CRUISING (PART 3).
Review for:
GENTING DREAM CRUISE
3D 2N
Price: RM1300/pax
Bought from: Cannot mention. Sorry.
The best discovery of the cruise (for me) is the hot tub. Sheesh, me olddddd. Haha
The hot tubs are the circular small pools at each corner of the main pool. Check out the pictures and you'll see them. If you booked the Palace room category, you'll have hot tubs that are almost empty all the time (at least during our trip) in the Palace private pool section.
At the main pool, the hot tubs are often occupied. By grace of God, I figured that people tend to run away when the sky drizzled (just slightly). The privacy and absence of people on the deck made it irresistible for me to plop into the tub (a few tubs had roof so the rain won't get to you). The water was warm and comfy. You can set the bubbles/water jet massage mode on. The tub can accomodate 5 people. We had the tub to ourselves whilst enjoying the fresh ocean air. Kids love em! It was heavenly. All I needed to make it perfect was a fancy drink in my hand. Drinks not allowed in the pool though.
On normal days I'd probably be thrilled to go on the adventurous adult water slides (they had a few) or try the zipline/rope course but since I was medically unfit then, I didn't.
Some of the activities one can indulge in:
✅️Swimming (main pool, hot tub, kids slides, adult slides) FREE
✅️Kids club (toys like kitchen, doll, colouring, jigsaw, Nintendo, lego blocks, arts & craft, watch movie etc). FREE FOR 2 HOURS DAILY
✅️Watching shows/performance at the auditorium theatre. FREE & PAID
✅️Glow in the dark bowling PAID
✅️Wall climbing/Ropes course/Zipline FREE
✅️Full facilities spa PAID
✅️Salon/barbershop PAID
✅️Shopping PAID
✅️Arcade games PAID
✅️Gym & fitness classes FREE
✅️Dance classes (E.g salsa/cha cha/rumba) PAID
✅️Organized group trivias/games at the main reception area (Deck 6). FREE
✅️Giant chess FREE
✅️Mini golf FREE
There are probably other activities too but I kept my list halal.
Food wise, we sticked to The Lido which was their halal certified main restaurant. The restaurants that were free (inclusive in package):
✅️The Lido (Deck 16) International/Halal/Vegetarian.
✅️Dream Dining Room Lower (Deck 7) Western set menu.
✅️Dream Dining Room Upper (Deck 8) Chinese set menu.
The restaurants above served food 5 times a day. We had 3 meals daily (all buffet) and even that felt like an overstretch for me. Not my kids though. They always had room for snacks when we returned to our cabin.
Additionally, there were many other specialty restaurants (need to pay):
✅️Silk Road (Chinese fine dining)
✅️Bistro (premium cut steaks)
✅️Umi Uma (Premium Japanese restaurant/Korean BBQ/shabu shabu/omakase)
✅️Hot Pot
✅️Crystal Life Cuisine (healthy alternatives)
✅️Gelateria (home made gelato)
✅️Blue Lagoon (Asia & international)
✅️Lobby Cafe (bakery & sandwich bar)
If food is your thing, then you'll be spoilt for choice.
Despite only sticking to The Lido for our meals, my kids and I were happy and always find something to love in the buffet spread. The buffet had good balance between Asian and Western for every meal. It's like dining at normal hotel buffet.
For breakfast there's assorted option between sweet and savoury. You can have oatmeal, toast, pancakes, waffles, muffins, hashbrowns, eggs, sausages, noodles, porridge, nasi lemak, fruits, yogurt, cereal and so many other things. My favourite for breakfast was the nasi lemak. Their rendang daging was delicious! If there's one thing I'd like changed, that would be the cereal. I hope they get better ones.
For lunch and dinner, there's always rice and plenty of side dishes (multiple proteins), noodles, pasta, dedicated section for vegetarian (Jain), salad bar, fruits, desserts. During lunch they serve ice cream with cones.
We are big fans of their baked macaroni with chicken & tomato sauce (the chef was not stingy with the cheese on top). My kids liked another dish too; creamy fettucine which they ate with baked fish fillet. We also enjoyed the baked goods (buns/baguette) with the daily soups.
Moving on to the swimming pool. An interesting observation was the way the pool guards run their deck. Safety was number 1 priority. This is true for both the kids pool and adult pool. The guards were standing around all the time and were very strict with rules.
✅️No running around pool.
✅️No diving into pool.
✅️Kids without supervision not allowed in adult pool.
✅️Must shower before entering pool
✅️No items like towel near pool (only on lounge chairs)
✅️Proper swimming attire required. Tshirts are allowed though.
✅️Inappropriate/unsafe acts not allowed.
✅️Must not hang out at the bottom of slides area
I am thankful to the pool guards as due to their strictness, the pool was always in order and safe. They rescued near miss incidents at the pool a few times while we were there.
For kids 4 years and above (if I'm not mistaken), you can leave them at Little Dreamers kids club. If your child is younger, then parent must be present. Club use is complimentary 2 hours daily. Beyond the 2 hours is chargeable. They were open during night time (early evening) too. The staff there were especially nice. Maria was kind to my kids and helped them with their activities. Thanks to the club, I had some quiet time by myself.
I'll post tips & tricks related to this cruise in PART 4.
Stay tuned! 😊😊😊
