Caribbean Cruise & Hollywood, Fl Jan/Feb 2017 Part 4

2/1/17 10:05am
Margaritaville, Georgetown, Grand Cayman Island

There was a lot of loud thumping music last night when I returned to my stateroom. Sleep did not come easily, but it came. I awoke chilled and stuffed up. I took a shower, because that seemed to help my sinuses last time and it helped a lot this time as well.

There were announcements from the cruise director, Eric, every twenty minutes or so about tenders and where to board them. You see, there is no pier at Grand Cayman and the ships just sort of float around off the coast while these small boats (tenders) bring people back and forth to the port.

I dressed quickly, because I was excited about Grand Cayman, and went up to the Lido deck for breakfast, which was cheesy eggs again and two glasses of orange “juice” (in quotes because it’s more orange flavored juice than actual orange juice).


I walked around the deck and checked out the views. It was really hot – a big difference from the past few days, for sure. High humidity, as well. 


I went down to the lobby and talked to guest services about the temperature in my room. They said there is no heat at all on the ship because it is a Caribbean ship, but they would send someone to check it out.
I went down to the bottom deck and boarded a tender. The tender looked like it would fit 50 or 60 people if you crammed them all on, but my tender was not full. It was rocking in the waves, but not enough to make me nauseous. I had read that people get nauseous when tendering.




I saw the Hard Rock Café from the tender, which was good. Once on land, I walked straight there. I was surprised to find that the Rock Shop was open. On their website, the Rock Shop hours were listed as opening at 10:30am. It was like 9:15am; they opened early. I bought my pins and took my pictures. 


(Hard Rock Selfie Count: 2)

After that, I walked along the water, taking some pictures of the ship. I backtracked since there wasn’t much going on in the direction in which I was walking. 








I sat down on a bench near this stingray fountain. 

A man walking by struck up a conversation with me about “paradise,” which is what he called “all this.” He introduced himself as Emile and he used to live in Brooklyn until his estranged father died and left him four houses on Grand Cayman Island! He didn't have very many teeth. He told me how great it is living there and suggested I buy a house. “Rob a f*#%ing bank if you have to,” he said. I’m considering it. 




After Emile left, I walked along the water again and realized I was very hot and tired and needed to pee. Margaritaville was right there and I figured it would be easy to get in to, use the bathroom, and leave without being noticed. However, I decided to stay. I was just so hot and tired and my bottle of water was too warm to cool me down. So, I ordered a pina colada and an ice water and sat down at the bar to relax, cool down, and catch up a bit on journaling.

The water and pina colada are helping immensely with my overheatedness.





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2/1/17 9:15pm
Top Forward Deck, Carnival Conquest, Caribbean Ocean

I am sitting in a chair that rocks (but it's not an actual rocking chair) on a forward deck facing the endless dark of the ocean at night. There are some huge mechanical thingies (for lack of a better term), which are spinning and making a droning sound that almost drowns out the sounds of the waves on the bow (or is it the stern? I don’t know – whichever is the front of the boat).

Orien’s Belt is recognizable above me and the moon, the amazing moon, is but a sliver. I smell nothing… well, maybe the Hall’s Mentholyptus cough drop in my mouth. The status of my sinuses ebbs and flows. I can breathe but deep inside I’m congested.

I am alone here and it is wonderful.

Despite the ongoing sinus issues, I had a really great day today and I just smiled involuntarily thinking about it.

Up until now, I had been filling all of my time with doing (or trying to do) stuff and things. I forced myself to sit and write for the purpose of getting everything down, but not for the purpose of really wanting to reflect. Right now, I’m in a reflective sort of mood and sitting here completely alone with the sounds and sights around me couldn’t be a more perfect setting.

After cooling down with the pina colada and ice water at Margaritaville (I did not bust out a flip flop, nor did I waste away, mind you), I went to the back bathroom and changed into my swimming trunks. Then I wandered back down into the heat and across the street to the pier in search of some indication of where I needed to be to meet my excursion group for the Barrier Reef Snorkel.

I sat on a bench near a sign that listed a bunch of excursions and began putting on my biodegradable and “reef safe” sun screen. I set up J. Fred MocLegoman to take a picture of this sign and just before snapping the picture, this attractive young woman sat down. She posed for her boyfriend or husband or fiance to take her picture.

A couple moseyed over and asked if I was there for the snorkel excursion. I said that I was and they sat down next to me on the bench. I asked them where they are from: Toronto. And if this was their first cruise: no. They had cruised Norwegian before (like me) and they found it to be boring.

Carnival definitely plays up the party atmosphere, but I honestly felt that the party has been lacking this whole time. Tonight, is the Mega Deck Party, of which I am led to believe will be a big party due to the exuberant use of the word “Mega.” However, the couple from Toronto didn’t know about it, so maybe it won’t be quite so Mega after all...

Two middle-aged ladies sat down on the opposite side of me and asked if we were waiting for the snorkel excursion, too. From there, the group steadily built up until around 11:35 am when a gentleman in Carnival attire said he would be back in a moment to collect us all for the excursion. He returned at 11:45 am (right on time), lined us up, collected our tickets, and led us about a half a block away to a bus that was waiting for us. We packed in (like sardines, literally) and the bus took us about twenty minutes away to a small cove along a canal with a dock. There was no boat.

We were told to wait for the boat in the bus (with air conditioning) or outside. I didn’t like being crammed in, so I got out. There was a black cat hanging around by the small dock and one young woman went over and began petting it.

While taking some pictures of Lego J Fred, a woman asked, “Are you the guy that takes the pictures? Or do you just do it for fun?” I – cleverly, I might add – said, “I’m the guy that takes pictures for fun!” She explained that she had seen a guy on TV who takes pictures of toys in places. I showed her Lego J Fred and told her what I do, why I do it, and that there are actually very many people who are doing the same or very similar things. She introduced herself and a gentleman that she was with as Kelly and Jim. We talked a little more about cruising and snorkeling and then the boat arrived.


As the boat slowly turned around and sidled up to the dock, the cat got up from its shady spot, sauntered over to the pier, and hopped on the boat when it got close enough. Excursion staff (crew?) explained that the cat’s name is Midnight and she is indeed a “ship cat.” The cat did not, however, come on the excursion.


Once the previous group finished getting off the boat, we were told to board. As the boat slowly left the dock and headed down the long canal, the crew explained safety related things and a bunch of other stuff that I really didn’t listen to since I was enthralled with the beautiful houses along the canal and the approaching ocean. Which I could see in the distance was turquoise and translucent and incredibly beautiful.


Once we reached the ocean, the boat picked up speed, but it seemed like it took a long time to get to the barrier reef. I stood up and leaned on a pole near the front of the boat and felt the wind whipping through my beard as I held onto my straw hat. The boat bobbed up and down over the waves and misty ocean spray blew into my face from time to time. It was seriously awesome!

When we reached the reef, we waited while the crew set and checked the anchor. We were told we had forty-five minutes to snorkel and would hear a loud horn to signal that it is time to return to the boat. I secured my snorkel mask and, with flippers in hand, leaped from the boat into the gorgeous water.








I put my flippers on and after a few moments figured out how to swim with them. The water was very clear and not cold and I took an entire disposable camera worth of pictures.


As soon as I landed in the water, I saw dozens of ugly, dull gray fish. They were about the size of a large flip flop and swam within arms reach. I swam away from them and the boat and towards the coral in search of cooler looking fish. There were some that looked like Dory (from Finding Nemo), some dark ones with white lines along their fins that appeared to glow. There were some zebra looking fish and some sliver fish.



I had hoped to see a stingray along with the cool fish and while I was the furthest away from the rest of the group, a stingray glided into view. It was swimming almost directly at me, but a little lower. It banked even lower as it came closer and swam right below me. It was a small one, compared to how big I know they can get. My exclamation of excitement was a muffled Chewbacca the Wookiee impression due to the snorkel in my mouth and being underwater. Admittedly, I was somewhat scared at first, but I lived.

I wanted to shout to the group, so they could see the stingray, too; but I was underwater and when I went above water, I saw that almost everyone was under water anyway.






At the end of the forty-five minutes, the crew sounded the horn. I had run out of pictures long before and was disappointed that I didn’t have one picture left when I saw dozens of the shiny black fish with the while lines that seemed to glow eating algae from the bottom of the boat within arms reach.







I climbed the ladder back up on to the deck of the boat and found that I was literally freezing. The air wasn’t cold, my body temperature was… not sure why, because the water didn't seem cold. Drying off only helped a little. Once the boat started heading back, I went upstairs (it was a two story boat) and hung out in the sun, which was quite successful in warming me up.

The ride back seemed much more relaxing than the ride there. However, once we reached the dock, we had just enough time to board the bus and get back to the pier to catch the last tender back to the ship. I did stop off to take one more collection of pictures, however.



The tender ride is really cool. Riding up along the big boat on a smaller boat is an experience that cannot be captured in a mere photo.

I rode the elevator with Kelly and Jim and they invited me to have dinner with them and another couple that they are traveling with. I said I couldn't commit due to being exhausted and would probably be napping around dinner time, but thanked them for the invite.





Once back to the ship, I realized that I was starving. I hadn’t eaten since breakfast (8ish; it was now 3:40pm), so I went straight to the Lido Deck and ordered a burger (Red Meat Count: 3) and fries (the taco bar closes at 2 pm -- lame!). I ate the mustard-slathered burger and copious amount of pickles so fast that I barely tasted it. And it was wonderful.







Then the food coma hit. I found a spot in the sun and laid out with my straw hat over my eyes. I put on some extra sunscreen as my cheeks felt a little burned.


I have no idea how long I laid in the sun for, but I realized that I was baking, so I went to the pool level and took a brief dip. The water was quite cold and refreshing after baking in the sun.

In the midst of reflecting upon this amazing day, I am struck with how completely fulfilled I am. Exploring a new port before snorkeling with cool fish in that turquoise water, then eating a cheeseburger before baking in the sun in a food induced coma, and then cooling off in a cool pool. Perfect.

After drying off, I went back to my stateroom and shaved and showered. My bathing suit was wet and so were my pajamas (after having spilled water on them), so I brought them to the laundry room and stuck them in the dryer.




I went up to the Lido Deck and saw that I missed the sunset. The horizon was epic none-the-less.





(We go north! Or is it south? Where are we?!)
I laid down in a lounger and closed my eyes. I could have napped except that it was too cold in shorts and a short sleeve shirt. So, when it was time, I went and picked up my laundry and returned to my stateroom to change into jeans and a hoodie.

I went back to the Lido Deck and grabbed dinner at the buffet, which was a blackened chicken salad. I ate out on main deck and watched a movie: The Magnificent Seven remake.

When the movie ended, I wandered around a bit until I found this little secluded area (although, some people have come and gone in the time that I have been writing) and now that I’m caught up, I’m going to close my notebook and my eyes and just be present here for a little while... Not too long, however, I want to check out the Mega Deck Party...