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Let FREEDOM ring! A picture review of our 2/25/17 cruise!


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So glad you enjoyed my review and had a good laugh! Next up is the Dream over Halloween, so stay tuned for more shenanigans and bad decisions! :')

 

Since this mess of a review has been resurrected, just wanted to tell my awesome readers to stay tuned! We switched our next cruise, and in 130 and some odd days, we board the Dream for the Halloween cruise. I'm already shopping for inappropriate costumes, saving for Cheers so we can again hit our daily goal, and squirreling away bail money in case our pre-cruise day in NOLA takes a turn for the worst. See ya in November! :D

Can't WAIT! If you can't make bail, we'll all chip in to get you out of jail and on the ship so you can eat, drink, be merry and get home to start your review! ;)

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  • 1 month later...

I've literally only read post #1 in this thread and I've decided two things:

 

1- I need you to narrate my life.

2- I wish your pictures would work (okay so I jumped ahead because I've had this on my "followed but not read" list for a while) because I need to put a face with the personality.

 

I have a feeling that 18 pages of this review won't be difficult to read, even without pictures working!

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I've literally only read post #1 in this thread and I've decided two things:

 

1- I need you to narrate my life.

2- I wish your pictures would work (okay so I jumped ahead because I've had this on my "followed but not read" list for a while) because I need to put a face with the personality.

 

I have a feeling that 18 pages of this review won't be difficult to read, even without pictures working!

 

Lol, I'm both glad and I apologize that you stumbled upon my review. :') I wish the pictures would show up, makes me mad as hell that I spent all that time writing and they don't show up. Stay tuned for my next review in November!

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Let me preface this next installment by saying that we have been to Cozumel many times, and these days, my only real mission there is to pick up my Retin-A, because I have been obsessed with anti-aging and preventing wrinkles since I was basically a fetus. Seriously, I would tug on my umbilical cord, and my mom would send down some Oil of Olay. So that's literally all we did this time. We got off the ship, got some Retin-A, and got back on. Not even one picture was taken. So, just to be able to have something to post for this day, I'm going to share some pics from some of our previous visits. So, please join me for an "alternative day" in Cozumel. (I knew Kellyanne would make another appearance in this review, that sneaky trick.):

 

Thursday, March 3rd, 2017

Thankfully, I woke up feeling better than I had the night before, so I decided to have a healthy breakfast. (Only 2 FunShips instead of 3.) We headed off the ship, and made the 7.5 mile trek down the pier into the port area. The water in Cozumel is just beautiful:

 

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On this alternative day, we had lots of things planned. First, we were going to Nachi Cocom, so we made our way to the taxi area. Here's a pic of the shopping area we passed through on the way:

 

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I think you've learned by now that the only time C and I are religious is when we are in a taxi in a foreign country. We will pray to anything. Zeus. Buddha. The Flying Spaghetti Monster. Fabio. Anybody, just let us get to our destination in one piece. When we arrived at Nachi on this alternative day, we kissed the ground, thankful that we didn't end up actually inside of the ambulance that we had tail-gated the entire way. (Yes, that really did happen on a previous trip.) We paid our balance, and were led to our palapa:

 

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We decided to look around a little bit. This is looking down the beach toward Mr. Sancho's:

 

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Here's the hammock area, where you can lose all of your dignity as you try to get in or out of one of these things after you've taken advantage of the open bar:

 

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Here's the pool, which although you can't see in this pic, also has a swim-up bar. So basically, this is where you have a chance to earn a prestigious Darwin Award after you drown by trying to drunkenly swim up to get your 13th Miami Vice:

 

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To be continued.......

 

I know I"m late reading this since you wrote your review in April, and I'm finally reading this in August. However, I have to tell you that you need to give us readers warnings. For example...warning, do NOT read at work, failure to do so will result in loud laughter, and food and/or water coming out of your nose and mouth. I have NEVER laughed so hard and loud at work before. Love your writing style, and humor. I'm thinking of trying to be like you and get the cheers package, and reach the goal of 15 drinks a day!!!

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Are you really going to be on the Carnival Dream for Halloween, because I"m on that cruise and have to meet you. Don't worry, I'm sure I'll see you at the Alchemy Bar, right? See you on the 29th of October.

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I know I"m late reading this since you wrote your review in April, and I'm finally reading this in August. However, I have to tell you that you need to give us readers warnings. For example...warning, do NOT read at work, failure to do so will result in loud laughter, and food and/or water coming out of your nose and mouth. I have NEVER laughed so hard and loud at work before. Love your writing style, and humor. I'm thinking of trying to be like you and get the cheers package, and reach the goal of 15 drinks a day!!!

 

Noted, I will add warnings to my next review! :') Glad I could give you a laugh. :D Also, get the Cheers package and strive for that goal honey!!!

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  • 3 months later...
  • 3 months later...
  • 6 months later...
I think I finally figured it out!! Thank you all for bearing with me! Photobucket is like the public bathroom of the photo hosting world. You don’t wanna use it, but you have to, so you just hold your nose and flush with your foot. I have no idea what that analogy even means, so let’s just move on and get this party started. I do want to preface this review by saying that my humor may not be for everybody. If you are prude, easily offended, or the kind of person who writes to John Heald complaining that your napkins weren't properly folded in the MDR, this review probably isn't for you. With that being said, ladies and gentlemen, I present to you my review of the Carnival Freedom:

 

Friday, February 24th, 2017

Finally, the day had arrived that we were heading to Houston! It had been 6 LONG months since we’d cruised (insert dramatic fainting here), and we were more than ready! We woke up, got our kids off to school (but not before gloating a little bit about how we'd be lying on a beach while they were sitting in class, and yes, we have an account set up for their future therapy sessions) and did some last minute packing. Luckily, I’m a light packer*, as evidenced by this pic of the shoes I brought along:

 

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*Disclaimer: That's a complete and total lie.

 

We had some lunch, did a quick Walmart run, and then, since my eyebrows were starting to give Bert from Sesame Street a run for his money, I popped into my salon for a quick wax. I knew I made the right decision when the sweet girl working looked at them and said, and I quote, “oh, honey, they so long!” I mumbled something along the lines of "that's what's she said" and made a mental note to never go 3 weeks (inner self: b***h, it's been more like 3 months) between waxes again. We met up with my mom to go over some last minute stuff, and then finally, around 12:30, we were headed to the airport.

 

Let me sidetrack here for a moment if I may. We live in a Tulsa suburb. When we cruise out of Galveston, and it comes up that we're from Oklahoma, staff and other passengers on the ship almost always automatically assume that we drove to the port. Inevitably, someone will ask how our drive was. I then proceed to give them the same face that Steve Harvey gives contestants on Family Feud when they give him a dumb answer:

 

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Yes, we live in Oklahoma, and yes, we neighbor Texas. However, Texas is a very LARGE state, and from our house to the port of Galveston is a 9 hour drive. Homie don’t play that. We live 15 minutes from Tulsa International Airport, and the flight to Houston is a little over an hour. I don’t like long road trips. I get cranky and uncomfortable and bored and suffer from a near-fatal condition called “Numbus Gluteus Maximus. It’s a very serious, very real disease that you can look up on the AMA website.*

 

*Disclaimer: No it's not, and no you can't.

 

So that’s why we fly, even though we “live close.” :rolleyes: Anyway, we get to the airport, and there's no line at check-in. We check our (96% full of my stuff) 4 bags, all of which weigh in right at 50 lbs thanks to C's mad packing/weighing skills. He has learned to adapt and overcome after 7 cruises with a wife who insists on bringing everything she owns on a cruise. But I digress. We sail right through and head to security. The line there is short as well. We empty our pockets, and take off our shoes and place them, along with our dignity, into the bins and step into the x-ray machine. Apparently something around my shoulders “lit up,” so I had to be patted down by a female TSA agent who had the warmth of Maleficent. After I was done getting intimately acquainted with that agent, I got pulled aside because my bag had been flagged in the x-ray machine. So another TSA agent, who was also warm and friendly (not at all) started digging through my bag, looking for weapons, bombs, stowaways, I don’t know. Finally she found what she was looking for. An unopened can of Diet Coke that I forgot was in there. She then proceeded to swipe the inside of my Minnie Mouse/Disney World bag for explosives residue. She did the same to my hands. Rest easy when you board an airplane, people. The fine folks at TSA are making sure that hardened, Diet Coke-smuggling, basically-a-terrorist people like me are being thwarted.

 

So my bag and I are finally cleared, and I look back to see C is in a similar situation. He’s spread eagle, hands behind head, getting a full pat down, groin included. They made him unbutton his pants, remove his belt, and they tested it for explosives as well. I mean, I know we’re sexy, but we really don’t have time to be fondled and groped by every TSA agent in the airport. At least not for free. We finally get through security and get our shoes back on and head to our gate. We were happy to see that our flight, Southwest Airlines Flight 1878 nonstop to Houston was right on time:

 

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We had “A” boarding passes, so I got my window seat. In no time, we were in the air and on our way to Houston:

 

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There was no Wi-Fi on this plane, so people were forced to interact with each other. You could see the look of horror on their faces as they turned to face their travel companions and tried to remember how to engage another living, breathing human. Most of them gave up after a couple minutes and just took a nap. The flight was quite bumpy, so the captain had the FA’s remain in their seats for the quick flight to Houston. In what seemed like no time, the captain was announcing that we were making our final approach into Houston Hobby. In just a little over an hour after taking off in Tulsa, we were on the ground in Houston.

 

We gathered our stuff and made our way off the plane. I have naturally curly hair, so as soon as I stepped onto the jetway, I felt that warm, moist embrace that is south Texas humidity. I could tell without even looking in a mirror that despite flat ironing my hair that morning, I was going to look like this by the end of the day, only not nearly as chic and put-together:

 

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To be continued.....

 

I know it’s been awhile, but are most of those shoes the same brand? I’m shopping for some lower heeled shoes that would be more practical for cruises! You have some cute ones, where do you shop??

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  • 2 years later...

Wow Felicia, that review was awesome!!!!

 

We've been on the Freedom in 2016, 2018 and our last time out in October of 2019 for the Panama canal transit, we loved, loved, love it!

 

We were booked on the Freedom for our 50th anniversary last March when got cancelled 😞 we rebooked for March coming but I think that may get cancelled too :-(. It's an 8 dayer.

 

Reviews like yours are helping!! Thank you, thank you!!

 

Hugs

Nicki

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