We are a married couple in our late forties, on our fourth cruise, our second with Carnival. We chose the Conquest because it left from Galveston, Texas; a destination we were looking at traveling to with friends, also a married couple in their late forties. We were a little hesitant about booking another Carnival cruise, but decided that we could only make a fair judgment of Carnival after we had sailed at least twice. This cruise was a joy, and we are eagerly counting down the days until our next Carnival cruise at Easter.
The ship was to leave from Galveston on Sunday, November 18, so we flew into IAH on Friday night. We stayed at the Wyndham Greenspoint Hotel complex, and had a spectacular room! I would highly recommend this hotel, and will stay there again if I am ever in the Houston area. We took a cab to the Downtown Aquarium on Saturday morning. It was a pleasant way to spend a few hours while we waited for our friends to arrive on Saturday afternoon. We were lucky enough to be at the aquarium to hold, and have our picture taken with a baby white Siberian tiger! This was my Houston highlight! We returned to the airport to pick up a rental SUV, our friends and then we drove to Johnson Space Center. Traffic on I 45 was very heavy, but we had no problem finding Johnson despite the fact that the NASA road was closed due to construction. We then drove on to Galveston for our stay at the Harbor House Hotel, a few blocks from the cruise ship terminal. We returned the SUV to the closed Hertz office on Avenue L, and took a cab back to the hotel. If we are ever in Galveston for another cruise, we will stay here again. The hotel was good, but the location is great!
We woke up to rain, and the spectacular sight of the Conquest docked at the pier. We had arranged to stand on the pier behind the hotel and wave to all of our family and friends via the Galveston Harbor web cam. Most people saw us! It was a joy to watch all of the dolphins swimming around in the Galveston harbor. One even came close to where we were standing and poked its head out at us! We then walked our luggage over to the terminal, which was only a couple of blocks from the hotel. We arrived at the terminal around 11 am, walked right up to the front of the non-US line, and were given the number "1" embarkation card. Once our friends got through their US line, they got the number "2." We handed our number back so we could all walk onto the Conquest together - likely causing us to board about 2 minutes later than we could have! We sat in the terminal until about noon, when boarding began. We were on the ship by 12:15. Embarkation was very smooth. We had a burger and fries, and a drink of the day in our hands on the Lido deck by 1 pm!