Review - w/ pictures - Navigator OTS - March 2 to 9, 2013

[Cuizer2]

Still in the Dungeon ...

 

 

This is from the Meet & Mingle (w/o the flash) ...

It was not a good place for a meeting. In fact, I have already read several negative comments about this location as far as having M&M events.

 

Caught this person trying to take my picture ...

 

 

 

The skate track ...

[Cuizer2]

Just a small remark. The pic you posted is definitely not the Navigator of the Seas.

 

Which picture are you referring to, because I was definitely on the Navigator of the Seas. Later I'll be posting pictures of the outside which will include the name of the ship.

 

Edited to add - take a look a post number six - this is the Navigator of the Seas!

[Cuizer2]

Monday, March 4 – Cozumel

It is 5:30am and even though the sun will not rise for half an hour, I can already tell sunrise will be a bust. Not only are there no clouds overhead, but just to make sure, there are clouds on the horizon. Sunrise is shortly after 6am. We are scheduled to arrive at 7am, which is fairly early. But in the distance I can see a Disney ship already docked. Docked at 6am – that is really early.

It occurs to me that this is the fourth time I have been to Cozumel and all four times on Royal Caribbean. Tomorrow it will be the fifth time I have been to Grand Cayman and that has been on three different lines (Carnival, NCL and Royal Caribbean).

It is 7:10am and the captain says we have been cleared to go ashore. The current temperature is 68 degrees and is expected to rise to 79 degrees later today.

At 8:20am the Carnival Dream showed up. Given the time, it is time for me to get ready to go ashore, but first a quick breakfast. I just grab a couple of slices of ham and a banana and eat in the Windjammer as I am a bit behind schedule.

In August 2004 I was aboard the Navigator of the Seas and I took a ship sponsored excursion to Chankanaab Park to swim with a dolphin. While there we were offered the chance to swim with a seal for only $59 more, which I took advantage of. Today I took an independent tour to Chankanaab Park to swim with a manatee. It cost $50.15 online. The taxi from the International pier (where we docked) to Chankanaab Park is $11 each way (if you have five it is $16 for the group or $3.20 each). I didn’t think the cost of the swim included admission to the park, but they let me in for free, so I guess it did.

While the dolphin swim is usually a group of ten people with one dolphin, there were only three of us (all from this ship) swimming with two manatees. A word of caution, don’t go swimming near manatees with your salad, because they eat lettuce – lots of it. It was great. Swimming with the dolphins is very popular and a lot of fun, but so was swimming with the manatees and we got a lot more inaction with the manatees than one gets with the dolphins (though the manatees will not pull you through the water like the dolphins do).

Unfortunately they don’t allow cameras any more (I had a water proof camera with me in 2004 and still bought the video and the pictures). The pictures are one for $35 or all of them (in my case 41 of them) for $79 on a CD (there was no video). I bought two pictures and saved a whole nine dollars. Okay, not really, I bought all 41 of the pictures.

Before swimming with the manatee I took ten pictures with my waterproof camera at Chankanaab Park. After swimming with the manatee the camera stopped working (oh ship!). I recharged the battery back on the ship, but the camera still did not work (double oh ship!!). There is no evidence of water intrusion in the camera, so I’ll have to get the camera checked out when I return home. This will make swimming with the turtles tomorrow less fun, but life has its ups and downs, even when one is on vacation. At least it is not as bad as forgetting to make sure there is a memory card in the camera. Oh wait a minute, what am I saying, it is worse – much worse and a lot more costly. And, I did it again today when I was running around the ship taking pictures of the other ships docked in Cozumel – I left the memory card in the computer again. The only difference is I had my camera bag with me, which means I had all the spare memory cards with me.

And while running around I stopped for some of the free ice cream available on deck eleven. There is also a Ben and Jerry’s on deck five, but that ice cream cost extra. While enjoying my ice cream I ran into one of my group mates. He went scuba diving today.

In between running around the ship and swimming around Chankanaab Park I took a short nap. The sun is a little stronger here, especially since there are no clouds in the sky.

We departed right on time, so I guess everyone made it onboard, as I didn’t hear any names called. We are moving our clocks ahead one hour so that the ship’s time will be the same as the local time.

At 4:45pm we had the welcome back party. I told the captain that he could save a few hours if he cut a few corners on the Mississippi River. He said there weren’t too many corners that could be cut. I said, well, if you are going fast enough and you build a ski ramp – he laughed.

I bought four pictures today, all eight by ten at $16 each. I think the price of the eight by ten photographs has gone down a little bit (I think they used to be over $20 each). Fortunately, as part of the group booking I received a $100 on board credit (OBC).

It is about time for me to create a spreadsheet to keep tract of my spending. Yes, this information is available on the TV, but I also use it when I am filling out my custom’s form. And for those that are interested, I have uploaded over 1200 photographs to my computer taking up over 6.6 gigabytes of disc space so far.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Cuizer2]

 

 

 

 

 

[Tennessee_Cruiser]

Question: Is smoking allowed in the Dungeon?

[Cuizer2]

Do you want to know how to get to the helicopter pad? Here are the instructions ...

 

Start on deck four starboard side. Go all the way forward ...

 

And up these stairs ...

 

Then walk forward some more ...

 

Keep walking forward ...

 

Keep walking toward the pointy thing at the front of the ship ...

 

Congratulations, you made it ...

[Cuizer2]

 

 

 

 

 

[Cuizer2]

Okay, a small break to catch up on some questions ...

[Cuizer2]

I would like to read your opinion of Simona.

 

Simona Ferraiuolo was our cruise director. Though I do not depend on the cruise director for anything, she was the least visible CD I have every had. I don't think I could pick her out of a line up. I didn't even know who she was until the middle of the week, and then only because through experience I realized the person talking must be the cruise director.

 

Now, understand, I did not go to any of the shows, where the CD usually makes an appearance. I was surprised that she did not announce the captain at the Captain's Corner.

 

However, don't take these as negative comments. Some of the CDs like to hear themselves talk, and I did appreciate the fact that I heard the captain over the PA more often than I head the CD. So actually, being less conspicuous is, in my opinion, a good thing.

 

So basically I don't have much of an opinion and I definitely have nothing negative to say about her.

[Cuizer2]

After my 23rd cruise I repeated ship for the first time which was the Mariner of the Seas.

 

I don't know if you are trying to be funny, difficult or what, but I was on the ...

 

[chrixxlax]

Thank you for the detailed review and pictures. We will be on the NOS in April for the Eastern Med cruise. This will be our first RCCL, and looks like we picked a great ship for our first.

[Cuizer2]

Question: Is smoking allowed in the Dungeon?

 

I don't remember. The Dungeon is the disco.

 

On the Mariner OTS the disco is called the Dragon's Lair.

[Cuizer2]

Okay, back to the review ...

 

Tuesday, March 05, 2013 – Grand Cayman

I am up in time for sunrise. Good cloud cover overhead. It is looking good. Oh no, we are headed directly into the sun. So I head up to deck twelve. Even worse, there are clouds on the horizon. So I go down to deck five and then to the helicopter pad for a good forward view. It is windy but nothing I cannot handle. Unfortunately the clouds at the horizon are getting worse (we are moving, so things change). I take a few pictures and a couple of short videos, but nothing worth writing home about. But all is not a total loss, as hardly anyone is up (we lost an hour this morning changing to local time Eastern Standard Time) and the Royal Promenade is empty which makes for good picture taking. The only problem is the firewall above the bridge over the Royal Promenade is closed for some reason. So photographs from the forward end of the Royal Promenade are worthless. However, I get a few good photographs from the aft end of the Royal Promenade. Then I put away my camera and head over to the Windjammer for some take out breakfast, which I enjoy on my balcony. I grab a couple of pre-made omelets, assorted meats, some cheese and a banana. The sign for the ham and cheese omelets and the sign for the vegetable omelets are reversed. I tell them and they switch the signs.

It is now almost 8am and we are two miles from land, though once again that is straight down. At our current speed of 17.7 knots (about 20 MPH) and the captain’s estimate (from yesterday) that we will arrive at 9:45am, I would guess that we are about thirty miles from Grand Cayman.

I’ve decided to give my Wow card to Sandeep, our waiter. He makes dinner feel special.

Well, we are a few minutes late, however, we are the only ship in town today. Two other ships were supposed to be here, but cancelled due to the swells. What swells??? I’ve seen bigger waves in a swimming pool. The tender ships are the local tenders that hold at least twice as many as the ship’s tenders. According to the captain the temperature will be in the upper seventies. We are using a different tender dock than I am used to. We are using the one closer to the middle of town.

I went up on deck to photograph the other ships before the captain said there weren’t any (he was right). It is strange, we are floating above half mile deep water, yet a quarter mile in front of us is dry land. Grand Cayman is basically the top of a rather steep mountain.

My plan is to wait a bit for the tender crowd to thin out, then take a taxi to Boatswains Beach (aka the Turtle Farm), spend two to three hours at the park, then do some shopping in town and catch a tender back to the ship before the big crowds start to appear at the tender dock at the end of the day.

Well, I’m back and I learned a lesson in independent shore excursions. Sometimes the ship’s excursions are a better deal because of quantity. The admission to the Turtle Farm, online, was $36. I simply decided that I would take a taxi there and back. So when I got off the tender I went looking for a taxi. I found several. None were all too happy to take one person one way, all the way, to the Turtle Farm and all wanted $30, each way. That would bring the total cost of the trip to $100. Fortunately for me, the Turtle Farm had some issue with my credit card and the charge did not go through. So by not going I lost nothing.

So I did a little shopping and on the way back to the tender dock was offered a tour for $15. $15 for a tour - that is not a bad deal. Lesson number two, tour operators like to fill up their bus. So I had to wait fifteen minutes until she found others to go, that was not a big deal. As we walked to the van I stayed at the end, hoping to get the front seat. It looked good until right at the van she found two more people. The front seat holds two and she gave the front seat to the two new people. Then she made some five year old sit on his parent’s lap so I could have his seat. I didn’t like taking the kid’s seat and I told him I was sorry. He didn’t seem upset by what had happened, but I still did not feel it was right. I decided I would buy him some small gift to make amends.

Our first stop was Hell. If you are not familiar with Grand Cayman, there really is a town, with a post office, called Hell. I have never been there before, and see no reason to ever go back. The best part of Hell (in my opinion) is that you can buy cold water and shirts that say things like I’ve been to Hell and back. I bought one of each (cold water and a shirt that has the word Hell on it). However, there was nothing suitable for a five year old stranger.

Our next stop was, are you ready for this, the Turtle Farm. All we had to do was tell them we were in Chocolate’s taxi and we could get a limited admission for $10. By limited I mean there were places in the park we could not go. Basically we were limited to the turtle tanks and we were only there for thirty minutes. But still, what was $100 was now only $25 ($15 tour plus $10 admission).

That is when I realized that two things were happening here. The Turtle Farm is near the hotel area. So they get lots of tourists. They charge the tourists full price. But they also get a lot of quantity business from the tours, so they charge the tour operators a reduced price. As for the tour operators, they make their profit off of the quantity. If a taxi can make a profit taking one person there and back for $60, then a tour operator can make a bigger profit by taking thirteen people there and back even if only $6.00 is allocated to transportation.

At the Turtle Farm you can buy Turtle Food (it looks like dog kibble and no, I didn’t taste it) for $5.00 for a small bag. Perfect. I gave the kid half my bag. He was happy, his parents were happy, and even though I never wanted to take his seat, I was now happy besides, I wasn’t really all that interested in feeding the turtles). Everybody wins.

The tour had all the quality you would expect from a $15 tour. However, it was worth $15, so I am not complaining. Next time I come here by cruise ship, I’ll likely just take a ship’s tour. But now at least I can honestly say I’ve been to Hell.

On the way back to the ship, on the tender, something strange happened. I had my SeaPass card in my shirt pocket. It is a typical shirt pocket that opens on the top. To the best of my knowledge gravity was working properly at the time, yet somehow the card few out of my pocket. Fortunately it landed on the tender and someone saw it happen and alerted me to it (I did not know my card flew out of my pocket). Now that I know what happened, I still don’t know how it happened.

While on the tour I learned that yesterday the wind was really blowing hard and no ships stopped. I now realize that the other two ships were probably due in Grand Cayman early and that at that time the weather may have been worse, so they chose to cancel the port stop. We arrived later after things had calmed down a bit and we were able to enjoy our day at Grand Cayman.

Back on board I decided to shower and rest up after having spent quite a few hours in the sun (and fifteen minutes in Hell – sorry, I couldn’t resist). The captain made an announcement at 5:30pm that the last of the passengers were on the final tender and that after offloading a medical emergency (the second one of the day) we would be off. Hopefully those people will make a full recovery and hopefully they have insurance to cover the cost of the medical care, their lost vacation and the cost of the flight home (and a passport so that they can fly home).

After the captain’s announcement I decided to get some ice cream and a snack. The ice cream was no problem, but the Windjammer didn’t reopen until 6:00pm, so I went to Johnny Rockets for a snack. I thought Royal Caribbean was only charging for the shakes, however, my hamburger and fries and shake cost $11. $5.20 for the shake and $4.95 as a cover charge (plus tip of course – which I added an extra dollar to). But hey, at least the hamburger and fries were free.

Well, it is twenty minutes to dinner, so I’ll catch you after dinner.

I was on deck ready for a great sunset. Unfortunately we were moving and as I said before, when you are moving things can change. By the time the sun was at the horizon it was now behind some thick clouds. In fact, one person who was also looking to photograph the sunset had turned away to speak to his friends and had to be told where the sun was, that is how think the clouds had become in less than fifteen minutes.

On Sunday we had taken a group picture. The picture was supposed to be ready on Tuesday. However, after asking to see the picture before dinner, the picture could not be found. The photography staff agreed to look while I was at dinner. After dinner the picture still had not been located. The woman I was speaking to wrote something up and said I could see the picture after 7pm the next day.

There were only two of us at dinner, as most of our table had chosen that night to go to Chops because someone who had been on this cruise earlier had said that Tuesday dinner was the weakest of the week. So the two of us had a nice talk and a quick dinner. I wasn’t very hungry, so all I had was a couple of beef sliders, which is basically a small hamburger with a small premium beef patty, and ice cream.

After dinner I was very tired and lay down for a little rest before working on this. Around 11pm I woke up and realizing that I was still tired just decided to go to sleep and work on this the next morning.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Cuizer2]

 

 

 

 

 

[Cuizer2]

 

 

This is the ice rink ...

 

 

 

[Cuizer2]

 

 

OMG, look out - quick, dive!!!

 

Wow, that was close ...

(Please note the name of the ship in the photo above)

 

 

[Cuizer2]

Well, unfortunately, if I want to continue cruising, I have to go to work. I'll continue the review when I get home late tonight.

[Topo Gigio]

I don't know if you are trying to be funny, difficult or what, but I was on the ...

 

 

I'm not trying to be anything! exactly in pot # 6 the ship in the 2nd pic is not the Navigator of the Seas!!

[Cuizer2]

I'm not trying to be anything! exactly in pot # 6 the ship in the 2nd pic is not the Navigator of the Seas!!

 

You are correct. That is the photo the cruise line was putting in the photo albums and I didn't catch it. When I get home I'll have to post the picture with the caption saying that it is the Navigator of the Seas (which I erased).

[Cuizer2]

I'm not trying to be anything! exactly in pot # 6 the ship in the 2nd pic is not the Navigator of the Seas!!

 

You are correct. That is the photo the cruise line was putting in the photo albums and I didn't catch it. When I get home I'll have to post the picture with the caption saying that it is the Navigator of the Seas (which I erased).

 

I stand corrected. That ship in post number two is the Navigator of the Seas. I can barely read the name on the side. I also compared the ship to the picture of the ship I took myself.

 

The ship pictured in post number six is indeed the Navigator of the Seas.

 

We can do this another way. It clearly is not the Oasis class. It doesn't have ears, so it isn't a Freedom class. The vision and Sovereign class don't have a helicopter pad in front. So that only leaves the Voyager class and the Radiance class.

 

The Radiance class has eighteen life boats - nine on each side. The Voyager class has 26 lifeboats - thirteen on each side. The ship in post number six has thirteen lifeboats on its side. Thus it is a Voyager class ship and since it says Navigator on the side, it is the Navigator of the Seas.

[travelplus]

Hey Cruizer 2 I just sat down here at a coffee shop to read posts on CC and am going to read your detailed review of the Navigator which my Father and I are going to board in NOLA on April 6th. If i have any questions or comments I will post them after reading the review.

[Cuizer2]

Hey Cruizer 2 I just sat down here at a coffee shop to read posts on CC and am going to read your detailed review of the Navigator which my Father and I are going to board in NOLA on April 6th. If i have any questions or comments I will post them after reading the review.

 

There is still more to come. I hope to finish by late tonight.

[joandian]

Great review so far, thanks! Do you know if Navigator has been to dry dock to be revitalized the way Mariner was? We are considering doing the TA on Navigator next year so I'm enjoying your review.

 

Jo

[Tennessee_Cruiser]

Great review so far, thanks! Do you know if Navigator has been to dry dock to be revitalized the way Mariner was? We are considering doing the TA on Navigator next year so I'm enjoying your review.

 

Jo

 

The Navigator will receive her upgrades in December.

[Clarea]

Great review so far, thanks! Do you know if Navigator has been to dry dock to be revitalized the way Mariner was? We are considering doing the TA on Navigator next year so I'm enjoying your review.

 

Jo

Navigator's drydock is scheduled for early 2014.