Disembarkation

I don't have any pictures from our final morning on the ship, it was a bit of a whirlwind!  

Since we had early dinner, we had an early breakfast assignment. I believe it was 6:30, not really a problem for us because we are up then anyway.  There is no room service the final day, but you can also go to the buffet at anytime if you prefer.  But we wanted to say a final good-bye to our servers, which we did.  Funnily, we were their only table at breakfast, so we got a lot of personal attention.  

During breakfast they made an announcement that the ship had cleared customs (around 7am) and people were free to disembark.  We finished eating, said our good-byes and walked off the ship.  So sad.  

In the terminal, we found a porter.  Now, this is something you absolutely should do if you ever cruise.  I took him to our bags and he loaded them onto his cart.  He stood with us in line and handled all our bags.  He showed me how to hold all the passports so I could lay them down for the customs agent.  Then he rolled our luggage out to the car and loaded the bags in the trunk.  All it cost was a tip!  From stepping off the ship to closing the doors on the car, ready to drive out, was a total of 15 minutes.  Awesome!

The NON-REVVING Side of Things

Our original plan was to drive back to Melbourne, fly to Atlanta, and then to either Cincinnati or Louisville.  Cincinnati looked really tight from Atlanta, so we were arranging things to get home from Louisville.  But at breakfast, Rob said he hadn't realized how early we would be off the ship so he started looking at other flights.  If we hustled, we could get a direct flight from Fort Lauderdale to Cincinnati.  

Step One of the hustle was to get off the ship and through customs, which our friendly porter helped us accomplish.  

Step Two was to arrange our rental car return to be Ft. Lauderdale and not Melbourne.  We got less than stellar customer service from Hertz and ended up going to the Melbourne Airport to return the car and pick up a new one.  Which turned out to be the same car.  Very frustrating.  

Step Three was drive to Ft. Lauderdale.  Check.  Thankfully the kids slept most of the way.  

Step Four, arrive at airport, drop bags, Kristina and kids through security, Rob return rental car.  This part was the most stressful because at this airport, the rental car return is off site and requires a shuttle.  Rob walked up to the gate right at the final boarding call.  Whew!  That was close.  But we got seats on the flight no problem and had a peaceful flight home.

This trip was our first with the CARES harnesses instead of the carseats.  These are FAA approved and use the seatbelt to create a 4 point harness.  They worked great, were easy to install and really made life easier.  And the kids didn't mind a bit, since they are used to riding in these types of harnesses in their carseats.

Final Vacation Thoughts

Rob and I agree that this cruise was one of our best family vacations, if not the best ever. I don't know if it's because the kids are at a much easier age, but we came back from this trip rested and ready to cruise again.

I know cruising isn't for everyone. For a long time I had no interest in it. But now I see the appeal in unpacking once and allowing the ship to take you to cool places. It's like a floating resort! And in this season of our lives, it's a great mix of family time and adult time. Our kids are old enough to spend some time making their own fun in the kids club, and that's very appealing! It's not something we will do all the time, but cruises will be mixed into our travels for sure.

In fact, we went ahead and booked another cruise onboard! If you book while on a cruise, you get a few incentives, like a reduced deposit amount and onboard credit from Disney. When we went to the future cruises desk, we had a few criteria: 1, the cruise must stop at Castaway Cay. 2, the cruise should be longer than 4 nights. 3, we wanted to sail on a ship other than the Disney Dream, nothing wrong with the Dream, but we wanted to explore a different ship next time.

We decided to book a 5 night repositioning cruise from San Juan to Miami on the Disney Magic in Decemer 2017. That's right, we booked for more than a year from now. Time to start planning!