We survived.
More or less, but what did we survive? A nice, long cruise aboard the Carnival
Conquest -- words that, by themselves, will have the power to make some forumers blanche.
Cruise. Carnival, but for us, we have taken many cruises and most of them have been nice. This one, even, was nice until the last day because we were able to roll with the punches that kept flying our way until debarkation, at which point the punches caught up with us. Here's what happened.
The ship was supposed to go from Miami to Grand Cayman, Costa Rica, Panama, Colombia, and back. We went from Miami to Grand Cayman, then to Puerto Limon, Costa Rica where we learned upon getting back on the ship that day that we would
not be going to Panama as scheduled due to protests against the government there. You can imagine the bitching from other passengers, because most of them (and us too) only chose that cruise for the chance to see Panama. But no matter. It was another "Fun Day at Sea" as Carnival calls them and it didn't really bother us. However, an announcement went out later on that fun day at sea that a passenger had had a medical emergency, and therefore we would be heading at full speed to Cartagena, Colombia. We arrived at 10PM when the ship was originally scheduled to arrive at 7AM the next day, and we all got to watch someone in a stretcher get carted off the ship and into an ambulance. The next day we enjoyed our day in Cartagena, then sailed way only to hear another announcement that night that another passenger had a medical emergency and we would be diverting to Grand Cayman to get that person off the ship and to a hospital.
After that, we were told that what with all the disruption we'd be getting back to Miami at 10AM, when the ship had originally been scheduled to arrive around 8. On the day we were due to get to Miami, due to a strong headwind, we actually got into port around 11:30AM. Then there came the usual dicking around, then an extremely disorganized debarkation process that dragged on for about four hours and had to be halted at one point because the cruise terminal got too full. We had not yet made it into the cruise terminal by the time our flight home took off at 1:40PM. But we went to the airport, managed to get on standby flights, managed to make both standby flights, from Miami to Charlotte and Charlotte to Greenville, and were at the baggage claim at Greenville-Spartanburg International when we received a text message to inform us that our luggage had not been able to accompany us and would instead be following us home at a discreet distance.
Then we both got sick, my husband with a cold, and me with covid.
It was memorable. For one thing, I found four rubber ducks on the ship and I'm quite proud of myself. That's a thing, you know -- people hide ducks on the ship and others look for them. But anyway, we survived and I made sure to take a great many middling photographs with my phone.
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Miami, Florida:
George Town, Grand Cayman:
Puerto Limon, Costa Rica:
In Puerto Limon, we did an excursion that took us to a cacao farm run by a drug treatment center whose recovering patients farm the cacao, turn it into chocolate, and run the little eco-resort the farm operates there. As my husband and I are both in addiction medicine, we found it interesting.
On our return to the port, a children's band was out playing the most aggressive Christmas carols I think I've ever heard.
Cartagena, Colombia:
Cartagena does not have a cruise port, per se, as the cruise ships dock at the industrial port and give incoming passengers a wonderful view of container ships being loaded and unloaded. However, something that's very interesting is that tucked away in a corner of the port is a little free zoo:
Then our excursion took us to the old city:
Castillo San Felipe:
The church of San Pedro Claver:
The bones of San Pedro Claver:
A museum dedicated to the Inquisition of Cartagena. It was unexpected.
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I'm pleased to report that Cartagena is a great world city, as it does indeed boast a statue of a guy on a horse.
The statue of Fat Gertrude, aka La Gorda Gertrudis:
And now, the Carnival
Conquest. The
Conquest is one of Carnival's older ships, built in 2002 in that delightfully tacky "themed" style popular then and which is now being phased out in favor of a more blandly generic "upscale" look. The supposed "theme" of the
Conquest is French impressionist artists, supposedly a nod to the ship's original homeport of New Orleans. I don't know about you, but when I think of New Orleans I don't think about a hodgepodge of giant glass flowers and a weird mishmash of random paintings. I do appreciate the decorating scheme though, that makes it appear the entire ship is wearing fishnet stockings, a fashion choice which would be extremely appropriate for a Bourbon Street whore. And it's that attention to detail that really lets you know they put a lot of thought and effort into things.
This drunk lady experiencing an existential crisis observed our comings and goings in our cabin's bathroom from her place of honor above the toilet. I sent a photo of her to my boss with the note:
This seems patientish.
The theater:
Most nights when we went to something in the theater we sat at a table adorned with these fat ladies. One night though, we mixed it up and sat a table adorned with fat gentlemen.
The comedy lounge:
The dining room:
This was one of the bars.
There was a bingo tournament going on while we were sailing, and bingo is not traditionally known as a game for fit young, nubile things. At one point a parade of seven of these scooters was trundling along down one of the main hallways, where my husband and I were sitting outside the coffee shop and reading. I called up
Ride of the Valkyries on my phone and was playing it as they went by, until my husband made me stop.
The coffee shop:
Various and sundry:
And the piece de resistance, the atrium:
We are cat owners, and recently acquired another cat, a little girl that one of our friends found screaming under a tarp in her yard. This kitten has no sense of personal space and therefore it seemed like kismet to find, among the hodgepodge, a painting of how our kitten behaves in the night.
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