Freedom Review - Newbie reviewer here

[luvabargain]

YES, YES, YES... You're doing a great job!! THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU!!!

 

You seem to have found new things on the menu! I never saw cheese popper before, I'll look for them!

 

LOVE the photos and the narrative!

 

Thanks! More to come!

[luvabargain]

Sea Day-Elegant Night

June 7th

We started our day by having room service. Just coffee for me. Derek ordered it to come between 8am and 8:30 and it came late. I told him to order it earlier, I didn't want to just sit around waiting for it - which is exactly what happened. I had the coffee and enjoyed sitting on the balcony with it and my breakfast burrito I had gotten from Blue Iguana. OMG, LOVED the breakfast burrito - so good.

This day we could feel the boat rocking a bit more than the day before, but not much. I actually enjoy the rocking motion.

Later I asked the cabin steward about putting ice in my room and he said he would do it immediately and he did - finally. He started becoming friendlier and warmed up as the cruise went on.

The first thing we decided to do after leaving our cabin was go to the shops. I didn't buy anything - there was nothing I couldn't live without, but had fun checking it out. Chad and Derek did a tad bit of gambling and quickly lost $10. They were done. D didn't like it - said it was more fun to take his chances in the arcade. Micki and I were waiting for them where we supposed to meet for trivia.

We just goofed off and did our own thing, mostly tried to catch the trivia games going on. The family decided to go to the spa deck to use the "hidden" jacuzzi. It was awesome - more private and relaxing. The guys spent some extra time and used the steam room when they were done.

For lunch we all hit the buffet. It was all salads and veggies for me and it hit the spot. I felt there was plenty of choices.

Micki decided to try the 02 club again as they had a video game competition, but she went and tried talking to a loner girl who didn't want to talk. Micki said the video games were just basketball at that time and she decided not to stay. She never went back, it just wasn't her thing and that was ok.

We watched some line dancing in the atrium and did some more trivia. Before we knew it, it was time to start preparing for elegant night.

I had meant to go to the laundry room and iron the guys' shirts the day before, or very early in the day, but of course that didn't happen. I went and had to wait, but thankfully only one person in front of me. There were several who got there after me and only one iron. The iron had issues! I was warned, and everything went well with my son's shirt, but half way through hubby's it started smelling burnt and crisped up one of his sleeves and a little gunk came out. UGH! At least it wasn't noticeable. I warned the guy behind me as if he couldn't smell it.

This was our first elegant night, so we dressed up and went to YTD where we were given a buzzer. In the meantime we had formal pictures taken. We had about a 20-30 min. wait.

Alex was our head waiter and he was nice, but sparse. I ordered the lobster tail. For dessert I had Creme' brulee' which is my favorite dessert. It was so good but very rich. The sugar was a bit too crusted, but I still enjoyed it.

The kids went off later to do their own thing and Chad and I went to an adult comedy show with comedienne Valarie Storm. This is when we were SO glad we didn't stay the night before with the kids. It was VERY adult and would have been super uncomfortable. It was ok, it was all about men's body parts. We then caught the last of the Playlist Productions: Heart of Soul. What we saw was good. We went into The Warehouse (arcade) and no surprise - the kids were there. We did some air hockey and Derek and I kicked butt.

We had an early day the next day in port, so we didn't stay up too awful late. We got things ready for the morning and I relaxed and unwound on the balcony for a while.

Our first morning at sea

 

Elegant Night in MDR

Goofball

 

Got suckered into purchasing a family formal (or 2)

[luvabargain]

Once again, I will try and get this right. I really should have taken notes on what we ordered, but I thought we would remember what each item was. Ha!

 

My Breakfast burrito from the Blue Iguana - my favorite!

 

I did the wheat tortilla and got everything vegetarian - no meat. It was so good. The crunchy potatoes really give it a good flavor and texture.

 

MDR Elegant Night Appetizers:

 

I had the Wedding meatball soup. It lacked flavor, was kind of bland.

 

This was Chad's soup and I believe it was the mushroom cream soup.

He said it was good.

 

I'm not sure what this is, but I'm sure Derek will know. He's a foodie and I'll ask him when he gets off work. He likes to try different things.

 

This was the baby spinach salad hubby had it too and we both really

liked it. It was much better than their Caesar.

[luvabargain]

Chad had this and I believe this was the slow cooked prime rib, it was just ok in his opinion.

 

Derek and I had the lobster and it was delish!

 

Micki had the root vegetables in pie crust and she absolutely hated it. I think it was the worst thing she ate on the ship in her opinion. It had a lot of sweet potatoes in it which she doesn't like, nor do I. I tasted it and I agree. Yuck.

[luvabargain]

Coffee Cream Cake - I think everyone but me ordered this, and they weren't too impressed.

 

Vanilla Creme' Brulee' - we all ordered this and I liked it the most. The others thought it was ok and I loved it.

 

Malted Chocolate Hazelnut Cake - I was the only one who ordered this and the others were envious and all helped themselves. I couldn't finish it though, and neither could anyone else. We were too full!

 

I finally remembered to snap a picture of the menu at dessert time.

[Baatman]

enjoying the photos...maybe you could take some of the food also.:)

[Hac Ptui]

I'm loving this TR. Keep up the good work! Yeah, I'm with the previous poster. Would be nice if you could post some food pics now and again...;)

[luvabargain]

enjoying the photos...maybe you could take some of the food also.:)

 

That might be difficult, but I'll try. :rolleyes:

[hfj17002]

Enjoying your review!

[luvabargain]

Key West - June 8th

Monday June 8th - Key West.

Today was Key West! I ordered coffee and OJ room service to come between 6am and 6:30. They were on time with it being barely after 6am, but forgot the OJ and no cream or sweetener. I was the only one up at that time, as usual. I actually was up at about 5am thinking it was later. I got my breakfast burrito at the Blue Iguana and ate it on my balcony along with my cup of coffee. I eventually got everyone up and the others went to the lido deck to find their breakfast. We watched on the ship map how close we were to Key West. We were scheduled to dock at 10am ship time.

 

I enjoyed watching the ship pull in at Key West from our balcony. We were a bit late getting in. I had booked a parasailing excursion with Parawest at 11cst/12est, but we were supposed to be there a half hour before at 10:30cst. It was near the ship port, but still quite a bit of walking to get there, especially not knowing the exact location never having been there before. We weren't allowed to disembark until 10:30 and the lines were long and slow getting off the ship. We hustled and got there about 20 min. late, but they called us to verify we were on our way - yep Key West = cell service!

 

We had the best time! It was awesome - so much fun. There was a mother and her younger daughter there and they went up first. Then Chad and I went and then the kids. The kids got dunked and really enjoyed that. Chad was a party pooper and didn't want to get dunked even though I did. Oh well - we loved parasailing and the guys who took us were awesome.

 

After parasailing we went off on our own to see the town. We walked quite a bit and eventually decided to check out the cost of renting an air car. It was $120 plus tax and carried 4 people, so we paid up and off we went. That was a smart move. We got to see the whole old town area and without having to kill ourselves walking. We went to a beach and just took a tour of the place. We went to Kelly's restaurant owned by Kelly McGinnis.

 

We went to a coffee shop and my coffee curdled when I poured cream into it. They gave me a new one and a free frapp for my inconvenience. That was nice of them, but honestly the coffee drinks weren't good - no one really was impressed.

 

We got the car for 4 hours and dropped it off with plenty of time to spare. We headed back to port and looked around the shops there before getting on the ship. We were the only cruise ship in port that day.

We were tired and decided to skip the main dining room that night and just go to the buffet. It was a nice change and made for a relaxing evening. I thought I would want to go to the MDR every night like on my last cruises, but the dinners there just dragged on and it was nice to be free and be on our own meal time after a busy day.

The kids decided to watch the movie on the lido deck: The Hobbit - Battle of the 5 Armies, and we went to the 80's show in the Victoriana which we enjoyed.

Afterward we went to the Lido deck to hang out and found the kids. Micki had fallen asleep and eventually ditched her brother and went to bed.

My view from my balcony. You definitely know you're nearing land when a lot of people are hanging over their decks. Land Ahoy! Here is the beautiful Key West.

 

Prime Real Estate

[luvabargain]

Key West Continued...

 

The Parawest crew * Me and hubby going up, up up!* YIKES!!!!

 

And the kids are off! * Uh-oh, I guess we shoulda tipped better! *

[wilee]

Thank you for the review :)

Edited June 19, 2015 by wilee

[luvabargain]

Key West continued.....

 

A little bit of salt water never hurt anybody

 

Conch Fritters at Kelly's * Our cute little electric car * The Southernmost point in the Continental U.S. - Cuba anyone?

 

We went to an old cemetery and the iguanas were everywhere.

[luvabargain]

Key West continued...

 

Well, at least we know we're heading in the right direction with the whale tail guiding us. Chad had us going in the wrong direction at first even though I said differently. I did say "I told you so". LOL

 

Another what is it? Elephant? Anteater? Pig? Dog? We all have different opinions.

[Hac Ptui]

Key West Continued...

 

The Parawest crew *

 

We are planning on using Parawest next month on our cruise. They get great reviews!

What did you think about the conch fritters?

[luvabargain]

A couple of extra notes:

Although a full day in Key West, we were back on the ship in plenty of time - I think we boarded around 4:15pm and boarding time was 4:30. There were several late runners and names called, but all got on board in time for sailing and we set sail on time.

 

We pre-paid and booked Parawest for our parasailing and they were great. I really like working with a smaller private company. We went ahead and purchased the photo package from Richie and he took awesome beautiful pictures and a lot of them. Way better than I could have done on my own. It was a splurge at $40 each, but worth it.

[luvabargain]

We are planning on using Parawest next month on our cruise. They get great reviews!

What did you think about the conch fritters?

 

Parawest did a fantastic job. We would totally recommend them. I really liked the conch fritters - it was my first time trying them. We all liked them, even my really picky husband tried them, and he doesn't like much seafood other than about 3 kinds of fish. We had conch fritters again in Freeport and those were even better, so good!

[luvabargain]

Freeport, Bahamas

June 9th

 

What we were waiting for - the Bahamas! I set the alarm but forgot to adjust for the time difference between ship time and island time. I got up way early. Oh well. Our ship was to be in port from 8am to 4:30 pm CST.

I went to get my coffee - no room service this morning. I just sat outside on my balcony enjoying the view and watching us pull into port eventually. In the meantime I did go back to the lido deck with Micki and we got breakfast - I had an omelet which was pretty good.

We made it into port a little early, and we didn't hurry to get off the ship, but we did have an excursion planned and were supposed to meet an hour after the ship was to get there. The Norwegian Sky was already there in port.

Debarkation wasn't crowded this day, and we were soon off the ship. We were to be picked up at the ship and they did mean at the ship! We walked away from it a ways to see if we could see the company where the excursion vans and taxis were all lining up, and we met up with our tour guy. He said we should have been "at the ship" where the other guy was locating the rest of our tour group. We were rounded up quickly - 13 of us altogether and off we went.

I had booked this tour through Calabash Eco Tours for a kayak/snorkel tour. The van driver/tour guy's name was Shamie and he drove us to our destination. Our van left a lot to be desired, but it served its purpose. It was weird having the driver on the right side and driving on the left side of the road. This was a first for me.

Shamie pointed out different sites and explained the Grand Bahama island and the city of Freeport on our way to the snorkel site which was about a 20 minute ride away.

The beach we went to was absolutely beautiful. We couldn't have asked for a more gorgeous site, and we were the only ones using it, it felt like a private beach. We got into our kayaks with our snorkel tour guide Ansenio and paddled on out to an island, which was farther away than it looked. The kids got into one kayak and Chad and I took another. The water was gorgeous. We got to the island and then donned on our snorkel gear. Everyone in our party had snorkeled before, so we didn't get the beginner talk. We started from shore and followed our guide. He would stop and point things and fish out from time to time. There were sea turtles and a stingray and even non man-eating sharks! It was great, I absolutely loved this area. Until......

So - one thing our guide cautioned about over and over was the fire coral. He took us out and finally pointed to it and told us to keep our feet near the surface and to not stand on it nor let our legs float down. Well, that coral was all of a sudden in abundance everywhere - and it looked like I was going to touch it easily, even though everyone else appeared to be above it with plenty of room. Depth was off for myself. I was breathing too much and it wore me out, especially with my bronchial infection that obviously I am not over 100%. I also started having a malfunction with my snorkel equipment and between that and someone stopping right in front of me when I was going over the coral, I wound up brushing the coral - twice! I started waving water in front of the areas and actually it wasn't that bad. It felt like a small scrape in those areas, I think because it was just a brush. Right after that happened I was a bit panicked due to trying to stay away from that and having my mask and snorkel malfunction and I wound up getting water into my snorkel and then I came up for air and drank a big gulp of ocean water, choking myself. In the meantime I was getting water in my mask nose as well. I stood up on some not fire coral and started yelling to the guide to come over.

He eventually heard me and made his way back to me and kept telling me not to stand there, to keep moving due to the fire coral, but I told him no. My mask and snorkel was all out of whack and he adjusted them but I still had to catch my breath for a minute after drinking all the ocean water and hyperventilating myself. I was able to move on finally and off we went - thankfully getting away from the fire coral.

Shortly after that the guide offered people to go back to the island since it was near, or to continue on for a longer snorkel. One couple decided to go back - the guy was having issues the whole time with his mask, and I think he was just a bit panicky. My equipment was still behaving and I continued on with the rest, enjoying my tour immensely. We got into some deeper water which I really enjoyed - lots of neat fish and not too close to coral.

We snorkeled around the whole little island area and made our way back on the beach. It had started to rain, which was cool - especially when seeing it from a snorkeling perspective under water.

We all made our way back on our kayaks. The kids had a malfunction and tipped over. Oops! LOL

After making it to shore they took our lunch orders, called it in to a restaurant and then away we went. We went to a restaurant that I'm sure they get kickbacks from. The food was decent - but the service wasn't great. It was busy and at a beach. We spent a couple of hours there and played in the water after eating lunch.

On the way back Shamie took a longer route so he could give us more of a tour and point things out. These people are very aware of the ship time and make sure they give plenty of time to get back to the ship. They are very conscious of that. The tour is about 6 hours. We made it back to the ship by 3:00 cst and we didn't have to be on until 4:30. We took a few minutes to look at the straw market set up outside the ship and some of the shops and then we were ready to board with plenty of time.

We spent some time looking at all the shops they set up for the cruise ships. We didn't find the people here to be that pushy. Mainly the pushy ones were the taxi drivers when we first debarked. There were people spouting their tours, but they weren't overly pushy.

We made it back to our cabin to relax, but I decided it would be nice to go in the spa's "hidden" whirlpool to wind down a bit. Chad decided he would go, so we left the kids and went. It felt great and was nice and relaxing.

We got back to our cabin and were able to watch on our balcony as we took off. We first watched as Norwegian took off about a half hour before us. We left on time and there didn't appear to be any pier runners and no names were called.

We decided to go to the main dining room, and wanted to get there early around 6. Our head waitress' name was Ni Chu and she was awesome, our favorite of the cruise. We were seated in the half deck (I call it) and I love this area.

This night the waiters got their groove on and danced on table tops. It was funny.

Afterward we went to find our pictures and purchased a few for memories sake. We decided to go to the Hasbro game show in the Victoriana and so we killed some time on the Lido deck while waiting for that. It was audience interactive and we enjoyed it.

After the game show we went back to our cabin and we must have all been exhausted because we passed out for the night. I was still decked out in my clothes. We had meant to go find some other activities and watch the Love & Marriage show at 10:15, but we had just exhausted ourselves.

 

I watched as the Pilots boat guided us in to Freeport * I had no idea Freeport was full of pine trees * The Norwegian Sky was docked next to us

 

We really enjoyed the water * The island we kayaked to was part of Peterson Cay National Park * Micki was excited to try out her underwater cam

[luvabargain]

Freeport continued...

 

Beautiful water and beaches * The kids had a mishap* The restaurant we ate at - you can see the guides Shamie and Ansenio

 

Our snorkel guide Shamie * The beach behind the restaurant * Freeport port

[luvabargain]

June 9th

Freeport:

 

The local beer - apparently there is no open container law in the Bahamas, so people were free to take one "on the road" * I had a froo-froo drink, a mango "something"

 

Chad had some kind of a fish dish * I had a cup of chowder - I think it was conch chowder, and I had a side of some sort of a pea rice - it was good * For an appetizer we had the conch fritters and they were really good - the best so far.

 

I didn't get pics of the kids food. I'm sure Derek had some sort of seafood and Micki had the veggie burger.

[luvabargain]

Food Porn:

Main Dining Room Freeport night

 

Appetizers:

 

Derek had the braised rabbit and said it was all right.

 

Micki chose the Gazpacho Andalouse and enjoyed it

 

I had the American Navy Bean Soup and it was decent.

 

Chad enjoyed the seared tuna.

Main Course:

 

Micki and I both had the featured vegetarian dish wish was the Indian style vegetable dish with lentils, basmati rice, pickle, papadam and raita. The "pickle" was nasty - it tasted like pure salt. The rest of the dish I really enjoyed although I was so full I couldn't finish it. Micki, on the other hand, didn't like the dish at all. The spices were too much for her.

 

Derek had the veal parmesan and said it was decent.

 

 

[luvabargain]

Chad enjoyed the seared tuna

 

 

Derek had coconut lime cake and didn't care for it that much.

 

Micki opted out of dessert and Chad and I both had the melting chocolate cake again. I was disappointed this time. It was overbaked and there was no "melting" inside, it just tasted more like a brownie. I didn't finish it. Chad said his was the same way, but he liked it anyway, maybe not as much.

[luvabargain]

The dancing waiters

 

So, it's another game of "what is it?" I think we had this one earlier in the week, regardless, I'm just not sure what in the heck it is. Cute critter, though.

[Keith1010]

Enjoying your review.

 

Keith

[luvabargain]

June 10th - Nassau ,Bahamas

Yay! It's Nassau day - still in the Bahamas!

 

We were to be in port from 7am to 4:30 CST. We made really good time and very, very slowly made our way into port. I got up early as always and enjoyed watching from the balcony. I could see the Norwegian Sky ahead of us and watched them dock. The Royal Caribbean Enchantment of the Seas was already there.

 

We didn't have anything booked for this port and so we just took our time getting ready for the day ahead and getting coffee and breakfast.

We had planned to rent buggies for the day so we could drive around the area at our own pace and do whatever we pleased, but we weren't exactly sure that's what we wanted to do, especially after learning that they drive on the "wrong" side of the road there.

 

Our cruise director Jen made an announcement that the U.S. had put out an advisory for Americans visiting the area and to make us aware that crimes had been committed even in the tourist area and that we should be aware and not show or carry large amounts of cash, wear expensive jewelry, go off in non tourist areas, etc.

 

Now, I had already known about this advisory months in advance, but did not tell my husband because I know he probably would not have wanted to go. He became a bit paranoid after hearing this and I had to do some fast talking.

Well, we made it off the ship and down the gangplank. The area was lively and full of music and vendors hawking their services. There was an information booth and I was able to glean some useful info there, and then my daughter and I got accosted and wound up with a hat and shakers dancing with some dude. Ok, not really accosted, but it was interesting. In the meantime, Chad had gone to see if he could get info about the buggies we had been thinking of renting.

 

This place was worse than Freeport as far as everyone trying to get us to tour or taxi or get our hair braided with them, blah blah. It still wasn't all that bad - Mexico is way worse IMO. We just said no and kept walking and that was that.

The buggy rental place was the same as the one I'd checked online and we decided to go ahead and get the 2 buggies. They were only 2 seaters so Chad drove one and I drove the other. What we'd failed to realize until we were signing papers was that these were stick shifts. Now, I love driving manual, but these were pretty rough. They sure had a learning curve to them. It would take some finessing to get the shifting right, and even then they were full of grinds and noises and just not right sounds. I thought mine was bad but Chad's sounded even worse and he had less working parts on his. The employee who brought me my buggy was flabbergasted (I love using that word) that I was driving one. He said that women don't drive them, which flabbergasted me. I asked why and he told me that women don't know how to drive stick and they're too scared to. Well, I proved him wrong. Ha! I didn't own an automatic until I was pregnant with my first born.

We got our jeeps and the lady at the rental desk (who, by the way, was wonderful) had given us a map that she marked up with areas to see, so Chad took the map and Micki rode with him and I got another non marked up map and Derek rode with me and we kept repeating out loud to ourselves to stay on the left side of the road.

 

The start was rough as I grinded and jerked into traffic. And we thought Texas had bad drivers! Yeah, like I said - this jeep would be a learning curve. Derek started panicking and wanted to quit and go back right then. No deal kid. I paid for 8 hours! I pointed out that his dad was jerking and bucking in front of us as well - ha ha. We were in for a ride for sure. I learned the jeep quick and things became much smoother as much as the jeep would allow

 

As if driving on the left side of the road and having crappy and noisy shifters wasn't enough, the jeeps had other issues. Our blinkers wouldn't turn off automatically, like a motorcycle, so we kept forgetting to turn them off after turning. My jeep's passenger side seat belt wouldn't pull out wide enough for Derek so he had to go without it on mine, and one of my tires was almost flat. Chad's horn and radio didn't work and he had a tail light out.

It quickly became evident that Chad had no clue where he was going and took us around and around aimlessly through places we didn't want to be, and it was obvious that Micki was not navigating. We wound up going over the Paradise bridge and I yelled to Chad that he had all the $ with him. He paid the bridge attendant for both of us - $1 each is all it was.

 

We wound up following him in and out of the Atlantis parking lot, amid other resorts and places. That is all I wound up seeing of Atlantis, at least up close even though I wanted to at least go in and look around and visit the areas they allow for free.

 

I had Derek pull out our map and we eventually were able to get to Cabbage beach which was on our list of main beaches to go to.

 

I was concerned about Cabbage beach being too crowded or overwhelmed with vendors, but that simply wasn't the case at all. The beach was beautiful with very few people, especially at that time as it was only morning. We parked the jeeps and walked to the beach where we immediately got in and started body surfing. It was awesome and we really, really enjoyed it. I am so glad that we didn't decide to just pay to use a resort's facilities for the day, as this beach was gorgeous and public. I only regret that we didn't bring beach towels from the ship. This beach was exactly what we had pictured the Bahamas to be like.

 

Eventually it was time to leave and go exploring other places. We switched up passengers and Micki came with me and Derek went with Chad.

We made it to the other side of town where the Sandals resort was, and visited some beaches there. We didn't like the beaches in that area as well as the Cabbage beach area. We did play on one of the public beach areas right beside the Westin resort. The beach was decent, but there sure is a lot of garbage in the area. There was a guy making and selling alcohol drinks in coconuts, so we got some, mine with no pineapple or coconut. They were good - and cute!

 

Eventually we left the beach and got back out on the roads. I took the lead with Micki as my navigator and she did pretty good with my directing her. We went to the fish fry area and had some non alcoholic drinks at a stinky bar and then made our way back out. None of us were hungry. I wanted to check out the Finway Castle area that the lady had marked on the map and so off we went. After several rounds of trying to get down the right street due to the one ways, we finally made it on the right street, but there was no parking on that street so I kept going and then turned to make our way around and back down. Chad started yelling that he wanted to get out of that area fast and so I turned down a side street. Well, there were some "thugs" that jumped down and crowded around us, so what does Chad do? He turned around and booked out of there leaving us girls!

Now, we honestly didn't think they were really up to anything, there was a little boy who got excited and kept yelling that he wanted one. A jeep I think. We think the men just thought the jeep was kind of cool. The side street was more like an alley, and it wasn't the nicest of places. We had to turn around in the middle of these guys and go back to the other street where Chad and Derek were waiting a ways ahead. They thought these guys were part of a gang and that the street was a dead end, etc. It wasn't, but Chad is the one who wanted me to turn in the first place. It was only about 3 blocks from the really touristy shopping area.

 

After a game of cat and mouse with the jeeps (rolling my eyes here), we decided to head back over to Cabbage Beach for one last round of fun in the sea. It was now afternoon and quite a bit more people, but still nothing like what I'm used to on Southern California beaches. We saw a lot of people from our ship, I could tell by recognizing several and seeing their Carnival beach towels. People were there from the other cruise ships as well, I met a guy who came in on the Norwegian Sky. He didn't want to pay the $150 pp to use Atlantis either.

 

We were sorry to leave the beach, but we had to take the jeeps back. We decided to drop them off and then go walking around the touristy shops in the area, as they were right there, everything near port. We wound up spending quite bit of time in the shops, this was the place the kids had decided to do most of their souvenir shopping.

 

We finally had to leave and made it back on to the ship at 4:25 - boarding was at 4:30. We knew this port would have a lot of pier runners, people were still shopping. We went up to our room and watched people from our balcony hustle onto the ships - Norwegian too. Norwegian finally pulled up the plank, but ours stayed. We watched several pier runners and my kids said they now know why they're called pier runners. They were actually running. I took some videos. The people on the sky balconies were watching and when one group of people made it onto our ship they broke out into clapping and cheering.

Unfortunately, it doesn't appear that everyone made it back on the ship. One of the pier runners was talking to the crew and was using the port dude's cell phone. She had gone on board and came out with an envelope that the port dude took, and I saw what looked like passports in his hand - hard to tell exactly at 8 stories up. He had gone back and forth to the other side of the port on his golf cart and appeared to be looking for someone. The lady appeared to by crying, as the crew was patting her and comforting her. She kept shaking her head and using the cell phone, but they eventually made her get on board and closed it up. We almost immediately pulled out, about 7 minutes late.

 

Chad and Micki didn't feel like eating in the main dining room. In fact, Micki didn't feel well and stayed in bed. We let the steward know, so we didn't get our room freshened that night. Chad went and got a Guy's burger for dinner.

Derek and I went to the MDR by ourselves and ate next to an older couple who kept to themselves. It was really good, in fact my favorite dish of the MDR other than the lobster. We were served quicker than our other nights and got out faster than normal - thank God.

 

We made it back to our rooms thinking Chad and Micki would be up and about and gone, but they weren't. This is when we discovered that Micki wasn't feeling well and wouldn't be getting up.

We all fell asleep, but I had wanted to catch the later show - Playlist Productions: Getaway Island, and woke up Chad and surprisingly he was still willing to get up and go. We enjoyed it and were glad that we didn't just poo poo the night away sleeping. We spent some time on the Lido deck afterward doing some dancing.

 

Micki was awake when we got back to the room. She was feeling well and wanted to get up and do something. We went and got coffee and ice cream and then decided to go around looking at stateroom doors to see the decorated ones. We finished looking at our level - 8, and then we visited 1, 2 and 6 before calling it a night. We were going to finish the rest but never did.