Nick55

Take the 1:00. We have done the san juan departure a couple of times and the airport can be a challenging experience. Depending on the ships in port, the time of the year (spring break, holidays), day of the week (sunday). You can have a real delay that you cannot fix. I know most flights are fairly full and we have had times where it took till 11:30 or 12:00 to get to the gate, due to the heavy volume.

While the agricultural screening is a pain, its usually the volume of the check in, and mainly the TSA screening that are the biggest delays. A lot of people get there early for later flights and take a lot of time at check-in trying to get on earlier flights. Plus the hassle of bringing back extra stuff like booze and other purchases from their trip. If a high number of flights are leaving from one concourse, that screening area can be really overwhelmed.

Friends were late, bumped by standby people there early, and had to pay hotel and food till next day flight. We love the itinerary, but don't enjoy the wait at the airport.

Just like those who go a day early into San Juan to avoid the hassles, we agree with those who suggest taking a mid day flight and not getting put into a position where it will put a damper on a great trip.

I purchaase a watch on almost every cruise i go on. I have found cruise ship prices to be better than US or catalog prices, but by far the best deals are in St Thomas USVI. The port talks (in my opinion) are typically sales pitches for vendors they support. I spend most of my time buying and selling equipment so i have made the watch purchase a "side fun" few hours on each cruise. I have never found a better price than St Thomas.

My best luck has been with imperial Jewelers in port. I typically get the best price i can find (by nicely (sometimes not nicely) getting turned away at every other store) and every time Imperial has beaten all of the prices, by usually a fair amount. Nobody has ever gotten close to their prices.

You MUST know what you are buying though for getting angood deal to work. But heck if you buy a watch you like and even get it for the same as in the US, you save the tax, duty and have a great watch to wear for the rest ofnthe cruise!

Piece of advice- if you play the shopping challange game it ends up really costing you more than just going to the local US store, because you have to usually buy something for DW at the same time.

Halifax - ryers lobsters near peggys cove

San juan - la casada blanca. Most authentic food and atmosphere on the island

Ketchikan Alaska - both seafood shacks on the pier. Great fish and chips and clam chowder at one, great salmon chowder at the one next to it

St Thomas - hilltop - great banana daquiri

nassau - walking around with a local beer from liquor store across from sailboat marina near cruise ship dock

I think each cruise line has its good and bad

RCI: good MDR and great fruits on their buffet. Their snack, dessert and coffee shops on the promanade deck cant be beat especially good quality for free!!!

Princess: MDR food is very good, italian restaurant is also good. I think their Chefs table is the best of cruise lines I have traveled. Good breakfasts with room service

Celebrity. Had some of the worst luck in their MDR. MY worst cruise food experiences. BUT on Infinity the SS United States consistantly had the best food I ever had on any Cruise ship. Steaks, lamb, seafood, souffles for dessert were exceptional every meal (we ate there 4 out of 7 days)

Holland America. Food was ok, but buffets had stupid hours (at least for the ports we visited) and closed even when people were still in that station filling their plates - duh! Exceptional room service meals - breakfast in cabin is better than having to go to buffet or MDR

Carnival: fairly consistant MDR, not exceptional but consistantly good and attentive service. Great frozen Drinks- they use Island Oasis products and they are very high quality mixes. Good pizza, chocolate buffet is very nice and burger bar also is nice.

Renting a car was great in halifax. They picked us up at the port. We drove around town and visited Fairview cemetary to see many of the titanic graves (they are spread out over 3 different cemetaries). Virtualtourist.com has some really interesting info available giving background about the cemetary and why the graves are positioned the way they are.

We then drove out to peggys cove and walked around for a while. Really unique location to visit and a quaint little fishing village. As earlier recommended, put off your urges to eat at any of the popular seafood restaurants along the way. Leave peggys Cove and go about 1 mile or so to Reyers lobsters. Fresh off the boat and really fair prices. We got 6 3.5# lobsters for the cost of a lobster dinner in boston. Not fancy, you eat on picnic tables, but really a great meal

Then take the drive back and see the Citadel overlooking the town of Halifax, take stroll around the grounds, see the big clock and you will probably be ready to head back to the boat

Strongly recommend renting a car and doing your own thing. Other ports we did tours but very convienent to be on your own in halifax.

We have done a few princess cruises, as a comparison from our experience:

Princess does a better job on ship tours, chefs table (more sophisticated and different menus based on each ship), more current movies on the "Movies under the Stars", wider choice of destinations. More formal atmosphere, especially on formal nights (which can be sometimes fun as a change from the casual lives many of us have).

Carnival has unbeatable pricing. In many cases 1/2 the price of princess. The casual nature is sometimes fun. In revisiting carnival after a 23 year absence we were pleasantly surprised at the fun we had. Found ourselves staying up later, enjoying activities that we began missing on celebrity, holland america and princess because they tended to be a little less busy at night. The serenity deck is a great deal for adults wanting the time away from the young ones!

We like both, have upcoming trips on both, but as long as the cruises on carnival don't have drastic reductions in quality vs what we saw the last time on the Valor., we will probably lean more to carnival for average cruises due to their pricing.

LOL, I have a hard enough time writing my name :) The Valor was a great ship. We enjoyed every port, and would definitely sail this ship again.

Appreciate you posting these. We are taking FSIL and her boyfriend on the 23rd and they have never cruised before. These let us give them some idea of what is ahead for them.

We cruised on the valor previously and really enjoyed it. Looking forward to this trip even more as it is snowing here AGAIN!!!

Jaems, depends on what you consider cold... We are going in Sept and the "average temps" for that time are upper 60s during the day, 40s/50s at night. So, I assume in Oct, it will be a bit colder. Definitely not "shorts/t-shirts" weather :) And I am in Maryland, looking to move to Utah in the next few years.

We did a 7 day princess Cruise out of NY in 2011 and it remains one of the most memorable cruises we have taken. It is very different from carribean and alaska cruises (more fog, less to see on the sea transits, cooler weather, not as "active"). But the ports we visited were great, very different types of excursions, and some wonderfull chances to get extrordinary seafood at quaint roadside locations.

We are limited on seasons we can take cruises, but loved the trip. My dmil and dfin, joined us. Their last cruise was an atlantic crossing in the 50's, returning from being deployed to belgium for years. Swore they would never get on a ship again after the two trips there and back.

We had one day with very high winds and heavy seas, canceled our stop at sydney. They had an amazing time on this cruise, enjoyed everything, including coming into NY, and have told all of their friends it was a great time. They didn't even notice the weather as modern ships are so stable compared to the old ships.

We would strongly recommend any new england cruise. We would be taking one this year had not there been limited ships doing it during the summer months.