Dream review-Eastern Caribbean 01/30-2/6/10

[austincici]

jmcancruise,

Blackbeard's Castle just kind of fed into the rum museum which flowed into the old manor houses, which then led right into the Amber museum. Almost like all one continuous walking tour. So if you're not interested in the amber museum, you can just keep right on going and skip it entirely.

[linda stupke]

Austincici- we are booked on the Dream for next Jan and we booked room 8477. Can you tell me how it was? Did you like the extended balcony? DO you have any pictures. I'd love to see them. Thanks.

[austincici]

Linda, we loved it, but the room next door between us and the aft wrap had a bigger balcony( wider). Wish I'd known! We loved it, because when it was too windy to be out at all on the rest of the ship, you're protected from it on the back, so unless it's raining, you can still go out. One day it rained and I went out and there was a complete rainbow off the back of the ship and one night a full moon over the wake of the ship. Beautiful! Didn't sit much, because I'm short and sitting made me look right into the rail. I don't have many pictures in the cabin, except of towel animals and the picture from the room looking out the back. But this link has some:

http://www.zydecocruiser.com/CarnivalDream/GrandMed/13Civitavecchia/cab6.htm

[austincici]

Linda,

Sorry posted wrong link on the last reply. You can find 8477 on this one.

http://www.zydecocruiser.com/CarnivalDream/GrandMed/13Civitavecchia/cab5.htm

[purpleblanket]

Day 4-

St. Thomas--warm and sunny!

To the buffet again before getting off the ship at 10:00. While I'm thinking about it, just wanted to say that yes, they do ration the bacon by serving it to you, but they always give you plenty. In fact, I had to start saying "Just a little", because otherwise they were giving me 5 or 6 pieces. Did the "Ultimate Island Experience" through Carnival. It was a 5 hour excursion in an open air taxi with several other people. We'd never been to any of these ports before, so we thought it was a good tour to get a look at everything. Went to Magen's Bay beach for a couple of hours (Wow, how beautiful!), a scenic overlook, Bleackbeard's castle, the Rum factory, Amber museum, and shopping with a harbor boat to take us back to the ship after. Bought some rum at the factory and had it delivered to the ship and an amber pendant. Then we walked back to Havensight Mall to the Shipwreck Tavern for a burger. It was HUGE and I had to leave half of it. Back on board for our 8:00 departure. Dancin' in the Street was the show for this night, and is definitely the not-to-be-missed show of the cruise. Back to the room, another shore day tomorrow...

 

Day 5-

St. Maarten--sunny again!!!

Buffet (again), then off the ship around 8:30. (We had booked Bernard's Tours online and were supposed to meet at 9:00). We got there and were assigned to Rosalee's taxi. I had read great things about Bernard's, but he must be so busy with all the ships in port (5 today, including the Dream and Oasis of the Seas), he must have had to hire on new tour guides, because she didn't say a lot, and not really loud enough for those in the back to hear. Of course, even is she had, I'm not sure they would have stopped talking to each other long enough to hear her. None of the stops were as long as advertised. We were supposed to have 2 hours at Orient Beach, and she told us to be back in an hour and 10 minutes. When I said I thought it was supposed to be 2, the rest of the tour said "One's plenty, that's fine!" They said 40 minutes at Marigot to shop, we got 25. Talk about a whirlwind shopping trip! But I still managed to grab a T-shirt. When we got back in the cab (an air conditioned van, very comfortable, by the way) the lady behind me sighs "Ok, I'm ready to go back to the ship and relax the rest of the day." We still hadn't even gotten to Maho Beach yet! So we get there and she says "What? I don't want to watch a bunch of planes land.", like maybe we'll skip it. Well, that was something we'd both been looking forward to, so I just said "Well, we do." and we got out. The driver gave us 20 minutes, not the30 minutes advertised. We had her drop us off in Philipsburg to shop (part of the advertised tour), and the rest just wanted to go back to the ship, so they did. I just don't know why they booked this tour if all they wanted was an hour at the beach and to shop in Marigot. They could have taken cabs or booked the Beach and Shopping exscursion. Oh, well, this was still my favorite port, and I think the tour would've been really enjoyable with a more enthusiastic bunch and a little better guide. The island is soooo beautiful! We shopped and ate seafood at the Firehouse on the beach then took the water taxi back to the ship. The guest talent show was this night and John performed his Bedtime Story. We'd seen it on Youtube before, but it was still a riot, and watching those seeing it for the first time was pretty fun!!

 

Great review Austin! Thank you.

I'll be doing this itinerary when I cruise as well. I'm just wondering what the "Firehouse" is and what kind of seafood you ate there? Is it a restaurant right on the beach? This sounds like a place I'd like to go to. You said you took a water taxi, so I'm guessing its not a place we can walk to from where the ship docks.

Thanks for the info.

 

Debbie :)

[holdon216]

Austincici, You mentioned getting wine onboard in your carry on??? Our last cruise was in Puerto Rico and you were allowed to bring booze onboard. Or at least they didnt care if you did.

Is it easy enough to get a few bottles on board in Cape Canaveral? And if so where did you buy it? Love to have wine in the room and just carry a glass up to dinner. Know one knows that we didnt just come from a bar on the ship :cool: How about the room steward? Would they know we were smugglers and if so do they care? TY

[LuvCruising01]

Thanks for the great review with such great details!

 

sorry for your tour not being as expected :(

[austincici]

The Firehouse was right on the beach in Philipsburg. We were dropped off from our tour at one end of the shopping area and walked through it for awhile, then cut over to the beach and just started looking at menus. There was one restaurant after another. They all seemed to have similar stuff, and we were HUNGRY, so we just stopped at that one. It was a firehouse theme, and we wondered if maybe a US firefighter retired and opened it there. Everyone working there was local, though. I got the shrimp skewers. It was two of them over this saucy Caribbean rice that was delicous. Had shrimp, peppers and onions and came with fries and a salad. When you get to the end of that shopping district downtown, there's the place to get on a water taxi for $4 person that takes you back to the ship. When you dock, you'll probably see it tied up there at the pier, waiting to take passengers over to downtown to shop. It has an awning over it, and is at the end of the pier. (By the way, I was in the mood for fried shrimp, but the only thing anyone seemed to have was popcorn shrimp appetizers.) We also ate at Rusty's in Port Canaveral the day we got off the ship, got there around 3:30 and watched the Dream sail back out and ate seafood. THAT was the best seafood ever, if you want good fish and chips! But they had everything else you could possibly want, too.

 

About the wine: Carnival allows one bottle each to be carried onboard in you carry-on bags. No need to feel like you're smuggling, it's fine. I got a glass of wine at the bar, and after that our steward just kept it clean and left it in the room for me. There's been talk about them tigtening up checking your other luggage, but DH had 4 Rumrunners in his checked luggage full of vodka, and they made it fine. I'm not sure if bottles of wines would make it as well, haven't tried it. I drink wine in the room, but love ordering all different drinks at the bar or in the showroom on a cruise. I've discovered I love whiskey sours and Miami Vice's from cruising!

[denisey]

Thanks Austin for the great review!

 

I'm still shaking my head at the airline for sending you to Fort Lauderdale then back to Orlando! I don't get them sometimes!

 

I had a similar experience at a different port on a well recommended tour operator. We had the owner himself and a very full van. One couple kept coming back 1/2 hour after the meeting time, so I spend most of my tour time, sitting on the bus, waiting for 2 yahoo's to decide to show up. And they really didn't care that they made everyone else wait. I put it down as an exception, but I wouldn't recommend that operator to anyone.

 

Just 8 more days until my Dream trip!

[austincici]

Thanks, denisey! We flew Southwest and could have booked a direct flight earlier in the day, but we had to drop our dogs at the place they were staying then drive 50 minutes to the the airport, so we actually chose the connecting flight. We did fly direct home, though! Hope you have a great time!!!

[happy cruzin]

Great review, and so glad you had a wonderful cruise! Did you go to the comedy shows?

 

We were on the Dream 1/30 sailing too and went to the Comedy Club almost every night. There were a totaly of 4 comics - 2 the first half and 2 the second. They did family and "R" shows....they only one we did not see was the "comedic magician".

They comedians on our sailing were FANTASTIC - sometimes we saw the early and the late show!! ;)

[linda stupke]

Thanks for the link to pics. We are so excited. Our friends are in 8475 and another couple have the wrap cabin. Do the balconies open all the way up or only by the door I see in the pictures? We have always cruised RCCL so this is a big switch for us and we're hoping we'll like Carnival too. We've been to all the islands before so not sure what we will do for excursions. I would like to go to that beach in St Martin that has the planes that fly in so low!

 

Linda

[austincici]

Linda,

I don't know about opening the balconies, it was just the two fo us, so we had no need to find out. But we loved the location ! And Maho Beach was really neat, just would have like more time!

[katiel53]

Thanks for your review. We sailed the same itinerary in January. We loved the ship so much that we are planning to do a B2B next April.

 

I wish we had John Heald as our CD. He is really a kind and generous man. Oh well, we will still have a wonderful time.

[purpleblanket]

Thanks for all the info about the firehouse!!

 

Debbie :)

[austincici]

Katie, we are planning our next one now, too. Thinking of doing the Southern Caribbean this time, which still includes St. Maarten. That was our favorite. We felt really lucky that we ended up with John!

 

Debbie, you're quite welcome. There were lots of restaurants up and down Great Bay, I'm sure they're all pretty good.

[didugger]

More please! We're going to be in 8466, one of the funky wrap-around corner cabins.

 

Looking forward to the rest of your review!

We just booked this cabin for April 24. How did you like the cabin and do you have any pictures posted? Thanks