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This Weeks Theme Is: Public
This is the Great Bay public beach in Phillipsburg, St. Maarten in the Caribbean. This was one of our ports on our cruise that we took in July, 2010. It was beautiful. The water was so nice, but a little cloudy due to all the sand being kicked up by all the water taxis coming in and out.  One Frog Commented So Far | Tags: Meme, Saturday Photo Hunters, St. Maarten | Category: Meme, Saturday Photo Hunters
Synopsis First there was darkness… A young woman wakes up to find herself in the dark. She does not know how she got there; she does not know why she is there. She feels for a light switch, thinking the light heals all pain. Then there was light. Death is only an instant. What light reveals to her is way past death itself. Realization sets in, and it is made clear that escape is out of the question. For a puzzling madman holds her captive, her freedom at the palm of his hand. Now there is only a decision. He will kill her only if she exhibits signs of a certain syndrome, and as of now there are only two different ways of ending this madman’s reign: Kill him or stay alive. Staying alive requires tolerance to pain and despair. It asks of her a precise resistance to a syndrome-one she knows nothing about. If she doesn’t die, no one else has to. Killing him vanquishes all hopes of freedom, for the key will die with him. Killing him will make her the one monster she swore she would never be: The same beast responsible for building a definite barrier on the line that divides her past from present to possible future-one who has silenced her past forever. My Thoughts This story is a twisted tale of a man, a serial killer who keeps a young woman hostage in his mansion to prove to himself that Stockholm syndrome is real.This is a short but very good read, especially for such a young writer. It is a psychological thriller that deals with a lot of mind games and mans desire to test a theory or two about human nature. Some parts of the book were overly descriptive but did not take away from the story nor did it add to it. I felt the ending of the book was a little flat but at the same time it left me wanting to read more, to know more about this odd man, the killer. It leaves much to the imagination at the end. I highly recommend this book, the positives outweigh any negatives and for being 16 years old at the time she wrote this, I do believe she has a great future ahead of her writing books!
Leave Your Comment | Tags: Book, Book Review, Keeping Her In The Light, Nicole Fuentes | Category: Book Reviews It’s official! My brother Jacob & my brother Joel are coming to visit for 3 weeks. Unfortunately my mom and sisters will not be able to come visit this year, but I am very happy and thankful that I will get to spend some time with two of my brothers. They get here on August 5th, one week from today. It’s when family comes that I really wish we had two cars but we will work it out, I will be doing a ton of driving. So now I’ve got to plan a few things. I don’t usually like planning but sometimes you have to. It will be a busy week of planning, cleaning and just anticipating their arrival!
Here is my brother Jacob! This is his first time to Florida & flying.
Here is my brother Joel, he’s been visiting us since we moved to Florida. I can’t wait to see both of them. I miss all of my family. 2 Frogs Had Their Say - Chime In! | Tags: Family, Family Fun, Florida Vacation, Vacation | Category: Family
Welcome to another edition of my weekly column Baking With The Social Frog! If you are interested in baking with me every week, put the button in your post linking to my blog. Make sure to leave a link in the comments section so I can come see what you have baked this week! Or just come by and check out what I have made and get a yummy recipe. Again, I am late getting this up today! Sorry. This is why I never say it will be up by a certain time because you never know,haha! This weeks recipe is very yummy, kids and adults love it! Whoopie Pies Cake Ingredients:
Butter Cream Filling Ingredients:
Instructions For Cake: 1. Cream together Shortening & sugar. Add egg and beat it with electric mixer. Then add the milk & vanilla, mix well. 2. Slowly add the flour, salt, cocoa, baking powder & baking soda.
3. Heat oven to 425. Drop spoonfuls onto cookie sheet. Bake 7 minutes, cool on wire rack. While that is baking you can make the filling Filling Instructions: 1. In a large bowl cream shortening and butter with electric mixer. Add vanilla. Gradually add sugar, one cup at a time, beating well. Scrape sides and bottom of bowl. Beat until fluffy, if you want to thin it a little, add 1 tablespoon of milk. After everything is baked and made, take 2 of the “cake” pieces and sandwich them with the filling in the middle. Refrigerate when done, will keep for several days.
Note that this is not what the filling usualy is for whoopie pies, but it is what I love to use, tastes better to me. Also, I never add milk to the butter cream but that also is personal preference! Let me know if you make these Whoopie Pies or tell me your variation on it! Come back again soon, this column is here every Wednesday so stop by for some more recipes and share some if you would like as well. One Frog Commented So Far | Tags: Baking, Baking With The Social Frog, Butter-cream, Whoopie Pies | Category: Baking With The Social Frog
I don’t think I’ve ever gotten so mad at a gas pump in my life as I do with #14. I swear it is broke! Today I worked at the USO, something I enjoy very much and I look forward to it every week. Where ever we end up next I do hope they have a USO! Today was not so busy, the usual phone calls and the occasional person coming in needing a fax or looking for tickets to an event. I put a lot of packets of different papers together. It took forever on the new fax/copy machine we got while I was gone on our cruise. It is so much better than what he had before but at the same time some things don’t run as smoothly. All that matter is, it all got done. Heading home I decided to stop and get gas, normally I get it in the late evening on my way to pick hubby up but I wanted to get it over with,haha! Every pump was taken BUT #14. I am assuming everyone knows it is messed up. I figure they might had fixed it. NOPE. I am not joking when I say this, it took me a good 10+ minutes to pump $20 worth of gas. It makes odd noises, stops and goes when it wants. I nearly break nails and pinch my skin, it never fails. People stare and wonder why you are still pumping gas… After that I was just ready to come home but we did not get to go food shopping this weekend, so I had to buy some dinners. After buying all kinds of things, I still forgot 2 important items, so I guess I will be running into the store late tonight after getting hubby from work. Do you like to go to Fairs? Local, County or State? In the almost 3 years we have lived here not once have we made it to the Greater Jacksonville Fair. I am sure there are good reasons we missed it. I only remember why we did not go last year, hubby was on deployment and I don’t do Fair’s without him. So, the Fair is from November 3rd-14th. We WILL be going this year, it’s our last chance here in Florida PLUS I decided tonight I will be entering 2 Baking Contest’s! YAY!!! One is a Pie contest, it has to be an original recipe or family recipe. The second one is a Cake contest…WOOT! This one also has to be an original recipe or family recipe. So guess who’s kitchen is about to become a test kitchen?!? I am excited about it. Both come with some great prizes also but just entering will be fun. Why have I not done this before? I might post pictures of what I concoct but I will not post the recipes. Was that a BOOO I just heard? Most likely not, as just about all of you out there are lurkers and you read my blog but seldom do you comment,haha! Thank you for reading I was all set to start experimenting when I got home from work, after shopping for items I needed and one of the important things I forgot to buy…Butter, for my frosting! So instead I will try to think up some yummy cake/frosting combinations. Anyone else enter cake or pie contests? One Frog Commented So Far | Tags: Baking, Cake, FL, Gas, Greater Jacksonville Fair, Jacksonville, Pies | Category: Baking, Cake Decorating, Life Yesterday I was thinking back to 5 years ago when I was visiting the local Hobby Lobby after we had just moved to Corpus Christi, TX. I had never heard of the store, I’ve since found out it is a “Southern” store. I had a desire to bake and decorate cake, so instead of choosing something very simple and plain, I had to start out very ambitious. Fondant. While at the store there, I found a recipe/design card from Wilton for this beautiful Fall/Autumn themed cake. It involved lot’s of colored fondant and cutting things out, placing things just so. Mind you I had to bake the cake first, level it and dirty ice it before putting the fondant on. The only thing I had ever done before was bake a cake and any kind of icing was from a jar and slapped on. For being my very first fondant cake I was and still am pretty happy with it!
I simply call it my Fall Leaves Cake. Since it was the fall time, Halloween was coming and I really wanted to make something fun and halloweenish of course. I asked hubby for some ideas and we came up with this cake together and we also decorated it together. It was a lot of fun to make.
In this cake we used butter-cream & fondant and it is a Pumpkin Witch! Have I ever mentioned that Fall time is my most favorite time of year aside from the Christmas season. Although, the fall time has just not been the same living in Texas then moving here to Florida. Although a chance of it being cooler in the fall time was greater in Texas than it is here in Florida. I like fall in Maine! So while I was on my fall themed cake kick I also made a cake for hubby to take to work, I was working on smoothing the butter-cream frosting & doing a basket-weave. I have since gotten better too!
I have made a lot of cakes in these last 5 years but these 3 stand out as my top favorites thus far. I have been doing tons of baking and making desserts here in Florida but not cakes. I was trying to figure out why because I love doing it so much. I think a lot of it is because I am afraid it will just get wasted. Hubby takes them to work, so I guess they are not wasted. So my cake decorating creativity has been brewing again recently, not that it has ever gone away though. So instead of pushing it away as I have been I have decided to embrace it. Does that sound to dramatic? Haha! I will be taking some classes either in August or September to enhance my skills and learn some new things as well. I am very excited about this! I hope to start making a cake soon as I have 3 designs in mind I’d like to make. I have them in my mind but I need to put them on paper, not the best drawer though! In case you are wondering, all 3 cakes were made with boxed cake mix and the frosting is homemade butter-cream, the best! Do you decorate cake, cookie or cupcakes? I’d love to see some of your stuff! You can find me over at Cake Central under “thesocialfrog” where I have some more cakes & cookies posted. One Frog Commented So Far | Tags: Baking, Butter-cream, Cake, Cake Central, Cake Decorating, Fondant, Hobby Lobby | Category: Cake Decorating
This Weeks Theme Is: Hanging
This is one of Carnival’s Towel Animals, it is a Gorilla hanging from the vanity area in our cabin. I looked forward to going to our room every night to see what animal was there. The pig was one of my favorites. I really hoped to get a frog, but sadly, I did not…maybe next time! We had a great cruise! The very last day of our cruise, we were exhausted, really. I guess it started to catch up with us. We tried to be up by 7:00am every morning and our bedtime varied between 2-3am. I am a night owl. There was not a lot of activities going on that last full day at sea. We did play Bingo, they had several games going that day. We played some trivia. Ohhh I forgot to talk about the “coffee shop” they have where you can buy cake, cookies and specialty coffee’s. I mention this because where we play trivia, the coffee place was right next to it. One day we both decided to try the coffee, well I was less than impressed for sure. They had no simple syrup sugar, so I was told to use the packets of sugar. I don’t know about anyone else but when I drink iced coffee, you don’t use packets of sugar, it will not blend right and you will end up drinking grains of sugar, not fun & that’s what happened. Keep that in mind. What I did love was the cake they sold there, Daniel and I shared a piece of the huge, fat, chocolate cake. It was rich! I ended up falling in love with the chocolate chip cookies they sold there as well, very yummy and huge! I had two of those cookies our last day,haha. We lazed around the ship really, moving from one area to the next, kind of people watching at the same time. Everyone looked tired, but happy. It was a great trip, one I will never forget. It was so awesome to experience all the things we did, together. Now we would like to take a Western Caribbean sometime. I’d love for family to be able to go sometime as well. The Dream is a wonderfully huge ship, for all the people it carries it needs to be a tad bigger I think,lol. Everything was great, the food, the staff. I really enjoyed both of the excursions we did and I highly recommend them both. Have you cruised on the Carnival Dream or any of Carnival’s ships? Let me know what you liked or did not like. Here are the last few pictures we took on our final day of cruising, July 09, 2010. Enjoy!
3 Frogs Had Their Say - Chime In! | Tags: Carnival, Carnival Cruise Lines, Carnival Dream, Family Fun, Vacation | Category: Carnival Cruise, Vacation Our second full day at sea meant one thing, we were now heading back to Port in Cape Canaveral Florida. I can’t say I was happy to be heading back because I was not. I wished we would have had more time in the Ports, particularly in the Bahamas. Before we had left on the cruise I booked us dinner at the Chef’s Art Steakhouse. So tonight was the night, July 08, 2010. I had hear many mixed reviews about if the price was worth it, since you have to pay extra for it. It was a little bit of a pain finding it actually. It is easy to get lost on such a big ship. We arrived a little early and we were seated immediately. It was very nice, the atmosphere, the wait staff were kind and attentive but so hard to understand. It took me a while to feel comfortable there. There were MANY food items to chose from, several things were out of my food comfort zone but I tried them anyways and found that some things were very good. We also purchased a bottle of wine, but I did not end up liking it very much. Daniel did though. The had all the shades pretty much closed so there were not any great views of any sorts but I was not there for the view, looking at my sexy hubby was great enough view for me They came around with a massive tray of meats for you to choose from and they explain what each cut is and such. The portions of meat are HUGE. We both enjoyed our meals very much and it was worth the money to be seated alone, together and it was kind of romantic. We both chose a different dessert, he got a apple thing of sorts and I got the cheese cake! Ummm, if you ever go, get the cheese cake, it is massive and delicious. When we were all done we ended up walking out and forgetting the rest of our wine. Apparently while we were eating dinner the ship had stopped and a passenger had to be taken off by another boat to land. I honestly do not know what happened and we never found out. Another passenger let us know when we exited the restaurant and he offered to take some pictures of us. The rest of the evening we had some drinks at the Piano Bar, listening to Jason. We played a little at the Casino then headed off to bed. Here are a few pictures from our dinner and of the ship. Enjoy!
Welcome to another edition of my weekly column Baking With The Social Frog! If you are interested in baking with me every week, put the button in your post linking to my blog. Make sure to leave a link in the comments section so I can come see what you have baked this week! Or just come by and check out what I have made and get a yummy recipe. Sorry in getting this up so late this week. I have fallen behind in just about everything,haha! Like I’ve said before I bake these things every Wednesday then post them, sometimes life and other things set me back just a little but tonight I have a very tasty recipe for you so enjoy! Cinnamon Sticks Ingredients:
Instructions:
3. Add 1 tablespoon of cold water at a time, you want a nice dough to form.
4. In a cup or small bowl combine sugar & cinnamon, this is by taste. There are no measurements, decide what you like like, then set aside. 5. Roll out dough as best you can into a square shape, makes it easier to cut out the squares to roll into the sticks. After you have rolled the dough out, coat the dough with the melted butter. Then sprinkle the cinnamon/sugar mix on top of it. Then cut dough into small squares, again you decide how big or small you would like them.
6. Roll up each squar into a “stick” and pinch the edges to make a seal, place on cookie sheet. 7. Bake at 375-400 for 15-20 minutes, again this depends on how you might like them but remember you want the dough cooked. You may also put a wash on top of them if you like. I like mine to be a nice light brown on top. You can eat them hot from the oven or let them cool and you can always heat them up in the microwave.
Let me know if you make these Cinnamon Sticks! Come back again soon, this column is here every Wednesday so stop by for some more recipes and share some if you would like as well. One Frog Commented So Far | Tags: Baking, Baking With The Social Frog, Cinnamon Sticks | Category: Baking With The Social Frog St. Maarten is a beautiful place. It happened to be one of the sunnier days we had on our cruise. It was also our last Port before heading back to Florida. So we did not do any excursion, instead we made it a free day and decided that half the day we would swim in the beautiful ocean, then the other half of our day, we would shop. To get from the ship to the beach you take a water taxi, the Yellow one to be specific. It is $12 for all day use to go back and forth. It is well worth it & pretty fast travel from the ship. We started of with swimming, as soon as you get to the beach you are approached by people wanting to “sell” you a spot on the beach. It was a little confusing at first but we followed a small group from our ship and found where the best deal was. For $20 you got 2 beach lounge chairs, an umbrella & 5 drinks. We were one of the first people over so we got a great spot on the beach, it was well worth the $20 too. I have to say that using sun block is a must but I also have to say that I used 90 SPF on my face and SPF 50 all over my body and I got burned badly here. Daniel did as well. The water was so nice. It was a very hot day in St. Maarten. We brought our snorkeling stuff and Daniel really used his. Due to all the movement in the water the clarity was a little murky, all the water taxi boats, jet skies and people swimming. Daniel still found many things, we collected some shells. It was as relaxing as I had hoped for, after all the busyness in the two other Ports, hanging out at the beach was wonderful. You may notice that some of the pictures are a little blurry, that is because we were using our water camera and we would take pictures under the water, then out of the water and did not think about the water droplets on the lens. Oh well. There were several ladies trying to sell stuff and they walked the beach from one side to the other. Daniel did buy each of us a necklace after them asking at least 10 times. We did not spend to much time out of the water, one of those times was because Daniel got stung by a jelly fish. Yikes! We got out of the water so quick. It almost kept me from going back in. But I did not travel there or anywhere to be afraid of things I could not control, so back in we went. We had no other problems. I enjoyed watching Daniel swimming around, finding stuff, especially all kinds of neat shells. It was great to see him relaxing and having fun. After we decided we had enough of swimming, we took the water taxi back to our ship and took a quick shower and changed. Then it was time to take the water taxi back to the beach where all the shopping was. We walked around for a few hours. We found some interesting stores, items and people. It was fun but hot. It was nice when you would walk into a store and feel a nice rush of cold air. Most of the stores as in the other Ports, were almost all jewelry stores so we ended up skipping many of those but did poke around in a few. One of the highlights of being there was going to see the “Yoda Guy” & meeting him. He created Yoda and helped with many other projects. He was nice, but we could not take a picture of him unless we bought something from his store. He is trying to get enough money together to build a museum for all of his things. If you are ever in St. Maarten, go visit him and say Hello! After shopping it was getting close to the time for us to leave Port, so we headed back to the ship. It was a wonderful day, more great memories were made and we both ended up with sunburns that we could still feel a week later,haha! Here are pictures from our visit. Enjoy! Our visit to St. Thomas was on July 6th! I’ve been having issues with getting videos on here so pictures will have to do, at least for now. I honestly am not avoiding blogging it’s just been a pain in my arse trying to get large amounts of pictures up and my slide show software decided to play games with me and I had to use a different & not so cool software. When we got to St. Thomas they were late getting us off the boat, I believe it was due to US Customs or something. The sun was kind of missing, like it had been through most of our trip, thinking back, had the sun been out plus all that heat & humidity, it ended up being okay. I was worried about the clarity of our dive and if we would see things or if it would just be all cloudy under water, mind you…we are not divers or snorklers so we had semi-high expectations. I had to keep in mind, we could not change the weather. We had a little time before our Helmet Dive at Coral World, so we decided to look at some of the shops, nothing really interested us especially after all the eye candy we had in the Bahamas. We ended up meeting a local guy there and talked with him for a long while about life on the island and things like that. It was nice. I was a little bummed because I have a friend that lives there on the island but I was not able to see her. I had no phone to call her on there when we got into Port It was interesting getting in the “tour buses” that took us to Coral World, even more interesting was the way people drive thier!!! Daniel actually started to feel sick going up and down hillsides. I figured a rocking ship on not so happy seas would make him feel worse! I thought it was fun and took it all in and decided it was like being on a roller coaster. We arrived at Coral World just as a rain storm was moving in. The pictures and weather did not do this place any justice. It was B E A U T I F U L. The mist, the rain, made it even more appealing. We were put in groups of 10 and we went and got dressed in our bathing suites. I do believe we were the only ones who did not come in ours. Then we had to go over safety information and sign forums pretty much stating that they are not responsible for anything that happens. It read like this: Blah,blah,blah…you are going to have fun,blah, blah, blah…live life and don’t worry so much!! Then came time for us to put water shoes on and a special pair of gloves that help you grip things. As everyone was going down, Daniel & I were the last two to head in, I felt bad for one lady. She really wanted her mother down there with the rest of the family but the mother just would not have it. She tried, then she started to walk down the ladder into the ocean and she lost it and refused to go. She missed out on something great! Then it was my turn. I don’t think I freaked out at all. I knew this was going to be an awesome experience for both Daniel and I. He had our underwater camera so he wanted me to go ahead of him so he could take pictures of me. They had a photographer under water taking pictures and video! So I go under and it was AMAZING! I could have stood there forever but I had to move so Daniel could come down as well. I’ve never been 22 feet under the water before. There is a little chain fence you can hold onto as you walk along, we were told it is good to hold onto when the wves are really moving up top. The water was not as clear as we had hoped for but it was still wonderful. Had the sun been out full force it really would have sparkled under there. It was a little hard to move around. The helmet is about 75 pounds which helps keep your feet on the ground but turning around was not an easy task for me but I wanted to see Daniel and his reactions too. He got some great pictures too. We were under water for about 35 minutes, we saw all kinds of fish and got to hold a sea spider and a sea urchin, both very cool creatures. After our helmet dive there were tanks and a few other animals to look at on the land. We were returned to our ship and we headed to the Skyride that takes you up to Paradise Point that overlooks St. Thomas, absolutely beautiful. While up top we had a world famous drink called a Bushwacker, it is so yummy! If you are ever there, get one! We poked around the few shops that were up there, bought a few post cards. Then it was time to head back to the ship. The day went very fast but it was so much fun, I wish we could have stayed longer. Apparently last week a family who was cruising with Carnival Cruise lines went off on there own in a taxi of sorts to the beach that is right next to Coral World and while they were there, gang violence broke out and their teenage daughter was murdered. A horrible story and I feel terrible for the family. This can happen anywhere though, no matter where you are you always need to be vigilant. I know many Cruisers are upset that Carnival is even still going to this Port but I don’t see a reason not to. Carnival has stopped all excursions that go to that area for the time being. Sadly it means no one else will get to experience what Daniel & I did but I understand the need to keep guests safe. Regardless, crime is every where and you should not let it stop you from going places. We felt safe. I wish we would have had more time to experience more on the island but we would have needed several days. If you are ever in St. Thomas, head over to Coral World and try the Helmet Dive, you won’t be disappointed. Tomorrow I hope to have pictures up from our trip to St. Maarten & I will also be starting back up “Baking With The Social Frog”! Enjoy!
For some reason there are some odd added text and such that I can’t seem to get rid of, sometimes technology bites me! Our first FULL day at sea was July 5th. We tried to plan out the night before certain things we wanted to do, several things overlapped others, so we had to pick and choose. We seemed to have hit stormy weather several times through out the cruise so most of the time the ship was moving & rolling, it was fine though and really helped at night, felt like being rocked to sleep,haha! We tried to be up early that morning so we could go play some Bingo. I read things from people before we cruised that stated to stay clear of Bingo, that it is a waste of time and money. Well…if you enjoy doing something, do it. That is the whole point of a vacation. Doing things you want to do. It was not the end of the world that I did not win Bingo but we both had fun together. Daniel did win one Bingo, sadly someone else won as well so they had to split it. Daniel was a tad lucky this day as he also won a pair of Gold earrings that he won in a raffle put on by the ship’s jewelry store. He got some nasty looks after winning those,haha! At one point during the cruise a woman came up to us and mentioned she was angry that he had won them, people are funny! We also played several trivia games, had a bit of fun at the Casino. We went to one of the talks about Shopping, what to look for. It was pretty much all about jewelry but informative. I did not want to miss out on anything. I do think that Carnival could add some more activities for the adults. The trivia games only lasted 10-15 minutes, then they were done…We were not big on trying to lay out in the non existing sun, so a lot of our time was indoors which is fine because it was our vacation. We did manage to snag a clam shell on the Serenity deck for a little while, that was nice, we both nodded off for a few. I really liked our room, Cabin #2300. I am glad we did not spend oodles of money on a more expensive room as we were never in there, only to sleep, shower or change. Although we do keep toying around with the idea of a balcony room the next time we cruise, we shall see. Let’s talk about the pools…well if you want to call them pools. A ship the size of the Dream, I imagined much larger pools. They even look larger in pictures. They were always packed, people all over each other, so we did not get a chance even once to use them. It ended up not being a big deal but I wish they would have put more thought into that. Many people have complained of lines and never getting into shows, well when you have so many people on 1 ship you must expect some sort of waits and no room. If you have been to Disney, the ship is nothing,haha! We did miss a show or two due to them being packed, so we just went to the later showing, most of the time due to our dinner time being 8:15pm. Get to them early and have a drink or two, that’s what we did. Another thing we both would have liked would have been a few more bars or lounges open much later than most were. We are night people and I was not thrilled that the only thing to do at 1am was go to the Casino or Caliente . We loved Jason at the Piano bar, most nights he was only there till 12am, a few nights we got lucky and he was there till 1:30am. Karaoke was fun, they need to do it more often, apparently many people loved doing it on our cruise and they would have more people than time each night, so a lot of people were bummed. It was all good though. Don’t get me wrong about anything I’ve said. No where is perfect or is going to fit each person 100% and we know that. We had an amazing time on and off the ship. There is a lot to do on the ship but there is room for improvement as well. We tried to end our first day at sea on the early side due to the fact that the next day we were going to St.Thomas!!! Here are pictures from our first day at sea. Enjoy! 2 Frogs Had Their Say - Chime In! | Tags: Carnival, Carnival Cruise Lines, Carnival Dream, First Day At Sea, Fun, Vacation | Category: Carnival Cruise, Vacation I meant to have this post up early today but I’ve had a string of not so good luck with some things today including electricity and computer programs. The first port we stopped in was Nassau Bahamas. I’d never been before but I had read on several cruise forums that it was not a great port and that many people prefer to stay on the ship rather than explore. I was not going to let that get to me. I honestly feel different about this port, I actually enjoyed it and I wish we would have had much more time there. It was our shortest stay out of all 3 ports. 8:00AM-2:00PM. It was actually a bit of a mess getting off the ship, I kind of expected it to be a little more “together” but at least we all got off the ship and were able to go about. I booked our “Glass Bottom Boat” excursion for the morning, so we pretty much got off the ship and tried to find where the Tour Guide was. Come to find out, they were running a little slow, we formed our group and off we went. It was very beautiful, it was hot and sunny and I was so excited. Then I panicked a little when I saw the boat was on the much smaller than the Dream size,lol! It was because it had been forever since I had been on a small scale boat and was afraid of getting sick. Happily I did not. We got a little ocean tour of the island while we headed out to the coral reefs, it was very interesting. We were just so relaxed and enjoyed the atmosphere. The water there is so pretty…different hues of greens & blues! I just wanted to jump off the boat and go for a swim. When we got to the coral reefs we were told to go to the bottom of the boat to “view” the fish and corals. I must say I was not so impressed by the “glass bottom” of the boat, as the boat was packed with people and there were 2 viewing areas with plexi-glass panels to look into the ocean. It was still tons of fun and I highly recommend it to everyone! After that they took us to another area of a ship wreck, out past the Atlantis Resort. Years ago a hurricane came through and the boat sank, all crew survived but the boat did not. It was really cool to see and learn about. On the way back to the boat dock it was nice to sit back, listen to music and take in all the beauty of the island. I did not want to get off that boat. It was great! After the excursion it was time for shopping. I kept hearing about the “Straw Market” on forums and people said to avoid it. I am not sure why as it was okay. You had to walk around a bit but if you try you can find handmade items by the people on the island. These are my favorite treasures. I will say if you are in the market for some knock off purses and other things like that, this would be the place to go, we had no interest in those items though. We decided to not go all the way into downtown partially due to time and the fact that it was mostly restaurants, not much of an interest to either of us. If you are thirsty, there are plenty of locals selling bottled water. It is safe to drink. I really wish we would have had more time to explore this place, I really liked it there and I would have loved to have been able to take a swim. If you ever find yourself there, don’t stay on the ship, there is much to be seen and to do. I am ready to go back! Here are pictures we took while in Nassau Bahamas. I have several videos I wanted to post as well but I am currently having issues with uploading them and have been working on it all day, so the videos will have to be put up at a later time, I will let you know when. Enjoy!
One Frog Commented So Far | Tags: Carnival, Carnival Cruise Lines, Carnival Dream, Fun, Glass Bottom Boat, Nassau Bahamas, Straw Market, Vacation | Category: Carnival Cruise, Vacation Hello Everyone! Forgive me for not posting even though we got home on Saturday. The truth is, as soon as we got home on Saturday, we took a nap and I woke up sick. Extremely sore throat. I am very glad it held off till we returned home. Honestly, I am sad to be back home. The cruise was amazing, everything about it was great. It was a wonderful experience and I can’t wait to cruise again. We arrived at Port Canaveral around 10:30am and there was not much of a line waiting to get inside. Everything was so easy. We had to fill out a health form and then sit and wait to be called to board the ship. Around 11am we were actually on the ship, exploring. We were told our room would be ready around 1pm. Of course this did not stop others from trying to get into their room sooner, but the staterooms were blocked off. We had lunch on deck 10, the Ledo Deck. We prefered eating “inisde” the entire cruise. I absolutely loved the Mongolian food at “The Gathering” on the Ledo deck. I was impressed on how smooth everything was running, considering all the people on the ship. People who are interested in waiting lines and such, let me just say…there are over 3 thousand people on the Dream, you will have a line or two, just breath and calm down. I saw some people get very ugly having that first lunch, I am sure they were miserable the whole time. At 3:30pm we had to meet to go over emergency things, they were clear and it was easy to understand and over pretty quick. What I found funny was that they asked everyone to stay off their cell phones during the presentation, for some odd reason something so simple was so very hard for like 5 people. They got snapped at by staff and for good reason. Everyone made thier way outside to the decks at 4:00pm to pull out of Port. This was when I saw dolphins and the only time I saw dolphins surprisingly. It took a while to get into international waters but when we did the stores on the ship opened as well as the Casino. Dinner the first night was nice, we got along very well with our dinner mates as we ended up calling them. I have several complaints about the people who served us. Apparently people at the table next to us were made of some very good money and they were given much more attention every night even though we were one of the first people in the dining room, we always left last. I was not impressed with the service and neither were our dinner mates. However, the food was amazing, every night! My favorite dinner was the Flat Iron steak and the dessert I LOVED the most but was only served once was the “Diet Orange Cake”, I could not believe it was classified as diet, it did not taste like it at all. We had pictures taken that day as well, they took pictures of you as you get on the ship and they came around at dinner and took pictures. It was nice actually. The cleanliness of the ship exceeded my expectations! Everything was always pristine and they were ontop of everything. Our room was always perfect after dinner and every night was a different critter. I hoped for the frog but never got it, oh well…maybe next time! I put together a slide show of our first day/night on the cruise ship, over the next few days there will be more posts and pictures. There was way to much to put into one post! If you have never gone on a cruise…DO IT! You will not regret it. Oh, I did want to mention that we both took Dramamine on the first day/night then stopped. We took it because we were not sure how we would be. It turned out we were okay. We did get a little dizzy here and there but nothing terrible and our sea legs came within a day or two. Enjoy!
One Frog Commented So Far | Tags: Carnival, Carnival Cruise Lines, Carnival Dream, Cruise, Fun, Vacation | Category: Carnival Cruise, Vacation |
   
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