Days 6 & 7: Our Fun Days at Sea on the Carnival Freedom

Day 6 - At Sea:

Here we are, our last two days of the cruise, and I have yet to enjoy brunch in the MDR. Well, that's going to change today. With two sea days ahead, we have plenty of downtime to do whatever we want, as much or as little. Other than the one "critical" task of rinsing our dive gear today, our schedule is completely open.

Blue skies and calm seas

After getting to bed at midnight, we slept in until 9. Ahhhhh, one of the many joys of sea days! We awoke to a beautiful sunny day with calm seas. Since we were doing brunch in the MDR with Keith and Barbara, we didn't order our standard first breakfast from room service. That coffee won't drink itself. Let's head down to deck 3 and sign up for a table.

We met Keith and Barbara coming down the stairs and the four of us approached the hostess to ask for a table. Thankfully the wait was minimal and soon enough we were seated. Our waiter served coffee and pastries while we perused the menu. I don't know why I grab a menu, as I always order the eggs Benedict. For a "mass production" service that Carnival has to do, they do a remarkable job with the eggs Benedict. I learned long ago to ask for the Hollandaise sauce on the side, though. Otherwise, the galley will plate the eggs Benedict with the sauce on them, which will then sit under a heating lamp. The sauce tends to get very thick and burned looking on top. Do yourself a favor and ask for the Hollandaise on the side. Trust me on this. 

Eggs Benedict with potatoes

Oh, my, these were soooooo good! The eggs were poached perfectly, and the muffins were crisp without being overdone. The Hollandaise sauce had a good blend of richness and tanginess. 

Cindy opted for the French toast crusted with Frosted Flakes. Yes, with syrup. She's not normally one to choose something so sweet for breakfast, but hey, cruise food doesn't count.

"Funnest French Toast"

I had a bite and if you like a punch-you-in-the-mouth sweet dish this is definitely for you. Just make sure to have a vial of insulin handy. 

We took our time at brunch, sipping coffee and deciding what we wanted to do next. Obviously, Cindy and I would be on the aft Lido, rinsing dive gear. Keith and Barbara elected to meet us up there, and hang out at the pool and hot tubs. 

It didn't take us long to change into swimwear and haul our dive gear up to Lido. Surprisingly we didn't find much of a crowd so we were able to rinse all of our gear and spread it out over a few sun loungers to dry. We alternated between the pool and hot tubs, having fun and visiting with others while our gear dried. 

After spending several hours on Lido, we took our gear back to the cabin, showered and took a short nap before dinner. I figured we'd be hitting the piano bar after dinner and wanted to be sure I had plenty of energy to hang out for the evening. This was also our second formal night, so I wanted to make sure we had time to get into our formal wear.

During the day, we only grazed since we had a nice brunch. We were all ready for dinner when it was time to head to the MDR. 

Appetizer: Pasta Fagioli soup

For such a simple soup, it was surprisingly satisfying. The broth was well seasoned and both the carrots and pasta had a good mouthfeel, not overcooked or mushy. 

Entree: Filet Mignon

Steak for dinner again. Yes, life is good! Perfectly cooked, and almost fork tender. The potatoes were rich and creamy and the green beans had a nice snap to them. 

Dessert: Grand Marnier Souffle

Orange creme Anglaise

It's a good thing I saved room for such a sumptuous meal. Usually, by the time dessert rolls around I'm pretty full and eat only a bite or two. Not this time! I finished every bite of it. Every.bite.

Even after all of that, I wasn't overly full. And the best part? I managed not to drip anything on my formal clothes. Cindy wanted to take some more formal photos after dinner, so we headed up to deck 5 and posed with three different backdrops. Some of these were new, at least to us, so we definitely wanted to see what would come out. 

That done, both of us wanted to get out of our formal wear and into more comfortable clothes. We didn't spend any more time in the cabin than to change and head back down to deck 5. Ben normally starts his night at the piano bar at 9. We were a bit early yet, so we dropped by the karaoke bar to listen to our fellow passengers belt out some tunes. As we passed the piano bar, though, Ben was there, earbuds in, working something out on the piano.

"Hey Ben, what are you doing here so early?"

He looked up, smiled, and said: "I'm trying to learn that song you requested the other night."

Wow, how cool was that? A few nights ago I had requested My Own Worst Enemy by Lit. He wasn't familiar with it and asked me to give him a few days to learn it. Sure enough, he did! You're a true professional, Ben, and an asset to Carnival.

We spent about half an hour at the karaoke bar before walking the short distance to the piano bar. I was happy to get seats right at the bar instead of one of the tables. 

Ben the Piano Man

As we got settled, drinks in hand, Ben did his version of My Own Worst Enemy. Dude! You totally nailed it! Then again, I don't know of any song he hasn't just owned. The man is definitely talented, and puts on a fantastic show every night he's there. Some people book a cruise just for a specific cruise director. I would book a cruise if I knew Ben would be on board.

He had the whole bar rocking and I had no idea how late it was getting. I happened to look up and see Keith and Barbara enter. There were two empty seats by us at the bar so we waved them over. A glance at my watch and I was shocked. Just a few minutes before midnight! 

After midnight, Ben will break out his "red binder" songs. These are more adult in content and not suitable for kids. Cool! Barbara requested one from the red binder and Ben made sure to tailor the song just for her. I honestly don't remember what it was, but it was hilarious.

I think she liked the song.

In just another blink of an eye, at least to me, Ben was announcing last call. Wait, whaaat? Already? No wayyyy!

Way!

In the words of Karl Childers: Alright, then. Let's drink up and call it a night. Yep, we closed that bad boy down again!

Day 7 - At Sea:

Yawwwwnnnn.....

Why oh, why are we waking up so early on a sea day? Well, it's really not that early. It's 9 a.m. and we don't want to sleep the day away. There's just one day left of our cruise, so let's squeeze in another full day of fun. Since we liked brunch so much yesterday, we decided to do it again. 

We beat Keith and Barbara to the MDR by 10 minutes or so. Just as we were about to give up on them, figuring they decided to sleep in, they showed up. Good, y'all are here, let's get some breakfast and coffee.

Eggs Benedict with cheddar grits

I'm sure you can see from the photo above that Carnival is not stingy with their cheese. Now that's my kind of cheese grits! The eggs Benedict, as expected, were wonderful, and the cheese grits were creamy and gooey with all that cheddar. 

But wait, there's more!

I did say this was our last full day, right? We're gonna finish this cruise off with a bang. Hhhmmm, what's the best way to complete this fine meal? I know, cheesecake!

Salted caramel cheesecake

OK, to be honest, Cindy and I split the cheesecake. The chocolate graham cracker crumb combined with the caramel cheesecake and salted caramel drizzle proved to be the best ending for brunch. 

Much like yesterday, we changed into swimwear as soon as we finished brunch and spent most of the day in the aft Lido pool and hot tubs. The grazing plan seemed to work well for us yesterday, so we did the same today. A slice of pizza here, a few cookies there, and we were happy. 

What's this? I happened to be looking aft, at our wake, when I noticed another Carnival ship in the distance. It would be crossing our wake from right to left, making its course north to northwest, probably heading to New Orleans.

Who's crossing our wake?

Carnival Triumph

Another passenger had some binoculars and identified the ship as the Triumph. Well, that made my initial guess of New Orleans correct, then. At least I think so. 

Cindy and I returned to our cabin around 3:30 to rinse our swimwear and hang it up to dry before packing later. We spent some time on our balcony finishing our open bottle of wine, a nice Riesling Auslese, one of my favorites. It's a sweet white wine, with notes of apple and apricot. 

Cheers!

Finishing our wine, we changed into our casual dinner clothes and headed to deck 5 for the Past Guest party.  We would go directly from there to dinner. The past guest party is usually good for a few drinks and some hors-d'oeuvres before dinner. I always wonder if we'll run into friends of ours that we don't know are on the ship. This has happened a few times before when we'd see someone at the past guest party that we didn't know was on the ship.

Hungry?

Waiting for the party to begin

We sat with Vinnie (our diving buddy from Freeport) and his wife, and traded stories of cruising with Carnival as well as a few diving stories. They were staying aboard the Freedom when it made the next cruise. Good for them!

Since dinner was coming up, we each had a few bites and a couple of drinks, but that was it. Based on what I saw on the menu, I wanted to ensure I was hungry enough to enjoy it. And enjoy it we did.

Appetizer: Caprese salad

Tomato and fresh mozzarella

balsalmico, virgin olive oil, basil

I'm always happy to see this on the menu. Whenever it's there, you can bet that will be my choice of appetizer. Basil is my second favorite herb, close behind cilantro. Just writing this blog makes me want to go to a restaurant serving a fresh caprese salad.

Entree: Jerk pork loin

Slowly roasted pork loin,

marinated in island spices and herbs

Jerk seasoning works so well on both chicken and pork. With the variety of spices such as cinnamon, allspice, and nutmeg, the heat is determined by how much pepper is added. It doesn't have to be blazing hot to be good, although I do appreciate a high heat level. This tenderloin was fork-tender and the jerk sauce had the proper amount of heat to be interesting. 

Dessert: Chocolate ice cream

Such a simple dessert, but oh so rich and creamy. Besides, I was getting full. 

As soon as we finished dinner, we headed up to deck 4 to check out the formal photos we took the day before. Some came out quite nicely and we purchased a few different backgrounds. We normally don't buy that many photos, but all of these were worth spending money on.

Between comedian John Wessling's family and adult shows, we took the time to pack and get ready for debarkation the next morning. We had to have our suitcases outside the cabin by 11 p.m. and we made it with about half an hour to spare. Once we finished that, we thought we'd close out another fun cruise by hitting the piano bar one last time. 

Hangin' with Ben one more time

Our intent was to hang out for just a little while, then call it a day. Yeah, right! Once again, we stayed longer than we thought and weren't really surprised when Ben made last call. Since it was the last night, he closed a little earlier than usual, but not by much. Thanks for a rockin' good time, Ben! We hope to see you on another ship soon.

Selfie with Ben

We turned in a little after one and slept soundly until our alarm went off. Time to get off the ship and head home, I guess. As usual, we had a blast, and can't wait for our next cruise. 

I hope you've enjoyed this series as much as I've enjoyed writing it. For your convenience, here are the links to the other blogs in this series:

Back to the Bahamas on the Carnival Freedom

Day 2: Our First Fund Day at Sea on the Carnival Freedom

Day 3: Key West on the Carnival Freedom

Day 4: Freeport on the Carnival Freedom

Day 5: Nassau on the Carnival Freedom

Coming up next, I'll wrap up 2018 and take a look at what's coming up in 2019.

Until next time....

carpe cerevisi