Carnival Pride - Day 3 - Sea Day (Part 2)

After spending a bit of time using our social internet plan to let our families back home know that we'd be going to Nassau instead of Grand Turk, we started to make our way down to dinner. As we came out of the corridor at the elevator bank, we ran into a couple sweet ladies standing there who looked totally confused. It turns out that they couldn't tell where their dining room was and were completely lost about where to go. We helped them check their sea pass cards to see where their assigned dining room was listed and gave them directions on how to get to the dining room. After we had parted ways, I wondered aloud to Joni about what those ladies must have done the first two nights if they were questioning now on the 3rd night where to find the dining room. 

When we got off the elevator right next to the Normandie dining room, there was a huge gap in the line to get into the dining room with the next group of people too busy talking to notice everyone had moved up about 20 feet. Joni dubbed herself the hole finder and we slipped right into the gap before anyone noticed and moved up. 

Thankfully tonight we were led to a table that wasn't tough to get into but I did notice a couple freestanding tables for 2 scattered about away from the railing during our walk to our table. We were never led to these tables but if you have the same concerns, I advise specifically asking for a two top away from the railing. One thing I liked about each night's dining service is that the wait staff would use our cabin check in to greet us by name. Then several times when placing our orders, they'd ask for our names to include them on their pads with our order. I hope this measure was for them to be able to verify that what you're choosing to order isn't on a restricted list for your reported food allergies. 

Tonight as we were seated, the waiter only handed us one menu before walking away. Rationing out the menus along with the melted butter now? I ordered a Diet Coke and this was the first time I'd been brought the can and had it left with me at the table. 

The head waiter came by to take our order and was confused when he saw we only had one menu. When we explained that we'd only been handed one, he reprimanded the first waiter and sent him to fetch another menu. This was also the first night I noticed they started putting the cards on the tables with the names of your table's wait staff.

With the rocking of the boat and the lack of entrée choices that Joni liked, she chose to keep it simple and ordered 3 appetizers instead. I forget exactly what they were but I'm guessing one was the shrimp cocktail. Selvin brought out 2 of her appetizers with my one appetizer of the Vegetable Spring Rolls.

Side note - if you've read my past reviews, you know of my desperation for soft dinner rolls. Happy to say that the mix of bread offered each night at dinner did include a couple soft choices. A few days into the cruise, I noticed my go to roll went to a darker wheat color and eventually started having seeds in it. The cut up slices of baguette worked just as well after that. 

On my 2nd ever Carnival cruise, I had a great stuffed mushroom dish that was served as these little button mushrooms in an escargot style dish and I was really hoping to see that on the menu again now that we were back on Carnival. So tonight I jumped at the sight of Crisp Portobello Mushrooms on the entrée menu. I also ordered the Baked Ziti just in case I didn't like the mushrooms. Selvin brought out Joni's third appetizer of the Greek Salad at the same time as my entrees. 

Greek Salad - immediate veto because Joni didn't realize it had olives

Baked Ziti - a safe bet

My sought after stuffed mushrooms - well this was not it. I gave it the old college try and then I flunked it out of school.

It took around 20 minutes to have our finished plates cleared. The delay became even greater because tonight we were in the restaurant at the right time for the dancing waiter performance. 

It's fun to watch the waiters that really get into the performance. One of the waiters on the lower level was so expressive he started grinding his body against the podium in between the choreographed moves. Pictured above is not him but our Team Waiter Pratama. 

I finally had to catch the eye of Selvin working behind the booths to get a dessert menu. Pratama came by to take our dessert order within seconds of being handed it. Meanwhile, our entrée plates still sat on the table. Joni asked about the ice cream choices to go with the Carnival Melting Chocolate Cake and Pratama said it "usually comes with vanilla." For lack of anything better sounding, I went with "if all else looks bad" choice of Apple Pie. Finally 10 minutes later someone came to take away our dinner plates. We sat there for the longest time waiting our dessert to arrive. Joni stopped Selvin as he rushed by to ask for coffee. He brought it but disappeared again right away. After watching several tables on the lower level being brought bowls of multiple kinds of ice cream, Joni stopped Selvin again to ask about the other ice cream choices. As soon as he listed her favorite of Butter Pecan, Joni asked to have some brought with her dessert. Selvin confirmed and rushed away again. Our apple pie and chocolate melting cake with vanilla ice cream finally arrive. Neither of us liked our choices tonight.

We waited another 10 minutes more to see if Joni's order of butter pecan ice cream would show up and it never did. Eventually Joni was tired of waiting and by now we were already 20 minutes late to go see the Getaway Island performance in the theater. This was a brand new cast and their first performance. There was a box of 3-D glasses at the entrance to the theater but we opted out of using them given the still rough seas. I'm not usually one for the big production style shows but this to me seemed super cheesy like a high school play. The cast stood at the doors to greet people as we left. 

I would like to give a shout out here to the couple decorated doors that we used as landmarks to know how to get back to our cabin. I didn't get a picture but the first had little signs that said "Yes, we are obnoxious" and "We still don't care." The second one we used was the one featuring this sweet plaque:

As a sign of appreciation for their guidance, we would routinely salute and/or say hi to Rufus as we passed by this door. One day our walk back to the cabin occurred at the same time as Rufus and Brenda were getting into the elevator just outside their cabin. We proclaimed "Hi Rufus" as we routinely did when walking by the door only to hear a "Yes?" as a head pops back out from the elevator. We all had a good laugh when we explained using their door sign for guidance. Here's to you Rufus and Brenda, we thank you and your plaque for its service!

Once we made it back to our cabin, we discovered a piece of paper left in our mailbox with a sad message.

Carnival giveth us Grand Turk then taketh away (for good reason). Carnival give us a fun excursion to do in Nassau instead, then giveth away for "low enrollment." We researched other options including the one they offered a 25% discount if we chose instead but decided against booking anything new. We also found the official letter confirming the change in itinerary.

Not long after arriving at the cabin, we heard another distress call announcement with a cabin number. Hopefully that one was a false alarm. A bright spot upon entering the cabin cheering us up was to find we'd each been left a gift card celebrating our birthday. I'd asked the travel agent to put on our account that we were each celebrating a birthday on this cruise even though the actual date wasn't for months later. We each received $50 off at the spa and Joni also received $12 off at Pixels. Purwanto had also left us a cute message on the mirror above the desk.

I'll share more about our experiences trying to cash in these gift cards when I get to those days.

I wanted to enjoy some time out on our balcony even though it was dark by now and tried to turn on our balcony light. Nothing seemed to happen despite my flipping the switch on and off several times. I stepped out onto the balcony anyway for a few minutes in the darkness. Came back inside, got ready for and into bed, and noticed this bright flash of light from the bit of balcony door we could see around the curtain. I thought it might actually be lightning until I realized it stayed lit up. Turns out our balcony light had finally turned on after all that time had passed. I got up to flip the switch once to turn it off and crawled back into bed.