Mariner Oct 2-9 day 6,7 & getting off ship!

[knothead]

Our Review - Mariner of the Seas - October 2-9, 2005 – Port Canaveral, Fl – Eastern

 

Again I’m not responsible for my grammar & spelling!

 

Day 6 – Day at Sea

 

These are the best days. We went early to windjammer and then went back to cabin and changed into our swimsuits for some relaxing!! What a life. Hubby had decided we needed matching bracelets! So off we went to find the gold by the inch booth. It was up on the main pool deck along with a big sale on T-shirts & other items. Hubby found a nice button shirt for $9.99, and we pick out the chain we wanted for our bracelets. We were measured and told we could pick them up in the fashion store tomorrow after 5pm.

We went by the fashion store that evening and asked if they happen to be ready and they were!! After all the hard work shopping we made our way to the upper deck to watch the men’s sexy legs competition! It was HOT and I’m not talking about the contest! The sun was beating down and they was not a dry thread on me anywhere. The guys all did a great job trying to win, from the youngest 6 years old to the oldest!! Fun was had by all! They were going to start the horse race after that but we were too hot to stay there. We made our way to the windjammer for some water & iced tea! After we had cooled down with the drinks we found our way to the top deck to find a shady relaxing spot! I loved just sitting and listening to the sounds of the ocean. Late lunch in the windjammer and looked around ship for awhile. We spent a few minutes in the spa hot tub and then showered in the locker room. Tonight was the last formal night so we hurried off to get all gussied up! Tonight was Lobster/Shrimp and Prime Rib in the dining room. I had Prime Rib & Hubby enjoyed Lobster/shrimp. The Prime Rib I had could have fed a small army. I had never seen a steak so big!!! It was tender & juicy- I was not disappointed I got this in place of the lobster. We enjoyed everything that night, took photos of our new friends and the beautiful dining room. All the chefs & kitchen staff came out and entertained us for a few minutes. After dinner it was off to see the last RC singers & dancers Broadway show “Pure Energy” What a show!!! It was high energy and very entertaining. Lot of special lighting & props! I believe it was my favorite of all the shows by the RC singers & dancers, even from other ships. Very well done! I hated to see this night end because I knew tomorrow I’d be packing up to leave. So it was off to the Dragon’s Lair for Disco! We loved this place. Watching all the people and dancing a few ourselves. Nice way to tire yourself out before bed time! Off to bed looking forward to one more day at sea!!

 

Day 7 – Another Day at Sea

 

Ate breakfast later this morning, again in the windjammer. I was trying not to be bummed about having to pack. We just walked around and enjoyed some the ships art, spent a little time in the casino and then I went to start packing. I don’t have a clue what hubby did! He finally came back to the cabin to see if I wanted to go to the spa for one last dip in the hot tub! I needed it by now from all the stressing I was doing! Off we went to spa! We relaxed in the hot tub and watched all the people exercising and thinking to ourselves “That really should be us!” We each went to our respective locker rooms for a nice sauna/steam room/shower. After that I went and finished packing for the most part and got out of my swimsuit and into some nicer clothes. We went to grab a bite for lunch and some frozen yogurt on the pool deck. We “people” watched and enjoyed our frozen treat!

Time sure does fly when you’re not paying attention. I had purchased our BINGO cards earlier, so it was off to win the BIG jackpot BINGO!!!! This was the biggest turn out I had ever seen! The entire Savory Theater was packed! The first game was won by (1) person @ over $800.00. The next game paid $911.00 and there were 11 people win! The jackpot was over $14000.00 and TWO people won (and it was not I or my hubby). I would have been so happy to leave that ship with $7000 + dollars in my pocket tax free!!! Bingo is expensive to play @ $35 pp for all 5 games in each session. I purchased one extra page for the final jackpot the total cost for our cards was $85.00. Hubby went out on deck 4 for awhile and I went to get ready for our last diner aboard the beautiful Mariner of the Seas (Makes me sad to re-live it again). Tonight dinner was international! Menu had Roasted Tom Turkey & Tempura fried Mahi Mahi. I tried the Mahi Mahi and was not disappointed, quite possibly the best meal yet! Hubby had the New York strip steak and said it was better than the one he had in Chops!!! We exchanged email addys with all our new friends, gave out hugs and said our good byes!

Made plans to contact each other for a possible cruise in the future together. Off to the farewell show in the Savory! This is another little bit of everything show! They first show clips of the cruise in review DVD and put a plug out for all to buy it before it sells out! Then we had a real treat by the Captain, Captain Gerry! He came out with his guitar and sang two songs “ Brown Eyed Girl” and “Tears in Heaven” He was fantastic, They acted like this was a surprise performance but I had heard on this board that he had done this in the past. He was leaving on vacation for awhile and would return in a few months!

The juggling duo was back for a segment of the show and then the funny guy Cantor. I can’t think of his first name right now. He was ok! I didn’t enjoy him as much as the first comedian! Well, its time for the Disco for our last night! We hung out there for a few hours and then off to bed. We had lavender 2 tags and they were to be called between 7:15am & 8 am.

 

Getting off the Ship

 

We got up at 6am knowing we needed to be ready to get off early. The Budget guy had warned us the earlier we could get off; the easier it would be to catch a shuttle back to get our rental car! We were ready, had ate breakfast and were waiting for our color tag to be called by 7:15am. We were to wait in the Savoy Theater! Our tag was called right before 8am and we proceeded through customs and on to the luggage carousels. We were pointed to the luggage area for our color, this process was very easy. We caught a porter who found our luggage and carried it across the street to the spot that Budget would be picking us up. We had just missed the shuttle and had to wait on the next one. It was there in about 15 minutes and we were on our way to get our rental car! This was also painless! We were in our car and on our way to kill sometime before our 5:18pm flight home. If I had known how easy it would be to get off the ship & into the rental I would have booked a flight out around noon. We decided to go the the Florida Mall, it was really close to the airport and we could kill a lot of time in a mall!!! This is a fabulous place. It had Nordstrom’s, Lord & Taylor, Sears, and bunches more cool places to spend money. We ate a bite in the food court and walked around. We headed over to the airport around 1:30-2pm. We didn’t have any trouble finding where to return rental car. Budget has people there to scan the bar code on your windshield, ask you to leave car running and remove your things. We will absolutely use Budget in the future! Went to get our boarding passes and go through security! No glitches in either! Our flight was on time and we were at home by 10:30pm that night! I’m glad we choose to fly instead of drive. This trip was a great. We had planned on not booking another cruise anytime in the near future but plans have changed. The Post-Cruise depression took control of us both and we are already planning our next cruise (which will earn us our platinum C & A status) in November of 2006!! I think it might be the Rhapsody again!! I hope I haven’t bored anyone with my long drawn out experience and details. I just loved reading this kind before my cruise and wanted to give something back. Happy sails to all future cruisers.

[cruisedave]

I've enjoyed reading your posts and appreciate what you said at the end. I am sailing the Mariner in two weeks and your review was great to read.

 

Thanks for taking the time and effort to post!

[Catseyes]

Knothead - Thanks so much for your very interesting and enjoyable review. I love the long reviews were you 'join' the writer on their cruise. I did our review the same way and enjoyed reliving it and all the kind comments people left afterwards. Thank you for taking the time to write yours. Wish you lots of happy cruising.

 

Tessa:)

[4merlurker]

I've been following your review! Sounds like you had a wonderful time!!! Thanks for sharing and Welcome Home!:)

 

Connie

[dirtgirl]

Thank you for putting in all the effort in writing your review. I enjoyed it!:) It is hard being back home, isn't it?