*OFFICIAL* CC Group Cruise 02/15/2014 Cupid's IV Southern Caribbean - Carnival Breeze

[Dspcentury]

Hello Cupids!!

I know that it has been a long time since I have posted on here and I have to get up to speed on what is happening!!I did see some excursions being discussed. As of right now I am looking at airfare from NY and it is really expensive!!:confused: I hope there will be some relief!! I think that if airfares continue to be high I think my future cruises may have to originate from NY. Adrianne and I will be traveling on the NCL Breakaway from NY in Sept and it will be great without flying!! It will be nice seeing the group again..it was alot of fun on the Carnival Spirit!! I am also looking foward to go to new places that I have not travel to before..

 

David...

[Cruisin Dave]

Howdy Cupids,

We are back.

Congrats to Grandpa and Grandma Elder on their first granddaughter. They are the best. You will spoil her.

David, Check flights to Fort Lauderdale. They are sometimes cheaper and you can get a transfer to Miami real cheap. Bettie and I are sailing on the RCCL Quantum of the SEad out of Cape Liberty in 2015. Char and Jim will be joining us. It's a 12 day cruise.

Heidi, the Jeep Safari sounds like allot of fun but Bettie has to watch out for anything that may jostle her back. Just can't take a real rough ride.

Later,

Dave

[Dspcentury]

 

 

 

David, Check flights to Fort Lauderdale. They are sometimes cheaper and you can get a transfer to Miami real cheap. Bettie and I are sailing on the RCCL Quantum of the SEad out of Cape Liberty in 2015.

 

Dave..I was thinking of that and was checking Jet Blue prices but they did not go to Feb 14th yet. I hope there will be a change in price!!!

[Flick]

Going up to Tampa today to visit K9s For Vets. We will be having a fundraiser for them in August. They train companion dogs for vets as well as active military personnel who have invisible disabilities such as diabetes, heart conditions, high blood pressure, and the ever popular Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. The dogs "sense" the problem and alert the owner by smelling adrenilin which the body produces automatically whenever in crisis.

[HeidiHo]

Good Morning!

 

Dave - Welcome back. I hope you had a great trip.

 

I am watching the air into Ft. Lauderdale too. a good option for us might be Southwest but last time I checked they did have Feb. 2014 flights out yet. We can fly SWA from either Midway or Milwaukee. Unfortunately they don't go out of O'Hare which is our preferred airport because it's only 20 minutes from us. Midway is about an hour and Milwaukee is an hour and a half. Milwaukee can be convenient though because even though it's farther, it's easier to get to than Midway or we can leave a car at my Dad's and he can drive up to Milwaukee since he lives in Southern Wisconsin.

 

Speaking of Southern Wisconsin, Staci and I spent the day up there at my sister's house yesterday. they live on a lake so we spent most of the afternoon on their pontoon boat. It was a little cool for swimming but perfect for the boat.

 

Have a great day. :)

[Cruisin Dave]

We already have our air travel booked. We like to fly AA because they have many direct flights from DFW. We also have our hotel booked.

[Cruisin Dave]

Howdy Cupids,

Here's an interesting excursion site for those that are interested:

Shoreexcursionsgroup dot com.

Dave

[De-Luxe08]

I've put this app on by cell phone so I can try and keep up with what has been happening with everyone. So I've only been lurking, just too hard to post anything from the phone. I've been watching airfare for a month now and only United has a nonstop from Cleveland to either Miami or FLL. The prices to either are outrageous. When we went on our cruise this past Jan, I was able to book one-way tickets and it came out cheaper. This time no such luck. At the moment, 2 round trip, nonstop tickets to Miami is around $1,500 and to FLL, which is usually cheaper, is around $2,000. Southwest is about a week away from the dates I need, so will be checking that. Other airlines are a possibility, but with flying in from the north in the winter, I just don't want to layover in either NY, DC or Chicago. I'm not opposed to laying over, just not up north. My luck I'll get out of Cleveland and get stuck at O'Hare.

 

I've browsed the excursions for these ports but haven't really put much thought into it. Other than my husband wants to dive. This is offered in two ports, just not sure which one he'll do. Depends on if he wants to do a wall dive or a wreck dive. This leaves my on my own at that port, so if any excursion is planned for that port, I just might tag along.

 

I still periodically check on hotels for the POM and they are still very high. I did find one for $75 more than for what I'm book at near the airport. I know it's quite a bit more, but I love staying in that area and being within walking distance of the Marketplace. Have it on hold, so I have until next year to decide.

 

Hope everyone has a great 4th of July. We are planning on spending the weekend at the motorhome, but won't be able to go out there till Fri evening. Our city has fireworks tonight, that is if it doesn't rain. We have had rain off and on, every day for the past 7 days. What's nice is, we can sit on our deck and watch them. Not as good as when we first moved in cause the trees have grown, but can see them well enough.

 

Take care all, Donna

[HeidiHo]

Good Morning!

 

Howdy Cupids,

 

Here's an interesting excursion site for those that are interested:

 

Shoreexcursionsgroup dot com.

 

Dave

 

Shore Excursions Group is an approved shore excursions company at my agency so I'm sure they are OK. I don't think many of our agents have used them much though so I really don't know much about them. Most of our agents use another one called ShoreTrips. You can check them out at Shoretrips dot com. I have never actually booked any excursions from them for any of my clients yet but the other agents in our office book with them all the time. I need to send some shore excursions this week to my clients that booked an Australia/New Zealand cruise. I don't know if Shoretrips has excursions there or night but I'll find out.

 

I am not feeling so great today. I'm starting to come down with a cold or something. It started yesterday afternoon with a sore throat. My throat isn't really sore anymore but now it's scratchy and there just kind of a tightness in my chest and my sinuses are draining. Classic early cold symptoms. I didn't sleep well at all last night.

 

Today I might go out shopping for a birthday present for Eric. I think he wants a Kindle which I'll order from amazon but then I'll go buy him some Blackhawks Championship gear. That makes it easy. His birthday is July 7th but I have no idea when we'll see him and I'd rather not mail his gift. Dave's brother called me yesterday to get Eric's address so he could send him a card but I didn't know it so I sent Eric a text and he said even HE didn't know it. I texted back and said, "You really ARE homeless, aren't you." LOL. He's not really homeless. We've just joked about it because for the past couple of years he's just kind of moved around living with people who had extra bedrooms and needed room mates but he's wasn't on a lease or anything. That's easy to do in a college town. I get strange looks from people when they ask me where Eric lives and I say, "I don't know." We've never been to his current place. He lives with a couple of grad students from China. I guess they had another room mate who went back to China so they had an extra bedroom. Eric found them on Craigslist. He'll be moving back home by the middle of August though.

 

Have a good holiday weekend. I will work lunch tomorrow but I'm off Friday and Saturday except for having to go the the travel agency Friday afternoon. Hopefully I won't feel too bad but we don't have any special plans.

[Flick]

Hope everyone has a Grand Fourth of July!!!!

[HeidiHo]

Does anyone know for sure if the ship stays on Eastern time during the entire cruise? I all cruises I've been on out of Florida on Carnival do but I want to be sure if i plan any independent excursions. It looks to me that all the islands we will be visiting will be on Atlantic Standard time and since no one will be on daylight savings time in Feb., all the ports should be 1 hour ahead of the ship. does that sound right? It's so confusing. I posted this question on the Breeze thread too but no one has answered yet.

 

I checked excursions on Shoretrips dot com but I can't find many that will fit with our ship times. I found a few in Aruba but they start at 9:00 and since we dock at 8:00 ship time it will already be 9:00 on the island. The only excursion I found that I like that also fits with our times is on Curacao and it's a sunset champagne cruise. It's a little pricier than a similar one that Carnival offers but the Carnival one doesn't offer champagne and appetizers. Here's the Shoretrips one.

 

 

 

There's no better way to end the day than by cruising the emerald-blue waters off the coast of Curacao aboard a luxury catamaran. The champagne and beautiful sunset are icing on the cake!

 

 

This tour includes:

• Sailing adventure aboard a smooth-sailing catamaran

• Appetizers and open bar

• Amazing views of an incomparable sunset!

 

Step aboard our luxurious, state-of-the-art sailing catamaran and then kick back, relax, and enjoy a glass of your favorite beverage as you watch the sun slowly slip below the horizon. From the deck of our custom built vessel, you'll have an unobstructed view of Mother Nature at her best.

 

Stroll the decks with a glass of champagne or fruit punch as you take in the stunning views of Curaçao’s coastline and a magnificent sunset.

 

The Sunset Sail includes champagne and appetizers (skewered tenderloin, shrimp, and chicken), as well as an open bar featuring soft drinks, fruit punch, water, beer, white wine, rose, rum, vodka, and rum punch.

 

A bathroom, sunning nets, and plenty of seating space are available for your convenience.

 

 

 

Per Person $68.00 USD

Child $53.00 USD (Ages 3-12.)

 

 

 

 

Departures (Local time)

03:40 PM(3.00 hrs)Meeting time.

 

Transfer / Meeting Instructions

No Taxi Required

 

Specific pick up or taxi instructions will appear on your voucher after you purchase your trip.

 

Special Instructions

No special instructions.

 

Restrictions

This trip is only available on Wednesday evenings.

[momofzeke]

We can't seem to catch a break when it comes to haying. The crop is terrible. Drought is a bitch. We cut what little there was in 2 fields, the first night of baling a spindle broke on the brand new baler & the wheel & tire fell off!!! Got that fixed & then it rained next night so no baling. Rained AGAIN last night, so no baling, plus all the hay we cut yesterday also got rained on.

 

In 2 days of cutting, we are already done with 3 fields. Those would normally take us 5 days, but there are large parts of the meadow that just didn't grow because there was not enough water on them. And now we have millions of grasshoppers eating grass by the ton. Instead of selling hay this year, we will most likely have to BUY some to get enough for our cows to get through the winter.

 

I am also waiting for Southwest to open the schedule for our dates.

 

A sunset cruise might be nice. Thanks for the info on the shore excursion companies, Dave & Heidi.

 

Have a good 4th, people! What do normal people do on the 4th?? Bar-b-q, camping, swimming, go to the lake? My butt will be in the swather. Sigh. Greg & Mal are having a bar-b-q and I wish we could be there!

[HeidiHo]

Good Morning!

 

I'm still not feeling very well today but I'm still going to work. I can't call off on a holiday. They'll never believe that I'm sick. Hopefully they'll send me home pretty early. We will be slow anyway. We won't do anything special today after I come home. Dave went up to Milwaukee with his brother yesterday for Summerfest. I could have gone but didn't feel up to it. Staci left yesterday afternoon for Lake of the Ozarks so I enjoyed the peace and quiet at home.

 

Have a great day. :)

[Cruisin Dave]

Heidi,

I just check John's Blog and looked at all the new Fun Times. They are dated 6/25. None of them indicate and time changes.

Dave

[De-Luxe08]

When we sailed the eastern ports on the Breeze, there was a 1 hr time difference for a day or so. Not sure about the southern ports. The ship was really good about making sure everyone remembered to stay on ships time. I stayed pretty nervous during this time. Was worried I'd get it wrong and miss getting back to the ship. I believe this occurred either in Antiqua or Tortola or both. Really can't remember which port.

 

Sent from my SCH-I535 using Forums mobile app

[Dspcentury]

Hi Cupids...

Today I was able to find a reasonable fare on American Airlines leaving on Feb 14th and spending a nice evening with Adrianne on Valentines Day and then stay in Miami an extra night and leave on Monday. I was thinking that the price was not going down that much at all. On the the way out we do not have direct flights but we do have direct flights on the way home. I hope the weather will be great at that time..not like we had 2010.

 

Heidi..I like the excursion you mention in Curacao. Sounds romantic and relaxing!!

[Flick]

Blub blub will this rain ever stop? We have had tremendous storms everyday for the last two weeks....over 9" of rain and counting. Thank goodness Florida is just one big sand spit so a lot of the water gets absorbed into the "ground" but we are starting to see standing water in low places and the retention ponds are overflowing. It is supposed to calm down by Sunday. At any rate I'm NOT cooking t-bones on the grill tonight!!!

On another note y'all should see our neighborhood...every house has American flags lining their front yards...we have seven ourselves. Someone moved in this past Tuesday, saw all the flags yesterday and immediately went out and bought a whole bunch of flags to put up by noon yesterday! They had just moved from California and had never seen so many flags at one time.

[momofzeke]

Woo Hoo! After I posted yesterday, Dave came in from checking the hay and said it was too wet to cut. So we made a flying trip to Bend! I got to hold Lily all day long, well, with a few breaks for feeding & changing. ;)

 

Had a delicious pulled pork Greg did on his smoker, beans, taters & Mal made a fruit pizza with shortbread cookie base that was better than crack! Brian & Staci had a family reunion for her family, but came over in the evening & we watched the big fireworks show from the back yard.

 

This morning we are going to take breakfast over to Greg & Mals, get in some good Lily snuggling & head for home to cut hay this afternoon. What a wonderful mood enhancer this has been! We won't see Brian & Staci because she has to work, & he flew to Seattle to pick up his new car that he bought & drive it home.

 

Heidi, hope you get sent home from work quickly & feel better soon!

 

Both Daves, glad you got your air booked.

[HeidiHo]

Good Morning!

 

I only worked one hour yesterday. When I got to work I told the manager that I wasn't feeling well and that I'd like to go home as soon as he thought he could let me go. He then asked me to run to the store for him which I did. That took about a half hour and then about 20 minutes later, once the other scheduled hosts arrived he told me to go home. I don't feel any better today but I have to go into the travel agency for a while. At least there I can leave whenever I want to. I wouldn't go at all if I didn't have some stuff to take care of but I'll probably leave as soon as I'm done rather than stay till 5:00 as usual. I could do most of the stuff at home but I prefer to do it in the office because sometimes I have questions that I need to ask the experienced agents and I'd rather use their printer instead of mine. I also have some things that need to be snail mailed and of course I'm not going to do that at home because then I'd have to pay for it. If I mail it from the office, they pay for it.

 

I will try to look into more excursions this weekend and I'm going to ask someone at the office about the company Dave mentioned, Shore Excursions Group. Like I said before, they are on our list of approved Shore Excursion companies but I'd like to talk to someone who has actually booked them for their clients or maybe even used them themselves.

 

I told you last week that one of our agents fell and broke her hip while on a cruise to Bermuda. I assumed she had insurance just because of the fact that she has MS but apparently she for got to buy it. Supposedly this was the one and only time she didn't get it. She was very lucky though that her medical insurance covered her hospital bill but they will have to pay for the 4 nights her husband had to stay in a hotel in Bermuda and for their transportation back home which I'm sure was probably pretty costly. She actually fell in her cabin on the ship but it was while they were docked so she was transported to the hospital in Bermuda and they did the surgery there.

 

There a family living two houses down from us that just had some additional family members move in and THEY BROUGHT LIVE CHICKENS WITH THEM!!!!! We do not live on a farm nor do we live in the country. We live in the suburbs where houses are just a few feet apart from each other. We can see them walking around their back yard. Supposedly they have a cage for them in the garage. Now, there is probably a village ordinance against having chickens so I don't know how long they'll have them. I won't complain though unless they bother us. As long as they don't have a rooster that wakes us up a dawn then I don't care. There's one house in between us and them anyway. I don't know where the people are from but they are not American and I think thy come from a country where keeping chickens on the property would be common so they probably think it's OK to have chickens here too. It's just strange seeing chickens in the suburbs. LOL

 

Enjoy the rest of your weekend.

[Nazarushka]

Heidi - if you find a couple of excursions you're really interested in, I'd send an email to the tour company. I'd be really surprised if they don't adjust their start times to when the ship is in port. People keep commenting about doing cruises that always stay on one time zone, but I've never done one yet that hasn't changed at least once. Also, keep in mind that February will be after the time change anyway, so the times they have posted now may change by then.

 

We're trying to get ready for our September cruise. Has anyone done anything in Mahogany Bay, Roatan or in Belize that they recommend? Also, what is the place in Cozumel that you guys always head to? People on our roll call are asking for a good beach to hang out for the day, but I can't remember what it was.

 

224 days to go!!

[HeidiHo]

Heidi - if you find a couple of excursions you're really interested in, I'd send an email to the tour company. I'd be really surprised if they don't adjust their start times to when the ship is in port. People keep commenting about doing cruises that always stay on one time zone, but I've never done one yet that hasn't changed at least once. Also, keep in mind that February will be after the time change anyway, so the times they have posted now may change by then.

 

 

Actually, I spoke with one of our very experienced agents in the office today and she said that Shoretrips is often very accommodating with their excursion start times. I also asked her about the company Dave mentioned, Shore Excursion Group and she said they are fine. In fact, even though we use Shoretrips more often, they don't have excursions in New Zealand and she told me to us Shore Excursions Group for the ladies who booked the Australia/New Zealand cruise from me. Because I'm still pretty new at selling cruises, I have not yet booked clients with either of those companies.

[momofzeke]

Michelle, the name of the beach in Cozumel is Paradise Beach. Great beach & they also have a nice pool.

 

In Belize, we did a Bannister Island beach break thru Carnival. It was nice, but we liked Paradise Beach better.

[Cruisin Dave]

Michelle, on our last cruise we went to Mr. Sanchos for the All Inclusive Day Pass. It's all the food and drink for one price. It also has a pool, water toys and you can rent jet skis. You can book it through Shore Excursioneer dot com.

Dave

Edited July 6, 2013 by Cruisin Dave

[HeidiHo]

Good Afternoon.

 

I am feeling a little better today. I'm still a little stuffed up but it's not bad. We're just hanging around the house today. We grilled the last 2 nights so I might suggest take out tonight. I don't really feel like going out.

 

This cat that we are taking care of is really funny. She's very different than any of the other cats we have ever had. She likes laps. I was sitting at my computer trying to work today when she jumped up on my lap and just laid down on her back with her back legs going up and over the keyboard of my lap top. She will also wake me up in the middle of the night by standing on my chest. She's a real sweetie though. We like her. Our other cat hasn't accepted her yet. They pretty much stick to opposite sides of the house and there haven't been any fights. The dog just ignores her. Sometimes when the dog comes to close to her she'll hiss. It's rare though that the dog even notices her.

 

Enjoy the rest of your weekend. :)

[Cruisin Dave]

Heidi, I think I caught your summer cold. I've felt rotten since Wednesday. What a way to spend a long weekend off.

Dave