jenseib
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I guess I felt the need to take a close up of M. hahaah
Time for dessert!
I decided I need a Mickey Bar too.
And selfie with Mickey Bar…which Claire was very embarrassed about.
And F, PT and M all looked at my bar and asked for one each. Hahaha!
Time for the show. I can’t remember whose is who’s now, but I obviously was taking pictures as they said “that’s mine”.
And I selfie with Poncho
A stop off at our room before heading to the last show of the cruise.
Again, we had a lot of laughs. It was not nearly as full tonight either.
And then time for the jump ropers…which were very talented.
Then time for 80’s flashback.
We had teams (each side of the room was a team) and they would play a snippet and the person representing us needed to say the song, but we could shout it out. I can’t believe how many songs these people don’t know! I was shouting out and Jo caught me! LOL. I guess I was a bit too loud…and she made me come up on stage and “sing” a bit. I am the world’s worst singer. It was I love Rock n Roll by Joan Jet. I could do the screech part though and she was impressed with that.
I think PT videoed it and I hope she lost it somewhere! Heehee. I never saw it and hope never to see it.
And with that, the fun was over and the evening was coming to an end. All too soon we would have to leave this wonderful ship!
I did a little bit of my rounds around the ship and noticed land in the distance…..booohoooo!
Then off to bed for Claire and I. M stayed out with her friends one last night and was pretty sad that she would not see them for quite some time.
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We headed down another street as F and Z wanted to see the Yoda Guy building. They went in for a short time and came right back out.
We shopped around a bit and I believe I bought Claire a shirt. And a magnet for myself.
I found another cow! (Good thing he is tied up...You wouldn't want him wandering away)
Then we decided to walk back to the ship as it wasn’t too far…but it was hot and I was sweaty. I was now wishing I had gone for a dip in the water so that I would have been a bit cooler on the way back.
There was a shopping plaza up near the port. This actually might be where I ended up getting Claire a shirt. I separated from PT and family and looked around on my own here.
And then after I was satisfied I didn’t need anything else I headed back to the ship.
I headed up and got some ice-cream. They had Mango in the machine today. I love Mango.
It was disgusting! It tasted nothing like Mango.
I got cleaned up and Claire wanted to play Bingo. I have absolutely no desire to play and never have. Claire has played with others many times and always has fun. M said she kind of wanted to play too.
Claire said she would pay for our set of cards if I took her, so I did. We had to wait in line for quite a bit before they opened the doors.
One of us left our key in the room again and someone ran back to get it and still were back in plenty of time.
We sent Claire off to get some seats when the door opened and M and I stood in line to get the cards. We then saw T and D were here, so we told Claire to go sit with them.
Claire told me to use the electronic one and she did the paper cards. We were close several times but never won.
I didn’t find it all that thrilling and Claire said Katelyn on the Fantasy is way better at calling Bingo.
Sadly, it was time to sail away from St. Maarten now and we watched as we left again.
The sky was pretty once again….the last sunset from the ship!
We hit movie toons trivia tonight…We suck! But we had a lot of fun once again.
Time to finish up packing, which I never enjoy.
Dinner was in Animators tonight. I believe J and MK were eating Palo with T and D.
Hey I actually took pictures of the menu tonight.
Tonight we drew our pictures for the animation show too.
Claire and I both had the beef wellington. Now I have been saying how most of the food has been better than the Fantasy this cruise. This was one of the exceptions….it was not good. I think it was just mine though as Claire seemed to like hers.
Luckily I had a backup.
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At some point Z had left us to go up by the bar and wait for us. We decided it was time to go and we found Z…eating a pizza! LOL. So we waited for him to finish.
After he was done, we headed off to catch a taxi back, but we were having him drop us off at the beach near the port. It didn’t take too long and one arrived.
And back we went. This time we took a different route back and there was a lot of traffic today too.
I see our ship!
He dropped us off and we headed off to the beach to walk around and look in shops etc. Note that you have to rent beach chairs here, which is fine…but you will be asked every 5 minutes if you are interested in renting chairs.
Kind of funny to find Ohio State fans here in St. Maarten. Those Ohio State fans truly are die hards!
J had texted me and told me about where they were. I did see them at one point and said hi, but again, I didn’t want to just join in on their alone time.
When we were at the airplane beach a lady had asked F if he knew where the beach with the golden cow was. We had no clue and not heard of that…..well we found it.
Walking the Beach
We decided to get something to eat. Some places were pretty full and had a wait and some just didn’t sound good. We decided on a Mexican place and sat outside. The sun was really bright and the waitress moved the tables and umbrella to shade us better. She was really nice.
I decided to get a drink.
I got 3 empanada’s but they weren’t like any I have ever had before. They were ok. I didn’t like that they were made with corn instead of flour. But the insides were decent.
When it came time to pay, she told us their credit card machine was down and we had to pay cash…..nice time to tell us. Luckily I had cash, but F did not. He had to borrow from Z to pay. Hahaha.
We then headed back down to look around some more.
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We arrived at our destination. As we pulled in it was kind of a narrow road and people were standing on the curb. I swear we were going to hit them and no one paid attention. Later I realized they were watching planes come it and it was easy to lose track to where you were.
There was a building with a bar and food and a pool, chairs, etc. More to it than just a beach.
We headed off to the bathrooms first and saw they charge a dollar to go….ugh. I HATE that!
But they were working on something and just told us to go in, so I did. Later I came back to go again before we left and they were charging then.
And then we made our way over to the beach. They had a bunch of chairs in rows next to the bar and beyond that was open beach and you could see the planes.
Video of plane taking off.
They have an area painted red where the danger zone is. As you probably know, people used to hold on to the fence and let their bodies fly back from the jets and someone was killed not too long ago. I heard they were watching, but I never saw anyone actually watching, though no one tried it either.
And then we watched for planes and tried to get pictures. It was harder than you think.
Video
I did go to the water at some point and waded in a bit. We never did end up swimming because for some reason Z didn’t wear a suit today.
Beautiful water here too.
The beach
This lady who didn’t speak English well kept asking me over and over when the next plane was coming in. I told her I had no clue and that I just kept watching the sky….but she kept asking me.
In this video you will see her in front of me. She seemed to constantly stand in front of me and if I moved she did. It started to become a joke with us and PT and F were referring to her as my new friend. I guess I looked like I knew a lot about plane schedules.
Ahhh…this must be when I went up to the water to check it out.
The water felt good….at home we were below zero….here in the 80’s.
So F was going to take a nice video and PT and I were going to do selfies with the plane. I never loaded the video to my Youtube, but he did a great job. I don’t know what the heck I was doing though. The sun was shining and it was really hard to see my selfie….but seriously…I am not even facing the right direction!!!
There I got a wing….Wow….that was bad!
Oh let me try one more. Evidently I didn’t have any clue on direction that day.
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Feb. 2, 2019, Saturday, St. Maarten
Hello St. Maarten….Yet another new port for me today.
Lots of ships in port today!
We had no real plans today. None of us did. We talked about going to a beach and possibly going to see the airplanes come in at the “airport” beach.
That morning I still wasn’t sure what I wanted to do. J and MK said I could join them at the beach, but I knew it was just them and I didn’t want to be a 5th wheel. PT and family decided they were going to the airplane beach to start with. I decided in the end that sounded like something I should see at least once in my life.
Claire had no desire to do ANYTHING! So she slept and stayed on the ship.
I went up for breakfast with PT and F and the view was pretty from our outside table.
We packed our bags and headed off towards the taxi stand.
We stopped as F went in a building for some wifi as his dad was sick at home and he wanted to check up on him. Unfortunately it had to be paid for and he said he would look into it later.
We found the taxi stands and decided exactly what route we wanted. They have taxis going certain routes, you pay a set fee, and then they direct you to where you will stand to wait for your vehicle.
And then we were off. It was a lot further away than I thought. I will admit I did next to no research about St. Maarten. I had looked at what Disney offered and I was not impressed with the options. PT looked at a few but in the end decided to wing it. J said from the beginning she was just probably doing a beach day as the beach is close. For some reason, I had thought the beach near the airport was very near the ship, but it wasn’t.
I found the ride interesting. There were some massive boats docked here.
As we went along you could see some of the devastation left from the hurricane. Many boats on the ground or sunk.
My guess is the owners got the insurance money and the boats weren’t fixable so they decided not to spend the money on getting them junked somewhere and just left them as is.
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As we sailed away the sun was going down and it was beautiful!
We watched as the sun went lower and lower. It was amazing how fast it seemed to drop into the ocean.
Tonight’s show was jump ropers and we didn’t care to see them so we skipped it.
Tonight was 2000’s trivia though and we all headed that way. This night it was crowded! It was funny how we had gone pretty much every night and each night it got busier and busier. We were all full of spirit tonight and PT, J and I all ordered soft pretzels.
Some of us got some drinks too. We had a fun time! Not so well at trivia, but we don’ t need to win, it’s just fun going.
Crown and Fin has snacks out each evening too.
After trivia was over it was still lively in there and J wanted me to go up and get a drink with her.
Her and MK were drinking these. I don’t know what they were.
Then it was time for dinner!
I believe we were in Royal Palace tonight.
I really like that they had butter balls instead of the little containers of butter.
MK and I both had the oysters. I took a bite. Hmmm pretty fishy. I took another and said nope, can’t do this, too fishy. MK took a bite and said “you’re right”. Then the taste lingered and MK said he had to find something quick to get that crap taste out of his mouth. I was laughing so hard. I agreed, but the way he said it (and he has a southern accent) was just so funny!
I have had oysters on the ships before and they were fine. This batch just was not good.
Surprisingly…Claire had steak! I am sure you are shocked!
The lobster was better on this ship than it has been on the Fantasy the last few times.
Dinner was good, but we were all kind of tired tonight too. At the point too where we know we have eaten too much over the last several days.
However, tonight was Match your Mate, which is always fun, so most of us headed to Azure for that. We played the 10 PM game and then watched Match your Mate and it was so funny. It was a good time and with all the laughing we forgot how tired we were.
After that I took a walk on deck 4.
And I went for some drinks to take back to the room and found these stairs, so I took a pic.
This is terrible to say, but I have never looked in on the Bibbiti Bobbidi Boutiques on either the Wonder or the Magic. And when I sailed the Dream last, it hadn’t been added yet.
Back in the room and our towel animal.
M went to hang with her friends and Claire and I went to bed. One more full day left. This cruise was going WAY too fast!
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And another cow alongside of the road.
More flowers!
I see the ships!
When we went past this place I just had to take a picture. The name totally cracked me up.
As we got closer to the port you could really see it was the slum area. Some dwellings weren’t much more than cardboard houses. They had vendors set up along the road too. And you could smell weed. Our driver said they were probably Church of Rasta Parishioners! Hahaha.
He dropped us off near the ship and we tipped him nicely as he really did a great job.
I thoroughly enjoyed this excursion. My only complaint would be that it states 6 per vehicle and there is no way 6 would fit and ride for that many hours comfortably. We had 4 and it was fine, with the exception of Claire in the way back and she said she was cramping up a bit. 3 in the middle seat would be tight. If they change it to a max of 4 I would recommend it to everyone.
Also an extra bathroom stop as it would be too long to make it to the beach break if that is the only stop they normally make.
I found Antigua absolutely stunning. I would love to visit again someday.
I wanted to do a little shopping, but Claire, who did not use the bathroom, had to go really bad and wanted to get back to the ship.
I took her back on and we cleaned up a bit (AKA wipe sweat off of us) and then got a bite to eat.
We thought those were mozzarella sticks but I think they were actually fish sticks and not very good ones at that.
I then headed off the ship again to look around. Claire decided to stay on the ship.
I looked around and bought a few things, but they had a lot of pushy people. Why don’t they understand that we do NOT like that. If you are pushy, I will walk away. You probably would have made a sale, but now you aren’t.
Back to the ship!
The horn playing…I believe to announce all aboard.
Claire and I headed to deck 4 as we were sailing away.
Video..lots of horns going
And more horn
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We walked up and down the beach and waded in and out at times. Darn! I wish we had worn out suits!
Just look at the color of that water!
Sadly my camera has spots on the lens so most of my pics have spots.
She didn’t care about getting wet after a while. Hahaha.
A shadow selfie!
Claire went and sat down at the table to finish her drink and I went off to the side to get more pictures.
And it was time to go again. Claire went back to her small back seat. She still was not too happy about that.
We had been talking with the guys and we all laughed how we had said earlier we would be fine skipping the beach and it ended up being one of the most beautiful places ever.
More sugar mills.
At one point we passed where PT and family was staying for the day. She said it was great there too.
Our driver did point out some all-inclusive resorts in the area too.
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Now we were getting closer to our beach stop. At one point Claire and I and the guys were talking when our driver was out that we really didn’t care if we did the beach stop as we didn’t care if we swam and were already having a good enough time. As we approached the beach area we could all see how stupid that thought was.
Whenever I think of paradise in the future, some of these images will surely come to mind.
We pulled off across the street and parked. Our driver gave us each a drink and then we crossed over and went through a building that had a snack bar with items to purchase and tables, etc. It also had restrooms (not the greatest, but hey when you need one, it works).
We put our stuff on a table with the guys and they went out to swim and Claire and I explored the beach….and both wishing we had worn our swimsuits!
Video
I took a few “hat shots”.
Video
Claire was wearing jeans….because she hates shorts for some odd reason. At first she backed away from the waves, and then she didn’t care and let herself get wet.
I just couldn’t get enough pictures…everything was beautiful!
Every time the waves came in I thought it was another fantastic shot to take.
They did have some vendors on each side of the building off to the far right and left. One was kind of pushy and kept yelling at me to come look at her stuff. I HATE that! I was obviously taking pictures….why on earth would you keep bothering someone when they told you no.
video
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Hello Donkey!
We made another stop!
I can’t remember what he grabbed here, but I think it was some other weed type thing for us to look at.
And then another stop!
This time for pineapple, which I did not know, but is a big producer here.
It was very good! And that is one of Claire’s favorite foods!
And one more stop! He went out and picked some finger rose (baby) bananas. And they were sooooo good!
I think all these stops for food were “extra”. I know he actually purchased the pineapple for us to try and I think he looked for baby bananas in an area where he would not be “caught” taking them. Hahaha.
And now for some of the scenery that has made Antigua probably my favorite place ever.
This water looks absolutely stunning!
And this is one of the nicer areas for homes too.
I believe he pulled off the road so we could take pictures.
This tower (and mountain) used to be called Bogey Peak, I think, but now is called Mount Obama. It is the tallest point in Antigua. I guess it was renamed not too long ago. Our driver was so funny. He said Obama never visited or did anything for Antigua and he has no idea why they have something to honor him.
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We now were reaching the Harbor area and it was also beautiful. I think they have some big Regatta each year.
We then had to swoop around to get a better view.
What a view these homes have!
Here is one of those sugar mills. We had seen them all throughout the island.
Look at those Evergreen trees in the distance. They just seemed out of place.
Another sugar mill.
And another one in the distance.
Did you know it takes something like a year for a banana tree to grow a new batch of bananas?
And once you pick them then you need to cut the tree down to a stalk and a new one will grow to make the next batch.
They had regular bananas and baby bananas which were even tastier.
He then stopped off to the side of the road and picked some guava for us to try.
You eat the whole thing. It was OK, but I had a hard time getting my brain around eating the whole thing.
Claire and I only took a few bites, but one of the guys ate the whole thing. His partner was laughing at him because he could only take a bite too.
I forget what these were, but they were something special as well.
This was some kind of prickly tree, a natural defense to keep people (and animals) away from it.
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I just thought the views were beautiful! It really is a beautiful island.
This road was one of the smoother ones.
It had been sprinkling a bit and you can see a bit of it on the window.
I believe the port is off in the distance. We had come quite a ways. In the end I think we toured about ¾ of the island.
Again…Seeing beautiful flowers in Jan/Feb is always a welcomed sight.
I just missed getting the picture, but there was a bull dragging a tree behind him crossing the street! He broke the tree down and was on his way……
To his honey!
You can see the rope tied to him still.
The farmer was actually in the area and waved to our driver to let him know he was aware the bull broke free.
Ahhhh Flowers!
More Cows!
As we drove along, of course we talked with each other. The 2 guys, which were a couple, were super nice and funny and we had a fun time with them. Our driver asked where we were from and stuff like that and it came out what my profession is…which has to do with travel and destinations, etc. He was like OMG! We are in one of the worst vehicles in the fleet and I get the person who is going to write a review on us! Hahaha.
I will say now, that I am pretty sure our tour was extended once he found that out and he did a lot of “extra’s” for us…or so I am led to believe.
At some point I asked about a bathroom break. It had been a few hours….and I am a lady with a small bladder. He made a stop at a store and went in and asked if we could use the bathroom and he would make it right with them later. Of the 2 vehicles, I would say ¾’s of us used the bathroom. So that might be something they need to add to the tour…an earlier bathroom break.
We finally made it to see some of the beautiful water.
I honestly think Antigua has some of the most beautiful water views I have ever seen. It was just stunning and pictures do not do it justice.
I believe this was the area where some of the stars have homes…way up in those hills.
I am thinking up ahead is where Eric Clapton’s house is/was.
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Now we worked our way out of the main town area. Along the way, he had pointed out schools and churches and other important buildings.
Gardening is a big thing here.
Many people had gardens, some nice and some basically in the middle of weeds.
Antigua used to be known for sugar and it has its sugar mill buildings all over the island…basically falling apart, but they are still cool to see. They also have bananas and other fruits. Now of course, it’s main source of money is tourism.
COW!
We started to go a little more off the beaten path and into the hills.
There also were a lot of junk cars and trucks just left here and there.
I asked about that and he said once they stopped working, it was just easy to leave them rather than trying to take them somewhere to be junked.
I believe these are guava.
I believe off in the distance is the Church of Rasta.
And you guessed right if you put 2 and 2 together with the name Rasta….It is the church of weed! Hahaha. Our driver told us that they had a lot of churches and different faiths as I believe they got tax breaks and other benefits for forming churches.
We pulled over and he got out and picked some weeds and tied them up and rubbed them….lemon grass. It smelled so strong.
Off we went again.
Fires start on their own here. He said that one farmer had a field where it was prone to fires and after a few years of everything burning up, he just gave up.
Also fields are not like how they are in the states. Things are kind of planted right in the grasses.
He made a joke about if we were ready to go swimming….and then said, OK here we are. Hahaha.
Fresh water is actually scarce on the island and they import some and save as much as they can when it does rain, which isn’t often. (Ironically we did have some sprinkles today).
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Feb. 1, 2019, Friday, Antigua
Antigua is another new port of call for us. We were excited to see what it had in store for us!
Today it was just Claire and I again. I believe PT’s family was doing an all-inclusive resort…and this might have been the day that M, J and MK went with T and D on a private boat, which they said was wonderful.
I went out to take a few pictures as we arrived.
It looked like it was going to be another beautiful island.
As my data started working, I went on to check social media. I also would check my return flights each time I had data just to see if the price went down or if I could get a later flight at the same cost. Well today was a score. Still the same early flight, but between the 2 of us I could get something like 1400 points back. I made the change and it said it couldn’t go through. I tried a few more times and it just wouldn’t work right. I then looked at my email and it did actually go through! Yay! I am always for getting more points back in my account.
When I booked this trip I had used almost all my points to get flights for the 3 of us. With canceling Skip’s flight and now points back, my point balance was now increasing to an amount I was happy with!
I went and got Claire up and ready and we headed off for a bite to eat.
I can’t remember where we met today, but I am thinking Azure. We grabbed some towels and went off with our group when called. Today we were doing an island tour of sorts and it was supposed to have some off roading and a spot for swimming. We decided against swimming and just wore regular clothes. We figured it would be uncomfortable to get back in a vehicle and continue touring while wet and in our suits.
We followed our group.
Antigua has a sister island, Barbuda. They talked about it quite a bit, but also told us it was basically destroyed in a hurricane.
This lady who had been leading us handed us over to a guy. I can’t remember his name, but he ended up being our driver.
He took us to our vehicles.
We arrived at Path Finder type vehicles. They were to hold 6 people each, and they had 2 for a total of 12 people. As he told us to get in the vehicles, people kind of just stood there and I figured I would move so I wasn’t stuck in the back. I am not tiny and I wasn’t about to be smashed in the 3rd row.
I hopped in the front seat and it wasn’t super roomy, but it would do. Claire and 2 bigger guys got in the 2nd row and an older couple went to the 3rd row. When I saw how cramped the 2nd row was, I told the biggest guy I would trade him and he could have the front.
The older couple sat for about 30 seconds and said no way. And I don’t blame them. The 3rd row had no leg room. It was one of those seats that basically sit on the floor of the vehicle and unless you can lay your legs out in front of you there is nowhere to put your legs. They said they would not spend the next several hours cooped up like that.
Our driver called in that we were about to leave and that 2 had decided not to go because of the lack of space in the back seat. He even said, I don’t blame them.
We put Claire in the way back and I told her she could sit sideways and lay her legs across the seat.
The other vehicle had 2 kids and they put them in the back seat. This is the ONLY way that these vehicles would hold 6.
We had 4 in our vehicle now and the only way it was really comfortable was putting Claire in the back alone.
Off we went and our driver chatted away and pointed out different things on the island. He said the ship actually docks near a poor section of the island but further out they have some really rich people who have houses on the island.
As we went along I saw this sign and it just made me laugh.
We all know that medical benefits are a scheme….but they actually announce it! Hahahaah
I will warn you now. I took a lot of pictures…all mostly snapshot types from a moving vehicle.
Selfie time. Right now Claire is a little annoyed that I made her sit in the back.
He took us up high to a parking lot for an overlook view.
It was really stunning!
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Gosh I got so far behind and finally had a chance to catch up tonight.
First, I wish you the best of luck with your health issues. I am undergoing tests too right now and am borderline and need more testing and it makes me so anxious. I can only imagine all you are feeling. Just live life to the fullest!
Loved the review as always. Those boats looked so fun and I might have to keep that in the back of my mind for the future!
Yay for booking a cruise for Aug. What date are you going? I would love to cruise this summer, but I don't think it is in the cards for us. But I am hoping for a winter cruise again.
And I am one for Alaska! Go!!! It's so amazing. I have the Joy booked for June 6th next year....so you know...that's a good date to choose!
I'll be down in your next of the woods in about a month. We are going to visit my sister the weekend of July 12. We usually go down once or twice a year to just hang out and do different things....and the Cheesecake Factory!
I typically fly out of Columbus too, and spend the night before our flight at her place too. She wants to move back to Toledo area but I told her she can't as I need that free place to stay the night before a flight. hahaha.
Thanks again for an amazing report!
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Tiana found us again tonight.
Claire loved her meat tonight. (She got 2)
I tried a couple of things.
And I tried several desserts!
Then the parade started!
Claire actually went with M to march around….something she would NEVER normally do. Z went with them too!
Krash!
This cruise we were celebrating my 50th birthday (I was still a young 49 on this cruise) and Z’s 18th b-day. They brought out the celebration cakes tonight. It was the worst night because we had eaten so many desserts already…..and cherries! They kept bringing bowls of cherries for our drinks and we were just eating the cherries plain….MMMMM!
M ordered some beignets to take to her friend later and put them in the room. I took my celebration cake. The next day our stateroom host took M’s beignets out (She didn’t have a chance to give them to him last night) and she left my celebration cake…which by that time was hard and disgusting. We were not too impressed with her taking ANY food away…and M had a cover on her beignets.
After dinner, Claire went back to the room and I we all went to Azure for Snippets. I ran to the bathroom and took a few pictures of the area as I think I hadn’t ever even stepped foot in Cadillac Lounge yet.
And Mike Super, the Magician was the adult show tonight.
He was pretty good and again we enjoyed the show. It was funny, as most nights it was M and I, Z, PT and F and sometimes friends of M would sit near us. We sat in the same row almost every single night. I guess we just were comfortable there.
One thing I don’t like about Azure is the little round tables in each row. I get they are needed for drinks, etc….but they weigh about 7 thousand pounds. Just to move them a little bit to get in and out of the row was no small feat!
Once the show was done, I headed up top for a bit, talked to a few people, got some drinks and then went back to the room to hit the sack!
Claire had found Mama Mia 2 on TV and it kind of replayed over and over, but each night she would catch it at the same part. So she would change it. Then she found some game show…like deal or no deal…or something like that and I have no clue how it worked but she really got into it. We would turn off the TV when we were too tired and made sure a light was on on M’s side and pull the curtains shut….and off to dream land!
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After towel folding, we went for trivia in the Promanade lounge. Disney toons!
We were early so we grabbed out seats and ordered some drinks. M tried an Irish coffee that was way more Irish and coffee and she couldn’t drink it.
Trivia with Connor
We did well and tied with 2 other teams. They only had a few prizes so we just took one plastic medal. …which promptly broke….but no matter, we have a few at home already.
We took a break and walked around a bit and then came back to laze in our chairs again. At some point PT asked where we were and what we had been doing. A whole lot of nothing today! I think she came down and joined us and I think Z did too.
Time for another trivia game! We had fun! Then it was craft time and M made a Marde Gras mask. Claire wouldn’t make one and I had no desire too.
The girls went off together and I went off on my own for a bit.
It was a little foggy out today.
We then got ready for the evening and headed off to see Frozen!
I really wanted to take a nap today, but Claire insisted I stay with her to do “family things”, so it never happened. The show was crowded and I was sure with the crowds and the swaying of the ship I would have anxiety of feeling trapped and/or issues with staying awake.
Now I am going to say the show was VERY good, but because I was so dead tired I did have issues staying awake during slow times and I did get the restless leg syndrome too. I was in the middle of the row and I just had that “I need to move” feeling.
After the show we all headed over to Crown and Fin for 90’s trivia! We had 2 teams tonight.
Oh and we were glittered for Marde Gras tonight! You can’t see it, but the outfit Claire is wearing is what I call her M outfit. When we bought it she was not sure she liked the pants, but I told her that it would be something I could see M wearing and all of a sudden they were ok to get. When Claire came out all dressed from the bathroom, M immediately says “I love those pants”! See…Momma knows! That made Claire very happy.
I did horrid with the 90’s trivia. But we do it for the fun of it and each night Jo would get funnier and funnier. The one thing we didn’t like was that Natalie the cruise director would come in each night and they would banter and joke with each other and it was wasted time. I don’t care for Natalie at all. I know some love her…me…she annoys me for the most part. Claire dislikes her even worse! Hahaha.
Dinner was in Tiana’s tonight, which really is my favorite place now.
Claire was being beaded!
I realized I forgot something and I think M did too, so I ran back to the room to get whatever we needed.
I actually think one of us left our room key in the room and then something else on top of that. Whatever it was, I went fast and came back out of breath.
And obviously took pictures on the go.
One night during the cruise, several of us switched over to cherry cokes (or diet cherry in my case). This threw Renato for a loop. It was like we weren’t allowed to switch what we drank. Poncho ended up many times getting us refills as Renato disappeared.
I liked the meat ball things.
The soup was just ok.
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Jan 31, 2019, Thursday, Day at Sea
Today was another Sea Day. I just can never get enough of these and sadly we only had 2 this cruise.
T and D invited M and I, and J and MK to Palo brunch with them. I had not expected that at all, and it was very nice of them to arrange it.
I walked around a bit in the morning after I got ready and I saw Pete again and he had to run as he was on his way to Palo…hey so am I!
J messaged me that they arrived at Palo early and were seated, so I headed that way and joined the group. Ironically we were seated next to Pete’s gang.
I took a bunch of pictures, so I will just post them. We had good conversation and good food. And best of all…since M is a platinum sailor….we got our meal for free (well we did tip).
And my favorite! Chicken Parmesan!!!!
We had a great time and literally rolled out. I was soooo full!
We headed back to the room and changed. Claire had told me not to allow her to sleep in today as she missed most of the last Sea Day and she wanted to do stuff around the ship “as a family” today.
She was ready and waiting and we looked over options. Towel folding was just starting so we headed that way. Claire has wanted to do a towel folding class on the ship for years!
M went with us and we arrived a little late, but grabbed our towels and soon caught up. We were NOT very good.
That would be a dinosaur.
And now on to elephants.
The twist part was called a carrot and we just kept laughing at how terrible our carrots were coming out.
And now for the swan….which kind of looked like a snake.
And some point we gave up trying from our chairs and went to the floor.
We were making a monkey now.
M’s was pretty good.
Claire’s wasn’t too bad.
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The Oasis doesn't use the key card for light switch activation does it? I was trying to find which ships do and I don't see anything about the Oasis, but I want to double check.
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We headed up top to watch the show. I think M went back to the room for something. And I am not sure if J and MK ended up watching with T in concierge or if they just called it a night?
In the elevator up, an older couple looked at F and said something like….”you were in quite the fight! What does the other guy look like?” I started laughing because F’s black eye and scratches just looked so real! The guy was surprised it was all done with make up.
We hung with PT, F and Z and M found us a little later.
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I don’t bother getting up close to see the show since I have seen it a few times now. But I do like the fireworks.
A picture of us gals!
See the sweater Claire is wearing? She wears it ALL the time. She just loves it. I have one similar and brought it with me too. Some evening’s M would wear Claire’s sweater and Claire would wear mine. Hahaha.
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Video
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Video
(And it’s terrible as I kept moving it to the side and missing fireworks.)
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Loved the fireworks as always. I just get a special feeling when watching those. They are not the biggest or the best….but they are at sea!
Claire headed back to the room and we went off to Intuition in Azure. Each night the shows would get funnier as you would get to know some of the guests and see Jo interact with them.
After that, I did some walking and then headed back to the room.
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I needed to do some laundry, so I went to do that. It was a waiting game. Everyone on this cruise seemed to want to do laundry and there was never anything open…day or night. So I waited till one opened and then I pulled stuff out after a few minutes and went on to put my stuff in and same for drying. It was just terrible trying to do any this cruise.
I also had brought some gifts to pixie dust. Claire ordered room service and I made the rounds to deliver my small gift. There ended up being a list of like 50 cabins on the pixie dust list. That is just way too many and I think many were taking it like a regular exchange. I was not. I was not buying 50 gifts for pixie dusting. LOL.
Then as I walked around, I found that several on the list didn’t have any bag or fish extender even out. I skipped them. I was trying to deliver to the rooms closest to ours first and then branch out…I ended up going on several decks and it was a lot more work than I planned.
Also there were teens roaming the halls. About 3 or 4 and I swear they were watching me. I worried they were stealing Fish Extender gifts. They seemed to be on every floor I would go on and then they would sit in the halls. I don’t care if kids stay up all night, but there is no need for them to be in the stateroom halls. I ended up seeing them walk around when they thought I was gone and they were carrying do not disturb signs, so I am sure they were moving them off doors.
A little later I was at the landing and bam bam bam…they came running down the steps but would jump about 4 or 5 steps. I then spoke up and told them they needed to knock it off or they were going to get reported.
And about 5 minutes later I saw an officer walking the stairs….and reported the kids…and then I saw security walking up and down the halls a little later.
Like I said, I don’t care what they do all night in public areas, but NOT in the stateroom areas.
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It was a long night and I think I went to bed around 2 AM or so. But we should be fine now with clean clothes! And one reason I did it was Claire told me all her jeans were dirty…..BUT she had a whole other packing cube full of jeans that she didn’t know about. UGH!
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PT sent a message wondering where people were. I told her where I was and that I was heading to deck 4. I ended up finding her there after a bit.
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She told me I had just missed seeing Mickey out here.
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And Pluto was down the way.
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I caught a few pics as he walked by.
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Many people were relaxing and waiting to leave.
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There were groups of kids onshore hollering and hooting at our ship. Every time the horn would play they would cheer.
I took lots of video while we were standing there.
At some point Z and F came and joined us too.
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We talked about our excursions. They did this cart sand sailing type thing and it sounded really interesting. PT showed me some of their pictures and I bet it was fun.
Finally we said goodbye and got cleaned up and ready for pirate night. I had a date with some glitter!
PT made matching shirts for my family, but since Skip cancelled, M wore his, which was like 30 times too big for her. LOL!
M did make up on us and added glitter to some of us too. F was hysterical. She made it look like he had a black eye…and it looked sooooo real!
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She gave Z a mustache and we just kept laughing at it.
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We all headed down to 80’s trivia tonight. We had 2 teams and neither did that great. But it was still a ton of fun.
We went for a walk before dinner.
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I just love deck 4!
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We are 2 roughed up pirates!
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Scratches and glitter courtesy of M.
Tonight we were in Animator’s. We missed last night, which was also there, but true to his word, Krash brought us our pasta!
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Claire sat next to F. She’s pretty quiet most of the time and shy, but F brought up some subject that Claire knew a lot about and she was a total chatter box and just talking away with F. I was shocked!.
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Z had asked for mozzarella sticks too.
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Our pasta! J and I were totally pigging out on it.
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And the rest of my food.
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And I always crack up when they bring out shrimp cocktail in a cup.
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With a ton of lettuce in it…Who eats that lettuce?
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I think I had my camera set on a weird setting plus the lighting…which gave me weird looking food.
Like a blue salad!
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I debated on getting the pasta from the pirate menu as the last few times I have had it it was not very good. All those times being on the Fantasy.
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It was excellent tonight and I am glad I got it. I am finding that the Wonder…for the most part….made many things better than the Fantasy.
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We had a lot of fun at dinner tonight! But we had to get going for the pirate show!
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Continuing my snorkeling.
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This bugger was coming straight at me…and he didn’t veer off till the very last minute.
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At one point I looked up to see which way to go and where Claire was. I was starting to join the wrong group…..oops. LOL. I turned the right way and joined my own group.
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I kept my eyes out for turtles but no such luck.
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And it was time to get back on the boat once again.
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We headed off again and our crew served us snacks and drinks.
They offered Claire the champagne and I told the gal no as Claire was only 14. She said…well the drinking age here IS 14…..um still a no! hahaha. Claire didn’t want any, but she was amazed it was only 14. I forget where the girl was from, but I am thinking Netherlands and I think she said the drinking age there was like 16. Wow!
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Our Captain was really informative too! As we floated along he would give us info about the area. The island is typically pretty windy, but when the hurricane came through to the nearby islands he said it sucked up all the air and they were dead still for a couple of days and it was soooo hot! They didn’t get rain or anything, just all the air sucked out.
He had some other interesting stories and gave us some history of the island too. He had an accent and he said some words in kind of an English/Dutch mix.
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Then it was time to get off the boat and into our little bus to the port.
We were told that these were new condos….I want one!
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And Flamingos were out there.
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And then back to the Wonder.
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I thought our excursion on a whole was good. We had a great team guiding us. I just expected better snorkeling with more colors. We saw a lot of colorful fish, but the coral was kind of plain. Bonaire is known for great diving, so I expected the snorkeling to be some of the best ever, but it wasn’t. I did have a good time and glad we did it though.
We were hungry, so we stopped off for a bite to eat.
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Horn video
Claire headed off to shower and I sat down and was just gazing off in the distance and kind of listened in on others conversations. There was a group of people I talked to off and on throughout the cruise talking and that voice! …I know that voice! Then it hit me. It was Pete Werner from Dis. So I asked him and sure enough….it was him!
I joined in the conversation then and he was telling the story of how he started his agency and Dis and it was a very interesting story.
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We settled back on the boat and took off to our next snorkeling spot.
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Video.
Our Captain told us that island we could see was basically an island where they would decontaminate slaves back in the day before bringing them to the main island. Also if one was sick, they would leave them there for like 2-3 weeks and come back and if they were alive and well, then they could come back to the main island. Sounds rough!!!!!!
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Look how pretty that water is and the changes in color.
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This was our next stop. I think he actually wanted to be further down but the mooring balls were all taken up already down the way. He told us basically to swim a big triangle to see everything. At times it will be very shallow with so many rocks and coral and to try to not touch any of it….especially the fire coral. He also said they have been seeing turtles here almost every day lately and we had about 90% chance of seeing one. Unfortunately it wasn’t meant to be and we never saw any.
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It was pretty deep where we jumped off at.
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And not much to see here.
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There was a lot of coral, but not much in the way of colorful coral.
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We put the DYS in Functional, Completing our ABC’s, Jan Southern Carib on the Wonder
in Disney Cruise Line
Posted
Feb. 3, 2019, Sunday, Disembarking the Wonder
This is always a sad day! They kick us off the ship!
I got up way too early….because I had to! This is the one day I could probably sleep in.
I ran up top and saw we were back in Puerto Rico. I messaged back and forth with PT and J. J and MK were walking off early with their luggage as they had a really early flight. Scary early in my opinion….something like 10:30 AM…but they were heading for Florida for a couple of days of fun there before going home.
PT’s family was flying out today too, but not till later. Claire and I had one more day in Puerto Rico till we flew home. Flights were much cheaper to fly on Monday and that gave us time to relax and see a little more of San Juan too.
J said they were just about to leave, so I went down the hall from the atrium and soon saw her and MK wheeling their bags. I gave them quick hugs and good byes! While on this cruise, J booked the Fantasy for Spring Break and she wanted me to book that cruise too. I told her I would check it out.
Since I was in the area of the art, I looked at it a bit and took some pictures.
I would love to have these pictures.
It looked like it was going to be a nice day.
Back to the room where we said good byes to M! It was so sad. She had been a wonderful extra daughter this week! I am so thankful she could fill in for Skip so last minute and she was so happy and thankful to come.
She headed off to go meet up with T and D as they had similar flight times and were going to all taxi together.
I got some breakfast and found PT and family and sat at the table next to them. We said our good byes, but I ended up seeing them several more times.
Finally, Claire and I grabbed our bags to wait to disembark. Now I always hear people talk about how they wait till their luggage tag is called before getting off the ship. I have NEVER heard this being done on any of the cruises I have been on…till now! And it went slow.
Claire and I went over by Azure and just camped out there in a window seat as we waited. I then tried to work with the Uber app to get refunded the overcharge I had from a week ago and they kept responding in Spanish. PT, F and Z then came walking around the corner and set up camp near us and F told me what he did, which was different, so I went that route through the app….and had my money refunded in 15 minutes!
We chatted and waited. None of us were in a hurry. I think our tags were the last ones called and finally it was time to get off the ship.
Claire and I always like to use a Porter and we got one and he helped us with our bags and we got through customs and he took us to the taxi area, where we were promptly loaded and on our way.
We were staying at the Courtyard Miramar. It wasn’t too far away and soon we arrived and unloaded our bags and paid our driver. Again, all Taxi’s have set fees to areas, so it was a pretty easy process. I do think we could have done Uber cheaper, but we just wanted to get our bags dropped off and be done with it.
I checked us in, they took our bags and told us they would let us know when the room was ready. We mentioned we were going to go to Old San Juan and she told Claire she should probably leave her sweater in her bag because it was already warm today and it tends to feel extra warm walking around there. Nope! Claire is stubborn and wearing her sweater! Crazy kid!
We texted a bit back and forth with PT and family, who were already in Old San Juan. There is a restaurant there that will hold bags and they had dropped off their bags and started touring around. We decided to put that address in as our destination and got an Uber and were on our way!
We got dropped off and look, we found out where the pina Colada was invented….or as Claire now likes to call them…The Pee Nus Coladas.
Now I am going to admit, I didn’t do a lot of research on Old San Juan. I read through a trip report from one of my favorite posters on Cruise Critic who has been to San Juan a few times. I remembered places she had gone to there, but never really knew the layout out. So we just started walking.
I saw something in the distance and I knew this was one place I wanted to visit.
This is the Umbrella Sky Project.
It’s a new art installation, intended to bring color back into the lives of the people after the hurricane. I have seen since we left that they changed them to all pink for breast cancer awareness.
It really is a neat sight!
At the end of the street is the Governor’s Mansion.
The mansion has housed every Puerto Rican governor since Juan Ponce de Leon.
We moved on, just looking around.
We wandered a bit. It was very different than I expected it to be.
Look! Pigeons!
That would be because we were at the entrance of Pigeon Park. (Parque de las Palomas)
They did sell food right outside the entrance, but we didn’t get any. I just wanted pictures.
It’s definitely a neat place to visit.