Wednesday Dec 7
Carnival Wine Cruise 2005
Wednesday was Grand Cayman day, and we didn't have any wine events scheduled until 5:30pm. We'd set up a "swim with the stingrays" for 12:15pm. I *love* stingrays and this was incredibly appealing to me. They started letting people know to gather in the Venetian theater pretty early on, but we slept through the early announcements. Still, I'd heard stories about long tender lines, so I didn't want to wait too late either. Bob headed down at 9am to get some melons from the buffet for me. He came back up with nice items, but said that the buffet selection seemed very off today. The melon was either very mushy or green, and the eggs were really not edible at all.
There was a PA announcement at 10:30 that said people should still go to the Venetian theater to get tender tickets. We went down and joined the line, getting #24 stickers stuck to our shirts. We sat in the theater with a lot of other people and were there for about 35 minutes, waiting as they called various numbers out. They called ours and we headed down to the gangway area on deck zero. At the bottom, it turns out the tender was full and we had to wait for another one to come to us and fully disembark before we could get on it. There was a series of stairs down to the boat - a few crew members there helped you do the stepping across onto the boat.
It's hard to see in this picture, but in essence you go out a hole in the side of the ship, down a set of relatively steep metal stairs to a small ship that is tied up to the side of the big one.
Here's a picture of another tender coming in while we were going out.
The actual crossing was very short - it was cool to see the several other cruise ships all around you, and compare them all. After all of the delays we weren't on shore until after 11:45.
The landing area was a HUGE crowd - you land in a circular open-air building and there are signs on various posts saying where tour groups are gathering. I was worried to get too far away, so we only wandered a little down the road to a shop to buy an underwater camera. It'd been on my list of things to get before we left for the cruise but I never managed to buy one. Then we were back at the gathering area at about noon. About 12:10 a guy with a bullhorn showed up and called out our tour group. He held up a yellow clipboard and told us all to follow him to the parking lot. We all had to walk down the street, cross the street then through a set of shop areas to the parking lot area. It was relatively hot out, I was avoiding the sun and staying in shadow.
A small group got on a large van, but when it left, there was nothing else to get on. We waited about 10 minutes before an old schoolbus showed up and the rest of us climbed onto it. Then we drove about 20 minutes over to the actual dock area. It was a boat with very little "cover" on it so I felt lucky to get an inside seat with the shade on me. I'm quite burnable :) When everyone was on, we headed out. It was a full half hour ride to the sandbar. The boat did sell soda, water, beer, cookies, chips, and tshirts.
The guide told us to be very careful where we stepped on the sandbar - the rays are very friendly, but of course it's cruel to stomp on them! They won't sting you unless you hurt them, just like any other creature. We all had to go barefoot - no shoes of any kind were allowed. The smaller rays were the males, while the larger ones were the females.
When we got to the bar, several other boats were there. People were worried about going out with the rays, which you could see as large black shapes moving around. Not me! I was one of the first people off the ship, with Bob right behind me. We had the free provided snorkels and masks on. It was really deep where we first got in - over 5' deep with high waves - but we swam over to the sandbar area where it was about 3' deep. The waves were still high and splashed in the snorkels occasionally, but I spent most of my time swimming with my mask in the water looking for waves. Bob stood and would either propel me towards a ray or grab me and tow me back in if I drifted too far off into the ocean.
It was GREAT!! The rays were REALLY friendly and I pet a ton of them. I could swim along with them, watch them swim beneath me, and had a ton of fun. I even fed one with a squid piece provided by the ship. I wish they had a lot more squid available to feed them! We were out there for a long time and I was reluctant to leave, even so. We were out there about a full hour. I should get those photos developed soon. Finally it was time to go, and we all climbed back into the boat. It was another 1/2 hr back on the boat, then another 15 minutes or so (less traffic) directly to the dock area.
Stingray Photo Slideshow
We'd considered roaming around town, but we'd also heard horror stories from previous cruisers about 2 hour long lines in the sun to get onto a tender. It was about 3:50pm at this point. The line seemed reasonable, and the Carnival rep there said it was currently only 20 minutes to get onto a tender, so we jumped into line. The line was mostly under that circular building so we didn't have to be in the sun much at all, and by 4:10 we were back on the ship again.
I want to note here that "on paper" the stingray tour was listed as a 2 hour tour, I believe. In reality, we left to start for it about 10:30am and were back after 4pm because of all the travel time and waiting involved. It's really important to plan that into your schedule.
We were now STARVING as we never had lunch, so we immediately changed and went looking for food. So was everyone else coming in on the tenders. No such luck! The buffets, Chinese, etc. was all closed, and the sushi was not yet open. The only things open were the 24 hr things - the pizza and grill - and they had HUGE lines. Huge huge. Bob went into the grill line and I went in the pizza line. Because people in line wanted specialty pizzas, they asked "anyone want Cheese??" and I was the first person down the line to want some. So I had my 2 pieces over at a window table in the pool area, with the blue plastic weave seats. There was a cool pirate ship that went by the window while I ate. I was fully done and had sat for about 20 minutes before Bob finally came over to join me. Apparently it was SUPER slow at the grill.
We headed back to the room to get changed for the sparkling wine talk at 5:30. By the time we got showered and changed and everything it was just after that, so we missed the very beginning of the talk. We got to try both "white and rose" from the Domaine Carneros sparkling wine from California. The talk was very interesting and is going to be covered on the wineintro.com website. The Victorian lounge was great for this, and most of us walked out of the room with a glass of sparkling wine (having drunk several during the talk). Bob and I headed right for the sushi bar.
I *love* sushi so I'd been hoping for this visit all cruise. However, I was a bit disappointed. This really isn't "sushi", it's a few rolls. They had a shrimp on rice, a roll with mayo in it, and 2 other crab type rolls. In fact I asked the chef if they had an option to have sashimi and he didn't know what sashimi was. We took our sampler plate over to the Paparazzi wine bar just a bit down the hall to sit and have our Champagnge with the rolls.
It was quite a nice combination, but right across the hall is Hot & Cold which is the disco. Apparently they were full swing into karaoke and some of the singers were pretty bad. So it wasn't a perfect combination, to have delicious Champagne, sushi rolls, and people howling out "OOooooh Sweeeet Child of Miiiiine! OOoo-ooOOooOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!" :) :)
When we finished up, we went up to the spa and exercise room to take some pictures. You had to walk through the locker rooms to get to the exercise room, which we found a bit odd. There was no way to just take a look at them easily. Once you get through, though, it was QUITE impressive. The saunas, male and female, were quite large. The exercise room was also quite large with individual weight stations, a long row of bikes and treadmills, and a gorgeous hottub with a landscaped waterfall-rock layout. I think I've found my new hottub hangout location!!
I signed myself up for a massage tomorrow at 3, since we have no plans until after dinner as far as the wine club goes. I figured I had a responsibility to test it out for the cruisecritic members :) :)
We stopped by the shop area - they had neat "first year of operation" type tshirts and such, and many alcohols which seemed OK but not "real bargain" priced to me.
We headed back towards the dining room and I wanted to stop in the "Cabinet" with the parquet floor to listen to the wonderful piano player before dinner. However it was REALLY smoky in here and Bob vetoed the idea. Usually I hate smoke but I was willing to put up with it to hear the music. No dice. We went up to the "real" piano bar (the one with the piano decor) but nobody was there. We hung out there enjoying the quiet until 8pm, when we headed down to dinner.
Tonight was a winemaker dinner, in that we got a glass of the Carneros pinot noir to try. Bob and I ordered a bottle of Bordeaux to go with the dinner itself. The dinner began with a bonus chef offering - a shrimp in tomato/guava juice which was OK. There were new england crab cakes which were nice and moist, a lobster bisque which had a lovely flavor but wasn't as thick or creamy as I'm used to up in New England. The chauteaubriand steak was REALLY good and after seeing how mine came out another table member ordered one for herself even though she'd already gotten the shrimp. Dessert was OK - a layered chocolate mousse / thin dough creation - but I still lust for that melted chocolate we had a few days ago.
The entertainment for tonight was first that a waiter sang a lovely love song for us, and then the whole crew did "jump for your love" for us around the tables, with many diners chiming in.
I want to comment here that pretty much every night people have dressed "Formally" - most women are wearing lovely cocktail (short) dresses if not full out long dresses and high heels. Many guys are wearing suits every night, or at least nicely pressed shirts with their slacks. I watched carefully tonight and only 1 guy and 1 girl wore jeans, and I'm not sure that they were eating in the restaurant - I only saw them on the way in, talking near the entry area.
I was exhausted by now, from all the swimming and constant early hours. I'm normally the type to wake at noon and then work until 4am. But I still wanted something chocolatey, and we had that port in our room. We went up to the Jardin Bar which has coffee, tea and desserts by the casino. I got a gorgeous black forest cake slice ($2 I think) and we took it up to the room. It was FANTASTIC with the port. A perfect end to an evening. Oh, and we got a stingray towel animal!! Too cool! Then it was to bed, before midnight!!
I do want to mention the beds are REALLY comfortable. Maybe it's because they're in essence brand new, but they are quite soft and snuggly. Also interestingly now 2 of our door fish had migrated to other doors. Apparently they are popular with people :)
Photo Collection from Wednesday
Carnival Liberty Winecruise main travelogue page