Our Marvelous Mardi Gras B2B (with pics!) - April 23rd, 2022

[Jamman54]

This is the beach to the right of the pier as you walk in…..

 

 

 

These bathrooms are nearby…..

 

 

Here is a view of the Mardi Gras and Freedom from that beach…..

 

 

Here is the Whale Exhibit…..

 

 

 

Patti then heads to the far end of the beach to the old conch graveyard…..

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To be continued…..

[Jamman54]

Patti next heads over to the Beached Whale Restaurant, Bar, and Shop…..

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To be continued……

[Jamman54]

Here are a couple more Mardi Gras and Freedom views…..

 

 

 

This is the Water Excursion pier…..

 

 

This way for a massage or hair braiding…..

 

 

Patti passes the pier and sees the masses streaming ashore…..

 

 

Patti is heading back to our cabana and gets these shots of the pool on the way. At this point it’s not too crowded yet…..

 

 

 

 

 

 

To be continued……

[Jamman54]

The Flowrider is getting ready to run for the day, and some of the staff is putting on a demonstration…..

 

 

 

 

Patti makes it back to our cabana, and Loretta takes our drink and food order. I showed you the food menus earlier, and these are the drink menus…..

 

 

 

 

 

 

It wasn’t long before our food arrives…..

 

 

To be continued…..

[Jamman54]

Patti had the chicken tenders and the cheeseburger in paradise…..

 

 

 

I had the lava lava shrimp and the jerk bbq cheeseburger…..

 

 

 

After we ate, we relaxed on our deck with our drinks. It looks like the pool is a bit more crowded now…..

 

 

 

 

 

 

To be continued……

[cruisin4Becky]

Im really loving seeing all the pictures of Amber Cove and Grand Turk. I cruised on the Magic in January and both of those stops were on the itenerary. Grand Turk got cancelled due to either too many covid cases on board or on the island,Im not sure which. I did get to go back to Amber Cove though which was nice. Im booked for September on the Freedom on a cruise that goes to Grand Turk. Cant wait to get back there again,its been too long!! Looking forward to seeing lots more pics of you  and your wife's great adventures!

 

[sid_9169]

Looks like y'all were making the most of it Jamman54!...

[Zavadil1]

Enjoying your review, this is great

[Princess Cruiser27]

Of course I'm late again Jeff. LOL Great review of the Mardi Gras so far. I'll read more later on. 

[Jamman54]

2 hours ago, sid_9169 said:

Looks like y'all were making the most of it Jamman54!...

Yes we are,  and we see that you're enjoying a culinary extravaganza! 😊

[sid_9169]

3 minutes ago, Jamman54 said:

Yes we are,  and we see that you're enjoying a culinary extravaganza! 😊

There's still a LOT more to come!... Thanks for "being there":)

[Jamman54]

1 hour ago, Zavadil1 said:

Enjoying your review, this is great

Thanks for reading! Much more to come! 😎

[Jamman54]

1 hour ago, Princess Cruiser27 said:

Of course I'm late again Jeff. LOL Great review of the Mardi Gras so far. I'll read more later on. 

Welcome aboard Barb! I knew you would get here eventually. 😁

[Princess Cruiser27]

Great photos of San Juan and Amber Cove.  I haven't been to San Juan since the 90's.  I was waiting for the pier runners in Amber Cove. 🤣

[rwest898]

I have one more question on the pool cabanas, I read there are 10 is there one less desirable than others?  I appreciate you taking the time to answer my question. I'm definitely enjoying your review!

[Jamman54]

55 minutes ago, rwest898 said:

I have one more question on the pool cabanas, I read there are 10 is there one less desirable than others?  I appreciate you taking the time to answer my question. I'm definitely enjoying your review!

 

Not really, depends on what you like to do. Numbers 1 - 5 are closest to the DJ, swim up bar, and the crowds. They are also closest to the bathrooms. Numbers 6 - 10 are nearer the other end of the pool, closer to the Flowrider and the beach. We always try to get number 9. That goes back to the days when our boys were growing up, they always did the Flowrider and like the beach. 

[bontx33]

Great review so far. Really enjoying it.

[Jamman54]

7 minutes ago, bontx33 said:

Great review so far. Really enjoying it.

 

Thank you so much! We still have a long way to go! 

[Jamman54]

For the rest of our time here, we relaxed on our deck, had some more drinks, and took an occasional dip in the pool. At 2:30pm we decided to head back to the ship. We flagged down Loretta who then brought us our bill. The total was $170, which included a generous tip for a job well done. I neglected to mention earlier, that when you check in for your cabana, you leave your sail and sign card with them. Not because you can pay with your card, which you can’t, but because they hold your card hostage until your bill is paid. You can use cash or credit card to settle up. This way you can’t skip out on paying. No pay, no getting back on the ship! We made a quick stop at the Margaritaville desk to pick up my card, and then we headed back to the ship……

 

 

On the pier, this was our view to the left……

 

 

This was our view to the right…..

 

 

The bows of the Mardi Gras and Freedom…..

 

 

 

The Mardi Gras gangway. We were shocked that there was no line at all to get back on the ship.....

 

 

Back at our cabin, we found that they had delivered our B2B information…..

 

 

Here are some views from our balcony…..

 

 

 

 

 

 

To be continued…..

[Jamman54]

While I napped in the cabin, Patti went up to Deck 17 to take some pictures of our sail away. She took a whole bunch of pictures of the Carnival Freedom across the way. She joked that when we are on the Freedom in January, she won’t have to take any pictures of the open decks!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To be continued…..

[Jamman54]

Here are some more Freedom pictures…..

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here are a couple of Cruise Center views from up on Deck 17…..

 

 

 

 

The last of the passengers are heading back to the ship…..

 

 

At 3:30pm our Cruise Director Lee leads the Bye Bye Grand Turk party……

 

 

To be continued……

[Jamman54]

Here are some more views of the Bye Bye Grand Turk party…..

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Mardi Gras sailed promptly at 4pm. Patti made her way back to the cabin, where she then prepared to send some clothes out to the laundry. I grabbed the camera and went out on the balcony to take these pictures as we say goodbye to Grand Turk and the Carnival Freedom……

 

 

 

 

 

To be continued…….

[Jamman54]

Tonight is the 2^nd Cruise Elegant Night. We decide that we’re going to go to Cucina del Capitano for dinner. Around 7pm we made reservations on the Hub App and we had a less than a ten minute wait. We are at Cucina del Capitano…..

 

 

 

The menu…..

 

 

Our table…..

 

 

The Chefs are hard at work…..

 

 

Here are some Cucina del Capitano views…..

 

 

 

 

 

For starters, we both had the Arancini and the Caprese salad…….

 

 

 

For our mains, Patti had the spaghetti carbonara, and I had the chicken parmesan…..

 

 

 

We shared an order of crispy potatoes which we both didn’t care for…..

 

 

For our desserts, Patti had the maple ricotta fritters, and I had the apple crostata…..

 

 

 

The meal was okay, but didn’t live up to our past experiences at Cucina del Capitano on other ships. We’ll give it another shot next week.

 

After dinner we walked around the ship for a while, and stopped to watch a little bit of Voodoo Moon at Center Stage. It didn’t impress us much, but I think that we were comparing it to “Soulbound” that we saw on the Horizon and Panorama. Afterwards we decided to call it a night and made our way back to the cabin where we found tonight’s towel creature……

 

 

Coming up next: The final sea day of this cruise and Fahrenheit 555.

[Alaskabride]

I’m loving your review & photos. What kind of camera is Patti using if you dont mind me asking?

[Jamman54]

12 minutes ago, Alaskabride said:

I’m loving your review & photos. What kind of camera is Patti using if you dont mind me asking?

Thanks for reading! Patti's camera is a Canon PowerShot XS720 HS. 😎