Disney Destiny 7 Night Eastern Caribbean Cruise Review (6/27-7/4)
I go cruising with my family frequently on multiple cruise ships. This was our 10th cruise with Disney and first on the Destiny.
ITINERARY: The ship made stops at Disney Lookout Cay, San Juan, Puerto Rico, and Phillipsburg, St. Maarten with 3 days at sea. Lookout Cay was cute and it's only about a 15-20 minute walk, but doing it in the blaring sun did end up affecting my mom's medical condition. I heard lots of complaints about the walk to and from the ship, mainly from older people who were not able to catch the shuttle, so if you are unsure if you can handle the walk, jump on that shuttle as soon as possible just to be safe. The water was beautiful here and lots of marine life! I didn't get off at San Juan on this cruise, mainly because I am Puerto Rican and visit frequently, but I can tell you that Puerto Rico is beautiful and there's lots of things to do. If you want to try some authentic food, I highly recommend Cafetería Mallorca near the port! They have great food and of course, Mallorcas (sweet bread pastry that's usually filled with ham or cheese and topped with powdered sugar). And if you're a coffee drinker, go pick up some REAL Puerto Rican coffee, not Bustelo. St. Maarten was beautiful and my parents did a 5-hour tour going shopping and sight seeing and going to the airport to watch the airplanes land. I just stayed on the beach and be warned, one half is French territory so be careful of taking pictures or you may capture someone's behind.
OVERALL LAYOUT AND DESIGN: I don't believe there was any clear themeing on this ship. It almost reminded me of the Disney Riviera Resort in Orlando with how generic and bland it looked. Aside from a few themed carpets, paintings, and outer rims of ceiling lights, I mainly just saw white and light blue. As far as bars and lounges go, there was nothing that really stood out about them except for De Vil's and The Haunted Mansion Parlor, however, the Saga downstairs area wins the award for most uncomfortable chairs I have ever sat on.
STATEROOM: We always get a Verandah Stateroom, which I highly recommend! It is so relaxing to sit outside and feel the wind and hear the ocean. While I didn't see any animals near the ship this time except for two turtles, there have been occassions where we saw dolphins jumping nearing the ship on our balcony! I also like how it's private so you can enjoy seeing the water without having to hear the chaos on deck 11. The room was Hercules themed and actually pretty big. My dad said we happened to get a longer room by luck so that was definitely a plus (I'm messy). There is lots of closet and shelf space and I loved that the toilet and shower were separate. The last Disney Cruise I took was almost 2 years ago and I must know, are these giant showers a new thing? This shower was the biggest one we had ever seen in all of our cruising experience and also turns into a tub?! I'm not sure if all of the staterooms other than Verandah's have this, but I love it.
ENTERTAINMENT AND ACTIVITIES: There were showings of many movies including The Devil Wears Prada 2 and Toy Story 5 and the Frozen and Hercules musicals were performed multiple times in the Walt Disney Theater. Frozen was great, but in the mixed reviews of the Hercules performance, I am among the negative ones. It seemed that Hades was trying to do too many different levels and land a joke with every line that was spoken. He even messed up a line in the beginning of the performance! The actor for Hercules sounded like he was chasing the music and said basically every line in the same tone of voice. We were also disappointed that they changed "Go the Distance" to a more modern beat that the actor's voice did not pair well with. Every other actor and singer was amazing, especially the Muses and Pain and Panic! I also really enjoyed the use of big puppets for the monsters. Other than this, it felt like there was nothing fun to do while on the ship especially when we had 3 sea days! Don't get me wrong, I love trivia and game shows as much as the next person, but if you aren't a drinker, dancer, or shopper, you'd better start studying for every kind of Disney trivia imaginable and be prepared to do it in a small area with a small amount of seats where grown adults are rude to children over a plastic medal (shoutout to The Sanctum and Triton's Lounge and that one woman who got upset at a teenager for being better than her at ballet during "Heard That?" and was complaining about it the whole cruise whenever we happened to walk past her!) The real stars of this cruise was Eric Jones and Jonathan Burns. Eric Jones is a spectacular magician and never failed to make the audience laugh. He even called my mom up at his smaller show in Saga and she still has the card! Jonathan Burns is HILARIOUS! His act is so stupid that it's funny and he's very interactive with the audience. We saw his main performance in the Walt Disney Theater and then saw his 18+ version in Saga. Sidebar: why are so many 18+ activities held in Saga when the upstairs has open windows and kids walk by making noise and hearing what is being said in the event the whole time?
SERVICE/DINING: The service is always great and pretty consistent with DCL. We loved our stateroom attendant, Stacey. In all of our cruising experience she was by far the most attentive and friendly one we have ever had, though all of them have been great. Our servers were Boris and Gustav and they pretty much knew our tastes and frequent orders by the second night without us having to tell them. If anyone happens to sail soon and gets Boris as their server, cherish him and his great service as he is leaving soon!
The main dining locations on this ship are Worlds of Marvel, Pride Lands: Feast of the Lion King, and 1923. My family and I enjoyed the Worlds of Marvel restaurant. It has interactive trivia and screens for small shows they do and character appearances. The first night we got Spider-Man, though I do have to say for Disney, it gave uncle playing Spider-Man for a child's birthday party costume-wise, but he remained in character and actually sounded like Tom Holland's Spider-Man. Other than a nasty steak one night, it was great. While I enjoyed the concept for Pride Lands, the placement of the stage was unfortunate and the performance that they were hyping up wasn't that good. If you also have a family of picky eaters as I do, this restuarant might not be the best option for you. 1923 was fine. The one thing I will say is that the walkway's are so narrow in such a fast paced environment that we witnessed a woman at the table next to us get hit on her HEAD with a plate and the covering as it fell off a server's carrying tray when two servers ran into each other. I usually love the buffet's on cruises as I've always felt that there was something new to choose from every day, but Marceline Market was pretty much the same thing every day except for different pastas and desserts. I also felt that they were a little stingy with the food considering it is an all-you-can-eat buffet. I had one woman give me a plate of 11 NOODLES (yes, I counted) with a full pot of them. Unfortunately, I'm a little shy so I just thanked her and came back later hoping I would be able to get more and I got pretty much the same size serving. I highly recommend you check out the quick service restaurants on deck 11, especially Donald's Cantina and Mickey's Smokestack Barbecue (I ate here way too much).
OTHER THINGS TO MENTION:
Characters: There are lots of photo opportunities with characters. We saw Chip and Dale, Mickey, Tiana, Belle, and Rapunzel and Flynn were walking around during the Captain's Reception. The lines were pretty long but we expected that.
Teen/Children Behavior: Obviously, Disney is family oriented so it's to be expected that lots of children will be there. However, on this cruise, it's like the parents forgot they were parents for a week. Small children were runing rampant around the ship, kicking chairs, bumping into people and the parents wouldn't say ANYTHING. If you have seen anything or were on the Destiny this past week, you have probably heard about the terrible behavior of the teenagers on the ship. I didn't have a lot of interactions with them except for them running back and forth in the hallway and yelling at 11:30 pm but I heard some horror stories from a few people on the ship. Of course, I don't believe this is a DCL issue, more of a parenting issue.
DCL App: I'm not sure if this was just us but my family and I had really slow sending messages on the DCL app, but let me know!
Overall, I rate this ship a 3/5. Very family oriented and clean. I would go on this ship again, but probably not my first choice. Let me know what you think!