Come Cruise with Me-Jewel Review 4/8/11-Southern Caribbean/2,000+ Pics/Super Long

[bionicman97]

Forgot to mention, but the hotel we stayed at was $105 a night with tax, if anyone was wondering.

 

Day 1 - Time to check out the room

 

At 2pm, with a full belly, we decide to check out the room. It is room 7534, which has one of those extra large balconies.

 

First thing we notice is the gift on the table

 

 

It is now sitting in our kitchen. For some reason, we still haven't opened it.

 

Here's the bed end of the room. No flat screens yet on the Jewel, but no big deal.

 

 

Here's the closet area (half of the closet)

 

 

Desk area (p.s. - if you need a fun drinking game, play "guess what the end of the message on the tv is - not that any of us drink around here)

 

 

Bathroom

 

 

and Balcony

 

 

Overall, it was a really nice room and we had no problems at all (other than one morning they had the toilet shut down for about 10 minutes, no big deal at all). This is the second time we have had this type of balcony room in a row. The question I keep asking myself is: "Would I do a balcony again?". The only thing it got used for was to dry my gym clothes the entire trip. We never sat out there at all. I'm prefer to be around other people almost all the time. We have no issues with having to see outside all the time, so that's not an issue either. I'm just not sure, really have to think about it next time.

 

Up next - It's picture time /aka/ explore the ship - coming soon. . .

[bionicman97]

Day 1 - Time to Explore / Picture time

 

First off, here were our guests at the port

 

This is a Regent something

 

 

and a HAL something

 

 

and our surroundings - East

 

 

and North

 

 

and here's us on the Balcony (didn't I just say we were never there? This was the one time - honest)

 

 

More of Day 1 - Time to explore/picture time - coming soon. . .

[bionicman97]

Day 1 - Time to Explore / Picture time - Continued

 

Our strategy was to start on deck 4 (the lowest deck that had common areas we were interested in and work our way up.

 

First stop was the dining room

 

 

Nice table setting

 

 

The art work

 

 

Two story dining room, of course

 

 

We sat at one of the tables by the window, near the middle of the picture

 

 

And now we can play "Where's the wife?"

 

 

Have we thoroughly covered the dining room? Ok, moving on. One more picture post and I'm done for the night.

 

More Day 1 - Time to Explore / Picture time coming soon. . .

[bionicman97]

Day 1 - Time to Explore / Picture time - Continued

 

So, out of the Dining room, heading toward the centrum

 

 

Here's the centrum

 

 

And the other side

 

 

Going up!

 

 

Nice projection screen, in case you forget which ship you are on

 

 

More artwork

 

 

That about covers the centrum. That's all tonight for review posting. It's approaching 11pm, so I will have to be getting to bed soon.

 

Coming tomorrow - Day 1 - The rest of the ship / International Ice Cream wars / Sail-a-way and more. . .

[seadog67]

Man Cliffhanger!!! Cannot wait for more!! Good job and thanks for taking so much effort for putting together such a picture rich review, I know how long it takes to enhance tons of pictures even good shots need a bit of work and yours look awesome, always in focus and steady. Good Job and thanks again!

[BillOh]

Wow, I've never seen any pictures of Jewell yet, so these were great. Love the dining room. After next week, this will be the only class of ship we haven't been on yet. Looking forward to hearing about the ports, we haven't been to most of those yet.

[wgraves]

I'm in to jogging now -- not because I enjoy it, but because I was a FFK (former fat kid) who lost about 60 pounds about 8 years ago and have been working out non stop ever since. I will never gain the weight back, that I have determined.

 

Congrats on this! I lost a good bit of weight a few years ago and have been furiously working to keep it off since. The wife looks at me funny when I go to the gym each morning on a cruise, but the way I eat on a ship, it's not optional. :p

[dajulieness]

 

Bathroom

 

 

 

 

. .

 

Beautiful ship!

 

and I bet it was nice having a door on the shower instead of a curtain.

[bionicman97]

Man Cliffhanger!!! Cannot wait for more!! Good job and thanks for taking so much effort for putting together such a picture rich review, I know how long it takes to enhance tons of pictures even good shots need a bit of work and yours look awesome, always in focus and steady. Good Job and thanks again!

 

Thanks :) The pictures are a lot of work -- That's why this review was delayed a week in starting ;)

[bionicman97]

Wow, I've never seen any pictures of Jewell yet, so these were great. Love the dining room. After next week, this will be the only class of ship we haven't been on yet. Looking forward to hearing about the ports, we haven't been to most of those yet.

 

Hope the pictures help. It's definitely a nice class of ship to sail on. The ports were great also -- more about that later.

 

Congrats on this! I lost a good bit of weight a few years ago and have been furiously working to keep it off since. The wife looks at me funny when I go to the gym each morning on a cruise, but the way I eat on a ship, it's not optional. :p

 

Thanks! I know exactly what you are talking about. It really has to be a way off life and for me, I pretty much have to be very sick to skip a workout. For some of the land based places we have traveled, I have had to have been pretty creative to get a workout in. I get ragged on all the time about working out on a cruise, but like you said about with eating on a ship, it's not optional.

[bionicman97]

Beautiful ship!

 

and I bet it was nice having a door on the shower instead of a curtain.

 

Yes it is! Love having the shower doors, so much better than the attacking curtain ;)

[wingnutphl]

Congrats on the new little cruiser!! Can't wait to get to the end of the review to get to the second announcement!

 

Keep up the good work! I am in the process of losing weight and it can be difficult at times but I keep thinking of all the new, pretty cruise clothes I can buy.

[tlconley]

My family was on the same cruise...had a great time! Just wanted to give some advice about cruising with children.

 

You may want to think about keeping the balcony room as after you have the baby (assuming the baby goes with you on vacation) there are a lot of nap times...we always escape to the balcony so the kids can sleep and we can enjoy the views and don't have to sit there (in slience) watching the kids sleep or staring at each other :D.

 

Terri

[will773]

I'm loving this review! Can't wait to see the rest!

[bionicman97]

Congrats on the new little cruiser!! Can't wait to get to the end of the review to get to the second announcement!

 

Keep up the good work! I am in the process of losing weight and it can be difficult at times but I keep thinking of all the new, pretty cruise clothes I can buy.

 

Thanks :)

 

It is difficult sometimes to loose and keep off the weight, but any incentive helps :D

 

My family was on the same cruise...had a great time! Just wanted to give some advice about cruising with children.

 

You may want to think about keeping the balcony room as after you have the baby (assuming the baby goes with you on vacation) there are a lot of nap times...we always escape to the balcony so the kids can sleep and we can enjoy the views and don't have to sit there (in slience) watching the kids sleep or staring at each other :D.

 

Terri

 

Glad you enjoyed the cruise :)

 

That is an idea for the balcony that I hadn't thought of - Thanks :)

 

I'm loving this review! Can't wait to see the rest!

 

Thanks - More coming later today :)

[mdxter]

Hey Curtis, congrats on your future addition. Enjoy your freedom b/c your life is about to change.

Your review is a rare b/c that I actually enjoy reading it as much as the pictures. If you don’t mind me asking, who did you use for your tour in Grand Cayman? I enjoyed the stingray (did this a while back) and barrier reef but especially interested in the ship wreck snorkel.

[Booking It]

You know how every family has a technology nerd that is appointed to fix everyone's broken piece of equipment? Somewhere along the line, I won that award and fortunately for me, I have over 30 members of my family that live within 45 minutes of me and another 20 on my wife's side. So I'm In Demand:rolleyes:

Ha! In my family, that would be my husband. I believe he spent over an hour on the phone with his parents one time trying to explain how to add an attachment to an e-mail. Oy vey!

 

I'm loving your review so far! Congrats on your newest cruiser. Since you are both eating for two, did you tip accordingly (ahhh, good memories of all of the tipping threads around here ;))? I also flipping love Olive Garden. Everybody thinks I'm crazy since Chicago has such fantastic restaurants, but that is where I choose to eat whenever we want a nice night out.

 

Keep the great review coming! :)

[bionicman97]

Hey Curtis, congrats on your future addition. Enjoy your freedom b/c your life is about to change.

Your review is a rare b/c that I actually enjoy reading it as much as the pictures. If you don’t mind me asking, who did you use for your tour in Grand Cayman? I enjoyed the stingray (did this a while back) and barrier reef but especially interested in the ship wreck snorkel.

 

Thanks -- I'm enjoying the little free time I have left ;)

 

For Grand Cayman, since we were with some first time cruisers, we did an excursion through RCI (we usually do private or on our own). It was $72pp called Catermaran Sail and Snorkel. The tour operator was something like Red Sailing (I think). It went to the ship wreck and the reef. After that excursion, we did find a place to snorkel on our own, which I will talk about during that portion of the review.

 

Ha! In my family, that would be my husband. I believe he spent over an hour on the phone with his parents one time trying to explain how to add an attachment to an e-mail. Oy vey!

 

I'm loving your review so far! Congrats on your newest cruiser. Since you are both eating for two, did you tip accordingly (ahhh, good memories of all of the tipping threads around here ;))? I also flipping love Olive Garden. Everybody thinks I'm crazy since Chicago has such fantastic restaurants, but that is where I choose to eat whenever we want a nice night out.

 

Keep the great review coming! :)

 

Thanks -- We had a great wait staff and they were rewarded accordingly ;)

 

Those breadsticks are addicting, aren't they?

[Pyrodite]

First off, congrats on your future-cruiser!

 

I am loving your review and can't wait for more. This is taking me back to my January cruise on the Jewel. Your pictures are awesome (much better than mine were!)-keep them coming!

[sgermic]

I'm pretty sure my boss hates you. But only because I spend so much time at work reading your reviews. Just fyi.

[bionicman97]

First off, congrats on your future-cruiser!

 

I am loving your review and can't wait for more. This is taking me back to my January cruise on the Jewel. Your pictures are awesome (much better than mine were!)-keep them coming!

 

Thanks :) I'm sure your pictures were good too.

 

I'm pretty sure my boss hates you. But only because I spend so much time at work reading your reviews. Just fyi.

 

Send my apologies to your boss. Maybe I'm saving your boss and he/she doesn't know it. Better that you be there reading my review doing part of your work than to be completely gone on a cruise yourself (from the bosses perspective, of course ;))

[sgermic]

I believe you are absolutely correct. Your awesome reviews satiate my intense need to cruise, therefore I can wait until November. I work for the state government, so it's not like I actually DO anything. I kid, I kid, just a lil current events jab right there.

[bionicman97]

Just got in the car to head down to Hudson to visit the wife's Grandpa at the Nursing Facility. That gives me one hour to post some review :) The bad news is I'm at the mercy of sprint's mobile network as we go - so bear with me. (Had to google "bear with me" -- wasn't sure if it was bear or bare. It's "bear". The other "bare with me" would mean to undress together, and well, we just don't know each other that well -- This PSA brought to by Curtis ~ "now you know, and knowing is half the battle" ~ where did that phrase come from, I can't remember)

 

Day 1 - We're still on day 1? Good grief!

 

So when we last left off, we just made our way through the centrum. Our next stop was through the shops

 

 

Then we arrived at the theater. Got a shot of the mommy to be

 

 

There's not to much I can say about the theater at this point, except it was hard to shoot in there without a tripod when we walked in, due to the lighting. This shot is heavily edited

 

 

Of course the wife snuck into a pic

 

 

The show for the first night featured a comedian, whose name escapes me as I ride down the road right now

 

 

More of the ship and Day 1 - Coming Soon. . .

[bionicman97]

I believe you are absolutely correct. Your awesome reviews satiate my intense need to cruise, therefore I can wait until November. I work for the state government, so it's not like I actually DO anything. I kid, I kid, just a lil current events jab right there.

 

Good :) I'm doing my part to help the country then ;)

[bionicman97]

Day 1 - The ship and more - continued

 

Once we left the theater, we stepped out to the muster area. This is the only time I visited this area, since, you know, the ship didn't sink.

 

 

This lady was a real ham, constantly sneaking into my review

 

 

After this we went through the sports area

 

 

Didn't do much here during the cruise

 

 

and then it was on to the casino

 

 

we didn't spend too much time here either, on the account of I find it depressing to loose money

 

 

Up next - the Schoneer Bar and More. . .