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Published: October 23rd 2009
It’s been about a week and a half since the epic adventure of transferring to the Carnival Ecstasy. And it’s been pretty chaotic ever since.
When I arrived on the Ecstasy, it was in it’s final days of dry dock (renovations). We had one night in Freeport, then 3 days to sail to Galveston, the ship’s home port. That time was needed. Though the ship had been in dry dock for 4 weeks, it was still a mess. Walking around the ship, I couldn’t wrap my head around how it was ever going to be in a condition for guests to be onboard, let alone be ready in only a few short days.
But I didn’t have to worry about the whole ship, thankfully, just my own club. There were long days spent up in the playroom/office working on the computer. There was no air conditioning there for the first few days, so office work was rather draining. It was a few days before I could actually go into my club to do work in there. A new dance floor was put in during dry dock and there was random pieces of ceiling and floor bars and things lying
around the room. Eventually I got in there though and cleaned and organized and lugged furniture around.
The Circle “C” (younger teen club) was built brand new during dry dock. I spent some time in there, mostly keeping Chris company, while he set up the new club. It’s really nice and the hotel director informed us that the cost to build it would buy a nice home (a nice home in Toronto for that matter - or a huge house with hundreds of acres back home!). In the evenings I’d have some wine in the crew bar and play Skip-Bo with Chris (the Circle “C” director) and D (our boss).
We were meant to get to Galveston the day before our first cruise, go through immigration and have time to go out in the city. Except we didn’t arrive on time, so immigration was postponed until the next day.
The first day of our cruise was pure madness. We had hundreds of contractors and crew members signing off, hundreds of crew signing onto the ship, two hundred crew cabin changes, full crew immigration and all of this while we had a couple thousand guests coming onboard! It
was such a long, hectic, patience-wearing day.
We had a sea day, then our first day in port - Progreso. It would have been nice to get out, but we had a full crew emergency drill, in preparation for our coast guard inspection coming up later this week. Between that and working in the early afternoon, I didn’t get off the ship that day.
So finally, today, I was off the ship in Cozumel. I’d been on the Ecstasy non-stop for 9 days. I am pretty sure that all my years on ships, that is the longest stretch I have gone staying on a ship. I’ve been getting pretty stir-crazy! But we had good news. Our port time had been extended so we had extra time in Cozumel!
Chris and I went downtown to No Name Bar - a bar for crew run by former crew members. I spent a long time online doing things I’d wanted to do for days. I did some swimming. It would have been nice to lie in the sun and read, but it was overcast and even rained at times. No matter, I was off the ship! Forget doing anything crazy
adventurous, just being off the ship is exciting enough for me today!
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swills82
Sarah Willett
Homesick for the Ocean
Between reading your blogs tonight and my short skype chat with Nicole and Steph (my closest friends from the Majesty), I am feeling uber ship-sick and wishing I were there instead of worrying about the state of the country I am currently in. Soak up every minute of it Netter. Miss ya muchly.