Live Emerald b2b Jan 17 and Jan 27

[vickie_bernie]

Monday

We got up and since we had to check out by 10 am we arranged to meet up with Sue and Mike at 10 and head to Joe’s Diner (near the Publix on 17th Street) for breakfast. We dropped them off at the pier around 11 am with all the bags while we headed back to Sawgrass (because one of the sweaters we had bought they had forgotten to remove the security lock on it). We dropped the car off at 12:30 and caught the Alamo/National Shuttle at the airport (they asked for proof this time that we were in fact customers – never had done that before) and we left for the pier at 12:45.

The Grand was docked at pier 2 so the Emerald was at pier 21, and I have to say it was quite a distance away and although possible to walk to 17th street it certainly would have been a long walk. In total there were five ships in port.

We had no real issues with checking in but I do have to relay the funniest. As we approached the security line ups there were four distinct roped off lines, I said to Bernie “take the one on the right as no one was going in it” and we went almost to the front, with two elderly couples in front of us but the other three lines had tons of people. The first elderly man in his suit goes in and all the bells/whistles go off. Security asks is you belt an issue – NO, do you have coins, cell phone – NO he goes back thru again the bells/whistles go off, security says take your jacket off and as the man does he hears the mints in the square tin in his pocket and pulls those out, yup that was the issue. We smile and wait patiently as the other lines dwindle. The older gentleman in front of us goes thru all the bells/whistles go off. Sir do you have a belt on that could be the problem – NO as he proudly shows his (what looked like a macramé belt) proudly, do you have a cell phone – NO, he goes thru again, the bells go off, the security is getting flustered and says can you please check your pockets. Now by this time I am giggling as the (I would guess 80 year old) man puts his hands in his pockets (looking like the 6 year old boy who has the frog, stick, tacks, marbles in his pocket) and pulls out the contents – coins fall to the floor, a nail clipper, heck even a bolt fell down. He cleared after this and we made our way thru as we glance to our left and all the lines have cleared! Bernie looks at me and says “guess this is there first time ever going thru security”.

We are on the ship very quickly and head to our cabin – an inside Caribe 721 for this leg. We do up our cabin list for our steward. The cabin is in great shape the bed looks great, but definitely needs an egg crate foam, the shower curtain however stinks of mold, it was so bad I had to remove it and put in a bag to contain some of the smell. Carlos our steward quickly changed it though and we are good to go. He very quickly provided everything on our list and was rewarded by Bernie.

The ship looks great, the dining room had been open for lunch but we were too late to take part in that. I can confirm also that the coupon book from the Travel agent does not have the coffee card coupon in it. We made reservations for the Crown Grill for Tuesday night (first formal) for 7 pm for 8 of us.

I love the new Princess Patters layout, very easy to read (for those of us getting older). Our Captain is Giorgio Pomata. We recognized a few other officers. Jaco Diedericks the Food and Beverage manager was on the Island with us in Oct. And as we were walking around we saw Peter Van Tonden the Captain Circle Host from the Island and he came out to give us a big hug and we were congratulating him as he just recently became a circle host and is doing great. We are hoping to meet him for drinks/dinner one night.

Considering our bags were dropped off at 11 am we didn’t get them in our cabin until 3:30. Ours were okay but many people got wet bags because of the rain and we did notice another women’s bag had been ripped badly (unusable) and was heading to the purser’s desk.

After muster drill we headed up to the Outrigger Bar to have an impromptu gathering of the Cruise Critic gang, quite a few were in attendance and it was nice to put a face to the name. Now weather was not cooperating it was overcast and showers – that had just stopped in time for our sailaway – but it was rather warm and muggy. We then ventured over to the Neptune’s pool for the music and party.

We had to unpack so down to the cabin and setting up of everything. For dinner we decided on the Horizon Court which was very very good, they didn’t have the seafood buffet but the shrimp and many other items were great and noticed that most of the items were also on the dining room menu. We met up with Anita/Richard for dinner, but after dinner we met up with Paul/Yvonne and Brian/Christine from the roll call who we have sailed with many times now.

We are back in the cabin at 11 and settle in and we are out like a light very quickly.

Tuesday

First happy birthday Bernie! It is always great celebrating his birthday every year in the Caribbean.

We are heading to Princess Cays and it is now 7:30. Will report more later.

[AliceS]

Vickie,

 

I thought that I'd find you here. Please remind everyone that the meeting is tomorrow and is at 10AM at Skywalkers. See you there. Alice:)

[cruisehome]

love reading

 

carol

[emerald444]

Happy birthday to Bernie ,love your posts and enjoy princess cays we got there last week too

[pablo222]

Would you be able to find out if Nicola Furlan will be

the maitre d' on board in April?

 

Thank you.

[u2cruiser]

What a nice place to have a birthday.

Have a great day. :)

[chamima]

Happy Birthday Bernie !!!!!!!!

:D:D:D

[Shamo]

Hi Vickie, I have been keeping an eye open, hoping to spot you, but no such luck. There 4 we will see you at the meet & greet tomorrow a.m. in Skywalker's. I hope it's still called for 10 a.m.BERNIE, We wish you a very happy BIRTHDAY !!!Morris

[joelmomma]

Happy birthday Bernie. See you next week!

 

Jo

[senior lady]

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BERNIE!!!! What a great way to celebrate:D

[Starshine95123]

What a great place to celebrate! Wish I could be cruising for my birthday on the 28th. But I leave for a week in Reno on the 29th, which is the next best thing. Maybe I'll plan a birthday cruise for next year.:)

[vickie_bernie]

Princess Cays

We dropped anchor not far from the beach in the Bahamas, also known as Princess Cays. We caught the tender at around 10 am and heading to the far left, past the music, past the restaurant, past the crowds and saw that Mike and Sue had got a bunch of chairs together and were relaxing waiting for us to arrive.

The weather was perfect, but that slight wind was misleading and kept us cool but trust me the sun was strong. We had a very relaxing and fun day frolicking on the beach, in the water and playing little jokes with each other.

Snorkeling was not very good because of the weather from yesterday the water was just not very clear. Lunch was the usual fare, hamburgers, hot dogs, ribs, salad and fruit.

We had a few things up our sleeves too. I had done up a door sign for the entire cruise critic roll call that showed our sailing and ports. When I emailed it out to friends, one of our friends (Bill) decided to add actual pictures to the sign of all of us. Now some of these pictures were not flattering at all, so something had to be done. As soon as we returned to the ship I snuck down and took the sign off and came back to the cabin and scoured the People magazine for “new” “better” faces to past over. I then snuck back down and replaced the poster. Check out the picture below (see blog link below for shot).

Tonight is also our dinner in the Crown Grill for the eight of us, (Bill/Cathy, Mike/Sue, Rose/Jerry and us) now this dinner came about because last year Vancouver (where we are from) and Chicago (where Sue/Mike are from) were in the Stanley Cup playoffs. The bet was whoever won the series would treat the other to the meal at the Crown Grill. Well we lost, and we were prepared to treat, but first we needed to show where our support was. Bernie picked up some temporary tattoos with the Canucks Logo, and all six of us showed up at Skywalkers with our tattoos showing. (see blog link below for picture).

We went up to Skywalkers for a drink in the Platinum Elite lounge (However we have not received our formal invite nor have we received the list of drinks and on which night there are on) we will talk to Peter about this tomorrow. Tonight is was a Rob Roy cocktail so I opted for the Key Lime Martini, very good by the way. We went and grabbled the last of the food items, and there was slim pickens and it was only 6:15.

Dinner was set for 7 pm in the Crown Grill and we were all looking forward to the meal. Jewel was our waiter and she was amazing, very attentive and accommodating. I worked hard at not overeating but man was I full. My one recommendation for Princess is that they should provide electric scooters at the door of the restaurant so you can take them back to your cabin, and if there are crowds in the way you can press a button that squeals out “Crown Grill” and the crowds would disperse, sort of like Mosses and the seas separating.

The Birthday crew all got their birthday cakes and got sung too, and a lovely take home treat wrapped up in foil that looked like a pretty hand bag, check out the shot.

Back to the cabin and a quick change and then back up on deck for a walk about to wear off some of this food.

Tomorrow is a quiet day at sea, we have our scheduled meet and greet with the cruise critic roll call for 10 am in Skywalkers.

[u2cruiser]

The song 'Perfect Day' comes to mind :D

 

I clicked on your blog and can read your report but can't see the pics. I must be looking in the wrong place. :confused:

[cormike1]

I can't see your pics either Vickie but I am loving your writeups. Our friends (6) from Canada also are e-mailing me with details of their day so it is fun to hear about what they are doing and what you are going. Have a fun day!!!

[vickie_bernie]

hi everyone, sorry I tried to put pics up in my blog yesterday but the server is very slow - a lot more people are tapping in now to the wireless and it is slow. I have managed to put up three pics so check again to yesterday's post.

 

Here is today's entry

 

Sea Day

Ahhhh sea day! The most relaxing days of cruising. The clocks were moved forward one hour last night so sleeping in until 9 am is justified. The roll call is set up for 10 am and the turnout is great! It was nice to put a face to a name and many officers attended.

Checked in with the Captain Circle Host Peter to see what happened to our Elite Lounge invite and menu for the cruise. No one has received one from our group, so something is up. He is going to look into it. We also invited him to the sailaway tomorrow in St. Thomas, we are getting together for wine to say good bye to St. Thomas.

The Matre’D has arranged for us to be able to make reservations in the dining room and when we return to the cabin Ivan has phoned too see if we would like a reservation tonight, sure I say, he then says 6 pm or 8 pm, I said neither we would like 7 pm, he said he can’t do that time the best he could do is 7:30. We take that and arrange a table for six, but I have a feeling we will just opt for no reservations in the future because for us having a set schedule is something with live by every day in our job and something we try and stay away from on vacation. But it was very nice of them to offer, and I will thank Nicola the Maitre d’hotel for doing it.

There just was a knock at the door, with chocolate covered strawberries a gift from the Maitre d’hotel Nicola, ahhh another reason to thank him. Since we are meeting friends for some champagne at the Outrigger before dinner we will bring them to share.

The poor cruise Director Tim is really ill, poor guy but Ben the Deputy Cruise Director is stepping in and doing a great job. It is nice to see him again, he was on the Grand with us two years ago and it was nice to catch up with him and give him a hard time about still being engaged to his girlfriend from Argentina.

Tonight’s dinner I have been told is Caribbean night (will confirm later). There is a Comedy Juggler called Chuck Gunter performing in Explorer’s Lounge and a Comedian by the name of Rodney Johnson in the Princess Theater (who we will probably see). Also tonight is the 50’s Sock Hop Dance Party with the band Phoenix Rising.

Movies on board: Easy A, Wall Street, Switch, Knight and Day, Killers and Christina Aguilera in Concert.

Tomorrow is St. Thomas and we are heading to Water Island for the day.

[cruzinchris]

How was your dinner at Bravo? Had you been there previously, or was this a first? We are staying at the Renaissance next Friday before we sail on the Island 1/29 and are trying to decide between Bravo and Bimini Boatyard. We've been to Carlos and Pepe's a couple of times and want to try something different.

 

I'm reading your live posts even though we aren't sailing on the Emerald. DH and/or I will probably do a "live" thread because we enjoy them :)

 

Bon Voyage!

Chris

[seacrystal]

Hi! I am really enjoying this thread as we go to the Caribbean the end of March. Something you haven't mentioned - is your tooth OK???

[Momma Mojito]

I too am enjoying your post, we cruised on the Emerald the first of October, the weather was not good to us, but we had a fantastice time ome the ship....she is beautiful. but so are the other Princess ships we've been on. I do think the Emerald may be my favorite. We enjoyed the music of Phoenix Rising in the Wheelhouse every night and glad to hear they are doing the fifties night. We heard them for the first time on our first Princess cruise...the Caribbean Princess.. they did the fifties night then... If you get the chance please tell them that Gene and JoAnn said Hi. They are a great group of guys who will give you an enjoyable evening

[vickie_bernie]

How was your dinner at Bravo? Had you been there previously, or was this a first? We are staying at the Renaissance next Friday before we sail on the Island 1/29 and are trying to decide between Bravo and Bimini Boatyard. We've been to Carlos and Pepe's a couple of times and want to try something different.

 

I'm reading your live posts even though we aren't sailing on the Emerald. DH and/or I will probably do a "live" thread because we enjoy them :)

 

Bon Voyage!

Chris

 

I really enjoyed it, it was quite busy and our friends have been going there for four years in a row -- their only comment was that they missed their favorite waiter, the server we had was not up to par. but i can highly recommend it.

 

Hi! I am really enjoying this thread as we go to the Caribbean the end of March. Something you haven't mentioned - is your tooth OK???

 

thank you for asking, funny is the teeth still ache the same way they did before I had all this work done but nothing like they hurt when I had the work done. The Bridge is taking some getting use to, i am sure it will settle but for now I am just dealing with it and not chewing on that side

[vickie_bernie]

Last night we arranged to meet with friends in Skywalkers for some drinks – yesterday’s drink special for Platinum Elite was the Chairman of the Board. But we still have not received a menu for the lounge.

We went down to the Davinci dining room for our reservation and Francesco the Matre D’ took great care of us assigning us to a table in Audrey (from the South Africa) took great care of us. The menu was Caribbean, not our favorite but we didn’t starve. I had the pineapple appetizer and the steak fajitas and the sorbet for dessert. Bernie had the cold pear soup, Caesar salad, and the pasta – penne with mussels (appetizer size) and the key lime pie for dessert. Francesco checked in a few times and offered us this table for the remainder of the cruise if we wanted. We thanked him and said we would like that but our table agreed that it wasn’t set in stone and if someone didn’t want to make it that was okay too. We’ve arranged for escargot for tonight’s dinner and Francesco is also going to bring a nice tomato mozzarella salad too. Great now I am hungry again.

After dinner we just wandered, there wasn’t too many things scheduled that we were interested in. The 50’s sock hop was happening in Club Fusion and we stopped in and danced a song or two. We walked the Promenade Deck and then chatted with some of the staff, photographer and the stores staff.

We were back in the room around 10:30 and watched a movie and were fast asleep.

We are docked at Crown Bay and our plans are to head over to Water Island.

current temp is 80 degrees and it is only 8:30 am

Tim the Cruise Director is still ill, the morning show is being hosted by Ben and he is doing a great job but it just isn’t the same. There have been no trivia questions and no shout outs – which we really miss as we love saying hi to our cruise friends and answering the questions. Also one thing I have noticed is they haven’t handed out the agenda of the entire cruise with the ports, the shows, MUTS which is all on one sheet and is very handy to have to plan your voyage.

\

[cruiseron36]

How was your dinner at Bravo? Had you been there previously, or was this a first? We are staying at the Renaissance next Friday before we sail on the Island 1/29 and are trying to decide between Bravo and Bimini Boatyard. We've been to Carlos and Pepe's a couple of times and want to try something different.

 

I'm reading your live posts even though we aren't sailing on the Emerald. DH and/or I will probably do a "live" thread because we enjoy them :)

 

Bon Voyage!

Chris

 

Bravo's is excellent, much better than tha bimini boatyard. We dine there pre and post cruise all the time.

[chamima]

Hi Vickie

Ask Francesco about his leg. If it's the same Francesco we had a couple of years ago he was having MAJOR problems with a leg (knee?).

If it's him say hello and tell him we hope he's better and make sure to have him make you some pasta!!! He is fabulous!

 

Also, ask if Ben was on the Golden to Hawaii a couple of years ago.

If so, I remember how great he was. I put in my comments then that they should promote him to CD.

[cruzinchris]

Bravo's is excellent, much better than tha bimini boatyard. We dine there pre and post cruise all the time.

 

Thanks for the tip. We'll have had a long day and don't want to stray too far from our hotel (Renaissance).

 

Sailing on the Island Princess in 9 days :)

Chris

[PescadoAmarillo]

We have free Internet from St. Thomas, so I'll take advantage of that to try to add to Vickie's detailed posts.

 

DH is convinced that, months after we finally return home, our skeletal remains will be discovered, sitting at the dining room table, utensils in hand (but napkins still folded on the table because, heaven forbid we place them in our laps ourselves), waiting for food to be served. Mom is concerned that I am becoming seriously too spoiled. And I have to admit that both predictions are entirely possible. This life is just too good.

 

We spent our day at sea quite differently than Vickie and Company. We always enjoy breakfast in the dining room, but then started to work it off right afterwards. For me, it's up to Deck 19 for some walking. DH stretched a pinkie lifting a drink in the hot tub. Then to line dancing with Alyssia; DH worked his biceps eating fish and chips in the pub lunch. Finally, ZUMBA with Mikko (yeah, he's back) while DH walked...to the ice cream station. Dinner was my favorite, cioppino, at our windowside table for 2 (thank you, Nicola) where we watched the moonrise over coffee afterwards.

 

This morning we set the alarm for 6am, and were up on the front of Deck 16 when the sun rose and the moon set. What gorgeous photos! DH is off the ship running errands (yes, we do still have to fulfill a few minor responsibilities, and we will head to Water Island or Lindbergh Beach later this morning.

 

Having a great time!

[johnmik1]

How was your dinner at Bravo? Had you been there previously, or was this a first? We are staying at the Renaissance next Friday before we sail on the Island 1/29 and are trying to decide between Bravo and Bimini Boatyard. We've been to Carlos and Pepe's a couple of times and want to try something different.

 

I'm reading your live posts even though we aren't sailing on the Emerald. DH and/or I will probably do a "live" thread because we enjoy them :)

 

Bon Voyage!

Chris

 

We usually eat at Bravo when we cruise and it is quite good,but they are very stingy with a glass of wine.You get an inch and a half of wine for the same price of the entree.