On the fourth day of our cruise, we were docking in Nassau, the Bahamas! I’ve never been to the Bahamas before, mainly because lots of people told me it’s not that impressive. To be honest, the excursions were a bit crummy and none of them seemed like something we would enjoy (plus, my mom doesn’t snorkel so that cuts out 70% of the excursions!), or if they did, they were super expensive. So instead, we decided we would go off on our own (our first time ever, in any port on any cruise!) and spend some time at the beaches.

(We typically don’t like to do beach-type excursions because we live 20 minutes from the beach itself, so it’s something we can do anytime we want! But we thought we would try it and see how we liked it.) Here’s how the day turned out!

Wednesday, May 7

9:30am: Up and attem!
We wouldn’t be docking in Nassau until noon at the earliest, so Mom and I had grand plans to wake up early and get in a workout before leaving the ship but that just did not happen. Instead, we chose to sleep in and laze around in the cabin on Wednesday morning, which was an a-plus decision, I have to admit. It felt so luxurious! I think we were still recovering from the day before! I don’t do much aside from playing games on my iPad and reading.

10:15am: Get ready
I finally manage to actually get out of bed and get ready for the day. We’re spending the day at a resort on the beach so I put on my swimsuit, pack my beach tote, pull my hair up, and I’m good to go! I pick up the room a bit while waiting for Mom to finish getting ready.

11:00am: Breakfast
We head up to the lido deck to eat at the buffet and find a seat inside. As we’re eating breakfast, the ship begins pulling into the port in Nassau and it’s gorgeous! I can also see it’s going to be a busy, busy day because we’re one of FIVE cruise ships docking there today! There’s another Carnival ship, two Norwegian Cruise Lines ships, and a Royal Caribbean ship. Lots of tourists!

12:15pm: Off the ship and in Nassau!
Nassau was a bit hectic, but once we bypass all the craziness of people trying to get us to join an excursion or take a taxi to the beach, it’s fine. The hotel where I had previously purchased day passes was just a short walk from the port itself, so we had no need for a taxi. We just followed the road to the hotel (the British Colonial Hilton), found it easily, and walked inside to receive our passes.

Our passes were $60 each and gave us access to their pool and facilities, beach and beach loungers, non-motorized sporting equipment (like kayaks and snorkel gear), as well as a $40 voucher toward food and drinks. With my voucher, I bought a hamburger, fries, soda, and a daiquiri later in the day and I still had money left in the voucher to give my waiter a tip. I think it was a really good deal, though I wish I had more time to spend at the hotel. (Though we were in Nassau until 8pm, the passes expired at 5pm.) (Also, I purchased the passes through Island Marketing, and I have nothing but positive things to say about the experience! I recommend using them for any cruise excursions. I’m definitely looking them up for my next cruise!)

I really loved the Hilton! The pool area was beautiful (I really wanted to lie in one of the beds, but they were all taken!), the water was crisp and clean, and it was very quiet. Exactly what I was looking for! We spent the next few hours swimming, relaxing with our books and iPads, and eating. Eventually, we wandered down to the beach which was also really nice but the water was super cold! Also, I totes saw a woman change bathing suits right on the beach. That was strange. (It wasn’t that kind of beach!) She was slightly hidden in a cabana, but I most definitely saw boobies. Wheeeee.

4:00pm: Walking around Nassau
We left the Hilton around 4:00 to walk around Nassau and do some shopping. First, we walked to the Straw Market because I had heard a lot of great things about this place and I was really excited to check it out.

Aaaaaand… nope. Nope, nope, nope. Not our thing! Straw Market was dusty, crowded, super busy, and really loud. It was filled with little stalls of women selling wares, like purses and shirts and other little knick-knacks to take home. Every time we passed by a stall, they would shout at us to come into their stall, ask us what we were looking for, etc. It’s a great place for haggling and finding neat trinkets to bring home, but it just wasn’t our scene. We looked around for five minutes, but I was a little terrified to go into one of the stalls so we left. I don’t like being hassled into buying something.

We eventually found some other shops closer to the port to poke around in and look for some touristy things to bring home. I ended up buying a shirt and a magnet.

5:15pm: Back on the ship
We make it back to the ship and then simply relax in the room for about a couple of hours. We read and play a few rounds of Scattegories.

7:00pm: Dinner
Tonight, Mom and I decide to skip eating in the dining room and just go to the buffet. For one, it was another “elegant dress” night and I wasn’t really up for getting dressed up again, and for another, we were both a little tired of having awkward dinners with our tablemates. We never really formed a good connection with them, and it simply became about surviving the hour and a half of our dinner and not enjoying the dinner and conversation.

So buffet it is! I have a feast. 🙂

8:00pm: Watch the ship leave Nassau
After dinner, we make our way up to the Serenity deck to watch as the ship sets sail. It’s such a pretty night!

(Please excuse the super grainy iPhone pictures.)

8:15pm: Low-key night in
There wasn’t much in the way of entertainment tonight, so we decide to go back to the cabin and chill. We get in our jammies, play a few rounds of Scattegories, and then see if there is anything good on TV. Surprisingly, we catch the latest episode of Modern Family (love that show!) and then catch around the last hour of the Sandra Bullock movie, The Proposal. It’s a silly rom-com but does its job of providing us with some entertainment for the night.

They were also showing Gravity in the outside theater but there was just something about a movie about people floating in space while sitting on a ship in the dark floating in the middle of the ocean that made me not too interested in watching it. Just me?

11:00pm: Bedtime!
Tomorrow was our last full night on the ship (and we would be docking in Freeport early!), and I was pretty sad about it. Vacations go by so fast!

If you had 6-8 hours to spend on an island in the Bahamas, which would you choose to do: snorkeling, laying on a beach, or going on a dolphin swim?

Okay, friends, prepare yourselves for this post! It’s going to be a long one because a lot happened on day three of my cruise. There was an injury, a pub crawl, and lipsticked men kissing random people on the cheek in a Key West hot spot. Let’s dive in, shall we?

Tuesday, May 6

6:30am: Alarm goes off
Yes, yes, sometimes, you have to set alarms on vacations. We were docking in Key West at 8am and we wanted to get off the ship as soon as possible (we had a busy day planned!), so it was an early morning for us!

7:45am: Breakfast buffet
We go up to the lido deck to have breakfast. I have a very healthy breakfast of sugary cereal, bacon, and a chocolate muffin.

8:15am: Off the ship and in Key West
We are cleared to leave the ship soon after 8am, so we do. I’ve been to Key West once before and Mom has been here twice so we’re fairly familiar with the area. We wanted to do some shopping before our excursion started at 11am, so we start walking around. Not even five minutes into walking around, my mom trips on a curb, falls, and injures herself. I will spare you the bloody pictures but trust me, it was stomach-turning. Luckily, the only real damage is on the bottom of her big toe where she sliced part of her skin, and then she had to walk on it for another five minutes until we could make it to a drugstore. We get bandages, water, and antiseptic wipes so she can get herself cleaned up. Not the best start to Key West, and is it horrible that I wasn’t even surprised this happened? In the past few years, my mom has been hit by a car while running, fallen in multiple races, fallen and hit her head while running downtown, and sprained her finger on an excursion on her last cruise… she’s just a bit clumsy, yeah? Love her to death, but I was just like, “Welp, this isn’t shocking. Let’s find a drugstore!”

Luckily, my mom is also a trooper so she bandaged herself up and we continued our shopping journey for the next few hours. I didn’t find anything worth spending my money on, but my mom found a shirt for her fiance and a visor for herself so it was a successful trip!

10:30am: Check in for our excursion
We signed up to do the Key West Pub Crawl which got rave reviews. I’m not typically one for pub crawls, but it seemed like a fun time and they served mixed drinks along with beer, so I was game to try it out. We check in, get our free t-shirts, and then hang around waiting for the tour to start.

11:00am: Pub crawl starts
One of the excursion tour guides gives us a short introduction, and then we’re placed in four separate groups of about 15-20 people each to begin the tour. Our guide tells us that at each bar, we have the choice between beer, a specialty drink, or a single liquor drink (like rum and Coke).

11:15am: The first bar – The Lazy Gecko
At our first bar, I order their specialty drink which is a margarita and my mom orders a Yuengling. We sit with a young couple from Orlando who are personable and friendly and discuss cruising. My margarita is tasty and I can barely taste the alcohol, which I love! (I, personally, despise the taste of alcohol.)

11:45am: The second bar – Rick’s Bar
At the second bar, the specialty drink is called the Caribbean Breeze, which is a mixture of rum, pineapple juice, and cranberry juice. Verdict? It tasted like drinking cotton candy. Super, super, super sweet, and I basically just powered through it. This bar was also next door to a pizzeria so Mom and I got a slice of pepperoni pizza. The pizza was delicious! One of my favorite parts of the pub crawl, which probably tells you all you need to know about my drinking habits. (The pizza came from Angelini’s Pizza, for anyone who wants to know.)

12:15pm: The third bar – Flying Monkeys Saloon
At this bar, they only served frozen drinks, so I got a strawberry daiquiri while Mom got a pina colada. We sat by ourselves where we could people-watch on Duval Street, which was fun. We both drank about 25% of our drinks before combining them together which made the drink 100% more delicious.

12:45pm: The fourth bar – Schooner Wharf Bar
We take a bit of a hike to our fourth bar, it was probably 10 minutes away. This bar is a bit more hectic, with live music and a ton of people. It’s hard to find a bartender to give our order to, but we eventually do. At this bar, I order a rum punch, and I don’t really like it. I’m not sure if it was the drink itself, or if I was just a little over drinking at this point, but I think I only drank about half of it.

I think I was also feeling a little overstimulated and over my social limit at this point of the day. I had been walking around Key West since 8am, it was extremely hot, and I’m the type of girl that drinks once every few months so all these drinks at one time felt like a bit too much. I didn’t feel tipsy or drunk… just done. I was hot and tired and a bit crabby. I’m sure some of it had to be the effects of the alcohol, but I could feel myself shutting down and not wanting to be chatty or social.

After this bar, we stopped on a random street to do a conch-blowing contest, a staple of the Key West Pub Crawl. Only a few people in our group chose to try it, but after seeing the first guy in the group blow for 45 seconds straight (TWSS), I was pretty certain there was no way I would beat that time.

1:30pm: Lunchtime
After hearing that the specialty drink at our fourth and final bar was Caribbean Breeze again (blech), Mom and I decide to slip away from the group and have lunch at Sloppy Joe’s. And Sloppy Joe’s was crazy! Almost every seat was taken, there was live music which made my head hurt, and I felt very worn out from the day. (Don’t I sound like a barrel of fun? I AM SO FUN!)

The weirdest part of the day happened when a random drunk guy waltzed up to my mom to have her tie his shirt up around his midsection. And then he messed it up and wanted her to do it again. And then had one of his drunk friends come by to also get his shirt tied. And then they posed behind our chairs in provocative poses to get their pictures taken. I just… I don’t even know? Ah, drunk people.

And then, said drunk guys went back to their tables, had red lipstick applied to their lips, and came over to give us a kiss on the cheek. (They were doing this to everyone in the restaurant.) It was just a strange, strange time but when you’re in Key West on vacation, I guess it all seems normal!

2:30pm: Back on the ship
After lunching at Sloppy Joe’s, we both decide we are ready to go back to the ship and relax. I take a shower and then read for a bit, before falling asleep for a wonderful, wonderful midday nap. Oh, it was simply the best and I slept for hours.

7:00pm: Get ready for dinner
Luckily, tonight is a casual dress night so I put on jeans and a nice top, straighten my hair, and apply make-up and that’s it. It takes me probably 30 minutes to get ready and then I sit on our little window seat to watch the sun go down. So pretty!

8:15pm: Dinner time!
For dinner tonight, I order empanadas and croquettes for my appetizer which were yummy, yummy; veal parmesan which was not my favorite; and chocolate melting cake for dessert.

9:30pm: Love & Marriage Show
We left dinner quickly so we could hurry to the main show lounge to watch the “Love & Marriage Show,” a staple on cruises. (Similar to “The Newlywed Game.”) And, before the show began, a young guy set up this adorable proposal for his girlfriend, who he has been dating for 10 years. It was SO cute and yes, there may have been some tears shed on my part. Kudos to the guy for being super creative!

The Love & Marriage Show was hilarious! They had three couples on stage: one couple had been married for three days, another for 24 years, and a third for 41 years. So many laughs! Of course, there was that twinge in my heart for not having my own special someone to have those funny moments with. I was a bit sad, “woe is me,” “when is it going to be my turn,” and all that jazz. Ah, feelings. They hit you at the worst times, it seems.

10:30pm: Settle in for the night
Mom and I go back to our room, get dressed in our jammies, play a few more rounds of Scattegories, and then read our respective books before calling it a night. Tomorrow, we could sleep in a bit since we wouldn’t arrive in Nassau until noon.

Have you ever participated in a pub crawl? (This was my first!)

Have you ever had to deal with an injury on vacation? My last injury occurred two years ago when I fell while hiking down a mountain in Georgia and broke my ankle. Most painful injury of my life.

Monday, day two of my cruise, was an at-sea day. I love a good mixture of at-sea and in-port days and this cruise only had one at-sea day. I prefer two on five- and six-day cruises, but it is what it is! Days at sea will obviously vary for different types of people. It can be as busy or as peaceful as you want it to be and for Mom and me, we wanted it to be relaxing, quiet, and calm.

Monday, May 5

7:45am: Up and attem!
I am a notoriously bad sleeper, especially on days when I have the potential to sleep as late as I want to. I seriously thought it was at least 9:30 when I woke up, though, and felt fairly well-rested and refreshed. There is nothing like sleeping on a cruise ship. Soooo relaxing!

8:30am: Breakfast
Another great upgrade to the “2.0” ships is the addition of brunch on at-sea days. I order a big breakfast of eggs, sausage, hash browns, and chocolate chip pancakes. We also order mimosas, which are delicious!

9:15am: Relaxing on Serenity
Now, my friends, this is how a Monday morning should be spent: reading, listening to music, people-watching, and napping in a hammock. It was so perfect and I couldn’t have asked for a more beautiful day, warm and sunny and breezy.

12:15pm: Scattegories & a workout
After three hours in the sun, Mom and I decide to go back to our room. We weren’t hungry for lunch yet, so we play a few rounds of Scattegories and then do a workout. While the ship does have a nice gym, we just do a workout in the room. This is what I did: 50 jumping jacks, 50 arm circles, 50 squats, 50 push-ups, and 50 tricep bridges. Then I repeated that circuit a second time, this time doing 40 reps of each. After that, we ran up nine flights of stairs and then back down. All in all, about 30 minutes of cardio so I was happy with that.

1:45pm: Lunchtime
We were hungry after our workout, so we went to the top deck of the ship for another burger from Guy’s. We had a pretty nice view for lunch! (Better than my usual weekday lunch view… which is my work computer.)

After lunch, we went to the casino to play the slots for 15-20 minutes before heading back to our room to play another few rounds of Scattegories.

3:30pm: Serenity & mango swirls
We decide to spend some time on the Serenity deck and it’s pretty much deserted at this time. We are able to snag a hammock and order frozen drinks to cool us off – mango swirls! I discovered this drink on my very first cruise and it’s my go-to for deck drinking. It’s a mixture of a mango daiquiri and pina colada and it’s seriously yummy. Mmm, mmm, mmm!

4:45pm: Before dinner naptime!
We didn’t spend too much time on the deck because it was really, really hot outside with very little breeze. So we went back to our room, where I read for a bit before taking a short before-dinner nap. The best.

7:00pm: Get ready for dinner
Time to get ready for dinner, and it’s elegant night so Mom and I get all dressed up! It’s fun to get dressed up!

8:15pm: Dinner time!
I have to say, I wasn’t totally impressed with the dinner offerings on this ship. I’m not a very adventurous eater, nor a very “fancy eater” so most of the offerings didn’t appeal to me. This night, I asked for things off the menu (something I don’t normally do) because nothing sounded good. (I know I should probably use my cruises to step out of my comfort zone and try new foods, but it’s really hard when I’m so picky!) Tonight, I order a Caesar salad, steak and a baked potato, and warm chocolate melting cake for dessert.

9:30pm: Casino time!
The entertainment tonight was a little lame (I watch way too many professional dance competitions to watch cruise dancing without a critical eye!), so we decided to spend some time in the casino. Honestly, I don’t love being in the casino because I find gambling to be stupid and a bit pointless. (And my dad has/had a gambling addiction that ruined his marriage, relationships with his family and kids, etc., so perhaps I have a bias against gambling.)

10:30pm: Winding down!
After spending some time in the casino, we head back to the room to settle down for the night, play a few rounds of Scattegories, and then read before going to bed. Tomorrow, we will be in our first port of call: Key West!

Are you an adventurous eater? What’s the craziest thing you’ve ever eaten? (For me, probably the alligator fritters I had on my first night of this cruise! I also tried squid once, during a seventh-grade science class. Not too bad!)

I’m back, I’m back! I wish I was still sailing in the beautiful Caribbean Sea but I am back. Ahh, coming home from a cruise feels so strange because I feel so disconnected from reality! I’ve said it a million times, but cruising always feels like I am truly getting away from my life because, for the most part, I don’t have any kind of Internet access (unless, of course, I want to pay an outrageous fee to have it!) so I can really relax, put away my phone, and sink in deep to the vacation feeling. My cruise (my sixth!) was a fabulous one. I am so in love with cruising and it remains my favorite way to travel. I’m already plotting out where I want to go on my next cruise! But now is the time to settle back into real life. It’s back to work, back to healthy eating, back to to-do lists and household chores and exercise regimes. Womp, womp. But! I have a whole week of cruise recaps planned for this dear blog because I know you all are on the edge of your seats, waiting to hear all about my adventures! (Right?!) I’ve decided to do “day in the life” type recaps this time around because it just seemed like fun! Let’s do this!

Sunday, May 4

9:00am: Leave for the port! It was a super easy, breezy drive to the port. Mom drove the first hour, and I took over for the second.

11:15am: Arrive at the port and make it through security and check-in in no time at all. Carnival likes to tell you not to arrive at the port before 12:30, but we like to be on the ship as soon as possible! We arrive so early that we have to sit in the waiting area for our zone number to be called, and this is when I realized I left my floppy sunhat in the car and my beach tote’s strap broke. Sigh. Not a great start to the vacation!

12:30pm: On board! We’re on board and our room is ready for us to see! We have an ocean view room that is a decent size. Plenty big for the two of us! We do a little unpacking and relaxing in the room.

1:00pm: Lunchtime on the Lido deck. We make our way to the Lido deck for lunch! This is our first time on a Carnival ship that has what they call “2.0 upgrades” which means it has the addition of Guy’s Burger Joint, RedFrog Rum Bar, and Blue Iguana Cantina, among other awesome upgrades. Mom and I decided we must try a burger from Guy’s and it lives up to the hype. Super delicious, with tons of topping selections to choose from. We also buy the “drink of the day” from a waiter because why not?

1:45pm: More relaxing! We spend an hour on the Serenity Deck (my favorite part of any Carnival ship!), then go back to the room to unpack our luggage.

3:30pm: Safety briefing Easily the most annoying part of the cruise, but necessary and no grumbling in the world can make it go away.

4:00pm: Even more relaxing! After the safety briefing, Mom and I find a nice lounger to lie on. We order drinks and watch as the ship sets sail. Then, we read, nap, and listen to music for the next few hours which just felt really, really, really nice. The perfect way to start our vacation!

6:30pm: Get ready for dinner. We chose the “late dining” option, which is our standard go-to. On one cruise, we had the early dining time (6:00) which was nice because we could enjoy more of the nightly shows but also made us feel a little more rushed. I like late dining, which is at 8:15pm.

8:15pm: The first dinner! I kept telling my mom that we were bound to have bad tablemates because, on our past cruises, our tablemates had been so, so, so awesome. We always seemed to luck out with the best tablemates that made for hilarious dinner conversations. And I think I jinxed us because we didn’t love our tablemates. They were a nice couple, but we just didn’t have the same rapport with them as we had with our other tablemates on past cruises. Oh, well! You can’t win ’em all, right? For dinner, I have a Caesar salad and my mom orders alligator fritters so I tasted those. Not too bad! For my main course, I have herb-roasted chicken, garlic fries, and roasted broccoli. And for dessert, they have apple pie on the menu which is one of my favorite Carnival desserts. I was so excited!

9:45pm: Nightly entertainment time! We have a busy night planned! First, Mom and I head over to the casino where we spend $20 playing the slots and end up doubling our money! Woo, woo! Typically, I don’t love the casino because it’s super loud and crazy, and filled with cigarette smoke (I’m super sensitive to the stuff!) but playing the slots is fun. (For about 5 minutes, then I get bored.)

After playing in the casino, we head to the main show lounge to watch the “Welcome Aboard” show. Some of it was cheesy and some of it was hilarious. We got to hear little snippets from the two comics on board. The male comic was super funny and the female comic was lame. (Also, she is the same comic we have had on two or three of our cruises. She’s FOLLOWING US! And all she does is recycle her material because I’ve heard her comedy a few times and it. is. the. exact. same. every. time. Get some new material! Erg.)

And then, after seeing the comics at the show, we decide to try out the male comic in his “adults only” show. I don’t typically enjoy raunchy humor, but I always try these shows to see if the comics can be funny without resorting to sex jokes. (Spoiler alert: they cannot!) There were some funny moments, but a lot of it was vile and gross and just… I may be a prude, okay?!?! But whatever. I like clean comedy!

12:20am: Get ready for bed. We make our way back to our cabin to get ready for bed. We’re both tired by this point, but since tomorrow is an “at sea” day, we know we can sleep in and spend the entire day doing absolutely nothing. The best, the best! I read for a bit before calling it a night.

If you could only choose one way to travel for the rest of your life (road-tripping, by cruise ship, or by plane), which would you choose?