Before this cruise I always knew that we could expect rough seas whilst sailing across the Bay of Biscay towards Spain but I was never expecting it to be bad as it was in the English Channel on our first evening onboard due to the added effects of Storm Ashley. I barely slept at all due to the extreme pitching and rolling of the Disney Dream throughout the night which in turn was causing the ship to creak loudly making sleep nearly impossible.

When it finally started to get light outside, I did start to immediately feel better as soon as I walked out onto the verandah as the fresh air felt truly amazing and once you can see the horizon, your brain can slowly start to recalibrate and work out what is going on.

At 8:20am Captain Zvonimir made an announcement throughout the ship including to all of the staterooms to let everyone know what was going on and to keep us updated with the weather and the current sea conditions. He also told us that it was not going to get any worse than this but it would remain the same for most of the day before drastically improving when we got closer to Vigo. He also asked everyone to be extremely careful and to hold onto the handrails when moving around the ship.

Thankfully even before this bad weather, we had absolutely nothing planned for this day – we were always going to do very little and as it turned out, this was probably for the best. After watching the Good Morning Disney Dream show on the television, we got dressed and headed up to Cabanas for breakfast as we were both starving. Last time we had experienced bad seas, we both felt a lot better after eating something and this turned out to be true once again. Cabanas was a lot busier than I expected it to be given the sea conditions as it is one of the worst places to be if you are suffering from any form of motion sickness due to it being on one of the top decks and at the aft of the ship where you can feel the movement a lot more than anywhere else onboard.

After breakfast, we walked around the ship for a while and then stopped at Mickey’s Mainsail to have a proper look around as it was so quiet. Despite how busy the shops had been the evening before when we left Southampton, all of the merchandise (except for the Disney Dream Loungefly bags) had been restocked overnight.

As it was so quiet on the outdoor decks and there was absolutely no one in the pool or in the hot tubs at the Quiet Cove, this is where we decided to spend the rest of our morning. Despite it being cold out, the water was so warm (it felt like a bath) and it was a great place to be. It was also great fun to be in a mini wave pool with the water splashing from one side to another and I don’t think we stopped laughing for over an hour.

So many people were walking outside bundled up in big winter coats with hats and gloves on and asking us if we were cold but we were not in the slightest. The only time I felt cold was when we finally got out of the pool to go back inside for lunch.

Having the Quiet Cove to ourselves for over an hour on a sea day was simply the best and it is one of my favourite memories of the entire cruise. Just before lunchtime blue skies started to appear and we even listened to all of the horns from the pool as they were blasted after Captain Zvonimir made his Midday announcement.

As we were both starting to feel hungry again, we went back to Cabanas for lunch where a few of my favourites were on the menu. We even sat outside to eat and looked out to sea as we sailed away from the cloudy grey skies and bad weather that we had been experiencing since leaving Southampton the previous day.

We then walked down to Royal Palace to get some dessert as our favourite Strawberry Mille-Feuille was on the lunch menu that day (the main dining room lunch menu changes daily) and we wanted to get it once again and it was every bit as good as I remembered and I cannot wait to get it again onboard our next cruise in a few months time.

After having a great lunch, we were both feeling incredibly tired as we had barely slept the night before due to the rough seas so we decided that a nap was definitely needed as we were struggling to stay awake at this point. We had also both taken a non-drowsy Dramamine as a precaution the evening before but I honestly felt so much worse from taking it as my brain had been extremely fuzzy ever since (which I also think affected my sleep quality) and despite always packing them whenever we go on a cruise, I do not think I will ever take one ever again as it affected me so badly this time – I would much rather deal with any possible motion sickness with natural remedies instead in the future.

After a great two hour nap, we woke up feeling completely normal again and ready for the rest of the day ahead of us which was the best feeling ever. We walked up to Deck 11 and sat on the comfortable chairs outside Cove Cafe with a tea and some pizza whilst looking out over much calmer seas (it was still windy out but there was much less movement on the ship compared to earlier in the day) and a beautiful blue sky whilst once again enjoying the fresh air. Once we got back to our stateroom, we showered and watched Ratatouille (another cruise tradition of ours) whilst getting ready for the evening ahead.

As we had not properly met any of the characters yet since we first boarded the ship the day before, we decided that tonight was the night to begin! We walked down to Deck 3 where we met Donald Duck in the hallway of the Lobby Atrium at 7:15pm with no line and then quickly joined the line to meet Goofy who was out at the same time by the staircase. Captain Minnie Mouse was out with no line at Preludes at 7:30pm and we also had just enough time before dinner to meet Captain Mickey Mouse who was also out at Preludes at 8:00pm.

Our dinner on the second night of our cruise was in Animator’s Palate and the first thing we noticed was there was a lot of empty tables as I think a lot of people onboard were either getting room service or food up on deck due to the rough seas earlier that day. Another thing that was also immediately noticeable was that it was a lot less crowded with more room around us than on our cruise in January where it was so noisy that you could not even hear yourself think and which had also felt very claustrophobic with so many tables squeezed together on a near capacity cruise.

The standard Animator’s Palate menu has some of my favourite foods onboard so of course I had to order the Black Truffle Pasta Purseittes to start which were amazing as always followed by the best ever Creamy Butternut Squash Soup. You really could tell the difference with the quality of the European ingredients onboard for this cruise as everything tasted so fresh and flavourful and this was no exception.

For my main course I decided to try something new and ordered the Grilled Tuna Steak but asked for it to be as rare as possible and it was absolutely delicious and something that I would definitely order again – who would have thought that I would order tuna just a few years ago as it is only something that I tried for the first time when we sailed on the Disney Wonder in 2022 and now I cannot get enough of it!

Tonight was the “Turtle Talk with Crush” show however once Crush appeared and introduced himself to everyone in the restaurant, we did not see him again until the very end of the meal as he did not interact with any of the tables at all so we just watched the other characters swimming between all of the screens around us whilst we were eating instead. On our last cruise we said that we would skip this dinner in future but I actually enjoyed the dinner experience a lot more than normal this time because of the lack of “show”.

There was no way that I was missing dessert as my favourite Lemon Icebox Pie was on the menu which again was one of the best that I have ever tasted and Jaqueline, Philip, Jayson as well as some of the other nearby servers also sang Happy Birthday to me and brought me a birthday cake made from chocolate mousse which I took back to our stateroom to enjoy later. Having my birthday the day before we embarked the Disney Dream in Southampton was the closest I have got to celebrating my actual birthday onboard over the years. We did have a cruise booked from New York to Bermuda a few years ago on my birthday itself but we can all guess what year that was and why it never happened.

Once we had finished dinner, we walked along the long corridor on Deck 3 and joined the short line to meet Chip and Dale who were out at 10:00pm by the staircase in the Lobby Atrium before heading back to our stateroom with my birthday cake in hand.

On our Hawaiian cruise onboard the Disney Wonder we had accidentally started another tradition when we played a game of basketball late one night and whoever lost had to get the tea the following morning. We wanted to do that once again on this cruise so walked up to Goofy’s Sports Deck but sadly found out that it closes at 6:00pm on the Disney Dream probably due to both Palo and Remy being directly underneath so we decided to walk some laps of Deck 4 instead before bed.

Once we got back to our stateroom, we sat in bed and finished watching Ratatouille whilst eating the Dove chocolates that had been left for us on the bed as part of the turndown service. The sea was so calm at this time compared to earlier that day and we were both hoping for a much better night’s sleep as we would be arriving in Vigo the following morning – a new port for us to visit and explore!

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