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Murphytown Cruises |
| OK, so we got hooked on cruises! We took our first cruise out of Baltimore (since the port was close to home) and selected the Carnival Pride. It was a 7 day Cruise to Port Canaveral, Nassau and Freeport in the Bahamas. The ports of call were not all that glamorous (other than Nassau), but we wanted to get a taste of what it was like to cruise. A lot of sea days, so we would really know if we had sea legs or not by the time it was over. Sailing under the Bay Bridge and down the Bay was a nice experience as well. By the time the first morning arrived, we were at the Outer Banks. All in all, it was a great first cruise, and we met a great guy in the jazz band on the ship as well (hold that thought). Oh, and the ship did not break down! No Spam.
The second cruise was (at the time), the only other option out of Baltimore. We sailed on Royal Caribbean’s Enchantment of the Seas. Since we knew we had sea legs, we picked a 9 day cruise to San Juan, St. Thomas, Dominican Republic, and Labadee Haiti. This by far was the best cruise we have taken as far as ports of call. It also sealed the deal as far as staying with Royal Caribbean over Carnival. The food by far was superior. On the other hand, the Enchantment had no music that fit our tastes. Each ship is different though, so all I can suggest to RC is “don’t forget the boomers”! Anyway, the one cool thing that happened on this cruise was that by sheer coincidence, the jazz guitarist that we met on our first cruise happened to be working on a Carnival ship in San Juan and St. Thomas beside us! Yes, we hooked up with him for a while in St. Thomas. It surely is a small world! The third cruise had to be a bit different since we have already sailed on “baby boats” twice. Sailing out of Baltimore requires smaller ships due to the Bay Bridge. Yes, a “real” cruise ship could not pass under it! We sailed out of Canaveral on the Freedom of the Seas (a REAL ship). Not knocking the Enchantment (except for the lack of music), but the Freedom was Huge! This ship used to be the largest until the Oasis class was introduced. The pictures speak for themselves. This cruise was a 7 day to Coco Cay, St. Thomas (again) and St. Maarten. Nice cruise, great ship, good music and a great experience. The most recent was very unique! We decided to try the Western Caribbean for a change and chose New Orleans (duh!!!) to sail out of. We went down two days early to jazz it up prior to the cruise. I know someone down there so he was gracious enough to provide us wheels for a night on the town on the last day. Prior to that, we did the tourist stuff (Bourbon Street and all that), but the real fun was Frenchmen Street. Two blocks of wall to wall music outside of the tourist district. This is where the locals go and believe me, I am still surprised we made it on the ship the next morning. Frenchmen was better than the cruse, but that is a story for another web-page! This cruise was on the Navigator of the seas. It is a little smaller than the Freedom, but not by much. In all other respects, the layout was almost identical. It was as if we were back on the Freedom. In fact, our cabin was the same number! Go figure. This cruise was to Falmouth Jamaica, Grand Cayman, and Cozmel Mexico. All in all, not much to say about the ports of call. Falmouth and Cozmel were “secondary ports” actually. Falmouth in particular is still under construction and the locals still have an attitude about tourists off the ships. Cozmel might as well be Tijuanna. The usual hassles. We did find a great out of the way local spot and hung there most of the time. Grand Caymen was great. The people were great, and the despite the fact that eight ships were tendered out there, we could still get around pretty well. Expensive though (our dollar stinks)! Western Caribbean (at least those ports) is not as scenic as the Eastern. We will be back there next probably, but New Orleans is in the mix cruise or not! |
