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[PelicanBill]

Who - Bill, Diane & Julia Abrams - Early 40's couple and 5 year old
from Upstate New York near Rochester.

Carnival Glory, 1/15-1/22/05 Western Caribbean "Exotic"
Port Canaveral, sailing 4pm
Key West 12-5
At Sea
Belize 8-5
Cozumel 7:30-4:30
Progreso 7:30-3:30
At Sea
Port Canaveral 8am

Part 1 of 3
==================
Booking and Planning
We are experienced travelers all over the US, Caribbean, and also
frequent Disneyworld visitors. Our last cruise was 11 years
ago on Royal Caribbean Sovereign of the Seas. I was not crazy about
that cruise - I felt too constrained to a schedule, and I don't
like getting dressed up on vacation. I remember wishing I had more
time in port.

We chose this vacation after considering some all-inclusives in
Cancun, trying to find something different than Disney but suitable
for a family. The Disney Magic was nearly twice as much as we paid
for the Carnival cruise! After researching and reviews of Camp
Carnival, we decided the Glory would be a good choice.
We booked our cruise through Expedia, and airfare also through
Expedia but separate. The air offered with the cruise would be
over $400 each, separately we got $120 each. Bought trip insurance
and planned our travel with plenty of margin for error.

Thursday
Checked in for our flight scheduled for 6:55pm. Rain in Atlanta
has put everything on delay, so we are 2 hours delayed but our
connection is 2 1/2 hours so still OK. Then, a plane slides off
the runway in Atlanta and further delays set in. Now our connection
is not valid and we begin working with the agent. This is why I
planned our travel a day and a half before the ship leaves. Plenty
of time. Worst case scenario, we can even drive 26 hours. The gate
agent says "we can still get you to Atlanta, but we can't get you
on a flight to Orlando for 2 days." Did I say plenty of time?
Calls to other airlines and Expedia are fruitless or will cost
more than $1,000. They can't tell is anything about our connecting
flight (is it delayed also perhaps?) so We get ready to drive to
Florida. I can't reach Delta on the phone either. An earlier
flight to Atlanta was delayed and boarding now, and I heard them
calling names of people due to get on. The gate agent asks Diane
to hand her our boarding passes. She hands them back a minute later
and says quietly "get on this plane NOW." They take both our
carry on bags from us as gate checks, but it's no time to argue.
On the other hand, when we land, we are the last people off the
plane and our bags are not there. It's pouring rain. I yell at
them. I know there is no computer record of these bags and they
are gone for good if they are not found within minutes. Our
medicines, cameras, and important things are all in there.
Suddenly, they "find" them in the belly of the plane when they
look again. I am seriously stressed at this point. Our connecting
flight to Orlando does in fact get delayed, and delayed again.
So we would have made it on our original flight, if only they
could have told us. We arrive in Orlando, and pick up a rental
car at Hertz without further incident. But when we check in at
the Fairfield near the airport, the inform me that a guest did
not depart and so they have no room for us, but have held a room
at the adjacent Hampton for us. It's inconvenient that we have to
check in, out, in, out - but later we see that we were not billed
for the first night for the inconvenience. We get into bed at 4 A.M.
Julia was a real trooper, getting waked up to walk through the
airport and car rental places at unworldly hours.

Friday
We slept in, of course, then a friend who works at Disney signed
us in as their guests for the day and under cloudy skies and rain
we did some favorite things at MGM Studios and the Magic Kingdom.
Did some shopping: We bought 2 bottles of champagne to bring in our
carry on bags, jugs of rum and mudslide mix, and a few packages of
juice boxes for Julia and to use as mixers for rum. Also bought
a soft cooler and a six pack of bottled water to use in port calls.
Brought a soft piece of luggage empty with us, so now I rearranged
some things to hide the rum and mudslide mix and juice among our
checked bags.

Saturday
We drove from Orlando to Cocoa Beach, just a 45 minute drive.
We visited Ron Jon's before dropping off our car at Hertz at 10:30am.
After a short wait, we were dropped at the cruise terminal at 11AM.
There is a partly covered drop off area where buses and others pull
in to drop off people and luggage. If you drive yourself you drive
out to a large covered garage, which has lots of space and is only
a short walk to the terminal. But don't enter the terminal until
your group is together if you don't want to be separated. You
find a porter who will put your luggage into one of a bunch of
large steel cages. Make sure your color tags are on the luggage
with your cabin number. Then you enter the building with your
carry ons. First you go through a metal detector and luggage
screening checkpoint just like the airport - so be prepared!
So many people were surprised, and not ready, with things in their
pockets, belts with giant metal buckles, even one gal with 10
pounds of metal piercings and 20 pounds of metal attached to
her pants! After you clear security, you go up an escalator and
are greeted and guided to a line. I did not see any different lines
for people with or without funpasses completed. Everyone waited
in a line until check-in, which went very quickly. They checked our
documents and passports, then took a credit card to attach to my
sign & sail account. From there we entered a short line to pick up
our sign & sail cards, then into another line where it was obvious
we were waiting for clearance to begin boarding. This all took only
15 minutes, and boarding began at 11:30am. The line begins to file
into a secured area that is a hall along glass windows that let
you take in the ship as you walk much of its length to the gangways.
As we passed a stern looking security guard, he leaned down close
to Julia as said in a just-audible voice: "Twenty four hour ice
cream!" As we turned the corner toward the gangways there were
a lot of people trying to push past us claiming they were getting
in the "no pictures" line. Listen up people: There is NO "no
pictures line" and NO place for you to go. Don't be rude, stay
in your place in line, get your freakin picture taken, and SMILE.
They hurry each family into place for pictures, never mind I
can't figure out where to let go of my carry on luggage and lift
Julia up so she can be seen, as there is a rail with curtain that
is higher than she is! They take hundreds of pictures of families
each day, and every time, EVERY TIME, we had to slow things down
to find a way to get Julia into the picture. Can't they figure
that out?

Suddenly we are on the ship. We and a hundred or so people are
crowding the lobby, gawking and staring up the atrium that rises
13 stories to the sky. They gave us a sheet of essential information
when we checked in but it is clear nobody has read it yet (including
us) - but luckily thanks to Cruise Critic we know we can't go to
our cabin yet, and should proceed to the buffet for lunch. We even
know that the buffet is on the Lido deck, deck 9. Everyone else
is incredibly confused and spill out into various decks where crew
members politely herd them toward the Red Sail Restaurant for the
buffet lunch.

Lunch is quite enjoyable, I have to say I am impressed by the
selection and efficiency of the lines, drink stations, and such.
We eat and relax and before we knew it the clock said 1pm so we
could go to our cabin. 8211 is located on Deck 8, the Verandah
deck, one down from the Lido which makes it convenient to get to
breakfast, lunch, pools, drinks and ice cream. It's a balcony
outside cabin on the starboard side just a few doors back from
the bridge (but our balcony is still private enough.)

Wow! The cabin is spacious and comfortable compared to
what we had on the RCCL Sovereign of the Seas! The bathroom was
amazing too. There was more storage and closet space in the room
and bathroom than many small hotels we have been to. We weren't
there 15 minutes when our luggage began to arrive, and the steward
knocked at the door. Daniel from the Dominican Republic has
a checklist and must greet each family at embarkation (and we saw
him every morning and evening, so I can't figure out how anyone
could have not seen their steward most of the trip!) We asked
for ice for our cooler, and about the bed for Julia, and gave
him an extra advance tip. He showed us the magic bed that comes
out of the ceiling, and Julia was hooked - she wanted to sleep
up there! The rest of our luggage arrived once piece at a time,
strange since we gave it to them all together. The last piece
did not arrive until 5:00!

Some more about the cabin
From the outside wall, there are two twin beds put together
into one bed, with enough space underneath to store most sizes
of luggage. There is a small bedside cabinet on each side with
a small space for some things. A couch fills the rest of that
wall, which turns into a bed. An upper bed drops out over it
from the ceiling. The rest of that side of the cabin is the
bathroom, which has a spacious sink area with lots of shelves
to store all your stuff. There is a good size shower with a
showerhead on an adjustable pole so kids can shower without
too much trouble. Water pressure and temperature were great.
The toilet is angled so you do not feel crowded. Warn small
children that it will make a scary noise when it flushes!
Along the other wall, coming from the door: Three large cabinets
give you plenty of shelf space and hanging space for clothes.
The lifejackets are also stowed in one area. Then comes a
vanity area with a mirror, light, and small stool. Under the
vanity and stool is a wastebasket, it's also a good place to put
shoes. Next is the locked minibar (we never used it), cabinet
with the safe, and TV above that. Last there is a narrow cabinet,
walkway at the end of the bed, and then the outside wall. The
outside wall is practically all glass - a picture window, with
wide shelf good for stashing things, and the door to the balcony,
which has a security slide latch placed higher than any small
child could reach. Side table lamps by the bed are good for
low level lighting, while the main lights are ceiling level
trough lights and are quite bright. We brought an extension
cord and night light, and bungee cord but never used it because
it was too cool at night. There was a hairdryer in a drawer
at the vanity, which you cannot pull very far out of the drawer.
We locked our safe using our AAA card. Don't use your Sign & Sail
card. The magnetics are weak and this wears it down. My card
stopped working in the cabin door 2 days before the end of the
trip.

Soon came time for the muster drill. We did not have a child size
life preserver so Julia looked pretty funny in a jacket as big as
her (they got us a child size one that evening.) As we got to our
station they slapped a wrist band on Julia. Children are required
to wear a wrist band that indicates their muster station so they
can be brought there in case there is an emergency while the child
is in Camp Carnival or otherwise separated. It seemed to take
forever to complete the drill, an when we were finally cleared to
return to our room we were long underway - so much for enjoying
the sail away from our balcony! It's a long channel, so we watched
as we finally slipped away from land. It was also fun to watch
the pilot boat come alongside and two men jumped over, done guiding
the Glory out of port. I can even hear one of them yell "Bon
Voyage!" from 200 feet away over the roar of the bow wave.
We were also entertained by our Coast Guard escort, doing
some high speed hot dogging for our amusement.

I could also see the Disney Magic leaving port about an hour behind.
And it was already dinner time! We had a 5:45 early seating, which
suits us having a young child, and it aligns well with closing time
at Camp Carnival - they are closed every day from 5-5:45 for the
staff to have dinner. Also, all our port times ended early enough
to get ready and get to dinner on time on this itinerary.

We go to our table in the Platinum Dining Room, near the rearmost
windows looking astern. Nice location, and we got to see the sunset
most evenings. We meet Tonya, our server, from Russia (I think),
Jana, our team waitress, from Croatia, and Bimal, our Maitre'd.
We found the food in the dining room to be decent, but not as
elegant as it was 11 years ago on our RCCL cruise. The service
is a bit weird - she forgets to reset our silverware sometimes,
mixes up orders, and is slow to get us iced tea and refills. It
improves through the week as we point such things out carefully.
One thing I did not like - on the formal nights they brought out
the same dessert for everyone and did not present the dessert
menu. It was all done before we knew it, so tell them you want the
dessert menu ahead of time if you prefer. Also, we felt hurried
to finish dinner and vacate the premises most of the time. The
entertainment done by the staff was lame until it got more
interactive. Even when they got Julia and Alex (the kids at our
table) up to dance with them it was an improvement. Our table
mates were a family of India heritage, two doctors and their 9
year old daughter, Alex. Julia and Alex got along great, and the
company was quite agreeable. We saw a lot of tables where people
showed up once or twice the whole trip - strange. There was a table
which had 3 parties, and never was there more than one of them
present. The buffet food upstairs was good, but not THAT good!

After dinner we reported to the Amber Palace (decks 3, 4, and 5)
for Camp Carnival orientation. All we did was fill out some forms
really, and met some other families doing the same. I would say
there were perhaps 100 children on our ship - not a lot. We saw
one group of kids earlier that day that looked like trouble -
playing unsafely around the pools, running around - but we never
saw any trouble the rest of the trip from them. There was a kids
party in the White Heat Disco, so we stopped there for a little
while.

That night we went to bed early, still tired from our trying trip.
We watched the lights of the coast of Florida slip by at about 20
miles per hour... I tracked our progress with my handheld GPS
(Magellan Meriden Color with enhanced world base map.) I found I
could track our progress most of the trip if I left the GPS on the
balcony, which I did often at night. I brought a bag of batteries
to keep feeding it.