Miss Vickie

We did Xtreme Adventure and it was by far our best outing of the whole cruise. And that was even with starting out the day with an hour worth of hard, cold rain. Noelle was just awesome and we had a great day. I would go with them again in a heartbeat.

Noelle was with us on the EcoTour a couple of years ago, she's terrific!

I'm excited to see the Monkeys. Are they friendly? Does Mandoo bring his own bananas or should I pick up a couple prior to the tour?

 

I liked seeing the monkeys on St.Kitts but I'm a huge animal activist so I don't like them being in captivity and slaving away for their owners. I just hope they are kind to those monkeys.

 

Thanks for your help :) 12 days now, I can't wait!

Mandoo brings bananas, and the monkeys are friendly. Not like house pets, but you can feed them. They are wild. They may come to get fed, but then they head back into the rain forest.

The monkeys on St. Kitts are another story, many times they are separated from their mothers, and the mothers are killed to get the babies.

Same hull, built out differently.

Okay great! Thanks for the reply. I'm just gonna go where he takes me. He said this in his email

 

"The spice plantation route is going to give you a great feel of the island.

 

Douglaston spice depot. There will be a presentation on all the spices.

 

Drive through the lush volcanic mountains to see the spices, cocoa and bananas plantations. Great photo stops.

 

The Grand Etang crater lake, also a presentation on the lake and surrounding areas.

 

Rain forest. Small walk on the nature trail if so desire. May see the Mona monkeys.

 

Annandale waterfall"

 

So I'm sure those are fine :)

That was our first trip with Mandoo, and obviously we enjoyed it, since we keep going back with him. :) I'm sure you'll have a great time. And you'll probably see the Mona monkeys at Grand Etang - the monkeys there seem to know him (bananas help :D) and I've seen them every time we've been there with him. They're adorable. They'll come up to you so you can feed them - it's not like St. Kitts where people are throwing baby monkeys on people and then charging to take your picture. Do you have your camera ready - you can get some cute shots.

ANYONE KNOW OF A TOUR OPERATOR THAT GOES BY THE NAME ONE TIME:confused: IF SO HOW DO I ET IN TOUCH WITH HIM THANK YOU:p

Mandoo, mandoo@grenadatours.com. We've toured with him 3 times and he is arranging our tour next January, too.

I can't decide which tour route to take.I've been looking at mandoo's tours and everything seems fabulous. Any suggestions?

 

I am interested in the cocoa and the spices and I also want to go to grand anse beach.

 

Thanks in advance :D

We've toured with Mandoo 3 times, 3 different tours, and have enjoyed all of them. We're booked with him again next January for a snorkeling tour. I think my favorite so far has been the 7 sisters falls hike, but this is not what you're looking for. We really enjoyed the northern route, too - I'd go with that one.

We've toured with Mandoo 3 times, 3 different tours, and are booked with him again next January. We recommend him enthusiastically!

We'lve booked with Mandoo to snorkel the underwater sculpture garden next January. We've done 3 of his tours in the past and trust him to make the arrangements for us. We've always had him as our guide before; I'm sure hat this time he'll be making our arrangements but won't be on the tour with us. The tour is one of the special tours he lists on his website - google Mandoo Grenada to find it (CC asterisks it out,, so I'm not posting the link).

Hi,

 

I've never been there but would like to know where the dock is located. Is it by any chance near the Road Harbour / Road Town area? I am interested in attending Sunday Catholic Mass and noticed that there is a church in Road Town. Hopefully the church is within close walking distance of the pier. It does not look to be that big of an island.

 

Thanks.

Yes, your ship docks in Road Town, and it's easily walkable. The town is pretty compact.

Please, please don't do a dolphin encounter! These people need to be put out of business. It is criminal to keep these beautiful intelligent creatures in captivity! If you want a real dolphin experience go ocean kayaking in Hawaii.

Ditto.

Antigua doesn't have a dolphin encounter. There was talk of opening one there, and Antiguans objected. In fact, there was discussion about passing a law to prohibit it. I don't know if legislation was enacted, but the dolphin encounter did not open.

Sorry Erniesband but I disagree with your comments. I did do research on their website before booking. Below is what the Eli Eco Tour website lists regarding snorkeling in their FAQs:

 

"On Eco we give you the opportunity to snorkel three times on the tour. The first is off the beach, and this is where we give our in depth snorkeling lessons for people who haven’t done it before or for people who need a refresher course. We then give you the choice of snorkeling again after lunch at Hell’s Gate Island , and one last time off Welch Rock before the trip home."

 

As for the type of catamaran, I never said the site erroneously described the boat. I said that I was personally disappointed to see it didn't have sails. I didn't say I was told it would have sails. Just that I was surprised it didn't. Of the 12 or so catamaran excursions I have done in the Caribbean this was the FIRST that had no sails.

 

To me, these boards are to help someone with making a decision on a tour. I wrote about my observations based on the website reading I did, previous experiences, and then what occurred. If you had different observations to provide I recommend you write about those.

Sorry your day wasn't what you expected, and you're entitled to your opinion. However, did you actually look at the pictures on Adventure Antigua's website? Plenty of pictures which clearly show the power cat which is used for the EcoTour (with captions, as appropriate). Zero picture of a sail catamaran. When you were researching did you ask about the boat, either on the boards, or when you communicated with the company? And the description of the tour describes multiple activities available at various sites, including snorkeling opportunities. It is not described as primarily a snorkeling excursion.

I've done all of Adventure Antigua's tours, all more than once, and have posted favorably about all of them.

Believe me, it was not a serious question. You had to be there to understand I guess.

Not having been there, I'll believe you ;)

The specific one I remember had nothing to do with knowledge or expertise - this guy on our tour (while the officer was showing us and explaining the azipod controls) asked "can ya make this thing do a 360 (yuk yuk)?" So I supposed show-off wasn't what I really meant when I made that comment above about roll your eyes.

That actually may have been a serious question. The Radiance class ships can do 360's - and, I don't know this for sure, but it's likely any ship with azipods can do that. Don't know what ship you were on when that question was asked.

We've toured with Thenford and Javin.

Thenford is an excellent guide, and a real gentleman. We semi-customized his standard tour, to include rainforest and skip the beach. Along with the others on the tour we went to Brimstone (an awesome site and a perfect location for photography) and to Romney Manor. That's where our itinerary differed from everyone else's. Thenford arranged for another guide to meet us outside the gardens at Romney Manor, which was where our rainforest portion began. There were seven of us, including our friend's 79 year old mother, who decided to join us instead of rather than continuing on with Thenford. The rest of us were 2 mid-20's guys and 4 mid- to late-50's adults. We were nervous when mom said she wanted to go with us. We needn't have worried. The guide was very good and stayed with her (except when he was swinging on vines with some of us). It was a different rainforest hike than we were used to - short and easy, more of a walk in the park. Not exactly a hike (luckily, considering mom). The guide who took us on the rainforest walk then took us back to the ship. Overall, it was an enjoyable day. Not exactly what we were anticipating in a rainforest hike, but both Thenford and the second guide were wonderful, and Brimstone is one of those don't miss sites.

The following year, when it was just 4 of us (our sons and friend's mother weren't with us) we went with Javin. We took his standard day, as we have Brimstone several times and wanted the soft adventure tour he normally does. We loved it! We are hoping to tour with him again in 2015. We climbed on Black Rocks, did a real rain forest hike, after which we had refreshments consisting of freshly baked local breads and pastries and local fruit juice and water, went snorkeling on a wreck, and spent a short time relaxing on a beach. It was rained part of the day and we couldn't do the whole hike because of the rain. Next year we're hoping to finish that hike and skip the beach. Javin is a great guy and and guide, filled us with all kinds of interesting information. He also stopped at a cane field and got up us some cane to taste.

No problem on Jewel, either. You could get a pastry with a smile, even if you didn't get coffee.

We stopped in Chulani when they were new, looking for 2 new Nikon DSLR's. Both my son, and I were looking. I was upgrading my D60, and my son, a professional photographer who uses high-end full frame Nikons at work, knew what we were looking for and what stateside and on-line pricing was, as well as the fact that the specific model we were both interested in was new, not available in stores at home and back-ordered on-line. Chulani gave us a too high price for the camera, and a load of bull about the lens, and also tried telling us that the charger and battery were extra (which meant they broke up the Nikon kit for sale). Needless to say, we didn't buy there and wouldn't recommend the place to anyone else. We checked several stores and ended up buying at Boolchand, for a very good price.

I don't normally buy lenses in the Caribbean, normally don't find the prices any better than I find locally or on-line. This year, though, I picked up a Sigma 120-400 for about $100 less than on-line pricing, once again at Boolchand.

And by the way, about that shopping guide you get on the ship - the stores in there have paid to be there. Some of them are good, reputable stores (we've been shopping at joe's Jewelers and Effy since before they were in the shopping guides), but being in he shopping guide doesn't guarantee the store is a good one, and doesn't mean you don't have to do your homework before buying.

To be very honest, I feel like the only one of these complaints that is valid is the room size. The rest seem rather petty. I don't know, I'll be on my first RCI cruise next week so maybe I'll come back with a different point of view afterwards, but it seems like those are not the things that should make or break a cruise.

Even room size isn't that big of a deal - there's plenty of storage, and we've never felt too cramped. And you're right, the other things don't make or break the cruise. Enjoy your cruise!

I would double check the info here. We were there in January 2013 and PR is no longer part of the nationwide free coverage. Unless it has changed back. We used it there for years, but then were told it changed. I would go to Verizon and check your plan out for sure. We did get on a cruise ship plan. Calling is 2.40 per minute and texts are 50 cents to send and 5 cents to receive but only on the ship and not in port. And you have to be signed up for that plan, although it is free.

I hope they changed it back so PR is free again, so I do hope my advice is outdated.

I had no issues, no extra charges using my iPhone for calls, texts, e-mail and data in January 2014. San Juan is still part of my nationwide plan, no changes. I actually stood on jewel's helipad and talked to my son as we sailed out of San Juan; the ship tower turns off and on automatically when you're far enough out that the land-based service is no longer available. As long as your phone says extended, not roaming, you're good

I've always turned off data roaming when I cruise. Do you still have to do that or can you receive emails and not have roaming charges?

If you've got Verizon, you can use data in San Juan at no additional charge. Calls, data, texts, e-mail, the works. :D Drives my husband nuts, he'd just as soon I have no connectivity.

Roaming in St. Thomas.

I've been using a verizon cell phone in San Juan for years. It's all covered, part of your plan.

We're fans of High Pockets. We've sailed with Capt. Kathleen several times. We always have a great day. Kathleen and her first mate take good care of you. The sailing is fun, you go to two snorkeling spots, Kathleen serves a great lunch, alcoholic beverages are included (after snorkeling is over).

Like blue_water mentioned, most sailboats on St. Thomas have six-pack licenses, as does High Pockets. However, Kathleen will arrange a tandem sail, if you are interested. On a tandem, two sailboats sail together. If you can't make arrangements with New Horizons, you may want to contact Kathleen and ask about a tandem sail.

With the new policy, if we wish to cruise in aft facing balcony cabins we are now restricted to 4 ships in the fleet. Nothing incorrect about that though it sounds like they are willing to help us when we want to cheat on our Radiance Class ships for something else.

 

I know they look like Barbie Dolls next to the big girls at the dock (Oasis, Freedom, Etc) but the Radiance class are our favorites.......luckily!

Radiance-class are our favorite, too. However, we "cheated" last year on Adventure. Have you checked the aft corner suites on the Voyager class? We had 1388, which was a d1, I believe, and HUGE. There is a pole in the room, but is much larger than any other d we've been in.

On Serenade they are reclassified as D-1s again, but still only hold 2 people. I think RCI has finally figured out that they are popular so is making an exception to their new classification to get a few more bucks out of us. I have no issue with that.

I wonder if they'll reclass them to D1's when they refurb JW. I've actually wondered for a long time why they weren't sold at a premium - on X M-class ships the comparable cabins are concierge class. I'm okay with it, we'll continue to book them.

Is this where everybody beats me up? Of course I guess I'm asking for it by posting my email.

 

How did I do?

 

 

 

 

Good Morning Mr. Goldstein-

 

I have been a rabid Royal Caribbean cheerleader for many decades. Years ago, as a RCI top accounts travel agent, I turned to Royal or Celebrity first. I knew my guests would return happy.

 

Fast forward to 2006 when I convinced my fiancé to visit Alaska. I wanted the Radiance. Your ship and crew did not disappoint. In fact it was so magical that halfway through Jim scrapped our honeymoon plans to Italy to return to Alaska and the Radiance. We came back in 2007 and were married in Juneau.

 

On that first trip I introduced Jim to aft-facing balcony cabins. He is totally hooked.

 

Sadly, I travel now with an EVC/scooter and have a fraction of the energy I once had. Your regular aft facing balcony cabins are perfect. The scooter fits alongside the larger sofa easily. On days I am too tired to leave the cabin I can spend the day on the lounge chair on that beautiful big balcony well protected from bad weather. The big lounge chair is a blessing to me.

 

Your new policy of not allowing 2 guests in a triple or quad has taken our aft facing balcony cabins away from us. I am completely crestfallen.

 

We have finally found a way for me to travel again. I can physically pace myself to enjoy everything I want and Jim can still explore and tour and not worry about my comfort.

 

We are returning to Alaska with our Best Man to celebrate our Anniversary. Jim made the reservation the night before my heart surgery to cheer me up.

 

Is Royal Caribbean going to break my heart and not allow us to stay in our favorite cabins?

1104 and 1604 on SR and JW used to be d1's, but were reclassed to d2's several years ago; my husband and I always book one or the other. I don't know about other classes, but on Radiance class, the aft facing balconies are available to 2 people.