Honolulu Blue

UPDATE #5 - Tyler gave us the bad news that the 50s show has been canceled.😢 I know a lot of people have worked hard for this. But conditions are still too unsafe for it. The good news is The World At Work is back on the schedule. I doubt I'll go see it. And, also the sun decided to make a cameo after all this rough weather.

UPDATE#4 - From Tyler: Guy's is open, buffet will open at its regular time (6 pm), YTD at the MDR will start at 5:30. Status of that passenger shindig still TBD.

UPDATE #3 - Francesco and Tyler freed us from our cabins at 4 pm, 10 minutes ago. Francesco noted that the outdoor decks were still closed and we needed to be cautious everywhere we went. Tyler further noted that we might want to prefer the MDR for dinner tonight rather than Lido deck options due to ongoing conditions. Also, they're assessing their ability to put on the passenger led 50s show. As these announcements were made, conditions seem to have gone south. Internet remains troublesome. I apologize.

I don't have anywhere better to go or do, so let me update you on what happened prior to our "situation ". I went to the room to find it fully cleaned. Thanks Hery. I then went back out for the debark talk. Tyler did a good job with this, even though he must have done most of it hundred times or more. He announced that he will be on the ship until February 18, then a vacation of about 6 weeks, then will be back on the Dream. I went back to the cabin to relax and was doing so when Francesco made his first announcement. As of RIGHT NOW, they're still assessing and we're still confined. This could change at any time.

UPDATE #2 - Captain Francesco and CD Tyler have let us know conditions have improved. They're still assessing conditions and revising our schedule, but we should be released soon. This is a first for me, being confined to quarters like this. We hit another Internet hole, apologies for the delay.

UPDATE - Things are a lot better now. Internet is back to normal, almost. It doesn't feel as choppy now. Captain Francesco just came on and said as much. He wants to do damage assessment around the ship before releasing us from our cabins.

Drama alert - the Captain, Staff Captain, and CD have all ordered us back to our cabins as a precaution due to bad weather conditions. They will let us know when we can coe out and play some more. It's rocky, but it's felt worse at other times. Internet is in and out, mostly out. I have full faith in our crew that we will get through this, but in case we don't... map shows us in the middle of the Gulf, south of Louisiana. Bye for now. 🙏

Well, that didn't go so great. I did what I tried to avoid and played too much video blackjack this morning. I lost $58 but gained about 220 points, for a total of 486 for the trip. If that doesn't get the attention of TPTB in Miami, then nothing I can do will. This caused me to miss the last Morning Show. Sorry Tyler. One nice thing I discovered is that there were a couple of kiosks that can dispense real cash for your casino balance. This was nice, as the line for the cashier was getting long. I picked up a couple of t shirts for $30. They looked nice and they'll come on handy as gifts and something else to wear on the road. To be continued.

As an addedum to this, I made a separate sports bet through the Carnival app. It can only be done while the physical casino onboard is open. Also, it doesn't list any NFL games for this weekend - possibly because we'll be off the ship by the time they kick off. The bet process was fairly painless - similar to the experience on the kiosk. Unfortunately, the game itself and the results were much more painful. 🤬 Thank you for reading along.

This morning, I completed one more session on this silly machine. The good news is I got about 260 points for this session, for a total of 485 for the cruise. That's almost $2500 coin in. If that doesn't get the attention of Miami, then I'll never be able to do it. The bad news is I lost $58. I couldn't get a streak started because the dealer would often get some miracle hand while I had decent to good ones. Isn't that always the way? ♥️♦️♣️♠️ Carnival had a couple of machines near the cashier that cashed out my bank in real cash. It worked smoothly and saved me some time standing in line at the cashier. I learned a lot that could help me on future cruises. Thanks for coming along for the ride.

Good morning! This is the final full day of the cruise. Tomorrow all of us passengers get off the ship and go back to the real world. What has happened between last night and now? Let's start with the gratuity news. That has hit my account, finally. That finally swing my account to the negative; that is, I owe them money instead of them owing me. The amount is fine, everything on my account is something I paid for. We slowed down a bit right after I wrote last night's post, and things got more stable after that. They remain so this morning. We set our clocks back an hour to match Galveston time again. The skies look gray, but there doesn't seem to be any hint of rain. It feels like we've dropped below 80 for the first time since day 2. The crowd at breakfast was down a lot for the usual reasons. No bacon today. I had ham, scrambled eggs, diced potatoes, apple juice, and passion juice. It's still good after all these days. I'm going to miss this as much as anything. What's on the agenda for today? The Wave Morning Show at 9:30, then maybe a look at classic rock trivia at 10:15. If they ask the right questions, I can give enough of the right answers to make some noise here. Sometime in here I'll go to the casino and cash out, while resisting the urge to gamble it all away. I also might pick up a couple of t shirts. At 11 is the debark presentation. I'm looking forward to seeing how many tines Tyler says to use the app. The World Works Here was scheduled for this evening, but it was bumped for the passenger 50s show (early) and comedy (late). I'm not interested in the replacements. Later.

Thank you for sharing your experiences. Maybe they ran out of invitations before they got to your cabin? Who knows. I had been looking for that invitation for a few days, thinking that perhaps it might not be the very last day with so much going on already. But it is, at least mine is. Your comments on the Gulf are noted. Thank you. I've been through the Gulf several times, and we're going through it now. It hasn't been bad so far, but I'll brace myself. 🙏 If I haven't noted it already, I've been to all of these ports before except for Colon. I have to say what have barely heard any country music onboard, but then I haven't sought it out. The background music has been almost all pop/rock. Most of the offered musical shows emphasize rock.And the atrium, when I've been there, have had rockers. Its good to get other perspectives on this. I noticed the water from the cabin has a bit of an off taste. It hasn't stopped me from drinking it. The water elsewhere seems normal to me.

@NinS, thank you for your further comments. I had forgotten about OCC. I think the west coast one was in addition to the regular one that year. I'm sorry to hear that Sixthman was disappointed by it. I find it very interesting that the musicians on your cruise were willing and able to add extra midday sets on the fly. I wish some of my upcoming music cruises would do that. I'm not too surprised that you get a lot of older and more experienced cruisers on TJC and MSM. The passengers on the ones that I go on are generally younger, newer to cruising, and less cynical about the ports. This will change as the years go by. There has been a little discussion of the environmental impact of reduced speeds on cruising. There's grumbling about reduced times in port, earlier embarkations, fewer stops, and later returns to port.

I think cruise ships will be the last ones to get squeezed out of using the Canal. The cruise ship companies (and their passengers) would rather pay up rather than waste days waiting or, much worse, change the trip to go around the Horn. Freighters and other commercial shipping are more flexible about time and route, if they can save $$$.

Now I will cover the afternoon and night of day 13 of our cruise. We left Cozumel about 2 1/2 hours ago. Soon after that, Captain Francesco made his announcement. The weather conditions looked to be favorable for a 6 AM arrival in Galveston on Saturday. We also had a considerable tailwind to help us along. It's starting ti feel bumpy again. No wonder! We're going 23 knots!! I can't recall ever going this fast on a cruise ship before. I've seen 22 for brief periods or when we had a medical emergency. I have heard of no such thing onboard now or at any time on this cruise (thank goodness). That's all I'll say about this, except that I hope it calms down soon. Let's go back a few hours. After my triumph at Piano Dudes Trivia, I went back to my room and found it made up. Thanks Hery. I also found my laundry made up. No issues; I think they did an excellent job again. I took a power nap and watched part of the departure from Cozumel. I was on the wrong side to see anything much, since we docked starboard. Later on I went to the trough for dinner. It was tough going considering the ship's motion and how busy the elevators were. I found this movie playing for the third time this cruise: Like the MDR, there was a Mexican theme going on here. I wasn't impressed. I settled for some chicken and added pineapple to it. Both were very good. I've been impressed with how good the food has stayed at the buffet through an unusually long cruise for Carnival. After dinner I settled down and reviewed my correspondence. First was my Diamond and Platinum gathering invitation: I'll have to add this to my personal calendar, since it doesn't show on my app. I'm not sure if I want to go or not. I'm surprised that Diamonds have to share a party with us lowly Platinums. And I'm surprised I haven't heard about split parties. The second piece was the debarkation letter. It looks like standard stuff, except for the constant references to the app. Oh, and the Texas sin tax declaration. Gregory Abbott wants to shake us down again. 😁 Last, but not least, is the final newsletter of this cruise. That's it for the night. Good night. Don't let the bedbugs bite.

Thank you for your thorough report. I'm glad you were saturated with good music and still had time to do essential work. It's good to hear that TJC is mostly reserved for next year already. It confirms my impression that interest in music charter cruises all over is spiking. Your discussion of possible alternate locations for future jazz cruises made me think about a couple of things. First, one of the music cruises I've been on (not from Jazz Cruises) tried a west coast embarkation and itinerary. TPTB in their onboard Q and A were not impressed by the reception they got for that cruise and AFAIK have no plans to ever go back there. Also, it made me think how far I would be willing to follow these music cruises. West Coast? Sure. Alaska? I have no interest in going there otherwise, but maybe. Europe? I don't think Europe and I are ready for each other. That would be a choice I wouldn't want to have to make.

Thanks for the embarkation and disembarkation notes. Lots of Ps and Ds here, that's for sure. I still think there will be a little something for us that will be revealed tomorrow. I'm glad you had a good experience with the laundry. Mine was similar, as detailed here - except for the last bag, which i will discuss a little later. Since you're obviously onboard, I'll give you the microphone. How has your experience been? How dud you like the ports? How did you survive the pounding we took??

I'll do my best to answer your specific questions when I board the shuttle on Saturday. This will help remind me.

On the cruise I'm on RIGHT NOW, I happened to attend a trivia competition exclusively devoted to Billy Joel and Elton John. There wasn't much of a crowd (Cozumel has a lot of power to attract people), but one couple proved to be formidable competitors. To make a long story short, that couple got 17 out if 20. I got 16 because I forgot about "Candle In the Wind", which I only heard a million tines in the 70s and a million more in the 90s. But they'd won three trophies on this trip already and decided to let me have this one. Gee, thanks!

Noon update. I went into Puerta Maya to take some pretty pictures and look at some souvenirs. This is a picture of all three ships. The Sky Princess was nearby. Paradise was later than the rest. It was docking as I returned to the ship slightly before 10. We were blocked from moving while they finished placing the ropes in a safe place. After a few minutes, they let us continue ti the ship. Before I get to that, let me loop back to my least favorite choke point in the Caribbean. If you've been here, you know what I'm talking about. I should note that it wasn't too bad today, especially coming back to the ship. I didn't buy any souvenirs despite seeing some nice prices (one store was selling 6 tees for US $20). Nothing particularly caught my eye. But as a shutterbug in training, a couple of items caught my eye: I let my friend sleep in today. I watched the crew go through some drills near Sam's, then it was time for Billy and Elton trivia. Quick history - I did this on the Breeze back in 2020 and almost stole a prize. I got 18 out of 20 and the winner got 19. Keep those figures in the back of your mind. Back to today, there were about a dozen people at Ocean Plaza doing this trivia. But it was clear that one couple was going to be stiff competition for yours truly. They seemed to have almost all the answers. I didn't catch our Fun Squad host's name. My best guess is Dee, so let's go with that. She was fun and played along with many of the songs. The competition was 20 songs long. We only had to guess the title, since we pretty much knew the artist already. The snippets Dee played weren't very long, but mostly they were long enough. A few of the Elton John songs were very obscure. I suppose some of the Billy Joel songs were too, but I got all those right. Maybe 6 to 8 songs were repeats between the trivia sessions. I got all those correct too. Ok, so how did I do? This time I got 16 out of 20. I'm still kicking myself for missing one of Elton's songs that was popular in both the 70s and 90s. And that was the difference. Nobody else got more than 10 other than me and that couple. They got 17. End of story, right? Wait! They asked me if I had won a Dream trophy before on this trip. I said no. They let me have the honor, since they had won three already. Dee gave them a medallion instead, which they seemed happy with. We both got introduced to the sparse crowd by Dee. And I introduced myself to the couple and said thanks. And here's my trophy with a huge asterisk beside it. Can't you see it? 🤔 Just another day on the Dream. 😃

I'm sorry to hear the Doobies will be playing at a bad location and you'll have to miss them. I dunno about Michael on R&R. He's got this cruise named after him... it might go to his head. 😁

Thanks for sharing. There's a lot to digest here. If I decide to go, I'm sure the Doobie Brothers will put on a good show. I'm a bit less certain about Steve Winwood, but I'm hopeful. 🙏 Life is short for these artists and for me, and that's always been the goal - see as many of my favorite artists while they're available to be seen and while I can go see them. I'm on a cruise that embarked almost 2 weeks ago in Galveston. We made our way steadily towards Panama, with some stops along the way. There were some musical shows and plenty of background music on the way, but nothing of much note other than what I've already mentioned. Today we made it to Cozumel. We had about 24 hours of rough seas on the way here. Most of our stops have featured strong winds, which I'm sure made the going rough. Thankfully, we haven't had much rain anywhere. None of the performances I watched, musical or not, on this cruise have been canceled or delayed, but I've heard of both on other performances. I haven't had any on any of my musical cruises so far, but I think I'm due for some. 🫨 Thanks again for the updates and I'm glad The Jazz Cruise turned out good for you.

I found out through random surfing that The Doobie Brothers are heading put on tour with Steve Winwood (at some stops). The article link us at https://thedoobiebrothers.com/blogs/news/the-doobie-brothers-announce-the-2024-tour . Elsewhere, I found that these guys are mostly covering the same territory at the same time as the NKOTB and friends tour. There are several options for me if I care to take a road trip. There are also a couple of VIP ticket options. I'm thinking about doing this. Mr. McDonald will be joining the Doobies for this tour and I'll see him in a few months on the McDonald LaBelle Cruise. I'm sure he won't play all the Doobie hits. And I like Steve Winwood too. Stay tuned.

This is day 13. Only one more full day at sea to go. Last night was relatively smooth. I slept well and dud some other boring stuff. Today is bacon day at the trough!! The bacon was looking a little rough, but it still tasted good. 😛 I also had ham, an apple pastry, scrambled eggs, and apple and passion juices. It still tasted good. We're still docking. We saw Voyager OTS on our way in. I also saw an abundance of towel animals on the loungers by the forward-most pool: I don't have many plans for today. I'll probably get off for a brief visit, since curiously I have 5 more cruises scheduled this year and NONE stop in Cozumel. I'll try Billy and Elton trivia at 11, and then there's nothing else for me. Have a great day!!

Evening update: Because I'm a gambling fool and a glutton for punishment, I took another run at the same machine. I tried out betting all three available spots starting at $3 per. They got up to $10 based on some progression that's too silly and complicated to mention. The long and the short of it is I won $86.20 with it and gained another 60 points. Here's a hand where I got two blackjacks. It would have been even sweeter had they paid 3:2. I did a little of this and that before retreating to my cleaned cabin. Thanks Hery. By now I was getting a little hungry. I initially tried to order room service from the app, but for some reason it wouldn't take. So I ordered it the old fashioned way - on the telephone. Someone in this thread or elsewhere noted that the chicken tenders were really good, so I had that. I added a brownie. The good news is that the delivery took about 20 minutes and was delivered with plates, covers, napkins, and silverware. And the tenders came with some solid curly fries. The description didn't note this and they probably should have. The bad news was the rest of the order. The chicken tenders were all right. I would have preferred real fried chicken to this, but that was not available. The brownie was big and good, but not really $5 worth of good, IMHO. It's unlikely I'll order it again. This order cost me $13 including the included gratuities. I took a power nap and woke up to much calmer conditions at sea, which continue as of now. I also woke up to Tyler's announcement. He said that debarking options were available now, and so they were. The Dream is one of the ships that are trialing a program where you choose your disembarkation options through the app. I did this, and after pressing some buttons, this is what it came up for me: BTW, it's interesting that they expect us to get back to Galveston at 6 AM, rather than 8 as was on the original itinerary. Also interesting is that I didn't see any debark items for my Platinum status. I'm sure they will show up in my mailbox in a couple of days as usual. I grabbed an 8 AM shuttle to the airport (IAH) from the shore excursions desk. I tried booking it in the app, but it gave me some nonsense about not having the funds for it. The desk had a little trouble too. Their computer was glitchy and slow. But we got it done, and that's the most important thing. BTW, United still has not yielded to reality and put up a travel waiver for their Max-9 flights beyond the 24th. It's a moot issue for me now, since I changed it a couple of days ago. My clothing has not been returned as of now. It would have been a stretch to have them come back this early. But tomorrow's newsletter dud come in on time. I'm going to skip America Rocks this time around. Oh well. ☹️ i think that's a wrap for tonight. Good night everyone!