It's SHOWTIME!

Here is one of our SHOWTIME performances. As I mentioned previously, the Yousef and his team of servers performed a different dance for us each night, usually during dessert. The dining room is usually pretty calm and dark, but when it's SHOWTIME, it lights up like a Christmas tree. Yes, I know the quality isn't great, and yes, I know I'm not a videographer, but it's still pretty funny.

This video is their dance to "Jai Ho" from Slumdog Millionaire. Poor Vernon. He just has no rhythm. Trust me, there will be no need for me to point him out to you in this video. It will be obvious. Gusti, on the other hand, was really getting into it.

My intention was to post the other SHOWTIME videos as well, but they are much longer and were taking far too long to upload. I think this will give you a general idea. Enjoy!

That's not his name....

They called him Herb...
They called him Flipper...
They called him Tessy...
They called him Gusto...
That's not his name, that's not his name
(that was my loose homage to the Ting Tings)

His name was Galileo!

A special contest

UPDATE: Thank you for participating. After wading through hundreds of entries (j/k), Beth had the most correct answers. Congratulations, Beth! The answers have been added below.


Where did our previous posts go? Becky and I decided to test your knowledge. How closely have you been following our journey? Below are a few questions about the cruise and our ports. The answers will come from our previous posts, but we temporarily "hid" them to prevent you from cheating. The person who can answer the most questions correctly will win this special Carnival prize pack. Some "Legend Loot", if you will.





The prizes include a tall water bottle caddy, a lovely turquoise string backpack, a Carnival fin tail fun cup, a deck of cards that was used in the casino this week, a Carnival Legend magnet and your very own plush towel animal. Worth playing for?

You have until Tuesday at 5pm EST. In the event of a tie, we have a tie-breaker question.


Put your thinking caps on. Pencils ready?


1) What was the name of our dolphin from the Dolphin Experience? Galileo

2) How overweight was my luggage when we left Cincinnati? 7 lbs (FYI, I bought another suitcase to get all of my loot home.)

3) How much did Becky win playing BINGO? $20

4) We met a crew member from Greensboro, NC. What was his/her position on the ship? Jenna was the fitness (Zumba) instructor

5) There are 132 types of agave. Name two of them. We mentioned sisal, pineapple, aloe vera, and the blue agave.

6) We saw rooster in the one of the museums we visited. What was the rooster made of? Chili Peppers

7) What is the national bird of Honduras? The Macaw

8) Our tour guide in Roatan had the nickname of D.L. What does D.L. stand for? Dark and Lovely

9) What was the first industry in Belize? Logging

10) Name the ports we visited. Which ones required a tender? Grand Cayman, Cozumel, Belize, and Roatan. Grand Cayman and Belize required a tender.

Tie breaker question - List how many towel animals we had in our cabin this week and what kind of animals they were. We had eight towel animals in our cabin. This was a trick question because we didn't get one on Wednesday (Cozumel), but we got three the next day (Belize).
They were a dinosaur, dog, gorilla (or sloth), turtle, turkey, elephant, unknown but looks like an eskimo, and a frog.

Honey...we're home

Well, we woke up in Tampa this morning, and after a brief interaction with the fine folks of the Department of Homeland Security (Customs and Border Protection), we made it to the airport in plenty of time before our flight. Today's flight was non-stop, so we were back in the Greater Cinci area around 1:30pm, and I was home by 4pm. Now it's time for laundry. :(

It was a fantastic trip, and I know there are many more things I want to share with you. I have a few more "must see" photos, and I owe you some videos, too. Give me a day or two to review the information I've shared with you (Grand Cayman seems like a year ago now) and to organize my thoughts. Be sure to check back tomorrow for a very special post.

Thanks for coming along with us.

Day is done...gone the sun

Today was not such a great day. The weather was beautiful, and there were plenty of fun things to do, but it's hard to enjoy them when the "real world" is looming. The best part about today was that we didn't have to be in a hurry. We slept a little later (like 8:30) and had a leisurely breakfast. We had planned to spend the day at the pool, but there were just other things we wanted to do.

At 11am, our cruise director hosted a meeting about the debarkation process and getting through customs. We finished up our last minute trips to the gift shop, went to the internet cafe to print our boarding passes and spent some time in the photo gallery. For those of you who haven't cruised before, there are umpteen opportunities to get your photo taken around this place. Every night before dinner, the photographers are set up in the lobby area with 5 or 6 different background options. Every night you can get your picture taken (no sitting fee and no obligation to buy!) then the next day the pictures are on display. They also take your picture at the dinner table, on the water slide, and coming out of the bathroom (j/k) etc. As you get off the ship at every port, there are also 5-6 opportunities for pictures. There is almost always someone in native dress (native warrior, native dancer, pirate) and there's always ship's wheel or life preserver/lifesaver ring with the name of the port. In hindsight, I wish I had taken every opportunity to have these pictures taken. At the time, you're just ready to get off the ship and get on with your day, but after seeing the pictures and the cool borders they put on them, I wish I'd done it. Of course, they are expensive if you decide to buy them, but some of them were really nice. Usually, Becky and I would get separated, so we weren't in the pictures together, so (note to self) next time I will plan better. We did end up purchasing two of the photos of us in the dining room.




We also went a class that taught us how to make the towel animals. It was always such a treat to see which animal we would find in our room in the evening, and not everyone would have the same animal each night. We would compare notes with the girls at dinner each night. I made a seal and an elephant in the class. They aren't as good as Sulwayan's (our steward), but they look pretty good for a first-timer.


Becky with Sulwayan, our cabin steward.


My towel seal

My towel elephant

Once we were convinced that we'd purchased everything on the ship, we went back to our cabin to pack. It's been like fitting a puzzle together trying to get all of our souvenirs packed. Becky and I both are having to check an extra bag to get everything home. It's sheer craziness! We have both packed and repacked to get the right weight distribution for our bags. Let's hope we're not too far off when we get to the airport tomorrow.

In the late afternoon, Becky took her last official vacation nap while I went on a tour of the galley. Here are a few statistics about the dining operations.


- Yousef, the Maitre d, is in charge of all food services. This includes Truffles dining room, the Lido Deck (Unicorn Cafe, etc.), special events such as weddings and catered parties, room service, crew mess, staff dining room, petty officer dining room, officer dining room, and captain's dining room.

- Truffles Dining room seats 1,316 (812 on the lower level and 504 on the upper level). There are two dining seatings each night.

- The kitchen is located on the deck below. The staff use escalators to bring the food up as it is ordered.

- There are almost 450 crew members in the food and beverage department. (about 950 total crew on the ship).

- There are more that 40 nationalities represented among the crew.

- The kitchen has one main chef and 120 sous chefs.

- All food supplies are loaded at the beginning of each week at the home port (in this case, Tampa). The supplies must be approved by the USDA.

- Food that is not eaten is put in a chopping machine and cut into very, very small pieces. This "mulch" is then discharged into the ocean when we are more than 12 miles for the coast. (Think fish food)


Here is the supply order for the week:

Prime rib - 2,200 lbs.
Chicken - 4,500 lbs.
Steaks - 3,500
Shrimp - 15,000 lbs.
Lobster tail - 1,000 lbs.
Veal - 400 lbs.
Hamburgers - 5,000
Hot dogs - 2,200
Baby back ribs - 13,000 lbs.
Ham - 600 lbs.
Salmon - 900 lbs.
Pasta - 1,000 lbs.
Pizza - 7,000
Tomatoes - 3,000 lbs.
Potatoes - 6,700 lbs.
Banana - 4,500
Apples - 2,500
Melon - 1,000
Pineapples - 1,000
Flour - 6,000 lbs.
Bacon - 36,000 slices
Danish - 20,000
Milk - 900 gallons
Coffee - 1,000 lbs.
Eggs - 50,000

On a daily basis, the chef's team makes between 10,000-12,000 meals per day (guests and crew) Amazing.

Here are a few photos I took on the tour.


Fruit plates ready for dinner


Watermelon carving

Deserts stacked and ready

Later in the evening, we headed downstairs tonight for our last dinner here. The food was good, as always. There is always such a variety. In honor of Halloween, they offered a couple of themed desserts. You could choose between pumpkin cheesecake and dark chocolate cake (this is what was hiding undercover in the picture above).

Vernon and Gusti were very sweet. Vernon was telling us that saying goodbye to passengers is hard on them, too, because they just get a chance to know you when it's time to say goodbye. It's hard to believe that there will be another 2,000 people here tomorrow. Becky and I would love to be stow-aways.

Here's our final sunset and of course, our final towel animal.

A little slice of Heaven

West Virginia is almost heaven, but Roatan is heaven, for sure. I know it may seem like every port is my favorite port, but Becky and I both agree that Roatan will be a place we visit again. As a matter of fact, we had a small discussion today about coming back to the ship only to pack our stuff and just staying here forever. We didn't get to see everything today, but we loved what we saw.

We arrived around 8am this morning after sailing very slowly through the night. Roatan has a port, so once again, we were able to walk right off the boat onto the pier. Here are a few shots I took this morning as we were docking.

Our excursion today was of the west side of Roatan. Roatan is one of the three islands off the coast of Honduras. It's 35 miles to the mainland. The island is about 30 miles long and 4 miles wide at it's widest point. There is only one main road that goes the length of the island. Once you get to the end of the island, you just turn around to come right back. Our very funny tour guide today was Jaslyn, but she told us her nickname is D.L., which stands for dark and lovely. Jaslyn told us the crime rate is very low in Roatan for two reasons: there is no where to run to get off the island so you will get caught and the jail here does not provide any kind of food. If you get locked up, you have to rely on your family to bring your meals every day. That's pretty smart.

D.L. first took us to the botanical gardens. In the US, our botanical gardens are usually part of a museum, or maybe it's a domed area with lots of plants and foliage. Here is Roatan, the botanical garden was like walking through a jungle. The vegetation here is very thick and lush because they get about 60 inches of rain each year. Vanessa, our guide through the garden, pulled leaves off of various trees for us to smell and identify. We saw (and smelled) cinnamon, all-spice, oregano, and vanilla in its most organic form. We also saw the fruit of a cacao tree (which makes cocoa or chocolate), a coffee bean, and the nut from a mahogany tree. Here are some visuals for you.

This is the fruit from a Caoco tree. The seeds make cocoa.

These are nuts from the Mahogany tree.

The red berry is actually a coffee bean.

While she liked the garden, Becky was eaten alive by bugs. We were standing next to each other, and for some reason, I don't have a single bite on me, but she is covered with welts.

Next we went to a bird and butterfly sanctuary. There we saw toucans, parrot, macaws (the national bird of Honduras), and even an ant-eater and white tailed deer. The butterfly area was small. I didn't get many photos of the butterflies because they wouldn't land.

Ant eater.

We had an opportunity to spend about an hour in the the West End Village. This place was magnificent. We spent a few minutes at a restaurant along (or should I say over) the Caribbean Sea. The water was so clear. It was really our first opportunity this trip to see anything close up that resembled a beach. After having a cool drink, we did a little shopping and then couldn't resist sticking our toes in the water. Notice the clear water.

We met a man who owns a t-shirt shop who told us that he came to Roatan three years ago on a cruise. He also fell in love with the area, went home and put his business up for sale, sold it within a week, and had moved back to Roatan three weeks later. I can't say that I blame him.
Another fun fact about Roatan: Although there are many banks on Roatan, they do not loan money for houses. The people of Roatan buy a piece of land then build as they have the money. It may take them years and years before their house is complete. Once they have a roof on the home, they will move in - even without windows. We saw many homes in various stages of completion.

On the way back to the pier, we stopped at the highest point on the island to take photos. This area provides a panoramic view of the westernmost point on the island with the Caribbean Sea all around.


Unfortunately, the ship left Roatan at 3pm today, so it was our shortest port. Becky and I were bummed to sail away from this tropical paradise, so we cheered up by spending our first afternoon at the pool. There are three pools on the Legend, and they were all crowded this afternoon. None of these pools are very large, but there are (almost) always plenty of deck chairs to go around. The pool was so relaxing. After about an hour, our chairs were seeing some shade from the deck above us, so we hung out in the pool. As you can see in this picture, there is a large shallow area (ankle deep) all around the pool. We made ourselves at home in this shallow area for quite a while. It was the perfect way to spend the afternoon.

Tonight was another "Cruise Elegant" night for dining. We got all cleaned up to go downstairs to see our favorite waiters.

Tonight the "showtime" song was YMCA. (Video next week). After dinner, we headed to Follies for a show called "The Big Easy" featuring songs about New Orleans. It was very good.

It's really hard to believe this trip is already winding down. Tomorrow we will have to start packing up. The disembarking process and going through customs can be a little complicated, and we have to catch a late morning flight on Sunday. But for now, we're just going to enjoy tomorrow.

Kim: The faces on the towel creations are torn bits of paper. The steward uses old copies of the daily newsletter (Carnival Capers) for this.

Beth: The water has been every shade of blue from turquoise to sapphire. It's unbelieveable. Today, the water was so clear, we could see the coral reef. (picture is included above)

An unBELIZE-ably beautiful day

Greetings from Belize. Finally, it's a beautiful day. Before we get started, I want to wish Happy 22nd Birthday to my nephew, Nathan. I bought you something today to commemorate your special day, and I wanted to let you know I didn't forget.

Good news! Becky woke up feeling much better, and so far today, things are great. She's wondering if the congestion has been related to the rain we've seen so much of this week.

Belize is a tender port..no, I don't mean sensitive. I mean we had to take a water taxi from the boat to the port. Today's ride was about about 15 minutes. When we first boarded the tender, there was a slight misty rain and another rainbow. (They must not be rare around here) But the rain was gone in just a few minutes, and a warm, blue sky greeted us.




Can you see the rainbow?



Today's excursion was called "The sights and sounds of Belize." Our tour guide, David, was both our bus driver and guide. (Beth, there were 22 in our group today, so we were in small bus instead of a coach bus.) Technically, we were in Belize City, and not to be confused with the more popular touristy cities in this country, such as San Pedro. Belize City is actually 30 miles from the closest beach, so while we were very near the water all day, the shoreline was rocky versus sandy. Because this area is only 1 foot above sea level, it is very easy for the government to add land when they decide to expand. I guess they just tamp down the dirt. David mentioned that some of the property that used to be waterfront now sits along a street. That would be a bummer! The flip side of being so close to sea level is that they are very susceptible to flooding during their rainy season.




Last month, Belize celebrated 28 years of independence from the British crown. Unlike, Grand Cayman (who was also under British rule), we drove on the right side of the road here. David said that not so long ago, they did drive on the left, but changed because a large highway was supposed to be built through the area to connect several Central American countries. Unfortunately, a hurricane caused a lot of damage in the area so the road never came through Belize. The government opted to uphold the new driving laws. Belize takes a lot of their influences from the United States. Even the guys around here wear their pants down around their thighs, showing their boxer shorts to everyone who cares to look.

David was really great to drive us through both the good and the bad parts of Belize. He said that 90% of the tourism to Belize City comes from the United States. He wanted us to see that the majority of their people are very poor, but they are rebuilding and are very proud country. He mentioned that they are the second most literate of the Central American countries. As we were driving around, it was 10:15am ship time, but 8:15am local time, so we saw good number of children in a rainbow of school uniforms starting their day. All of the schools here require a uniform, and each school has a different color.






Repeatedly throughout the day, David thanked us for choosing this tour to become educated on the rich culture and history of Belize. So many tourists come there only for the snorkeling and diving.

Our tour today consisted of two activities at the same stop. First we went through a small museum depicting the timeline of their country. Much of Belize used to be rain forest. When the British settled here, they discovered the Mahogany Tree and soon started exporting them back home to England for the use of building fine furniture, ships, etc. It takes about 80 years for the Mahogany tree to mature. Unfortunately, they British didn't replant trees as they cut them down. (Now, of course, mahogany is protected.) Logging became the first official industry of Belize. Once the loads of trees were unloaded in England, the boats were loaded with bricks to balance the ships for the trip back to Belize. These bricks were then used to build new buildings, thus changing the landscape of construction in this country.





Next, we went next door to an auditorium to see a dance troupe perform several native dances. There were several men playing different sized drums, turtle shells, a conch shell and maracas. It was pretty interesting. I took videos of these dances and will post them when I get home.


After some light shopping, we headed back to the Legend around 3pm ordered some room service (Becky had a BLT and chocolate cake; I had a BLT and creme caramel - a custard). I actually started typing today's blog, and we relaxed until dinner. (I can't remember if I mentioned that we have the 8:15 seating for dinner.) When we arrived at dinner, only the girls from IL were there. Vernon and Gusti were glad to see us and told us that they missed us last night.


Becky, Gusti, Me, Vernon

What was on the menu? Becky had potato soup and mozzarella cheese sticks as appetizers, a pork chop for dinner, and bitter and blanc for dessert. Bitter and blanc is dark chocolate and white chocolate bread pudding. I had a spinach and portobello mushroom salad and a shrimp cocktail, a vegetarian enchilada, and the bitter and blanc. I also tried the coconut cake that was made with splenda. (It was delicious.) After reviewing the video from our dinner show a couple of nights, Becky and I teased Vernon that he needs to work on his dancing. Tonight's show was to "Hot, Hot, Hot" so we made Vernon practice his moves ahead of time. He is terribly shy. When it came time for "SHOWTIME", Vernon seemed to be hiding in the back, but then he came out and danced right in front of our table. It was hilarious and pitiful at the same time. Of course, I have it on video and will be sharing it next week.

We went to a passenger talent show in the Follies at 10:30. John Heald, our cruise director, hosted the show, and he is a lot of fun.

After the 4 acts performed, he had an audience participation skit that was hilarious. It was so crazy that Becky and I thought it was scripted. At midnight, there was a Mexican buffet and deck party on the Lido Deck. It's a beautiful, warm night, and when Becky and I left, the party was going full force with about 100 people on the dance floor doing the electric slide.

There is just so much more detail that I would love to share with you about each day of this trip, but there is just not enough time in my day. As Karen has pointed out, I am a night owl and usually stay up until about 1-2 am getting this posted. I'm enjoying recapping the day for you because it's helping me to remember. I have so many great photos that haven't hit the blog, but I'll make time next week to share some of them, too.

Quick story...when we headed out this morning, we saw our cabin steward in the hall. Becky told him that I was disappointed to have not had a towel animal last night since she had been sleeping. (Hmm...I was disappointed? Well, yeah, but she was too.) She asked if we could have two animals tonight. When we came back from the excursion, we had a turkey and a turtle on our beds! As an extra treat, we also got an elephant tonight with our turn down service. Bonus!

Tomorrow is our last port, Isla Roatan off the coast of Honduras. Our tour leaves at 9:30, so I'm going to sign off for now. Keep the comments coming. BTW - Beth, yesterday's coach bus was a brand that I was unfamiliar with. Most of the cars we've seen on this trip have been European or Asian; however, we did see about 15-20 Saturns today. How weird is that?? The beds are pretty comfortable - I just haven't seen much of mine this week. :) You would love this cabin because it is SO dark at night.

Here comes the sun...or not

Hola from Cozumel, Mexico. Today may have been our busiest day yet. When we woke up this morning at 7:30am, we were not quite in Cozumel. We were very close because we could see land on the horizon. The day was starting out to be a little cloudy, but we did see the sun peek through.

Unfortunately, we also saw rain in the distance. As we were eating breakfast by the window in the Unicorn Cafe, this is what we saw.

It was so beautiful, and I knew it had to be a sign of good things to come. We made our way down to the Follies Lounge (the theater) to meet up with the other 2,000 people going on excursions today. I'm not exactly sure why they corral us in there before we leave the ship. In Cozumel, the Carnival ships dock at Puerta Maya, which is a private area that Carnival has built. There is currently one pier, but they are in the process of building a second pier. When that goes in, there will be room for 5 carnival ships to port on the same day. Today, the Carnival Holiday was already at port when we arrived.

This is us pulling along side the pier.

Because we were at a pier, we could walk right off the ship. No tender was necessary. It was a great time savings, but the walk from the ship off the pier was a good 1/4 mile or so. Puerta Maya is like a smaller version of downtown Cozumel. With a few exceptions, the same shops were located at both.

When we arrived at the end of the pier, we saw signs for today's excursion, Cozumel highlights and shopping. As we got in line, guess what happened? Yep, it started raining. We got on a motorcoach with 37 new friends, our tour guide Barbara, and our driver Jorge, and started our tour. Our first stop was Discover Mexico Park. It's a small cultural museum that not only highlights the different cultures of Mexico, but also showcases the beautiful craftsmanship of their people. All of the art on display was made completely by hand. The tools, dyes, paints, etc. used to make these goods are also handmade. There were some pretty amazing pieces in there. Here are a few that caught my eye.

Tree of Life

This is colored sand.

This rooster is made from chili peppers.

Outside of this museum, they had a pathway that led to replicas of famous landmarks in each of Mexico's 31 states. Unfortunately, it was raining pretty hard and the pathway was muddy, so we didn't walk through the display. I did take a few pictures on my way back to the bus. I just can't tell you what these buildings are. Again, all hand-made.

Luckily, the rain let up. Our next stop was a Mayan village. There are currently 45 families living in this village. The houses are little shacks. Barbara told us that this village is responsible for making a lot of the jewelry (mainly black coral and silver) that is sold at other shops on in Cozumel. They had shops set up, and most of the prices were reasonable; but as you might expect, they could be a little pushy. The main attraction at this village is a 1,000 year old Mayan church and a 500 year old Catholic church. When Catholicism was introduced to the area, they had to build the church so that families could worship together. We weren't able to get into the Mayan church, but the Catholic church was quite picturesque.



Back on the bus, everyone. On the way to the next destination, we stopped at a beach-side souvenir stand. (Barbara knows all the hot spots.) We weren't really interested in the items for sale, but the view was beautiful. There were huge rocks of coral along the shore, and the waves were really rough. (I felt sorry for all the people who thought they were going to snorkel today.)

We get back on the bus and drove about a mile down the road when Jorge pulled over. There was a man along side of the road that was helping newly-hatched turtles make there way into the sea. If any of you are fans of turtles, you probably know that usually hatchlings leave the safety of their eggs at night when it's safe. A good majority of young turtles won't make it to the water because they'll be eaten by birds. A group in Cozumel has decided to help the cause, and they put a stake in the sand by the turtle's nest with the date they are likely to hatch. (Notice the red stake in the photo below.) When the date draws near, they come to the nest to watch the turtles hatch and then help them make it into the water. It just so happens that because the weather was so rough today, some of the turtles were brave enough to head to the water during the day. This little green turtle is now making his was to the Gulf of Mexico where he'll someday weigh about 500 lbs.



Next we learned about agave. Barbara told us there are 132 types of agave. Examples of agave include sisal, aloe vera, and pineapple. This is the blue agave plant. It looks like a gigantic pineapple plant growing in the ground. The blue stalks (if that's what you call them) will get to about 7 feet tall when the blue agave is ripe. This will take 10 years. What is made with blue agave? Why, tequila is made with the blue agave. Our next stop was to the Cava Antiqua Tequila "factory". Barbara tells us that if tequila is made with 100% agave, you will not be hung over in the morning. I will take her word for it. They did offer us a tasting of 9 different tequilas. They make a lot of flavors such as cream, coffee, cherry, and orange. Tequila is actually made with the big round part of the agave. (the large egg shape in the photos below) The nectar from the blue stalks are actually used to make a natural sweetener. Since it is sugar-free, it is popular with diabetics. It looks like maple syrup. I bought a bottle to try in my hot tea this winter.

At this point, we've been on this 4 hour tour for 4.5 hours, and we haven't been to downtown Cozumel. A couple of people asked if we could skip the shopping in downtown and just head straight for the Puerta Maya. Since many of the shops are located at both places, we voted to just drive through downtown and then head for the pier. By this time, I'm starving, and it's late enough (about 4pm) that the only thing available on the ship will be hot dogs, hamburgers, or pizza. We decide to try one of the recommended restaurants, Pancho's Backyard. I had a sampler platter (notice my chicken sombrero) and Becky had a burrito.

We did a little bit of shopping and headed back to ship. The Carnival Imagination had arrived while we were gone and is now parked beside us.

Becky has had a rough 24 hours. She had some sinus pressure under her right eye and has been sneezing and blowing her nose all day. She bought some medication at port and has been sleeping since shortly after we got back. I went to the fitness center then came back thinking we'd be getting ready for dinner, but Becky's still sleeping. I'm really not hungry since we ate such a late lunch, but I'll miss Vernon and Gusti. They work hard to make our dinner special. If she wakes up at some point this evening, we'll probably order room service and just relax tonight. Our cabin steward came by at 8:30 for our turn down service, but since Becky's in her bed, no turn down and therefore, no towel animal tonight. Sorry, folks!

We left Cozumel at 7pm. Next stop...Belize.