CRUISE 2013 - DAY 7 SINT MAARTEN/ST. MARTIN

Our final stop was one of our most favorite islands - Sint Maarten/St. Martin.  Half Dutch and half French and an incredibly beautiful island with lots of stellar beaches to enjoy.  We have talked about coming back to the island for a week's holiday as you can also take a ferry to Anguilla and Saba is nearby as well...plus they have great local transportation so you could get around quite cheaply via local bus and only use taxi's when absolutely necessary.

Pier and welcome centre

We got off the ship around 9:30am and started walking into town.  We headed off on the path we usually use and got past the water taxi pier and realized that the path is now cut off as there is construction going on.  Another couple was peering around perplexed and we both said "...but this is the way we came last time!!".  We had a laugh and both turned back toward the welcome centre.  We walked along together out past security to the main road and began walking toward Philipsburg together.  We found out they were from Wales (UK) and were on their 24th (!!!) cruise.

We said our goodbyes when we hit the outside edge of town and Dave and I walked along the boardwalk looking for the spot that we had our picture taken fifeen years ago on our very first trip to St. Martin.  A lot has changed and we never could find the alley with the right statue to recreate our photo.

We cut through an alley and made our way to Front Street and wandered back along the street until we got to Old Street where we cut through to reach Back Street. 

The entrance to Old Street

At the end of Old Street is the bus stop, located on Back Street.  We only had to wait for a few minutes before a white van (aka local bus) pulled up with "Mullet Bay/Maho Bay" in the window.  Look for "bus" on the license plate, not "taxi" as they can look the same.  We were heading to Mullet Bay Beach, one of our favorite beaches and very cheap to get to since bus fare is only $2 per person each way.

As we drove by the Princess Julianna Airport, we got to see one of the Delta shuttle flights take off flying passengers from the disabled Carnival Dream back to Florida.  We had always seen planes taking off in the opposite direction toward the mountains but this one took off toward the water.  We asked the bus driver why this was and he explained that if the plane was wanting to conserve fuel, they would take off toward the water as they needed to use a lot of fuel to get up enough speed to lift off the runway and get over the mountains going in the other direction.

Mullet Bay Beach

Once at the beach, we rented two lounge chairs and an umbrella for $15 and settled in to read, relax and take in the sights.  We walked the beach for a bit and then hit the water for a good long float.  I couldn't call it a swim because we didn't move too far : - )  The water was a lovely temperature but not as clear as our last couple of visits.  Every beach on this cruise had much higher waves and the sand was more stirred up because of rougher seas in the Caribbean recently. 

We hung out at the beach for a few hours and then walked out to the main road and waved down a bus heading into Philipsburg.  We had the driver drop us off at Rima's so we could see if there were any souvenirs or clothes we wanted to buy.  They have tons of dresses, purses, shirts, hats, jewelry...with better prices than most.  Don't expect high quality or local creations...this is your basic cheaper clothing and souvenirs likely made in China or somewhere similar, but they do have good prices.
  

Rima's distinctive yellow building

Nothing really grabbed our attention so we left and started walking back toward Front Street looking for an internet cafe.  We eventually found one in a small alcove off of Front Street, in the back of a convenience store.  We bought some time and caught up on email and Facebook.  Dave really wanted a bag of Lay's potato chips but when he found out that a bag that would cost us $2 - $2.50 in Canada would cost him $5US, he just couldn't bring himself to do it!!

We walked along the boardwalk and back to the pier for a treat that I had been waiting all day to get.  There is a little hut on the pier, called Coco Express, that sells the most delicious coconut smoothies I have ever tasted.  I got a small for $4 but when I finished the last of it just before we boarded the ship....I thought I should have bought the large.  Sooooo good!!!

Coco Express - delish!!!!

We went to supper, said goodbye to our waiters and tablemates and went back to the cabin to pack up everything.  Once we packed our suitcases, keeping anything we might need in the morning, we put the cases outside in the hallway and crashed for the night.  St. Martin did not disappoint and we had another competely enjoyable day.

CRUISE 2013 - DAY 6 ST KITTS

We didn’t have much planned for St. Kitts as we figured we would want to slow day after our day on St. Lucia.  We slept in and after breakfast, I got my stuff together and headed up to the Serenity area (adults only) to relax and read for awhile.

We got off the ship around 11am and went to find an internet café.  We always buy internet time on the ship because we need to keep up on business stuff daily but we do quick checks to see that nothing needs our attention and leave any Facebook or email stuff for when we are at an internet café where we can get a half hour for $4 or so.   We spent some time getting caught up on the ‘real world’ and then wandered through the shops in Port Zanté (the cruise terminal) and the market nearby.

We spotted the St. Kitts National Museum as we were walking around that thought that we should check it out as it was just the right speed for our lazy day.  We paid our $3 entrance fee and spent a good hour going through the exhibits and reading about the history of St. Kitts.  It is interesting to get an understanding of places as it gives you a better appreciation for their culture and history.

We got back on the ship around 1:30pm and had some lunch.  The pizza on the Valor was raved about by many people we talked to so I tried some for lunch.  It is a thin crust but it is the lightest crust I have ever tasted on a thin crust pizza.  You could custom order what you wanted and it was definitely worth the time to wait for a nice hot pizza to be done.  Spent the afternoon around the pool, laying in the sun and reading.

View of Nevis

Our evening was as low key as our day.  On a cruise with such a port intensive itinerary, it is nice to build in a bit of down time where you don’t have to do anything or go anywhere if you don’t feel like it.

CRUISE 2013 - DAY 5 - ST LUCIA

There are two cruise ship docks in Castries and when we woke up on Day 5, we realized that the ship was berthed at La Place Carenage instead of at Pointe Seraphine where we have always been docked on previous stops on St. Lucia.  Fortunately, they are just across the bay from each other.  We were hoping that our tour guide, Herod, would be aware of the change and meet us at the right spot.  We figured that most locals know Herod anyway so we could always ask someone to give him a call.

Valor at the pier in Castries

We grabbed a quick breakfast and made our way off the ship to meet Herod at 8:45am.  As is the norm, once we got through the shops that they send you through to get out onto the street, there was a crowd of people hollering and offering tours.  We asked the first guy we came to if he knew where Herod was and he immediately pointed us to right outside the door where we spotted Herod’s wave and smiling face. 

We have toured with Herod several times and he has always been so accommodating.  We had been trying to arrange for a Land & Sea Tour with him but he needs a minimum number of people to run that tour and did not have enough.  He told us, when we were emailing him, that we shouldn’t worry.  He would take care of things and make sure that we got to do exactly what we wanted once we got there.  He had arranged with a friend who was running a tour out of one of the Sandals resorts that we could hop in the boat with their crew and they would take us down the coast to Soufriere, where most of the best sights and experiences on the island are found.  Herod would pick us up in Soufriere and do whatever we wanted to do or see.

Our trip down the coast was beautiful.  It was already very warm at that time of the morning and the boat would stop periodically so the guide could point out some sights from the water.  We got to go right into Marigot Bay, which we had only ever seen from a lookout above the bay on our previous land tours. 

Marigot Bay

We saw spots where they filmed Dr. Doolittle and some Pirates of the Caribbean scenes.  We went through a small tunnel in a rocky outcropping that was used in a scene from the movie.  These water taxi guys sure have to know how to maneuver the boats as there is a lot of current and waves going through the tunnel. 

We went directly to Sugar Beach, an upscale resort located between the Pitons, the volcanic mountains that are St. Lucia’s claim to fame.  They dropped us off on the small dock and pulled out snorkel equipment for anyone who wanted to snorkel.  Dave wasn’t up to it but I grabbed some gear and headed into the water at the base of Petit Piton.  There are tons of tropical fish and lots of coral to be seen, even though it looks like nothing exciting above the water.  Unfortunately, there were a lot of little small jellyfish around that day.  Some were very hard to see until you came into contact with them, then ZAP!!  It wasn’t extremely painful but after two or three zings, I decided to head back in.  We had some beach time and then got back in the boat to go to Soufriere where Herod picked us up.

Snorkel area at Sugar Beach

Sugar Beach Resort

Our next stop was the drive-in volcano.  Since we had seen the volcano tour on prior visits, Herod took us straight to the volcanic mud baths down the hill.  You are supposed to immerse yourself in the hot (and I do mean HOT) mineral pool first but the day we were there, the temperature of the pool was 105F and I stepped in up to my ankles and jumped right out.  Herod said that you can get dehydrated in that temperature within a very short period of time.  We went right to the buckets that contained the mud and smeared the mud all over ourselves and then went to sit in the sun until the mud dried out.  Then we scooped up water from the mineral pool and got the worst of the mud off and hit the open-air showers to rinse the rest off.  When you are done, your skin feels so soft and smooth, like a baby’s skin!

We headed back to the car and our next stop was a local restaurant called Martha’s Tables, where we stopped for lunch.  Absolutely delicious local cuisine.  I had mahi mahi done in butter and garlic and Dave had a Creole Chicken dish that was so tender the meat was falling off the bones.  There was also saffron rice and beans with small dumplings, steamed veggies, sweet potato, a starchy root vegetable that is common to the islands, homemade mac and cheese and an eggplant stew that looked like a green chutney and was very tasty.  We met some people that came over from the Sugar Beach resort and chatted with them for a bit before we continued on with the tour.

The next stop was Dave’s favorite spot on the island….the warm waterfall aka The Fountain of Youth.  They say you leave looking and feeling 20 years younger : - )  It was quite crowded when we arrived but everyone left within about 15 minutes and we had the entire place, both waterfall and soaking pool, to ourselves for over a half hour until a couple from Melbourne, Australia joined us.  It is fun to meet people from all over and pick their brains about their weather and culture.

We headed back to the pier to catch the water taxi back to Castries but had to wait quite awhile.  Herod was on his phone chattering away in Creole and I figured he was trying to hurry the boat along as our all-aboard was at 4:30pm.  Eventually, we heard him say “Mango” during a conversation and when he hung up, I asked him if Mango was on the way.  We had Mango as our water taxi captain a few years prior and he was very charismatic and we always remembered him.  Herod said that the other boat was still on its way and he wasn’t making us wait any longer and since Mango was just heading back to Castries with a group, he got him to turn around and come back and get us.

We had a pretty wild ride back to the ship because time was of the essence and speed and waves makes for some rocky slams and bumps.  We made it back with five minutes to spare before all aboard.  We were very sore when we got off the boat and knew we would pay for that ride the next day.  The ship didn’t actually leave until 5pm, but we don’t like to cut things that close.

We didn’t have much time to get ready for Formal Night #2.  I just wanted to lay down and sleep.  I had a Greek dish called Spanakopita (Greek pie with spinach, feta and stewed tomato) for supper.  It was delicious!!  Another pro of cruising is that you can try new and different dishes without wasting money.  If you don’t like it, you just ask for something else and they bring you another option.

We were so tired from our day…the fresh air, the hot mineral pool, the boat ride.  We spent the evening in our cabin watching TV and trying to keep our eyes open until a reasonable time to go to sleep.  We can thank Herod for another wonderful day on St. Lucia and for tailoring our tour to exactly what we wanted.  If you are ever interested in a great tour guide, email him at herodtours@gmail.com or check out his website at  http://www.herodstours.com/  .  He is in the process of revamping his website as emails sent from the site are not getting through to him so I would avoid using the contact form until things get fixed up.

CRUISE 2013 - DAYS 3 & 4 - AT SEA & BARBADOS

 Our previous day was the only sea day on the cruise.  We just spent the day relaxing, reading and chatting with some fellow passengers we met.  I had a migraine hit later in the day so I spent the evening in bed, drugged up with a bag of ice on my head.  Fortunately, it didn't hit with full force and was gone when I woke up the next morning.

We started our day with a good breakfast at the buffet and got off the ship around 9:45am.  Depending on where your ship is berthed, you may have to take a bus to get to the cruise terminal but we were the only ship in port that day and we docked within walking distance of the terminal.  We made our way through the terminal on a rather round-a-bout route since they make sure you have to walk by each and every store before you can get to the exit.
 

As usual, the cab/taxi area was crazy!  Everyone is yelling at you….and at each other.  You have to stand up for yourself or they herd you around like you are livestock!!  We usually walk to the bus terminal and take a bus up the west coast as we really enjoy the beaches along that coast however, neither of us was able to sit for very long so we decided to take a short cab ride to Harbour Lights, a beach bar/restaurant located on Carlisle Bay about 5 minutes from the pier.  We got in the cab and proceeded to wait over 10 minutes while the cabbie tried to find other people to pack into the van.  Our fellow passengers were getting quite vocal and hollering at him to hurry up as he was wasting good beach time.  They might as well have saved their breath as he paid little attention.  Finally we were on our way to the beach.  All of the other passengers got off at the Shipyard, a very popular beach club and we went about another half mile down the road to reach Harbour Lights.
 

We got dropped off in the parking lot and walked through the building and out the back onto the patio that led to the beach.  There were all sorts of vendor tables set up selling jewelry, beach wear, hats, etc. but we just kept walking to the beach.  Before we even got there, an attendant asked if we wanted chairs and an umbrella and we paid him $15 dollars for two wrist bands that would give us run of the facilities and lounge chairs for the day.

We found a couple of chairs and an umbrella down the beach away from the more crowded area and parked our bags.  The beach is absolutely beautiful!  A long crescent of very white sand and the water is the Caribbean blue that a picture just cannot capture, no matter how hard you may try.  We spent a few hours relaxing, walking the beach and swimming…well, more floating.  The water was warm and clear but the waves were quite rough so we stayed out beyond the break area of the waves. 

There are a lot of beach vendors walking the beach and you can start to feel pestered after a while.  On the good side, they will leave you alone with a simple “No, thanks”.   If you are interested in snorkeling with the sea turtles, there are tons of boats that will take you a few hundred yards off shore to a shipwreck where all of the ship’s excursions go to snorkel.  They were charging $20 a person when we were there and that is a half decent price.  If you are a strong swimmer, you could actually swim out to the spot.  Just look for the crowd of people and boats/catamarans and head in that direction.

Relaxed and a little crispy, we made our way back to the bar area and asked if they had internet.  They had wireless but we hadn’t brought our tablet with us so the owner offered to let us use his office computer to check our email.  Very accommodating staff!

A cabbie was waiting for us to take us back to the ship.  We grabbed some lunch and I decided it was a good time to do a load of laundry.  It is always nice when there is a passenger laundry on the ship as you don’t have to pack quite so much.  One load mid-week gets us through the cruise!

We finally met our tablemates at supper…an older couple from Pennsylvania that we enjoyed getting to know throughout the rest of the week.  We hit the comedy/juggling show and then bedtime.  Another beautiful island stop!

CRUISE 2013 - DAY 2 ST THOMAS, USVI

Good morning, St. Thomas!!  One of our very favorite Caribbean islands.  This is one island we would like to come to for an entire week.  You can easily catch a ferry to St. John, Tortola or St. Croix from St. Thomas so you could be as busy, or not, as you prefer.

We were supposed to meet our tablemates from last night on the pier as they wanted to go to Honeymoon Beach with us.  We walked around and waited for about 10 minutes but couldn’t find them.  We found out later that day that they had gone past the gate and were waiting on the other side for us.  We never caught sight of each other : - (  We couldn’t wait any longer because we were determined that we were not going to miss the ferry to Water Island again…like we had the last two times we were on St. Thomas!  We walked through the Havensight shops , all the way to the exit where the taxi stand was located.  If we were just going downtown, we could have caught a safari cab once we got off the ship but since our destination was not a regular one that a lot of people would go to, we had to get to the taxi stand.  We were waiting to leave and another couple got into the van.  We started chatting and we asked them where they were going (Emerald Beach) and told them where we were headed when they asked.  They thought Water Island sounded perfect and asked if we minded if they came along with us for the day.  So, we picked up a couple of great travel companions from the great state of Texas.

The ferry leaves from Tickles Dockside Pub over in the Crown Bay Marina. 

There are two cruise docks on St. Thomas:  Havensight and Crown Bay.  The town of Charlotte Amalie is between the two locations so we had to travel a bit of a distance to get there.  We arrived well in advance for the 10:30am ferry.  We spent the time getting to know our new travel buddies and all piled on to the ferry when the captain arrived and opened the cabin (ie: removing the rope across the open doorway). 

Ferry schedule

The ferry was completely full and left early so we were extra glad that we got there in good time.  The ferry costs $10 per person for a round trip.  We met a couple of cops from Montreal on the ferry and they joined our group for the day as well.

On arrival at Water Island, we all walked up the hill and then turned to the right at the top of the hill to make our way down to our own little bit of paradise.

The walk takes a leisurely 10 minutes and the beach is powdery white sand and the water is crystalline blue.  Usually the only people on the beach are a few adventurous cruisers who take the ferry over and the rest are either year-round residents or those who are renting properties on Water Island for vacation.



Bathrooms

Heidi's Honeymoon Grill for a bite to eat

We swam, walked the beach and laid in the sun all morning.  There is a beach bar at the far left hand side of the beach and also a grill at the far right hand side if you want to have lunch.  The food is very good but it will cost you $10 for a burger and coleslaw...but it's a good burger!!   Around 1:30pm, the Kon Tiki party boat arrived and the beach started to fill up.  Fortunately, we planned to catch the 2:15pm ferry back to St. Thomas so we didn’t feel too crowded for very long.  I guess the word is getting out about our ‘secret’ beach!  We headed back to the dock a little before 2pm and waited in the little stand that held the residents’ post office boxes and a good ‘put and take’ library as well. 



Water Island dock with St. Thomas in the background

The trip back across only takes about 15 minutes, at the most, and there was a cab already waiting to take us downtown or back to the ship.  I had planned on doing some browsing at the Vendor’s Market in Charlotte Amalie but Dave’s hip and leg were bothering him and I decided that there really wasn’t anything critical I wanted to buy and we just headed back to the ship.

We grabbed a late lunch at the buffet, took a shower and a nap before supper.  We had our assigned table for four all to ourselves for supper.   After supper, we went to the family comedy show and the Welcome Aboard show and then crashed.  Sun, sand and surf sure makes a girl (and guy) pretty tired : - )

CARNIVAL VALOR - SOUTHERN CARIBBEAN CRUISE DAY 1 SAN JUAN, PUERTO RICO

After a few days in Florida visiting Mom and Dad, our cruise vacation began with an early morning flight to San Juan, Puerto Rico. 

We left West Palm Beach at 7:30am and were on the ground in San Juan just after 9:30am.  There have been some improvements to the airport since we were there a couple of years ago as a whole new  section has been added. 

After picking up our luggage, we made our way to the taxi stand outside to catch a cab down to the pier in Old San Juan where the Carnival Valor was docked.  We felt the change in temperature as soon as the doors opened.  Florida was only in the 60’s and low 70’s and it was already above 80F at that time of the morning in Puerto Rico.  We arrived quite early to the pier so we waited about 45 minutes to get let into the terminal.  We checked in and waited another hour and a half to get on board the ship.  I can’t say Carnival’s embarkation process was the best we have ever experienced.  We have sailed with Carnival several times and have never seen things so disorganized and chaotic.  They assigned everyone a zone number and the theory is that you board by group but, with no announcement or any warning, a whole bunch of people who had checked in well after we did, started heading toward security.  We were well back in the line and waited another half hour to get through security and get on the ship.  We have never had that happen on any of our prior cruises, so it was a negative for Carnival on that score.

We got on the ship around 12:45pm and the cabins were already open to be accessed so we dropped our carry-ons and headed to Rosie’s Restaurant for the lunch buffet.  After lunch, we toured around the ship getting a sense of where things were and taking pictures as we went.  The layout is pretty similar to the Carnival Victory, which we have been on a couple of times before.

We had full intentions of getting off the ship and walking around Old San Juan for the afternoon but made the mistake of laying down….and that was all she wrote!  Turns out that it was probably good that we didn’t get off the ship because we heard from our supper tablemates that the security line was really long and delayed getting back on.  They waited quite a long time in line even though they had already checked in earlier in the afternoon.

Supper was earlier than normal at 5:30pm and was open sitting.  We ended up at a table for six with a couple from Ontario (the ship was crawling with Canadians) and a couple from Sao Paulo, Brazil.  We had such a good time that we were all still sitting around the table at 8pm.  We love meeting people from near and far and getting to know a little about where they’re from.

After supper, we changed and hit the hot tub until the mandatory Muster Drill was called at 9:30pm.  Miss the Muster Drill at your own peril!!  They don’t mess around after the Costa Concordia sinking and they will hunt you down to make sure you go through the drill.  We were laughing that we were getting soooo old because we were toast by that time and we had the first of many early nights on our cruise.