Carnival Freedom 6-Day Western Caribbean Cruise

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Once the rain stopped, it turned into a gorgeous day, and this really is a beautiful beach!

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The excursion included unlimited Beer or Rum Punch, or non-alcoholic punch if that’s your fancy, and a buffet style lunch. The rum punch was very good, not the strongest drink ever but when its unlimited you can make-up for that! I would recommend bring a water bottle or insulated cup, (the water bottles with cozies from Fat Tuesdays in Key West worked GREAT!) The cups they serve the punch in are very small and the ice melts very quickly in the hot sun, so if you don’t have a water bottle or something of your own you will spend the whole day in line at the bar getting refills!

 

The buffet lunch was excellent!! There were hamburgers and hot dogs, (with all the fixings you could add yourself) and also grilled Caribbean jerk chicken that was amazingly good. Also several sides like macaroni salad, potato salad, baked beans. There was also a fresh cut fruit salad that was REALLY REALLY good! I love fresh fruit, and this stuff was the freshest I think I’ve ever had. There were chips and salsa and Pico that were very good as well.

 

These was also dessert, pies and cookies. I really don’t remember what the variety was or much about the dessert. Must have had one too many rum punches by the time i ate desserts!

 

 

 

 

[tinkerbell_82]

Great review- thank you for sharing!! I am on the brink of booking my next cruise and now you've got me checking out this itinerary!! :P

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At the beach they also have a place to rent snorkel gear, it was $10 for 1 hour I think. This was my first attempt at snorkeling and using my underwater camera. Saw some pretty cool stuff, got some ok pictures, and drank my share of salt water (YUCK!)

 

 

 

 

 

This rock was really cool looking, not sure what makes it look like that.

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A couple more pics from the Tiki Beach

 

 

 

 

 

One word to the wise- DONT FORGET your sunscreen! They have shop that was selling souveniers and such at the beach and a bottle of sunscreen that costs $6 anywhere else was $35!!!

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The excursion was a little shorter than it needed to be, but that left us plenty of time to see some of the other things in town and do a little shopping. First stop: Jimmy Buffett's Margaritaville!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

This waterslide was so much more fun that the one on the ship!

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I know this because I went down it of course!

 

 

 

 

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Wonder if the new Margaritaville Cincinnati will be this much fun?! lol My guess would be that it won't have a waterslide! Can't wait till March to find out though!

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As I mentioned earlier, I am huge Hard Rock Cafe collector and fan, so next up after the Margaritaville, Hard Rock Cafe Cayman Islands.

 

 

 

 

 

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After the required Hard Rock shot glass and t-shirt, we wondered around to some of the other areas shops.

 

 

 

 

 

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There were several ships in port with us!

 

 

 

 

 

The line to get back on board was pretty long! It went pretty quickly, but definitely took longer than getting off in the morning did.

 

On the tender boat ride back

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Since we finally had some nice weather to enjoy we decided to head to the pool once we boarded. The main pool was rather crowded so we decided to head to the aft pool.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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After pool time it was food in the Lido Restaurant since no one felt like dressing for dinner. Then back to the cabin to change a relax for a bit, before we met up again later in the Sports Bar.

 

 

 

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After the sports bar it was up to the Lido Deck to watch some "big" TV and just enjoy the evening under the stars.

 

 

 

 

 

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After some time under the stars, it was off to bed, Ocho Rios is up tomorrow, and port time is early!

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Day 5- Ocho Rios

 

Well its our last port of the cruise, Ocho Rios, Jamaica.

 

 

 

 

 

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We were booked on the Carnival Excursion- Cool Runnings Sail & Dunn's River Falls. When we reached the end of the pier the catamaran boat for our excursion was already there waiting for us to board. VERY convenient! No looking for a guy with a sign or waiting forever for everyone to arrive to board a bus or anything!

 

 

 

 

Once on board they had a photographer that was going around getting people to pose for pictures. She was quite fun and did a good job. It was nice that we were on board early because she was able to spend more time and get better pictures before the catamaran got crowded.

 

After a little while everyone was on board and the catamaran sail to Dunn's River Falls was underway! The views of the island were absolutely breath taking as we were sailing! For all the negative things I have read about this port, it was beautiful. The island is far more mountainous and tree covered than I envisioned.

 

 

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The water in Jamaica is gorgeous, so unbelievably blue!

 

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After a short little boat ride we arrived at Dunn's River Falls.

 

 

 

 

 

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The falls were beautiful. I must admit the climb up was much more difficult than I imagined it would be. If you are not in the necessary physical condition to climb the actual falls there is also a path with stairs beside the falls that you can climb up, and many people chose to do this because as I said the climb up the actually falls is challenging!

 

You hold hands and form a long chain to climb the falls and help each other along. The water was quite cold, but it fell very nice in the warm Caribbean sun!

 

Also one other note, Aqua Sox are a MUST!! When they say they are required they mean it. We bought cheap pairs and took them with us, but you can also rent them on the catamaran ride over as well for a couple of bucks!

 

 

 

 

 

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