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Archive for the ‘Cruise’ Category

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I Pet A Monkey

In Carnival, Carnival Cruise Line, Cruise, Uncategorized on April 9, 2013 at 10:03 am

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I’ve been to Isla Roatan, Honduras, many many times as the Liberty went there every second week, but I never managed to go on an excursion there for some reason. Last week when we made our last stop there on the Legend, Valeria and I went on an excursion in Roatan!! It was so much fun, we did ziplining and then went to a resort beach and a park with monkeys!! It was such a fun time! It was really interesting to see more of the island. I’ve only really seen the Mahogany Bay part, which is actually made by Carnival so it’s very picturesque. The ziplining place was a 45 minute drive from the pier. In that time you could very clearly see the change in socioeconomic landscape. The areas immediately surrounding Mahogany Bay contain homes that are very run down, ramshackle, and close together. They appear pieced together with random materials, many people loiter in the streets which are very dirty. After about 15 minutes of driving, the houses get further apart as well as larger and larger until you are surrounded by massive sprawling mansions with guest cottages and well kept grounds. After that comes the resort areas, encompassed by a sprinkling of rural housing that gets smaller again but these homes are much tidier. The resorts are absolutely stunning. The entire island is covered in lush green rainforest-type foliage that is absolutely stunning. Ziplining through the trees was absolutely breathtaking. At one point a little monkey came leaping through the overhead branches and landed on the ziplining platform! He was the cutest little guy and he held my hand!! Once we were at the end of our zipline adventure, we stiopped for a brief visit in the monkey park. Valeria had a monkey with her baby on her back jump onto her shoulder and lay down on her head. It was possibly the cutest thing I’ve ever seen! After the monkey park it was time to head to Tabyana Beach, which was beautiful too! We wandered down the beach a bit and had lunch at the Infinity Bay resort, which was simply stunning!!! It’s nice to feel like we’re on vacation for a little bit!!  So Roatan was a great success all around. It was the perfect day to say goodbye to the Western Caribbean!

 

 

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Scary Movies and Cruise Ships

In Cruise on March 4, 2013 at 2:54 pm

Let me preface this post by saying that I am a horror movie fanatic. Old ones, new ones, all kinds of horror movies, I love em all.  My last roommate on the Liberty was a special kind of scary movie fan that I have only ever encountered on ships. She can’t watch scary movies at home, but on the ships she can. This interesting phenomenon spawned today’s post:

Reasons That Horror Movies are Less Scary on Cruise Ships than in Real Life

1)   You can’t sneakily break into a cruise ship cabin. If you are trying to break into a cabin and murder someone, it’s gonna be tough. There is just one (typically creaky) door, that will spill hideous fluorescent light into the cabin awakening the at least two crew members who are probably getting the only two hours of sleep they’ve had all week and WILL rip your face off if you disturb them. Good luck with that, movie villains.

2)   Once a movie villain kills someone, a speedy getaway is key. On a cruise ship, even if you do manage to get away with murder, where do you think you’re going?? We’re going to find you, we have a brig on board, and it’s international waters….need I say more??

3)   There is virtually no way anyone can sneak a giant machete or gun on board. There are so many metal detectors and x-ray scanners to get on board it’s like a floating airport.

4)   Cabin stewards know EVERYTHING……seriously. Guest Services might be the brain of the ship, but the cabin stewards know what/who/where everyone is doing at all times. If you think you can end a life without a cabin steward somewhere knowing exactly what’s happening, and coming to the rescue, think again. Consider your murderous plot ruined!

5)   You just feel safe living in a box with another person. Most scary movies are built upon the premise that someone in a murderous rage is able to sneak into your life undetected from the outside world. Even real world news can’t sneak into our lives on the ships, let alone a psychopathic murderer……those usually have criminal records and are unable to get passports or travel.

6)   Scary movie villains are angry people.  Vacationers are happy people. You do the math.

All of these factors contribute to make scary movies less scary on cruise ships. In the real world there’s so many places in your home or apartment complex that scary movie villains could hide and get you, cruise ships are happy bubbles where villains can’t get you!

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Just like driving at night

In Cruise, travelling on December 29, 2012 at 1:21 pm

I was just up on the bridge to drop something off for the captain, and it was the first time that I’ve been on the bridge at night time. It’s SO AMAZING up there at night. I know I’ve said that the bridge is amazing plenty of times, but there’s a completely different feeling up there at  night. First of all, the lights are all off. Which at first took me by surprise, but then the 1st officer made a very valid point….’when you drive a car at night do you turn on the interior lights?’….of course I don’t, because that would be crazy. Apparently the same rule goes when you’re steering a ship. So it’s quiet and dark and the ocean just stretches out forever. As it does in the daytime, but at night it’s darker and more mysterious. On the right side of the bridge they have set up a little Christmas tree with presents under it and some tinsel as well, so the tree lights create a comforting Christmassy glow in that little corner. Miles and miles away you are able to see other cruise ships, some large, some small, all lit up. With the navigational equipment, the bridge officers are able to tell you what ship you are passing and other information about each ship. Tonight we saw a Royal Caribbean ship and the officers informed me that in a few short hours we would pass our sister ship, the Carnival Freedom. One of my very good friends from GSA College is on the Freedom, and somehow I feel comforted just knowing that our ships are passing in the night. After leaving the office I think I will go out on deck 4 forward and watch the freedom pass us.

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Silver Dining Room

In Carnival, Carnival Cruise Line, Cruise on December 20, 2012 at 12:08 pm

One of the funnest things  I got to do with my parents was eat in the main guest dining room all week. It’s amazing to see what the guests see. It’s a whole other side of the ship!! Every evening, the dining room staff do a dance or sing a song of some kind and it almost always involves everyone flinging their napkins around wildly….so of course I joined in!! Today is my birthday!! Steakhouse tonight!! YAY!

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Bacab Eco Park Kayak

In Carnival Cruise Line, Cruise, friends, fun, travel, traveling, travelling on December 17, 2012 at 11:13 am

Wow it’s been SO long!! I’m so sorry, I’ve been so distracted with my parents visiting and work and all that. No excuse, I know, but I knew I’d be back eventually. HERE I AM!!! So many things to talk about!! First of all, I’m so so happy to have been lucky enough to have my parents on board with me. It was truly amazing!! Not only did I get to see my wonderful parents, but I also got to experience life as a guest, and they got to see the world that I’m living in!! So we did all kinds of fun things while they were here. One of those things was a wonderful visit to the bridge. I love the bridge, it’s so peaceful (most of the time) and i love being able to see that much ocean at once. So I got permission from the captain to bring my parents up for a visit!! Another wonderful thing we did was go on a kayaking adventure through the Belizian rainforest at Bacab Eco Park. First of all, the tour guides were amazing!!! They were so knowledgeable and fun. They really took care of everyone on the tour. We had a blast!!

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAMom and dad in their kayak!

 

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Beautiful views!!

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Symbiosis

In Carnival, Carnival Cruise Line, Cruise, travel, traveling, work on November 13, 2012 at 1:58 am

First of all, let me apologize for being such an absentee lately, with the bad weather and a lot of extra work, I haven’t been able to get much posting done. However, I do have a lot to say, I’m just trying to get it out there!! Here’s something I’ve been working on for a while, I’ve had it sitting in my ‘blog’ document file for a while and just haven’t been able to finish and post it. Oh, I also jsut wanted to say to the other amazing bloggers out there who have followed me lately, I’m very very sorry that I haven’t had a chance to check out your blogs as well, my internet on board is very very limited and most of the time I just get on long enough to post what I’ve written beforehand. As soon as I’m in a port for a few hours I promise to pay more attention to the rest of the world!! Thanks for your patience and for following my adventures!!!

Guest Services is such an interesting place to work. We are, in essence, the hub of activity on the ship, like the nerve center of the brain. We are where everyone goes for problems/questions/complaints/compliments/lost items/found items/crying fits and pretty much anything else you can think of. 

As you can imagine, it gets pretty hectic. There are some other departments that we rely very heavily on to get our job done quickly and efficiently. Issues come to us and we call other departments to get the work done. Specifically, housekeeping. In any hotel the front desk and housekeeping work very closely, but it’s even more so on a ship. The way ship housekeeping works is that we have cabin stewards who do the cleaning of the cabins, turndown service, etc. Then there are the floor supervisors who have sections of decks that they are responsible for, they each supervise a certain number of cabin stewards/cabins. Then there are the housekeeping manager and assistant manager who are in charge of everybody! So in any given day, many different things can go wrong or be perceived to have gone wrong on a ship. Guests call us at Guest Services, we call the appropriate department. Nine times out of ten, we call housekeeping. We have a neat excel document where we can input the cabin number that’s having an issue and the spreadsheet gives us the cabin steward’s phone number and the floor supervisor’s phone number (they all carry cell phones) and we call whomever is on duty at the time. Sometimes we have to call what feels like a million times in a shift, sometimes not at all. Either way, the moral of the story is that housekeeping and guest services are best friends. There’s a certain time of evening when only one floor supervisor is on duty, so ALL the other cell phones get forwarded to that person. Often I’ll end up calling that supervisor a dozen times in one shift to assist me with various tasks such as checking temperatures in rooms, opening safes, pulling out trundle beds, changing remote control batteries or any one of a hundred different requests. The floor supervisors and housekeeping crew work SO hard everyday and I couldn’t do my job without them! Obviously this kind of symbiosis is present in all kinds of other work places. Somehow we feel more connected here than I ever have in any other hotel or resort. Partially I think it’s because we not only work together, but live, sleep, eat, and play together. Although this is also true for resorts where the staff live on property, when you are on land, you can go places, you can get off property. On board, the longest you can leave the ship is for a few hours at a time. It creates a very different dynamic, and I’m pretty sure I adore it!

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Formal Night

In Carnival, Carnival Cruise Line, Cruise, friends on October 30, 2012 at 2:48 pm

This week we had a goodbye party for several of my lovely friends who are leaving in the next few weeks. We kind of had two parties actually. For one, we got dressed up in our blue uniforms (we refer to them as our ‘blues’), and went to the nightclub and the Alchemy bar. Since these places are in guest areas, we had to have our blues on. Since I don’t have my blues, the girls were kind enough to lend me theirs. Everyone gets two sets of blues so there’s always someone to borrow from. I’m still waiting for mine to arrive, one day they will get here!! The second party was in the crew bar, we had food and drinks and invited everyone! Both were lovely, and I wanted to share some photos from the nights because we all looked so lovely dressed up in our blues!! I can’t wait until I get mine!!

The whole gang!! Having a blast!

The ladies!! These girls are so fabulous!!

My SGSS on the left, myself in the middle and my GSM on the right!

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Now you’re Speaking My Language!!

In Carnival, Carnival Cruise Line, Cruise, traveling on October 16, 2012 at 1:25 pm

As you know, I recently moved in with my paisana, Natalie. It’s so lovely to be living with another Canadian. Carnival really tries to let you live with friends, or people from your country and I’m very grateful. Everyone here is wonderful and I love diversity and I love learning about new cultures and languages. However, when you’re far away from home and there’s barely anyone for your country around (there’s 7 Canadians out of 1,160 crew members, I checked yesterday), it’s the most amazing thing when you can reference a Shoppers Drug Mart and not have people look at you as though you’re insane. Natalie said something about Future Shop the other day and I almost cried. Also, being able to speak English really quickly is something I’ve missed. English is such a complicated language (especially when you factor in all the slang) that there are certain nuances that are very difficult to teach. Even people who have been speaking English as a second language for years, while their English is lovely, it’s just not the same as someone who speaks English as their first language. I imagine it’s the same with any language, your second or third or dozenth is never going to be as completely comfortable as your first. I find that as much as I want to learn more languages, there are so many people who want to speak English more fluently, and while I’m very happy to help them, it’s amazing to get to come home at the end of the day and be totally understood. Another thing I’ve had to get used to in the language department, is making my emails very simple and concise. As GSAs, we send emails all over the ship, to all different departments. Sometimes, for the people reading them, English might even be their third or fourth language. Sentences or words that I or some of my colleagues might consider easy to read, may be difficult for others to read, so I have to really concentrate when I send emails to make sure that I’m conveying precisely the message that I want to be conveying, and not confusing the whole ship (sometimes I’m confusing, I’m aware. I’m a work in progress).

While we’re on the language topic, I feel as though I should just write something about ship language. Obviously there’s the typical ship language that is pretty standard; port, starboard, forward, aft. The usual terms. Then there’s the funny ways that the crew speak to each other on a daily basis. In any given day I will use words from at least 5 different languages, only two of which I actually speak fluently. What you end up with is people speaking mostly in English with a medley of accents and a plethora of random words thrown in the mix. Such as:

 

Paisana/paisano = Italian word meaning a person from your country. (I actually used it at the beginning of this post)

Ciao = also Italian, meaning hello or goodbye, we use it constantly, when entering a room, leaving a room, passing in the hallway or starting/finishing a conversation.

Buenos Dias/noches = good day/night in Spanish (spelling might be off, my spell check is in English, sorry!)

Hola = hello in Spanish

Banana = not actually the fruit. We use it when we’ve gotten in trouble or scolded for something. For example; “I got banana yesterday from my GSM because I forgot to follow up with a guest.” Or “I can’t believe you did that, when the HD hears about it, you’re going to get banana for sure.”

 

That’s just a few that everyone knows and uses! I also use a few Russian words (which I won’t even bother trying to spell) with my Russian friends, and more Spanish/French words when I’m with someone who speaks those languages. That’s really just a very small sample of the languages around here. There are SO MANY!! It’s such an amazing environment, I love hearing all the languages everyday and I’m dying to learn more! I was working on learning a little Croatian at breakfast this morning!!

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Wildlife!

In Carnival, Carnival Cruise Line, Cruise, travel, traveling on October 9, 2012 at 9:53 pm

The craziest thing happened last night. After our shift (around 1am), my supervisor and I went to the Lido deck because he wanted some pizza. On our way back to the crew cabins, we walked along the open deck (you know how much I love the night stars and ocean) and saw the strangest thing. Now, I must preface this next sentence with some information. When we are in port, birds enjoy being social on the ship. When we set sail, we leave with some feathery stowaways. Sometimes they might be injured and unable to fly back to the shore, maybe they just weren’t paying attention when the ship left and then by the time they noticed we were moving they were too far away to fly back to shore. I’m not sure what birds think about (I’m assuming not much), but regardless of their motivation, they need to sail with us until we get to land again. Usually there’s a few of them, maybe a dozen. Last night as we were walking, we saw two fly into windows right in front of us, one right after another. One I tried to pick up and rescue, then thought about it again and realized that wasn’t a very clever plan. I’m in no way equipped to nurse a stunned bird back to health, and also, birds are dirty. So we kept walking and I looked up and saw a CLOUD of tiny little birds. Seriously! At least a hundred of them, with all the chirping it sounded like daytime!! I felt as though I was in an Alfred Hitchcock movie!! I’ve never seen so many lost birds in my life. So today we docked in Cozumel and I’m hoping that some of them made it off the ship safely!! Maybe I’ll check after work tonight!!

Speaking of crazy animals! I totally forgot to talk about the size of the iguanas in Grand Cayman. I didn’t get a good enough photo of them to post, mostly because I was gawking at the outrageous size of them!! They are MASSIVE!!! There’s a bunch of little ones, but then you see these iguanas on people’s lawns that have bodies the size of dogs. Not small dogs either. Medium sized dogs. Like the size of a cocker spaniel. Seriously. And their tails are almost double the length of their bodies. It’s outrageous!!! I even saw a small one swimming. SWIMMING!!! Not quickly, but efficiently. They cover lawns, like COVER. We literally saw a hundred or two of them. It was so insane. I’ll try to take a photo of them next time I’m there!!

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Snapshots of Roatan

In Carnival, Carnival Cruise Line, Cruise, friends, travel, traveling on October 8, 2012 at 12:03 pm

I’m not really sure why I didn’t post these photos sooner. I think I forgot I had them! These are my photos from Roatan!! Absolute paradise!!

Pretty self explanatory!

The beach sign with the chair lift behind it!

The Liberty

 

 

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