February 2007 Archives

Well this was the day everyone was waiting for, so if it is downhill from here there is a reason. Today we docked in the Bahamas. It was cloudy and overcast and most everything on the island where we were looked to be dead. They were also calling for rain, but we had dolphins on the brain. So we woke up early we had ordered breakfast room service the night before for 8am. We needed to be off the ship by 9:45. Now room service is included in the price. However it is nothing too special. Danish, Bagel, Toast, Cereal, Milk, Fruit & Juices. So we ordered something for everyone. The one thing it did was help us get on our way faster.


Once everyone was awake and we ate we headed to deck 0 were we walked off the boat. When you walk off the baot they scan your room card to know you left. We then waited for about 20 minutes for the bus to take us to the dolphins. When it arrived we got on and it was about a 30 minute trip to Unexso. The bus dropped us off at the gift shop, we exchanged our tickets for wristbands and were sent out ont he deck to wait for a boat to take us to the dolphins. We waited about 15 more minutes the baot came and took us on a 20 minute trip through the made made canals to the dolphin bay. The canals were lined with million dollar houses which were interesting to look at.

When we got to the bay we were lead to a few picnic tables that overlooked the dolphin area which was pretty big. We were then greated by trainers and take down to the dock to sit. We were cautioned not to bring good cameras to the docks, but i took my digital anyway.


Once we were sitting they brough in 2 dolphins, both of which starred in movies. They told us about them then took people in groups of 4 to get in the water and pet and interact with the dolphins. OUr family was second. Everone got in minus me and lolo. I stayed and watched her and took pictures. I think everyone was very happy with the dolphin encounter. Elsie and Mimi were a bit scared at first but warmed up quickly. We then took a boat back to the gift shop and then a bus back to the boat.
We could have shopped a little bit but i had my fill of activity and everyone was hungry so we grabbed a late lunch on the lido deck buffet and went to our room to relax.


We took showers, then We explored the ship a bit got our bearrings and did a bit of on board shopping. Then off to dinner which was a formal night (suit & tie) food was good. We then crashed early.

So last night after arriving in Ft. Lauderdale we sought out the cruise terminal and marked it on our GPS so we could find it in the AM. We then went to our hotel for the night. a very uneventful night. We left for the temrinal and arrived about 11:30 we were in inbound traffic of about 7 lanes of vehicles about 30-40 deep. Once we got to the front of the line we showed our ID's and our tickets and they gave us a pass and info to how to get to the ship(Carnival Liberty). We then followed the signs to drop off our stuff. We litterally were escorted into a small turnaround area drove up to a laoding dock of sorts through our bags out of the back of the vehicle, then the kids and shelly waited off to the side while i parked the vehicle in the parking garage.



We then followed the signs for VIP check in. that was a cool blessing cause we avoided a ton of lines other people were in. We went through our check in and got our Sail-and-Sign cards from a carnival employee. these cards got us into our room and also were for buying things on board. So pretty much they hooked them up to our debit card.



We then walked on board. When we got onboard they took our pictures and electronically matched them to our sail and sign cards for security purposes. We were not allowed in our rooms until 1:30 so we went to the lido deck to eat food.



They had a buffet/cafeteria style selection of salad, main dishes and fresh fruit. they also had another area where you could go choose between 3-4 deserts. To be honest nothing too special. The desserts reminded me of the desserts that our local chinese buffet puts out. Some sort of layered cake with fluff in between the layers, more pretty than tasty.



After lunch we went to our rooms. Went out on the balcony and took some pictures of the other ships etc. We then went to a meeting for camp carnival. They introduced themselves to the group of us and had us sign our kids up for activities. IF you know Shelly and I we do not trust our kids with many people and had no need tos end our kids off to camp carnival. And I was slightly turned off by the counselors asking the parents to cheer because they could get rid of there kids. Some lady in the back was hooping it up cause she couldn't wait to unload her kid. This left a bad taste in my mouth. I wanted camp carnival to be something my kids want to do. Not something I wanted them to do so i could selfishly go on my way. Anyway more on this later.



After the meeting we went to our room got all dressed up and went to dinner. Our dinner was at 8:00pm ever night in the silver dining room. We had two waiters one that smiled and one that did not. The food was served in four courses (appetizer, salad, main, dessert). Once again nothing stupendous, just ok food.



We then turned in for the evening cause tomorrow is dolphin day in the bahamas.

Well while in florida i thought i could surprise or freak out my cousin tim with a random cisit to his house. We got the address from grandma and with the help of GPS we found his place. knocked on the door but he was not home. We talked to his neighbor and took a picture with her. Then we left him his wedding card & present and left. We thought about taking the bulldog welcome bootscraper with us on the cruise but decide he was too heavy. (after the surprise did not work, we would have called him but grandma gave me a wrong number for him, so oh well.)

will have to work on that.