Robert and Nancy Houchens, a retired couple from Virginia, spend most of their time on cruise ships and recently reached a milestone while on Carnival Pride 1000 days at sea on a Carnival Cruise Line ship.
As they sailed the Norwegian Fjords, Robert asked the ship’s team to surprise Nancy with a celebration to mark the occasion. Of course, Carnival Pride’s crew members were happy to oblige. The Houchens have been cruising for decades, so we asked them what they love about life on the high seas.
Why do you cruise, Nancy For us, cruising is a way of life. Our goal was to sell everything we owned and pretty much live on cruise ships. And we’ve done a pretty good job of it since we’ve retired. When did you start cruising, Robert More than 20 years ago, our kids were still at home. At first, we cruised because it was a great value.
Nancy, you’ve made many memories aboard many ships. What stands out is that Carnival Pride has many memories for us. It’s a very special ship. We were so lucky because we were invited when Pride came back into service from Baltimore last September. We were asked to participate in the opening ceremony with Carnivals President Christine Duffy, which was absolutely wonderful and very emotional.
Robert, what is your favourite place on board a Carnival ship Serenity deck? Nancy Yes, we love the Serenity deck. We used to go to the nightclub, party and stay up all night, but now we like to relax also the beds. You cant sleep anywhere you can look at the sea from the beds.
After spending 1000 days at sea, you must have many friends across the Carnival fleet. Nancy Yes, we have family all over the fleet, meaning the team members on board. They have become family to us now we try to figure out what team members are on a particular ship, and that’s how we pick which cruise we want to go on.
After cruising for so long, we’ve got a lot of extended families, and we love them.
Written by: Jill Walsh
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