I just boarded Carnival Horizon in Miami for my 25th Carnival cruise. As you can see they recognized that on my mirror and I got the special 25th cruise milestone card. I stopped by the room just to drop my bags off. Then I’m going to grab a drink and eat lunch.

I got on pretty early so lido isn’t even crowded yet. I’m looking for the servers selling fun ships. So far I’m only seeing ones selling them in those additional charge cups. You can see one on the left here.  I’m going to see if I can find one with regular fun ships in the buffet.

I didn’t see any regular fun ship servers. Here are some views of Miami.

I’m just getting a fun ship at Tides.

There’s one with regular fun ships.

JiJi’s is my favorite specialty restaurant on Carnival and it’s only on three ships. I have it booked three times this cruise. At lunch you can get noodle bowls at JiJi or pasta bowls a Cucina. I’m going for the noodle bowl.

I have heard people complain that they no longer allow you to create your own bowl. These sound better to me. Steak and Pineapple pork were not options before.

This is the pineapple pork bowl. It’s very good.

Here is a look at the cakes downstairs in the buffet.

Funfetti cheesecake

I got another fun ship from Tides.

The buffet was so crowded people were using the drink station as a table.

Look at this guys line! This is almost where I was standing when I was in line for a Covid burger on Panorama in March 2020.

The other side has a long line as well.

I know they’ll cut you off after two drinks if you don’t go to your muster station so here I am. 

Outside of the muster station this lady asked the crew member holding the sign for his hat. She says “I want your hat.” He tells her they are available for sale in the gift shop. She says “I don’t want to buy one. I just want yours.” He says he needs it to work. She says “won’t they just give you another one?” He says no they just give him one uniform.

I was looking for a place to watch the NFL Draft and have drinks. I went to Pig & Anchor first. All of their TVs are advertising. What a waste. Just like the pub on Splendor. I wonder if Panorama is like that now. I know when I was on Panorama this TV was on live sports.

This is the main dining room for Your Time Dining, Port Day Breakfast, and Sea Day Brunch. Only Vista and Horizon have the bar in their dining room. 

My next stop looking for the draft is the Skybox Sports Bar. They have one TV on the draft but the audio is Caribbean music. There is no bartender yet. 

This is new.

I like the sound part. I’m freaking people out with this. I’m going to use it the whole cruise. I bet most people never look at it.

What’s the point of that? Various sports every night. 

I had to go for a refill. 

Rooms should be ready now.

This is one of those forward extra space 4Js like I had on Magic last year. When you book two years out, you get the pick of the litter.

That happened too easily.

Here are today’s Fun Times.

I’m finally running out of that 500 pack of plastic straws I bought for $8 on Amazon in 2019. Usually I make sure I have 100 straws packed. This is the bag I get them from. This time it was so low I just brought the whole thing.

I’m using a platinum gift. Since this suitcase didn’t have the pouches I decided to use the toiletry bag. 

I made it back to the sports bar for the moment we’ve all been waiting for.

I’m good with it. Keep drafting quarterbacks until one pans out. He’ll compete with last year’s 4th round pick Jake Haener for the backup job this year.

Spicy Bloody Mary from John Wick.

Sports bar is now open. The draft audio is on.

The bar closed for a safety briefing and everyone took off. The bartender was cool and got me a Corona to hold me over since my drink was low.

The next moment we’ve all be waiting for.

The next moment we’ve all been waiting for.

The bar is open again. The bartender was trying to be proactive by getting me another Corona. I got it last time because it was a quickie before before the safety briefing. I was going to try a couple of their specialty cocktails and a couple other beers.

I stepped out to lido deck for sail away. There’s the pilot boat.

That’s a MSC ship.

After sail away I stopped by the atrium for a fun ship.

The next moment we’ve been waiting for.

Challengers just came out. I saw the first showing on Thursday.

The forecast looks pretty good this week.

These guys I’ve been talking to next to me. Guy next to me is waiting on a drink. The bartender asks his friend why he’s nursing his drink.

And the last moment we’ve all been waiting for.

The string trio is in the atrium.

These people are waiting for a table assignment. Instead of waiting elsewhere and coming to the dining room when their table was assigned, they just show up and clog the elevator lobby.

I have never had a table like this in 25 cruises. This has to be a massive mistake 

I think this could be the “you’ve cruised with us 25 times and we haven’t done a thing for you table.”

I’m trying to do something different but I’m not a fan of the duck rolls or crawfish strudel.

It’s all just a matter of opinion. I saw someone on social media give those duck rolls a 9/10 and the crawfish strudel an 8/10. I didn’t expect the duck rolls to be cold but they were. And something about that strudel pastry didn’t work for me.  Those were the appetizers. I sat there for another 45 minutes with nothing and decided just to skip dinner.

I just walked into an elevator and said “I don’t care where it’s going it has to be better than here.”  I was right. It took me to 8 and I walked up the stairs to 9. I am done for the night.

I’ll get that tomorrow. Good night!