realized why Jimmy had left us the blanket. We put the balcony chairs together and curled up under the blanket watching the river go by.

At one point we encountered one of the creepiest things we've ever seen. The Dream glided past a badly aging cargo ship going slightly slower than us. As we passed, fog rolled off the decks and down the stairs of the poorly lit vessel. It looked like a ghost ship, and while we took many pictures, none of them came out as anything but a dark smudge (I swear it really was a ghost ship!).

Now we'd gotten a tip in our role call that the Carnival Elation would be making her way upriver this night, and as we'd sailed on her last year, we wanted to see her as she made her way back into port. Waiting, Jacob fell asleep, and I wondered in this heavy fog if we'd even see her at all.

After a little while, I nearly fell asleep, when suddenly the fog was replaced by bright light, and out of nowhere a bright white hull pierced the darkness. the Elation had arrived, and gosh she looked pretty!

In the picture you can barely see the fog if you look at the beams of light cast from the Elation's lower level aft windows. But it was an amazing sight. After seeing many smaller, run down cargo vessels drifting in the fog, the Elation brightened the night for just a minute, then slowly slid out of sight, and the darkness and fog returned. It is hard to give justice the the way that night's scenery unfolded, but I hope this gives you a peak!

After a truly beautiful and slightly creepy night on the river, we headed back into our room, which had grown far too cold, turned the heat up, threw the spare blanket on the bed and called it a night. As I drifted off to sleep, I swore I could hear faint words calling from somewhere on the ship "Conquest, Conquest, Conquest..."

Up Next: Waterslides, Lido madness and Jimmy the Ninja/Mindreader!