Lissie & Lilly: Cruise Day 1 - Boarding and Leaving Port

Our family is going on our first cruise today for 5 days, and I decided to be brave and bring Lissie and Sawako Lilly with me after much pressure from them. ^_^ It's my first time taking the dolls out in public, and on a trip, outside of visiting an AG store so I admit I am nervous, but I figured, I won't ever see these people on the boat again, and if I do, I doubt they'll remember me. 

Our ship, the Carnival Triumph, left from Galveston so first we had to drive down there.

Lissie: Don't worry! I've got this!

Lilly: You haven't even got a licence! 

Lissie: Pah! I have a licence for reckless fun!

Lilly: Yes, but I don't have doll hospital insurance coverage for reckless fun so please come down Lissie.

Lissie: Oh fine, but only because my feet won't reach the pedals. 

Lissie: Come on already Big People! What's taking so long?
Lilly: I think they're all going to the restroom before we start on the long drive.

Lissie: *sigh* Big People problems.

Lilly: Working bladder problems.

I had Lissie and Lilly stored in my backpack as we went through security. I didn't really think anything of it as I put my bag on the security belt to go into the scanner and walked through the metal detector. As I pass through, I heard a loud exclamation from the security officer at the scanner, "WHAAA-! COME OVER HERE AND LOOK AT THIS!" 

I turn around and see that she's stopped the belt, and it suddenly dawned on me, "Oh llamasaurus, she must be looking at L&L on the x-ray scanners." XD I started laughing and told her, "You must be looking at my dolls right now."

Her eyes opened wide and then she started laughing with the other security officers she had called over. She said, "Oh! They're dolls! I thought for a second they were babies and thought what the heck is wrong with this girl?" 

>_< Errrrrrrgggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

 Lissie: ALMOST? Almost doesn't cut frozen butter!

Lilly: No one warned us that half the cruise is waiting in lines to just board the ship.

Lissie: First there was the line for baggage check line, then the security check line, then the key line, and now a check in and key line! This better be the last one! We've been waiting for decades!

Lilly: Well, technically only 2 hours, but it certainly feels like decades.

 Lissie: Finally! Finally! We can finally board the ship!

Lilly: Doesn't this walkway to the ship make it feel like we're getting on an airplane Lissie?

Lissie: I'll say! I signed up for a wooden, rickity gangplank! None of this fancy, safe steel and glass structure nonsense if you please.

 Lilly: Oh look below Lissie! So that's how our bags get loaded onto the ship! It is like an airplane after all.

Lissie: Mwahaha! Bow down you insignificant, inferior bags! Perhaps if you work hard, one day you can make it to carry on status like us!

Lilly: Lissie, remember what we said about your gloating?

Lissie: Do it frequently and do it obnoxiously!

Lilly: ......

 Lissie: Hurry! Look how far ahead everyone is!

Lilly: Wait Lissie! I can't run as fast as you. I didn't realize to go across the sea you have to go up first.

Lissie: Life is full of up and downs, now let's go! *pushes Lilly forward*

 Lilly: Look Lissie! It's the name of our ship.

Lissie: Triumph, a most fitting name for General Washington!

 Lilly: These small lifeboats don't look very capable at all. I'm so surprised to see they can carry 150 people!

Lissie: Or one Lilly, and one Lissie with all her ego and self importance. 

Lilly: But what about our Big Person?

Lissie: No fear! She can swim! After all, her eyes won't rust if they get wet.

 Lilly: Oh what a big room and bed! Even if Samantha, Cecile, Marie-Grace, and Lydia Charlotte were here, we would all have room to spare. There's even a TV and paintings on the wall.

Lissie: Who needs a TV when you have the ever changing sea outside your window?

Lilly: Do you think the Big People will feel cramped though, Lissie?

Lissie: They won't even have time to feel cramped because they'll be too busy exploring the ship. Come on Lilly, I want to test those pillows! That's always the first thing you do in a new place after all.

 Lilly: Which side do you want Lissie?

Lissie: Take whatever side you want! Sides for everyone! Everyday is a side! I don't care as long as I can roll on this ultra poofy pillow.

 Lilly: Do you think we've already set off? What time is it? The schedule said we would leave at 4.

Lissie: But we didn't even feel anything! No tremor, no shudder, no groan of protest!

Lilly: Oh, let's go look out the window! Perhaps we're already in the middle of the Gulf of Mexico.

 Lissie: Well, there's not much to see, mainly because there's too much condensation on the windows fogging up the view.

Lilly: This glass is awful thick. I wish it wasn't nailed shut so we could open it.

Lissie: Yes! So we can charge right into Davy Jones' Locker and tell him how things are done!

Lilly: ... Perhaps it's a good thing the windows can't be opened.

 Lilly: You're right Lissie, it looks like we're still docked.

Lissie: You know what we should do? We should explore the entire ship before it starts moving and we start heaving over starboard.

Lilly: Why starboard? Why not port? Also, I don't think you'll have to worry about heaving at all. Our Big Person remembered to bring motion sickness medicine.

This is the interior of the London dining room. There are 2 dining rooms and the guests are divided between them so neither space is overcrowded. The other dining room is called Paris dining room. ^_^ Each dining room has an upper and lower floor, and people who make a reservation to have their meals at a specific time eat on the top floor. People who just don't give a cow's tail and spot what time they eat at can come in on the bottom floor whenever their stomach summons them.

 Lissie: But more importantly, which dining time are we?

Lilly: I think we're the any time crowd.

Lissie: Good, because my stomach is summoning me now.

Lilly: You'll have to tell your stomach to go into hibernation because it looks like they're still setting up for dinner.

Lissie: ARGH! The brochure lied!!! Anytime meals!!! Why is this time not anytime??? Let's get out of here before I eat the tables.

The bar (one of many) is of course located at the center of the cruise ship and the first thing you see as you board the ship. There are 4 glass elevators behind the bar so you can watch other people making themselves sick as you feel sick. XD

 Lissie: Because the soul of a cruise is slaughtering your liver and wiping your memory so you don't even remember the cruise?

Lilly: Yes, something like that, and you have to pay extra for your alcohol since it's not included like the food is!

Lissie: Jeez, as if a soul wasn't motion sick enough on the ocean, you're going to add some visual and mental disturbances to the mix. Why drink when you can go to the buffet?

Lilly: I think your stomach is talking again Lissie.

 Lilly: My, look at all the floors around the bar! What do you think is on each of them?

Lissie: Let me see here on my trusty treasure map. Hmm... it looks like there's a guest service and excursions booth on the bar level. Then one level above is the Pixel Gallery.

Lilly: Gallery? But there aren't any pictures.

Lissie: That's because we haven't set sale yet. As soon as we're on the sea, you'll get tons of pictures of people gorging on food, alcohol, and other memories they'd rather not have captured on film.

Lilly: And the floor above that?

Lissie: That's the floor we sell our souls so we can shop in the duty free shops.

 Lilly: *coughing* What is this place? I can't breath!

Lissie: This is one of the few places on the ship you can smoke as you lose your inheritance, the casino!

Lilly: But we haven't even left port yet, why are people already here?

Lissie: Oh you poor, naive doll. Don't you know? Some like to live, and others like to not.

Lilly: I'm not sure that's how to saying goes Lissie. It sounds suspiciously like something you made up.

Lissie: Wanna bet on it?

 Lissie: Aside from the standard slot machines, we have tables for poker, blackjack, roulette, and fifty other ways to use a deck of cards to swindle your sanity.

Lilly: I don't think I know anything you just said Lissie. Can we please leave now? I don't think this is a place for a doll to be.

Lissie: That's because you've been spending too much time reading about lung disease with our Big Person. This is where the party never ends for Big People!

Lilly: Lung cancer is no party Lissie, neither is debt, now let's go please.

I personally don't smoke, drink, or gamble and do not plan on picking up those habits, even in moderation and with responsibility. However, I respect that it is within other people's rights to do so as long as they don't hurt others.

 Lissie: According to my handy dandy map, this is the Rome theater.

Lilly: Everything on the ship seems to be named after a famous European city, London, Paris, and now Rome. I wonder if the rooms on the other Carnival cruise ships are named after other large cities in Asia, Africa, Australia, and the Americas.

Lissie: You're thinking too much Lilly! Remember? You're supposed to let your mind dissentigrate into nothingness while on a cruise!

Lilly: But I brought all my textbooks to study...

Lissie: Why would you study? Don't you know there's going to be endless shows with singing, dancing, Bingo games galore in this theater? 

Lilly: Well I do love a good game of Bingo...

 Lissie: *panting* Finally... 10 floors later... we made it up to the deck...

Lilly: Why are you out of breath Lissie? We took the elevator all the way up.

Lissie: High altitude... no help for it...

Lilly: Hahaha! Don't be so dramatic Lissie! Look at the tail! That's the smokestack design for all the Carnival cruise ships you know.

Lissie: I don't know if a nosediving plane is the best imagery one wants to invoke on a relaxing cruise.

Lilly: Only because everything invokes the most extreme imagery for you Lissie.

(There is also a small jogging track up the stairs but... I'm not ashamed to admit I have no plans to make use of it. XD)

 Lilly: Goodbye Galveston! We'll see you again in 5 days!

Lissie: Don't drown in rain while we're away! Or actually, keep your rain, don't send it with us you hear?

 Lissie: Whoo hoo!!! This is where the rocking, rolling parties take place!

Lilly: But look at those clouds. What will they do if it rains?

Lissie: Party harder obviously! Who cares about getting wet when you're already soaked in the Jacuzzi!

 Lissie: Let's go climb to the top of those balloon things Lilly! That's the perfect place to stand on top of the world.

Lilly: I don't think we're allowed to do that. Those are the weather balloons and instruments. Besides, don't you want to go see if dinner is ready yet in the London dining room?

Lissie: Ah... the sacrifices I make for my gustatory delight. 

 Lissie: *whispering* Lilly, I think I'm going to burp.

Lilly: Oh no! You can't! Not in the middle of the Welcome Show! Everyone in the Rome Theater will hear you.

Lissie: Ugghhhh... but my stomach is stuffed like the pillows in our cabin...

Lilly: That's your own fault for picking 3 appetizers, 5 entrees, and 2 desserts at dinner. Just because the food is free and you can eat as much as you want doesn't mean you should.

Lissie: But how else am I going to try EVERYTHING?

Lilly: Shhhh! Don't distract the dancers as they're performing.

 Lissie: How do you think they can stay balanced on the rocking ship? 

Lilly: I'm sure they're experienced professionals who are used to it by now.

Lissie: I think they're cyborgs. That level of enthusiasm can't be authentic. Especially after dinner.

 Lilly: It's the cruise program director! He's the one who puts together all the on board activities and events to make each trip fun.

Lissie: Did you notice that the inflatable head and butt of the ship on the stage are separated? Do you think cruise ships are like earthworms? If you chop them in half, can both halves still sail away?

Lilly: ... What was in your dessert again?

After the show, we returned to our cabin to find something incredible waiting for us on the bed.

 Lissie: It's a rabbit! It's a rabbit!!!

Lilly: It's a rabbit made from towels! Amazing!!!

Lissie: Yehaaaaw! Giddiyup Peter Rabbit! To lands uncharted we go! 

Lilly: But, we're going to Mexico and that is charted.

Lissie: Not on a towel rabbit it's not! Get on Lilly!

Lilly: I guess we're not going to get any sleep tonight.

☆ Next Day>>>