On May 5, we embarked on Disney Dream at Port Canaveral for the shortest cruise we have taken since we started cruising in 1982. We booked this cruise using Disney Vacation Club points, getting a nice verandah cabin midships (port side) on Deck 6. We have taken 18 cruises and this was our fifth cruise on DCL (previous cruises include two four-day cruises on Wonder in combination with time at Walt Disney World, a 10-day Mediterranean cruise on Magic and the 12-day inaugural Baltic cruise, also on Magic). We are in our mid-fifties, with no children, but we have an affinity for Disney products and appreciate that Disney can provide great experiences for adults as well as families and children. My first review on Cruise Critic last year described our less-than-stellar and very expensive experience aboard Disney Magic for their first Baltic cruise. Fortunately, our adventure on Disney Dream pretty much restored our faith in DCL.

Pre-Embarkation: We did our own flights, as our vacation extended beyond our short cruise on Dream. We also booked our own hotel in the Port Canaveral area. I have traveled to the Cocoa Beach area many times for my job in the past and can highly recommend the fresh seafood lunches and dinners at Grill's, located right at the Port (a great place for watching cruise ships sail out).

Embarkation: We arrived at the port around 1:00 pm and parked in the garage. Because I was using a travel wheelchair due to knee problems, we were able to get an early boarding card number (the wait to board would have been about an hour otherwise). Embarkation seemed a bit chaotic, but we were checked in fairly quickly and immediately boarded the ship. It was a little disappointing to know that after four cruises and thirty days at sea with DCL we were still silver members of Castaway Club, but this short cruise now puts us in the gold category, for what it's worth. The greeting and announcement as we boarded is very nice and we were impressed with the beautiful atrium area. Read more