Mardi Gras Cruising – Getting Started

WARNING: Photo intensive!

It’s hard to know where to start. Embarkation, I guess. We had signed up for 12:00-12:30 since at the time we signed up, we weren’t sure if we would be in Vero Beach with my brother or more local to the terminal. We left a little early and picked up a couple of small items at a local pharmacy before filling up with gas and going to our parking spot. There were a lot of ships going out so things were busy at Park Port Canaveral. We arrived at 12:30 and were quickly ushered through our check-in and on to our room. After dropping off our carry-on bags, we headed out to get something to eat, do our e-muster, and go find some foo-foo coffee.

Masks were required in the terminal and on the ship – second week it will be the terminal only.

Foo-Foo coffee found at the Java Blue, around the corner from the Punchliner Comedy Club where our e-muster was held (SOOO glad they are doing it this way). I met Christina, the barista, when I ordered our first iced cappuccino coffee. Yum! I missed these. (and yes…we were both wearing our custom READY TO SHIP – CARNIVAL 2022 shirts I got on Etsy)

Once that was done, we headed back to our room and discovered our luggage had been delivered. The rooms on the Mardi Gras were a bit smaller with a different closet/drawer configuration that we had been used to, but we managed. LOL! When that was done, I decorated our door. Since we were doing a back-2-back cruise AND we were on the Mardi Gras AND we were going to celebrate Mardi Gras ON the Mardi Gras, this was a must for me. There were door decorating contests in the Facebook groups for each week, but I initially ignored them.

We were originally due to depart at 4pm but several other ships left before us: Norwegian, Royal Caribbean, Disney, and Carnival (Magic). So we relaxed on our balcony and watched them all pass.

We had two sea days – so it was pedicure time, then time to explore the ship. Here’s a few pics.