Disney Cruise Line celebrates its 25th anniverary As Disney Cruise Line celebrates its 25th "Silver Anniversary at Sea", I embarked on one of the summer sailings from Southampton over to La Rochelle, France. With just one port and a new ship to experience - this being the Dream's first time in Europe - I experienced some real highlights AND a few lowlights for good measure. Southampton port was familiar to me since my very first Disney cruise (and cruise full stop) was from here. Originally when we booked, the Dream was due to dock at the Horizon Cruise Terminal like last time. Luckily, I'd checked online a few days before to find that we'd been switched to the QE2 Terminal. This meant a slight alteration to plans since the hotel we stayed at the night before was within walking distance of Horizon. Not so much QE2.  On the morning of the cruise, the taxi company warned us that heavy traffic was expected and advised us to get the tax an hour ahead of our PAT (por...

We had a 7am breakfast slot on debarkation day as we'd booked the earlier dining for this cruise. This was fine, but another reason we preferred the late dining with the accompanying later breakfast. I peered out the curtains and saw we were just coming in alongside the docks before heading down. Our suitcases were left outside the stateroom the night before, and I definitely recommend doing this. It made everything so much easier as you don't have to lug them to breakfast. As if by magic, the port of Southampton appeared again! Ami our room host was absolutely fantastic, and we gave him a box of chocolates with a hand-drawn note (my husband drew some amazing little Disney character silhouettes on gratitude cards) alongside the tips. This is by no means required, but boy do these CMs work hard, and we like to show how grateful we are in a different way sometimes. On the way down to Lumiere's for breakfast, I came off the WiFi and back on to UK signal. This is where I made a...

Today we were having a Palo brunch at 12, so we pre-booked some very light room service breakfast for when we woke up. I just had Special K with almond milk. I wish I'd found out what supplier the milk is, as it tasted good. Room service breakfast has some vegan options After watching the world go by on the verandah, it was time to head to Palo. It was nice and quiet when we went in, and what a stunning setting with such a relaxing Italian vibe. The server knew right away that I was vegan so I didn't even need to tell him. He brought out a selection of breads, including crispy sesame bread which was divine, especially with the balsamic dip. The sesame bread was crunchy and delicious The server said our champagne was on the way, to which we politely said "no thank you" — we were still a little delicate from last night's whiskey tasting. Neither of us are big drinkers so we forfeited our champagne for some freshly squeezed orange juice. They were able to make me som...