hishorselover

Day 8 - St. Maarten

 

"My first glimpse of this port was concerning. Something was burning in the middle of town and continued to burn all morning. Strange."

 

 

This is the dump. It has been burning for months :(

That's correct. When I was on in May, formal nights were Tuesday and Thursday (Antigua and St. Lucia for us since we didn't have a single sea day).

 

Looking at the Carnival website, starting May 2019, the itinerary changes and the final day is a sea day, so that's why there is some confusion about when there is a sea day.

I've sailed this itinerary twice. I like that they are going to change the sea day to the last day. I love, love, love this itinerary but it is EXHAUSTING! I think it would be great to have that last day to relax and unwind before the stress of traveling home the next day. I may just have to book it again to see if my theory is right :cool::cool::)

I'm so sorry for your loss. There is a lot of great advice above. My advice, don't over think it. I'm not sure if anyone said this and I apologize if it's a repeat but my advice would be to let your new love experience and enjoy it for herself. Don't compare it to trips you'd taken with your wife and don't constantly remind her of things you and your wife did on your many trips. Act as though it's a brand new experience for you as well because, in a way, it will be. Relax and enjoy the newness of it all.

I was on Fascination last May. There were two elegant nights - Tuesday and Thursday. I believe it is still the same.

Are we able to board ship drop our stuff off and then get off again to look around San Juan

 

 

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FYI Johnny60...there is a Walgreens right across the street from the port entrance for anything you may have forgotten or don't want to bring on the plane with you :). We bought our soda there. They have wine too. Funny story...we had gone to Walgreen's to get our soda and later that night I realized I had left my camera SD card at home. My husband said, "Oh, we can just go back to Walgreen's in the morning." I laughed at him and told him that would be great except we wouldn't still be there in the morning...LOL. His first cruise...:D

Thank you for your honest review. I have been considering this ship for the ports...

 

How was the stability / motion? I get seasick and wore the patch on the Magic with 0 issues, but I worry on an older ship it might not work?

We sailed on Fascination last year and actually took our patches off mid week because they had caused our eyes to dilate so we couldn't read anything and the dry mouth was horrible! The only movement we felt was pulling into port each morning. I think it was mainly when the ship was backing in. The whole ship would shake and make a lot of noise. This lasted probably about 20 minutes or so. It was my wake-up call which was okay with me because we had a balcony so I would just go outside to watch. I've done this itinerary twice. Once on Valor and once on Fascination. Love it!

I have sailed this itinerary twice, once on Valor in 2013 and last year on Fascination. Although I can't compare to other cruise lines as these are the only two sailings I've ever done, I have to say both cruises were extremely enjoyable. We had 3 people in a balcony room on Fascination. It was definitely crowded, especially with the upper bed pulled down but as you stated, the itinerary is so port intensive that we pretty much only slept in the room. It was nice having the balcony to sit on while other members of the party where in the shower or getting ready to go out. Don't forget that Fascination just came out of dry dock to get some upgrades!! We didn't find the ship crowded at all and it was clean enough. Honestly, this itinerary is FANTASTIC and I wouldn't pass up a chance to do it again even on Fascination.

We are indeed also in NH. Southern part.

Did you hear about the new Nor'easter forming for early next week? Yippee skippy!

March hates us this year :(. I'm in south east NH (Salem).

We were there last year. Gorgeous beach!!! My son had a cheeseburger and said it was the best he's ever had. I'm not sure if the vendor that is there is the same as the owners of the hut that used to be there. The chairs and umbrellas are already there. Someone will approach you to see if you want to rent.

We sailed Fascination from San Juan two and a half weeks ago. (We got 20" of snow today, after 13" fell last Thursday. That's 33" for those who don't want to do the math.) Oh, how I wish we were still on the ship!

The night before Barbados, we noticed luggage outside cabin doors. It took a few minutes to remember why.

As we left for our excursion, we saw other carrying on luggage.

 

It really didn't make an impact at all.

I gather you are in the New England area? NH for me. Too much snow...

Just thought I'd come back and report about our experience with Treetop Adventures.

 

We did their ziplining and we're thrilled with our trip! They picked us up at the pier, took us to their location and we hiked to the most incredible waterfall! It was spectacular! We hiked back and had a yummy lunch. We then did 12 really fun/fast/long zip lines! The folk there were terrific. The lines were well maintained and safety was apparent without being overbearing.

 

Highly recommended!

I agree. I've done this tour twice (had the same guides both times!). It is a lot of fun and they even make the open jeep ride to the location fun. Our guide found a tarantula in the rocks at the waterfall. It was just chilling, not near the actual waterfall. My husband, who is deathly afraid of "spiders" thought it was great!

I forgot my Burts bees lip balm cruise before last and only had one option in the fun shops. Wasn't too bad surprisingly.

 

We always forget the wine key. Not a big deal...just got one through room service.

 

Last cruise I forgot to dump my coffee out of my husbands thermos he uses for work. (He despises coffee) After sitting for a week in the car it took several washes to get the smell out. :p

 

Luckily I've never forgotten anything important or that we couldn' go without. Once, I didn' bring enough clothes for myself.

Forgot your Burt's Bees Lip Balm? I would DIE! I'm a Burt's Bees junkie and am forever losing mine even though I have at least ten of them. :p:p:p:p

Thank you for posting these picture and bringing me back to island paradise. We spent a few hours at Mullet Bay last year and were in heaven.

It's not gonna happen. You won't even be off the ship before 8. We sailed on Fascination last year, handled our own luggage, went as soon as we were called and it took about an hour just to get on an elevator (stairs were closed). Then you would have to go through customs off the ship, travel to the airport (which is easily 20 minutes), check in at the airport, etc. Nope.

We had FTTF when we cruised on Fascination last year. The only benefit we had from it was that our luggage was in our room before we were. Other than that, we never used it. Honestly...we didn't need our luggage that early either. We had to use guest services a couple of times and never had more than one person in front of us.

This is what I recommend and is what we did when we cruised last year. We took a cab from the port to Mullet Bay - AMAZING beach with chairs/umbrellas (at least before Irma, not sure about now). I can't say enough about how fantastic this beach was. We asked our driver to come back for us around 12:00/12:30 and took a quick (ten minute +/-) drive over to Maho to watch the planes come in. There are plenty of cabs there to pick you up. The cab we grabbed at the port gave us wristbands that so all we had to do was find drivers with matching shirts (there were many). I forget what we paid for the round trip taxi fare but it wasn't bad. The water is good at Maho, you can definitely hagd out in there but it can be very crowded. The beach is not one that you would think of for a "beach day" but is worth spending a couple of hours to see the planes!

We used prescription patches that are worn behind the ear. I don't remember which brand but I DO NOT recommend. Although we had zero sea sickness, the medication caused our eyes to dilate (we were very careful not to let the medication come in contact with our eyes) causing us to not be able to read anything all week. It was crazy - trying to read the FunTimes was quite a challenge! It also caused us to have terrible dry mouth that no amount of water could quench.

Beware that on our recent cruise on Fascination, we hung our card on our cabin door the night before and did not receive our order. When we asked about it our room steward told us not to hang the card until late at night because the kids on the ship will take them down and sometimes put them on other doors. Also, the coffee was always great but we also ordered milk for our son and it was extremely warm every morning - like gross warm, as if it had been out of the fridge for several hours.

We were there in May. We got a taxi at the port in St. Martin, paid a flat fee (I'm sorry I don't remember how much) which gave us a ride to Mullet Bay, then the driver picked us up at a designated time to bring us to Maho where we were able to get a taxi back to port. They gave us wristbands to wear which allowed us to use any taxi from that company. We did have to request the transport from Mullet to Maho. It's super easy - there will be many drivers right outside the terminal. Have fun! This was my 3rd time to St. Martin but only my first to Mullet Bay. It was fabulous!

On a bit of a comical note, our tour guide in St. Martin told us the islanders have nicknamed Fascination "The Dinghy" :) I had only sailed on Valor (same itinerary) and it was my husband and son's first cruise so I wasn't overly concerned about the ship. We chose it for the itinerary. I agree that more dining options would have been nice. Another great thing about this itinerary for us (we sailed on April 30th) was that we were only the ship in every port. No crowds!

I was wondering the same thing. On our recent cruise we found the same couple at the same events we went to. We chatted with them quite a bit but never exchanged information. We were planning to ask how to keep in touch on the last night of our trip but we received news of a family crisis at home that day and didn't feel up to mingling that last night.

We cruised on Fascination in May and was told by our guide in St. Lucia that the other terminal is under renovation which is why we were docked on the other side. No real issues other than a different scenic route for my second time on this excursion :0

For us, our lack of use of the MDR had nothing to do with dress code. We were booked for early dining which, most nights, turned out to be too early after being out in the sun all day. The later time, according to some in my party, was too late (which is why we booked early dining). We only ate in the MDR twice on our recent trip.

My husband, 18 year old son and I sailed this cruise on April 30th as well. We had a great time. Yes, the ship is old and dated but the entertainment was good and it never felt crowded. We only went to the PG comedy shows. We enjoyed one of them tremendously but found the others to be just okay. The pool area was chaos until it got dark, then my son pretty much had the pool to himself. I have nothing positive to say about the hot tubs. They were ALWAYS crowded with LOTS of kids! You couldn't pay me to go in there :)

I had FTTF on Fascination for my cruise in May. I would say the only benefit it offered was our room was ready when we boarded at 2 PM and we our luggage arrived very early, long before the hallways were cleared of other bags. Other than that, we never used it. There was never a line at guest services. We had an "early" flight at 11:41 am. We didn't use FTTF to disembark as this option was very early. We carried off our own luggage when our deck was called and were at the airport by 9:30.