Our Glory Adventure

Three years ago today, we set off on vacation (really a long weekend) on a cruise up to Canada. It was a family trip, and it was great to get to spend some time with family on the sea and away from home. As we've been recapping our other adventures, it occurred to me that, while the Glory is the one (and only) trip we've fully recapped, we never wrote a summary post about our adventures. On the third anniversary of our trip, what better time to do it than now?

Our cruise on the Carnival Glory left in the afternoon from the west side of Manhattan, which meant we didn't do much that day other than sail out, have our first dinner in the dining room, get acquainted with the ship, and end the night with some late night snacks at the grill. The Glory was your pretty basic, traditional cruise ship, in that it had a main dining room with traditional seating times (unlike the trend to have more and more smaller restaurants and reservations at all different times), a large buffet, and other snack areas. It was a smaller ship but a comfortable size for a short cruise. It had more amenities than another ship that A and I previously sailed on.

We spent the second day of the trip at sea, where we mostly relaxed as far as we can remember. I have no idea what we did other than maybe go to the gym. We had breakfast, lunch, and dinner in the dining room. It was formal night which meant we got dressed up and took lots of photos, which was fun.

On the morning of day 3, we docked in Saint John, New Brunswick. I had been there once before on a different cruise but it was A's first time visiting the small Canadian town. We didn't take any special excursions, but just wandered around town for a bit and searched out some Canadian dishes. We started the day with breakfast on board the ship before taking the short walk into town, where we stopped at a food court for some poutine and window-shopped at fast food restaurants. We closed out our stay with a local blueberry ale, a lobster roll, and a bowl of chowder at Billy's Seafood Company, which we were quite happy with. 

After getting back on board, we stopped by the burrito station in the buffet area for a snack. We ended the night on the ship with dinner and the midnight Mexican buffet, which I was quite excited about. When do I not want tacos? (As a side note, how much do our stomachs expand on trips that we can eat all that food in one day and not feel utterly sick?! I'm a bit horrified at how much we ate that day. Sure, I went over 19,000 steps that day, but I'm not sure that justifies it.)

Our last full day of the trip was another day at sea as we made our way back to NYC. We had our usual breakfast in the dining room, and then headed up to the Lido deck at lunchtime where they were having a chocolate buffet. We also grabbed some other snacks that were left over from the previous night's Mexican buffet and A investigated the Mongolian wok and some other buffet stations. A ate a bigger lunch at the Lido deck, but I only had some tacos so I ate more when we went down to lunch in the dining room. (Yes, technically 2 lunches.) We ended another day of relaxing, gym-going, and hanging out with our final dining room dinner.

After a stormy night (watching lightning on the water is simultaneously scary and amazing), we were docked back at the pier in Manhattan and it was time to bid vacation goodbye - but not before grabbing one last breakfast at the buffet (the only thing open). From there it was time to say goodbye to family, take a tedious walk through customs, and then head over to the office (yes, we went to work straight from the ship). Vacation over.

Would we take this trip again? Maybe. If the trip were just a quick getaway with a main goal of relaxation, and the price were right, then we would definitely consider it. There's something nice about being out at sea, endless blue water in every direction, that is just so calming. Add to that that there is little cell reception and you're kind of forced to relax (in a good way). The port stop was okay and the ship was fine, but they wouldn't be the main motivators to go back. It would be nice to take a cruise up to New England and Canada sometime during fall foliage season, but unlike this cruise, that would be more about the ports and less about just getting away. This may have been a very short trip, but it was a great summer break!