A week on "The Dream"

I will never forget the squealing reaction from our rented Grand Marquis as we caught our first glimpse of the Dream. Even from far away, the ship was massive!! It is the newest in the Carnival fleet, taking it's first sailing in September last year. Steve and Alan dropped us off with our luggage while they went to return our "pimp wagon". I'm sure it wasn't long, but the anticipation to get on the ship seemed like they were gone forever!

This was our 3rd cruise and Steve and I have never stayed in a room with a balcony. This ship offered something new...no other ship on the water has it...it was called a Cove Balcony. We figured we would try it out since we wouldn't really know the difference. They sell these rooms for substantially less than the other balcony rooms, saying that they are more enclosed. We fell in love with it the second we walked in. (I think our friends did too!)

The room was absolutely perfect. We loved to sit out on the balcony and watch the waves crash into the ship. There were many nights we just listened to the sound of the waves. We LOVED being close to the water instead of up on the 8th and 9th floor in the "more premium" balconies. We met our neighbors as we set sail. A cute little Spanish, salsa-dancing, couple from LA. We never learned their names, but if they heard us come out, they would pop their heads over to say hello. We met our room steward, Johnnie, right away since there were no electrical plugs near the bed for Steve's C-PAP machine. Luckily, he loaned us an extension cord, otherwise it would have been a VERY, LONG week!

We were able to do a "room tour" of the Olsen's balcony room on the 8th floor. Their balcony seemed the same size, but it was enclosed in glass. You were able to see everyone else on their balconies and it overlooked one of three hot tubs on the 5th floor deck. We were thrilled with our balcony since it sat just under the lifeboats giving us shade and it was much more private than the ones upstairs.

Steve sat out on the balcony early one morning and swore he saw birds diving into the water. After watching them for a while, he remembered how far we were from land and realized there was no possible way there would be birds clear out here. He took a second look and found they were not birds, but flying fish!!