Part 2 of my cruising experience! By the date and time this posts, I’ll will have returned from said cruise.
I am on the cusp of boarding my 14th cruise at the end of the month, but my memory lag states this is my 17th sea voyage on a cruise ship! Guess memory loss is characteristic of 49 years of age. HURMPH! (I couldn’t account for 3 cruises) Let’s dive into 25 years of my cruise experience history.
1 Windstar Cruise, 1 Disney Cruise, 3 Princess Cruises, 3 Holland America Cruises, and lastly 5 Carnival Cruises. ALL of them were wonderful, but since it’ll be the Carnival Liberty on March 30, 2025 … the focus of this post will be my experiences on Carnival, which is known to be the Funship!
- (2007) Carnival Destiny – Destined For A Carnival
- (2023) Carnival Dream – Requiem For A Dream
- (2025) Carnival Liberty – Give Me (Carnival) Liberty or Give Me Death
Destined For A Carnival
(2007) Carnival Destiny – Destiny disembarked from San Juan, Puerto Rico; then St Thomas, Dominica, Barbados, St Lucia, and Antigua. Scott, Sidney, Lupe, John, Charlene and yours truly rocked this cruise.
The Boatyard In Barbados
Here’s a story … several couples including us booked a Caribbean Cruise. Charlene found online a beautiful beach area on Barbados called “the Boatyard” for all of us to enjoy as our shore excursion. We all motored out there for fun, sun, and surf. The admission fee granted a complimentary drink, use of the non-motorized sports (sea trampoline and climbing iceberg), chair and an umbrella.
A couple hours in my bro, (Scott) and I were getting, as he put it, shipwrecked with buckets of Corona. Charlene laughed, “It was almost a Corona commercial.” My body was aching from yesterday’s Dominica adventure with the zipline, rappelling and canopy crawling but Scott suggested the sea trampoline was reachable even for me. I swim slightly better than a brick, I quipped.
[fast forward to later]
Charlene knows my swimming abilities, or rather lack thereof. I told her my intentions and to watch for me.
I waded out as far as I could then launched into what I called “swimming”. I’m thinking, What the hell am I doing out here?
I grab a hold of the ladder to climb. As I climbed a wave racked the trampoline, my ring finger gets caught on the side of the ladder, and my wedding ring slips off and into the ocean. Thankfully, my finger wasn’t attached to it.
OH MY GOD! WHAT. THE. FAWK. Neko, the Boatyard attendant, saw this from top of the sea trampoline. Tears instantly welled up in my eyes. I thought, It’s gone. Simply gone!
He immediately calmed me down and assured me, that we’ll find it. I thought, Yeah right. That’s all you, guy.
Thankfully there’s a Baywatch-red-floating device tethered to the trampoline. I asked to borrow it, and for 30 minutes I attempted to recover it. Neko explained what to do to ensure our best chance of success.
After 30 minutes, I declared defeat. My arms, legs, and lungs were mush. I asked him if he’ll at least hold his position while I get my wife and a friend. He instructs me to grab a complimentary snorkel set in the SCUBA shop after I dragged my sorry-oh-so-very-sorry self onshore. I made the defeated march to Charlene and Scott.
I announced that I am in trouble. I would be grateful for their help to locate my wedding ring … About 20 seconds into my explanation Charlene and Scott jump up, and immediately make their way to the trampoline.
I quickly walked to the shop to grab the snorkel gear. Once I return to the shoreline with gear in hand, I was ordered by Charlene to return to get a life jacket, too. By the time I got situated like an overprotected 5 year old with lifejacket and snorkel gear, it was too late.
My wife and bro were wading back and waving me off. Neko had found it after an hour plus searching.
I sighed in relief, “Thank God for him!” Of course, he wouldn’t accept money. The sheer act of gratitude was enough for him.
He mumbled something about needing a drink. I thought, No doubt! I aged about 20 years and needed a drink, a smoke and perhaps some Valium myself.
We walked into the bar with my snorkel gear in hand, bright orange life jacket on. Now to truly appreciate this scene, imagine a 6’3 or so bald, black man built like Arnold Schwarzenegger in a wetsuit standing next to me. Quite a scene!
I announced to the bartender Neko’s money is no good here today. Or at least right now. Neko ordered an iced tea, New York style. As did I. He wanted a pack of smokes; no problem. He chatted me up for a bit. I stated out loud that Neko is my new hero. The local bar flys laughed.
I left him with another Long Island and a hand shake. As I walked toward the door, 2 scantily clad hourglass bodied women brushed past. They yelled, “Neko, you’re still our hero!” Needless to say, I plopped myself in a chair on the beach with my wedding ring for the remainder of the excursion.
Requiem For A Dream
(2023) Carnival Dream – Jennifer Workman is co-captain of the dance troupe, West Coast Country Heat. She inspired the team to join her on a cruise. I dropped my deposit on the cruise while I was on the team, then once I was promoted to Manager for Costco, I withdrew myself from the team.
My invite was still active even when I moved to Arizona in March 2023. My roommate was not WCP. My cabin mate ended up being WCP’s friend, Marc E. Marx. We’ve traveled with him before, so I knew that he’s good people, good vibes, and good times.
It would be Marc’s first cruise ever. I was shocked I was able to coax my Navy veteran friend onto a non-haze grey ship! Traveling with a group is fantastic, and this group is awesome regardless. Admittedly, it had been 16 years since my last voyage on a cruise ship.
Cruise Ducks
Apparently, hiding plastic and/or rubber ducks has been a “thing” since 2018.
The tradition of hiding rubber ducks on cruise ships began in 2018 when a 10-year-old girl named Abby Davis hid ducks on a family cruise. The activity has since become a popular part of cruise culture.
How it started
- Abby asked her mom, Ashley, if she could bring rubber ducks on their spring break cruise.
- Ashley bought 50 ducks and Abby hid them around the ship.
- Abby and Ashley found people of all ages finding the ducks.
- Abby and Ashley created a Facebook page called “Cruising Ducks” to keep track of the ducks.
How it’s spread
- The Facebook page has become a large online community.
- Cruisers share tips on where to buy ducks, where to hide them, and how to attach information tags.
- Many of the ducks come with tags that say “Keep or hide, you decide!”
The geocacher in me kept finding these ‘cruise ducks’. Once found, you had the choice of keeping them, or re-hiding them to keep the fun going. I chose to hide. I didn’t wanna drag back more than what I had onboard.
International Geocaching
As soon as I knew that our ports-of-call were Belize, and Mexico, I started researching geocaches near the port area so that I could geocache while traveling. My intention was to earn my Geocaching digital souvenir from each country with the first found geocache.
That meant two opportunities in Mexico: Costa Maya and Cozumel. There was only one shot for Belize. To maximize my probability of success, I created an ‘offline’ map and list of possible geocaches that were either close, and/or had Favorite Points assigned them.
Then, I spoke with my cabin mate and friend, Marc, about my intentions in port so he asked if he assisted would that be ok. It was more than ok, as I usually quip that …
Collaborative efforts often yield better results
In Costa Maya, we didn’t like the shore excursion offerings so we opted to chase down ‘my geocaches’ as Marc would put it. Stephanie asked to join us for the same reasons: no booked shore excursions.
After a quick taxi ride to a popular area of Costa Maya, I was hell-bent for leather on finding it. Marc and Stephanie were happy to assist after I explained, and coached them on what we were looking for. Within minutes, we found it! I recorded it immediately so that I would refresh the Official Geocaching App to claim my digital souvenir for Mexico.
IT. WAS. GLORIOUS.
It also meant I could truly relax in Cozumel, MX, because my focus would be fun under the sun instead of fretting about a hidden box. Finally, we steamed on to Belize. We did have a shore excursion, but I was gonna find my cache … one way or another.
After the shore excursion, we did have a hot-minute or two, by the pier, and it was my opportunity. I found it, and recorded it again immediately.
Give Me (Carnival) Liberty or Give Me Death!
(2025) Carnival Liberty – Another Carnival cruise, another West Coast Country Heat group. Same ole Los, same ole Marc E. Marx.
That Was Easy
New Orleans, LA. March 25, 2025, Friday. My travel buddy, Marc, and his travel buddy, Jay, arrived in the “Big Easy” on Thursday. Evidently, it was the nth time to the city.
Fun Fact Alert …
The Crescent City. NOLA. N’Awlins, New Orleeeens. The Queen City of the South has many names and one that seems to have stuck–even though it makes locals cringe–is the Big Easy.
Believe it or not, the Big Easy moniker didn’t start with the 1986 Dennis Quaid movie or even the 1970 James Conway crime novel the film was based on. Some say, it all began in the 1960s in a newspaper column by New Orleans gossip columnist Betty Guillaud who used the tag while comparing “the Big Easy” to “the Big Apple.” But others insist that it goes back even further than that.
According to bigeasymagazine.com, The Big Easy was originated by African Americans. In 1911, there was a dance hall in Gretna known as “The Big Easy Hall” where Buddy Bolden used to play. For those of you who’ve never heard of Buddy Bolden, man, that cat could blow a horn. Louis Armstrong once said, “He was just a one-man genius that was ahead of them all…too good for his time.”
My American Airlines flight was uneventful. That said, that was the first time seated in the last row in the tail area! What a bumpy 3-hour flight. marc suggested taxi versus ride-share services such as Lyft or Uber. Once I arrived to the hotel, and somewhat settled down, we walked to Estrella’s Steak & Lobster.
Estrella’s was quaint yet lively restaurant. Fairly certain the liveliness was attributed to Friday night + the NCAA College Men’s Basketball Tournament was in progress with Sweet 16 Games.
I digress.
According to my Geocaching app, a Virtual Cache with 400 plus Favorite Points was less than 500 feet away. It was easy to talk them into helping me [See what I did there?] No container, to claim credit, you travel to the coordinates, answer the site-specific questions, and selfie, and *bOoM* done.
You see, your first find in a state will earn you the digital souvenir. So as the adage goes, “make your first shot, your best shot”. By collecting Louisiana, I have closed out all but Florida on the southern border of the contiguous 48 United States.
And, so I did. It was called The Founder (of New Orleans): Jean Bapriste Le Moyne de BIENVILLE
We hustled back to the hotel in time for my online event, Happy Hour, Season 2, Episode 6.
Self Care Saturday at Sazerac’s
Marc mentioned that he booked a whisky tour for Jay and I. He is the whiskey aficionado of the group, so he tracked down a tour of the local whiskey distillery: Sazerac House. It’s a distillery. It’s a museum. It’s a boozium!
Our self-guided tour was still fun – get it? The tour ended into the gift shop as we anticipated. Marc wanted to buy the limit of Eagle Rare, and E.H. Taylor, which was not anticipated to a limit of 1 per person, per driver’s license, per 90 days! We walked away with Eagle Rare, because E.H. Taylor was sold out by the time we were even asking about it.
My little sister wanted to live vivaciously through our adventures therefore suggested food places to enjoy. We wandered down further the French Quarter. As we passed Jackson Square for an easy Virtual cache there I picked up.
Our lunch target was Central Grocery for their world famous muffuletta.
Y’ALL, it was the most delicious sandwich I’ve tasted so far! It instantly became my new favorite. Marc is a motorcycle enthusiast, especially Harley-Davidson. The store was open but didn’t have coins available.
As if we were starving … Cafe du Monde offered their world famous beignets. We started wandering back to the hotel when Razzoo’s three-for-one special called our names. We posted up minutes before Ole Miss graduates invaded to pre-game before their formal night. HOURS LATER we stumbled away.
After all that walking, NOLA Nail & Massage convinced us to treat ourselves to 40-minute foot massages.
Sailing Sunday
Sunday was our day of departure for the Carnival Liberty for Marc, and I, while Jay stayed behind in New Orleans. 7 days of fun under the Caribbean sun with West Coast Country Heat, Marc E. Marx.
I earned my Jamaican, and Cayman Island Geocaching digital souvenir respectively.
More from me later …
los, Fil-Am Renaissance Man 