Carnival Freedom 6 day review - with pics

[nickiford]

This will be a somewhat detailed review, my first! I love to read the trip reports so I really made an effort to make notes and do one when I got home. On this trip was myself (36) and my sister (34). We take a trip without our husbands once a year and usually go to an all-inclusive resort but this year we decided to try a cruise. All and all, we had a great trip despite a few wrinkles which you will read about shortly. We live in Southern Ontario, Day 1 of our Trip really started Friday at noon when we left work and drove to Buffalo. We took our time made our usual stops, Coach Outlet in Niagara Falls, Walden Galleria in Buffalo finally arriving at the Best Western Inn at the Airport. We have stayed here prior to trips before, it's very adequate, free breakfast, reasonably priced 5 minutes from the airport with a free shuttle and on site parking for the trip. The prices including taxes and parking was $125, we had a Best Western gift card for $100 so we only had to split $25! We were a little budget conscious on this trip because we weren't sure how much our S&S card would end up being, having only all inclusive experience we didn't know how much we would drink. We spent a little as well at the Walden Galleria, Pandora and JC Penney two great stores we don't have in Canada.

We got a parking spot in a snowbank to avoid having to shuttle to one of their satellite lots, thank goodness for 4x4. We had planned on doing one more edit of our suitcases (we are always worried about being overweight) and leaving the excess items in the truck, we wanted to have it handy.

We had a nicely timed flight around noon direct to Fort Lauderdale so we relaxed a bit in the morning, had breakfast and then took the 10 am shuttle to the airport. I'm going to stop now, try to post some pics, I've never done it before so I want to make sure that it works.

Edited February 21, 2011 by nickiford
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[nickiford]

Me

 

 

My Sister Erica

 

If anyone can tell me how to make these pictures bigger let me know, I'm trying to figure it out right now.

Edited February 21, 2011 by nickiford
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[nickiford]

Flight

We flew Southwest on time, very turbulent flight, seatbelt sign was only off around 10 minutes all together. I thought to myself that if I don't get motion sick on this plane than I should be fine on the boat. I was a little concerned about motion sickness. I had brought gravol with ginger as well as sea bands just in case. We called the hotel shuttle and went over as directed to the hotel shuttle pickup spot, it was complete chaos. Waited about half hour for the shuttle, reasonable in my mind. We were staying at the Days Inn Hollywood Fort Lauderdale Airport South. It was a little dingy but acceptable. We were thinking of going to the Aventura Mall we had looked online and thought it looked like a nice mall but the front desk said it was about a twenty five dollar cab ride and we decided it wasn't worth it and just decided to go across the street to the Holiday Inn for some drinks and supper. It was very nice, probably worth the extra money to stay there. We had a few beers my sister had a burger and I had fish and chips it was very good and very reasonable priced. When we arrived at the hotel the only shuttle that they had available was at 2 pm. I was not pleased with that but understood that there was limited room.

When we woke up the next morning, we went downstairs for the complimentary breakfast and it was a zoo. No tables for breakfast, people with luggage everywhere, so we decided to go over to the Denny's where we had quiet very nice breakfast. I had posted on Cruise Critic a quick wwyd about the shuttle time, whether we should take it or just pay for a taxi. The overwhelming response was to take a taxi, so we decided to. We went down around 11:15 to check out after spending the morning at the pool.

[ATTACH]185728[/ATTACH]

Once again chaos, 10 minutes later people were still waiting for the 11:00 shuttle it was running very behind, there was a taxi waiting and we got on the way. The taxi only cost $20. We were very pleased with our decision not to wait for the shuttle we were on the ship by 12:30.

On the way our first Whale Tail sighting!

[nickiford]

Embarkation Day

It was a very quick and simple process to get in the boat, no confusion at all. We decided to go and have some lunch first, upstairs to the fish and chips station, no crowds at all. It was very warm in the

buffet.

After lunch we went to our stateroom which we found to be plenty of room.

Tons of storage, we changed into our swimsuits and off to the lido deck, found chairs no problem. I did find that some of the areas that I had seen pictures of on the Internet actually seemed a little smaller than I thought but the ship itself seemed bigger!!

After sitting out for a while we decided to go back to the room around 3 to see if our luggage was there. We started to unpack but then soon it was time for the muster drill. There were so many people late to the drill that they had to do it twice!! Then we went up to 10 forward to watch the sail away, then back to our room to unpack and have a nap.

We knew that we were going to have dinner in the dining room that night because we needed to pick up drink tickets and the wine package that we had purchased. We bought had pre-purchased 8 drink tickets each as well as 4 soda tickets through Bon Voyage. The wine package we bought just after sail away. We had anytime dining because we prefer to sit at a table for two but often enjoyed conversation with adjacent neighbors.

We both had the tiliapia, casear salad and split a sweet and sour shrimp. Chocolate melting cake for dessert, it was amazing.

After dinner we went to the Victoriana Lounge for game shown mania. I was picked as a participant and I won! I got a ship on a stick!!!!!!

The we just walked around for a bit and them back to the lounge for the Welcome Aboard Show. I was a little disappointed in CD Dan, because I was really looking forward to having John Heald but since he was heading back to the Splendor he was handing things over to Dan for the week. The show was so-so, dancers were ok, Dan was boring, one comedian was terrible, the other was funny, decided we would try to see him at some point through the week. After that we went to get some pizza, so good!!!! Then off to bed.

[nickiford]

Key West Day

Up at 7:15 am, sleeping in for me!!! Went to the buffet for breakfast around 8, way too busy in there so we went to the dining room, had eggs benedict, very good. At this point we were questioning our steakhouse reservation because all of the food was so good. After that it took us about 15 minutes to figure out how to get off the boat and after a quick stop to ask at Guest Services we were on our way to Key West. We were docked at the outer mole so we had to take a trolley. Very short ride, very simple process.

Key west was very busy and very hot! Three ships in port this day. Shopped around Mallory Square, walked up to Hemingways house on Whitehead and then back on Duvall. Stopped at Magaritaville for a beer and some conch fritters, then my sister got her hair braided by a very nice girl, right across from te Hard Rock.

Roosters and chickens everywhere.

It was a little bit of a wait for the return trolley and then we were back on the boat. We ended up on the scary trolley for the shuttle on the way back.

Lunch at the buffet, salad bar and cheese plate and we split a fish and chips. We then went to try to find a spot on the serenity deck in the shade, none to be found so we found a spot on the lido deck for the afternoon. I prefer to sit in the shade...depending on the time of day, there really isn't much shade on the Lido Deck but we lucked out that day. Entertainment at 3 was Danny, acoustic was amazing, listened for two hours then back to the room to relax and then get ready for dinner. A fantastic day! We could really start to feel the ship move when we went for dinner. Erica had the salmon with shrimp and casear salad appetizer and I had the black bean soup, casear salad and I had the baked polenta with a mushroom ragout. I wasn't the biggest fan of it, but it was alright. I was expecting the polenta to be a different texture, it seemed very runny to me. Then a few bites of warm chocolate melting cake for desert.

It was pretty late by this point and we knew we wanted to go see the good comedian from last night and we were very glad that we got there early, we got a table for two but by the time the show started it was standing room only and the people were packing themselves in. His name was Mark Theobold and he was very funny. It was extremely rocky in the comedy club but we were still feeling alright. Just before the comedian started we heard them announce Operation Brightstar. I explained to my sister that I was pretty sure that that meant that someone was sick, like heart attack sick, more information on this to follow. After that we went to try our luck at the casino, I decided to gamble $20. The first ten went in $10 seconds in a quarter Haywire and the next time $10 I put in a Little Green Men Family Renunion, hit the bonus once and at one point was up to $40 ended cashing out to a players credit to my s&s card of $30 to save for another night. We then took a quick look though the shops, poked our head in the piano bar, first impression not so great of the piano guy. Disco was hopping, a Michael Jackson dance competition was starting in about 15 minutes. They had island music in swingtme and they was a very rambunctious but small group in there dancing up a storm. In bed and fast asleep by midnight.

[LBumb]

great job so far.

[nickiford]

First sea day

Woke up a bit early today, decided to go to the dining room again for breakfast. As we walked along the promenade on our way to the posh dining room we got the first glimpse of just how fast we were going, very fast. Went to the dining room and ordered but quickly discovered that the ship was moving a lot. I didn't really feel sick, but just didn't feel hungry. I ordered but wasn't hardly able to eat anything, my sister ate a a little bit but didn't finish her breakfast either. We then just went back to the room to get changed and very quickly to get ready to try to get a serenity longer. We don't mind the big screen and the people watching on the lido deck but found the chairs rather uncomfortable and there seems to be more shade on the Serenity deck. We lucked out! Two loungers on the upper deck that we were able to pull under the semi shade covering. We drank some Ginger ale, sort of went in between feeling ok and slightly under the weather. One definite side effect is that we were not at all hungry. At some point in time we started to hear rumours about what had happened last night, there was a passenger that had a heart attack and we had to turn back around and got back to key west in the night so he could get medical attention. We heard rumors that the passenger actually did pass away on the way back to key west but nothing is confirmed at this point. Rumours were that we weren't far enough away for a heli -rescue but don't know if that is true or not. We ending up sitting beside a really irritating couple but we were not giving up our spot for anything. We ended up sitting out there until around 2:30 just relaxing.

Serenity Deck

 

View from our Spot

I started to feel a little hungry so I went all the down and got a few nachos. Then we went back to the room to lie down and relax for a while, had a little nap and then started to think about getting ready for dinner. The movement was much better in our state room we were approx mid ship a little more towards aft on the seventh floor. We decided to wear our sea bands and didn't have any further nausea for the rest of the trip.

We got ready for dinner and went down about 7 pm, everyone looked very nice for the first formal night. There was a fairly long line, waited about 1 minutes and were then given a pager and probably had to wait about ten minutes more. Service was very slow for dinner tonight. We both had the cheese stuffed mushrooms for appetizer, I had the lobster and shrimp and Erica had the grilled flat steak all was very good. We didn't have dessert tonight, we wanted to rush over to try to get seats for the Beatles show, we got there ten minutes from showtime, had to sit very high and sort of side ways to the stage but could still see alright. It was an excellent show, loved it. After that back to bed, and to our room. The ship movement was decreased considerably and we could see from the television that we we going about twenty km less per hour than before, wondered if that is what makes the difference with the with all of the movement. Watched Parenthood, read for about 10 minutes and went to bed.

Towel Animal from the 1st Night

 

 

Towel Animal from the 2nd Night

[whisker2193]

Great review. Gets me fired up all over again for March 20!

[nickiford]

Grand Cayman Day

Woke up at around 6 am could still feel a bit of movement, about 30 minutes later I was pretty sure we had stopped moving, checked the ship cam we could see Grand Cayman! Got up and went for breakfast at posh dining room again. I had pretty much the same thing every morning for breakfast, Eggs Benedict with no ham, side of bacon, and a side of hash browns. So delicious! There were lot of vibrations every time that they had to start up the engines to keep us in place. We were really beginning to think that we were quite fortunate in having been assigned the other dining room. There seemed to be a lot less movement and noise in Chic rather than Posh. Every morning we would also check to see what was for dinner and to check our folios totals. Tuesday was a completely no charge day because we were feeling a little under the weather, it is nice not to drink and have no bill!!! After breakfast we decided that we wanted to do the luggage express, mostly because that we have a late flight and I was concerned about what we were going to do with our luggage since I didn't think that we could check it in until a few hours before the flight and didn't want to get stuck sitting with it. We filled out the paperwork and took it down to guest services, the additional cost was $20 well worth it IMO.

Tender to Grand Cayman

 

Today we did the Best of Grand Cayman tour. Turtle farm, rum cake factory and hell. We booked this through Carnival and it was paid for before we left. There were a total of three buses in this tour but they were spaced out well so that there were not too many crowds at each stop. Hell was about what I expected, a dumpy little spot with a gift shop. The limestone formation was really neat, only stopped for about 15 minutes there.

Next stop was the rum cake factory. They had lots of free samples, it was really good. I bought a package of 4 small cakes, two chocolate and two original, one for me to have a home, one for friend,one for my mom and my mother in law, I also bought a Grand Cayman Magnet. I collect magnets from everywhere I've been. The bus driver was very entertaining and told us lots of facts about Grand Cayman as we drove around. Next stop was the turtle farm. It was very neat to see the large sea turtles but I was a little disturbed about the premise. I didn't realize that the sole purpose of this farm was to raise turtles for food. I was thinking that they raised them and then released them into the ocean or something, it was a little sad. I don't think I would visit there again.

But at the back of the farm they had this interesting area that looked sort of like an all-inclusive resort, it had a big beautiful pool with blue loungers all around it. Apparently you can pay extra to hang out there if you want to.

When we got back to the pier the line to get back on the tender for the freedom was very large but it moved quick we didn't get a chance to shop here at all and were a little bummed because we saw someone with a pandora bag but we were hoping there would be more duty free shopping in Jamaica.

At this point I want to insert a little note about complainers. I cannot believe the amount of complaining I heard everywhere I went, "I can't believe the line is so long", "where's my drink I been waiting five minutes", and on and on and on. You are on vacation people!!! So the line is long, if everyone tries to get back on the ship at the same time it will cause a line!! Complaining while in the line to the people around you accomplishes nothing. It just seemed to me that there were just a lot of unhappy people. I don't think it has anything to do with Carnival or the cruise, I would assume that they are like that all of the time.

When we got back we went right back to the lido deck for a lunch buffet. Salad bar, and some nachos and chicken fingers. After that we went back up to the room for a rest it was around 4:30 by now. We rested for a couple of hours and then decided to get ready for dinner. We went down to the casino bar to catch acoustics with Danny again and had a couple of drinks. He really is fantastic. Then we decided to go for dinner in the dining room again. Great dinner again, possible the best cream of mushroom soup I have ever had, casear salad and the flat steak with potatoes carrots and broccoli and then warm chocolate melting cake. Erica tried the diet pumpkin pie and it was terrible. Had a few more drinks over drinks, erica had a bottle of wine, corked the rest for the next nights dinner. Went to the casino, burned throughout my $30 credit for the other night very quickly, took out another $40 from my s&s put the last $20 in a Ms Little Green Men and started to win. The little green men games were being really lucky for me this week! Ended up cashing out $50, went and got the cash, and I planned on putting it down on my S&S card but as you will soon see I didn't need to. After gambling we decided to go down for karaoke. There was only about 20 or 30 people there, it seemed a lot of the same people were going up again and again. Erica went up and sang Fancy, she had a cold, it started off really good but then she started to lose her voice. We then went up together and sang Hey There Delilah. Stayed until around 11:30 then went up to the lido deck to check out the mega deck party. It was a nice warm night, there were a lot of people dancing, we watched for a while and then thought we had better get to bed since we had a fairly early morning in Jamaica. I haven't mentioned it yet, but Erica has been coughing her head off for the last couple of days and now it appears she is getting a full blown cold she also managed somehow to get burnt to a crisp in the shade the day before, so she was not feeling all that great but was trying to hang in there.

Edited February 21, 2011 by nickiford
fix turtle picture

[nickiford]

Jamaica Day

Up early, slightly hungover from drinking several crown royals and ginger ales the night before! We are now officially out of bar credits, we have left 3 pop credits and 2 bottles of wine credit from the package that we purchased. We counted on the next two days being a little more pricey. Also forgot to mention, the previous day I had made a ten dollar donation to St Judes hospital and got a shirt and a bracelet. It is a nice way to get a souvenir Carnival T-shirt.

Went to the dining room again for breakfast, very fast service, our tour was leaving today from the pier at 9:30 so we went to leave at around 9:00 am. Today we were doing the tour called Ocho Rios highlights and shopping. You might notice that not one time have I mentioned the weather, that's because every day so far it's been beautiful, warm and perfect. We left 4 feet of snow and -20C weather so we are easy to please. First stop on the tour was a beautiful vine covered church in St Anne's parish.

We learned about Jamaica from our tour guide as we drove around. Next stop was an early settlers house where we learned about the history of Jamaicas first inhabitants the taino Indians.

We tend to like these types of tours, us and all of the other 70 years olds! We hate the beach and are not particurlarly adventurous so we like the bus tours. We then stopped at a restaurant right by a waterfall for a complimentary drink and photo opportunity. There was a guy who took our photo and then presented it to us in a cover with a postcard the picture had a custom frame on it, he said it was $10 and we said no thank you and then he said $5 so we bought it.

This is a picture our guide took for us.

We then drove through beautiful rainforest area called Fern Gully, went to Wassi Pottery.

and then went to the Taj Mahal shopping centre. We went to the House of Diamonds to look at Pandora beads. She said that prices were dictated by Pandora, the basic prices were the same, but then she quickly told us that she could give us a 10 percent discount and then shaved a few extra dollars off, I bought a ying yang bead with a diamonds in it that was $80 for $70 and Erica bought three glass beads that should have totalled $120 for $100. We also bought some blue mountain coffee and some jerk sauce 4 for $10 and I bought a magnet.

Here's is where things start to take a little bit of a turn for the worse. We got back to the ship around 2 pm, when we were boarding this dinging sound went off that said that we had a message, and we were apparently supposed to go straight to guest services. When when got there we said that we had a message, they asked us to sit in the lobby and that someone would be right with us. We were starting to freak out a little to think of what could possibly be wrong. Anyway he soon came over and said not to worry but that there was some urgent maintenance going to be required in our cabin and that we would have to move. He said as a result of the inconvenience we would be given a rebate back of two nights of the cruise and complimentary laundry. We were then escorted to our room by a guest services representative, he waited for us while we packed up all of out things and then took us to or new room. There wasn't anything immediately noticeable about what could be wrong. Our beds were stripped, my night table was emptied and there was a pile of screws in it. We didn't know if something was loose, the stripped bed made us think maybe the found bed bugs or something, our new room was fine, it was an accessible room so it had a very large bathroom. My sister and I are pretty easy going people, if we had to move, we had to move and they really went out of their way to compensate us. When we went to get our room keys they had also given us 3 complimentary drinks each. We really felt that they went above and beyond with the service. They said that they wished that they could upgrade us but the ship was completely full so they moved us to the only empty room. We figured that it was probably the room of the people that they had to drop off in Key West because of the heart attack which was confirmed on the last night when we got a message from the casino for the two previous occupants that they had a casino credit on their S&S cards.

We finally got to go grab some lunch at the buffet and then went back to our room to get organized get our laudry ready.

We had a bit of a lie down and then got ready for dinner. Erica had escargot caesar salad and the flat iron steak again. I had the delice of the ocean which was tuna tartar, smoked salmon and shrimp cocktail, casear salad and then I had the flat iron steak again, we share another chocolate melting cake for dessert.

After dinner we went down to watch Mark Theobald again in the punch liners comedy club. It was the same set as in early this week but it had a few new jokes and he warned us before hand. As soon as that show was over we booked it down to the theatre to watch Jump Jive and Wail. It was alright, not as good as the Beatles show. We watched that for a while and then went back down towards the comedy to catch Mark'ss later set, sat in the piano lounge until then other comedian was done. Then when he was done we got a seat for Mark, so funny again.

Then we stopped at the late night budget for some bread and cheese snacks and then back to the room for the night.

Here I'm going to insert a short explanation before I get into what happened next. I cannot sleep without a body pillow. I used to travel with an entire pillow stuffed in a suitcase but then a couple of years ago I bought a body pillow case and now just ask for an extra pillow and stuff it with hotel pillows. This particular case was brand new it had been with me only to the Best Western in Buffalo, then the Days Inn in Fort Lauderdale and then onto the ship. When we we getting ready for bed I was stuffing my body pillow case, I found a bug on the case....pretty sure it was a bed bug. If the internet on the ship wasn't the slowest thing I've ever used in my life I would have looked it up on my ipad. Let's just say I was 99.999999% sure it was a bed bug. Now things were starting to make a little sense, in our old room our beds were stripped and this pillowcase was the only thing that had come directly from my old bed to the new bed. I killed it with a tissue and then thoroughly checked the case, the pillows and the bed I found nothing else, then I wanted to keep the bug I could not find the tissue that I had just killed the bug with!!! I'm in an 8 foot room with two garbage pails and I can't find it!!! I then decided that I was going to ask guest services the next morning if bed bugs was the reason that we had to move rooms. I thought it was important for us to know so that we would be carefully going through our things and to make sure that we hadn't inadvertently brought any to the new room. My sister finally convinced me that I should just go to sleep.

Edited February 21, 2011 by nickiford

[nickiford]

2nd Sea Day

When we woke up the next morning I went down to guest services to tell them that I had found a bug and to ask them if that was the reason why we had to move rooms. She said no it wasn't bed bugs but that it was maintenance but that she would send someone up. Just as we were leaving we ran into the investigation team that they sent and explained to them what happened, one the guys said oh you were from 7342, I said yes, "what was wrong with our room", and they were sticking with the story, they said it was "maintenance". But then he something about "you found a bug again".

We left for the day for the serenity deck, got two comfy loungers in the shade again. Spent the day lounging around, went to the buffet for lunch, went back to the room around 2:30, there was a message from guest services. We called they apologized about finding the bug, said that they would refund 50% of our cruise fair, which was another night on top of the two that they had given us and were giving us a certificate for 50% off a future cruise booking to be used within the next two years. They also assured us that our room had been thoroughly checked. They still didnt directly admit that it was bed bugs but they kind of alluded to the fact that it was. At this time, neither of us had any evidence of actual bites. We sat and rested and watched tv, ordered room service. Our laundry and certificates were delivered along with our luggage express information. It was then that we discovered that one of luggage tags was missing, Erica had one but I didn't. I called down there and the said that according to their records I didn't have a bag. Who does luggage express and has no bag??? Anyway they said that they would fix it for me and soon enough another luggage tag appeared under the door. We got basically all packed up, it was a little difficult to figure out what to pack and what to leave out because our luggage had to be outside the door by midnight and whatever wasn't in the luggage would have to be on the plane but we figured it out. Then we went down to look at our formal pictures that we had taken the night before...they were not good! They had a gold by the inch stand setup outside of the jewelry store, my niece Brooklyn had said that she wanted jewelry for her birthday so Erica bought herself and Brooklyn a necklace with an initial charm and she got a free bracelet, we had to come back at ten to pick those up. Then we went for our last dinner in the dining room. We both had a crab cake, caesar salad and Erica has a salmon dish and I had chicken with mushroom alfredo and it was so good, easily the biggest portion from all week. I couldn't even come close to finishing it we were both even too full to order the chocolate melting cake. After dinner we went to gamble, with all of the credits they had given us, my s&s account was now at negative $17 I had decided that I would gamble $40 but ended up throwing in another twenty but gambled a long time. After that we went to see the Big Easy Show. It was by far my favourite it was so good!!! Then we went to pick up the necklaces and stayed for the raffle in the store, Erica got a ticket because of purchasing the necklaces. It was really busy and crazy around there around the draw time. After that we just went back to room finished packing set our bags out and tried to sleep. It was pretty difficult I woke up several times in the night and had to check what time it was and since we had packed the alarm clock I had to turn the light on everytime!

More towel animals...

 

 

 

[Cuizer2]

Me

 

 

My Sister Erica

If anyone can tell me how to make these pictures bigger let me know, I'm trying to figure it out right now.

 

Here is a start.

[Cuizer2]

On the way our first Whale Tail sighting!

 

 

If you want really big pictures you need to already have your pictures hosted on the Internet.

[Cuizer2]

Embarkation Day

 

 

It was a very quick and simple process to get in the boat, no confusion at all. We decided to go and have some lunch first, upstairs to the fish and chips station, no crowds at all. It was very warm in the

buffet.

 

 

After lunch we went to our stateroom which we found to be plenty of room.

 

 

Tons of storage, we changed into our swimsuits and off to the lido deck, found chairs no problem. I did find that some of the areas that I had seen pictures of on the Internet actually seemed a little smaller than I thought but the ship itself seemed bigger!!

 

After sitting out for a while we decided to go back to the room around 3 to see if our luggage was there. We started to unpack but then soon it was time for the muster drill. There were so many people late to the drill that they had to do it twice!! Then we went up to 10 forward to watch the sail away, then back to our room to unpack and have a nap.

 

We knew that we were going to have dinner in the dining room that night because we needed to pick up drink tickets and the wine package that we had purchased. We bought had pre-purchased 8 drink tickets each as well as 4 soda tickets through Bon Voyage. The wine package we bought just after sail away. We had anytime dining because we prefer to sit at a table for two but often enjoyed conversation with adjacent neighbors.

 

We both had the tiliapia, casear salad and split a sweet and sour shrimp. Chocolate melting cake for dessert, it was amazing.

 

After dinner we went to the Victoriana Lounge for game shown mania. I was picked as a participant and I won! I got a ship on a stick!!!!!!

 

 

The we just walked around for a bit and them back to the lounge for the Welcome Aboard Show. I was a little disappointed in CD Dan, because I was really looking forward to having John Heald but since he was heading back to the Splendor he was handing things over to Dan for the week. The show was so-so, dancers were ok, Dan was boring, one comedian was terrible, the other was funny, decided we would try to see him at some point through the week. After that we went to get some pizza, so good!!!! Then off to bed.

 

Two good, and free, image hosting sites are Webshots.com and Photobucket.com.

[nickiford]

Final Day/Trip Home/Final Thoughts

We had a wake up call at 6:30 which we didn't really need since that was when the debarkation announcements started for the self assist lower floors. Erica woke up in a panic thinking that we had overslept. We got up showered and dressed and went down to Posh for my last eggs benedict sooo good! We were done breakfast and out of the room and waiting on the promenade deck by 8:00. We were told because we did the luggage express that we could get off anytime between 8:30 and ten. We decided we might as well go at 8:30. Customs was a breeze, nobody looked in our bag and he barely looked at the customs form. We were in a taxi and then at the airport at 9:00. Security was a bit if a line but fast moving. We already had our Southwest boarding passes as that is part of luggage express, we had numbers A22and A23, when we bought our tickets we did the the early bird check in. We got great seats in the very comfy southwest chairs and then sat there for four and half hours it actually went by very quickly.

Flight home was uneventul, 30 minutes faster than the flight there. Arrived in Buffalo at 4:30, we were excited that we were going to get head start on our 3 hour drive home. Go to Baggage Claim and wouldn't you know it...NO BAGS! I guess that Fort Lauderdale airport had problems all day with baggage belts jamming and our flight was missing over 20 bags. Those poor girls at the Southwest counter in baggage...not a good job. We filled out a form and were told that because we lived in Canada our bags would be Fed Ex'd to us and we would receive them Tuesday. If we wanted to we could hang around until the 8:20 flight to see if they came in on that, but we opted to just go home. Crossing the border was a breeze, we had nothing to declare because everything was in our bags!

It's been just over a week now since we have been back. We ended up receiving our suitcases on Wednesday. I washed everything in the case and then put it in the shed just in case we had any bed bug hitchhikers. When I woke up Friday morning I was itching my right arm and discovered my arm was covered in bites. I have approx 30 bed bug bites in all, I phoned my sister, she has the same thing. Apparently we belong to the part of population that has a delayed reaction to bed bug bites, they can show up anywhere from 7 to 10 days of exposure. It is now Monday, the bites are much better and I'm trying not to let it damper the memory of our great vacation.

I don't blame Carnival at all, I think they did everything thing they could as soon as they discovered the problem. They could have very well left us in the room and let us getting eaten and we would have been none the wiser. I think cruising was fun, I don't think I would go every year, but I would go again. The food was so above and beyond any all inclusive resort we have ever stayed at and I loved seeing the different ports. I will definitely be using my 50% off cruise credit in the future!

If any one has any questions, I would be happy to answer. I also have more pictures, I just didn't upload them all because I was downloading them one by one from my sisters facebook page.

Thanks for reading!

[Cuizer2]

Key West Day

 

Up at 7:15 am, sleeping in for me!!! Went to the buffet for breakfast around 8, way too busy in there so we went to the dining room, had eggs benedict, very good. At this point we were questioning our steakhouse reservation because all of the food was so good. After that it took us about 15 minutes to figure out how to get off the boat and after a quick stop to ask at Guest Services we were on our way to Key West. We were docked at the outer mole so we had to take a trolley. Very short ride, very simple process.

 

Key west was very busy and very hot! Three ships in port this day. Shopped around Mallory Square, walked up to Hemingways house on Whitehead and then back on Duvall. Stopped at Magaritaville for a beer and some conch fritters, then my sister got her hair braided by a very nice girl, right across from te Hard Rock.

 

 

 

Roosters and chickens everywhere.

 

 

It was a little bit of a wait for the return trolley and then we were back on the boat. We ended up on the scary trolley for the shuttle on the way back.

 

 

Lunch at the buffet, salad bar and cheese plate and we split a fish and chips. We then went to try to find a spot on the serenity deck in the shade, none to be found so we found a spot on the lido deck for the afternoon. I prefer to sit in the shade...depending on the time of day, there really isn't much shade on the Lido Deck but we lucked out that day. Entertainment at 3 was Danny, acoustic was amazing, listened for two hours then back to the room to relax and then get ready for dinner. A fantastic day! We could really start to feel the ship move when we went for dinner. Erica had the salmon with shrimp and casear salad appetizer and I had the black bean soup, casear salad and I had the baked polenta with a mushroom ragout. I wasn't the biggest fan of it, but it was alright. I was expecting the polenta to be a different texture, it seemed very runny to me. Then a few bites of warm chocolate melting cake for desert.

 

It was pretty late by this point and we knew we wanted to go see the good comedian from last night and we were very glad that we got there early, we got a table for two but by the time the show started it was standing room only and the people were packing themselves in. His name was Mark Theobold and he was very funny. It was extremely rocky in the comedy club but we were still feeling alright. Just before the comedian started we heard them announce Operation Brightstar. I explained to my sister that I was pretty sure that that meant that someone was sick, like heart attack sick, more information on this to follow. After that we went to try our luck at the casino, I decided to gamble $20. The first ten went in $10 seconds in a quarter Haywire and the next time $10 I put in a Little Green Men Family Renunion, hit the bonus once and at one point was up to $40 ended cashing out to a players credit to my s&s card of $30 to save for another night. We then took a quick look though the shops, poked our head in the piano bar, first impression not so great of the piano guy. Disco was hopping, a Michael Jackson dance competition was starting in about 15 minutes. They had island music in swingtme and they was a very rambunctious but small group in there dancing up a storm. In bed and fast asleep by midnight.

 

There are other image hosting sites. Some are free, some are not.

[nickiford]

Thanks for the photo posting tips. I'm finished now but I will know for next time.

[Cuizer2]

First sea day

 

 

Serenity Deck

 

 

View from our Spot

 

 

 

Towel Animal from the 1st Night

 

 

Towel Animal from the 2nd Night

 

 

Once you pick out an image hosting site you want to use, you up load your pictures to the that site.

[Cuizer2]

Grand Cayman Day

 

 

Tender to Grand Cayman

 

 

Today we did the Best of Grand Cayman tour. Turtle farm, rum cake factory and hell. We booked this through Carnival and it was paid for before we left. There were a total of three buses in this tour but they were spaced out well so that there were not too many crowds at each stop. Hell was about what I expected, a dumpy little spot with a gift shop. The limestone formation was really neat, only stopped for about 15 minutes there.

 

 

 

 

Next stop was the rum cake factory. They had lots of free samples, it was really good. I bought a package of 4 small cakes, two chocolate and two original, one for me to have a home, one for friend,one for my mom and my mother in law, I also bought a Grand Cayman Magnet. I collect magnets from everywhere I've been. The bus driver was very entertaining and told us lots of facts about Grand Cayman as we drove around. Next stop was the turtle farm. It was very neat to see the large sea turtles but I was a little disturbed about the premise. I didn't realize that the sole purpose of this farm was to raise turtles for food. I was thinking that they raised them and then released them into the ocean or something, it was a little sad. I don't think I would visit there again.

 

 

But at the back of the farm they had this interesting area that looked sort of like an all-inclusive resort, it had a big beautiful pool with blue loungers all around it. Apparently you can pay extra to hang out there if you want to.

 

 

 

Once you have your pictures hosted on the Internet, it is possible to post much bigger pictures.

[Cuizer2]

Jamaica Day

 

 

Went to the dining room again for breakfast, very fast service, our tour was leaving today from the pier at 9:30 so we went to leave at around 9:00 am. Today we were doing the tour called Ocho Rios highlights and shopping. You might notice that not one time have I mentioned the weather, that's because every day so far it's been beautiful, warm and perfect. We left 4 feet of snow and -20C weather so we are easy to please. First stop on the tour was a beautiful vine covered church in St Anne's parish.

 

 

We learned about Jamaica from our tour guide as we drove around. Next stop was an early settlers house where we learned about the history of Jamaicas first inhabitants the taino Indians.

 

 

We tend to like these types of tours, us and all of the other 70 years olds! We hate the beach and are not particurlarly adventurous so we like the bus tours. We then stopped at a restaurant right by a waterfall for a complimentary drink and photo opportunity. There was a guy who took our photo and then presented it to us in a cover with a postcard the picture had a custom frame on it, he said it was $10 and we said no thank you and then he said $5 so we bought it.

 

This is a picture our guide took for us.

 

 

We then drove through beautiful rainforest area called Fern Gully, went to Wassi Pottery.

 

 

 

 

Here's is where things start to take a little bit of a turn for the worse. We got back to the ship around 2 pm, when we were boarding this dinging sound went off that said that we had a message, and we were apparently supposed to go straight to guest services. When when got there we said that we had a message, they asked us to sit in the lobby and that someone would be right with us. We were starting to freak out a little to think of what could possibly be wrong. Anyway he soon came over and said not to worry but that there was some urgent maintenance going to be required in our cabin and that we would have to move. He said as a result of the inconvenience we would be given a rebate back of two nights of the cruise and complimentary laundry. We were then escorted to our room by a guest services representative, he waited for us while we packed up all of out things and then took us to or new room. There wasn't anything immediately noticeable about what could be wrong. Our beds were stripped, my night table was emptied and there was a pile of screws in it. We didn't know if something was loose, the stripped bed made us think maybe the found bed bugs or something, our new room was fine, it was an accessible room so it had a very large bathroom. My sister and I are pretty easy going people, if we had to move, we had to move and they really went out of their way to compensate us. When we went to get our room keys they had also given us 3 complimentary drinks each. We really felt that they went above and beyond with the service. They said that they wished that they could upgrade us but the ship was completely full so they moved us to the only empty room. We figured that it was probably the room of the people that they had to drop off in Key West because of the heart attack which was confirmed on the last night when we got a message from the casino for the two previous occupants that they had a casino credit on their S&S cards.

 

 

We finally got to go grab some lunch at the buffet and then went back to our room to get organized get our laudry ready.

 

By posting a link to your pictures ...

[Cuizer2]

2nd Sea Day

 

 

More towel animals...

 

 

 

 

 

... picture of Port Everglades ...

 

[whisker2193]

I am on Empress deck March 20th...will surely check everything out now that I know. Thanks.

[hlb76]

Thanks for your review.. Glad you nenjoyed cruising. We love it. We did a AI once and the whole time we longed to be on a ship. Guess different strokes for different folks.

 

 

Sorry to hear about your little bug issue. I'm glad you handled it so well. Most would be here cursing Carnival. Sounds like they handled the situtaion well.

 

I know it's gross but I am surprised there are not more issues w/ it. A lot of ppl stay at hotels prior to getting on the ship who knows how many stow away things could make it on. Not to mention what can come from people homes. UGHHHH I dont want to even think about it.

[nickiford]

I know, that was my thought too, that I had brought them with me, but based on the number of bites that I have I'm thinking that they were already there. I'm sure that they have treated the room but it was room 7342.

[flgatormom29]

Thanks for this review! Its the same cruise I will be taking in oct. Getting married onboard in key west! I like seeing pictures of the ship and ports so I know what to expect and it makes me so excited!

 

I sure hope they fix this bed bug problem! As of right now, I'm in 7392 which doesn't seem very far from u! Just thinking about it is making me itchy! But we are hopefully upgrading to a suite, but still.... Better get that under control!