Mountainbreeze's HUGE Victory vacation review!

[mountainbreeze]

I'll be right back with Grand Turk Day!! :)

[mountainbreeze]

DAY 5 - GRAND TURK DAY - Wednesday Sept 4, 2013

 

I woke up at 6:30AM, and of course I went out on the balcony immediately.

Perfect timing AGAIN, but totally by accident.

 

I could see Grand Turk!

 

My camera fogged up when I brought it out into the humid air from the air conditioned cabin.

Fogged up sunrise picture

 

 

The water was SO blue!

 

I ran back inside to get ready for the day. We were able to get off the ship around 7:00AM and I was anxious to get off the ship as early as possible for a few reasons.

1. It was GRAND TURK!!

2. We would only be on the island until 2:00 PM so I knew the day would go by fast

and 3. We had rented 2 golf carts for the day and I wanted to hurry up and get them.

 

I made sure the kids were up. When we were all ready, we went up to the breakfast buffet.

This time, we tried the smaller buffet at the back of the ship instead of the big main buffet.

 

Hector was the omelet maker at the back buffet. He was a little slower at cooking the omelets, but they were really good, with all the cheese melted inside.

After I discovered Hector the awesome omelet maker at the back buffet, I never went anywhere else to get omelets for the rest of the cruise.

 

 

 

After we ate, we went back to the cabin to get our bags.

Lisa left Carlos a tip and a note, and we put our "crusin" sign on the door before we left.

 

Out in the hallway, we saw Ari again - the room steward that wasn't our room steward

We all said Hello as we passed his cart, and he wished us a great day in Grand Turk

 

Hi Ari!!

 

 

We also noticed the same Security Guard was still posted outside the door down the hall. Lisa felt so sorry for him because he had to work such long hours. She had talked to him last night, and he was helpful with whatever she had asked him about. This morning, she tried to give him a cash tip (for his help the night before) but he refused it saying he really loves his job.

[mountainbreeze]

We met up with Amy and her group and the 8 of us got off the ship around 8:00AM

 

 

Our first island of the trip!

 

 

 

 

 

In the port area, there are several shops, restrooms, an info booth, and Margaritaville.

 

 

As we walked out of the port area, we looked back and we could see our ship.

Grand Turk is a tiny island, only 6 miles long and about 2 miles wide. We could see the ship from almost anywhere on the island.

Grand Turk is part of the Turks & Caicos Islands. It's the largest of the Turks Islands - but not the Caicos Islands. Grand Turk has a population of 8,000 people

 

 

Just past the front entrance of the cruise center, we could see the golf carts.

 

Amy and I had arranged and paid for 2 golf carts several months ago. They were $80.00/day each + gas.

This isn't one of the Carnival excursions, we rented the golf carts from Nathan Smith on our own.

We wanted to get out and explore and see what Grand Turk is all about. I wanted my kids to be able to get a feel for the island, and not just the cruise center area.

 

Chris was the designated driver of our cart for the day.

Although the golf carts were just like US golf carts with the steering wheel on the left, he would have to drive on the wrong side of the road here.

We signed some papers, and got our cart.

Amy and her group got theirs too, and we all set out to explore.

[mountainbreeze]

The first place we went was into Cockburn Town to get some cold drinks. We found a grocery store and everyone got their refreshments.

 

We had a map, and a general plan of the things we wanted to do and see that day, so we set out to find the first stop. A secluded (but public) beach that should have been beside Bohio Resort.

 

We drove around, got confused, asked directions, didn't understand the directions, drove some more, and then we found it! I really think we found it entirely by accident, but here we were!

 

Oh, look at that!! It was a beautiful spot! I had read about this beach in someone else's review and it was as beautiful as promised.

 

 

It didn't take long for us to park our carts and get in that ocean

 

 

It was a beautiful warm sunny morning. The weather was perfect.

The water felt great too.

 

 

 

We collected sea shells, got baggies full of sand and enjoyed the morning.

Chris and Cody were surprised at how clear the water was. They had both been to several beaches in California, but nothing like this!

After we were there a while we noticed a woman walk up to the beach. us, She got in the water and quietly enjoyed her morning too.

She was down the beach pretty far away. I had to zoom to get this picture of her.

 





 

After about 30 minutes in the water, I got out. Right away I noticed the tops of both my upper arms, near my shoulders were red and a bunch of small bumps and blisters were forming. There were about 20 bumps and blisters on each arm, about the size of small peas.

 

UH OH!! What is that??!! I honestly had no idea.

Did I get bit by something? Jellyfish? Sea urchins??

Unlikely, since it was on both of my upper arms and nowhere else.

It didn't itch or hurt.

 

I poured some of my bottled water on my arms and dried them off with my clean towel. There wasn't much else I could do, and they didn't hurt or itch at all.

[mountainbreeze]

We all stayed on the beach for another 20 minutes or so, and then we packed up and got back in our golf carts to explore some more.

Amy and her group wanted to go over to Bohio Resort.

Lisa, the kids, and I wanted to go to the lighthouse.

We said goodbye for now and we went off in different directions.

 

One last picture of the awesome secluded beach by Bohio Resort

 

 

 

We drove along, trying to read the map and figure out how to get to the lighthouse.

We saw a lot of wild animals along the way, like this little donkey.

 

 

Chris did really good with driving on the wrong side of the road.

 

I noticed that within about 40 minutes or so, the blisters and bumps on my arms were completely gone.

That was weird! I'm glad it went away and didn't come back again.

 

I looked it up when I got home, and although I am not really clear what it was, it had to be some type of allergic reaction to something in the water. Something microbial?

Anyway, I was glad it was gone and I didn't think about it for the rest of the day.

 

We kept driving

And driving

 

 

And we never did make it to the lighthouse!

Where is my husband? The one who never gets lost?

[mountainbreeze]

We stopped at this gas station and put some gas in the golf cart. It was over $6.00 a gallon!!

We didn't have to put much in though. We had probably used less than a gallon by that time.

 

 

We gave up on the lighthouse idea, and we turned around and headed for Governor's beach.

Last time I was here with Tim, we found a lot of sea glass on this beach, and I was hoping to find more.

We all hit the water as soon as we got to the beach, but we didn't find a lot of sea glass. There were a few pieces, but nothing like I found in 2011

Lisa

Cody Leigh

 

And Chris

We were all busy bees, looking for treasures

 

 

I love this picture of Lisa with that gorgeous ocean behind her.

[mountainbreeze]

To our left, we could see our cruise ship

There was also a bug rusty boat at the shore, I didn't remember that from last time I was here.

 

I was out of the water, and drying off when a man came up and started talking to me. He was really nice. We talked for quite a while and he told me all kinds of cool things about Grand Turk.

His name was "Biggie" and he has lived on Grand Turk his whole life. He has never been to the US, although he would like to someday.

He pointed to some nearby islands, which I hadn't even noticed were off in the distance, and told me about one called "Salt cay", a very small island about 2 miles on its longest side. They used to mine and distribute salt from there.

 

Another even smaller island is called "Cotton Cay. Its uninhabited now, but apparently they used to grow cotton there.

 

Biggie told me that the people of Grand Turk LOVE when the cruise ships come to visit. He said we provide their little island with money and jobs. That was good to know, I was thinking they might think we are a nuisance when we are here.

 

A few months ago, the water supply at Margaritaville was making people sick. Ships stopped coming to Grand Turk for about 2 months while the problem was fixed. Biggie said it was a slow and dull 2 months. They couldn't wait until the cruise ships started coming again.

 

He told me that the big rusty boat had washed ashore during Hurricane Sandy, and so far they hadn't been able to move it. He said there was a political battle about what to do with it, but he thought the boat would be cut up and scrapped soon.

 

He also told me the reason we didn't find much sea glass that day was because it is "seasonal". He said there are times of the year when there is a lot of it that comes in with the current. Apparently, it wasn't sea glass season in September :(

 

I learned that the reason this beach is called "Governor's Beach" is because the Governor's house was right there next to the beach.

 

Chris and Cody came out of the water to dry off and talked to Biggie for a little while too.

This was the part Grand Turk I wanted my kids to know. The real part. I was so glad Biggie had come over to talk to us. I wish I could have spent more time talking to him that day, but we had to move on.

 

Biggie and I.

My new friend from Grand Turk

 

 

 

As we were saying goodbye, I gave him $5 for his time and attention to us.

He told me his real name is "Clevie", but everyone calls him Biggie. He said next time we come back to Grand Turk we should look him up and he would be our personal tour guide. He said to just ask around and everyone on Grand Turk knows him.

 

We had to get going, we only had a few short hours before we had to be back on the ship.

Plus we were getting hungry.

 

Next we went to my favorite place, Jack's Shack!!

It's a small bar/ restaurant right on the beach. Perfect for lunch!

 

 

 

 

We found a table and we all ordered Jerk Chicken. It was SO good!!

They don't give silverware, you just have to dig in with your hands.

 

 

[mountainbreeze]

 

 

 

 

This little doggie showed up while we were eating and parked him/her self by Lisa's beach bag.

We asked the waiter if we could feed the dog, and he said yes we could.

That dog had a lot of french fries that day.

This is LeRoy. He is the cook at Jack's Shack. He is from Jamaica, and he uses a special Jamaican recipe to make his jerk chicken. It's SOOOO good!!

I walked over and thanked him for cooking us lunch and I put $5 in his tip bucket

[mountainbreeze]

This dog is "Topher". His owners are Jack and Janet, who own Jack's Shack. Topher is quite famous, and has his own following of fans on the Jack's Shack facebook page. He swims like a person, and he digs for crabs in the sand. He is really funny to watch.

 

 

What is THIS??!!

Gross..........whatever it is.

It has horns on top of its head.

There is some creepy looking stuff in the ocean.

 

 

Out in the water, we spotted our Roll Call friends.........we seemed to see them every day, several times a day. It was good to see them here too!

 

Looking at our ship, which we would have to board very soon.

 

The bar at Jack's Shack

[mountainbreeze]

We had our coupons for a free shot of rum. Lisa and Cody didn't want rum, but Chris and I went to the bar and got ours.

 

 

Drink up!!!

 

View from the Jacks Shack tables. You can see the ship back there.

 

 

We went in the gift shop and Cody and I got a few things. Chris and I each got a Jack's Shack t-shirt.

 

The 4 of us went in the water for about 20 minutes, and then it was time to pack up and go. It was about 1:15 by now and we had to b back on the ship by 2

 

 

We dropped the golf cart back off, and walked back up to the cruise center.

 

 

When we got there, we looked in several of the shops and stores.

 

Chris and I walked over to Margaritaville to see what was going on. After we saw the crowds that were there, we were glad we had taken our own little excursion that day. We didn't make it to the lighthouse, but we did have a very good day visiting 3 different beaches.

 

 

We saw a "you are here"map in the cruise center area.

My, we are far from home, aren't we??

[mountainbreeze]

Stalling before we went back to the ship. I wanted to spend every minute I could here.

I really love Grand Turk.

 

I bought a small Tortuga Rum Cake at one of the shops there. I had never tried it before, and I wanted to see if I liked it. I was going to Grand Cayman on the next cruise (next week), where they have a Tortuga Rum Factory that makes them. If I liked it, I wanted to buy more in Grand Cayman to take home. Lisa also wanted to try it.

 

Finally, we headed toward the pier.

 

Standing in line to get back on the ship. It went pretty fast.

Before we knew it, we were back on the Victory.

 

 

As we came onto the ship, there is a security check. The guard from our hallway was now working the checkpoint. Lisa was really upset seeing him there. She knew he was up all night, guarding the door of the cabin down the hall, and now he was working the entry checkpoint. She asked him if he still loves his job and he smiled and nodded.

 

Back up in our cabin, we could see people still lining up to get back on the ship.

 

[mountainbreeze]

This was weird too...........we had Chris slathered in sunblock all day (SPF 50) and he still managed to burn.

His burn was really strange, only in patches across his neck and back. Some areas were left completely white and other were burned. That was the weirdest sunburn I ever saw.

He wasn't really in any pain from it.

We put Aloe Vera on it and I gave him some Ibuprofen. Not much else we could do.

 

Chris and I were having some really weird things happen to our skin today.

 

 

 

 

 

With all the passengers loaded on the ship, we watched them pull the ropes in and we were off.

Watching sailaway from our balcony.

 

Goodbye Grand Turk!!!

 

After sailaway, we showered and changed out of our wet clothes.

We had some "errands" to run so we went out to take care of them.

 

 

I went to the internet cafe to message my best friend Christina. She was going to be flying to Miami in 2 days to meet me, and I was sure she was very excited at this point.

Carnival charges a fee for internet usage, but they allow you to get on the Carnival Funville Forums for free from the ship. Christina and I had set up a thread there so we would be able to message each other while I was on the ship.

It wasn't instant communication, but at least we could message each other.

I couldn't remember my Funville password, so I didn't get to log in. I decided I would come back and try again later.

 

 

 

We went down to the photo shops to look at all of our formal night pics. We liked several of them.

 

 

Since I already posted our formal pics, I'll include this picture here that I forgot to post yesterday.

How could I forget this one??

 

Here we are with Donkey, the assistant cruise director

 

We also stopped at the kiosk near guest services and checked our Sail & Sign balances. It was good to keep an eye on them daily rather than wait until the end.

 

And finally we stopped in the gift shop and looked around for awhile.

[mountainbreeze]

After our errands, we went back up to the cabin for some balcony time before dinner.

 

Amy and Greg stopped by and asked us to accompany them to a special photo shoot they were doing.

We all got dressed for dinner and went out to watch their photo shoot before we went to the dining room.

 

We split up from Amy and Greg after their photoshoot, and the 4 of us went into the dining room around 7:00PM

We had a nice server tonight named Nungah. He was really good, and took care of us at dinner very well.

He had a thick Asian accent, so he was very hard to understand, but we did OK.

 

After dinner we had some time to kill so we went back to our cabin.

 

We saw Ari in the hallway and this time we asked him why the guard was in the hallway all night. Ari told us the guy (passenger) had too much to drink last night and was out of control. His roommate thought he was going to jump off the balcony. The security guards locked his balcony door so he couldn't open it, and the doctor came and shot him with something and he went to sleep. The guard was posted to make sure he was OK and that he stayed in his cabin and slept it off.

Well, that was quite a story! Ari was quite talkative about it too. He was hard to understand with his accent but with charades and his broken English, we got the story.

 

We happened to see Carlos and I remembered to ask him about the TV remote. He took it with him and came back in 5 minutes with another remote. The new remote worked fine for the rest of the cruise.

 

Chris wanted some pizza, I guess he didn't get enough to eat at dinner. We all went up and while he stood in the pizza line, the girls hung out by the pool. I got another ice cream cone too!

 

We wanted to go to the Love & Marriage Show in the Caribbean Theatre at 10:05 PM, so we went down to the theater a little early to try to get good seats. Because we were so early, we happened to catch the last half the Quest Adult Game Show.

 

The Quest show was absolutely hilarious!! Marcelo had us cracking up! I won't spoil it by telling what happens since so many reading this are going on a cruise soon. Take my word for it, go to the Quest Adult Game Show and you will be glad you did. I'm pretty sure this show is shown on all (or most?) of Carnival's ships. I have even heard another cruise line does something similar. Hopefully you will get to see this show with Marcelo hosting. He is a very funny man.

 

We stayed to watch the Love & Marriage Show, which Marcelo hosted also. This show was very funny also. The longest married couple were so cute.

After laughing so much, my voice was really almost gone now.

 

The Caribbean Theater - the view from our favorite seats

 

 

 

 

We went back to the cabin for the night. We were exhausted after another long day.

Carlos had left another cute little towel animal for us

We all sat on the balcony for a little while and just enjoyed winding down and listening to the churning water below.

 

We worked out a meeting time for the morning. Chris and Cody wanted to order room service breakfast and eat it on our balcony in the morning, so we worked out a plan for that.

 

It wasn't long before the kids went to their cabin and Lisa and I went in to get ready for bed.

 

 

At some point this day, Chris and Cody noticed we were on TV on the ships TV channel from the night before. There were people making video's of formal night. I had noticed them when we were meeting the Captain but I didn't think anything of them at the time. Our little family made it on the cruise video 7 times, and it was played over and over on the ship channel for the rest of the cruise.

We didn't buy a copy of the video - it was $24.99 - and I think we saw it on the TV about 20 times that week. By the time the cruise was over, I didn't want to see it anymore!

 

I was in bed that night around 1:30AM. We had a great day in Grand Turk, and I hoped for an even better day in Half Moon Cay tomorrow.

 

Ooohhhhh! Now that I had a chance to stop and actually realize..........we were on our way to Half Moon Cay!!!!! This island was the reason I booked this particular cruise in the first place. As a matter of fact, it was the reason for the entire back-2-back.

We would be there tomorrow!!! I went to bed dreaming of tomorrow.......

[mountainbreeze]

DAY 6 - HALF MOON CAY DAY - Thursday Sept 5, 2013

 

I woke up around 7ish and I remembered immediately that this was Half Moon Cay day!!!

 

I went out on the balcony and couldn't believe my luck again, I could see Half Moon Cay!!!

 

It was a beautiful morning in the Bahamas. I had obviously slept through the sunrise, but I got my camera and started taking pics of the island as we approached.

 

 

We still had over 2 hours until they would let us off the ship so Lisa and I watched for a while. When we were close enough to the island, the ship dropped its anchor so it would stay put for the day. Right away, smaller boats came up to the side of our ship to unload things we were taking off the ship for the day.

 

Lisa and I got dressed and went up to the breakfast buffet. We went to the back buffet and I looked for Hector the omelet maker.

 

He's there! Good Morning Hector!

 

 

 

There were only one or two people in line. I asked Hector to make me another ham and cheese omelet and I loaded my plate with all the other breakfast stuff. Short lines and no bacon police back here either.

 

Lisa and I sat at the tables by the back pool to eat

 

After we ate, we went back to the cabins to see if Chris and Cody were up yet. We found them on our balcony eating their trays of room service breakfast.

We all watched as tenders and other boats pulled up to our ship to continue offloading things.

Finally it was time to get off the ship!

We loaded our backpacks and beachbags for the day, left Carlos his tip, put the "Crusin" sign out, and we headed off for the day.

 

Of course we saw Ari - the room steward who wasn't our room steward - in the hallway on the way to the elevators

 

Say Good Morning to Ari!!

[mountainbreeze]

We went down to deck 1 and got on a tender boat:

 

 

 

And within a few minutes we were loaded full of people and on our way to Half Moon Cay.

HMC is a very tiny island in the Bahamas. It's about 2400 acres in total but only about 50 acres have been "developed". The rest of it is wildlife and birds. There are less than 50 people that actually live there, they are caretakers of the island. It is owned by Holland America Lines which is owned by Carnival Corp. so both cruise lines use this island for day trips. The ships bring the food, alcohol, crew and supplies they will need for the day.

 

Here is an ariel view of HMC that I found online (Thank you if this is your picture!)

You can see the small channel toward the left side if the photo where the tenders went into to drop us off at the dock area.

 

Half Moon Cay is, without a doubt, the most beautiful place I have ever been in my life.

The weather that morning was perfect and I was ready for a peaceful relaxing beach day.

 

 

 

We are here!!!

I had rented a cabana for us for the day, remember when we first boarded the ship and I had to stand in line at guest services for a torturous 15 minutes? At that time I got our cabana number - I chose #14 - down on the quieter end of the beach.

After we were on the island, we found the info booth and the lady pointed us toward the truck-things that would give us a ride to our cabana. Of course we could have walked, but it seemed easier to get a ride this early in the morning.

When we arrived, our cabana was perfect!!!

Our cabana came with floatie mats and snorkle gear for the 4 of us, an outdoor fresh water shower, lounge chairs, a misting fan, air conditioner, table & chairs, refrigerator, a cooler with cokes and waters, and some snacks.

 

 

 

Here are a few pictures of our cabana that we took throughout the day:

[mountainbreeze]

The fruit and dips they brought us to snack on. We also got a bag of corn chips.

 

 

 

Bonny and her family were in the purple cabana next to us. I didn't get a pic of our other roll call friend's cabana on the other side of us.

 

We spent the morning in the water and in the cabana

 

Chris and Cody spent a lot of their day snorkeling. They had never snorkeled before.

There wasn't much to see, but it was still fun.

[mountainbreeze]

Our ship was out there waiting for us:

 

I have a quick story about a fellow cruise passenger who was a bit of a jerk that day.

During the morning, more and more passengers found their way down towards our end of the beach. There were plenty of free lounge chairs set out for everyone all along the beach. The beach at our end was never very crowded, most people didn't venture that far down the beach.

 

One of the times I came out of the water and went into the cabana, a girl in her mid 20's had pulled several lounge chairs right in front of our stairs and was laying in one of them. She was the only one in the chairs at the time I walked up, but there were things on several chairs next to hers.

They had blocked our stairs, leaving me about 1 foot of sand at the bottom of our last step to squeeze by to get up our stairs.

I honestly didn't mind her/them being near our cabana, but I couldn't quite understand why they needed to be right in front of it and right at the bottom of our stairs.

 

Here is a pic I fixed up so you can see where she had put her chairs.

 

As I walked toward her from the water, I decided I would ask her nicely to move.

My words exactly, "Ma'am, could you please move your chairs a little to one side, so we can get to the stairs?"

I am not kidding, she looked at me and said, "Why can't you just go around?"

 

I wasn't going stand there and banter with her, I just went around and up the stairs.

 

I was shaking my head at how rude that was. There was plenty of beach for everyone, plenty of shady areas too. She could have put her chairs anywhere she wanted..........but right in front a set of stairs that people were obviously using was an odd choice.

 

I had just made it up onto the cabana deck and put my floatie mat down when I looked out and saw that there were several men nearby with the words "STAFF" written across the backs of their t-shirts.

 

You see where this is going?

Yes I did, I went right back down the stairs and tattled on this girl.

 

I walked up to the first staff guy, he was HUGE, big as a football player. I told him I was in cabana #14 and some people had moved their chairs right in front of the stairs. I asked him if he would please ask them to move to one side.

He looked at me and asked, "You don't want them in front of your stairs?"

And I told him I just wanted them to move to one side, so we can have access to our stairs.

 

He turned from me and went right over to her, and LOUDLY asked her to move her chairs.

She got up and started dragging the chairs and all their stuff off to one side. The staff guy pulled her chair even further to the side. He made big sweeping arm motions and he said loudly, "This area is reserved for cabana holders only."

 

There. Problem solved. I thanked him and he left.

Of course it helped that I knew the cabana rules. I knew from reading other reviews that she was not allowed to put chairs directly in front of the steps. I knew any staff or crew I saw would ask her to move, but I didn't think I would see a staff member so soon. It' was kind of funny that it all happened so quickly.

 

I'm sure she was embarrassed, since the staff guy was pretty loud and made a bit of a big deal about it in front of a lot of people.

She should have just moved when I asked her nicely, and quietly.

 

Our roll call neighbors in cabana #13 had their own experience. While their family was in the water, a cruise passenger that they didn't know walked into their cabana to help himself to a drink. They noticed him and stopped him before he fixed his drink.

 

I guess some people don't realize we paid for the use of the cabana for the day?

 

Anyway, those incidents were quickly forgotten and we had a very relaxing and fun day on Half Moon Cay.

 

Another view looking toward the far end of the island.

 

 

 

We left the cabana around 11:45 to head to the lunch pavilion. Carnival sent some of their chefs from the ship and they served us a nice lunch. We loaded our plates with Jerk Chicken and side dishes and walked back to the cabana to eat.

 

 

We spent the afternoon doing much the same as we did in the morning. Swimming, snorkeling, and hanging out in the cabana. I spent a few minutes over at Bonny's cabana #15 talking to her and her family.

 

I also walked over to visit our other roll call neighbors, Chris & Sarah, in #13. When I walked over there I noticed they had a Ship on a Stick sitting on their cabana counter. I had seen pictures of these, but I had never seen one up close. I asked Sarah if I could look at it.

 

She surprised me when she handed it to me and told me I could KEEP it!!

Well, that was sure sweet of her!! What a nice gift!

I was thrilled and I think it's one of my favorite souvenirs from the ship.

 

My very own "gifted" Carnival Victory Ship On A Stick:

 

 

 

Amy and Greg came down to our cabana sometime that afternoon and we all spent some time together in the water and in the cabana. We walked down to the Half Moon Cay gift shop and Cody and I got a few souvenirs.

 

The day went by really fast and before we knew it, it was time to leave.

 

We packed up and left the cabana at about 4:00PM.

[mountainbreeze]

We walked back to the tenders on the beach so we could enjoy every last second of HMC

 

 

I as we walked by, I ran in and got a few pics of one of the new giant 2 story cabanas

 

 

 

There was a huge hot tub inside

(sorry about the smudge on my camera)

 

 

And a full bathroom. I didn't know they had bathrooms in these!

 

Up on the 2nd floor:

 

[mountainbreeze]

There was also a kitchen with a sink:

 

 

 

 

Walking back along the beach toward the tender dock. It was fun to photograph the ship.

 

 

We passed by the Pirate ship bar. Earlier that day there was a DJ set up on the little patio

 

 

The sand here was so perfectly white and baby powder fine. I did remember to get a baggie full to take home.

 

 

[mountainbreeze]

Waiting in line for the tender. The line didn't take as long as I thought it would. But it was very hot.

 

 

As we boarded the tender, we were right behind some crew members.

I was following the pack of passengers down into the bottom of the tender when one of the crew told me to take the stairs to my right and head upstairs. He said they would offload the tender from the top first.

 

I told him "thanks", and we headed upstairs.

 

When we got up to the 2nd floor, the same crew member pointed to a row of seats and said, "Sit there, you'll get off first".

I thanked him again and we sat down on the bench he had pointed to. That was really nice of him to offer that advice to us for no reason.

 

 

He and the other crew members sat down near us, and I snapped a picture of them as we were waiting for the tender to fill up.

 

It was right about then that I noticed one of them was DONKEY!!

The nice one that told us to go upstairs is sitting on the left

 

 

As we all sat waiting for the tender to fill, these three entertained us.

First they put towels over their heads, because it was really hot in the sun

 

 

After a few minutes under the towels, they sang to us. They sang the Menah Menah song from Sesame Street from under the towels, and everytime they got to the do-do-do-do-do part, they lifted the towels up. It was quite fun watching them.

 

 

Just for fun,

is the original Sesame Street Menah Menah song.

Go ahead, listen to it! If you watched Sesame Street when you were a kid, you know this song......

 

After the tender filled, we headed out through the channel

 

[mountainbreeze]

Getting closer to the ship

 

 

 

 

In the picture below, you can see the tenders pull up to the side of the ship.

 

 

 

Back on the ship, I was waiting for Lisa and the kids to get through the security check and I saw the same nice crew member from the tender standing next to me, we talked while we were waiting there and I asked him his name. He said his name is Shane. I told him thanks again for being so kind, helpful AND entertaining on the tender.

 

Back up in our cabin for sailaway, we watched from the balcony. The ship turned around and we were off.

Good Bye Half Moon Cay!!!

 

After we couldn't see HMC anymore, we all took showers and sat around on the balcony for a while resting. We were all wiped out from a long day in the hot sun.

Poor Chris got a bit too much sun. As much as we had kept him slathered with SPF 50 all day, he burnt to a crisp. I felt bad for him.

Another round of Ibuprofin and a lot of Aloe Vera.

[mountainbreeze]

We sat on the balcony for a long time before any of us felt like getting dressed for dinner.

Finally, we managed to get dressed and we met up with Amy and her group for dinner in the MDR

The waiters danced and sang "Hey Baby" to us that night, I loved it when they did this!

I got a picture of Cody's chocolate melting cake. She loved this stuff.

 

 

After dinner, we stopped at the casino bar so I could have a smoke

I loved hanging around the casino bar/promenade area on deck 5. This band seemed to always be here playing really good music. They played a lot of 70's and classic rock. Slower, mellow stuff like Eagles, etc...

 

Our plan for the evening was to see "Showcase of the Stars" in the Caribbean Theater at 10:00PM

I knew from reading other reviews that this show was one of the worst of all of the shows they have, but I honestly was too tired to try to come up with a plan B.

 

We had a few errands to run, so we tried to fit some things in before the show.

We went to the internet cafe again, this time I had my password with me and I was able to log on with no problem.

Carnival Victory internet speed was surprisingly fast.

I logged in to Carnival Funville Forums, and sent Christina a message. She was leaving for Miami tomorrow. I knew she was at home packing and that she was SO excited. I wished her safe travels and told her I would call her first thing when the ship docked in Miami on Saturday morning. I hoped she would see my message before she left.

 

 

 

We ran some other errands, stopped back in to the photo shops and bought a few pictures from the formal night. We also made a stop at guest services for something. Most likely, we all checked our Sail & Sign balances to make sure we agreed with the charges on our cards.

 

Around 9:30PM, we went into the Caribbean Theater to find our favorite seats for "Showcase Of The Stars"

 

Just as I had heard, it was kind of a lame show. It was like a passenger talent show, and the talent wasn't very good. There were some better than others. Some I felt sorry for. Marcelo was the host, introducing each act and "interviewing" them after they did their song, dance, etc.... As always, Marcelo was very funny. He really made the show as far as I was concerned.

 

By the time the show was over, we were all sooooo tired.

Chris was miserable by now, he was SO sunburned. Cody had a bit of a burn too, but nothing compared to Chris.

Chris and Cody didn't even bother coming to our cabin for late night balcony time. They went right into their cabin and I have a feeling they were both asleep really quickly that night.

 

 

Carlos had left us a towel animal.

I'm not really sure what it is...........maybe a dinosaur? Chris thinks it might be a giraffe?

Lisa and I spent some time sitting on the balcony, and then we went inside to get ready for bed.

We decided to try the Tortuga Rum cake I bought in Grand Turk the day before.

I thought it tasted like too much rum, but Lisa liked it.

We were both in bed by 12:30

The next day we would be in Nassau, a much bigger island in the Bahamas.

We didn't really have any plans for our day in Nassau, maybe some shopping and lunch.

I knew it would be ok to sleep in a little later the next morning, but I also wanted to get pictures of the lighthouse as we approached Nassau. I had no way to know when we would arrive there, so there was no specific time I could set my alarm for.

[AZmike480]

Great review thanks for the all the info.

[mountainbreeze]

Great review thanks for the all the info.

 

I'm glad you are enjoying my review, Thanks for reading!

[Anyislandwilldo]

Keep up the good work Mountainbreeze. Enjoying your review! I love the way you took a picture of the deck sign prior to taking pictures of the lounges and such on each deck. That is a great idea. I am going to steal that idea. Thanks!