We are now at our 200-day countdown. Normally I would be diligently making out our packing lists, to-do lists, and checking hotel rates daily. Although I have been checking hotel rates, I have not made any reservations as I know changes are coming. I just do not know when. So, we are basically in a holding pattern.
While in this holding pattern, I have discussed with my husband our options when the time comes. Depending on how the cruise is changed, we are considering changing to the Carnival Vista in March, 2022.
And so, we wait. I consider our options for other things to do in August.
In all honesty, we were not expecting our cruise on the Carnival Radiance to be cancelled. And yet, here we are!!! We totally understand the reason for the cancellation and we our looking forward to our next cruise leaving in exactly one year.
But let’s look back on how everything has changed since our original cruise…
On November 15, 2019, I booked an 8-day cruise on Carnival Freedom leaving out of Galveston on August 29, 2020. This was booked as a surprise for my husband even though I was sharing information with him one evening. At the time I booked, there was a $50 deposit sale going on so it was a perfect time to book. A couple of days after I booked the cruise, we had family birthday lunch at his sisters house. I asked her to give him his present from me to him so he wouldn’t suspect anything. But somehow, when he was given his “gift” he knew it was something from me. He was happy that we would be going to different ports for us and on a ship we had not been on. The ports of call would be Key West, Freeport, Half Moon Cay, and Nassau. Now all we had to do was wait for August 29, 2020 to get here. Or so we thought.
Then COVID-19 happened and everything we knew started to change everywhere. Cruise lines started cancelling cruises. People had to wear masks in public. People were asked to stay home. We sat and watched thinking we would be in the clear since our cruise was several months away. But just in case, I started looking at options for next year and even posted the options on our refrigerator so we could look at the list whenever wanted to. Occasionally we would talk about the options, but we still had hopes that we would be going on our Carnival Freedom cruise. We were wrong.
On June 22, 2020, we received an email from Carnival letting us know that our cruise had been cancelled. We were given options and decided we would rebook for August 20, 2021 on the Carnival Radiance, selecting a 9-day cruise going to Key West, Grand Turk, Half Moon Cay, and Nassau. The only think left to do was to wait for FTTF to become available to think about excursions. There was nothing else to worry about. Or so we thought.
On July 23, 2020, we received an email stating our Carnival Radiance cruise had been cancelled. This is something we were not expecting at all. I sent Jim a text letting him know that the cruise on the Carnival Radiance had been cancelled and we would need to think about our options for re-booking. By the time he got home, I had a list of our options listed by length of cruise.
Option 1 – 6-day cruise on the Carnival Dream going to Costa Maya, Belize, and Cozumel leaving Galveston on August 22, 2021.
Option 2 – 6-day cruise on the Carnival Dream going to Costa Maya, Mahogany Bay, And Cozumel leaving Galveston on August 8, 2021.
Option 3 – 7-day cruise on the Carnival Vista going to Mahogany Bay, Belize, and Cozumel leaving Galveston on August 28, 2021.
Option 4 – 7-day cruise on the Carnival Vista going to Montego Bay, Grand Cayman, and Cozumel leaving Galveston on August 21, 2021.
Option 5 – 8-day cruise on the Carnival Dream going to Key West, Freeport, Half Moon Cay, and Nassau leaving Galveston on August 28, 2021.
While I was waiting for Jim to get home, I sent an email to our PVP, Josh Waitzman, to let him know that we would know what cruise we would want to change to by 6pm. I had a feeling in knew which one Jim would want to pick to I started looking at the available staterooms. I narrowed it down to either an interior with walkview or a balcony stateroom with an extra large balcony.
Once Jim got home and we talked about the options for maybe 5 minutes, I was ready to speak to our PVP and sent him an email letting him know we knew what we want!!! We had decided on the 8-day Carnival Dream selecting an balcony stateroom with the extra large balcony. True to form, Josh sent me an email letting me know he would be calling me shortly. Within 30 minutes, he called and everything was transferred to the new cruise! Our PVP makes everything thing happen to effortlessly. Plus he is so fun to talk to!!!
On July 24th, I sent an email to the Port of Galveston requesting to transfer our parking reservation hoping that this will be the last time I have to do this. To my surprise, I received a response within an hour with the new information for our parking reservation. I was also able to purchase Faster to the Fun. Today was definitely a good day!!! Then on August 4th, I booked a cabana for our time in Half Moon Cay. I decided that I really didn’t want to take a chance of waiting and then not being available.
Now we wait one year for our cruise. During this time, we will consider our excursion options for Key West, Freeport, and Nassau. I will also be watching for hotel options for our pre-cruise stay and will make endless to-do lists and packing lists. Luckily I know how time flies and before we know it, we will once again be boarding the Carnival Dream for another fabulous cruise.
A new year, a new cruise countdown. Jim and I were looking forward to our cruise on the Carnival Freedom I booked on November 15, 2019. We were branching out from the typical 5 or 7 night cruise and would be going on an 8-night cruise to Key West, Freeport, Half Moon Cay, and Nassau. This would be the second cruise that did not go to Cozumel. And although it seemed strange to not going there, we were looking forward to a much different itinerary.
Everything was going along like normal. I was looking at possible excursions but not booking anything. Just looking to get an idea on things we might want to do in the different ports would be going to. And I may have been doing some Amazon shopping as well. But for some reason, I was not shopping as much as I normally would.
February came around. Jim tested positive for the Flu and I had recovered from it. Ryan Newman had an horrific crash at the end of the Daytona 500 which he survived and has returned to racing. If you saw the crash, you know that he definitely had an angel riding with him during that time.
But there had been news reports about COVID-19, the Corona Virus. At a routine check-up with my doctor, he told me not to go on any cruises. I told him that we had one booked for August 29th. So, after much discussion, we decided to keep our cruise and see how things worked out.
Then cruises started getting cancelled by ALL cruise lines when the CDC established a no-sail rule. I was starting to get concerned about the fate of our cruise, but I decided that whatever was to happen would happen. I stopped shopping for the cruise and started concentrating on other areas of our life. Particularly my mother who resides in an assisted living facility. The facility immediately blocked all visitors from the facility. At least I knew she would be safe from the virus. Or would she.
On April 13, 2020, Carnival extended the cruise pause to June 27th. I felt relieved but not convinced that we would cruise. I was still not shopping for the cruise and my level of scoping possible excursions dropped drastically. But I did start looking at options for a cruise for next year, just in case! I picked out three cruises for August 2021 that I felt would be comparable to the cruise we had booked, printed out the options, and left the options on the refrigerator for Jim and I to look at and consider.
Option #1 is a cruise on the Carnival Dream leaving Galveston on August 28, 2021. It is an 8-night cruise with the same itinerary we already have booked. The pros, it is an itinerary we have not gone on. The cons, we were on this ship last year. We like the idea of going on a ship we have not been on but we will consider it as an option.
Option #2 is a cruise on the Carnival Radiance leaving Galveston on August 20, 2021. It is a 9-night cruise going to Key West, Grand Turk, Half Moon Cay, and Nassau with four sea days!. The pros, it will be a ship we have not been on and has recently been thru a dry-dock. The cons, I’m not sure there are any. This cruise option is definitely high on our list!
Option #3 is also on the Carnival radiance leaving Galveston on August 6, 2021. It is also a 9-night cruise but will be going to Grand Cayman, Mahogany Bay, Belize, Costa Maya, and Cozumel with three sea days. The pros are the same as option #2. The cons, we have already been to all of the cruise ports with the exception of one, Costa Maya. Although we have no objections to going to ports we have already visited, we are really looking forward to something new and different for us.
Jim and I would periodically look at the cruise options but didn’t give it much thought. That is until around June 19th. Rumors had started making their way onto the group cruise page. I started looking at stateroom options for all 3 cruises so I could have an idea of what we might want. Since the cruise I booked for this year is in an interior with walkway view, I thought it would see what is available for the same category stateroom as well as balcony staterooms. Once Jim got home from work. I told him he had to make his decision then. No waiting. Once he told me his choice, we discussed staterooms. We could have the same category or we could go with our preferred choice of a balcony on Lido.
So Jim decided on Option 2!!! In looking at the stateroom options, I noticed that there were “L-shaped” balcony staterooms available on deck 7. I put one on hold knowing that it would expire in a couple of days. I started holding my breath until the pause extension was officially announced on Monday June 22nd. I immediately called my PVP and left a message on his voice mail and I also sent him an email asking him to call me ASAP as I already knew what I wanted to do.
Much to my surprise, he contacted me by email within a couple of hours and said he would call me shortly. And he did!!! We were able to transfer our booking to the Carnival Radiance leaving Galveston on August 20, 2021. We are booked in the L-shaped balcony I want. The money we paid for the original cruise transferred to our new booking, obviously without penalty, and we received a nice on-board credit.
Now we are back to a very long cruise countdown. And I’m okay with that!!! I have once again started looking at excursions but I’m going to wait until closer to the cruise to start my shopping. Well, I might book one excursion in a couple of weeks. I guess we will just have to wait and see!!!
With 175 days until our cruise, I finally decided to start researching our parking options for this cruise. Now, this is not our first time to cruise out of Galveston. This will be our ninth cruise leaving from this port! So we are aware of all the options that our out there.
For this cruise, I initially was deciding between EZ Cruise Parking and Galveston Park N Cruise. EZ Cruise Parking has the option of parking with shuttle to the port or park and walk to the port while Galveston Park N Cruise is strictly park in walk. We have EZ Cruise Parking four times and Galveston Park N Cruise three times and, for the most part, have been happy with Both. But this time, after posting the weekly countdown to the Facebook group page for this cruise, I decided to look into a couple of different options. Port Parking and Port of Galveston parking.
The first cruise parking lot that has become our favorite due to its location is Galveston Park N Cruise, galvestonparkncruise.com. It is located at 2514 Strand Street and is a very easy walk across the street to Cruise Terminal #1. The street to the cruise terminal is protected with a light so there is no need to dodge cars while crossing! Galveston Park N Cruise offers two options: indoor parking or outdoor parking. For this cruise, the rates are:
Outdoor: $111.90
Indoor: $129.20
There is no shuttle to the port which is fine with us. We have no problem walking to the cruise terminal.
EZ Cruise parking was the next parking facility we considered, ezcruiseparking.com. It is located at 2727 Santa Fe Place and is also an easy walk to Terminal #1 but not easy from terminal #2 which we found out last year on our Carnival Dream cruise. EZ Cruise Parking offers two options: park and walk or park with shuttle. Both options are outdoors but the do offer an option of a car cover for an additional $10. The base rates before taxes and fees for this facility are:
Park and walk: $92.02 (prepaid booking)
Park and shuttle $97.43 (prepaid booking)
The routinely have a promo code you can use that is typically $5.00.
Since we are aware that this cruise will start at terminal 2, we know the walk will not be easy. We also know that the shuttle to and from the terminal has been slow. On one cruise, we were so tired and frustrated waiting on a shuttle that we walked to the port. This is one reason we tried the park and walk option on our last cruise. On this cruise, we decided that this would not be an option for us. At least not for this cruise.
Port Parking was the next to be considered, portparking.com. Located at 202 37th Street, at the corner of Harborside, we have driven past this parking facility several times, we never really took it into consideration mostly due to the location. It was highly recommended on our Facebook group cruise page so I decided to look into it a little more deeply. This facility offers three options: outdoor parking with shuttle, indoor parking with shuttle, or indoor park and walk. Personally, I would not use the park and walk option. I do not think my lungs could handle the walk but I did consider the shuttle options.
The rates for this cruise are:
Outdoor with shuttle: $108.25
Indoor with shuttle: $108.25
Indoor park and walk: $92.02.
I will say that I was surprised that the price for indoor and outdoor were the same. I did hear great things about this facility and the shuttle service so it was a contender.
Another facility I briefly looked at was Falstaff Cruise Parking located at 3402 Church Street, falstaffcruiseparking.com. I had seen this one used by frequent cruiser Life With Favor. Since it is one that she used I decided I would at least look at it. It is indoor parking, and is just a bit further to the port than Port Parking. So look I did but quickly decided against it…
Parking: $85.00
Shuttle to pier: $15.00
Total price after taxes and fees: $115.83
I probably would have given it more consideration if they did not have a separate charge for the shuttle. Definitely not close enough to walk in my opinion. I will definitely give it consideration on future cruise, but not this one and not with the payment structure. I would rather see the parking and shuttle be inclusive instead of separate.
The last option I looked at is Port of Galveston parking, portofgalveston.com We used this on our first cruise out of Galveston. Sense then, we have broaden our horizons and look at and use others. Port of Galveston has 2 options, parking lot and parking garage. I always thought there was only the one lot option so I was excited to see another option. The parking lot option offers a shuttle while the parking garage is directly across the street and an easy walk to Terminal 1 or 2. Although there is a walkway leading from the garage to the pier, I fully understand that it is not accessible. The rates for both seem competitive:
Parking Lot B: $92.00 (after fees and taxes with a $5.00 discount for prepaid online booking). Located at 224 23rd Street.
Parking Garage: $122.00 (after fees and taxes with a $5.00 discount for prepaid online booking). Located at 150 Rosenberg.
Since we like to be adventurous, we decided to try Port of Galveston garage parking!!! I will give a full review of the parking when we return from our cruise in September.
So the cruise is booked, hotel has been booked, and now parking has been reserved and paid for. What’s next???? Time to start my packing lists!
Although this cruise was actually booked months ago, I have been in a funk, so to speak. Typically at this stage, I would already have our hotel booked, parking reservation made, and started planning the clothes we will be taking. But for some reason, I just have not been able to get into it like I normally do. That is until today which is actually 198 days away!
What changed??? Well, I always look for good deals on hotel rooms and I have always been able to find good deals on Hotels.com. But for some reason, the prices have been more than I want to pay for one night stay. We prefer to stay at Quality Inn as we have always had a good experience there. We have also had pre-cruise stays at The Commodore and used bonus time at Silverleaf Seaside Resort (now Holiday Inn Vacation Club Seaside Resort… don’t get me started about this). Since prices are more than I care to pay, we started looking at possibly staying in Kemah for the night. I’m basically a creature of habit. I ALWAYS stay the night before a cruise in Galveston and have dinner at The Original Mexican Cafe. I just could not wrap my head around staying somewhere other than Galveston. Today, I decided to check Priceline.com to see if their prices were any different and I am so glad I did. I booked a room for one night at Scottish Inn. The room is prepaid for and there is no cancellation for this booking. We are locked in for our stay!!! The best part is the price difference between the two websites was $36.00. I try to save money anywhere I possibly can!!!!
We have friends that stay there often pre-cruise and have had no problems. I like that it is off the beaten path yet convenient for our needs. By that I mean that it is close to The Original Mexican Cafe and not far from the cruise terminal.
So now, all that is left is to book the parking. I’m 98% certain that I will be booking our parking with ezcruiseparking.com for this cruise. We used it on our Carnival Dream cruise last year and the only drawback for us was the walk to the car after the cruise. But, for the price, we are willing to make the walk again. We like being able to walk to the cruise terminal before and after the cruise and our preferred parking is approximately $40. more.
I also need to start making lists!!! One good thing is that I do not need any new clothes and we do not need any new luggage. I may have gone a little overboard last year, LOL!!!! Hopefully this year we will not leave our 12-packs of coke at home!!!!
14 weeks, 98 days, until our cruise on the Carnival Dream. Today I watched the Galveston webcams to see her sail into port!!! She is such a beautiful ship and I cannot wait to get on her!!!
So, what have I been doing to prepare for this cruise??? I have been doing some shopping on Amazon and Steinmart had a 12-hour sale. And I still have stuff in my Amazon cart I want to get. And I will, a little at a time!
Lets start with Steinmart. Their 12-hour sale is always great plus I had a coupon! I bought one shirt and 1 pair of crop pants. I have the perfect earrings for the shirt that I bought last year from BaubkeBar. The crops were purchased to go with a top I got last year in a Stitch Fix box! I’m looking forward to wearing the shirt this weekend to a dart reunion We are going to!
My Amazon purchases has included:
Tassel Pendant necklace to go with earrings I purchased last year from BaubleBar.
Women’s Sleeveless Beach Dress.
Water shoes but I actually purchased them to wear when exercising around the house.
And 2 pairs of shoes.
An Amazon purchase that is coming this week is an Extra Large beach bag.
And what is yet to come…
Necklace and Earrings sets, one in green and one in neutral colors. My plan is to only get one of them, I’m just not sure which one it will be.
A 22″ rolling duffel bag.
Pink Shorts
Flamingo print shorts
2 Microfiber towels, but this is a maybe. I might not get these as I might just take regular beach towels or I might buy some while we are on the ship or at a port. Yes I know they are not necessary.
Another duffel bag that has a luggage sleeve so it will fit over our carry-on bag.
A duffel tote bag that also has a lubbage sleeve to fit over a carry-on bag.
And lastly a crossbody purse thingy.
I’m hoping that this will be the end of my shopping, but I doubt that it will be.
our life reality 