An Excursion through Carnival

The morning starts off hot. Not the intense searing heat that I normally associate with summer. The heat is different as is the humidity, but it is still hot. I had slathered Tim down in sunblock and he had purchased a hat. I was soaking in the sun. I don’t burn as easily as my pale, pale spouse.

The idea had been to pick an excursion that started at 1215. By the time we went to preregister for it before our trip, all the slots where filled. Instead, we wound up with a 0915 slot. We decided to go through Carnival for the simple fact that there is a wait guaranty when you go on an excursion with the ship. The ship was only in port for 10 hours. 10 hours is not a lot of time when you run into trouble. When you book your excursion with them they will wait or they will get you back to the ship at their expense. This type of thing matters to me. I would hate to ruin my vacation over 20-30 dollars on the price of my excursion. Call it, insurance.

How to get to the Excursions was simple. I think the ship should have handed out a page that explained how to get to the excursions and how they collect you. With the daily news letter (FunTimes) they also deliver a handful of junk mail. Its like going to my own mailbox but on my cruise ship. These pages are adverts for the spa, the art auction, gambling classes and on board sales. I think it would not be hard to explain how to get to the excursion.

In Freeport:

First, you get off the ship. This means going down to deck three and going to the pier. You then walk the length of the pier, go through a gate, and find yourself in a little shopping area with some pavilions and lots of busy ships.

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View from the ship of the pavilions.

The pavilion have signs on them for the various excursions from the ships. You mill around at these signs and wait for someone to arrive and call your excursions. This person then hands you a waiver that says they won’t blame you for breaking stuff and you won’t blame them for getting hurt or dying.

There are also taxis everywhere. This is for the more adventitious and those that have private excursions. There are also people picking up the private excursions. Its a well organized chaos but still chaos.

We waited by our sign. Our excursion was to leave at 0915. At 0900 a woman appeared and called for people for our excursion. She handed everyone a waver form to sign. This is the waver that stops them from suing you for breaking their stuff and you fro suing them for hurting you. It’s a pretty interesting form and it includes a waver for gross negligence.

Our bus then arrived. It was a charter buss and we loaded up. The buss was the Bahamas Taxi Union. The driver handed us little laminated cards. Some where laminated some were just taped over. These were our bus passes to get back onto the bus and back to the cruise ships. Otherwise we would need to get a taxi. The last taxi would leave at four pm and after that we where again on our own with needing to get a taxi.

Like England, Japan and Australia, the Bahamas’ are left hand drive. There is an eclectic mix of right hand and left hand drive cars on the road. Cars seem to own the road unless other cars are approaching. The middle of the road is a perfectly fine place to be, it seems. The shoulders are also well worn of grass becuase people have to use them like crazy. We sat at the front of the bus and the bus spent more time in the middle of the road then on either side of it.

We passed Burger King, McDonalds, and KFC. McDonalds was closed down. Burger King seemed to be the popular fast food place for the port according to the driver. “Have it your way,” he chuckled. We also came across a street light fallen in the center of a rotary. The solution was to direct traffic through a parking lot which had an entrance to the rotary past the fallen street light. The problem is that to get to the parking lot we had to drive across grass and over a curb.

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We the did this feat in a very large bus. The driver did not even blink as he headed off road. The road crew flagged us by. I guess they often direct buses to go off road. Why not? I’m closed minded I guess. I like my buses on the asphalt. Passenger eyes were wide and knuckles were going pale. We made it back to the road and continued on to the port.

We got dropped off at what I think is a taxi and bus stop/stand area. Our guide turned out to be a young man of about sixteen or so. He muttered ‘snorkeling that way’ and charged off. We followed. He walked very fast. We followed faster. He never looked behind him. I sighed.

The Port area was a mixture of a mall and a port. There where a lot of shops, some dance clubs, a lot of bars, and then the catamarans that went out to take people sparkling. Several hotels bracketed the harbor. It is a beautiful picture. I’ve seen similar images on television my entire life but living it was different.

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It was early but the shop keepers where all out. One lady’s shop was a little wagon full of hour glass shapes. These turned out to be hats. Strange, crazy looking hats shaped like hour glasses.

The shopkeepers immediately started to call out to us to visit their shops. We followed our guide like good ducklings. We rounded a corner and reached the boats. At that point we where told that our boat was broken. However, if we were willing to wait another forty minutes they would load us up on another boat and we could go snorkeling. Was that okay with everyone?

“Yes!” People stared at the woman like she had two heads. We had half an hour to look around the market place. I found a few items that I liked but I did not want to buy things and drag them onto the ship.

I am not used to dealing with shop keepers like this. They are calling to you to come into their store as you look from the edge. Some are polite and their voices a bit sensual as they try to lure you in. Some call you pretty girl or handsome man. Others say ‘I have to make a sale today’ and some even do the ‘I have children to fee’ spiel. They all have the same thing but some have a few different pieces. This means, if you are looking for that diamond in the rough you have to keep looking. They say things like, “We can make a deal”. I’m an American girl and I am used to going to the store, paying whats on the sticker, and leaving. This made up pricing and deal making is beyond me and makes me uncomfortable.

Also, the prices are not cheap. Tee shirts are cheaper on the ship sometimes. Most of the people on the ships are only going to go to a few local places that they are taken by the ships. The shopkeepers know this and their prices shoot up to match. There are no deals to be found, just decisions to be made if what you see is worth what they offer or what they might deal it down to.

I found a lovely wooden gecko that is a wall hanging. The same thing was in several shops. The one that I stopped at had a lady that was not as pushy as the others. I said that we would come back later after our trip.

Sunrise over the Alantic

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We are not early morning people. We put out our room service order to come at 0700 hours. It came at 0645. I frantically grabbed something to put on and let them into the room. There is an order sheet that you hang out on the door between 2300 hours and 0500 hours.

I had gone a bit wild with the ordering.

From Bahamas - 2011

This is what I ordered:

Two orders of melon, two orders of citrus, two orders of toast, two orders of cereal, two orange juices, two smoked salmons, some strawberry yogurt, hot chocolate and coffee. It is not as much food as it seems.

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Very tasty stuff. Not very much of it.

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The melon was not ripe. This was hit and miss through the entire trip.

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The smoked salmon was divine. My husband did not care for it. I ate his as well.

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The toast was very soft. Barely toasted.

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The orange juice had ice in it. I did not care for that at all.

The biggest problem was that they forgot the coffee. Tim was not functional without coffee. He did not care for the smoked salmon either. He ate his cereal and his fruit and his yogurt. We then went up to the lido for some coffee for him.

Up there, he got some scrambled eggs. I tried a bagel but it was awful. I had another plate of fruit and some hot tea as we watched the ship come into port.

As the ship came into port we could see what looked to be a derelict ship named Sea Escape sitting in the water.

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I looked it up later but I was not finding out much. It may be a casino ship. All I know is that it was rusted out, its name was half worn off and it just looked sad.
The ship pulled smoothly into port. They are graceful, these behemoth machines. and we headed back to our room to grab our snorkel gear and change into bathing suits.

We had purchased underwater camcorders (Kodak Play Sport)and waterproof watches for the trip. We also had water proof wallets that hung around our necks to hold our ship cards and our cash. Now we would see how all of it stood up to the ocean herself.

Room Service for the Hell of it

I was being a glutton. There is no other excuse then the desire to indulge in true gluttony. I have no excuse. Nor do I feel shame. I wanted to try as much food as possible. I only had three more days after all. That's not a lot of time to try a lot of things.

I had to order room service. It was free after all. Our menu was missing a page when we arrived. I asked our steward, when he introduced himself to us, to replace the page. We found it on the bed later that evening. The room service menu is limited. It contained deserts and sandwiches and a chicken and steak dish.

I ordered a roast beef sandwich for myself and Tim decided on a BLT. We also got some hot tea and desert.

From Bahamas - 2011

From Bahamas - 2011

The food was good. The bread was lovely. I hate highly processed bread that gets soggy quickly. The sandwich had mustard on it. I’m not a big yellow mustard fan so I ate around that section. It had a slice of brie cheese on the bottom.

I decided to try a custard type flan desert. It had a caramel sauce and diced apples on it. It was okay but I don’t really like custard type deserts. I keep trying them and I keep not liking them. Tim loves it and happily consumed the rest of it.

From Bahamas - 2011

I tipped the person delivering it. The only other times I got room service after this was the morning. At those times, they dropped off the menus and left before I could tip.

Photographs

From Bahamas - 2011

Let me take a minute to discuss my introduction to photographs on cruise ships. I rarely mention it in the posts because I did not participate in it.` However, after watching my fellow passengers on the final day I have come to realize that the on board photography must mean more to others then it does to be.

There are lots of opportunities to have your photograph taken. The people taking the photographs seem to be professionals. This is a big money maker in the ship. The only area that I really noticed security detectors were on the floor of the atrium that held the photographs.

First, let me say that I got a lot of nasty looks for saying no thanks. They are also a bit pushy about it. Most people won't notice this becuase they don't mind having their photograph taken. Also, all of the photographs are optional. Just because they take it does not mean you have to buy it. Nor did anyone really pressure you to buy them. However, by the final day people were very absorbed with finding their photographs and buy them.

The ship even has all sorts of themed frames to buy, scrap books, and photo albums. There was a scrap book class on one of the sea days for people to learn to or work on their cruise scrap booking.

That said, they take your photograph constantly. When we boarded they had two back drops set up. One was a photograph of the ship. As each group approached the gangway they called them over and set them up in front of each of the back drops. When our turn came I said, "Do I have to?" and the guy goes, "No but its fun! Memories! Come on!"

"No thanks!" and I headed to the gangway. My goal was the cruise not a photograph I would not want. I'm not fond of photographs.

The photo taken as an ID photo when you board is not one they show you or you buy. They kind of taken it on the sly. I might not have noticed if I did not know they were going to do it. They take it as they scan your card the first time and welcome you on board.

They took photographs at the meals as well. They would take them separately, together, in groups, by gender, whatever you would agree with. I pissed that lady off by saying, "No thank you". It is very much not expected for you to refuse.

Then, through the ship they have photo shoots set up. There are backgrounds and props.

Before the meals they often have a themed character to have your picture taken with.

When you get off the ship at port they want to take your picture with the backdrop of where you are. I had to say no thank you to that. I got some more nasty looks for refusing.

When you get off at port they have another themed character to have your photo taken with.

They take your photo through the ship for candid shots.

They record the parties on the Lido deck and sell the videos for you to buy as people dance and compete in the competitions.

On Elegant Night the Fun Times suggests that you stop at the photo ops and take shots at each background. There were twenty of them scattered around the ship between three decks.

Then, the deck of the atrium that is dedicated to the photographs is vast. The photos start on the walls. Then, they get filled up and the photograph racks unclip and unfold from the wall. I assume a ship with a longer itinerary has an even larger place for photographs because they were crammed by the time we were done.


And the prices. I took a photo of the price guide. Fancy photos were 22 and casual were 10-12. Set up shots that were not fancy were 20. You could get a second copy of any shot for 10 bucks.

We got 3 photographs the entire time we where there. 2 from our Segway tour and taken by the Segway people. The husband wanted them. One was of the husband and that was from his tour of the ship and included in the price of the tour.

Those were the only photos we agreed to have taken. If they took any of us that I missed, oh well.

Evening Explorations

Carnival delivers a little ship news print that is called the FunTimes. They also call the ship the FunShip so take it as you will. The news letter is useful. It tells you the times of all the shows and activities on board as well as their locations. There are a lot of on ship advertisements for things such as the art auction and the gambling classes. However, there is also a simple itemized list of all ship activities. This includes what time we are entering and leaving port, what time to return to the ship, when meals are and what the feature meal is at the Lido Buffet.

This is how I found our first event attempt, called Game show Mania. It was the only interesting thing that I saw on the first night and I suggested it to Tim. He agreed and we made our way to the lounge after dinner.

This seems to be how you earn ships on a stick. These are gold colored cheap trophies that Carnival gives out for games and silly fun. They had movie trivia at the start as well as music trivia. Not being one that watches movies or listens to music it was over my head.

The Gameshow Mania was basicaly onboard jepordy. I’m not sure what I had hoped for. I guess something interesting. This was not interesting. I left. Tim stayed. I decided that wandering the depths of the ship would provide me with much more interest.

It turns out that I was right. I’m not the social type. The ship was quiet. The bars were full and the air smelled of intoxication. I don’t drink and at times I have trouble dealing with drinkers. I remind myself that a cruise ship is one of the better places for people to decide to drink on. I avoided the crowds and sought out the quieter parts of the ship.

There where a lot of couples talking. The atmosphere around them was often tense. I do not think that the conversations where pleasant. There were many frowns and strained atmospheres. Perhaps this was a fix it cruise for many. Ocean and sky. These are two pieces to a romantic puzzle.

Night time on board fascinates me. The interior of the ship is a lot like being in a building. We had hit a bit of rough water and I did not have any type of sea legs. Therefor, I could feel the pitch and roll of the floor as I walked around and occasionally staggered when the ground was not where I expected it to be. The shops are open late and everyone is running around with a drink in their hand. I wound up with raffle tickets to something at some point. I’m not sure what the raffle was for or where it was. This happened a few other times on the ship. I know it was either for art or jewelry, two things I was not interested in pursuing on my ship.

I know that sounds strange, but even though they assure me that they are giving me great sales and excellent deals, I don’t believe them. Crazy as it is, I just don’t.

I started with the Lido deck. As I stepped outside I wondered if I was in the right place. For a moment, there seemed to be no wind and a black ceiling had been placed over the entire expanse. I shook off the feeling and instead stared up at the expanse of unlit black sky above me. A string of light bulbs runs the length of the deck and they block out the starlight. The walls of the deck are also two stories tall with the upper edges being another area for sunbathing. This makes it very warm with very little air movement. The air, instead is heavy with the scent of chlorine from the bubbling hot tubs.

I wound my way up the steps onto the next balcony. We had not really been forward so I headed that way, climbing steps as I found them. At one point, I stepped through a doorway and found myself on a spongy surface. Puzzled, I followed the red squishy path and discovered the mini golf area. I then realized that I was standing on the jogging track. They were located at the very top of the ship to the front. Beyond them, was a balcony. It involves walking along the jogging path and stepping off onto the edge of the mini golf AstroTurf to reach. However, it is the tallest deck for guests on the ship and you can really gather a nice headwind.

I discovered the deck 11 front balcony. It sits right above the bridge. The ways to access it are small and off the beaten path. Form the Lido deck you go past the bars on the left or right sides of the pool area. There is a door there and it leads to a long, dark deck. This deck is where the controls for the life boats are. If you heard forward there are little signs that stop you from entering the bridge, but the stair case leads up to a deck that wraps around the front of the ship.

There are also polished wooden doors right past the elevators before the atrium. They are inconspicuous compared to so many of the other doors.
This deck is amazing. It’s better, in my opinion then the one up top because it is a bit darker and it is more forward. You can feel the wind and just lean into it and enjoy being on a ship.

After a bit, I returned to our room and sat on the dark balcony watching the moonlight over the water. It is a fantastic past time. I highly recommend it.

First Dinner

I was excited to eat. The buffet was featuring Italian that night. Tim changed into long pants and we went to find our dining room. We had chosen any time dining and we decided to eat around 7:00. We had assumed that we would eat later, but after unpacking our things we where excited and hungry and very, very tired.

We were assigned to the Fantasy Dining Room. There are two dining rooms. The second is called the Ecstasy Dining Room. The names make me giggle.

From Bahamas - 2011

Outside a show girl in full costume was there for people to take photographs with her. I'll discuss pictures during another post.

They are elegant places with lots of glass and brass, wood chairs and table cloths every where. The seating arrangement seems to be that assigned dining gets seated in the center. The center of the room is a raised platform. The any time diners eat on the sides. There are tables of four and tables for two. They will combine them for larger parties but you get to eat privately.

Now privately sitting is not a cuddly booth for two. For the most part the tables look like this.

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One side is a booth and one a seat. There is an average of eighteen inches between the tables. Its enough room to slide in and out but it is not secluded. The booth side faces the windows. The tables are narrow but somewhat long. When they seat you they pull the chair out for the woman and place her napkin on her lap. I hate this. I can pull out my own chair. I can also put my napkin where I want to. I tended to sit on the other side of where they pulled the chair out becuase I had no idea they where pulling the chair out for me. My automatic reaction is to avoid them so it made for some awkward seating situations until I caught on. This type of thing is an interesting divergence point between Tim and I. I shy away from people giving me services that I ca do on my own. They don't bother him and bit and in fact he enjoys the attention.

When you sit down you get fresh bread and butter. They make all the bread on ship and they do an excellent job of it. Its crusty and soft. Your water glass is filled and then the drink waiter comes around and tries to convince you to spend some money on alcohol or soda. Tim didn’t care for the taste of the water. It had a bit of a metallic flavor. He asked for some lemon and that cleared it up. He kept offering me lemon and I kept saying no. The flavor did not bug me.


Because I have been reading forums about cruising I knew that I could order whatever I wanted. This was a good thing because the menu looked pretty good. There is a section called Didja (As in Did You Ever) and it features an exotic selection that you might have wanted to try but did not want to risk.

The first day it was Escargot. I’ve always wanted to try it but not enough to pay for it. So this was a great option for me. I’m pretty adventurous with exotic food. I won’t eat things with mayonnaise on them but I’ll try snails.

I didn’t take photographs of the menus. They are pretty wide ranging. There is a daily menu with staples such as a flat iron steak, a burger, spinach dip and a Caesar salad. There is a daily comfort food section with things like meatloaf and fried chicken.

I stuck to the ritzy side. The first day I wound up with the duck appetizer, a Caesar salad, and the escargot. The waiter came up and asked, "What would you like?" and I answered, "A lot of things" and rattled off my list feeling giddy and wicked at the same time. It was fantastic.

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The duck. It was on a spicy rice noodle and they were delicious. I’ve been learning to cook rice noodles becuase I love the texture. They are a bit slippery. Tim also got the duck but he did not care for the rice noodles under it.

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The escargot. It was chewy and buttery. A lot of oil on the dish. The toasted piece of bread helped to absorb the oil and give it a flavor more then an oiliness. It wasn’t bad but it wasn’t super great either.

I didn’t get a photograph of the Caesar salad. I ordered a fancy named chicken dish that was basically a piece of chicken coated and cooked in fresh herbs on a tomato cream pasta. The pasta needed more sauce and the herb thing had a bit of a blandly bitter undertone. The piece of chicken was cooked to perfection and was succulent and moist.

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Tim got a pork chop type thing that he said was very good.

From Bahamas - 2011

And then for desert. Tim ordered coffee and I ordered tea. The desert menu has about 10 selections on it. They have two main deserts, a low calorie deserts, ice cream, sorbets, and then alcoholic drinks. I had heard a lot about the warm chocolate melting cake so I decided to try it.

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My first impression was that it was a chocolate lava cake. But then I realized that it did not have a liquid center. It was really, really, very rich. Its tasty and a nice dark chocolate flavor. Its super sweet and the ice cream helps to tone it down. I ate about half of it and then I was chocolated out. My husband tried it. His eyes lit up and he started to drool a bit as he consumed the rest of it.
I can see why people like it. However, it was not unique in my opinion. I tried the other, more exotic deserts for the rest of the trip.

I liked Tim's key lime pie a lot more the the chocolate cake. It was very creamy.

From Bahamas - 2011

There was another interesting thing. The couple next to us saw us get the plate of lemon slices and did the same. We would come to see them multiple times through the rest of the cruise. Two thousand people are a lot of people but you start to see the same people over and over again. The girl seemed a bit grumpy and the man uninterested in what she had to say.

I noticed them becuase they where some of the only people in the dining room wearing shorts and t-shirts. I was reminded of the heated arguments on Cruise Critic about dress in the dining room.

I had to chuckle a bit inside.

Backing up And Spinning in Place

I had watched a cruise ship special while I waited for my trip. It was filled with fun information and it was about turn over day for the Oasis of the Seas. Freedom of the Seas was in port and it is the Oasis’ Sister Ship.

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Also the Disney Dream was in.

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The Disney Dream did a similar route to the Carnival Sensation. It did a four day cruise and then a three day. The Freedom of the Seas does a 7 day.

Both of these ships are much larger then the Sensation with twice the passengers. We had a light load with only a bit over two thousand people on board. With fewer passenger’s we where the first out. I got to see one of things, that to me, is coolest about a cruise ship.

They back up, spin in circles, and parallel park like a car. I had watched the Monarch of the Seas dock on a television special. They spun it in a circle when they went to port. Being on the ship as it spun around was very cool

You saw the photographs above. We parked on the rear upper deck and watched our ship back out of dock and spin around to open water.

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And off we went. About this point we lost cell reception from land. The Florida coast line was attractive.

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Later, the Dream came up from behind us and passed us moving a lot faster.

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And then the Dream passed us.

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We unpacked our clothing. I’m not used to unpacking when I travel but Tim is. I took the closet and he took the drawers. There was more then enough room. Our room could easily hold four people and all of their luggage without anyone tripping over anyone else.

A Grand Suite on the Carnival Sensation - U98

Around one thirty we decided to see if our Cabin was ready. There had not been any announcements about cabin’s so we decided to go look. I figured that the decks would be locked down if they did not want us on them.

We were in room/cabin U98. This is a Grand Suite on the Upper Deck in the middle of the ship. We had an extended balcony as well.

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There are two twins that are connected into a king. The bed was VERY comfortable. After the hard ass bed we had the night before, this was blissful.

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There is also a couch, a chair, and an ottoman. The couch is a pullout bed if you want to shove a few more people into the suite. It has more then enough room for more people.

From Bahamas - 2011

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The fridge never got cold. It stopped things from being warm but I could not grace it with more then being a bit cool. It was not cooler then the AC. The AC kept the room cold. Tim said he could do with more air flow and resolved to bring a fan the next trip.

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There is also a chair behind me as well as the door. There is a lot of room here.

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The door stays open by itself. Getting something to hold the door open had been a lot of discussion. We did wedge the chair in front of it just in case while we played with the lock. The lock and the handle are separate so you will not lock yourself out unless you turn the actual lock from the inside. There is a lip to get back into the cabin and Tim and I both tripped over it several times until we got used to stepping high.

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The bathroom also is a step up. The light switch is on the outside and it is at normal level. Therefor, if you try to turn it off from the inside of the room you almost fall out. The tub is very tall. The lip of it was above my knee. The shower was in the center of the tub which was also odd feeling. It is very deep but not very large through the center.

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The tub is nice and deep to lounge in. However, if the ship is rolling be careful about stepping into it. It is high enough that you are very much off balance stepping in. There is a rail and the counter is right there.

Carnival Sensation - First Views

We entered the ship right at the base of the four story atrium. Another group entered as we did and said, “You can’t even tell that you are one a ship!”. It was true. It was like being inside of a Vegas Hotel. Lots of neon, bold colors, crazy decorations, and a bar full of people right in front of us. We stepped into the glass, neon elevators and headed up so that we could get out of the flood of boarding people.

Boarding officially starts around 1230 but if the ship is ready they start taking them as early as 1130. We were on board by 1200.

We went up to the Lido deck. I figured that wherever everything was, up would mean the open decks. The Lido deck is where the pools and the buffet are. There is also the Mongolian grill and a burger and hot dog buffet as well. These are all free ship food places. We had our backpacks and bags of soda so we wanted to find some place to settle down until we could go to our room.

We picked a table at random and settled in. My husband went off looking for something to eat. I guarded the bags and people watched. The food lines where already very long and it was only about 1230. However, most people were carrying their bags and waiting to go to their rooms

The Pool on the Sensation is very small. It is around 15 by 30. It looks to be very shallow. It is not a swimming pool. It is a body of water to play in. If you just want to splash around head to the aft (rear) of the ship and try the water park. There are several slides and lots of water works to splash around in.
At each end of the pool is a circular hot tub. There are two of these. Lounge chairs abound. They are full of sun burnt people. These sun burnt people seem to be enjoying themselves. I left them to it. I was interested in swimming in only one body of water and it was not on the ship.

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There are another two, small hot tubs on the Serenity Deck which is the adult only area. This did not open until the second day we were out. The lounge chairs here are also more comfortable. They are padded and for the most part set up side by side.

My husband wandered back with a plate from the Mongolian Grill. It wasn’t bad. I would have liked a bit more sauce. He got it schezuan style and it was quite spicy. I did find the deserts and they are the first things that I took photographs of.

Chocolate Cake – Very Rich

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Candied Fruit Cupcake – It’s like a fruit cake with regular cake. I didn’t try it
but Tim said it was tasty.

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We also had some salad and fresh fruit. There was watermelon, cantaloupe and money do melon. I nabbed a few pieces of french bread and Tim found the rotisserie and had some meat carved. The lines were getting long and we didn’t know how to navigate them. The lines for the Grill the Mongolian and the Rotisserie all pool in the same general area but there are three stations. In the main buffet area there are two sides that mirror each other. This all helps the traffic to funnel through and move quickly because there are three different stations for a total of six places to fill your plate.

It was a lot of food and plenty of places to sit. Sadly, some of those places were outside. Not adjusted to the heat yet, we found a hallway and settled down there.
I also learned not to use unisex bathrooms. The seat did not lift and men had been using it and missing. I do not blame this on the ship. The bathroom was clean. It did not smell bad. It was just obvious that people had been using it and using it poorly.

There are plenty of gender specific bathrooms scattered around the ship. I avoided the unisex ones after that. They are right off of the pool area and lots of people trotted around barefooted. Yuck. My eyes cross just thinking about it.

Heading to Port Canaveral

It was about ten when we left. We stopped at CVS along the way to get some drinks. On the ship, soda costs extra. Or you can buy a soda card. Well, for a 4 day cruise a 30 dollar soda card for each of us seemed excessive. You can bring up to 12 nonalcoholic beverages on board. You can also bring a bottle of wine or champagne each. I grabbed a selection of drinks for the two of us and hopped back into the car.

I’ll say that Florida’s roads are well marked. However, I would expect there to be more signs that say CRUISE SHIPS THIS WAY then there were. We did not see any signage until we were three miles away on the road that leads to the ports. A bit after the signs we start to see the ships sitting at port. They loom up over the trees and they are enormous.

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The Disney Dream has the red stacks and the Royal Caribbean Freedom of the Seas is the other. My ship, the Carnival Sensation, is smaller and tucked behind them.
The Hertz place was right past the ships. We had barely stopped weaving all over the road as we ogled the cruise ships and then Hertz place appeared. It was not even a mile past the ships. We parked and started walking towards the building. Two employees approached us and asked if we had our mileage. We gave it, they grabbed the keys and told us to hop on the shuttle and enjoy our trip. We blinked and bam, we are on the shuttle and on our way.

That is what we had been looking for. Organization and coordination.
The driver for Hertz was fantastic. He gave some facts about each ship docked. The Disney Dream was at dock with the Royal Caribbean Freedom of the Seas and the Carnival Sensation. The Sensation is the smallest of the ships by far.

We got dropped off. I did not have to pay the porter for my bag. He did not ask and I did not give. We will see if our bags make it. We printed our luggage tags out in color. I then folded them as instructed and taped them up with clear packaging tape. Then, we stapled them all around the edges and in the center. It will take some effort to remove them. We also have luggage straps around the bags and nothing valuable inside of them.

At the terminal, we have VIP boarding. It means a super short line and a direct walk to the ship. I kept managing to get into the wrong lines. There are signs and the signs have arrows. There is normally a path by the sign. Yet, it is the next path over that I am supposed to take. How, I am supposed to know this I am not sure. Don’t walked by the sign, pick the unlabeled lane one line over instead.
I then got yelled at for taking a photo graph as we walked up the steps to get to the gang way.

The first glimpse of the ship was neon.

From Bahamas - 2011

It was hard not to stop and stare around us. While boarding a ship is not an accomplishment, it felt like it at that moment.

Residence Inn Marriott Melbourne

From Bahamas - 2011

I slept poorly on that rock hard bed. It was awful. I woke up about every thirty minutes. I’d love to say that it was excitement, but it was misery.
We woke up sore and grumpy. I called the airport shuttle to inquire about the shuttle schedule to the port. I was told that they had one shuttle scheduled to go to the port and that it left around noon. We are supposed to be boarded by 1430hrs. That is not much time considering the distance from the airport to the cruise lines was about an hour.

We went and got breakfast. Coffee was needed by the husband. We where both a bit hungry and tired. It worked out for us. They had a real breakfast, much to my surprise. Often times, the breakfast offered by a hotel is some old bagels and dry pastries. They had eggs, sausage, potatoes, waffles, cereal, oatmeal, and juices. They also had coffee. At one point, I looked around and realized that I was the only adult not drinking coffee. I felt strange. It did not help that someone had switched the television to an evangelist Sunday morning service. I learned that God can read text messages and knows when you use his name in vain. I guess all of those comic strips of them using computers in heaven are true.

We started making a plan B. Plan B evolved as I did some reading and discovered that there was a car rental right by the pier. I asked my husband to see if we could move the drop off. He was tired and grumpy about our sudden lack of premade plans. When he called Hertz they said “Sure, and your rate is the same.” That means the 63 dollars we were paying to rent the car from the previous day covered us dropping off at the pier. They also had a shuttle to the cruise terminal.

This was becoming a better situation. Finding the actual addresses to GPS coordinate ourselves was a little bit harder. People have been cruising for longer then there has been an internet. Some of these established agencies are not online yet. This makes finding simple bits of information hard. Everyone wants to route us to the airport as their home base.

Yet, we found the address, packed up, and headed out.

At checkout the receptionist asks, “How was your stay?”

Tim looked at her and said, “It sucked. The bed was horrible. It was incredibly hard.”

“We hear that a lot,” she chirped. “People either love them or hate them.”

“I hated it,” he snarled. “It was awful.”

“Sorry about that! So, here is your bill,” she checked us out. “Oh yes! The night clerk said that you all were taking a limo from Black Diamond?”

“No. We thought the hotel had a shuttle. We rented a car.“ Tim glared and we left.

We will write a poor review for that hotel. TripAdvisor.Com and I will have a talk.

From

Residence Inn Marriott in Melbourne, Florida: Do not stay here unless you like hard beds and shady dealings

Flight to Flordia

Fly early if you can.
We arrived at the airport about two and a half hours before our flight. We normally try for three, but I had gotten off of work at 0700hrs and I was not moving as fast as I might have. We had packed well in advance so we where fine there.

We fly United. Tim flies with them all of the time for work. He travels a lot for his job so he is a premier member and gets perks and miles to fly with them. We went to their self check in section and attempted to check ourselves in. The first terminal did not work. We slid over to another terminal but then we wound up stuck between two high maintainance groups.

The people to our left wanted to change everything about their flight. Instead of going to the check in line for buying and changing flight details, they stood in the self check in line and occupied one of the people. Each of the airline people are assigned to two terminals. They are there to check your ID, put on your baggage tags, and load your baggage. They did not have the time to do any of this thanks to this group.

To our right, was a British couple and three teen age girls. They where upset becuase however they had booked their tickets, it caused the girls not to sit together. One of the three is sobbing becuase she will have to sit by herself. The father is snarling at the guy about how they keep getting the run around. The girls are now all crying. Their luggage is pink but I don’t think that had anything to do with the entire situation.

All told, it took us forty five minutes to get our bags checked in.

Then we had to wade through security. The high maintenance couple to our left appeared near us in the security line. We got out of that line and moved to another. I’m glad we did because they caused another incident over at the security point.

By the time we made it to our flight we had fifteen minutes until boarding. We had not eaten all day, our plan being to eat in the terminal. Instead, we ran through the airport and passed a sign that said ‘Last place to stop for food here’ and reached our terminal. Wheezing and out of breath I ran back to the last stop for food and bagged chips and some apples. As I headed back Tim called and told me that our flight was delayed for an hour due to technical problems with the plane.
So much for running around. We went and got dinner. It was a nice meal that reminded me that you only get plastic utensals inside of hte airport. Unless you are in one of the airline clubs. There, you can get real utensals.

Another flight came in. It was a bigger plane and I assume it was either scheduled to sit for a while or head to Florida. It was our plane now. and we where on our way with an hour and a half delay. This is the type of reason why we had decided to fly the day before. I would not want to live with the stress of trying to fly in the same day as the cruise and having the flight delayed.

When we selected our hotel, we selected one that was close to an airport. We looked into it and they said that they had a shuttle to the cruise line. This seemed to be the easiest option. We flew into Orlando and rented a car from Hertz. We would then drop the car off at the airport by the hotel and take the shuttle provided by the airport to the dock.

The Hertz rental itself was a bit of a mess. My husband has been a Gold Member of Hertz in the past. He signed up for it. However, he has said that it often does not work. Therefore, he went to the desk to pick up the rental car. There he was told he was a gold member and he could just go and pick out a car. So, when we went to the pickup there was a sign board and his name was not on it. We went into the next office where we were told we were not gold members and given our rental car. Our rental, of course, was located all the way to the back of the lot. It was a little Toyota Corolla. I was hoping for the Nissan Versa we had originally asked for.

The Toyota Corolla has no trunk space. We fit our two large cases in the trunk and it was done. There was not enough room for anything else. Not even a backpack. The third case and the backpacks went onto the back seat.

It was about an hour’s drive from Orlando to Melborne airport. It was a smooth ride with little traffic. We went to the hotel. We dropped off our stuff and went back out, our goal to get something for dinner. The highway sign said that there was an IHOP nearby. However, it seems that the sign lied to us. There was no IHOP.
We wound up at Steak a Shake. This was a very nice experience. Nice enough that we wrote a review. There was also a massive fraternity meeting going on and everyone was dressed in purple. They took up about a quarter of the restaurant. The staff managed to keep them corralled. ‘Thank you.

Back at the Hotel we decide to ask the front desk about the shuttle. She says, “We can help you arrange transportation.” This is where things start to go downhill. “We don’t have a shuttle ourselves” she said. “I can help arrange transportation to the cruise line but it will probably cost a lot. Can’t you just drive? They have parking at the pier.”

“We have a rental car,” we remind her.

“Oh. You sure wanted to the last minute to plan this.” I can’t say what comes after that becuase my head exploded for a moment. We accepted contact information for the airport shuttle and for a private company called Black Ice or something else shady and went to our room.

There we said “WTF” to each other and pulled out our laptops to look up transportation. This is when we learned that the free WiFi that the hotel had bragged about was slow. If you wanted their fast internet you had to pay to play. Also, the bed was rock hard. I flopped down on it, stomach first and almost vomited because it felt like someone punched me in the gut. I was not expecting that and I apologize to my stomach. It didn’t deserve that.

We made some phone calls but no one was open. Frustrated, we decided that we would call in the morning. Worst case scenario, we’d get a cab.

Day 1 in Tokyo

The husband is still asleep beside me. At 1540hrs I woke up with a snap. It is about 0611hrs now but our time, 1540hrs is me waking up a bit late to head to work in an hour or so.

So I'm awake. As the Husband snores beside me, I'll write up yesterday's action.


Everything went pretty smoothly.

We left the house in plenty of time. We got to the airport around 1000hrs, which was the plan. Our flight was laving at 1250hrs but we wanted to make sure we had time to get a good meal. I'm glad we did.

We parked in economy and caught our buss. We made sure to take lot and bus stop numbers down in our phones for later reference. We also took photographs of where the car was from the bus stop. The last thing we want to do is loose the car. Because the Husband was upgraded to first class we got to use the super short line at the airport. There was also a herd of boy scouts making an international flight somewhere. They where all in their little khaki uniforms running to and fro.

As we entered the airport, a man had exited and was turning around trying to figure out which deck he wanted to get on. This TSA lady is leaving and she bellows in this horrible, bitchy SNARLY voice, "WRONG DOOR" to this poor guy. What the hell? There is almost no one around and people get confused at the airport.

Anyway, we grab a wonderious lunch at Fudruckers. They have just opened and the guy doesn't know how to use his credit card machine. So, I pay and give the receipt to Tim to expense later. Yay for cash. Yay for paranoia!

We go to the business lounge. I have never used a lounge before at an airport. I normally get there, find a socket for my electronics and camp out until my flight. My husband, travels three hundred percent more then I do is getting used to all the little perks. These special places where they give you food and comfortable chairs are a bit odd to me. I slink in and peer around, suspicious.

The guy tells Tim, "Sir, you can use the First Class Lounge" but we were meeting with some of his co-workers. This lounge system is interesting. Lots of chairs and places to charge your stuff with people hanging around trying to shove alcohol and snacks down you.

We didn't stay for long because they started boarding the plane almost an hour early. I ran and grabbed a pretzel and some lemonaid for the flight and we boarded. This was the second rude Dulles employee I've met today. Maybe it was early, maybe I wanted everyone to experience the warm excited blur I was in. He's probably just tired of herding people he can't communicate around. I dunno, but the plane is loading and this one group is hanging back and he just starts yelling at them to get moving. I think they didn't want to cut in line but I wanted to give dude a Valium.

The Husband is swept away to his little area.



I find my seat and sit down. Only its not my seat. I thought that I seemed one seat back but I was in a happy buzz. So, when a guy asks me, 21B? I go... 20B... and get up to ask the kid in front of me... 20B? and he goes 19B? To ask the guy in in front of him who is the true cause of it all being one seat back and in an isle when he should have been in a row. As we are sorting ourselves, a steward goes 'Everyone needs to get seated' and the kid goes 'We're sorting it out, thanks'.



So we sit. My seat mate is a quiet Japanese man who naps most of the trip. There are a ton of kids around me, but I'll give the parents credit, they worked hard at trying to keep them quiet.

The flight wasn't bad. I was in Economy Plus so I had plenty of legroom. They fed us (nasty stuff) and gave us snacks, liquids, and such. There are TVs in the seats. I wasn't allowed to go visit the Husband but he was allowed to come back and slum. He was blocked the first time he went back for a moment until he convinced them that he did belong up there. He wound up sending me a cookie at Dinner and feeling a bit lonely. There were only three other people in first class and he discovered that he wanted to sit with me more. We're trying to arrange that on the way back and I'm not going to argue the business upgrade for me. Not that he'd listen to me again on that anyway.

We arrive at Narita. I'm excited. The flight took us up to the arctic circle and down across siberia. I really want to see a map and trace the flight path on a globe. But we are here and we get off the flight and the airport is HOT.

WTF? Its around 1530hrs, 90 degrees outside and the airport is burning up. We're all sweating by the time we reach customs. They gave us customs forms on the plane to make it all easier. We hang them over, have our index fingers scanned and a photo taken and we're done.

We're still sweating.

We stand at baggage and wait and wait and wait and none of our groups baggage shows up. Finally, a porter asks us if we were on this flight and we say yes. As we look up and down the baggage carousel we notice something down at the end.

Our bags. All taken off.

I guess becuase they had priority stickers on them.

So we collect out baggage. Collect our missing group member who took a different flight, and off we go to find out about taking the bus. Because, of our missing member we have to wait for the bus that leaves at 1750hrs. We hang around, buy some soda and stuff. I got some onigri. Rice balls are tasty. They had fish or something that was tasty inside.

I have no clue if I'm using the right doors or not at Narita. They all have exclamation points and open for me so who knows. I try to watch what people are doing but I feel like an idiot. I'm now illiterate after thirty years of literacy.

The trip wasn't bad. The seats are small and we were hot and the Husband tired so some grumpyness set in. It was about two hours to the hotel with traffic and all. But we made it. We got dropped off at the hotel and checked in.

The Courtyard Marriott Ginza in Tokyo Japan.



Our room for the next 18 days.



Most of the group decided to hit the sack. The Husband wanted to get food and so did I. We showed and changed. I wasn't smelly from the flight, but 2 hours in the non air conditioned airport and I was stank. I was tired but the 13 hours forward had moved me into my night schedule so I was ready to eat and go to bed. We wandered for a few blocks until it got really bright and neon.



We found a place with plastic food on display and energetic staff members moving people inside.



I peeked in and saw a busy but heavenly smelling interior if you ignored the cig smoke. We decided to make the attempt. The exterior menu had English on it, as did the interior. We got these big salads with beef on them and some fried chicken pieces and two sodas.






Everything was very tasty. Service was prompt. It was noisy without being irritating. We eat, were able to pay by card and headed back to the hotel.

We stopped a at convince store, found something that said Milk and had a cow on it, a box that had white grapes on it, and some cola flavored mentos.




Back to the hotel room to set up the internet, and zonk out