We had #2 tags, so we could get off the ship almost at any point. We went and enjoyed a nice MDR breakfast with two Canadian couples. There were a ton of people in the MDR for breakfast this morning. We probably should have gone a little faster at breakfast, and I definitely didn’t need that last chocolate donut and chocolate milk (but I sure did like it). Anyway, there was quite a line to get off the ship by the time we were doing it. For some reason, there was less of a line if you had odd numbered luggage tags.
A final shot of the ship as we were waiting in line to get to the luggage.
Once we finally got to a porter, things moved along better. After we got our stuff, he took us over to the other side where the odd numbered tags were going through customs. Way, way, way shorter customs lines on that side.
I left mom with all the luggage and I went to get our rental car. I then picked up her and the luggage. It was a rainy day, so no loss on not getting a convertible for this leg. I dropped mom at the bus station and went to return the car. I was hoping to take the nice cheap bus back to the bus station, but I had apparently just missed the needed busses to make it back in time. So I had to take a taxi. We then got on the Megabus to Atanta.
After the cruise, when we had turned our phones back on, we got messages about my aunt. She had complications from what should have been routine gall bladder and hernia surgery. She had nearly died, and was now still in ICU. She lives in Augusta about 2.5 hours east of Atlanta. So we went to her after the Megabus, and one pre-arranged Atlanta hotel night. I left my mom in Augusta, and I had to return back home in order to work.
Overall it was really a great trip with some once-in-a-lifetime moment. The ending was rather a bummer to come back to that news. But I really have no major complaints, and feel so much happier and rested after this great vacation.
One other random thought on the cruise: I never understood on this trip the difference that a really great CD can make. Richard Spacey was great. So funny and fun. It just made the whole trip more fun in an unexpected way.
The eventual drive back home was even prettier as the mountain had finally begun to turn green again as well.
I ended the trip with another Popeye’s meal and then got back to my eating plan the next day.
My aunt could still use any and all prayers. She seemed to be doing better for awhile and they took her off the respirator, but she's taken a turn for the worse now. She's having trouble breathing. They are considering putting her back on the respirator.
I woke up early once again with final flowrider plans.I went for a first breakfast at the WJ.I then went to the Flowrider.I had to watch for a while until the advanced stand-up surfing time was done.There were about 5 guys this morning, very different from the almost private time I got sharing it with just one other guy on the morning of my birthday.By the time the advanced time was over, 2 other non-advanced guys had joined.It was fun, although I never got one as good I had gotten that first morning.
On this video compilation, I left the recording I ended up with of one guy who really good at it. Just so everyone could see what actually good on this looks like.
After around 5 tries, the line had gotten somewhat long and I was done.It was fun though.I was glad I had rented the wetsuit for doing this.The water temperature was not the issue.I just was more comfortable knowing that all my body parts were staying covered.I saw a number of butts that day.
I then went for a second breakfast at MDR.I ordered my usual classic breakfast, but also got the yummy leftover crab cake egg benedict.I just ate the crab cake with the yolk on it, and left the rest there.I almost ordered a 2nd one though, just because I liked that crab cake so much.
I then met up with mom in the room, and we went and hung in the cantilevered hot tubs with our Kindles one last time. We followed that up with lunch in the MDR, and got done just in time to wander the promenade and see a little of the Freedom Fest celebration.
We then took our C&A books to the casino to redeem the coupons there. I actually won a free keychain with my free pull. It’s an unusual RCI keychain and I rather like it. We were going to do the match coupons at the roulette (one on red, one on black thing), but neither of the roulette tables were open, which is a supposedly almost sure way to walk away a little better than even. I played a dollar on a slot machine, just for fun.
We then went to the jewelry making class. The cost was only $10 for a set that will make a necklace, bracelet and earrings.
The easiest of the 3 options (it did include earrings and a bracelet not shown).
The second hardest (which did also include earrings not shown)
The hardest of the three along with the class teacher (same guy who we did the ribbon to flower class with on the previous day)
If you do this, unless you choose the simplest of the 3 sets, there is no way to finish in the allowed time for the class. I did pick the hardest, and mom picked the 2nd hardest. Mom almost finished her necklace in the allowed time. I got almost a 3rd of mine done, and then dropped most of my work on the floor by accident. He helped me to clean it up, and I can re-do the work.
I had hopes and plans of maybe doing the ice skating and the wall climb on this day, but I just ran out of time. I was just minutes too late for last wall climb. I then had to rush to return the wet suits to the dive shop closing time.
We then watched the Move it Move it parade again from deck 8. This time from the other end than I had seen it that first night. We then went to the WJ so Mom could have a sushi snack in Jade.
We also had issues this night with forgetting things in the room. I had 6+ return trips to room for various forgotten things. This is a good time to mention the room steward for the rooms up the hall from ours. She was so nice. I liked our own, and he was very helpful. I just didn’t see him all that often. The steward next to ours, I saw her all the time. She always had a smile for us. And as I made at least 6 trips back to the room in an hour and a half (seeing her almost every time), she never openly laughed at me, just a nice happy greeting.
Dinner started with the cold soup for mom (another one she liked), and the French onion soup for me (it was okay). Mom had a special order turkey and veggies, and I had the fried fish and seafood plate as well as the lamb plate for me. Both of them were great.
The only picture I got of our wonderful waiting team.
We both skipped dessert. I was too full, plus we had free cupcakes in room. We had gotten a call earlier that day asking if we liked the cupcake class. Mom said yes, and they asked if we’d like free cupcakes. Does anyone say no to that question?
The farewell show was that night, of course. Before the show, one of CD staff said we was having a prize competition for the first 3 people over 18 on the stage. I saw a hat in his hands, and I was on the first row. So I climbed/rolled onto the stage. I got quite a laugh for my moves to get up there. The competition was to make a paper airplane to fly the farthest. I did not win.
My plane few pretty much straight up and straight down. Quite funny and amusing, but definitely not the winner. The other two guys’ planes went almost to the first level back row and to just past the back row of the first level. So I left with the standard RCI keychain, but it was fun.
The actual show was a mish-mash of various things: Richard Spacey’s summary of dance (available on Youtube according to him), another aerial show, a juggling comedian, and the singers along with the usual representation of all staff.
We then went back to the room and quickly packed up everything in time to put the bags out by 11 pm. And while I was sad somewhat that the cruise was ending, my feet had actually had all they could take.
After putting the bags in the hall, I went to Sorrento's in my PJ's for a final couple of slices of pizza. Mom ordered her tea from room service. And we enjoyed our cupcakes (there was a nice note with them).
And there was, of course, a final towel animal that night, a stingray (a little hard to see on the white bed).
So finally the day for the long awaited dolphins had arrived. The line for breakfast in the MDR was too long if were we going to get to our tour on time. So we were forced into the WJ. I remembered why I hate the WJ. The crowd was ridiculous. I wish I had thought of Sorrento’s as an option, but I didn’t. We got breakfast though and survived it.
We then got off the ship and got to the tour spot and checked in right at the recommended time of 9:15. They directed us to wait in the shade of the fence. We then waited around in the heat for at least 45 minutes. When we finally did get under way, there was one guy with a sign trying to lead way too many people. But eventually we made it to the taxi stand, and the tour leader got us a taxi and made it to the park.
Dolphins, wonderful dolphins. I don’t have words for great this experience was, but for $119 I have lots of great pictures for how it was. We almost didn’t get the photos because we thought they said $190 for them. So we were very happy when it turned out to be $119.
The one thing I will say is that both mom and I were very glad we had rented the wet suits with our OBC from booking onboard. The water that the dolphins were in was rather cool for us. We were just barely comfortable with the wet suits on. I saw kids whose teeth were chattering, and we are cold sensitive so I was glad for the wet suits. It was well worth the $40 for the week, even though mom really only used hers that one day.
After the dolphins, we got a short interaction with a manatee. It was interesting how they were both slimy from the stuff growing on them, but then rough as they are actually closely related to elephants. This photo is from the gallery on the picture DVD.
We then got changed and went to the sea lion show. It was fun to see.
I have a short video from the show too.
Before the show, a photographer went around and asked about pictures with the sea lion. It was only $15 for two people. The sea lion only kisses one person for the photo though. So whenever we go back at some point, we’ll go two single photos for $10 each instead. It was a physical photo for this, and I haven't taken the time to scan it yet.
After the sea lion photo time, they offered us a tour of the dolphin area. We mostly took it for the opportunity to see the 3 baby dolphins they currently have. The baby dolphins were adorable. One of them was actually feeding from his mother when we went by. It was sooo cool. This photo is once again from the gallery on the photo DVD. They wouldn't let you use your camera while on the tour.
The rest of the tour was okay, but was mostly stuff we had already seen as part of our dolphin experience.
We missed our scheduled return time by 15 minutes with waiting for the sea lion photo. But I begged my way with another RCI tour operator into returning with some of her people. We got back on the ship and had a sorrento’s snack. I loved the pizza, and returned to enjoy it a number of other times after this. They a vegetable panini (sp? – a grilled sandwich thing) that they made special for mom without the cheese.
We looked at the schedule then and realized we had time to make it to a ribbon to a rose crafts class. This was actually a very hard thing to do. Mine was actually really made by class leader. But I did help make mom’s. It was fun to do though. We wore them in our hair to dinner.
We had an early dinner this night due to a plethora of available activities for this night. Mom had the chilled honeydew soup and loved it. I had the crab cake and absolutely loved it. Mom got a barely cooked salmon (as she wanted it). Some number of nights before this, Florentina had started bringing mom the menu for the next night at the end of each meal. Mom could then make any special requests then so it would work for her eating plan. I had the beef duo and loved it. No dessert for mom this night, and I had a sugar free red berry thing, which was pretty good.
We then went to watch The Croods in 3D. It was a lot of fun. We then raced to see the ice show for our 9:00 reservations. Mom really enjoyed it, and I liked it. There was a decent amount of ship movement this night, and it was really impressive that they mostly landed their jumps with those movements happening.
We ended the night with another snack at Sorrento’s for me, and a snack from Café Promende for mom. Plus we got room service for hot tea for mom, and hot chocolate and chocolate chip cookies for me. And of course the towel animal, a snake tonight.
The picture doesn't do this justice. He actually had a tounge that stuck out and everything.
Since realizing that Grand Cayman was a tender port that can sometimes be missed if the seas are too choppy. I had been praying for calm seas. The sea was as flat as could be this morning.
Another one of my favorite mom pictures
I think this pirate ship must have been sort of excursion. It looked like it might be fun.
While I remember it, the ATMs on Freedom are actually BB&T ATMs. We actually bank with BB&T. Although we never got a chance to use them since they were broken the last two days, when we wanted to use them. But it was only 3% charge in the casino, which worked out to only $1.20, so very cheap.
The night before I had used a minute of internet time to go to cruise critic and search for the cheapest way to get to the Turtle Farm. I very quickly (fortunately) found that the public bus can be taken for $2.50. With some effort and asking around, we were able to find where to catch it. People did keep trying to point us to the tour buses, but a $8 per person each way and that was more than we were prepared to pay.
It was a nice little bus ride (really just a van). The driver was very nice about getting my mom’s wheelchair loaded. The ride took around 30 minutes with all the various drop-offs and pick-ups along the way.
The turtle farm was in general wonderful.
We made a quick stop to look at the large turtles and put on sunscreen. Mom and I both burn very easily.
There were several iguanas ont he beach where the turtles could go to lay eggs.
We then started with the aviary. On the way to the aviary, we happened to see the small turtles in the lagoon getting fed. We could see then there were lots of turtles in there where we would later be swimming. For some reason though I didn't take any pictures of them.
I did take a picture of this rooster on the way to the aviary. There were lots of chickens just running around all over Jamaica.
There was supposed to be a bird feeding at the aviary about an hour after we got there, but we didn’t stay in the aviary long enough to see it. It was just too warm out, but we enjoyed seeing all the pretty birds.
Be warned, some people did get hit from above.
We then went to find out when the lagoon opened for snorkeling and swimming the small turtles. It was soon and was just enough time for mom to get changed into her suit. The lagoon was tons of fun to snorkel in. There was a ton of fish, especially over by the bridge and glass wall to the predator tank. And even though I know there were lots of turtles in there, since we had seen them earlier being fed, I only ever saw two when we were swimming in there. The guy at the snorkel desk had told us that the turtle like to hide, and apparently they are very good at hiding. It was still fun though with seeing all of the pretty fish.
I had given mom my iphone in it's waterproof case so she could try taking some pictures. She had difficulty with it and here's her most interesting picture.
But to be fair, while I got a good movie with the iphone, the picture taking did not work well for me either.
This is a compilation video I took with my real camera in its waterproof casing with the boring just water portions mostly edited out.
I also have this video from the iphone.
We saw these birds on the island that were rather pretty.
This is the money turtle shot pulled from the good camera video.
We really did have a good time in the lagoon though, even though we didn't see a whole lot of turtles while in it.
After getting out of the lagoon and showering, I then raced over to the predator tank in time to see the predator feeding. It was cool, although I didn’t really get any good pictures of it since I got there too late and all the prime spots on the bridge were taken.
Use your imagination a little, and you can tell that these are pictures of nurse sharks. LOL. So I’d suggest getting there early if you want to a good view of it.
We then stopped by the large turtle tank where they were feeding them. It was fun to watch them come up after the food.
Next was the alligator feeding. My best photo of it was with my iphone.
By the time I got out the good camera, the exciting feeding parts making him jump for it were done. But I did get this one video.
It started to rain after this so we ran for cover after this near the yearling turtles. In a break in the rain, I went out to catch and hold one of the turtles. Mom took pictures from some distance away still under cover (these are zoomed in and cropped).
When there was a decent break in the rain, mom got a couple of turtles to hold.
This guy showed us that if you pet the turtles under their necks, then they calmed down. It worked too. It was fun.
After washing our hands, we took a brief tour of the hatchery museum. It was kind of interesting. It was raining pretty hard by then, and we decided it was a good time to head back to the ship.
We just sat under cover for a little while just outside the entrance. The first driver had told us that buses come by every 5-10 minutes. We saw some get off one of the buses, and he told us we had to wait right by the street for one. So we did, and then, of course, one pulled into the driveway. With the rain and everything, I was a little frustrated by this time. In getting mom into the bus with her chair and everything, I had set the bags on the ground. Apparently in the confusion of getting everything loaded, I left our Del Sol bag on the ground in the driveway of the turtle farm. In this bag, we also lost mom’s entire swimsuit and the skirt bottom to mine, as well as our sunscreen and my flip flops. In the end, around a $40 loss probably.
When getting off the bus, I realized we were missing the bag. Shortly thereafter, I realized I had also lost our sea passes. I know I had put them in my shorts pocket after getting off the ship. I’m not really sure when they got lost. The shorts were in the lost bag at the point when we went snorkeling, but who knows. So we went to the port, and explained our loss. The first guards let us through with an understanding nod. When we got to the point where you actually have to show them to get to the tenders, they asked for our ids. I gave them our passports, they came back with our sea passes. Someone had turned them in. We asked if maybe a bag had been turned in with them, but no luck. We then happily got back on the ship with our sea passes.
After a quick stop at the next cruise desk to make an appointment for later, we then enjoyed a late lunch in the WJ. We then relaxed for a while in the room, watch the Love & Marriage game show re-showing on the television, until the time for our appointment. It was fun. The next booking was easily made as all we really needed to do was pick out a room. We had already decided pre-cruise on the Serenade of the Seas out of New Orleans for next year.
This was the 2nd formal night, and since it was still like only 5:30 and our dinner wasn’t until around 7, we took the time to sit on the promenade and people-watch. It was great fun to watch all the people in their outfits. Many were quite beautiful, and others, well, we had fun watching them together.
For dinner, shrimp appetizer for mom, mushroom gravy pastry thing for me. Mom was starting to get very tired of shrimp by now. For entrees, we each had one plate with two lobsters for each of us. I then had the prime rib as well. I liked the prime rib better. Mom had the sugar-free coconut-lychee mousse pie, and found it to be quite good. I tried the baked Alaska (really like the marshmallow topping), and the mousse with fruit (it was okay).
This night was the Once Upon a time show. I liked this show, although I ended up with the song “Popular” from Wicked stuck in my head. But it was a fun and well put together mish-mash of songs. After this, we went to watch Quest. I prefer Quest on the smaller ships. I know they can’t do it the same on the larger ones, and it was okay but not the same. The best part was when the team was supposed to make a ball with 4 people. Then the ball was supposed to roll, as balls should. It was a trip to watch them to try and roll their bodies.
Finally at my nightly stop to look at the cookie selection in Café Promenade, they finally had chocolate chip cookies. I went to Cafe Promenade almost every night in order to get mom hot water for her nightly tea. And of course, there's always our nightly towel animal/person.
