First Post

Hello everyone, and welcome to my blog. I am going to use it to talk about travel, photography, food, video games, and whatever else I find fun. For my first post I am going to start with our cruise we just came back from. This is going to take a little bit as it was a 11 days and I am still sorting out the pictures and such but I will try and post every day or two to keep it updated. So lets begin.

This cruise we went on was with Celebrity cruises on the Equinox. I was traveling with my wife Jacqueline, my older sister Jeniffer, my younger sister Sabrina, my younger brother Jordan, my mother Jan, and my grandmother May. We were on the 10th floor of the ship which is the library floor in rooms 1211,1209, and 1207. I do apologise now as I did not take a lot of pictures of the ship for some reason but here is a picture of the library.

​​

 

The cruise ran from March 14 to March 25. The ship was leaving from Fort Lauderdale and was traveling to: Cozumel Mexico, Puerto Limon Costa Rica, Colon Panama, Cartagena Columbia, and Grand Cayman. We flew in on the redeye the sunday night before. Living in Abbotsford B.C. we had to travel to Seattle airport to get our flight. Lucky for us there were four accidents and the bridge was closed to get into Seattle because of high winds. We left for our two hour drive at 2pm for our 7pm flight. We got to the airport by 5:30pm and lucky for us our flight was delayed due to the wind storm till 9pm. We decided to get a bite to eat while at the airport and I took a couple of pictures.

​​

 

 This is a picture of my brother Jordan, my sister Sabrina (pink hair) and my wife (Jacqueline). You will also notice that we have a Travelocity gnome on the table. He travels with us wherever we go and we do try and get as many pictures with him as we can. He will pop up in more pictures.

After finally getting on the plane and making it to San Francisco we had about a 20 minute layover before we had to hop on to the next flight to Fort Lauderdale.

​​

 

 Here is a picture of Jacqueline and Jordan with Gnomie in San Francisco right before we jumped on the next plane. If you look in the background the blonde in the wheelchair is my mother Jan. You wont see much of her as she doesn’t like her picture taken, kind of like me.

So we make it to Fort Lauderdale at 7:30am. This is the time we had to wait. We couldn’t go to the port until later in the morning so my wife and sister Jeniffer went and got coffee at starbucks and the rest of us found a little restaurant in the airport where we got some breakfast to waste time.

After wasting a bit of time we decided that at 10 am we would head to the port. So we grabbed a couple of cabs since they wont fit 7 people and 11 bags. Getting to the port was uneventful and by the time we unloaded and checked in our bags we had to wait again.

They opened the doors to the port around 10:30 and we headed in. We were some of the first people in and we checked in and got the family all setup with there sea passes and headed to the waiting area.

​​

 

 Here is Jordan, Jacqueline and I waiting to be let on the ship. My wife loves selfies so there will be a few in here.

At 11 or so they started letting us on the ship. At this point I do want to note that for Jordan and Sabrina this is there first cruise. Me this is my third, my wifes second and the rest of the family at least four or more. Jordan and Sabrina were both very excitied as you can see by Jordan in the picture.

Once onboard we headed to our favorite place on the ship which is Bistro on 5. This is a great little restaurant that serves crepes, entrees, soups, milkshakes, floats, and more. I know they have changed it to sushi on one of the other ships but that hasn’t happened full fleet yet so we were still happy. And yes you do have to pay $10 to eat here but it is worth it and you can eat as much as you want. Jordan later on in the cruise came back and ate a hamburger and 5 crepes. He is a bottomless pit.

​​

 

 Here is our family picture in Bistro on 5. I take this picture every cruise, just remember I am not in it.

​​

 

 Here is a picture of one of the crepes.

So while eating we hear the anoucement that our rooms are ready so we all headed up to our rooms to get ready for muster drill. We met our room steward at this point. His name was Baso and he was very attentive. He would always say hi to us when we saw him and would check in with us throughout the day. A little secret we have learned is to tip at the beginning of the cruise and a little at the end. We have always got outstanding service doing this.

We all ended up taking a nap since we were all exhausted from our flight until it was time for the muster drill. We proceeded to the photo studio to watch our video and then went back to our room.

We all had rooms with balconies so we could relax and watch as we sailed away from Fort Lauderdale. Here is a  picture of us leaving.

​​

 

So after this we pretty much just relaxed while we waited for dinner. I was tired along with my wife so I know we took a nap. Dinner was at 8:30 so we had plenty of time to rest up.

Here is the menu for the first night.

​​

 

​​

 

 Looks like the above image got corrupted but you can still see what is on it.

​​

 

 French onion soup which is always good.

​​

 

 This was the Thai Coconut soup. It was very spicy and is a cold soup. I was not a big fan of it and ate only about half.

​​

 

 Prime rib for dinner, how could you go wrong.

​​

 

 Crème Brule for my grandmother.

 

Sabrina had chocolate cake.

​​

 

She also had apple pie.

​​

 

I believe Jordan had the crepe.

​​

 

I had cheesecake with mango topping. It was fantastic.

After dinner Sabrina and I went to watch the film for the night which was Vacation. I enjoyed the movie even for a third time. Sabrina really enjoyed it also for her first viewing.

After the movie we went to the buffet to get a snack before bed and get a drink. This is when we met our new bartender friend named Happy (that was his name on his badge). Every evening when I went up there he was working and we would talk about how they day had been, how the cruise was going, and how the family was. He was a very nice gentleman.

After this we went back to our rooms and headed to bed and that is the end of our first day.

I hope you enjoy my first post. I will try and update regularly. If you have any questions feel free to ask me.