Blog from Jewel of the Seas August 30, 2014

[sabookkeeper]

I am really enjoying your review as we will be on the Jewel in February. Is the Windjammer the only place to get lunch on embarkation day? On both Princess and Celebrity, we found some other smaller venues to eat.

[Marilyn Johannes]

We were on Jewel last week and when we boarded I specifically asked if Windjammer was only venue open and was told yes. I didn't look around to see if anything else was open.

[Clarea]

I am really enjoying your review as we will be on the Jewel in February. Is the Windjammer the only place to get lunch on embarkation day? On both Princess and Celebrity, we found some other smaller venues to eat.

There is a pizza venue in the Solarium, but it may not be open right at boarding time.

[dancinman66]

Love the review thanks

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

[luvtravel88]

I am really enjoying your review as we will be on the Jewel in February. Is the Windjammer the only place to get lunch on embarkation day? On both Princess and Celebrity, we found some other smaller venues to eat.

 

I think that's the only place open. There is an outdoor area by the pool that has sandwiches, fries and such, but they were still closed when we went by in the afternoon. The Solarium Cafe was also closed.

 

There are not a lot of places to eat on the Jewel in comparison with other RC ships. It only has two upscale restaurants, Chops and Portofino. It has the dining room, the Windjammer, and a couple of Cafe's with very limited menus.

I heard that when they take the Jewel for refitting in 2016 that they're going to add more upscale restaurants.

[luvtravel88]

Monday, September 1 St. Maarten

We got up this morning at 7:15 and met for breakfast at 7:50. We were off the ship and headed for our tour at 8:30. I had chosen to tour today with Bernard’s Tours. They had a very good rating on TripAdvisor and we weren’t disappointed.

 

Our guide’s name was DJ Dave. As this was a private tour, we got to decide where we would be going today, and how long we would stay. It was just the 5 of us. We weren’t in a caravan. We weren’t with a large group of people. It was wonderful!! Dave was very knowledgeable and gave us a lot of history and information about the culture and lives of the people that live on St. Maarten. He also had a full ice chest of soft drinks, water, Caribbean beer and a homemade mixture that he called eye opener. He promised that if we finished the bottle, he’d give us the recipe. We were able to finish over the course of the day and learned that it was about ½ rum, with juices and cane sugar. SIL was feeling no pain by the afternoon!

 

Once we were seated in Dave’s van, we went over what we were going to do that day. When I made the reservation, I had sent Bernard’s a list of the things we wanted to see and do. It was basically their Island Tour, but I wanted to spend a bit more time in some of the areas. We worked our way counter clockwise around the island, stopping at beautiful overlooks to take pictures. We spent about 1 ½ hours at the clothed side of Orient Beach, although we did see some topless women, as we were on the French side of the island. We were taken through a resort area, through a beach bar/restaurant and on to the beach. We paid $20 for 4 chairs and 2 umbrellas, which gave us access to the restrooms, changing rooms and free wifi.

We had lunch in Marigot at a restaurant called Rosemarie’s. It was St. Maarten cuisine. We had curried goat, oxtail, curried chicken, grilled mahi mahi and a fish plate with lobster, conch and shrimp. All of the plates were served with brown rice and black beans. Everyone enjoyed the meal but service was on island time. I wish I had requested some time to walk around Marigot, but our lunch took all of our time there. There is a well known bakery in Marigot called Seraphina’s that I really wanted to go to. Unfortunately, they are closed on Mondays.

Curried Goat

 

After lunch Dave drove us to Maho Beach where we spent about an hour watching the planes fly in and out of the airport. This was a very interesting experience and was a lot of fun. Hubby is an engineer that works in the aerospace industry and has spent a lot of time developing parts for airplanes and has found himself often in the bellies of the planes. He wouldn’t allow us to get in the path underneath the planes as he said it is really not safe, so we watched from an open bar at the side.

Surfboard announced arrival times of the large planes.

 

We were going to be dropped off in Phillipsburg where we could spend some time exploring the town. It is about a 15-20 minute walk back to the ship. Our kids decided they were too tired, so we had Dave take us back to the ship. We arrived back at the pier about 3:15. The cost of the day was well worth it. It was $360 for 5 of us and we gave Dave a $50 tip. Lunch was another $80 and then $20 for the chair and umbrella rental. This was cheaper than an all day tour with RC would have been and we didn’t have to fight the crowds. The most crowded place was at Maho Beach and they weren’t groups of cruise passengers.

 

We had purchased a couple of bottle of liqueur at the duty free shop and were hoping we’d be lucky enough to get them through security. We put them in separate carryon bags, hoping that at least one would get through. One of the bags was flagged and I was directed to a table to have the bottle marked with our room number to be returned on the last cruise day. When I walked over to the table, there was no one there, so we walked on by and on to an elevator. We put the liqueur bottles in a cabinet out of sight. We weren’t sure if our room steward would intervene if he saw them.

 

We spent a couple of hours in the Solarium before getting ready for dinner. It’s a really nice place to take a nap!!

 

Dinner was good again. I didn’t write down what we ate, but there was never a meal where anyone said Yuck! Some items were better than others, but nothing was unpalatable.

 

We played cards again this evening and headed to bed around 11:00.

 

Unfortunately, I can’t comment on any of the main stage shows as we didn’t go to any of them. I had read on Cruise Critic that they weren’t that great and Hubby and I really wanted to spend time with our kids, one who lives across country and the other who lives in Scotland, so we usually played cards in the evening. We did go to a couple of the late night shows and I’ll comment on them.

Edited September 16, 2014 by luvtravel88

[finz2u]

We're on the Jewel in November and your review is making me so excited. Can't wait to read the rest of it.

[mlmbar]

We're on the Jewel in November and your review is making me so excited. Can't wait to read the rest of it.

 

On Jewel Nov 8 and this is making me so excited, too!

[dntweav]

On Jewel October 4th. and actually in cabin 8086. Our first Southern cruise, and our first cruise in 6 years. Life got in the way. So excited at this point, and ready to go. Review is helping.

[Folk Singer]

Thank you for the review. We had a good time at Maho Beach being blown into the ocean. :):)

[luvtravel88]

On Jewel October 4th. and actually in cabin 8086. Our first Southern cruise, and our first cruise in 6 years. Life got in the way. So excited at this point, and ready to go. Review is helping.

 

Be sure to take ear plugs if noise bothers you at all. The music does stop each night about 12:30, so if you stay out late it won't matter. It was quiet after that.Other than the noise, it was a great room to have, in a great location.

[luvtravel88]

Tuesday, September 2 Antigua

 

This morning we slept in, as I hadn’t organized any tours today. Before we left for this trip, my (adult) kids were very clear that they just wanted to rest. I don’t do rest too well, so I tried to organize tours that everyone would enjoy as well as intersperse our days with nothing to do. We had been on the go since boarding the ship, so today was an unorganized day.

 

Hubby and I had been to Antigua a couple of time before, so it didn’t matter to me if we didn’t have anything organized. I knew that we had been to Nelson’s Dockyard about 20 years ago as a part of a tour and remembered it was really pretty so that was going to be our plan for the day.

 

We got up about 8:15, got ready and went to breakfast. We got off the ship with YD about 10:00 and walked through the pier and the madhouse of people trying to get you to take a taxi, book a tour or get your hair braided. They would back off immediately when we said “No, thank you.”, but there would be another person right behind them. Once we got about a block away from the pier, that stopped.

 

We had decided to take the city bus to Nelson’s Dockyard. I read on Cruise Critic that it was very easy to do. It’s also very cheap but that wasn’t our motivation. We really enjoy immersing ourselves in the culture of an area when we can. Let me tell you, we got immersed!!

 

When we left the pier, we walked straight ahead until we reached Market St. which is about 2 blocks. At Market St. we turned right. We walked several blocks up, until we reached a fork in the road that had a large statue sitting on it. We took the right fork and about another block and a half down, there was the bus station. The entire walk took about 10 minutes.

 

We needed the #17 bus to take us to Nelson’s Dockyard. We paid $5 for 3 people and got back 2 Caribbean dollars. We took our seats and waited. The bus held about 30 people and we had to wait until the bus was completely full, which took about 20 minutes. Once the driver left the station, it took about 30 minutes to reach the Dockyard, which was the last stop on the route.

 

It was quite a wonderful learning experience. It had not occurred to me that we would be the only Caucasian people on the bus and I didn’t even realize it until we were getting off the bus. The driver had a gospel music radio station playing so loudly, we really couldn’t talk to each other and a lot of passengers on the bus were singing with the radio. When someone wanted to get off the bus they would yell, “Bus Stop”, and the driver would stop at the next stop. Very few people got on the bus on the route. People got on at the station in St. John and got off somewhere along the route. By the time we reached Nelson’s Dockyard, we were the only 3 people left on the bus. We were told there was a #17 bus every 45 minutes to an hour, but there are no set times. We knew when we were ready to leave, we may have a wait.

 

We were disappointed in Nelson’s Dockyard. It was as beautiful as I remembered and there is a lot of British Naval history here but the area is pretty small and many of the buildings on the site aren’t open to the public or have been made into shops or restaurants.

 

 

There was a nice, small museum that told of the Dockyard’s history as well as Naval information. There were also some placards along the sidewalk that gave some information about what you were seeing.

 

It cost $6 per person to enter the Dockyard and with that, you got a map of the area. We spent about an hour here. This would be a good place to stop as a part of a tour and the museum keeper told me that they have tour groups from the cruise ships come through for about 45 minutes in the morning and again in the afternoon pretty much every day. I would think that when there is more than one cruise ship at port, it could be a very crowded place.

 

 

We headed toward the entrance once we finished our visit, to wait for the next #17 bus and we were very lucky that there was one sitting out front, getting ready to leave. We were the only ones on the bus when we left the Dockyard and since this was the end of the route, we didn’t have to wait for the bus to fill. The bus driver on the way to the Dockyard had told us to give the driver on the way back, our 2 Caribbean dollars, and I think another $3 US dollars for our ride back. As we rode along the route back, the bus would pick up and drop off people. It took about 30 minutes to get back. We thought we might not make it back in one piece, as this particular driver drove CRAZY! Between stops he would careen around curves, pass cars on hills, and drive as fast as he could on straight passes all the while have very animated conversations with the passengers he was picking up.

 

There was a woman I began talking to soon before we got back to the bus station and I was asking her if she knew of any place in St. John’s that had Wifi. I had to check my emails every day that it was possible to do so for my job. She actually walked us to a coffee shop that was along the pier. We got coffee and sat outside in the shade where I could check my emails. It was very hot in Antigua, but there is a nice breeze pretty constantly, which helps a lot.

 

There are several blocks of shops and restaurants along the pier, but we weren’t interested in buying on this trip, so we walked back to the ship. Once onboard, we headed to the Windjammer for a late lunch. OD and SIL were there so we joined them. They had gotten off the ship and had walked around the St. John’s area which they enjoyed.

 

We intended to spend some time in the Solarium after lunch, but we couldn’t find any loungers that weren’t in the sun so we spent some time on our balcony. Our balcony use was very interesting this trip. We almost always get a balcony cabin and we usually use our balcony extensively, making it additional living area to our cabin. This trip we rarely used it at all. YD shared our room with us and she would use it a bit, but mostly would go next door to OD’s balcony.

 

I had been developing a cold since Monday and it had taken hold of me today. I was really bummed because I take a lot of extra care to ensure we don’t get sick on the ship and darn it, I know I got the cold onboard. When we first get to our cabin, I wipe down any surfaces I think that hands touch a lot with Clorox wipes. We use the Purell extensively whenever we pass it on the ship, and I will often get my food in the Windjammer, put it on the table and then go wash my hands before I eat. Well, I touched something that had cold germs on it. Here it is September 17 and I still have a lingering cough.

When I first felt like I was getting sick, I bought some Airborne on the ship and began taking that. Today, I got some cough drops as well. The over the counter drugs in the gift shop area are very limited and I wasn’t sick enough to go visit the ship’s doctor.

 

Hubby spent the afternoon on the balcony, reading and napping, while I decided I would get better rest on the bed.

 

We got ready for dinner and all went down about 6:00. One thing I’ve been meaning to let you know about….. There is soap in the bathroom both for the sink and the shower and there is a container attached to the wall in the shower that I think is shampoo. There is no conditioner offered and no lotion. Also no shower cap. I had read on Cruise Critic that there was no shampoo offered either. We ended up taking our own shampoo and conditioner. I actually purchased several travel size containers, so as we used them, I could throw away the bottles, making the suitcase just a bit lighter.

 

Dinner tonight was bouillabaisse, Caesar salad, coq a vin and apple tart. Everyone else in the family had vegi paella. Everyone thought their meal was good this evening.

 

After dinner, we played cards in the Schooner Bar, where we listened to a really excellent guitarist named Segundo Vasquez. We enjoyed his music immensely. My only complaint is that we heard him several other times on the ship and he played the same set of music each night. It would have been nice to hear different music.

 

Tonight we went to the Love and Marriage Game from 10:00-11:00. It was a lot of fun and very funny. There were 3 couples. A newlywed couple, a couple that had been married about 15 years and a couple that had been married 40 years. They tried to find a couple that had been married more than 50 years but if there was any one there fit that, they weren’t offering. It was played like the old Newlywed Game and was hosted by Dennis, the Cruise Director. All of the couples received a bag of goodies with a bottle of champagne.

 

After the show it was off to bed.

 

If you were interested, tonight was White Night up on the pool deck. There was music and food set up. We wore white to dinner and there were quite a few others that did as well.

Edited September 17, 2014 by luvtravel88

[Folk Singer]

Sounds like you are having wonderful time. We like the Black and White Party always enjoy that. the photos are great.

[LifeIsButADream]

Am loving your review...I set sail on her three weeks from Saturday and can't wait! I will appreciate the splendor of the older ship with all the beautiful wood and tons of windows. Can't wait to hear more about your trip...sorry you caught a cold!

[Piggie1951]

Great reveiw. We are sailing on the Jewel 10/4, so I am so glad you mentioned the "White Party". I have one question. Was there a Ben and Jerry's on the Jewel?

 

Thanks

[luvtravel88]

Great reveiw. We are sailing on the Jewel 10/4, so I am so glad you mentioned the "White Party". I have one question. Was there a Ben and Jerry's on the Jewel?

 

Thanks

 

Sorry, no Ben and Jerry's. The only ice cream I even saw was soft serve in the Windjammer.

[luvtravel88]

See next entry.

Edited September 18, 2014 by luvtravel88

[luvtravel88]

Wednesday, September 3 St. Lucia

 

Today is the day I’ve been waiting for…. I booked this trip solely based on the itinerary. We have been to the Caribbean many times, and St. Lucia is the one island I’ve wanted to visit that we hadn’t yet been to. Since this was our first visit, today would include a tour of the island.

 

We got up about 8:15 this morning, got cleaned up and went to breakfast at the Windjammer. At this point in our trip, we found a side room in the Windjammer that is kind of off the beaten path. When you walk into the Windjammer and head for the buffet, there is a seating area on the left. If you walk through this seating area and turn to the left, there is a room that is a part of the Windjammer but is kind of partitioned off. There were always empty tables in there and that is where we started meeting for breakfast and lunch. It was quieter in there, without the hustle and bustle of the rest of the Windjammer area, and best of all or worst of all, depending upon how you feel about it, the servers don’t spend a lot of time back there, so there wasn’t anyone swooping down to remove your plate and utensils the second you took a last bite. On the down side, there wasn’t someone coming around with coffee or asking if you wanted something to drink and you had to go get it yourself. We didn’t mind waiting on ourselves at all, so this was the perfect meeting place for us.

 

We were off the ship by 9:20 and met our guide for the day at the end of the pier. I spent a lot of time researching possible tour guides for the day and I had originally reserved a tour with Spencer’s Tours. After doing some additional research, I learned that Spencer’s is a large company and takes several vans for the same tour on the same day, so they kind of caravan. I really didn’t want to be part of a large group, which is one of the reasons we don’t do ship tours. I’m sure his trip is great and there were a lot of great reviews of his tour on TripAdvisor, but there were also some negatives. The one thing his tour does have is a boat ride that does cut down on driving back to Castries.

 

I ultimately chose to use More Than A Cab Tours. It is owned by a woman named Vickie and she was fantastic! We were the only tour she did that day so we had her to ourselves. I had worked out an itinerary with her online and she was very good about corresponding with me. We did a basic Island Tour, similar to the itinerary of the other companies. Castries is to the north of the island and the tour goes to the western part of the island to Soufriere and then back. The roads are VERY curvy so if anyone in your party get motion sick, be sure they take some Dramamine. Several of us have this problem. We all took medicine and we were all fine.

 

Vicki was very knowledgeable about the area and had lived in St. Lucia for many years. She was able to answer all of our questions and gave us a lot of history and information about the people that live here. She also told us quite a bit about how her family lives which was very interesting. She was very personable and easy to talk to.

 

Vicki took us from Castries to Morne Fortune which was a beautiful overlook of the area. In conversation with her on the way, we mentioned having gone to the Bacardi Rum Factory in San Juan, so she stopped at a Rum Factory in St. Lucia, where we all bought some coconut and peanut butter rum. We have enjoyed both of these since we’ve been home!

 

We also talked about my cold as we got in her van, and she stopped at a grocery for me to get some cough syrup, as the ship doesn’t have much in the way of OVC medicines. Going into the grocery was very interesting. We didn’t spend much time in there, but Vicki did point out many items that I had never seen before. She helped me at the checkout counter and told me the equivalent amount of US dollars to pay.

She then drove us through Canaries, which is a very small fishing village. We noticed a lot of people just sitting on their porches, or walking along the road. We learned that this is a very poor area. There are not a lot of jobs and we found out later that surprisingly, St. Lucia is the poorest of the islands we visited.

 

It took about an hour and a half to make our way over to Soufriere, where we had amazing views of the Pitons. We were told the two Piton’s were actually 3 miles apart, but they look side by side.

Vicki took us to a local restaurant in Soufriere,(sorry, I don’t have the name) where we had a local dish called Roti. This was basically a burrito with your choice of curried meats and served with a bit of salad.

Overlooking Soufriere

In front of the small Piton

 

She also took us to a drive through volcano. It isn’t really though. They explained why they call it a drive through, but it didn’t stick with me. She parked the car and paid admission for us. We were taken by a guide for a walking tour around the volcano. This tour includes many stairs and it’s all uphill. It had many steam vents and areas of boiling water. The area smelled like sulfur and the rocks around the volcano area were white and yellow. At the top of the area the guide walked us to, there was a beautiful waterfall. The water came down from way uphill in the rain forest and was very cold. Several of us had worn swim suits and got in for a dip. It was quite invigorating on a very hot day. We had towels from the ship and used them to dry off.

Volcano--There was much more to see than this little spot. It was a pretty big area.

 

Waterfall

 

As an aside here…. There is someone standing beside the gangway every day so you can check out beach towels. They swipe your ship card by the number of towels you’re borrowing. When you return to the ship, you just stop by this area and have them swipe your card again for the number of towels you’re returning. Just be sure to count the beeps coming and going so you don’t get charged for towels you didn’t borrow. They are $25 a piece.

 

Across the street from the volcano was an area of mud baths, that were still a part of the volcanic area. We didn’t go down there, but we could see people mudding themselves up and then washing off. It is supposed to be very good for your skin. We did purchase some bars of black volcanic soap that is also supposed to be good for your skin.

 

We then made our way back to Castries, the way we came, which was through winding roads. These roads do go through the rain forest which was very nice.

 

We had mentioned to Vicki that we would like to purchase some fresh spices before we went back to the ship. There is a very large, open air market not far from the pier. Vicki took us through here. We passed through the tourist area which was booth after booth of crafts and to the back to the fresh market. This is where the locals do their daily shopping. It was really interesting to see. Many of the items in the booths were things that the owner grew in their yards. There were also some bottled items as well as fresh fish.

 

The owners wanted to haggle, but we let Vicki take care of that for us. She knew what we wanted to buy and she told us a fair price to pay. She also told us how much US dollars to give them that would be equivalent to their Caribbean dollar. We all left with several kinds of spices.

 

Another aside… there is no problem taking spices home like there would be with other agricultural products.

 

Vicki drove us very close to the ship and dropped us off at 4:15. We had a fantastic day with her. The cost of this private trip was $275 for five people. We treated her to lunch and gave her a $50 tip. I thought this was very reasonable for a 7 hour day.

 

Once back on ship, we rested for a while before cleaning up for dinner and tonight is the last formal night.

 

Dinner was good again this evening, but I don’t remember what I had. My cold had really gotten to me and we have been really busy so I really hadn’t had a lot of opportunity to rest.

 

After dinner this evening I needed to go to bed. Hubby decided to join me in the cabin and spent some time out on the balcony enjoying the quiet. YD came back to the room about an hour later and we spent the rest of the evening watch TV.

 

Another aside!…. We had been really lucky with the weather and hadn’t had but a sprinkle of rain all week. On this itinerary, the islands are all pretty close together, so a couple of nights the ship only goes about 8 miles an hour. The fastest we went all week was 17 miles an hour. When you’re going a little faster, you can feel the ship swaying a bit, but it was very gentle. The Captain would come on the loud speaker every evening about 5:00 and give an update about where we were and where we were going as well as a weather forecast for the next day. He would then tell us what that would mean for travel from one island to the next. Most of the time we stayed on the inside passages away from open Atlantic which makes the motion much less.

Edited September 18, 2014 by luvtravel88

[luvtravel88]

Thursday, September 4 Barbados

 

We had decided early in our planning process, that Barbados was going to be a beach day, so my research was in looking for a nice place to spend the day. Barbados has lots of very nice beaches.

 

Our criterion was that it needed to be pretty easy to get to and from the ship, the place we chose had some amenities such as a restroom, a place to get something to eat and that had chairs and umbrellas for rent.

 

I spent quite a bit of time reading Cruise Critic threads as well as looking at TripAdvisor. I finally decided that we should spend our day at The Boatyard. It looked like a fun place to spend the day. We would have to get a taxi there, but for $15 per person, you got entry into The Boatyard that included a chair and umbrella, a rum punch per person and a ride back to the ship. The Boatyard had a bar, restaurant, restrooms, showers, changing area. They also had some water toys that you could enjoy. They included a rope swing into the water, a climbing wall and a trampoline that sat on the water.

 

We got up about 8:45 this morning, made our way to breakfast about 9:30 and left the ship to head to The Boatyard about 10:30. The Barbados terminal had free wifi so we stopped there to check email for work and then we found a taxi to take us to The Boatyard.

Most of the taxis hold at least 10 passengers and you have to wait until it’s full before they leave. Thankfully, this didn’t take but a few minutes. The cost was $5 per person to get there and it took about 10 minutes.

 

Once we paid our entry, we walked through the outdoor restaurant and on to the beach. There were about 3 rows of umbrellas and chairs set up and a couple of rows of cabanas. By the time we arrived, the first couple of rows closest to the ocean had already been taken, so we set up in the third row. It was still close enough to be able to see what was going on along the shore. It was a very pretty beach and there were a lot of people there, but it wasn’t overcrowded.

There were people that were offering swim with the turtles/snorkeling trips that lasted a little over an hour and were $20 person. There were several people that would go from chair to chair trying to sell items they had made or offering to braid hair or give massages. They were polite and when you told them you weren’t interested, and they didn’t come back and keep bugging you.

Both of our daughters and SIL did take one of the turtle/snorkeling tours and YD said it was the highlight of her trip. All of them enjoyed it immensely.

 

We had lunch in the restaurant which was pretty reasonable. It was basically bar food such as pizza, burgers, flying fish sandwiches, etc…

We stayed until about 3:15 and decided it was time to go back to the ship. One of the nice things The Boatyard does is give you a ride back to the ship. The taxis leave about every 15 minutes and they don’t announce every time a taxi is going to leave, but about once an hour they’ll give you a 10 minute heads up to let you know one was leaving.

 

Hubby and I got cleaned up as soon as we were back onboard as we were invited to an Upper Tier member event. We are Platinum level on RC which is the lowest of the upper membership levels. This event was held on the helipad which was really cool as it’s usually closed off to passengers. There were a lot of crew there and we were served champagne and passed canapés. Dennis, our Cruise Director made crew introductions and then they mingled with the crowd for a bit and took pictures. The Captain wasn’t able to come as the ship was getting ready to sail, but we were below the bridge and we could see him wave to us as they blew the ship’s horn. We don’t go to many of these events, but this one was nice as there were only about 100 people so it wasn’t elbow to elbow.

Took this in late afternoon from our balcony.

 

Dinner tonight was lobster tails and baked Alaska or grand marnier souffle for dessert. Tonight was our last night in the dining room as we are going to Portofino tomorrow night for dinner, so we told our waiter Melvin and his assistant good bye. Our service had been very good all week and we had felt very well looked after.

 

After dinner the family played cards again in the Solarium. It was particularly quiet in here this evening although the bar was open. It was really nice to be off the beaten path.

 

At 10:45 we went to the Safari Lounge to find a seat for The Quest that began at 11:15. We weren’t sure what we were going to be watching but it is what it’s called. Dennis, the Cruise Director leads it. Everyone there gets into teams of about 10. They worked very hard to get everyone there to participate. They made anyone under 18 leave and they were very careful about that. They preface the game with comments that if you don’t like risqué things, you should leave. They didn’t want to hear complaints from offended people after the fact. They were telling people to leave.

 

After that, the game began. All groups were given a number and when Dennis called out a thing to find, someone from the team would run up to him with the item and your group number. There was someone off to the side giving points to the teams. The faster you came to Dennis with your item, the more points you got. The first items were pretty mundane, like show me a picture of your baby but quickly became more risqué. Show me a piercing not in an earlobe. Show me a tattoo. One of the men in your group, come up front with 3 bras on your head……It was very silly, but was quite funny to watch. There were probably more than 300 people that participated.

 

The Quest was over about 12:30 and then it was off to bed.

Edited September 19, 2014 by luvtravel88

[adamdiane]

Thank you for the review. We had a good time at Maho Beach being blown into the ocean. :):)

 

We did too!! I think I am still finding sand to this day :)

 

Looks like the beach area has changed now though from when we were there.

 

Hope you are both well

 

OP - thanks for your review - we will be on Jewel (again) in November and are staying in the Condado area of San Juan for the first time so really appreciate you taking the time and sharing your vacation experiences with us.

 

Adam

[luvtravel88]

Friday, September 5 Sea Day

 

 

Today was going to be a day of rest. We had taken advantage of the wonderful ports of call and had gone somewhere or done something every day. Our group of 5 had decided at dinner last night, that we were going to each do our own thing today. I think OD and SIL wanted some time alone and YD is easy going and didn’t really care what we did.

 

 

We got up at 9:00 this morning and slowly made our way to breakfast.

 

 

 

We watched a Question and Answer session with the Captain, Head of Hotel services and Head Engineer, looking on from the 8th floor that looks down onto the Centrum. There were chairs set up in the center, where people could sit and the CD, Dennis was the Moderator. He took some interesting questions from the audience. This lasted about 30 minutes.

 

 

We went back to the room and did quite a bit of packing and sat on the balcony and watched the water go by.

 

 

About 1:00 we went up to the Windjammer for lunch. The dining room was open for lunch today, but we didn’t want to spend that much time at the table.

 

 

At 2:00, Hubby and YD went to a Save the Waves program that discussed how RC is trying to preserve the environment.

 

 

At 4:00 all 5 of us went to play Bingo. This was the last session on the cruise and they were giving away a free cruise. Cards were pricey. There were 4 games. 6 cards for each game were $55 and these were all paper with pull down centers to cover your number. They also had electronic games that held 30 cards. You could purchase the electronic and the paper cards for $67. That gave you 36 cards per game. The session took 45 minutes and someone from Argentina won the cruise.

 

 

We got back to the room about 5 and got ready for dinner at Portofino. This is the Italian Restaurant on the ship. Our reservations were for 6 and when we arrived, there were only 3 other tables with people. It did begin to fill up as we were getting ready to leave. The food was really good and the service was excellent. We had 4 courses as well as wine. The upcharge without the wine was $20 per person plus a tip. Quite honestly, I wouldn’t have gone to either of the upcharge restaurants as I thought the food in the dining room was really good. Our OD and SIL wanted to treat us to dinner and they had made the reservations. It was very nice, but to me, I’d rather spend my money on something else.

 

 

After dinner, we went back to the room and finished packing, having our bags out before 11. At that point we were in for the night. We spent some time out on the balcony and then off to bed.

 

 

 

Saturday, September 6, 2014 San Juan Disembarkation Day

We were up this morning at 6:15 and were in the Windjammer for breakfast by 7:00. There was a copy of our charges for the week under our door and we checked that while at breakfast.

 

 

As an aside…. You can use an interactive system on the stateroom television to check your account anytime. I did this almost daily to make sure that I hadn’t been charged for something that wasn’t mine. We had no problem and since we intended to let our charges stay on our credit card, we didn’t have to do anything.

 

 

The Windjammer was quite busy this morning and the made to order egg station was closed. There is also no room service on debarkation day. We had breakfast and then headed back to the room to pick up our carryons. Our place to meet was the theatre and we had to be there by 8:15. I didn’t think to mention it earlier, but on Thursday night when we returned from dinner, all of our disembarkation documents were on our bed. There were new luggage tags with a number on them, customs forms and a time schedule, telling you what time and where to meet to get off the ship. There is also the option on not leaving your bags outside your door the night before and carrying your luggage off the ship yourself. If you do this, you have to do it totally alone as there is no one to help you. Also these people are about the first off the ship at 7:30.

 

 

We arrived at the Theatre a few minutes after 8 and we were called to get off right at 8:15. They call you off by your luggage tag number.

Once you get to the terminal, they have the luggage separated by luggage tag number. It’s very easy to find. Once you find your bags, you take them and get in line to go through customs. You have to have your customs form filled out and be ready to give it and your passport to the customs agent.

 

 

I had read on Cruise Critic that if you get a porter to take your luggage, you will go to an expedited line and you would get through Customs much faster. We did get a porter and gave him $2 per bag. As it happened the line that we would have gotten into if we hadn’t gotten a porter, when about the same speed as the one with the porter so today, we could have saved the money. Maybe other days it pays to use a porter.

 

 

Once you’re through Customs, you make your way outside and to a taxi. The porter went with us and handed our bags over to the taxi driver. We went directly to the airport. It took about 15 minutes to get there.

 

 

As you come into the airport there are some luggage machines almost at the front doors. These are USDA machines. You have to put all of your luggage on them and get a USDA sticker. You can’t check your bags without this sticker. Once you’ve completed this process, you finish checking in for your flight.

 

 

Our first flight was uneventful and on time. Our second flight, unfortunately, was delayed about 3 hours. We were due home about 7:00pm and instead got in about 10.

 

 

We were glad to be home, safe and sound and we had a wonderful time.

 

 

That’s the end of my blog. Hope you enjoyed it!

 

 

I do have all of the daily Cruise Compasses and if anyone is interested I can upload them.

 

 

If anyone has any questions I’ll be happy to answer them.

Kim

[NemoCrownie]

Thank you so much for all of your time and providing so much useful information. what was your overall impression of the ship and ports? Would you do this cruise again?

[jerrib]

Thanks for such a great review. I always learn something new.

i.e. I had been reading about using a porter to get thru the custom lines quicker and was planning on doing that. Now I know to check the regular lines first. Thanks!

[luvtravel88]

Thank you so much for all of your time and providing so much useful information. what was your overall impression of the ship and ports? Would you do this cruise again?

 

You're welcome! I hope it is useful!

As far as my overall impression of the ship and would I do this cruise again.... It depends.

Any cruise is a great vacation! We haven't been on one that we didn't like.

You can tell from my signature that we're not company loyal. I have tended to pick our cruises based on itinerary.

Any RC cruise we have done is when we have taken our kids. Even though they're adults now, there is just a lot to do on an RC ship even a smaller one like the Jewel. There is also a much greater variety in the age range of people on an RC cruise.

 

The RC line in my opinion still has somewhat of a party vibe, but not to the extent of the Carnival line. It's more toned down. RC has done away with the constant announcements that we used to get blasted in our room on a daily basis. They still make announcements about upcoming things on the ship, but now they only announce to speakers in the hallways, so you have to open your door if you want to listen.

 

When Hubby and I cruise alone, we tend to choose Celebrity or Princess. They tend to be a bit more sedate and the passenger age range is not as varied and tends to be a bit older. There aren't as many kids on these other two lines either.

 

So it really just depends what you are looking for and what your needs are. All of the companies have pros and cons. There are things that I like about them all and things I would change if I could.

 

The Jewel is a smaller ship. This has pros and cons too. There aren't as many passengers and we never felt crowded. Being a smaller ship, there weren't as many choices of places to eat, but there were enough for us. There weren't as many places to go listen to music or dance in the evening as there are on larger ships, but for us there was enough.

There's plenty of shopping available and the casino is typical in size. They do have a rock climbing wall, which my kids enjoyed as well as a 9 hole putt putt course.

 

I think the size of the ship didn't bother me as much as the age. It is in very good condition when you look at it with a broad view. It is kept very clean, polished and shiny, but when you look at individual things, such as lounge chairs, the edges of your balconies, the shower tiles, the carpeting, the drawers in your stateroom, some of the tables in the Windjammer, furniture in the public areas, etc.... you do see wear. The ship is supposed to go for refurbishment in 2016 and it's time. These things don't take away from the enjoyment of the trip, but are just noticeable.

 

Again, it just depends on what you're looking for.

 

So a long answer for a short question. Would I go again? Sure! If it fit my needs at the time.

Edited September 20, 2014 by luvtravel88

[NemoCrownie]

Thanks! That was just the kind of response I wanted, very fair and balanced. We haven't been on many cruises and all RCCL because of price and itinerary but I am really wanting to try Celebrity or Princess so perfect response. I'm concerned about the age and wear and tear but my only experience on a refurbished ship was not good as I think they have diminished the public space and open feel of the ships. Again, thanks so much!