Kim040465

I also am new on this site but I can so relate to the Donkey ride up the mountain for 7 miles! It was definitely an experience. I had not thought about the kids swimming out to the boat and filling their mouths with coins! That was interesting although I felt sorry for them!

Probably so! I was just searching for videos of the cruises back then. We were laughing at some of the things we saw. It was a great experience, though.

Yes! This was my first cruise and I was 14 years old! Two of our Aunts took my sister and me. When leaving the port of Miami everyone would be waving by to family and friends and confetti and balloons were everywhere! We had the best time. It was just like the show "The Love Boat" which we watched all the time. Very small ship looking back now but I remember the crew being so personable. They would be walking around the ship and just sit and talk to people. Dinner with the Captain was a very special formal event and of course your group had their picture made with the Captain on the entrance to the dining room. Well, actually you dressed up every night for dinner back then. The cruise director would go on excursions with us. One I will never forget was in Haiti riding a donkey 7 miles up a mountain just to see the Citadel. The crew brought bottled water and our lunch with them. It was quite interesting seeing all the people that lived in these shacks up in the mountains and some were even practicing voodoo. Definitely something you could not do today. When we go to Haiti today they have black iron gates surrounding an area just for cruise ship visitors with signs on the gates saying "If you pass through these gates you are doing so at your own risk". That's pretty scary. Jamaica is the same way. The world has really changed a lot and for the worse!!! I am glad I had the opportunity to experience cruising and other countries before it became so dangerous. They had a talent show one night on the ship and the four of us each dressed up like one of the four islands we visited. We won first place! We did get into a tropical storm and they had all the doors locked so no one could go outside for about a day until they could get out of it. The tables in the dining rooms had ledges around them so nothing would slide off the table in bad weather I guess. Every night there was a Midnight Buffet in the dining room. Ice sculptures were always on the buffet as well as in the dining room during meals. Great experience for sure and definitely different from the world of cruising today which we do and love it! Sorry so lengthy but when I started writing it just brought back so many great memories! Kim in MS