Permanent Jet Lag
03 Jan 2009
Trip
On Saturday at around ten in the morning, we drove down to Orange County so we could make it to the ship at Long Beach. The drive was about five hours long so we got there at approximately four o’clock. Then we had dinner with my uncle at some Asian place, ;D. We slept overnight there, that’s when I stayed up until one reading Blood And Chocolate ♥ when I was supposed to be asleep at eleven thirty. :D* (oh and I love how this word processor is correcting my every spelling mistake, that’s why there are apostrophes and capitalised I’s)
Anyways, so my uncle drove us to Long Beach the next day at, hm, lets see, one? Yea, so we passed the giant Queen Mary ship. x] Ours was the Carnival Paradise. He dropped us off with our luggage which we sent in first, then we went through security and all that jazz. Finally we got our Sail & Sign In Cards, which was like our ID on the ship. It was I-M-P-O-R-T-A-N-T we didn’t lose it. It was to show the guards when we left/got back on the ship, to buy things, to get in the stateroom, etc.
So we explored the ship for awhile, it was pretty big. Round nine decks, the numbers started at 3 and went until 12. Deck 3 was mainly the embarking/debarking deck, Decks 4, 5, and 6 were mainly rooms. Deck 7 was the main deck, that’s the one I was on. It had a bar, information desks, the Internet Café. Deck 8 had the Elation and Destiny Restaurants, some Galleria Shops, and bathrooms. Haha. Deck 9, some more stuff like picture galleries of the photos they take for you, and Deck 10 had the Paris Restaurant, which was buffet and I liked. OH OH and a 24-hour pizza bar. B) Oh yea ~! On Deck 12 there was the pool, mini golf course, and basically hangout station. Huh. Now that I think about it, was there a Deck 11? o______o
Um so every night we had assigned seats at table number 227 at 6:00 pm, but we didn’t have to show. The first night we did, we were sitting at a table of eleven with four people from Arizona and three from San Jose aswell. ^_^ The food wasn’t really that great on the boat tbh. D;
Catalina Island, CA (who knew it was a part of California?)
We sailed all night, and the next morning arrived at Catalina Island. The port was too small to dock in so we had to take ‘tender boats’ (smaller boats) to get in. We ate breakfast and took a tender, it only took about five minutes to reach the shore. It was sunny and nice. (: We walked around a bit because our City Passport Tour wasn’t until 11:30 am. When it was time, we had a full bus so the guide took us out early. As we were going around, a cloud covered the island. o_o Yup, it was sunless and foggy. Kinda funny, how a cloud can cover an entire island LOL.4 Funny Things About Catalina Island
01. They have a 3rd Street, but no 1, 2, or 4.
02. They have a Eucalyptus Avenue, but it’s the only street on the whole island with no eucalyptus trees on it.
03. They have a giant dome casino, but your not allowed to gamble.
04. They have a bird park with no birds.
Yeaaa, those cracked me up. xD Turns out the Wrigley guy, the gum guy? Lived in Catalina Island with his family. Weird. o_o
ZOMG theres also this AWSOME store called, Del Sol there! Everything in there changes colors in the sun! I got a nail polish that my friend Kelsey had before she moved, she didn’t know where her friend got it from. Its like a light greenish-silver and changes to pastel purple in the sun. ^o^ Amazing stuff. Even the bag they put your merchandise in was whitish, turned purple. I’m currently wearing my polish, ahah.
Another thing we did was go on a glass-bottom boat. The name tricks you. If anyone ever goes to Catalina Island, DON’T GO ON IT. Major ripoff. There are only little high-walled sections with the glass bottom, and the fish all looked the same. Plus the extreme rocking did not help my stomach. x_x
Ensenada, Mexico
The next day at Ensenada, we only had one tour – the Blow Hole Tour. People said theres only three in the world and the biggest ones in Ensenada. So, the tour was at 1:45 pm and we had like 4 hours to burn. We walked around downtown where tons of people came up to us and tried to sell the exact same thing. I wanted the Mexican Jumping Beans, really cool! But I didn’t get it. D;So at the Blow Hole, well the tide was a bit low so we didn’t see much. I got some pictures though, it was actually still pretty cool. Water goes into this natural fissure and shoots up. The lady said on a good tide day it went from 30 to 100 feet high, well we didn’t get it that high. The ocean view mixed with all the rocks was really pretty. (: We were there for an hour before taking the bus back to the main port to get back on the ship.
Oh, something else really cool! They had people on the streets who could write your name on a grain of rice. They write it with a really really skinny-tip pen, and the writing was extremely neat, even at that small scale. It was crazy. Then they put it in this little tube, along with a colored flower (part of it, think daisy with one petal off), inject water in it, and seal it up. :D I have one, I’m wearing it right now too bahaha.
Fun Day At Sea
Thursday was the Fun Day At Sea! day. We spent the whole day sailing back to Long Beach. Well, it wasn’t so great in the morning. Seasickness. >.< The ship was rocking so much, I was like tipping back and forth and my stomach wasn’t coping so well. I kept running into the bathroom, thinking I was gonna be sick. But when I sat down and locked myself in the stall it felt a little better. You couldn’t feel the rocking as much. Then I had to leave and for like a few minutes it was better then worse again. Finally I took a pill, and tried to get some breakfast down but it didn’t really work. It hurt if I ate too much. Finally I took a sick and felt better, haha. ;] After that, my mom and sister started getting woozy and I laughed at them. xDEverything Basically In Between
There were also a bunch of shows every night, Monday night they had the Welcome Aboard. I didn’t go to that one. Tuesday there was the Hollywood/Vegas-type show. It was pretty good. Almost fell asleep though, ahah. x] Wednesday there was a magic show with Bobby Bortia! It was actually really cool, he moved cards with his shadow, he did some cool card tricks involving Aces, and some mind stuff. ;D Finally on Thursday there was a sixties, seventies, eighties? (?) style show called Shout. It involved the song that went like this: “Put your hands up and SHOUT, kick your heels up and SHOUT” or something like that, I’m sure you all know what it is? (;They also had competitions, like Blackjack, Karaoke. A funny one was the Mens Hairy Chest Competition. It was little chilly that day so there were only three contestants. There were three rounds: hairiest chest, best pick-up line, and best Tarzan impersonation. The pickup lines were funny: “Your cute…your cute”; “I have a motorcycle outside”; “I have a Ferrari.” Hahahahaha.
Staterooms
The rooms were NOT that great. They were tiny little cabins, rectangular when you stepped inside. ** ALL THE DOORWAYS HAD ANNOYING ‘WATCH YOUR STEP’ NOTICES ON THE FLOOR, COS THEY WERE RAISED! WELL I DIDN’T SEE THEM UNTIL I TRIPPED OVER ABOUT 2304830298432 OF THEM. ;_; ** So anyways, there were there tiny beds, one on the far wall and one on either side (left and right). The hallways was so tiny, like one person standing could touch the closet on one side and the wall with the bathroom door on the other. The bathroom was a whole other story, like the worst ever. A comedian on Wednesday night was bashing it, really funny lololol. Theres a super-loud toilet that sounded like it could suck down anything, and a little sign above it said “Please do not put bulk objects down the toilet.” Yea, I had to plug my ears everytime I pressed the button to flush. >.> WHOOOOOSHHHHH-and then a sudden blocking sound. Likewise, the trash can was underneath the sick and a half-moon shape stuck against the wall. And next to the shower, on the far underside of the sink. You’d think we’d be throwing away paper from the toilet, not the shower?… I Can’t Think Of A Good Ending Title For This
Like my cruise? (: Its okay if you didn’t read all of it, I’m sure you’d get the point around halfway through some paragraphs. Some parts were good and some were really weird and some were terrible but I guess it was fun. ;DI will reply to all of the last posts comments if I haven’t yet, so don’t worry if you only commented on the last one and not this one.
Although, please tell me what you’d like to see on the site. Layouts? CSS?
I almost forgot! :D New layout! This one has to be my all-time favorite so far on the entire history of the site. MUCH THANKS to Amanda for the drop-down sidebar code. (; GO VISIT HER NOW! ;D
xx <3
+ dA
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