Ahoy, Nancy!
Planning a cruise is super-exciting! When you are able to begin your online check-in for your cruise on the Disney Dream, you will select a "Port Arrival Time". This is the time that it is expected that you will arrive to Port Canaveral. So, depending on how your family is traveling to the port, you will choose what you think will work.
Our family almost always rents a car at the Orlando International Airport and drives to Port Canaveral the night before our cruise. Then, in the morning, my husband drops the girls and I off at the terminal and then he returns the rental car while we get a porter to take our luggage. If they are allowing passengers into the terminal, the girls and I will enter, go through security, and then wait for my husband to return in order to check-in.
When you are checking-in, you will receive a boarding number card, which is the group you will be in to board the ship. While your family is in the terminal, be sure to take some pictures in front of the amazing model of the Disney Magic, and wait in line for photos with one of the famous Disney Characters. You can also check your children into the Oceaneer Lab or Oceaneer Club while you are waiting in the cruise terminal.
When your number is called, you will go through the Mickey ears to a hallway where photographers are waiting to take your embarkation photo. I call this our "Before" photo, when we are all clean and happy to be getting on the ship. Do not miss this! If you are planning to purchase a photo package, you might consider pre-purchasing on the
Gifts and Amenities tab on the DCL website. I almost always purchase the photo CD of all of our cruise photos.
I hope you have a wonderful cruise on the Disney Dream. Please visit us again at the Disney Parks Moms Panel with more questions before you set sail.
Happy Cruising, Tracy V.