---  Nassau, Bahamas  ---


In Nassau, Bahamas, we chose the Blue Lagoon Private Island with Lunch tour.   I can recommend this tour & enjoyed the boat ride over to the island as well as coming back, as we were shown the estates & houses of Tom Cruise, Oprah Winfrey, Chuck Norris, Cristina Aguillera, Nicolas Cage, Michael Jordan, et al, which were all on neighboring Paradise Island.


The beach was pretty & inviting, with brilliant water!   The water was shallow from end to end, but I suspect a number of kids over the years threw rocks from a reservoir pile of rocks seen from the other side in to the water, because every now and again, you'd step on a large rock, but the water was usually clear, no crashing waves in a protected cove, and they had large, oversized hammocks & provided a lunch, too, if you selected that option.   The boat ride to the island took a good 30 to 45 minutes to get there.   I sat out on the front open deck of the bow & had pictures taken of us seated on the open deck of the bow.   


Amenities included--->>  There were inflatables for the kids to play on in the water.   Even parasailing was offered for an extra charge and there was a gift shop there on the island, with lockers, a place to change, restrooms, & showers that had weak water pressure to rinse off.   You could purchase additional food besides the meal voucher that came with your ticket.   


Understand that this is NOT the cruise ship, so you cannot eat them out of the house!   It's a one plate, one visit lunch, with no refills, and THEY serve you the portion of food; you do not get to serve yourself, so you can't eat them to the nub, as we can on the cruise ship.  Men are served 2 legs of chicken; women one leg of chicken.  One cheeseburger, a salad, rice and ONE small cup of lemonade or fruit punch.  It's quite overpriced if you dare to buy food on your own.  One member in our party found a small order of potato wedge french fries cost $4, for a small fry.   Locker rentals are $5 for the day.


They do provide a lifeguard on duty at the beach, and the beach is well-appointed with long beach chairs & several umbrellas sprinkled about.


Of the 3 tour excursions we did, on this cruise, this one rates as the top-most one we did.  When coming back from the boat ride, they afford you excellent photo opportunities to take of the ship, from all angles, too, so you don't need to worry about that!

Nassau

---  Freeport, Bahamas  ---


Here, I thought I'd try something new & broaden my horizons.   This time we chose the Dolphin Encounter Experience.   This was the tour whereby you enter the water with 2 Atlantic bottle-nosed dolphins with a group of about 30 other people.   You take turns, 2 at a time, one person per dolphin to come up close to it, pet & feel the skin of the dolphin, see all around it, up close while in the water with it, and if you're lucky, he'll do a show for you, splash you, or wiggle his fins at you if you tickle him well enough on the belly!   Then, you pose with the dolphin as he gives you a kiss & a picture is taken.   A T-shirt is provided for free to document your visit, but the picture will cost $14.95, for one picture, if you choose to purchase, or $20 for 2 pictures.


They will also allow you to bring your own camera and take pictures and video of the dolphins as they perform various tricks & acts for which I took pictures & video of.   It was an interesting show & you also have the option to take pictures with a couple parrots on your shoulder, on the return back to the boat, which takes you back to the ship.    I can recommend this tour as well, as it was an interesting tour, and not too overpriced either by the way these dolphin encounter tours are priced.   Notice--->>   This is NOT the dolphin tour that takes you on a boogie board or where you ride the dolphin by clinging your hand to its dorsal fin.   That's another tour & is quite overpriced.


The only thing I wasn't really satisfied with, is I thought we should have been provided a complimentary, non-alcoholic drink as so many tours in the Caribbean offer, during our boat ride over & back from the tour operator staging area at Port Lucaya.


For all y'all worried about the currency in the Bahamas, don't fret over it.   They gladly accept the United States dollar, but you may get the change back from the sale, in Bahamian currency.   The fix for that is use your credit card, but for very large purchases, most credit card companies may assess a currency conversion fee or what's called a foreign transaction fee since you're not in the United States, so be mindful of that as well.

Freeport

---  Key West, Florida  ---


Here, we chose the White Knuckle Speed Boat Thrill ride.   After about a 20 minute drive over to their dock, we boarded a vessel that seats about 10 people.  It's a family-owned operation.   The water was as smooth as glass, but the boat just didn't seem as fast as I thought it was going to be.   The driver spun-out doing 180Âº turns & even 270Âº turn-abouts, mainly cornering & going around channel markers.   It was the son of the owner of the company who piloted the speed boat.  He was quite young; tried to tell jokes, but it just didn't stick on the small group of 10.   No one got sick when he did the many spin-outs of the 180Âº & 270Âº turns or while he was hot-doggin' it.   There weren't really any photo opportunities offered either leaving the pier or coming back.  I felt the tour operator could have done more to engage us in some photo opportunities.  You can tell this tour operator was quite amateurish.   At least they offered some complimentary water, sodas, and even beers, on the return back to the dock.  Also, they should invest in another transport van where everyone can SEE OUT the windows, instead of looking at speckled, obscuring black dots.  After all, this should be a tourist van for sight-seeing; not a prison transfer!  It should be designed to allow folks to SIGHT-SEE & look OUT the windows to see the island during that 20 minute transport, so I wasn't thrilled with the fact we couldn't see out the whole time on the transport to and from.  Might as well put a brown bag over our face during the 20 minute transfer!   This tour didn't really deliver the chills n' thrills I was hoping it to, so for that reason, I cannot recommend this tour, as it was just a bit dull for me.   Maybe the boat could have been faster & more zipping if they didn't stuff 10 people in it.


Think about the Conch Tour Train, which has been around for decades, or the other trolley which makes stops as a hop-on/hop-off.   The Conch Tour Train does NOT allow hop-on/hop-off and is instead a tour.


Be sure to visit the historic Mallory Square in Key West.  It is in close walking distance to the cruise ship's pier.   We walked the whole distance from end to end on Key West's Duval street, to get to the Southern-Most point landmark in the Continental United States & grabbed a picture shot.  I estimate we walked about 3 - 4 miles that day.

185 sq. ft. cabin.  Lots of storage space for an inside 4F category cabin on deck 7.  Squeaky cabin, with rattling.  Mid-ship.  Quiet location.

)  STRENGTHS of the Carnival Conquest cruise:
    
-- Elegant Dining Room FOOD in the Renoir & Monet 
-- Dining Room SERVICE in the Renoir & Monet Service throughout the ship 
-- Glamorous, razzle-dazzle COSTUMES of the dancers during production shows 
-- The cruise director's comedy (marriage show) and his personal comedy 
-- The 4 dance classes were interesting & fun 
-- 3 production shows, one of which incorporated within the Magic show; tons of Carnival costumes on the dancers; they give you all you want; much more than the other cruise lines.)  WEAKNESSES of the Carnival Conquest cruise:

-- Activities not described, in the daily caper; incomplete descriptions  
-- Too much of the same activity -- karaoke, trivia, bean bag toss 
-- Not enough variety game shows; 
-- Not enough opportunity for audience participation 
-- Nighttime theatre shows NOT offered in the big auditorium EVERY night like on ALL other cruise lines 
-- Music selections in the production shows not appealing 
-- SEVERE over-crowding and INSUFFICIENT seating space in the Degas Lounge during Punchliner Comedy Club shows 
-- Severe over-crowding in the public areas, lobby, Toulouse Lautrec Lounge, during other nighttime shows, and in the pools/hot tubs -- just severe over-crowding everywhere in general 
-- Embarkation, (boarding on the first day), took 2 hours!

Carnival Conquest Review

Carnival Conquest to the Bahamas & Key West, 9/25/2011...

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