Grand Turk and the Freedom

Tuesday, January 28, 2014

 Grand Turk is a 6 mile long speck of sand, barely above sea level, technically in the Atlantic, not in the Caribbean at all. It is a British Overseas Territory, at the easternmost of the Turks and Caicos archipelego. It appears fairly comatose until the cruise ships arrive, then it launches itself into a fitfull few hours of selling useless baubles to overfed tourists before it falls back into whatever rhythms of island life it has. One can speculate on what life was like way back when, when there was little to eat beyond plantain, coconut and whatever fish could be caught. The scenery is beautiful, but as a character in the movie "Local Hero" famously said "Ya cain't eat the scenery".

The main attraction for many of us is the free wi-fi at the Froots smoothie shop. We are all gathered at the altar of Internet to connect with our friends, family and Facebook. The off-duty ship workers are spread out on the ground grabbing bandwidth. Most of them are from Indonesia and don't get home for months at a time so these moments of contact are the most important part of shore leave for them.

Snorkeling and SCUBA diving are the main attractions  here apart from lying on the beach. By the time we got there all the beach loungers were taken, which didn't really matter, as negotiating the sand on crutches was the limiting factor. And getting in water that is home to  other hungry things is not our style.

Peg is interested in a couple of diamond earrings for our 10th anniversary which is apparently close. There are "great deals" on diamonds here. And you can "upgrade" your diamond the next time you come back! She found some diamond specks set into earring posts. There were six of them displayed on a small piece of black cardboard. I asked the sales lady how much they were and she said "$250". I put on my best Idiot from Omaha face and asked "For all six?" I'll give her credit for professionalism, if not for a sense of humor. She didn't smack me, and was very polite as she explained that was the price for a pair. We did not buy earrings.

After more aimless wandering we headed back to the ship for lunch. Our ship, the Carnival Freedom, is one of the older ones in the fleet and it shows both in its dated decor and design and in its upkeep. The decor is my biggest complaint. It is very busy, like a pin ball machine, and incongruous with its name Freedom and its attempted ties to the Statue of Liberty and the Constitution. Scattered around the main buffett deck are these light fixtures.

To me they look more like a Medusa than Lady Liberty.

And this statue is plunked down in the middle of the buffett.

Here is the lobby.

Las Vegas would blush

The first thing you see when you enter the ship is the bar. It sets the tone for the whole ship. The design of the decks hinders easy movement. For example, the main dining room is situated in the middle of deck three. In order to go beyond it you have to either go through the dining room or go up or down to another deck. Also,at the rear of the dining room there is an entrance, but you can't be seated from this entrance, you have to somehow find you way to the front entrance. Many people have been confused by this. There is no easy way to get to the bow of the ship, which many people like to do when we come in to a port. The promenade deck only runs the length of each side of the ship, so you can't do a full circle walk. These are little things, but you notice them if you have been on any other cruise ships, and you start to miss them. For me the biggest fault is the missing mountain of smoked salmon. I love smoked salmon and I want it avalable.  When they have it, they ration it. 

On the plus side, our stateroom is large and comfortable. We're one deck up from the basement so we have a close up view of the water through a large and unobstructed port hole. The beds are comfortable and there is even a small couch to sit on. The bathroom is large and the shower is hot.

The staff has been very friendly, but they seem a little...distant, I would say. On our NCL (Norwegian Cruise Line) cruise you would constantly see workers doing little maintenance tasks. Here not so much. In the buffett we find the coffee machine may be empty, or there is coffee but no cups. They pick up dishware pretty quickly, but they don't always wipe down the table. It's those little things, attention to detail, that we notice.

The big bugaboo for Ms. Risk is the Purell dispensers, or lack of them. On NCL there was Mr. Washy-Washy, a large Jamaican man who was at the entrance of the buffett every morning, and almost every meal, singing his liliting Washy-Washy song, right by the Purell dispenser. People sang along with him, and they used the dispensers. Those dispensers were everywhere and by day two people were so used to using them they didn't even think about it. You would walk by one and automatically put your hand out for a squirt.
Here the dispensers are sporadically placed and often empty. There is lip service paid to washing your hands and using the disinfectant, but there isn't the gentle social pressure that worked so well on NCL.

Ma and Pa go to the beach