Miracle 9/11/11 Review -- Cruising with a 10 month old!

It’s been six months since I took this cruise but I thought writing a review might get rid of the winter blues! At the time I was 39, DW 38 and DS 10 months. When we booked this cruise people told us we were crazy for taking a 10 month old. Well…..we had a blast! Granted, we did have to change our routine quite a bit from our previous cruise but we still had a great time.

Shortly after booking the Carnival Miracle 9/11/11 cruise out of New York city, I joined CC and discovered the roll call section. What an amazing group we had. It seemed to grow daily. A lot of the members were talking about the fact it was going to be the 10 year anniversary of 9/11 and how it was going to affect traveling to the port, hotels, and just overall security. They really helped each other with hints and tips. It wasn’t really a concern of ours as we were traveling by bus from Albany, NY directly to the port.

One of the CC members brought up the fact that the 9/11 lighting ceremony was around 7:10pm and how awesome it would be if we were able to view it from the ship. The problem was we were scheduled to depart at 4:00pm. He suggested we all contact Carnival and ask if there was anyway we could delay the departure so we could be a part of the 9/11 ceremony. We all sent emails to Carnival and John Heald asking if this was possible. Weren’t we all surprised when we got an almost immediate response saying they would look in to it!! Long story short….not only did Carnival delay the departure but they also made it a very memorable event.

With the background covered….let’s relive this trip! I will be posting pictures but do not have the any of the Fun Times. Keep in mind I did not take notes as I hadn’t planned on doing this!

DAY 1

The bus was leaving at 7:00am and luckily we only live about 10 minutes from the station. However, I ended up working the night before and didn’t go to bed till about 2:00am so that was still pushing it for me! We loaded up our luggage and DS and were out of the house by 6:30! Not bad for first time parents! If any of you have traveled with an infant you know just how much stuff they need! DS was only eating baby food and formula at this point so we had to bring all his food with us as well as a weeks worth of diapers and all the other baby stuff! We made it to the bus station with plenty of time to spare.

We boarded the bus and were on our way to New York City! DS sat on our laps and ate his breakfast. The bus trip really was uneventful and he did really well! No major melt downs.

The traffic wasn’t that bad going in to NY but once we got to the port it all came to a dead stop!

So close!! We were probably stuck in this for about an hour. Once we got closer we found the reason was a security check point with dogs and the whole routine. After the bus cleared the check point out driver got us right in front of the ship! The porters and driver unloaded our luggage and we were allowed to get off the bus and head in to check in!

Looking forward to more! We were just on the miracle last week.

We had two carry ons plus the monster diaper bag! We thought security was going to be difficult but it actually took about 10 minutes. They didn’t open any of our bags and didn’t even ask about the two bottles of wine and bottles of water I had. Through security and into a slow moving check in line. DW took DS for a diaper change while I shuffled our stuff through the line. It took close to 40 minutes to get to the desk. Once there, it was a breeze. S & S cards in hand and a zone card, we found some seats and let DS stretch his legs a bit!

Waited another 30 minutes and our zone was called so on the ship we went! We went directly to Lido because we were starving. Of course it was a zoo so we went all the way aft to the outside deck and found a table. I believe this is now the new serenity area. Anyways, we took turns getting food and then we started our vacation!

I bumped in to a couple of CC members and chatted a bit and then went to find our cabin. We knew we weren’t going to fit a crib in an inside room so we got our first balcony cabin! I don’t think we will be able to go back to an inside after that!

First thing we noticed was the couch was made up as a bed and there wasn’t a crib! This was a problem. I called the room steward but the phone was forwarded to guest services. I told them the problem and they said the crib would be set up at 6:00pm when the room stewards came back on duty. No big deal. Put DS in the stroller and started wandering the ship.

We had a CC meet and greet at 4:00 to organize the sail away stuff. One member had a banner made, another brought American flags and another made CC Miracle 9/11/11 luggage tags! Like I said earlier….a great group!

Got back to the room around 4:30 and our luggage was there, so we unpacked. Our roll call was meeting at 6:00 on deck for the sail away.

Our CC group met up on deck 10 and started hanging the banner and handing out American Flags. Carnival had sent a photographer and guest services manager up as well.

It was a cloudy evening but warm and it seems everyone was on deck for this sail away. As we sailed down the Hudson we had a beautiful view of NYC. Here is the USS Intrepid.

More pictures of the city

And in the distance we could see the 9/11 memorial lights turning on

AWESOME! Can't wait to see more :)

As we got closer to Ground Zero the Freedom tower became visible. It was lit with red white and blue lights for the memorial.

The Captain stopped the ship directly in front of Ground Zero and then made an announcement honoring those who perished 10 years ago on 9/11. It was completely silent on deck and then a NYC Police Officer played Amazing Grace on the bag pipes.

As it got darker the lights got brighter and brighter and it was just an amazing sight to see!

The ships photographer then took the CC groups picture

One more shot of the lights with the Freedom tower

Thank you for taking the time to write this. The pics from the memorial gave me chills. So amazing!

Great pics. How is the little guy.

Great pics. How is the little guy.

He is doing great Stu! Running around and climbing everything. His ship on stick that you gave him sits proudly on a shelf in his room. It looks like we will be taking him on the Miracle again September 3rd.

Feel free to jump in if and when I forget some stuff. I had no intentions of writing this but I was looking at pictures today and thought....what the heck!

Thank you for taking the time to write this. The pics from the memorial gave me chills. So amazing!

It was amazing! To see 3000 guests and crew lining the deck being silent and paying tribute to those we lost.

Lots more to come!

Please keep the info coming.I am cruising soon with my daughter son-in-law and my 10 month old grandson.

Laura

great so far, can't wait for more.

Please keep the info coming.I am cruising soon with my daughter son-in-law and my 10 month old grandson.

 

Laura

If you have any specific questions, feel free to ask. Our biggest life saver was the Maclaren stroller we bought. It folds like an umbrella stroller but was a bit bigger and reclined so DS took many naps in it. It fit perfectly in our closet.

He is doing great Stu! Running around and climbing everything. His ship on stick that you gave him sits proudly on a shelf in his room. It looks like we will be taking him on the Miracle again September 3rd.

 

Feel free to jump in if and when I forget some stuff. I had no intentions of writing this but I was looking at pictures today and thought....what the heck!

Our next cruise is on the Glory in April with our kids including our grandson who will be a little over 1 at that time. Amazing how quickly they change.

It most certainly was a memorable cruise.....

Found some of the "all-terrain stroller".....

It was an awesome cruise with great roll call.

Had a great group excursion thru a cave (sort of) in Bermuda.

We had planned to take NCL to Bermuda but cost of inside on the Gem 7 day was equal to balcony on Miracle 8 day.

And funny thing was that due to hurricane Gem was sent to Bahamas even though we went to Bermuda.

Hey Chris! Thanks for writing this and letting us re-live this vacation! I have to agree, we had a GREAT Roll Call group!!!

It was amazing! To see 3000 guests and crew lining the deck being silent and paying tribute to those we lost.

 

Lots more to come!

Great review so far!! The quote above just gave me chills!! It must have been something to see!

Around 7:30 the ship started to once again sail down the Hudson. At this point DS was getting hungry as were we. Took a quick couple of pictures of the Statue of Liberty and then went to the cabin to grab DS food and discovered the crib had still not arrived.

Called the steward on the phone and he came to the cabin immediately! Unlocked the fridge for us and told us to go eat dinner and he would set up the crib and turn down the room. He and his assistant were awesome all week long! They always called us and our son by name and had a towel animal ready every night!

We headed up to Lido to grab some dinner. We had early dining in the MDR and missed it due to the sail away activities. Found a high chair with no problem. DW fed the boy while I went and got us food. This was the only dinner we ate at the buffet and it was very good.

We wandered around the ship for awhile and went to the theater for the welcome aboard show. DS had fallen asleep in his stroller but woke up about 10 minutes in to the show so we headed back to the cabin to get him settled in for the night.

Crib was set up. They don't use crib size sheets but rather fold a normal size sheet up to fit. It works but seemed a little odd. Now DS won't go to sleep if he can see us, so I use our beach towels and towel clips to cover the sides of the crib. It worked well. DW was tired and settled in for the night, I decided to head to the casino. DS wasn't asleep yet so I crawled past his crib so he didn't see me!

I just realized that I was so wrapped up with the 9/11 activities that I didn't tell you anything about this cruise. We were heading to Bermuda for three days. We were at sea Sunday, Monday, Tuesday and arrived in Bermuda Wednesday. We left friday and arrived back in NY on Monday morning.

Up Next--Day 2 @ Sea

This is a great write up. Thanks for sharing!.

Everyone slept great! DS made it all night! We were feeding him his breakfast in the cabin when the Captain came on the in room speakers. He told us we were changing course and heading towards Virginia because of a medical emergency and to clear the aft lido deck for a Coast Guard rescue. A little while later I heard the Coast Guard helicopter approaching so I went out on our balcony.

Of course the Captain is keeping a watchful eye

They started to lower the rescue swimmer and then went to the aft where I lost sight of him.

I went back inside and we went to Lido to get some breakfast. Hardly any line at the omelet station and NO bacon police! I picked through till I found some extra crispy bits. Again, no complaints about the food. Crew members are being super friendly to DS and he is loving all the attention.

Our Roll Call group had a plaque and challenge coin made for the Captain and we were presenting in to him this morning. I headed down to the theater for the 10:45 presentation only to find out he had to reschedule due to the medical evacuation.

We just wandered around the ship until DS wanted to take a nap around 1:30. DW decided to nap with him and I went to our official CC meet and greet at Frankie and Johnnies. There were 128 people on the list. It was nice to finely get a chance to sit and talk with these new friends. They brought the banner that was displayed during sail away and we all signed it. It was going to be sent to John Heald as a thank you for all he did to help us get the delayed sailing. After the meet and greet we were going to have a cabin crawl!

I had never participated in a cabin crawl before but was very interested in seeing the different type of rooms. Unfortunately I forgot to bring my camera so there are no pictures. I believe we went to an ocean view first, then a standard balcony and then an aft wrap suite! Holy smokes was I blown away by this thing! Maybe we can talk the owner of that cabin to post a couple of pictures! Then we went next door to standard aft balcony, which was also nice. Nicer was the jello shots that were waiting there for us! This CC member also had brought bags of Ginger Chews for anyone that wanted them. I got a bag for DW and they seemed to work well when ever the ship started rocking too much for her! I ran back to my cabin to see if DW and DS were awake and wanted to see the aft wrap. They were, so off we went. Couple more jello shots and back to the room to get ready for the first formal night.

We were kind of nervous about going to the MDR with DS. We had no idea who we were sitting with and if they would like kids. Not to mention trying to keep him entertained through out the meal!

Turns out we had the best table mates EVER! They were our age and also had an 11 month old! Dinner service was very slow and we weren't sure we were going to make it through desert as we had been there and hour and a half already. When the Maitre'd came to our table to ask how everything was, DW told him it was slow and asked if he could help improve the situation the next night. Seemed to have worked the following nights.

Anyway, we got along great with our new friends and the two DS had lots of fun!

Time to stretch our legs....

Food was very good and our table looked like a war zone from the two little ones. The waiters did a great job catching flying silverware and french fries!

We wandered around after dinner and tried to catch a show but DS was done and we headed back to the cabin for the night. There was a note left in our room that said plaque and coin presentation to the Captain was rescheduled for the following morning! Great!

Coming up....Day 3 @Sea

I had never participated in a cabin crawl before but was very interested in seeing the different type of rooms. Unfortunately I forgot to bring my camera so there are no pictures. I believe we went to an ocean view first, then a standard balcony and then an aft wrap suite! Holy smokes was I blown away by this thing! Maybe we can talk the owner of that cabin to post a couple of pictures! Then we went next door to standard aft balcony, which was also nice. Nicer was the jello shots that were waiting there for us! This CC member also had brought bags of Ginger Chews for anyone that wanted them. I got a bag for DW and they seemed to work well when ever the ship started rocking too much for her! I ran back to my cabin to see if DW and DS were awake and wanted to see the aft wrap. They were, so off we went. Couple more jello shots and back to the room to get ready for the first formal night.

 

We were kind of nervous about going to the MDR with DS. We had no idea who we were sitting with and if they would like kids. Not to mention trying to keep him entertained through out the meal!

 

Turns out we had the best table mates EVER! They were our age and also had an 11 month old! Dinner service was very slow and we weren't sure we were going to make it through desert as we had been there and hour and a half already. When the Maitre'd came to our table to ask how everything was, DW told him it was slow and asked if he could help improve the situation the next night. Seemed to have worked the following nights.

 

Anyway, we got along great with our new friends and the two DS had lots of fun!

 

 

Time to stretch our legs....

 

 

Food was very good and our table looked like a war zone from the two little ones. The waiters did a great job catching flying silverware and french fries!

 

We wandered around after dinner and tried to catch a show but DS was done and we headed back to the cabin for the night. There was a note left in our room that said plaque and coin presentation to the Captain was rescheduled for the following morning! Great!

 

Coming up....Day 3 @Sea

Ha...I was that cabin owner but I don't think I took any pictures of the cabin since I had already seen so many on this site (which is what made us decide to book the suite in the first place). Only got a couple of the balcony...

Here's the video that I used to show our friends and family where we were going to be staying...