The Carnival Jubilee
On a Monday night, March 24th of 2003, my friend Chris Sharp called me and asked if I wanted to go on a cruise. “Sure” I said, thinking he meant sometime in the future, like summer time. Except he wanted to know if I wanted to go on a cruise that Thursday, his girlfriend at the time (now his wife) couldn’t go, and his parents were offering to pay for a friend to go with him, they were also going along with his sister Tiff, and her friend Spring. At first I turned him down because I didn’t think I could get the time off of work.
After getting off the phone, I said to my brother (I was living in his house at the time) “I just turned down a free cruise.” He urged me to see if I could get the time off work. I called Chris back and told him I was going to twist some arms the time off. The next day at work, I was able to do some horse trading for the days off I needed, and got it approved. Chris’ Mom, Phyllis was able to get us booked on Wednesday. If memory serves me, our names weren’t even printed on the ship manifest, they were written in because it was such a last minute booking. I was broke and in between paydays, my brother loaned me $50 for spending money.
My first sail and sign card, the cruise that hooked me!
We left out of Galveston that Thursday, March 27th, 2014 (I think the time stamp from the pics is off a day) on the Carnival Jubilee (which was sold by Carnival to a small cruise line in Australia who named it the “Pacific Sun”, who sold it to a line China, who renamed it “Henna”) . It was a four night/five day cruise, though only three full days as one day was the embark day, and one the disembark day. Our one port was Cozumel on Saturday.
Galveston
Stateroom
Lifeboat drill
Ms. Phyllis
George
(L-R;Tiff, Spring, Chris, Me, Phyllis)
(L-R; Spring, Tiff, Chris, Randall, George)
Chris Sharp, Showgirl, Me
Here I am, younger, and fatter, with more hair at least. Not to mention I have a sunburn, so my face looks awesome…
I hate this picture, but it is part of my history.
A pirate’s life for me…
I really, really hate this one, but again, it is part of my history.
Tiff and SPring
Chris in line for Pizza
Cruising
Sunset
George
Chris and Phyllis
Phyllis, Chris, Me on the lido deck
Chris lounging
Lido deck
It being my first cruise, I did not want to miss anything, so I think I slept maybe 3-4 hours a night. Not that I am in great shape now, but at the time I gave no care to how much I ate and was a lot bigger too, needless to say that all the food I wanted was a big highlight at the time.
It was my first time in Cozumel, which at that time was the farthest I had been anywhere. The water there was (and still is) beautiful!
Cozumel, I don’t remember which other Carnival ships were docked that day
My first time in Cozumel
Chris and Phyllis
Carlos N Charlies
Snorkeling Excursion
On the way back from Cozumel, we had some rough weather and the ship was rocking pretty well. Going up stairs were like being in a fun house, you went to take one step and ended up take three. Though a lot of people were getting sea sick, I did not. Ms. Phyllis had insisted we all take the meclizine that was available for free at the purser’s desk. We saw people walking around with barf bags. The Sharp’s like to play Conasta, a card game, and they taught me to play. While the ship was rocking to and fro we all sat on the inside Lido deck and played Canasta while people watching.
It was a great experience, and definitely hooked me on cruising. I will always be grateful to the Sharp’s for their generosity of paying my way to go. I have been on five cruises since then, all with Carnival, and a couple more with the Sharps. Each one I have been on with them has been a blast!
I found a few pictures; most of these were taken by George. I hate how I look in pictures, but I really hate these, but it’s part of my history. So I am sharing…
Disembark day
