Fantastic Voyage 2018 Diary: Day One

Have you ever been to a cookout, boot ride, pool party, music festival, family reunion, old school basement party and sorority/fraternity conference all at the same time? Then you haven’t been to the Tom Joyner Foundation Fantastic Voyage sponsored by Denny’s. There’s a reason why it’s a bucket list item for so many people. As a first-timer myself, I’m not sure I was ready. Join us for our daily diaries from the cruise and if you’re smart, you’ll go right on ahead and make that deposit to secure your spot for next year, because you’ll going to want to be here. Here are the Day 1 highlights:

ALL ABOARD:

While some folks drove directly to this year’s departure port in Galveston, Texas, Houston was the epicenter of cruise travelers who arrived early for a night of pre-cruise partying in Houston, Texas. Houston was poppin’ and much of the activity centered around two host hotels, the Westin Oaks and the Royal Sonesta. Shuttles from both hotels took people down the road to Galveston, where the Carnival Breeze awaited.

And don’t think the party starts on the ship. Oh no. The party stars on the shuttle bus. My bus featured a sing-along and some enthusiastic sailors who were ready to turn up even before the ship sailed. For some of the group, this was their first time and when one expressed fear about cruising for the first time.

Given the size of the ship, loading was pretty quick. You had to be onboard by 4 p.m., but the ship wasn’t scheduled to sail until about 9:30 p.m. Some experienced sailors were already in bikinis by the pool deck, while others just waited in the lobby of the ship, which conveniently has a bar (and fruity-looking drinks were being handed out) for bags (which you could hold onto, but for ease, many chose to check. Bags arrive at your door hours later).

SETTLING IN:

Once you get on board, the biggest challenge is finding your room. Imagine a high-rise apartment building sitting on its side and you have a general idea of how long the hallways are on the Breeze. It seems at first as though the hallways are like fun house mirrors that get longer and longer as you walk. In fact, your Fitbit may blow up due to the amount of steps you will take around the ship. But once you get your bearings and figure out the difference between fore and aft (fore is the front, aft is the back) you will easily find your way around. Most important, the Lido deck, where food is available 24 hours and believe me, you’ll need fuel before the night begins.

ENTERTAINMENT:

There is no limit to activities on the Fantastic Voyage. Your job will be to figure out how to do ALL of them, while still managing the basic amount of sleep to allow you to function for the next day. Our suggestion would be to catch up on all your sleep before you head to the cruise, because its unlikely that this will happen once you get on board. It’s a “Party With A Purpose” and the purpose, aside from benefiting the Tom Joyner Foundation, is to have as much fun as humanly possible.

Cee-Lo Green

So drink up that Red Bull, 5 Hour Energy and utilize the coffee bar options so that you can make it through. Yesterday’s pool deck concert featured Tamar Braxton, Cee-Lo, Snoop, Common and DJ Nabs, who kicked if off in front of an excited crowd, who took their lighted bracelets and lit it up as the party moved from day into night.

There was plenty of crowd interaction from each act – Tamar brought some singers onstage to sing with her, Snoop invited women to dance with him, and Common, in a virtuoso display of his freestyling skills, brought a woman onstage and created an entire rhyme around her. I don’t mean a few bars, I mean an entire song’s worth of rhymes. Shout out to real hip-hop.

As these artists were not sailing, they had to get off the boat quickly so that we could get started. Once we did, the night’s entertainment began: Gospel Explosion featuring Shirley Caesar and Marvin Sapp, the comedy show featuring Guy Torry and Rodney Perry, among others. Sapp and Caesar took the crowd to chuuuuuch, and since it was a Sunday evening, if you didn’t make it to church that morning, you definitely made it that night! If you could hang after the comedy and the gospel shows, you still had an entertainment option – the Golden Era of Hip-Hop show featured Bonecrusher, Das Efx and EPMD. Showtime: 2 a.m. Hope you had the Red Bull handy!

GRAB YA AUNTIES

The best description of the Fantastic Voyage: It’s the Spring Break for grown folks. So you will see someone’s aunties, mommas, daddies, granddaddies and even great-grands, out here partying. I picture some of y’all telling your family that you’re going on the Fantastic Voyage and them thinking you’re sitting on a beach chair under a towel reading your Daily Devotion.

Let me be the first to tell you – your momma, auntie, grandaddy and grandmomma were likely partying to Snoop Dogg and possibly, although I can’t be sure it was your mama, even getting their twerk on. But here’s the thing – there is a pact aboard ship that you can’t tell the kids or grandkids how much fun you’re having.

You’ve got to keep the mystique alive so that us grown folks can continue to have a good time without you. Because if you knew, how much of a good time was being had, some of you young folks might get jealous or judgy and we don’t that.

Also, we must discuss a few things – there are a bunch of Dallas Cowboys fans in the world. I mean a whole lot. And there are a bunch of vendors who apparently sell or make shirts that allow you to represent every city, HBCU, fraternity, neighborhood, couple status, and regional area that you can imagine. Where do some of you go for these items? We’d like to know.

Also, please note, if you are a single woman or man, this ship is full of sexy grown people looking to mingle. Yes, plenty of couples do come together, but there is more than just food on the buffet at the Fantastic Voyage. There are a whole lot of tasty choices outside of it as well.

TOM JOYNER REALLY IS THE HARDEST WORKING MAN IN SHOW BUSINESS

We believe Tom has tapped into a vibranium source that allows him to get energy from his microphone or something, because whether you see him taking pictures with everyone around the ship and never losing patience or kindness, or partying along with the crowd during a concert, or doing a daily morning show from the ship, or hosting numerous events, or just being able to sustain this amazing event 19 years in a row, you realize that he more than lives up to his reputation as THWMISB. He’s the James Brown of radio.