This is long overdue, so here we go...
The worst part of a cruise is getting on the ship. You have 2000 people all trying to get on at once, so it tends to suck. They try to make it as orderly as possible, but it still tends to drag on for a while.
Once we got on the ship, we felt so lost. The ship had 13 different decks. So finding our way around the first day or so was a bit tough. Luckily Rachel has a good sense of direction and was able to locate everything pretty quickly. I was almost as lost on day 7 as I was on day 1.
First thing we did after checking out our cabin was heading to get something to eat. They have this place called the deckside grill which serves breakfast in the morning, and burgers, hot dogs, chicken fingers and fries during the day. We stopped in and got a burger and fries. It definitly hit the spot. It was a great place to stop by in the morning to get an omlet, freedom toast, sausage, bacon etc before heading into town.
The US Coast Guard followed us out of Tampa for about 3 hours to make sure we were ok. Drunken girls on the boat screamed over the side of the ship down at the Coast Guard boat. I guess women really do gaga for men in uniform.
The first night and next day were spent out at sea. It may sound boring, but there is lots going on to keep you busy. Each night when they turn down your bed, they leave you a little booklet called Carnival Capers which lists what's going on the next day and where they are taking place. They have all sorts of stuff to do. There are ping pong tables, arcades, a gym, spa, pools, shows, lounges, BINGO, karaoke, a casinoand all sorts of wackiness going in.
The shows were really excellent. Some nights they had stand up comics, other nights they had juggling acts, magicians, balancing acts, and even a guest talent show. The guests did a pretty remarkable job. One woman did an incredible acapella version of Mercedes Benz by Janice Joplin. Another young girl played the piano and sang an original song she hat written. At one point during the song, she dropped the F bomb which got everyones attention.
The 2nd night at sea was "formal night" which means if you have dinner at one of the main dining rooms, you have to wear a suite or a dress. I wore a lovely strapless gown. How they suck more money out of your wallet is they setup these scenic backdrops all throughout the ship and have staff photographers take photos of you. On formal night since we looking all snazzy, we must have posed for about 20 photos. We ended up buying 5 of them.
At 8:30 we were seated for dinner and met the other guests at our table. Rachel and I were the only Americans at the table. The other 6 people (3 couples) were all British. One of the dudes had teeth just like Austin Powers. I couldn't help but notice. Luckily they turned out to be nice people, so we were able to engage in some conversation.
The next day we arrived in Grand Cayman. Holy crap what an expensive island. Luckily we had booked a shore excursion, so that was already paid for. That day we did a three part tour. We first stopped at Turtle Farm where they rescue and breed sea turtles. Some of which get quite huge. They have smaller ones that they let you hold and pet. I'll post some pictures of that at a later time. The 2nd stop was a stop in Hell. Hell was a bit of a disapointment. It was basically this little town with this weird black rock formation. So they named it hell because they invisioned the rocks to be something like you would see in hell. They also had a gift shop, and post office where you can mail post cards that would be post marked from Hell. The last leg of the tour was the best part. We took a chartered boat out to Stingray City and got to swim and feed the stingrays. I'm sure a lot of people have seen Stingrays in aquariums and on the Discovery Channel, well that doesn't really prepare you for when you are inches away from them in the water. They are HUGE. Some of them had to be over 3 feet wide. Luckily they are very tame animals and swam calmly around us. They setup buckets with squid that you can hold in your hand and feed to them. That was pretty sweet. We also got to do a bit of snorkeling there. The water was incredible. Warm, shallow and crystal clear. It was a good time. On the bus ride back to the ship, we passed a lot of American food joints like Burger King, Papa Johns and KFC. We considered stopping in to get something to eat, then we saw that a Whopper happy meal cost $12.00. So we waited till we got back on the ship.
The 2nd day we arrived in Costa Maya Mexico. This was by far my favorite port that we stopped in. Our excursion that day was Jungle Beach Break. We took about a 40 minute bus ride and made our way down to this private beach which was literally surrounded by a jungle. The beach couldn't have been more perfect. It reminded me of one of those Corona beer commercials. Palm trees, straw umbrellas, hamocks, aqua colored water, and an open bar!!! We secured two lounge chairs near an umbrella, laid out our towels and relaxed in the sun for a while. When we got hot, we headed up to the bar and got us some rum punch and margueritas. We spent a lot of time in the water since it was so beautiful and relaxing. They supplied us with these floating lounge chairs that you could lay on in the water and let the water gentle rock you. The tides were very calm so it was so relaxing. The sign nearby said the water temperature was about 82 degrees which was just amazing. Coole nough to be refreshing, and warm enough to just walk right in. Off to the sides they had all kinds of non motorized water craft like paddle boats, canoes, kayaks etc. A little further down they had jet skis and little speed boats. One of the coolest things there was what they did with the fruit that fell from the palm trees. They were these green looking melons about the size of a honeydew melon. They would take these melons and had a guy with a machete chop them down and hollow them out and make them into drinking cups. Sort of made me feel like I was on Gilligans Island. Once they carved them out, you could bring them up to the bar and they would fill them with youe drink of choice. We pretty much stuck with rum punch most of the day. They also had XX bear on tap which I tried. We spent about 5 hours there before we headed back to the bus and back to the ship. I had taken about 70 photos there and had filled up my memory card. So I popped in a new memory card before we boarded the bus. I dozed off on the bus ride back and must have dropped the memory card. So our pictures from that day were gone :-(. It really sucked because it was the most beautiful, picturesq place I had ever been.
The following day we headed into Cozumel Mexico which was also beautful. In town where we met our team leader Guilliam (from Montreal) it was blazing hot. It was only about 8:00 AM but it felt like it was already over 90 degrees. After talking with Guilliam for a while, we headed to their base camp. There we met our second team leader named Miguel. They gave us some basic instruction on how to operate the speed boats and we boarded the boats. Each boat was about 8-9 feet long and had two seats and a small storage compartment. The boats went approximately 30-35 knots at top speed which doesn't sound that fast, but it feels a lot quicker when you have the wind and surf in your face. The first leg of the trip the waters were pretty calm. We got to open the boats up a little and cruised around. Then we went out a little deeper and started hitting MUCH choppier water. A few times waves really knocked us around. The boats were made of fiberglass so they were very light. At one point the couple in front of us got hit on the side from a wave and nearly flipped over. The woman in the boat was so freaked, she ripped the handle right out of the side of the boat. A few times I felt like we could flip over as well, but they had a thing on the back of the boat that looked like a spoiler you would see on the back of a car, only taller. I think that is what prevented us from flipping. After about 45 minutes on the open waters, we stopped at this section of coast called Barracuda Beach. On the beach we were greeted by two locals who cooked us an authentic Mexican lunch. We had chips and salsa, tacos and quesadillas. They als had soft drinks in coolers for us. After we ate, we swam in the waters for a while. Lots of little fish swimming all around us. Neat silvery little fish that sort of glistened as the sun hit them throgh the water. We looked up and noticed a little further down the beach, they had started a game of beach volleyball. I grabbed my camera and started taking some pictures. They were short handed on one team and asked if I wanted to play. So I handed my camera to Rachel and joined in. Fortunately we had two girls on my team who played volleyball in high school. So they were pretty good. It was so much fun, but man was it hot. We ended up winning both games that we played. By the time we were done, we were all pretty hot and sandy. What was perfect was that we could just jump in the water to cool down. Man was that refreshing. AFter cooling down a bit, we gathered our belongings and headed back to our boats. We headed back out and luckily the return trip was much calmer. It made for a fun ride back since we had a lot of flat, open water so we could really speed around. About 20 minutes into our return trip, we noticed that one of the boats had stalled out. We flagged down Miguel after a while and he headed back to get them back on their way.
We got back and took a boat back to the pier. We showered and cleaned up then headed into Cozumel to walk around a bit. That's where we deciced to get some henna tattoos. It was kind of a cool experience. I got a flaming sun on my shoulder, whole Rachel opted for a viney sort of tribal around her ankle. I still have mine, although its faded to gray now. Rachel's faded a lot quicker since she peelers from her sunburn. We visited a few shops, picked up a few souveniers, posed with the locals and roasted in the hot Mexican sun. At one point, one of the security guys says "Senor, do you want to see a bird so you can take a picture?". So I reluctantly said yes and he led me behind this hut. I expected a group of men to be waiting back there to rob me of my money and camera and beat me to a pulp, but there were no men back there. Just a snake. Not a huge snake, but for someone who isn't accustomed to seeing snakes up close, it may as well been an 12 foot anaconda. I followed the guy back and saw an owl which I took a picture of, but in retrospect, I could have done without the owl and snake.
The next day we visited our last port of Belize. Belize is relatively new to the cruising world, so they don't even have a dock built yet. So we dropped anchor about 5 miles from the shore. They had these tender boats that took us back and forth. I swear the boats felt like the boats that stormed the beaches of Normandy. Really choppy, noisy and lots of water spraying up over the sides. That was an adventure in itself. We met up with our snorkeling boat captain named Charlie, who was one of the coolest people I've ever seen. He had dreadlocks with coins, bottle caps, rings and shark teeth hanging from them. He just looked like he fit the roll perfectly. We took about a 30 minute boat ride out just off the coast of this small island. They gave us snorkels, masks and flippers. We jumped off the side of the boat and plunged into the water. The water was so beautiful. As we snorkeled, we saw all kinds of tropical fish and plantlife along the barrier reef. Some of the more adventurous folks actually dove deeper and picked up some conch shells off the bottom. One little girl ventured a little too far and got stung by a jelly fish. We felt bad for the little kid. She was curled up in the fetal position, crying when we got back on the boat. We spent about 90 minutes swimming around and snorkeling looking at all the life under the sea. It was really beautiful. A few passing showers passed overhead, but we didn't mind much since we were already wet. We then swam to the shore of that little island where they had a little Tiki Bar set up. Walking in those flipper is NOT EASY. Walking forward is next to impossible. So they suggested we sidestep of walk backwards. That worked much better. On the shore at the Tiki Bar they served us rum punch and snacks. We stayed there for about 30 minutes before we had to swim back out to Captain Charlie waiting for us on the boat. The boat ride back is when things got REALLY interesting.
First off one of the men who had been married 3 days before in the Cayman Islands had lost his wedding ring while snorkeling. Luckily one of the other more experienced SNUBA people found his ring for him. The man who found his ring had this really loud wife who made this whole big presentation about it. "LADIES AND GENTLEMAN, THIS MAN LOST HIS WEDDING RING TODAY. AND THIS MAN OVER HERE, MY HUSBAND FOUND IT!!!!" At that point everyone on the boat cheered. The young bride who's husband had dropped the ring cried. But it was a nice moment.
We stopped after 2 rum punches, and I'm glad we did because I think they started mixing in LSD or crack or something. On the ride back they started playing party music like "Hot Hot Hot" and Bob Marley music. There was a group on men and women on the boat who were at least in their 50's. They completely lost their minds. They were doing the conga, grabbing younger men, screaming, flashing, dancing and just going completely mad. Eventually just about everyone joined in, but the older people were definitly the loudest and most out of control. One of the older guys was so red, I thought his head was going to explode. He was badly sunburn, and I guess from drinking he was made even redder. There was one guy who had the HUGEST beer gut I had ever seen. His belly had to extend out at least 18 inches. He was drinking like a fish. As we got off the boat, he was still getting refills of the rum punch.
On the 2nd to last nighy they had a game show theme going on in one of the lounges. On the way in you drop your name and cabin number into a bag. There were probably about 200 people, so I didn't expect them to draw my name. Well after the 3rd game ended, my name was the first to be called for the 4th game. So I headed up to the stage where they had these three podiums that looked like that they had been stolen from the 1985 Jeopardy set. I was up against 2 girls. One about my age, one I would guess in her early 20's. My head is filled with so muich useless crap, I was made to play this game. The first question was an audio clue. On which tv show would you hear this song? Duh duh da dum SNAP SNAP. I ring in and answer "THE ADAMS FAMILY!". Correct for 10 points, only 40 points to go. The 2nd clue was also an audio clue, it was the rice crispes commercial song. I didn't recognize it at first, but when they got to the end, they say sang SNAP CRACKLE POP, so I rang in and guessed Rice Cripies and got another 10 points. The next question was about I Love Lucy. I identified the theme song and how had 30 points. 30-0. The next question was an easy one, but answer it correctly was only half the fun. At what event would you hear this song? "Here she is...." I rang in and answered "Miss America Pageant". I was right, but now Marcus (the host) asked me to come down to the front of the stage and do my best Miss America walk. So I proceeded to strut my stuff down the stage towards Marcus. He then asked me "Why do you deserve to be Miss America". My answer "Because I'm the only one with any points in this game!". The crowd and Marcus laughed and I was up 40-0. At that point I guess Marcus felt bad for the girls, so he asked them two snowball questions. The girt to my right was named Melissa. His quuestion was "What is Melissa's middle name". Melissa rang in all excited and chipper and said "OOOOHHH I know this one!!! Anne!" 10 points for Melissa. The girl at the end got the next snowball question. I think her name was Julie. "How many pets does Julie have waiting for her at home". She rang in and answered 0, and was awared 10 points. 40-10-10. The next question was to identify what movie the song was from. It was that "She's a maniac song from Flashdash". Without thinking about the consequences of answering the question, I rang in and answered Flashdance. Marcus then asked me to come down to the stage and do my best Flashdance dance. So did the little running in place, stamping my feet thing on the stage. This time the crowd and Marcus I believe were laughing AT ME and not with me. But who cared, I had won!!! I was presented my plastic ship on a stick trophy and made my way back to my seat.
Getting off the boat the next day was a long process. There was a woman named Maria Mendez who if I ever meet, I would like to slap who hadn't cleared immigration. So they were searching the ship for her. Asking her to report to the Empress deck to talk with immigration. They made that same announcment about 5 times over the course of an hour. Until they find Maria, noone is getting off the ship. Finally they wised up and made the same announcment in Spanish. They only had to make the announcment twice in Spanish before Maria showed up. After that getting off the ship wasnt too bad.
Overall we had a great time. Got to do several things we had never done before, saw 4 places neither of us had been before and got a much needed week of relaxation.
