Soloing the Caribbean: Live from the Regal - 22 Jan to 05 Feb 2017

[ar1950]

Great review!! While reading your review I learned a new word today--ablution. Thanks so much for that!

 

I will be following along and taking notes!

 

I, too, have always regarded my morning shower as ritual purification of sorts. :):D;)

[Kenosha Cruiser]

Enjoying your sense of humor, your review is fun to follow. Thanks for taking the time to share your adventure with us. Hope you will keep posting each days Princess Patter so we know what to expect when we board the Regal on February 12th.

 

Cheers - Ken & Darlene

Edited January 24, 2017 by Kenosha Cruiser

[St Paul Girl]

HI John:

Can you please check out Club Class dinning for us. Chat up the maitr'd looking after the entrance area for Club Class. See how busy it is or |NOT and ask to check out the special menu items.

This would be much appreciated.

Have a Happy Cruise!

[caribill]

By the way, what and where is Amber Cove? I've never heard of it.

 

It was built by Carnival Corp and is similar to the ones they built in Grand Turk and Roatan.

[anthonyy7]

This is a great read, I miss the Regal! I know exactly what you mean by the aft cigarette smoke [emoji853]

 

 

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[phabric]

Looking forward to hear about Amber Cove as it is a new port.

[Croptop]

Here is yesterday's Patter:

 

Apologies if they're blurry but it's tough to take pictures when the ship is bobbing and weaving and the captain refuses to hold the ship still last night no matter how much I complained.

 

Coming up: Today's Patter and I go for a run on Amber Cove.

 

 

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[ian441672]

I just got the Princess email for the 2/5/17 Regal cruise and Billy Hygate is the CD; so my guess is he's onboard right now too.

 

Interesting. We've just got off the last cruise and it was Kelly Rose as the CD. She didn't even mention she was moving on or it was her last cruise. Didn't warm to her much, so hope the new guy is better.

 

Also about the Commodore, as someone else said, he is very approachable. He popped his head round the curtain on our Chefs Table dinner to say hello, was visible on the Caribbean Deck Pool party, and when on the Elite lounge on disembarkation day, he came in to say thanks for cruising and he appreciated our business. Top guy!

[FlorenceItaly]

We spoke to Kelly on our Christmas cruise(Dec 18-29) and she indicated currently she is a fill in for those vacationing, etc. We enjoyed her very much on our cruise.

[Croptop]

And today's Patter:

[Kenosha Cruiser]

Croptop, thanks for posting the Princess Patters. Hope you don't mind, but I have been reposting them on our roll call for our Regal cruise starting Feb. 12th. Looking forward to your feedback on Amber Cove. This will also be our first visit there. Enjoy your day and happy cruising!

 

Cheers - Ken & Darlene

[Croptop]

Day 3: Amber Cove, Dominican Republic

 

This morning started off in a similar fashion to yesterday: up at shortly after 0600hrs to get in a (very) short warm up run before attending the Stretch and Abs classes in the Fitness Centre at 0700hrs. During the stretch class, passengers were cleared to go ashore. Then, shortly thereafter, shore operations were halted again while the Koningsdam docked.

 

Finished the workouts and grabbed a quick breakfast in the Horizon Court. Since I could get a cell signal, I took the opportunity to check my email and upload yesterday's Patter. I was soon joined by a massively hung over Brit (he told me so) who then promptly started giving me grief for having my head stuck in my phone. Telling him that I was providing crucial information to readers on Cruise Critic only mollified him a little so I finished up got on with my day.

 

The gangways were open again by this time so I popped ashore for a short run. Stepping onto the pier, I found myself in a chiaroscuro canyon formed by the dark blue hull of the Koningsdam to my left and the white hull of the Regal to my left. True to naval traditions everywhere, since neither of the ships were moving, members of their crews were out on the dock scraping, washing, and painting portions of the hulls.

 

After the typical "exit through the gift shop" scene that is every cruise port in the Caribbean, I set out along the highway towards Puerto Plata. 3 kms out, I'd still not encountered anything but hills, highway construction and trucks belching thick, black diesel exhaust so I turned around, crossed the road so I'd still be facing traffic and ran back to the port. On one of the uphill climbs, I was joined by a stray, scruffy looking dog -- it looked like a chihuahua but bigger and with a mottled white and brown coat. He/She/It would dart ahead a dozen metres or so then stop and lock back at me as if to say, "C'mon fat boy! Get your butt up the hill" (except that it was probably in Spanish). He'd wait long enough for me to just about reach him before he'd shoot off again and repeat the process. We did that for about a kilometre and it really kept me entertained and I forgot all about the trucks belching the clouds of exhaust for a bit.

 

Reboarded and headed up to my stateroom to get cleaned up with just a brief detour to the International Cafe to pick up a "Bananofee Blast" (essentially a chocolate banana smoothie with a shot of espresso in it -- recommended!). Then back ashore to explore the port area a bit more.

 

As you exit the duty free store, you turn left to hit the shops, board busses and taxis, and leave the port area proper. If you turn right, then you enter the recreation area whose centrepiece is a large pool with swim up bar and hundreds of loungers. With two ships in port, the area was busy but not massively so and if you were happy with not being right on the pool's edge, there were plenty of chairs available. There's also a "Sky Bar" at the top of a hill that gives you a pretty decent view in all directions along with a zipline to bring you back down the hill. Bet that's fun if you're loaded.

 

The swarms of flies that were reported in various reviews last month were nowhere to be seen today. All is good.

 

Coming up this afternoon: I eat lunch at Alfredos again and we get lecture #2 (of 4) on bushcraft survival: Finding Food and Water. Not sure what Gord can teach us that we don't already know: Alfredos is on deck 5, Horizon Court is on deck 16. There are bars everywhere. But I'll attend anyway because maybe he'll have some tips on reducing wait times at the Anytime Dining Room. :)

[Croptop]

A few random photos from Amber Cove:

 

We're joined by the HAL gang:

 

The pool:

 

The cabanas:

 

The prices!

[Croptop]

Even after a morning workout and a 6k run, I climbed the damn stairs to the Sky Bar so that you don't have to:

[CruzinNoony]

I noticed on the embarkation day Patter that the treasure hunt drawing was held at 8:30pm in the Piazza and you have to be present to win. We have late traditional dining, so will either have to skip dinner or the drawing. Usually, they have it at sailaway or the next morning. I'm not happy about this at all!:mad:

[gotta cruise again]

I noticed on the embarkation day Patter that the treasure hunt drawing was held at 8:30pm in the Piazza and you have to be present to win. We have late traditional dining, so will either have to skip dinner or the drawing. Usually, they have it at sailaway or the next morning. I'm not happy about this at all!:mad:

 

Meredith (or is this Bob?)...I would choose to have my appetizer then scoot out for the drawing, returning in time for dessert!! LOL :eek::p:D

 

See y'all soon!

--Leah

[CruzinNoony]

Leah, that is a great idea. We might just do that! :) Meredith :D

[PrincessNancy]

A few random photos from Amber Cove:

 

 

Gorgeous pics of Amber Cove-thanks for sharing!

[Croptop]

Sailaway from Amber Cove was around 1500hrs and we shot straight out to sea from the outer pier leaving the Koningsdam behind. Like yesterday, my afternoon was spent mostly lounging around reading after nice lunch at Alfredo's (the Calzone since you asked). Nothing much really to report.

 

At 1615hrs, I attended the much anticipated bushcraft survival series where I learned to never, ever, ever, ever, not even once, drink seawater or urine. So Bear Grylls can suck it! I'm sticking with Diet Coke at dinner tonight. After hearing about the deliciousness that is Nettle Tea, Cattail Root, and Dandelions, we were treated to a demonstration of how to use a coconut and, more importantly, how to get one open (hint: like most things in a survival situation, it starts with a pointed stick). One interesting note: towards the end of the lecture, Gordon hinted at the possibility of a future excursion whenever the ship was docked at Princess Cays where he would take a bunch of people out into the bush and do more practical demonstrations and allow everyone to actually eat some roots (and not drink urine). It's just in the idea phase at the moment but I'd definitely sign up for it if it ever appeared on the excursion list on a future cruise.

 

After that I popped back up to my cabin to dress for dinner. Tonight's experiment: asking for a table for one at 1830hrs in the ATD. But first, by request of St Paul Girl, I had to get myself thrown out of the Club Class dining area. It actually went down quite civilly. The guardian at the door arched her eyebrow at me when I started to enter but once I explained that I just wanted to see the Club Class area at the request of some future cruisers, she practically gave me a tour. On the Regal, the CC dining area is on the port side of the Concerto dining room (so you enter through the right hand doors as you are facing aft). Once through the doors, the CC area is the first small section of tables to the right of the doors just past the Maitre d's station (plus a little extra). When I peeked in at 1830hrs, it was at most 1/3 full and the same was true when I took another quick peek at 1915hrs after I had finished my dinner. I didn't, however, get a chance to ask about the extra menu items. Sorry.

 

As for my own dinner, I dropped down to deck 5. The line up at the right hand set of doors for the Symphony dining room was about 5 couples deep so on a whim, I crossed over to the left hand side. Jackpot. Only one couple ahead of me. They were seated right away and the Maitre d' recognised that I was alone and said that even though the dining room was pretty much full he could seat me quickly. I ended up waiting about 5 minutes at the door before being seated. The group of four behind me, however, were given a pager and a forecast of about a 10-15 minute wait. Some of you will be happy to hear that during the time I was waiting at the doors at least one couple was turned away because the gentleman was wearing shorts. So they're enforcing the dress code on the Regal. I ended up at a two-top in the first section facing the doors so I got to watch as pretty much everyone who showed up between 1830hrs and 1915hrs was handed a pager and asked to wait.

 

It was Italian night and the service was quick and attentive and the food was hot and good. I ended up skipping dessert and was done in 45 mins.

 

Since I was finished with dinner with plenty of time, I claimed a seat in the Princess Theatre for the 2000hrs show with comedy magician Christopher James. It was a good show with just the right mix of illusion and (sometimes cheesy) humour. I won't go into any detail about his show so as to not ruin it for future cruisers.

 

Tomorrow is St. Thomas (and I'm pretty sure we've ALL been to St. Thomas before so no massive report from me is planned). One thing that will be different, though: we're not scheduled to arrive until 1200hrs and at that point a bunch of other ships will still be in port so we'll have to tender in to shore. But at 1500hrs (or so) they're going to move the ship in to the Havensight pier where we'll stay until 2130hrs. Should be an interesting time.

 

But first, tomorrow morning we set the Vista Lounge on fire in our continuing series on surviving in the Outback. Stay tuned!

[FlorenceItaly]

Really enjoying your live reports! I am typically not a buffet person, but, I have to say the buffet on the Regal is pretty impressive. I was also hesitant to cruise on such a large ship, but, I loved the Regal. It never felt crowded to me. I would cruise on her again in a heart beat.

 

 

 

Marie

[St Paul Girl]

Hi Croptop:

Thanks for the great commentary! You have a great writing style, uniquely Canadian,eh!

Have a great Cruise and Thank you very much

[lovevacadays]

Even after a morning workout and a 6k run, I climbed the damn stairs to the Sky Bar so that you don't have to:

 

Thanks for posting the pic of this bar. We didn't get to it when we were there last month. Nice view.

[ckl001]

I am really enjoying your reports. It is giving me a great insight as I will be on a 14 day cruise in 2018 in February on the Regal and also travelling solo.

It will be my first time on Regal and also aCaribbean cruise.

 

chez

[Poipu1]

Thanks for your detailed, entertaining review.

 

We did the Ultimate Ship Tour on the Regal in August and loved the experience. Commodore Romano was a very approachable, gracious host on the bridge, for the last stop on the tour. I hope you enjoy it as much as we did. The galleys were amazing!

[jagsfan]

Nothing better than good food and a good book. My Kindle loves solo dining.

 

 

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