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Blog from Jewel of the Seas August 30, 2014


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This is a blog of our August 30, 2014 Jewel of the Seas Southern Caribbean cruise with a couple of days beforehand in San Juan thrown in.I'm not very good about taking pictures as I always seem to get caught up in the moment, but I will have a few along the way. We had a wonderful time! I'd be happy to answer any questions.

Wednesday, August 27

We left for Charlotte from Louisville right on time and got into Charlotte a few minutes early. We found our gate easily although it was a bit of a walk and our flight to San Juan also left on time. From the time we lifted off from Louisville until we stepped foot in San Juan was a little over 6 hours. Air travel couldn’t get any easier.

 

 

We found the taxi line as we left the San Juan Airport. It is right as you walk out of the exit doors in front of baggage claim. It could be easy to miss as the sign for the line is quite small and on a pole from ground level, rather than a sign hung from above. The line was long but moved very quickly. We waited about 10 minutes. There was a long procession of taxi’s waiting. There is a person standing along the taxi line asking where you’re going and has a sheet they fill out and give to you. The taxi’s have set prices to different zones in San Juan. The price is determined by the zone you’re being taken to and then they add $1.00 per bag as well as an additional $2.00. We thought this might be a gas fee. It’s nice because there is no haggling with the taxi driver. Everyone know what will be paid as you get in the taxi. We were staying in the Condado area and our rate with 3 bags and a tip was $25.

 

 

We stayed at the Doubltree again. This was our third stay there. It is a very nice, full service hotel with a pretty pool and seating area, whirlpool, a work out facility, business center, a restaurant and a spa. The nightly rate does not include a $28 per night resort fee but it was reasonable enough that we didn’t mind. The rooms are average sized. The one thing I don’t really like about the hotel is the bathroom wall that faces out into the main part of the room. It is made of glass blocks. The door is frosted glass. You can’t really see into the bathroom, only blurred skin, but it just feels as though you don’t have as much privacy.

There are several things we really like about staying here and these keep us coming back.. There is a grocery store that is open 24 hours a day right across the street. They have a nice wine selection, so we stop there the morning we leave for the ship to pick up our 2 bottles per stateroom allowed. They also have a lot of pre packaged fresh foods. Depending on what we were doing for the day, this came in really handy for an afternoon snack or a light, late dinner. Because of the activities I had scheduled we had two meals and a snack from the grocery made up of fresh cut fruit, fresh made salads and a couple of sandwiches. Not only was this convenient, but it was very cheap. While there we also got several pounds of Puerto Rican coffee beans to enjoy back home. Yum!!

 

 

Another thing we really like is that the hotel is in easy walking distance (I’m talking up to a mile) of many, many restaurants. Ashford Ave. is a main thoroughfare that has lots of restaurants and bars, as well as a city bus (#17) that will take you right into Old San Juan. The last stop on the route stops in Old San Juan right at the pier, one block from the Sheraton Old San Juan hotel.The cost of the ride is just $1.50 per person.

Ashford Ave. is also the street that runs parallel to the ocean. There are many small roads in between the buildings that you can turn on to and the beach is about 100 yards away.

After checking in to the hotel, we took a bit of a siesta and woke up a bit more refreshed.

 

 

 

We decided to take a walk around the Condado area. I had gotten some restaurant ideas from TripAdvisor, so with those in hand, off we went. We knew we wanted local cuisine, so Puerto Rican fare is what we were looking for. We found a restaurant on my list called Orozco’s that was about ¾ mile away from the hotel. It was a small restaurant and you could choose to eat inside or out. We chose to eat inside as the tables outside were along a rather narrow sidewalk, so the street was not too far from you. As the restaurant is on Ashford Ave., it is very busy. Also, Puerto Rico this time of year is HOT!!! There were some fans inside so with the breeze, it was quite nice.

The most well known local food is the mofongo. It is made with mashed plantain. Some restuaurants(as did this one) offer you a choice of green plantain, sweet plantain or yucca. The traditional mofongo is made with green plantain. They are formed into a bowl and then stuffed with your choice of meats or vegis. They all have some sort of gravy on them, making them very moist. I had a churrasco monfongo and daughter had a vegetarian one. Both were delicious! Hubby had a piece of flat steak with onions which he said was also really good. We ordered a half pitcher of sangria. It was good but a little weak. Service was very good. The wait staff there must share the customers, because several different people waited on us and checked on us over the course of the meal.

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After dinner, we took a leisurely walk to the hotel and off to bed.

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Subscribing so I can read when I get back from same cruise. I am at the airport headed to PR.

 

Sent from my SCH-I605 using Tapatalk

 

Would you do me a favor and report Cruise Director info back to me so I can update the list? Dennis is the current CD, but he should be handing over CD duties to Carly soon (possible this weekend). It would be really helpful to know which is the CD for your sailing. (you could post on this thread or on the CD thread: http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1859416)

 

Thanks, and bon voyage!

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Thursday, August 28

We got up this morning at leisure and about 9:00, walked to a restaurant that I found on TripAdvisor called Pinky’s. It was about a 6 block walk from our hotel. It is basically a storefront restaurant with seating for about 8-10 people inside. The rest of the tables are outside along the sidewalk and seat about another 30 people. They are open for breakfast, lunch and dinner. We only went for breakfast, but went there all three mornings that we were in San Juan. Go early on a weekend morning as we had a wait. The food was great! The portions were large and it was cheap! We would spend about $10 per person which included drink and the tip.

If you’re a hot tea drinker, that’s one thing Pinky’s doesn’t have. It was OK though, because there’s a Starbucks right next store.

 

 

Fortified for the morning, we were intent on going to the beach. As I mentioned earlier, the beach is just a block off of Ashford Ave. so you could cut through any street you came to, but we were looking for a beach with some amenities so we could stay for a while. We really just wanted someplace with lounge chairs and umbrellas to stay out of the sun. We got out our handy dandy map that the hotel had given us and found there was a large park about a mile down the road. So off we went.

We came upon a small park with a playground about 3 blocks from our hotel and we saw some loungers stacked up but it was pretty deserted so we continued on. We walked for about 20 minutes, looking down each side street at the beach but not seeing the park we were looking for. We finally decided to go down one of the side streets and onto the beach to see if we could find the park from there. It was pretty deserted where we were. There were people, but not many and we didn’t see any areas where there were chairs. Oh, well. Since we couldn’t find a shaded area to sit, we decided to go back to the hotel and spend time at the pool instead. You see, we aren’t sun worshippers and with our pale skin, we would be burned in no time. So anywhere we went, we looked for shade.

 

 

We decided to at least walk back along the beach and watch the ocean along the way. We started back toward the hotel and when we got back to the area where the playground and loungers were earlier, we saw a large wind flag planted in the sand that said Doubltree. We found that the loungers belonged to the Doubletree and there were umbrellas as well. There was a Doubletree employee there, who had shown up after we had come by the first time. He was there to help you set up your area and as a hotel guest, it was free. We were very excited. This was fantastic! We just wished we’d realized it before we walked as far as we had. On the upside, we got some exercise in today.

We spent a couple of hours at the beach. It really was lovely. There weren’t a lot of people there. No one tried to sell us anything and the water was beautiful.

 

 

On our way back to the hotel we stopped at the grocery across the street and picked up some things for lunch and dinner as we are being picked up at 3:30 to go to the Bio Luminescent Bay in Fajardo.

We were so full from breakfast, that we had a light lunch out on the pool deck patio and were ready to go at our appointed time with beach towels in hand as this was how our driver recognized us.

 

 

We chose to use Pure Adventure for our Bio Bay Tour. We found out from our driver that there are 12 companies that do this tour. We were very happy with our choice. Our driver picked us up about 3:45 and then picked up 7 other people from hotels around the area. With all of the stops and the traffic, it took us 2 hours to reach the area that the tour began. The tour began a bit after 6pm and it was still very light outside.

 

 

The area that we were dropped off in looked like a street festival with lots of booths, some selling food or drink, others trinkets that were handmade. There were some booths that were selling alcoholic refreshments. Don’t drink before your tour!!! Wait and reward yourself when you get back. Trust me, it will make your kayak more difficult to maneuver. There is a bathroom available.

 

 

Once we were dropped off, we went to find the Pure Adventure booth to pay for the tour and use their bug spray. This is very important!! Once everyone was checked in, we had a safety lecture, got our life jackets and had some instructions as to how to make the kayak move the direction that you wanted it to go. A couple of things to know about this trip are: the water is really salty and by the time we got finished with the tour, we had a fine sheen of salt all over us. The other thing is, that we got really wet on the tour. We wore swim suits with shorts and shirts on over them. Don’t take a non waterproof camera with you as it will get ruined. I have a waterproof case on my camera and that would have been fine, but I forgot to purchase a strap before our trip and I was afraid it might go overboard so I didn’t take it. Pure Adventure does have a Facebook page and they do take a couple of pictures and post them, so there is an opportunity to get a couple of pics.

 

 

The kayaks are for 2 people and are made of hard, bright colored plastic. They have small holes by where you put your feet so as soon as you sit down, your butt gets wet and stays that way. We assumed the holes and the small amount of water helped with stability.

You have to walk out into the water about up to your waist to get into your kayak so you’re wet already. Also, the water in the small bay and in the canal is only about 4 feet deep. Once you get out into the lagoon, the deepest spot is about 12 feet deep.

 

 

Once everyone was ready to go, we loosely followed our guide across the bay and into a mangrove canal. The mangroves grow up and over on either side of the canal forming a canopy above you. Once we entered the canal, it was much darker, and there would be small openings in the canopy where we could see the sky.

 

 

The canal was probably about ½ mile long. I don’t know how long it took to paddle into the lagoon, but it wasn’t a difficult trip. By the time we reached the lagoon it was almost pitch dark. The guides tied our kayaks all together and we talked for a bit about the dinoflagellate plankton that light up when they’re disturbed. By the time he got finished, it was dark! He showed us how to disturb the water and OMG! It really was fantastic. If you just ran your hand through the water, you saw glittering like diamonds, but if you really swirled the water with your arm or paddle, the water looked like it was backlit with greenish white light. As soon as you removed your hand or paddle, the water went dark. We had about 15-20 minutes to paddle around the lagoon to experience the Bay. It really was quite something. You are not allowed to get out of your kayak as the oils on people’s skins were affecting the plankton so they no longer allow this. I was fine with this. Quite honestly, I wouldn’t want to jump into black water in the pitch dark!!

 

 

While we were sitting tied together, one of our guides attached small lights to the front and back of our kayaks. The front had orange, the back had red. That way we could tell where a kayak was in the water.

Once our guides told us it was time to go, they had as get in a line to head back into the mangroves. We had a guide in the front and one at the end. They also had spotlights if necessary.

 

 

It was probably even darker in the mangroves because you couldn’t even see the sky here. That made the plankton even brighter. We could see them almost all the way back to the Bay. The trip back in the kayak was a little more difficult because you could only see the orange and red lights in front of you. Some people hadn’t done a lot of kayaking before and if you were unlucky enough to be right behind them, it made the trip more difficult.

 

 

We got out, where we had gotten in, and had a few minutes to look around the booths and get something to eat or drink if we wanted. We left the Bio Bay about 8:30 and the the ride back only took about 1 ½ hours, so we reached our hotel about 10:00.

 

 

At this point we were pretty hungry as we chose not to eat on the trip. We took some food we had purchased at the grocery, down to the pool and had a light dinner of salads and fruit. I forgot to mention that the rooms at the Doubletree have small refrigerators, microwaves and small coffee makers so this enabled us to purchase things at the store and keep them cold.

 

 

Once we’d finished dinner it was off to the room to shower and then to bed.

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Friday, August 29

This morning we were up at 9:00 again, dressed and walked to Pinky’s for breakfast. This morning it was a shared breakfast burrito and fruit pancakes, both huge!

 

 

We wanted to spend the day in Old San Juan and spent some time during breakfast on the internet looking at the city bus routes, trying to decide if we wanted to do that or just get a taxi.

 

 

As an aside, one nice thing about being in Puerto Rico is that as an American Territory, internet and phone are not considered international so we were able to continue to use the items we are accustomed to and not worry about an exorbitant fee.

 

 

We opted to take the city bus. It was .75 per person which was much cheaper than a taxi at about $15, but when we travel, we enjoy learning about our surroundings and the culture as much as we can. A city bus allows you to see more area, and watch the people around you. It does take a bit longer just because of the stops and starts but we were in no hurry. It took about 20 minutes to get into the Old San Juan area and we got off at the end of the route, which was at the bus depot. That happened to be right on the pier, about 2 blocks from the Old San Juan Sheraton hotel, which is easy to find on a map.

 

 

The Old San Juan area is only about 7 square blocks and is very easy to walk. It is very hilly in places, generally the north-south direction, so if you don’t want to do the hills, you just make your way in an east-west direction. This direction also has a slope, but it’s much gentler. There are many plazas interspersed among the streets with places to stop for a bit. The streets are very close together and can barely manage one car because people park on the street.

 

 

When we got off the bus, we walked 3 short blocks to the Tourist Information Center and got directions to the Bacardi Rum Factory. We have been to San Juan 6 or 7 times now, but had never visited there. It is very easy to get there on your own.

 

 

 

We walked across the street from the Tourist Information Center to Pier 2. We paid .50 per person to take the ferry across the Bay. The ferries come about every 30 minutes and we waited about 15 for the next one. The ride across the Bay took about 10 minutes. Once we got off the ferry, we turned to our right and walked about 2 blocks to a yellow parking garage. We found several vans waiting there to take passengers to the Rum Factory. We paid $10 for 3 of us and that included a tip. The ride to the factory took 10-15 minutes and dropped us in the Bacardi parking lot.

 

 

There is an outdoor covered bar area and there is a kiosk at the front where you go to sign up for a tour. It is free and also comes with 2 rum drinks. They gave us buzzer like you get in restaurants to let us know when it was our turn to take the bus to start the tour.

The tour lasts about an hour. You go in the front door of the factory that leads you through 6 rooms. These rooms show the history of the Bacardi brand and included a film about the family. One room showed how the distilling process would have looked when the family first started making rum. There was another room of historical family documents and artifacts. Another room had 3 video screens with buttons you could press that showed different areas of the factory and the work that goes on there. There were 3 small rooms that had smelling pots of the different kinds of rum they make. The last room was a tasting room which was fun and we did get to taste one of the superior dark rums. I know this doesn’t add up to 6!

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You don’t get to leave this small 6 room area, so you don’t get to go where any distillation process is occurring. For a free tour this was fine, but I wouldn’t have been happy if it had cost anything and seeing it one time was enough. The tour ends at the gift shop of course and you could purchase just about anything you could think of that had the Bacardi Brand on it including many different kinds of rum.

 

 

Once back out at the open air bar, we took advantage of our two free drinks. That's 2 drinks each! The cups were small, probably about 5 oz. It was very interesting as you had about 20 choices of what flavor of rum you’d like to try and then you had about 8 mixer choices. You could also get a readymade rum punch which was in a dispenser like lemonade.

 

 

It was a nice way to spend a couple of hours and to get back to the ferry, we went back to the parking lot, found a van driver, and headed back to the parking garage, where we gave our driver another $10, then headed back to the ferry.

 

 

By the time we got back it was 3:00 and lunch time was long over. We decided to have an ice cream to hold over until dinner. There are several small shops as you get off Pier 2 and one of them is an ice cream shop so in we went. Two scoops at $4. Not too bad.

 

 

We began walking the streets on Old San Juan, stopping as we saw interesting buildings, churches or plazas, just moseying along. Since we have been to San Juan several times we had already been to both of the forts a couple of times and we have done 3 walking tours. I will say the last walking tour we did was in the evening and we both thought it was the nicest one as it had begun to cool down then.

 

 

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I spend a lot of time on Cruise Critic before we take a trip and am always looking for interesting ideas of things to do or restaurants to enjoy. Several of the threads that I read talk about a con artist that walks the streets of San Juan but is kind of known as the Yeti of San Juan because once he knows you’re on to him, he takes off and no one has been able to get a picture of him. His shtick is that he will come up to you and ask you if you know English. Once you say yes, he gives you the story that he and his father were mugged the night before and he wants $6 so he can get to the hospital to see his father. He is cleanly dressed in khakis and a button down shirt. I told my family to be on the lookout for him, because bless our little hearts, we can be soft hearted, and I didn’t want us to be conned.

 

 

Well, we are minding our own business on one of the side streets in San Juan when this man in khaki pants and a button down shirt walks up to us and says, “Do you speak English?”

Well, in this split instant I said,”No.”

He obviously didn’t believe me and said, “Do you speak Dutch, Japanese, French, Italian?”

I said, “No.” as we began to walk away.

He started yelling at me! “You’re an @@@hole. You’re not nice. We’re nice here. You’re an @@@hole!

I looked at him and said, “Cruise Critic!! I know you from Cruise Critic!!!”

At that point he turned and quickly walked away. I so wish I’d had my camera out. Another Yeti moment lost! We really couldn’t believe we had seen him.

 

 

 

About 5:00 we came upon a coffee shop and decided to re-caffeinate before dinner. There was a nice plaza outside of the shop doors so we took our coffee and went to enjoy watching the people pass by. This plaza was full of pigeons and it was fun to watch them move in waves as people passed by, back and forth.

 

 

As I was sitting, I kept watching a man walk over toward me and back, then over to me and back. The third time he came over to me he started making fists and flexing his biceps. Then he walked away again. He then turned and raised his shirt and pointed at me. Oh No!!! What is going on??? My Hubby and younger daughter were a bit away from me and I turned to look at them, with what I would assume was a puzzled look. My Hubby shook his head and pointed behind me, where I saw a Police Officer standing. As I looked back around the man was coming toward me and as he reached the bench I was sitting on, he pulled his shirt off and threw it on the ground at my feet. At that point I said to myself, “Time to go!” and I got up and walked to the end of the plaza where Hubby, Daughter and I stayed to watch what was happening. The man was quite upset about something and kept gesticulating with his hands, taunting the Officer. The Police Officer said something into a radio, and soon another officer appeared on the Plaza. The two officers did a really good job of diffusing the man and he seemed to calm down a bit, but we decided to head on.DSC09999_zps54147a25.jpg

 

 

 

 

I must have had a drama magnet on me today!!

 

 

As it started to head into dinner time, I got out my list of restaurants in Old San Juan, that I had collected from TripAdvisor. We easily found a few of these that were pretty close together and looked at the menus that are posted outside at most of the restaurants. We decided on a restaurant called Aji Viego that specialized in Puerto Rican food. I had a shrimp mofongo and daughter had plantain lasagna. Both of them were excellent. I don’t remember what Hubby had, but I remember he liked it. The restaurant had several long open windows at the front of the restaurant, with tables right next to them and we sat at one of these, allowing us to look onto the street and watch the passersby. The fans inside made this very pleasant, but the mosquitoes also took advantage and we all left with several bites.

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We decided to take the bus back so we walked to the bus depot where we had gotten off this morning. There were several buses there, but no #17. It was kind of deserted down there, so we didn’t want to hang around. We had passed a taxi stand on our way to the bus depot so we headed back there. I knew from my research that it should have cost about $12 to get from Old San Juan to our hotel. The taxi stand guy waved for a cab and then told us it would be $16 basically because he got some money for waving us a cab. We said no thanks and walked away and back on to the Old San Juan streets. We had been stopped several times while we were walking in the afternoon by cab drivers looking for fares, so we knew it wouldn’t be hard to find a taxi on our own. The first taxi we came to told us the fare would be $17, so we said no thanks. The next guy we came to said $14 so we hopped in. The ride back to the hotel took about 10 minutes.

 

 

We got back to our hotel about 8:00 because older daughter and son in law were meeting us to join us for the cruise. They arrived about 8:30 and were hungry, so we went around the corner to a restaurant called Bebo’s. This was also a Puerto Rican restaurant and it was packed!! This is a restaurant the locals come to. Older daughter had a chicken mofungo and SIL had paella. They said both were really good.

Back to the hotel about 10:00 where we packed to leave to board the ship tomorrow.

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Hi

Loved your review so far. We will be staying at the Holiday Inn Express in Nov. Is that near the area where your hotel was located. Sounds like a good area. Looking forward to more.:)

JEWEL OF SEAS NOV

kruise runner:cool:

 

I looked up the address of the Holiday Inn Express and then went to Google Maps. If I have your hotel correct, it looks like you are right off of Ashford Ave, about 1 1/2 miles closer to Old San Juan than where we were. Ashford is a main road and has lots of shops and restaurants. This is a great area and we were told pretty safe. There was a lot of pedestrian traffic after dark.

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Saturday, August 30

Finally, after 14 months of planning and waiting, we are boarding the ship this morning!

We got up at 7:30 and got ready for the day. We met older Daughter and SIL at 8:30 and walked to Pinky’s for breakfast again. We got there about 8:45 and we had about a 10 minute wait. There was a pretty constant line waiting for tables while we were there, so if you go on the weekend plan for a bit of extra time. Once again the food was good and plentiful.

 

 

Once we were fortified, we headed back toward the hotel and stopped in the grocery across the street for wine for the ship and Puerto Rican coffee beans. The ship allows guests to bring in 2 bottles of wine per stateroom but the staff at the check in wasn’t strict with this. We brought in 3 bottles per stateroom. I guess if we had gone overboard, they would have stopped us, but we each had one bottle in our carryon bag. I wouldn’t put the wine in the checked bag because it’s possible they would want to check it and if it’s in your checked bag, they may hold it for you to come collect.

 

 

We got a taxi van from the hotel to the Pan American Pier which is not the Pier that is in Old San Juan. It was $23 for all 5 of us, tip included.

 

 

It took about 20 minutes to get to the pier and we arrived about 11:00. Having read many Cruise Critic postings, we expected the ship to begin boarding about 11:00 so we thought once we dropped off our bags, we would then get in line to start the process.

We did drop off our bags and did get in line and there weren’t a lot of people ahead of us, but there we stood. Finally at 11:30, they opened the doors to begin boarding. The waiting line here is a bit different than other ship terminals we’ve boarded. The line was in a covered area, outside. It was shaded but very hot and there was no seating. Once we were inside, it only took about 15 minutes to go through the boarding process and we were on the ship about 11:45. As we walked on board we met the first of may purell stations. The hand sanitizer was all over the ship and they had people stationed at the Windjammer to make sure you used it as you entered. We didn't have any problem with this. It's a small thing to do to try to stay well.

 

 

 

We went up to the Windjammer and found a place to sit as we weren’t allowed in our staterooms until 1:00. Since we had all had big breakfasts, we just got something to drink and watched as people swarmed into the buffet and began to pile their plates. We all decided to have a light lunch about 12:30 because we had early seating dinner at 6:00. Salads and fresh fruit hit the spot.

 

 

At 1:00, we headed to our staterooms. We were in rooms 8088 and 8086. Older daughter and SIL had Room 8088 and Hubby, younger Daughter and I were in 8086.These were the hump cabins on the port side, so they were the first two rooms off of the elevator. The rooms were the same size as all the others but the balconies were quite large. 8088 had 2 loungers, 2 chairs and a table and 8086 had 1 lounger, 2 chairs and a table. The small sofa in the picture opened up to a twin size bed. Our stateroom attendant would set it up every night, then take it apprt every morning. They were in a great location. I was worried about noise from passengers as they passed our rooms, but that was never a problem. There was a noise problem however, and I’ll let you know what that was in a bit.

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Speaking of our stateroom attendant, he was great. He met us early in the afternoon on the first day and we did ask him for a few extra things each day. We asked for fresh ice everyday as well as 3 wine glasses. A couple of days we needed an extra roll of toilet paper and once we were out of tissues and soap. He replenished quickly and afterward, he would leave extra so we wouldn't run out again. I did give him some additional money above what he would get from us from the $12 a day.

 

Older daughter (OD), SIL and Hubby all decided on a nap, so younger Daughter(YD) and I set out to explore the ship. We took the elevator all the way to the top floor, which was 13, and slowly made our way down. We walked from fore to aft on each floor and used the stairs at either end as we made our way down.

 

Once we reached Deck 8, we decided to see if our luggage had arrived, and sure enough it had. We decided to stay and unpack and with all 3 of us working, it didn’t take but a few minutes.

At that point YD was ready for a nap, so Hubby and I decided to explore where I had left off. We spent an hour or so exploring floors 4-6.

The ship is really nice. It's not too big and very easy to walk from one end to another and one area to another. I will say, we did see quite a bit of wear on furniture, lounge chairs and upholstery. Windows needed to be cleaned. We did feel that everything else was very clean and we saw people cleaning constantly.

 

We all met up for our first dinner at 6:00. The 5 of us had a table to ourselves. This was fine but we would have been happy with a larger table, offering the opportunity to get to meet some other people. Our head waiter, Melvin was very nice. We were never able to figure out our assistant waiter’s name. She was also very nice, but wasn’t as attentive as we have been accustomed to. We found out a few days later, that she had just been promoted to her job from Room Service and we were the first group that she was working with in the dining room. After that we chilled out, realizing it wasn’t lack of effort or care on her part, she was just learning the job. The first meal was nice. Prime rib was on the menu this evening. I didn’t take pictures of the menus to post here as I have found them in several other posts on Cruise Critic and they haven’t changed.

 

After dinner was the mandatory Muster Drill. It began at 7:45 and the announcements made it clear that everyone was expected to attend and that we would all be held at our stations until everyone was accounted for. Once we got to our Muster area, all we had to do was check in with a staff person and find a seat. The Muster Drill is much easier and painless than it used to be. You no longer have to drag your life jacket with you. You don’t have to put anything on and you don’t have to stand outside by your lifeboat. All you do now is listen to safety information over the loudspeaker and then watch as a couple of staff members demonstrate how to use the life vest. That’s it! Easy, peasy. We were on our way by 8:15.

 

Sail away was at 8:30. We started out watching the ship leave from our balcony, but we were on the opposite side from land so we went up on deck to watch San Juan fade into the distance.

 

We played a card game with the kids in the Solarium where there were some nice big, round tables and not a lot of people. Then off for showers and bed. Another aside--- we are basically shower in the morning people, but we have found when cruising in the Caribbean, the activities you are doing, whether on the ship or in port, make you hot and sticky from the humidity and yucky from all of the sun screen, so we tend to shower before dinner each day.

 

Now here is where having rooms right off the elevators became a problem. The elevators are on the edge of a circular area that you can look down on all the way to the 4th floor. This is the centrum and is the center of the ship. It is very pretty and goes from the 4th floor all the way up.

From about 7:30pm until about 12:30am, they play music here. Some nights there are dance activities. From inside our 2 staterooms, we could hear every note. Some nights were louder than others depending upon the type of music being played that night. I am a very light sleeper and battle insomnia on a regular basis. Thankfully I carry earplugs and needed them each night to go to sleep. The rest of my family made do, but we all complained about it to each other. As nice as the hump balconies were, we all agreed we wouldn't choose them again.

 

In our opinion surveys that were done after the cruise, this was truly our only complaint. I'm sure they must get this complaint all the time. We did suggest that when the ship goes into drydock in 2016, that they insulate the first several rooms on each floor that are closest to the Centrum. We really felt that as a part of our vacation, we should have been able sleep when we wanted without the noise.

Edited by luvtravel88
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Iuvtravel88

Thank you for the info on the hotel. As you probably guessed this is our first cruise on RCCI and out of San Juan. . So as you have said Cruise Critic is a well of info, and most cruisers are very helpful. Glad you enjoyed your cruise. Love the review ,waiting for more.:D

Anticipation high, just counting the days till jewel time

kruise kat:), kruise runner:cool:

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Sunday, August 31 St. Croix

After a very smooth night, we got up at 7:00 this morning, dressed and headed to breakfast.

 

We had buffet breakfast every morning in the Windjammer Café. People have complained about the food in the buffet on Cruise Critic endlessly. People are correct, there is the same stuff out every morning, but there is so much on offer, you could choose to eat something different every morning.

One of the things I really like is the made to order eggs station. You can have fried eggs or omelets with a nice variety of filling options. People have also complained endlessly about the coffee. My Hubby, who is a self proclaimed coffee snob, has found the coffee to be fine in all of the dining area. We didn’t pay for a single cup of Starbucks coffee all week, which is what Hubby drinks at home on a daily basis.

 

 

Eating at the buffet is fast and filling. The seating area is vast and no matter what time we ate, we never had a problem finding a table for 5 although we may have had to searched a bit. There are no trays to put your plates on, so you will likely need to go back for drinks. The only criticism I have about eating in the dining room is that the wait staff patrols the tables and if you get up and walk away to get something or if you even look like you’re finished, they swoop in a remove your plate, silverware and all. There were several mornings we would have to “rescue” someone’s food.

 

 

We were off the ship at 8:20 and met the driver I had booked with prior to leaving home. Her business is called Rashida’s Taxi Service. She was waiting for us right at the pier and drove us to our prebooked excursion with Virgin Kayak Tours for the morning which was a Kayaking Tour on Cane Bay in Salt River National Park. It was $20 per person for a round trip ride and she was waiting for us when we finished Kayaking to take us back to the ship.

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It took about 30 minutes to get to Cane Bay and Rashida pointed out different landmarks along the way. We arrived and met our guide Brian. He and his wife own the company. Their kayaks were propelled by your feet and there was a switch on the side of the kayak that would turn the paddles underneath, allowing you to change directions. Paddling with your feet allowed you to propel yourself much faster, with less exertion and we were able to go a much greater distance.

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This is us before the tour.

 

 

We put the canoes in on the ocean and then explored three nearby Bays. We were on the water about 2 hours. Brian was very knowledgeable about the history of the island and was very involved in conservation. He showed us a lot of interesting things along the water and took us into St. Croix’s Bio Bay. It was the middle of the day though so we couldn’t see any light coming from the plankton.

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The tour was really great. It began about 9:00 and we were finished about 12:30. It cost $50 per person and then I gave him another $10 tip per person. Definitely worth it!!

 

 

We had Rashida take us back to the ship, where we went right to lunch in the Windjammer. Again, there has been quite a bit of conversation on Cruise Critic about the buffet for lunch. There were a few different items on the hot bar each day, a few different salads and the soups changed daily, but basically it was the same every day. Again, there were so many things to choose from, you could choose to eat different things every day.

 

 

 

Everyone was pretty tired from our morning excursion, so we decided to split up and do our own things. Our daughters spent the afternoon on the balcony, reading, sleeping and talking. SIL slept most of the afternoon, and Hubby and I spent our afternoon in the Solarium in the shade, on a lounge chair, reading and dozing. It was a lovely afternoon!

 

 

For those of you that don’t know, The Solarium is an adult only pool area that has a glass ceiling but is indoors. It is cool in there, although there is a salt water pool and a couple of hot tubs. There are soft jungle sounds throughout the area.

 

 

We all cleaned up in the late afternoon and tonight was the first formal night. Everyone looked so nice. We saw one man in a tux this evening. Most of the men wore suits, some just in jackets and ties. There were even a few men in just pants and button down shirts. No one was kept out of the dining room, regardless of their attire. I have my own personal opinions of the dress code, but don’t want to start an argument here.

 

 

They had lobster bisque and beef tenderloin on the menu this evening. Both were really good. Hubby had banana rum soup, duck and chocolate soufflé for dessert. We all thought the food was good again this evening.

 

 

We played cards again this evening. I enjoy talking smack with my SIL as we’re both pretty competitive and it’s fun to have bragging rights for the evening. Our kids headed for the Battle of the Sexes Game at 11:15, and Hubby and I headed to bed. The kids said the game was very funny and they enjoyed it.

This little guy was waiting for us in our room when we returned in the evening.

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