Carnival Triumph 2014 – Installment #4 Everyone loves a sea day!

For most people, sea day’s are for sleeping in. But I’m not like most people. I’m always up early on vacation. I want to be able to take in every minute of my cruise. Unfortunately for my husband, he usually wakes up not long after I do. Maybe because I make noise when I go out onto the balcony. But where else can I get a gorgeous view to start my morning? Besides, is there really anything better than morning coffee on the balcony on a beautiful morning?

Sea day’s also mean Sea Day Brunch! This is definitely another thing we truly enjoy to do on a cruise. The menu may be somewhat limited, but we tend to always order the same thing. I always have the steak and eggs and Jim always orders the Eggs Benedict. What can I say… sometimes we are not very adventurous when it comes to food.

When we went on this cruise, Jim and I both smoked. At this time, Carnival no longer allowed their guests to smoke on their balcony’s. Since out stateroom was on the Lido deck, we did not have far to go to get to a smoking area. We met some very nice people there. And Fernando made a friend!!!

In the distance, you could see rain. Luckily, on a cruise, rain typically does not last very long. At least it hasn’t on any of the cruises I have been on.

We decided to go hang out in our stateroom and try to figure out what we wanted to do with our day. One of my favorite things to do is to people watch. But in our stateroom, the only one to watch was my son.

Before long, it was time to get ready for cruise elegant night. This is the only time we ever get dressed up so I like to take advantage of it. But first, I had to enjoy the sunset from out balcony. Sunsets are always so beautiful as are the sunrises.

On our way to dinner, we stopped to have some pictures taken. Pictures were also taken in the dining room. Wine and waiter entertainment always makes for a great dinner experience.

After dinner, we returned to our stateroom to change clothes. And to try to decide how we want to spend the rest of the night.

We decided to play some mini golf which was so much fun. We truly enjoy spending our evenings on the open decks.

Installment #5 is our adventure in Progreso.

Carnival Triumph 2014 – Installment 3 I’m ready to get on the ship!

As with every cruise I have ever been on, sleep the night before was minimal at best. I was up early on September 22, 2014 and I felt that my family should be up too! We needed to eat something for breakfast… well, they needed to eat. I was too excited to eat much. I just wanted to leave the hotel and go to the port!!! I really so no problem having that attitude, LOL!

This is the first cruise that we purchased the Faster To The Fun just so we can get on the ship quick! But first, we have to check out of the hotel, drive to the port, drop off our check bags, drive across the street to Galveston Park N Cruise to park our car in the covered area, then walk across the street to get in line to check in for the cruise. Is it just me or does this one process of going on a cruise seem to take F O R E V E R??? As usual, we did have to wait for a while before we were able to board. But that was okay! We had the opportunity to meet and visit some fellow Anchor Clankers. That definitely helped pass the time away.

After the wait, we were finally walking our way towards the gangway. But first, we had to stop for our traditional Welcome Aboard/Bon Voyage photo. It is one of the necessities I must have for our scrapbook and it should never be skipped!!!! Walking onto the ship means that the vacation has really begun. We will be totally removed from social media and cell phones for the next 5 nights.

We spent the day taking in the sights of the harbor and looking for dolphins. We also tried our very first Guys Burger. Oh. My. Goodness. They are absolutely delicious! I cannot wait to devour more while we are on the Triumph!

After the mandatory muster drill, we made our way to watch sail away from our balcony before going to dinner. We had selected Your Time dining which meant we could eat dinner anytime between 5:30 and 9 pm. We like to eat early so we were usually sitting at a table for dinner no later than 6 pm. Dinner the first night usually means the pirates would be invading the dining room!

We were tired after dinner so we did some more walking and exploring of the ship before turning in for the night.

Tomorrow will be a fun filled sea day which will begin with sea day brunch so please come back for installment #4.

Carnival Triumph 2014 – Installment 2: When will we leave for Galveston?

Finally, September 19th rolled around. It is the day Dawson goes to visit his mother for the weekend. I knew when he left that we would not be able to start our cruise adventure until we picked him up on Sunday at 6 pm. But we were hoping his mother would agree to let us pick him up after church on Sunday. Either way, it would be a long wait for us to pick him up. So, around 5:30, Jim left to take Dawson to visitation. Jim returned around 6:30, walking in the door saying “we have a little problem.” My heart sank. Then right behind Jim walks in Dawson!!! Turns out that everyone at Dawson’s mothers house was ill and she didn’t want to take the chance of Dawson getting sick right before his vacation!!!! This means we could actually leave for Galveston much earlier!!!

But, since we have pets to make sure they are cared for, we stuck with the plan on leaving on Sunday!!!

On Saturday, we made sure everything was packed and ready to go. Of course, there are always last minute things we need to get so we did that as well.

We were definitely ready to roll on Sunday. We only had to make one stop at my brother-in-laws to drop off our 3 month old puppy for him to watch then we were on the road. We made our regular stop at Buc-ees and stopped for something to eat along the way but other than that, it was just a normal Sunday drive to Galveston!!!

After we got checked into our hotel, we went to have dinner at The Original Mexican Cafe. Fernando insisted on having 2 drinks and did not want to share, silly frog. He somehow managed to sneak into the car so now we were forced to take him to dinner with us!

Nothing else really happened on this night. Nothing to do but to take in the views and walk around. And pick up forgotten items from WalMart!!!

Now to try to get some sleep before we board the ship!!! It’s never easy for me to sleep before embarkation day. I just hope there is something good on TV to pass the time!!!

Installment #3 will be our embarkation day!!!