MITSUGIRLYS DAWN TO BERMUDA NOVEL (or review as some may call it)

Can I come cruise with you? I too am the planner of everything and it can be very exhausting. I would love to get a chance to be a follower knowing it was all taken care of and done right. What an amazing gift you give your family every trip, not to mention those of us that will use all your hard work to make our trips easier. Thank you!

Enjoying your review. We've been to Bermuda several times now and your review is bringing back memories. I had planned on trying to get over to Tobacco Bay this August...but w/ those crowds I think we'll pass and check out another beach. Last time we went we were the only ones there for a good hour or so

I had clothes for the trip but no specific plans, just knew I wanted to see as much of Ireland as I could in the 21 days and that I wanted to drive on rural roads, not major highways.

Oh ok. LOL I really wasn't sure. But did you not do research on the place to look at things you wanted to see? You had to have some type of knowledge what was there and some interest right? (Yes, I'm baffled at this moment with my OCD planning :D)

I think we can handle your wild family! :p We have the room and love to show off our beautiful area.

 

Yes we have lived here for 12 years and never been on an Alaskan cruise for good reasons......Summer here is the most beautiful place we have ever seen! The Pacific Northwest in the summer will blow your mind, for this reason we have no desire to leave from late June to September. That is pretty much the cruising schedule for Alaska. All our out of state family fill our summers with visits. This August we have only 7 days without family or friends visiting! We live 1 mile from the marina our boat is moored and spend a lot of time there. Most days we can see both Mt Rainier, Mt Baker and the Cascade mountain range. The Puget Sound has a beauty all it's own. I can promise you the beauty here in the summer surpasses anywhere.

 

One day we will go on one, as people tell us it is only one week, but when our late fall, winters and springs are very rainy we cherish our summers.

 

Our anniversary is in May also, Great month! :D

I guess I no idea it was that beautiful during the summer months. You definitely paint a beautiful picture of your home area. :) Maybe I should just forgo a cruise and plan a vacation with you. :p

Yes, May is a great month!

Beautiful pictures of the beaches and the unfinished church! I think when I do get around to going to Bermuda, I will have some research of my own to do - the beaches and the transportation system! Hope you manage to get that camera battery charged. I mean, don't those camera shop employees know who you are?!:eek:

That's what I kept telling my hubby..."Don't they know who I am? I have to have lots of pictures for the people back at cc" Sigh :p

Stinks about stores closing at 5pm in Bermuda. We live in an area that has "blue laws" and the only things that are allowed to be open Sundays are grocery stores and drug stores. And when I was younger even THEY were closed on Sundays, then they were allowed to open, but could only sell FOOD, no misc. items. (and I am not much older than you!) Now they are allowed full sales, but the department stores, Home Depot, etc. etc are closed on Sundays. You get used to it, but I would agree that if I was cruising to an area, I would hope the stores would stay open for the time I am there.

Hope you are feeling a bit better and still VERY MUCH enjoying this review!

Yea it really stunk not having anything open. It was like "tourist things like the beach" versus "shopping" hmmm, the beaches will always win and you will lose out on taking my money at your stores.

I do remember growing up that the stores were not allowed to sell things like tobacco and alcohol on Sundays. I remember my marine dad always stocking up the day before. :p

Great review as always! I'm selfishly hoping you go on Escape before I do so I can read one of your reviews on it. :P

Haha. Kendra is trying to talk me into that ship. :p

Valley Girl: Middle class and upper middle class girl from the San Fernando Valley (California) who would speak in a specific manner in the 1980's made famous by Frank and his daughter, Moon Zappa's cult classic parody song "Valley Girl" which makes fun of all the stereotypical things Valley Girls would say. I believe that Moon heard this type inane talk at "Like the Galleria!" and began imitating these girls and her dad, Frank Zappa heard her, thought it was funny and could be put to music to parody them. Valley Girl became his most successful hit in the US.

This song led to a movie called "Valley Girl" starring Nicholas Cage and Deborah Foreman - It's like God!!! Totally bitchin'! (LOL!)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D43xdpFvThs

LOL, I totally remember that song and thinking "This is really a song???" Like totally? :p

I wonder if a lot of others feel the same about the NCL shops? Wonder if we could launch a campaign to get NCL to change what they carry onboard so they have the types of items we all really need plus some other things that actually fit with where we are cruising?

 

We have a suitcase scale similar to yours as well. It is a real godsend! Looking forward to the next part of your review.

I can't even begin to imagine a campaign that would get NCL's attention...after all, they say us social media people don't really matter. :rolleyes:

The scale has to be the most awesome thing I have ever purchased while traveling. I shrieked with delight when I found it on the ship that time.

I've been enjoying reading this review -- it's been very helpful planning for our upcoming Bermuda trip -- especially knowing about the HOHO bus in St. George. We are not quite as detailed in our planning as you are, but we've learned that if we don't have a plan, we tend to spend a lot of time just hanging around and not really seeing much of anything. :D

 

Thanks for taking so much time to share with everyone.

The hoho bus. LOL I'll have to use that from now on. Why didn't I come up with that during my review? :p

That's exactly why we plan, I don't want to get stuck not seeing much or getting the most out of my port day. :)

Can I come cruise with you? I too am the planner of everything and it can be very exhausting. I would love to get a chance to be a follower knowing it was all taken care of and done right. What an amazing gift you give your family every trip, not to mention those of us that will use all your hard work to make our trips easier. Thank you!

See that's when you know that you are a true planner or not. I know that I'm a planner for the simple fact that IF someone else would take over and do all the planning for me, I wouldn't be able to function wondering "Will we see is all?" "Will this be what I want to do?" "What if I don't like it?" "What if we miss something we should have done?" The what if's would just have me a nervous wreck. :p

Enjoying your review. We've been to Bermuda several times now and your review is bringing back memories. I had planned on trying to get over to Tobacco Bay this August...but w/ those crowds I think we'll pass and check out another beach. Last time we went we were the only ones there for a good hour or so

My original plan was to head out very early, take the ferry over to Hamilton, then the bus to St George and head to tobacco bay before the crowds made it. Doing it this way would put you there about 1 hour before the first crowd of people coming over on the St George ferry would make it. You would get prime location on the beach and probably pretty much have it all to yourself. However, I was just too tired and crowds really don't bother me "too much"...especially when I spend all of my time in the water and not on the beach anyhow. :D

I am going to attempt to get more done on this review today. It has been a rough night and day today. I did make it to the doctors this morning and she did seem to think I have bronchitis and said my sob and wheezing really concerned her. I'm on steroids, inhalers and all kinds of crap now and she promised I'd feel better by Wednesday. I sure hope so. I can't take much more and had a break down last night. Sigh

So here we go. DAY 5 of the cruise and DAY 3 in Bermuda.

Today is the day that I believe I came down with my "sickness", well at least showed signs of symptoms. I woke up at 4:30 this morning with a terrible cough. I could not stop. I could not clear my throat no matter how hard I coughed. I had a bit of a wheeze and the sound of that alone was keeping me from falling back to sleep. I was afraid of waking up the family with my hacking that I decided to get dressed and go out for some fresh air.

I headed out to the pool deck to just "sit" for awhile. To my surprise there were about 5 guys out in the hot tub, just standing in it, beer in hand, yelling at people walking by "Hey there, how ya doing?" they'd say. :rolleyes: I stayed out there coughing over and over trying my best to shake this frog in my throat to clear it and get the wheeze gone. Then I headed back to the room and laid back down around 6am only to wake up again at 7:30 when my alarm went off for the day.

All this talk about being the "planner" I did let Kendra take the reins and participate in the planning of this day. I had all of our plans figured out months prior and every time she ask about this last day (you know, so that she could make up her last folder and put the money in it for that day), I had no answer.

It was getting really close to the time we were to leave and she said "I would really like to go jet skiing!!!" So she started researching places there and sending me the links. I would research, look at the reviews, email them with questions and then we would finally pick one. I remember reading several post on "renting a boston whaler" and I had absolutely no clue what that was but did see that they carried them at all the jet ski rental places. So that was my next research.

We had finally figured it out!!! We were renting jet skis for part of the day and a "boat" for the next part and only a few days to spare before we left on the cruise. :p

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

We headed over to the buffet for breakfast, after dropping one of my batteries off at the photo shop first thing in the morning...and yes, it was finally returned AND we were actually walking through the area and THEY stopped me and said "Do you still need your camera charged? It's returned now." I was shocked after the attitude they had given me all week. We then called Kendra at 8:15 and told her that we NEEDED to be off the ship and grabbing a cab AT 9:30am the latest. Not...heading to our rooms to grab our beach bags at 9:30, not heading off the ship at 9:30, not walking along the pier at 9:30....getting IN the cab around 9:30. This would give us time to get there, sign in, get our "instructions/review on how-to", sign the papers and be off on our jet skis at 10am.

At 9am, I called Kendra's room. Chrissy said "they left for breakfast". When went back over to the buffet and did not find them. We circled. We came back and called again. Chrissy said "nope they never came back and they took their bags with them." Hmm. So that meant they had no intention of coming back to the room and that meant I was going to go ahead and get off the ship hoping that they would be out there waiting on us.

We took our obligatory picture for the day:

So the following were my plans for our last day in Bermuda and I had really hoped that nothing went wrong because the other 2 days did not exactly go as planned and already Kendra and family was missing. Just great!

Catch cab to H2O watersports at 30 Kings Point, Sandys

441-234-3082

8 minute taxi from dockyard.

$135 per jet ski-rent 3 two seater jet skis.

Boat= $80 first hour $30 every hour after and renting for 3 hours total (charged for 2 hours) =$140 for 3 hours.

(plus gas at $11/gallon up to 5 gallons?) (take $40 for gas)

9:30 leave dockyard in taxi

10:00-11:15 jet ski tour

11:30-3:30 17’ motorboat rental around west end.

3:45 catch taxi back to dockyard

All aboard 5:00pm

We picked H20 Watersports for several reasons. First it was mentioned on here by someone on the boards that I trust their judgment and have been talking to them for many years on the St Thomas board. We seem to enjoy the same type of things and places. Another reason, they were closer to the dockyard, saving time and money in taxi fees. Next reason, I emailed this place AND Sommerset and H20 immediately got back to me and answered my questions and it took Sommerset days and days to respond to me and they did not even answer my questions appropriately. When I emailed Sommerset back, I never did get another response up until the day we left. H20 seemed to be pretty much on the ball and they also gave us a "deal" for renting both the jet skis and the motor boat....so H20 it was and they would be getting my business!!!

We were told that you catch the taxi's right as soon as you leave the ship area at #1. The person directing the "taxis" ask where we were going and we told him, but told him we were waiting on the rest of our party of 3 more. He said he would call as soon as we were ready.

Kendra, of course, was nowhere to be found. I thought for sure that we would find her outside waiting for us. We waited...and waited...and waited...and it was now 9:45am. Much later than what we had anticipated and at that point I was fed up of playing the waiting game and made the executive decision that we would just go ahead and leave for our tour. I was very disappointed and "hoped" (fingers crossed) that Kendra and family would already be waiting at H2O for us because quite honestly, this tour was not going to be the same or fun if they were not along...after all, she did come up with this idea. :(

Up next...will Kendra be waiting for us at H2O...what do you think?? :p

Welcome back Mitsugirly, missed you (I was going through review withdrawal)!!

 

So sorry. It has been a long week and not feeling well and I feel like it's never going to end. I'm going back trying to answer questions and I didn't even bother to look at who posted. My apologies. :(

No, no, no. Don't apologize at all! I know you're sick, it didn't come across well at all. I really, really appreciate your dedication to all of us at Cruise Critic even with you being so sick. Feel better! I don't do sick either and I know how it is. I had the flu earlier this year and it was mentally hard LOL. I hate being down.

Mitsugirly - i' m so sorry that you got sick. I was on the cruise after yours and I too got bronchitis - day 2 for me. As the week went on, I heard more and more people coughing. It made me question how often the linens - particularly the duvet covers are cleaned. I've been home since Friday night and am feeling a bit better except for the back muscle I pulled during one of my coughing fits. I say we both get a mulligan on the Bermuda cruise and get to go back!

oooh Cliff hanger!

I hope you get to feeling better soon.

Valley Girl: Middle class and upper middle class girl from the San Fernando Valley (California) who would speak in a specific manner in the 1980's made famous by Frank and his daughter, Moon Zappa's cult classic parody song "Valley Girl" which makes fun of all the stereotypical things Valley Girls would say. I believe that Moon heard this type inane talk at "Like the Galleria!" and began imitating these girls and her dad, Frank Zappa heard her, thought it was funny and could be put to music to parody them. Valley Girl became his most successful hit in the US.

This song led to a movie called "Valley Girl" starring Nicholas Cage and Deborah Foreman - It's like God!!! Totally bitchin'! (LOL!)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D43xdpFvThs

Oh good! I had good reason to feel insulted...I'm like totally laughing at

Myself now! :D

Oh good! I had good reason to feel insulted...I'm like totally laughing at

Myself now! :D

I'm from California and when I arrived in Texas at age 14, I sounded like a cross between a Val and someone who has attended The American Academy of Dramatic Arts (long story). But the other kids in my school in Texas would ask me:

"You from yurp ???"

It took me quite some time to figure out that they thought I was from Europe based on my accent. Nowadays it's my Australian husband who gets the weird questions:

"What is your original language?" :confused:

"Do you drive home often?" :eek::eek::eek:

LOL!

I'm trying to imagine what will happen with cliff hanger. I am hoping she and her fam are at the watersports facility or at least show up running behind Kim's taxi...

Welcome back Mitsugirly, missed you (I was going through review withdrawal)!!

Awww, thanks so much.

No, no, no. Don't apologize at all! I know you're sick, it didn't come across well at all. I really, really appreciate your dedication to all of us at Cruise Critic even with you being so sick. Feel better! I don't do sick either and I know how it is. I had the flu earlier this year and it was mentally hard LOL. I hate being down.

Thanks for your understanding and I really appreciate your kind words.

oooh Cliff hanger!

I hope you get to feeling better soon.

Actually just a break for dinner so that I could take more meds. LOL

Oh good! I had good reason to feel insulted...I'm like totally laughing at

Myself now! :D

So...do you like, totally talk like that? Inquiring minds want to know. :D

I'm from California and when I arrived in Texas at age 14, I sounded like a cross between a Val and someone who has attended The American Academy of Dramatic Arts (long story). But the other kids in my school in Texas would ask me:

 

"You from yurp ???"

 

It took me quite some time to figure out that they thought I was from Europe based on my accent. Nowadays it's my Australian husband who gets the weird questions:

 

"What is your original language?" :confused:

"Do you drive home often?" :eek::eek::eek:

LOL!

 

I'm trying to imagine what will happen with cliff hanger. I am hoping she and her fam are at the watersports facility or at least show up running behind Kim's taxi...

LOL on the questions they ask to the hubby. :p

Coming right up....the cliff hanger that I didn't mean to do on purpose and just too a break (I guess at the wrong time) for dinner. :p

So we get in the taxi and the driver turns around to head out and he ask where we were going. When I told him H20, he had no idea who they were or where it was located. I even gave him the address and he still didn't know. He pulled back around and ask the taxi "director" who gave him the directions. (I thought that was weird because I would later ask H20 how long they were in business and they said over 20 years).

It was about 8-10 minutes to the place and the taxi cost $14.50 to get there....of which we were SUPPOSED to split between Kendras fam and us!

We pull up and I see nothing but the workers there. I guess Kendra had not decided to head there and I was so disappointed at this point.

I went inside to check in and told them that I was unsure of what happened to the rest of our party and we were unable to find them. I ask if they were somewhere around here just waiting to pop out and yell "surprise mom! We actually made it some place on our own without you" but that didn't happen.

As I was checking in and going over everything with the worker I hear the hubby outside laughing. I look outside...and there is Kendra and family pulling up. Whew...they made it AFTER jumping in the cab at 9:35 at the pier...but NOT at the #1 station and instead was waiting over at the very last station, which is over by the ferry line, and NOT knowing where she was going or what the place was called...just jumped in the cab and told them to take her to the "Jet ski renting place"...which meant that they took her to Sommerset. Once there, they had no reservation for them of course, offered them a "deal" for the day and then was nice enough to say "Just know that if you paid by cc with the other place and you don't show up, they will still charge your cc and you'll be paying twice". So, she jumped back in the cab and Sommerset told the cab to take them to H2O and see if that's where they needed to be. A $24 taxi ride and they found us. Whew.

NOW THE PROBLEM STARTS WITH THE RENTALS.... (I guess this is cliff hanger #2 since Sakari is bugging me for a little bit "kuzzi" time at the moment) I'll return once again. :p

It sounds like getting to the jetski place was more exciting than the jetski ride will be! I hope not, because we have ridden jetskis a few times and they really were a lot of fun!

Glad to hear you've been to the Dr and have medicine that will help you get better.

I hope you feel better Kim:).

Great job here! Also thanks for traveling out of Boston!

I was on the cruise week before you. The green and red train is a shuttle from dockyard to daniel head beach. They have paddleboards for rent and a shipwreck you can snorkle to it is 16.00 pp they also have a kickboard type board with a see thru glass for people who don't like snorkling. Did not go there but had plans to if we had a day without rain our cruise got in late due to a medical emergency on Sunday and Monday it rained most of day so on Tuesday horseshoe bay won for beach trip it was wall to wall umbrellas that day lol

It sounds like getting to the jetski place was more exciting than the jetski ride will be! I hope not, because we have ridden jetskis a few times and they really were a lot of fun!

 

Glad to hear you've been to the Dr and have medicine that will help you get better.

LOL. Getting to the jet ski place was quite worrisome since the driver wasn't sure about where to go and I was worried whether or not Kendra was going to be there. Sigh

I hope you feel better Kim:).

Thank you so much. :)

Great job here! Also thanks for traveling out of Boston!

Thanks for the comments and glad you are here.

I was on the cruise week before you. The green and red train is a shuttle from dockyard to daniel head beach. They have paddleboards for rent and a shipwreck you can snorkle to it is 16.00 pp they also have a kickboard type board with a see thru glass for people who don't like snorkling. Did not go there but had plans to if we had a day without rain our cruise got in late due to a medical emergency on Sunday and Monday it rained most of day so on Tuesday horseshoe bay won for beach trip it was wall to wall umbrellas that day lol

Thanks for the info on the train. I had no idea where it was going. I will have to look that up. I seen people on a beach close by the Vixen. I assume that's Daniel Head Beach. Looked pretty, but small...at least from our point of view in the ocean. LOL