Sunday, January 14, 2024
My sleep app said I slept for 9 1/2 hours. Guess all those five hour nights finally caught up with me. We skipped the hotel breakfast, but we had to make two trips to the nearby Publix (a 3 minute walk) for some forgotten items. It was already humid and very cloudy. However, at home, 2 inches of snow was predicted. I’ll take humid.
We used Uber to get to the Port of Miami. It was a 10 – 15 minute drive and we arrived at exactly our check-in time. The on-board process was very quick. We never stopped walking and we were on the ship by 11:15. There were a number of Carnival staff members directing people to their muster stations. Ours was in the main dining room on Deck 7. They checked us in, and we watched the life vest demonstration. We would watch the safety video once we got to the room.
They were dissuading all passengers, even Diamond and Platinum passengers, from going to their rooms to drop off their luggage so I was glad all we had were our backpacks. We went to Deck 8 and got some Bar-B-Que at the outside kiosk of Pig & Anchor. We stayed on Deck 8 and sat in the shade in the Summer Landing zone.
At 1:30, the Cruise Director announced that the rooms were ready for occupancy. Our extended aft balcony, 10508, was just two floors up from the Summer Landing area. The room consisted of a king bed, one pull-out couch, a stool that had storage and fit under the desk. the balcony was large enough for a lounger, two chairs, and a small table. Nice view of the Summer Landing pool and the ocean.
The outdoor sailaway was cancelled because of rain. The inside areas became very crowded very quickly. We found a seat in the Celebration Central Zone area and listened to the percussionist perform some Caribbean tunes on the steel drum.
Once we were in international waters, the Casino opened, and we played some slots until it got so crowded you couldn’t move around. We got a sandwich from the Deco Deli and called it an early night.
