A Dream of the Mediterranean - May 27 2023

[Missmilphie]

We’re just off the May 27 2023, Disney Dream cruise around the Med so thought I’d post a trip report to highlight the good (mostly), bad (not a lot) and the ugly (one unfortunate incident) of our holiday.

This trip was a much needed vacation for myself (Nicky), husband (Tom), 13 year old daughter (Mimi), 7 year old daughter (Sophie) and my mum and dad came along too .

My immediate family have cruised before
- I did a similar DCL itinerary back in 2012 and we did a Northern Europe DCL in 2017 - both on the Magic. First time cruising for my mum and dad. We were a little nervous that my mum would hate it as she’s deathly scared of the water but after a brief wobble seeing the sea out of the portholes for the first time she took to it with no issues at all!

We normally try and fly from London Stansted as it’s closest to our home in Norfolk, England but the flight prices were way too high (I think because of half term holidays / grand prix etc) so I found flights on Vuelling from Gatwick at a slightly more reasonable price.

Thursday night saw us get the children from school as quickly as possible ready for the drive down to London and an overnight stay at the Hilton Gatwick.

Can’t fault the Hilton - we had a family room which had a queen and two single beds and it was clean, quiet and only a couple of minute walk through to the South Terminal.

 

[Missmilphie]

Travel Day 0 - London and travel to Barcelona

We were up early for our 9:10 flight to Barcelona - check in was a little more complicated than we’re used to as we had to do the checked luggage labels and scan the bags on to the belts ourselves with Vuelling - there was one, rather grumpy, lady helping the masses of people and she was getting cross that people were getting it wrong - which felt a bit unreasonable when no one had a clue what they were doing!

Once through security we had a nice breakfast to set ourselves up for the day and it was soon time to board.



It might have been a little early for some …



The flight itself was comfortable and uneventful and we arrived in Barcelona a little after midday


We’d been warned that it would take a long time to get through the airport at Barcelona and it was - it took us until after 3pm to get to our hotel and it was very warm - my daughter regretted not bringing her fan! Taxis were easy to get just outside the airport and it’s a quick ride into the city.

We choose to stay at the Petit Palace La Boqueria for the night before our cruise - it was a fairly basic but perfectly adequate hotel just off La Rambla - bunk beds for the kids and a good central location.

 

[Flossbolna]

Great start! Sorry yo hear that there was something ugly on your cruise!

You got on the Dream the day we got off so it will be interesting to compare as your cruise had a very similar itinerary.

 

[Missmilphie]

Day 0 - Barcelona

We dropped our bags in our hotel rooms and hot footed it out the door again to walk down to our 4pm timed entry at Casa Battlo. I’ve been here before and wanted my family to experience it and it was even better than I remembered as they’ve added lots of interactive / media elements.

We booked the silver house entry tickets online about a fortnight before the trip - I’m glad we did as Sophie loved the interactive iPad element of this tour.

It’s a beautiful house with truly unique and stunning architecture.




After a cool drink on the roof terrace at the top of the Casa we walked back towards the hotel, through a square with the most pigeons I’ve ever seen! My picture doesn’t do it justice they were everywhere!


Finally we found a lovely tapas place near the hotel which we’d seen from some trip advisor research before we went.

All in all a busy but good day

 

[Missmilphie]

Day 1 - boarding the Dream

We woke up to another lovely sunny day in Barcelona - we had been a bit worried pre cruise as the forecast kept changing between good weather and rain each time we looked but we got very lucky and it was hot and sunny for the whole trip. No need for the packed raincoats and umbrella!

After a nice leisurely breakfast at the hotel we had an hours stroll along La Rambla soaking up the atmosphere before heading over to the port in a taxi.

Boarding was what I’d probably call organised chaos! It all seemed to work but there were huge crowds of people and it was open boarding by the time we’d made it through on our 11:30 PAT. All fairly quick and smooth though.

I just love arriving on Disney property and this was just the same magical feeling.



We checked our dining allocation (we got our private table request - it didn’t look like many people were sitting outside family groups) and headed up to Cabanas for the crabs legs my husband had been dreaming about since our last cruise! We don’t really get them in England (you can get dressed crabs but they’re a different type with lots of brown meat and they don’t have the same big claws).

The rooms were ready by 1:30 - we had a great family ocean view and my parents had a balcony room. Quick change for a first swim and a go on the aquaduck with short lines and then off to the muster drill and sail away party.



And of course who can say no to the drink of the day



Dinner tonight was Animators Palette - they did turtle talk tonight which Sophie enjoyed. The food for the whole cruise was generally very good and the service was friendly and prompt. There wasn’t a lot of “chat” but we are fine with that as we’re used to a more removed European service style.

Tonight’s show was the Golden Mickeys - we saw all three “proper” shows and they were all very good but this was probably number 3 if I had to rate them in order.

Tired but happy we called it a day

 

[erogers]

Thank you for writing this! We're looking forward to hearing about the rest of your trip. We're considering booking the 9-night itinerary out of Barcelona exactly one year from today. We'll also have our two kids and my parents with us.

 

[Missmilphie]

Room location

When we’ve cruised before we’ve been pretty mid ship but we wanted cabins for us and my parents on the same floor and for us to have one of the slightly bigger oceanview family rooms - that meant floor 8 was the best option we could see at the time of booking.

It also meant we’d be pretty far aft - room 8170 - a few rooms back from the aft lifts.
My parents were 8552 - more middling.

Before the trip I’d read a lot of forums and was getting a little worried by talk of how rough the aft could be - the fears happily turned out to be needless in our case. I could definitely feel the engines when we were manoeuvring into ports (and that did wake me up briefly some mornings) but other than that most nights I couldn’t feel any more than a gently rocking with a couple of nights of a little bit of vibration but no rattling or anything to disturb us (tip - the bathroom door handles did make a bit of noise if they were shut so we left the doors ajar and that solved it. Also make sure the hangers are bunched up so they don’t “wind chime” again each other)

I was very happy with our room - lovely big porthole and Didi our room host was great. Location was really handy for Cabanas breakfast too.

 

[o&smom]

So happy to see another trip report in the Med. We cruise on the 27th of June. Can’t wait!

 

[TaraEve]

Following along! Thanks for all the great details! We are sailing out of Barcelona on July 15. My kids are 15,13, 10 and 6, so any details on the kid’s programs are very appreciated! We haven’t been on a cruise since my kids graduated up to the teen areas and I am hoping they will like them!

 

[o&smom]

Following along! Thanks for all the great details! We are sailing out of Barcelona on July 15. My kids are 15,13, 10 and 6, so any details on the kid’s programs are very appreciated! We haven’t been on a cruise since my kids graduated up to the teen areas and I am hoping they will like them!

Ooh, the Dream has amazing teen spaces. DS just aged out, but loved the Edge and the Vibe on our cruises as he got older. DD just experienced the Edge for the first time in February. She had planned on spending most of her time in the Club and the Lab as it was her last cruise to use those other than open house times. Our cruise had mostly preschoolers, so she went to Edge and never went back. She had a great time, and is really looking forward to our June cruise.

 

[Missmilphie]

Day 2 - Cannes

I had a difficult first nights sleep - not the ship’s fault, I struggle the first night anywhere new (although I have to say the mattresses were so comfy I almost didn’t mind laying awake!)

We were up bright and early for a Cabanas breakfast. We ate at the buffet every morning except the disembarkation day. We found it really good - something for everyone and the hash browns were nice and crispy (an important point for me!!)

Today was Cannes, France and the first tender to leave for non DCL excursions was around 9am. We didn’t do any official port adventures this trip - we like the freedom to go at our own speed and we’re not keen on shopping which all tours seem to devote lots of time to (plus we’re a bit reluctant to spend on tours we can find cheaper for ourselves when it’s not 100% what we’re after).

We didn’t have any huge desire to do much in Cannes - we’ve been to France lots of times and I couldn’t find anything that particularly appealed when researching before the trip. But it would seem a shame to be so close and not visit so we hopped on one of the first boats over.

The tender process was easy - you just headed down to the theatre and they gave you a number sticker - by the time we’d sat down in our row we were pretty much standing up again to be led down to the boat and it was only a short ride over to the port.

Just outside the port entrance the little land train was waiting - so we bought tickets and took a nice 50 minutes ride around the town.

My parents didn’t join us today other than for the tender over -they took a train to Antibes and had a wander around and a nice lunch - they know the area well and were happy off on their own for some peace!

After the train we headed back to the ship - we had a bit of a wait but got back for lunch time and had a nice lunch in Cabanas. We’re fairly light lunch eaters and I appreciated the daily salads and shrimp etc.

Sophie wanted some more swimming time post lunch so we made the most of a quieter ship and enjoyed the pools, aquaduck, slide and hot tubs before her BBB appointment.

She’s normally quite a tomboy so it was lovely to see her get so into the princess vibe!

 

[Missmilphie]

Following along! Thanks for all the great details! We are sailing out of Barcelona on July 15. My kids are 15,13, 10 and 6, so any details on the kid’s programs are very appreciated! We haven’t been on a cruise since my kids graduated up to the teen areas and I am hoping they will like them!

Sophie is 7 and loved the kids club - she made lots of friends and seemed to spend most of her time there drawing / crafting. The highlight for her was Olaf coming to the club and playing games with them.

Mimi is 13 1/2 and after visiting both the clubs on the first day decided they weren’t for her this cruise - she felt too young for Vibe and Edge wasn’t for her either.

I was quite glad in retrospect as on our Facebook group for the cruise there’s a number of comments with issues with a group of teenage boys from Vibe. Apparently they were bullying other children going into edge and knocking on stateroom doors and running in the early hours as well as trying to fight other vibe boys. Multiple complaints seem to have been made but nothing changed. Such a shame for people to experience that behaviour in what should be the Disney bubble .

 

[Missmilphie]

Obviously the bad experience for people on our cruise in the teen area was caused by one group of children so please don’t let it put you off! Ashamed that they were apparently fellow Brits.

 

[Missmilphie]

Day 2 continued

Since she was all dressed up, Sophie was keen to go and show off her new look at the kids club. The staff were all so sweet around the ship and called all the little ones who were in costumes by their princess names.



I think Mimi must have taken herself off somewhere (probably to spend some time on her phone since we had internet connection in port!!) so Tom and I went for some couple time in Cove Cafe. Loved the cute pictures they make on the coffees:



We also had a go at some Disney Trivia - we thought we were fans but … apparently not given our poor performance at these events!! (15 out of 40 on the Disney songs was a particular low!!)

Dinner tonight was at enchanted garden - we had another great meal - Sophie is v picky but ate her body weight in mac n cheese and Mickey bars nightly.



Tonight was semi formal night and the shimmering seas soirée was a nice opportunity to get a free glass of bubbly! I’m not sure what we did between this and the fireworks - it might have been the generation game at the D Lounge - a cute competition between 4 families to see which kid and parent knew each other best.

Then it was up to deck 11 for a short deck show and fireworks, I know some people said they’re weren’t all that, and it’s true they’re not park standard shows but we really enjoyed them.

 

[Missmilphie]

Day 3 - Livorno

My family were all really looking forward to this day as Tom and the girls hadn’t seen the leaning tower of Pisa before. I had and my impression of Pisa last trip wasn’t the best but I’m pleased to say I take it all back as I really liked it this time around.

My parents again did their own thing today as they’d also visited Pisa, Florence and Lucca previously (the closest places to get to from port). They said they had a nice day in Livorno itself and were glad they looked around there.

We headed off the boat fairly early and got a taxi to the train station - I think we were overcharged as we understood enough Italian to tell the driver was laughing at our 30 euro trip on the phone to a friend

It was then fairly simple to get a ticket from the ticket machines at the station to Pisa - just remember - in Europe you have to validate your tickets before travel - you put them into a little green machine at the station and it stamps them. They don’t tell you anywhere you need to do this and some people on our cruise were caught out by this and fined. (They don’t take being a tourist as an excuse).

Trains run regularly from Livorno to Pisa and they’re nice double deck ones - it only takes about 20 minutes.

We had a half hour stroll to the tower from Pisa station and stopped on the way at a lovely little art cafe for the best pistachio croissants - I could eat these every day and not get bored - they were sooooo good.

Had to take the iconic picture - except Soph likes to do it a little differently! (we did take the normal holding up ones too!)

 

[Missmilphie]

Day 3 continues -

We bought tickets for the museums online a week or so before we left from the official website - you have to select a time for the climb up. Worth noting that only 8’s and over can go up the tower itself so whilst my husband and Mimi ventured up Soph and I indulged in some gelato.

It was a very warm (for us Brits!) day and Mimi had a bit of a headache so we only looked around the cathedral, baptistery and one of the museums - remember to have covered shoulders if you want to do in the cathedral. They were all very interesting.

After lunch at one of the nearby pizza restaurants we headed back to the ship. This time we got the blue route bus once we got back to Livorno train station - €6 for the 4 of us to Piazza Grande (get tickets at the shop in the station) and then a free shuttle bus back to port.

I think Soph spent some time in the kids club (she did for an hour or two most days!) and we chilled out for a bit.

Dinner tonight was Palo for Tom and me whilst my parents took the girls to Royal Palace. I was a bit sad to miss this meal as I love some escargot and duck but we don’t get many opportunities for child free meals and Mimi had them for me instead - she said they were good!

Palo was empty when we arrived at 6 and only about a third / half full when we left. It was a brilliant meal - Tom choose better than me (as usual) with lobster pasta and osso bucco but mine was great too. Despite the large portions he couldn’t say no to the chocolate soufflé either.



Afterwards we met up with my parents and had fun at the silent disco. Mimi was suitably mortified by nana’s embarrassing dancing - especially given we were right next to Tom Fletcher from McFly who was also on the cruise!

I think (but don’t hold me to it) that it was a ventriloquist show tonight (it was a magician the night before) but we decided to call it a night and get some sleep. (I think mum and dad may have snuck off to Pink for some champagne)

 

[TaraEve]

Obviously the bad experience for people on our cruise in the teen area was caused by one group of children so please don’t let it put you off! Ashamed that they were apparently fellow Brits.

Thanks so much for the info! Such a shame that that little group caused so many problems. My two oldest(15 and 13) get along really well, I wish they didn’t have to split up between the two clubs. I feel like together they would have a little more safety and security against something like that. I’m so glad your little one enjoyed herself!

 

[Missmilphie]

Thanks so much for the info! Such a shame that that little group caused so many problems. My two oldest(15 and 13) get along really well, I wish they didn’t have to split up between the two clubs. I feel like together they would have a little more safety and security against something like that. I’m so glad your little one enjoyed herself!

They won’t have to split - you just sign a waiver for your 13 year old to go to vibe (we did for Mimi in case she wanted to go). I thought Vibe looked really cool, I was surprised she didn’t didn’t want to try it.