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A 'lil HooHaa

Messing with the blogging world since 2005

cruise photos

Carnival Pride cruise review: Final thoughts

September 18, 2013

The Carnival Pride, sitting in port in Florida.

(This is the final in a six-part series about my first cruise. I sailed on the Carnival Pride from August 4-11. It started and ended in Baltimore, making in Port Canaveral, Florida; Nassau, Bahamas; and Freeport, Bahamas. The other parts of this series ran over the past few weeks). 

The ship has certainly sailed.

Alas, it’s time to put this series to bed as well. By now, if you’re a reader of the blog, you’ve read about my adventures about going on my first cruise. If you haven’t, well, shame on you. Go back and read them.

Now. We’ll wait.

OK, so you’re back? Welcome!

These are my final thoughts on this cruise. I’ve covered pretty much everything I could from that cruise. Being there as a member of a wedding and serving as the photographer allowed me to miss the experience of boarding with so many others. That was nice, I must say. The wedding and reception happened on the boat while in port in Baltimore. After that, it was one heck of a fun time.

The wedding was wonderful. Those involved were excellent. The food was exquisite. The celebration was awesome. It was an honor to be a part of the wedding and even better to be sailing with the newlyweds and the small party that joined them.

And I had the chance to cross something off my bucket list.

I had the chance to meet some great people — staff and guests — including the cruise director Josh (left) and assistant cruise director Sassy (right).

I’m not a “cruiser,” per say. I talked to several people on the ship who cruise any chance they get. I went to forums before the cruise and researched and people really do the cruising thing.

I’m more of an explorer. I like to go somewhere and have the freedom to check things out and do what I want without restrictions of a massive body of water surrounding you. Despite that, I always said I wanted to at least try a cruise and see what it was like. I’m glad I had this chance.

I never remotely got motion sickness. Walking around was no issue. And exploring the boat was quite fun in its own right. I wish I had a little better financial situation as there were a few things I would have liked to have done, such as the chef’s dinner or the Captain’s tour. Maybe on a future tour, I’ll have that chance.

But overall, taking a cruise isn’t a bad way to spend a vacation.

And despite there being more than 2,000 people on this ship, you could still find places for it to be quiet. Such as heading out to one of the lower decks, where people rarely seemed to be.

With a balcony room, it was nice to be able to sit outside and watch the world go by. Or, at night, it was nice to sit out there and just listen to the water. It’s very relaxing.

The food — with so much available 24/7 — was awesome. The entertainment was excellent. There are memories from this cruise that will last with me forever.

The people were the best. From guests to staff members to anybody I spoke with, everybody always seemed to be cheery and in a goof mood. And why not, right?

Before going further, however, I wanted to bring you some fun stuff. On the final sea day, the cruise director Josh, held a question-and-answer session. I took notes as I knew it would be full of great stuff to post. The questions ranged from the size of the ship to how much booze was served (my question, of course) and Josh did everything he could to answer. He’d call other people on the ship to find out answers, which was too cool. This was one fun show to watch.

How about these tidbits from this seven-day cruise?

  • The ship is 963 feet long — that breaks down to 11,565 inches
  • Enough milk is consumed to fill three swimming pools
  • The boat produces, from sea water, 1 million gallons of fresh water per day
  • More than 30,000 eggs are eaten
  • There are no garbage cans throughout the ship as crew members take care of that because of how waste needs to be taken care of
  • There were 920 crew members that represented 58 nationalities

Oh yeah, the booze. I asked that question and Josh called up somebody to get the answer. A bit later, he was called back. Turns out people like to have a good time on the ship. How good? See here:

  • 1,035 bottles of wine/champagne
  • 9,400 cans/bottles of beer
  • 873 bottles of liquor
  • 14,052 cans of soda

He didn’t get numbers of kegs of beer, but I’m sure that’s not too low of a number, either.

Crazy, right?

Anyway, moving on. With all the positive, there were, unfortunately, a couple of negative things did happen, mostly surrounding the wedding.

A good way to relax was to find a lower deck and just stare out at the ocean. Often, these decks were empty.

I’d be remiss to note that the couple had a frame with a photo of them in it. During the ceremony, they poured colored sand into it, around the photo. It was a nice situation.

Alas, Carnival, somehow, lost this item. No matter what the cost of it, it was priceless as it had way more of a significance to the newlyweds than money. It’s a shame that this happened. It’s a black eye situation, too, as nobody wins. Carnival looks bad and the newlyweds have lost something that money really can’t replace.

One thing to note — I wasn’t an “official” photographer as when you are married on the cruise, they give you one. However, the prices are extremely high for what you get. The photographer assigned to this was nice to start, but as things moved along, he got a bit more testy with me. See, people were looking at me for the photos.

Oh, the humanity, especially seeing as I was picked by the bride and groom.

A couple of times he made sure he got in the way of me shooting, too. I was trying to respect the space, but here was reality — the couple wasn’t going to spend that crazy amount of money on photos.

I understand the idea here, but Carnival really needs to re-visit this policy. They have to remember that it’s about the couple — and if they don’t want some photographer they don’t know, have never met and haven’t discussed things, then that’s how it should be. You don’t see places off the ship forcing a photographer down the throat of a couple, so why on board?

And though those were the only true negatives that I can recall, these are ones that can have lasting memories and not necessarily in a positive way, about the cruise line.

The other aspects of the wedding — and the cruise — were top-notch, however.

I’m sure I’ll sail again. It’s a relaxing and stress-free way to vacation and a way to see some cool places, meet different people and be able to know it was an affordable way to go.

Feel free to leave a comment, or e-mail P.J. at hoohaablog [at] gmail.com. Also, please “Like” HooHaa Blog on Facebook!

Filed Under: Cruise, My world, Photography, Travel Tagged With: bahamas, baltimore, carnival, carnival cruise, carnival cruise entertainment, carnival pride, carnival pride photographs, carnival pride photos, carnival pride review, carnival review, cruise, cruise food, cruise photographs, cruise photos, cruise review, food, freeport, nassau, photos, port, review, travel

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Carnival Pride cruise review: Top photos on the ship

September 3, 2013

I stood at the front of the ship quite often. Being on the ninth floor was quite nice to be able to just watch as the ship sailed on.

(This is the fourth in a six-part series about my first cruise. I sailed on the Carnival Pride from August 4-11. It started and ended in Baltimore, making stops in Port Canaveral, Florida; Nassau, Bahamas; and Freeport, Bahamas. The other parts of this series are scheduled to run  over the next couple of weeks). 

I wanted to take a break from all the other reviews and share some images from the trip. I took a lot of photos, whether with my main camera or my iPhone, so I wanted to pick out 10 or so images to share with you.

These images are all from the boat, however. I didn’t want to use port shots or anything as I covered that already. So anything goes with these, as long as they were on the ship.

Remember, my initial reason for being on this cruise was to take photos for a wedding. And the wedding took place on the ship, so that’s all good, too.

I’m trying not to duplicate ones I’m using in other posts, but nothing can be guaranteed!

I have picked out 10 photos below, in no particular order.

1. Sunset

It’s unfortunate, but I didn’t get to see too many cool sunsets. With a later dining time, we were eating when these often happened. I was told I missed an amazing one on one night, but there were a few other nights where it was too cloudy or it just didn’t have that “magical” feeling. This one was pretty amazing, though.

Sunset

2. Newlyweds

As noted above, I was on the ship to also take photos for a wedding. As we were walking around after the service, we wanted to set something like this up. However, this was as I was testing some lighting things out. I really loved how the shot came out.

Newlyweds

3. Carnival Pride

I love shots like this. Just simple things, but it shows the ship you are on and that you’re on the ship. I took a few of these over the course of the week, but liked this one quite a bit.

On the Carnival Pride

4. Dolphin

I had heard about dolphins swimming with the ship. In fact, somebody had seen them a day earlier. I didn’t know if I’d have the chance. I was walking on the deck one day and saw a bunch of people looking over. I had my camera and looked over … and there they were. I snapped as many shots as I could before they disappeared, but it was really wild to see.

Dolphin

5. Another Carnival ship

One night, while sitting out on the balcony of my room, another Carnival ship sailed by. I pulled out the zoom lens, knowing I wouldn’t be able to keep it still enough to get a crisp shot. So I messed with the movement, hoping to get something cool. I liked how this one turned out.

Another Carnival ship sailing by

6. View from the front

I never got tired of going up to the top decks to lean on the railing and just stare out as the ship sailed along. The views were amazing, the wind hit you in the face and it was extremely relaxing. Often, I was the only one there, too, so the quietness was very peaceful.

Sailing ahead

7. Storm brewing

The view changed on the final day at sea as we headed into a crazy looking storm.

Storm ahead

8. Getting off the ship

OK, I consider this technically part of the ship. I took this one day when getting off the ship at a port. Just really thought the look of it was pretty neat.

Walking off the ship

9. Sunset II

Another sunset shot. Not quite as nice as the first night, I don’t think. And this one disappeared before the horizon because of clouds. But I liked how it glistened the water.

Another sunset

10. Setting them up

OK, so a somewhat “selfie” shot as the final one. This is as I was trying to line up everybody from the wedding who was sailing. It wasn’t the easiest of jobs, especially because of how nice it was on the ship!

Set up!

Feel free to leave a comment, or e-mail P.J. at hoohaablog@gmail.com. Also, please “Like” HooHaa Blog on Facebook!

Filed Under: Cruise, My world, Photography, Travel Tagged With: bahamas, baltimore, carnival, carnival cruise, carnival cruise entertainment, carnival pride, carnival pride photographs, carnival pride photos, cruise, cruise food, cruise photographs, cruise photos, food, freeport, nassau, photos, port, travel

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hoohaa29

Writer who loves images just as much as words! In search of perfectly poured pints of Guinness and great hot dogs. Find me on twitter @softball29.

I guess the April Fool's joke is on us, Mother Nat I guess the April Fool's joke is on us, Mother Nature? Oh .. ha ha ha.
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I also guess this is why hitting back roads to work is good -- you can stop and take a photo and not worry about anybody coming (usually)! Main roads around here are fine for now, but it's definitely quite picturesque on the lawns/trees etc.
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#snow #winterspring #springwinter #april #blackandwhite #photography #photooftheday #goawaywinter #love #instagood #picoftheday #bestoftheday #nature #backroad #road
This was pretty relaxing and fun. #lego #legos #ea This was pretty relaxing and fun. #lego #legos #easter #legoeasterbunny #legoeaster #relax #hobby #fun
It shouldn’t be so hard to find a trash can... # It shouldn’t be so hard to find a trash can... #litter #mask #masks #blackandwhite #streetphotography
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softball29P.J.@softball29·
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I mean, if you hold a #Wrestlemania in an open stadium... eventually rain delays had to come, right? 🤣

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RealKentMurphyKent@RealKentMurphy·
7 Apr

28 years ago The Sandlot was released and this iconic scene was brought into our lives.

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2 Apr

New blog post: Photo Blogging Challenge (March 2021): Eight #photobloggingchallenge #pbc #challenge #blogging https://hoohaa.com/?p=15201

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