Boundless Horizons

Day 5 – May 24 – Naples, Italy

Ashore 07:00 – All Aboard 19:00

The port hours were extended from the original schedule of 08:00-18:00 ahead of our sailing, and I was a bit concerned that the earlier ashore time would affect our port adventure start time. Fortunately the app told us to meet at 7:45am in the Walt Disney Theatre, just ahead of the original 8am start.

I’ve mentioned in previous entries that I’m not a morning person – this morning was no exception! Given our early start for the port adventure, we ordered a room service breakfast to arrive 6:30am-7:00am to make sure we had something to eat before leaving. I definitely needed to get some caffeine! I was so tired when I got up that I managed to bang my head really hard in the bathroom – I was fully expecting to see blood when I looked in the mirror. That wasn’t a great start, I was really tempted to abandon the tour and go back to bed! Fortunately other than a bump there was no damage.

Rhys is much more competent in the morning and was able to get a nice shot of Mount Vesuvius as we came in to dock.

We made our way to the Walt Disney Theatre just before 7:45am to join our group for our Pompeii Half Day port adventure. There was a bit of waiting around while they got everyone assembled – I’d packed a large sun hat to protect me from the sun in Pompeii so I was able to get seated in the theatre and use my hat to hide that I had my eyes closed until it was our turn to leave!

We headed to the coach and started on our journey, with our tour guide providing narration. On the way to Pompeii we stopped at a cameo factory where there was a very brief overview of how cameos are made, then an opportunity to use the bathroom and browse the shop. This felt a bit unnecessary, though the bathroom break was welcome. The cameos were pretty but quite expensive so not really an impulse purchase.

We arrived outside Pompeii around 10am, where they split us into two smaller groups of 20. We then waited to get our “3D glasses” – to be honest, these were more hassle than anything. They were augmented reality glasses which let you see what the ruins would have looked like before the eruption, I found a video on YouTube about them. The glasses themselves were awkward to put on, they were attached to a control unit which you wore around your neck. I found it quite heavy and it kept getting tangled with the radio / earpiece that they provided so we could hear the guide. The images were interesting but we could have saved a bit of effort by looking at print outs.

The tour itself was excellent. Our guide was really engaging and informative, there’s so much to see that it was definitely worth having someone explain it as we went around. The views were stunning, Mt Vesuvius felt really close so I can only imagine what the volcano looked like before the eruption took off the top. We were glad we brought water with us, and hats! I’d read in advance that Pompeii has very little shade – the people without hats in our tour group looked quite red by the end.

The tour finished around 11:45am, and we were given a voucher for a scoop of gelato or a soft drink. We were told to meet back at the Hotel Vittoria at 12:15pm. I was a little disappointed that we’d not had a chance to go to the gift shop, so planned to go back – then we realised that we would need to clear security again just to access the shop. So we just joined the line to get our gelato and waited to go back to the bus.

The bus got back to the ship just after 1pm, so despite being advertised as a 4 hour port adventure, it actually took over 5 hours with the Pompeii tour taking around 1 hour 45 minutes of that. I’m glad we did the port adventure to try it, but it would probably have been more efficient to do a private tour. With a bit more cruise experience, I think we’d go with that option in future.

I’d originally expected to be back around 12pm, and we hoped to go to the Archaeological Museum in the afternoon. Between being back a little later and being tired from a busy morning, we didn’t have the energy for that so we decided to walk into Naples for lunch then head back to the ship to get ready for Pirate Night. The port of Naples is in the city so it was just a short walk, unlike the other ports which involved a bus ride, though that does mean dodging taxi drivers as you leave!

I’d researched a few places in advance, but all of them were further than we wanted to walk in the heat after our morning walking around Pompeii, so we went for a stroll near the port and came across a place called Stritt Stritt. They didn’t do pizza but they did serve excellent pasta which was perfect since it was almost 2pm and we hadn’t eaten since a light breakfast at 7am. Feeling refreshed after some food, we grabbed some photos and headed back to the ship.

We were back on board with enough time to catch Making the Dream, which ran a couple of times during the cruise. It was an interesting presentation by Linds from the entertainment team in Pub 687 where she took us through the history of Disney Cruise Line and then how the Dream was built.

It was Pirate Night and I had been preparing my outfit since we booked the cruise! I’ve loved Pirates of the Caribbean since I first rode it as a kid, so my outfit was inspired by Redd. I definitely gave myself a challenge trying to transport my hat though!

This was our first Pirate Night and I really enjoyed it. We were back in Animator’s Palate which had pirate-themed art displayed on the screens, so I think we were in the best restaurant for it. I had the Braised Barbecue Beef Rib Salad, which was in the “lighter note offerings” section of the menu, while Rhys had King George’s Roasted Privateer Strip Loin. For dessert, I had to have the Rum-Soaked Chocolate Cake and Rhys had the Caramel Macadamia Nut Cheesecake Tart.

After dinner was the first of the shows up on the pool deck, with Mickey and friends taking on Captain Hook and his crew. The timing was great as we had just started to sail away which gave Mount Vesuvius as a backdrop to the show. Between the two deck shows, we strolled around deck 12 taking in the view. It really is incredible to see the volcano in person.

We had some wine on our verandah and then headed to the Walt Disney Theatre to see Jamie Raven’s magic show. We didn’t bother with most of the variety acts, but we both really enjoy magic acts and we’d seen him on TV before. He was great!

Then it was time to go back upstairs for the fireworks. We headed to the same place that we had been sat on Day 2 for the Silver Anniversary fireworks – deck 11 on the Starboard side, by the windows. While this meant watching the fireworks through the window, and a slightly obstructed view of the stage, it gave us a table to sit with drinks and an uncrowded spot to enjoy the show. We also grabbed some pizza from Flo’s Cafe.

And with that, Pirate Night was finished – at least it was for us, there was a party on deck after the show but we were done!