The Official Trippingpara's Chasing the Canadian Sunshine in the Maritimes Review

[Crusin Karen]

Yes, the gangway difference was insane! When we departed in the morning, the gangway was on the ground (it looked like we exited Zero Deck). Anybody that had Oceanview rooms on Decks 1 and 2 would have been staring at the side of the concrete pier. When we returned later that afternoon, Deck 3 was now standing where you expect it...3 stories in the air. The tide there is crazy!

We are in an OV on deck 1 9/23-9/30 so this should be interesting!

[trippingpara]

We are in an OV on deck 1 9/23-9/30 so this should be interesting!

 

It's going to depend on what the tide is like when you arrive. We happened to dock pretty close to the lowest tide mark so we were pretty lucky and able to see both the low and high tide extremes.

[trippingpara]

Appreciate this fabulous review so much. Your hotel in NYC reminded me of feel of one I first stayed in on first flying on an airplane trip summer before sixth grade..lol...now 57. It was called The Statler (sp) Hilton.

Oh your words, pictures, everything is just wonderful...how to thank you?? The armchair travel is so appreciated and the Sunshine looks wonderful and your candid review of pros and cons so great. This looks like a super trip to me...thank you, Sarah.

 

Hi Sarah. Thank you so much for the kind words. Wait till you see our hotel at the end of the cruise. Talk about a complete 180! We went from closet sized to king sized! Glad to hear that you're enjoying the review. There's still quite a bit more to come!

 

 

Thanks so much for this review- the photos and review are Top Notch!

 

Hi bitemebaby. Love the name!! Thank you for joining along and I'm glad that you are enjoying it so far. I appreciate the kudos very much!

[trippingpara]

Thursday, August 10th – Halifax, NS, Canada (cont)

Here are some more shots of Peggy's Cove and the surrounding fishing village.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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[trippingpara]

Thursday, August 10th – Halifax, NS, Canada (cont)

Here are some more shots of fishing village at Peggy's Cove as well as the some snapshots of the gorgeous drive back towards Halifax.

 

 

 

 

 

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[mbrownferrier]

Thank you for such beautiful photography

 

 

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[pacruise804]

Thank you for the stunning pictures, they make me feel like I'm there. They'd make gorgeous calendars or puzzles too.

[trippingpara]

Thank you for such beautiful photography

 

 

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Thank you for the stunning pictures, they make me feel like I'm there. They'd make gorgeous calendars or puzzles too.

 

 

Thank you guys for such lovely feedback, I really do appreciate it!!

[trippingpara]

Thursday, August 10th – Halifax, NS, Canada (cont)

After we visited Peggy’s Cove and it’s quaint little fishing village, we headed back towards Halifax. Along the way, our friends were very nice to me and stopped several times, so I could jump out and grab some photos of the coastline along the way. Back in Halifax, we went straight to the Halifax Citadel. It was a British fort that was built in 1749 and British troops remained there until 1906 when it was then turned over to the Canadian military and remained active until 1951.

 

 

 

 

 

 

It is a National Historic Site and part of their national park program. Our friends had a Canada 150 pass which gave us free entrance into the park. Thank you very much!!!! There was a small parking charge of $3.15. We walked around taking photos and chatting until they noticed that our next stop (the Titanic gravesites) closed at 4:00 pm. Since it was about a quarter after 3 pm, we needed to start booking.

 

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[trippingpara]

Thursday, August 10th – Halifax, NS, Canada (cont)

We piled back into the Jeep and headed to the large cemetery which housed the grave sites of a couple dozen victims of the Titanic disaster including a few crew members. Lady Trip is really into the Titanic as well as historic graveyards, so it was a win / win for her.

 

 

 

After the Titanic grave site, we headed back towards the Citadel to the nearby Public Gardens. It was a large, sprawling Victorian Garden in the traditional English style. Gorgeous!! We slowly meandered our way around taking photos and chatting away. We eventually decided that it was best to start heading back towards the main cruise terminal and grab something to eat before Lady Trip and I had to grab the last shuttle back.

 

 

 

We sat down at a nice pizzeria across from the QM2 and ordered some small individual pizzas. Good!! Sooooo good!! We spent the next hour chatting and eating before we unfortunately had to say our goodbyes. It was so awesome that CarnieAddict and Lady Carnie took the time off from work, drove all the way down to Halifax just to visit us. We had such a great time hanging with them again and we are actively working on scheduling our next cruise with them. Meeting people like them and developing such friendships is what makes cruising so awesome!!

 

 

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[trippingpara]

Thursday, August 10th – Halifax, NS, Canada (cont)

After boarding the ship, I watched sail away and found out we were in the front of a little parade. There was a tugboat made out just like the children’s tug boat, the Little Toot, a fire boat spraying their hoses, a Canadian naval ship and bringing up the rear was the QM2. There was also a naval helicopter that kept buzzing us. They buzzed us really close one time and quite a few people were startled by how close it got to us.

 

 

 

Afterwards, we changed into our swimwear and jumped into the Serenity pool. Much to our pleasure we discovered that it’s heated!! That was a very welcomed surprise. Since it was around 7:00 pm and we were cruising along the Maritime coast, the air was rather cool to say the least. We hopped in and chatted it up with the couple that had gotten married on our first day aboard the Sunshine on Monday before we left NYC. Dallas Redneck was what I called him. He called me Tom Brady in return (I’m a big Patriot and Tom Brady fan).

 

We yucked it up and joked with each other for a while (he was a Payton fan even though he’s from Texas). But he was a smart man and even admitted that Brady was better. Then again, I did have to admit that Payton was definitely one of the best as well (even though Brady is G.O.A.T.!). The time eventually came that we had to suck it up and jump out of the pool. The water was so warm but the air was so cool. It was like going from the tropics to the arctic instantly. Chilly-willy!

 

After the pool, we grabbed some grub from the Lido Marketplace and relaxed. It was there that I noticed that my watch face was completely frosted over. What the? I then realized that there was a chunk missing out of the face and water had gotten into from the pool. Son of a…! That was my favorite watch! It was a dive watch that I have had for quite a few years. It had been to a lot of places and a lot of oceans with me. I was devastated! Okay, not really but I was pretty bummed. You know what this means? Yep…watch shopping!!! One of my favorite past times!

 

It didn’t take me too long to find a new one. I had to have it resized so I wouldn’t be able to pick it up until early the next morning. I was going to have to live for one night without a watch. Since I feel so naked without a watch, I opted to continue wearing it even though it was hard to read. Amazingly enough, it still worked! Afterwards, we watched the sun set from our balcony. That will never get old!!

 

 

The rest of the night was wasted sitting in JiJi’s waiting to be served. We spent over 3 hours there and most of our food was lukewarm at best from sitting so long waiting for us. Grrrr!! Never again!

 

 

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[pacruise804]

Love those sunset pictures!

 

Did you have enough time at the Citadel? We are planning to walk their first on our cruise and also visit the Public Gardens with side trips for donair and a few pubs. I was reviewing our AAA Tour Book and it said to allow at least 2 hours.

[BroadwayGirl]

Love those sunset pictures!

 

Did you have enough time at the Citadel? We are planning to walk their first on our cruise and also visit the Public Gardens with side trips for donair and a few pubs. I was reviewing our AAA Tour Book and it said to allow at least 2 hours.

 

 

Chiming in even though this isn't my review....we just got back on the Sunshine and spent a good 2-3 hours at the Citadel and didn't think we saw everything there. We did take a 45 min guided tour which was great to give us background but we defintely didn't make it to all of the exhibits we could have seen.

[SenatorsFan]

Hey Mr. Trip, that's Theodore Tugboat you saw when leaving Halifax. He used to star in a children's TV show my boys used to watch! :) Still enjoying the review and pictures.

Heather

 

https://maritimemuseum.novascotia.ca/what-see-do/exhibits/theodore-tugboat

[trippingpara]

Love those sunset pictures!

 

Did you have enough time at the Citadel? We are planning to walk their first on our cruise and also visit the Public Gardens with side trips for donair and a few pubs. I was reviewing our AAA Tour Book and it said to allow at least 2 hours.

 

Hi Pacruise804. Thank you, glad you like the pictures. The time it takes to see a site is hard to say since it depends on one's level of interest in that particular place. I'm a military man so I can spend countless hours at a historical military site like the Citadel. Lady Trip, not so much. Needless to say, I would have liked to have spent some more time there, but we were on a clock so that means that I'll just have to come back again!

 

From what we did see, I would say that 2 hours should be sufficient to see the Citadel and the vast majority of exhibits there. I hope this helps! Cheers.

[trippingpara]

Hey Mr. Trip, that's Theodore Tugboat you saw when leaving Halifax. He used to star in a children's TV show my boys used to watch! :) Still enjoying the review and pictures.

Heather

 

https://maritimemuseum.novascotia.ca/what-see-do/exhibits/theodore-tugboat

 

Hi SenatorsFan. Thank you for the correction. That's interesting. It looks really similar to the Little Toot that I grew up with. When comparing the two, that is definitely Theodore Tugboat not Little Toot. Glad you're enjoying the review and pictures.

[pacruise804]

Hi Pacruise804. Thank you, glad you like the pictures. The time it takes to see a site is hard to say since it depends on one's level of interest in that particular place. I'm a military man so I can spend countless hours at a historical military site like the Citadel. Lady Trip, not so much. Needless to say, I would have liked to have spent some more time there, but we were on a clock so that means that I'll just have to come back again!

 

From what we did see, I would say that 2 hours should be sufficient to see the Citadel and the vast majority of exhibits there. I hope this helps! Cheers.

 

Thanks!

[trippingpara]

Friday, August 11th – Somewhere in the North Atlantic

How I love not waking up to alarm clocks! Such a rarity for us. Even on weekends, we often have stuff going on that requires us to have an alarm clock set. I think that’s one of the reasons that I am beginning to enjoy sea days! We eventually rolled out of bed, did our normal morning routine and finally made our way to the Lido deck to grab some breakfast at the Marketplace. We headed straight to the omelet line. I have always had some great omelets here and they didn’t disappoint this time around either!

 

I had a ham, bacon and cheese omelet which was cooked to perfection. I had them slap some bacon on the side and made a last-minute decision to have them toss on the last two pieces of French toast as well. I love French toast but something was telling me not to take the last two pieces. I should have listened. They were cold and the edges were hard from sitting out too long. Oh well, the omelet and bacon were great and more than enough for me. Lady Trip really enjoyed her “everything but the kitchen sink” omelet too. But she was smart and negated all calories by adding in some fruit and cottage cheese. Her doctor would have been proud. Mine on the other hand would have smacked me around for all of that bacon. My motto is: “that is way too much bacon, said no one EVER!” - well, except for maybe my doctor!

 

It was still early and the weather was beautiful, so we headed to the Sportsdeck to walk around the track. It takes 10 laps around to equal a mile. We strolled around, chatting and just enjoying each other’s company. It was like a never-ending walk on the beach. Just without the sand in the shoes and the cawing seagulls buzzing your head every 5 seconds. Beautiful water vistas everywhere and a pleasant sea breeze in your hair. What a way to relax!

 

 

 

As we walked around, they opened up the ropes course. We did it on the Vista and wanted to try this one. Lady Trip was a bit scared when she did the one of the Vista but she is such a trooper and agreed it to get a go here. We got strapped in our harnesses and off we went. We quickly crossed the first obstacle and then had a wait for a gentleman who had his very young daughter with him. She seemed very scared of heights and at every station, he had to coax her to cross it. People were piling up behind him and it was getting harder and harder to stay on the little platform as we waited for her to cross. We finally had to tell people to stop coming across behind us as there was no more room on the platform.

 

The little girl did successfully navigate 5 of the stations before she broke down and refused to do anymore. So, her dad grabbed her up and crossed the next week carrying here. I don’t think the attendants liked that as the British chap that had suited us up was quickly coming around the stations from the opposite side in front of us. He helped the little girl across the next station before he threw her onto his back and crossed the remaining stations himself. He was like a monkey as he crossed those stations!

 

We now started moving quickly across the remaining stations until the second from the last one. As soon as I got on it, it started swaying and I was struggling to keep my balance. About 3 feet from the next platform, the inevitable happened…down I went. Thankfully the harness worked and caught my fall. Since I was only a few feet from the platform, I was able to shimmy myself over to it and climb up onto it.

 

As soon as I pulled myself up to a sitting position on the platform, the crowd below me erupted into cheers. I guess my dilemma had attracted quite the crowd. I waved to my fan base below me and quickly jumped back to a standing position. My smile quickly faded as I looked across to the other platform and saw Lady Trip's face. She looked terrified. She saw me fall and had lost all desire to now cross the same rope. I then had to coax her across showing her the mistake I made. But like the champ she is, she made it across with no problem.

 

Unfortunately for me though, both of my hands had suffered some pretty decent rope burns from trying to stop my fall as well as a minor rope burn on the side of my neck and a scraped-up elbow from climbing onto the platform. Oh well, you wanna play, you gotta pay my mum always said!

 

As I walked down the stairs back to the attendants, a nice lass asked me if I wanted to go again. As I looked down at my bloody hands, “Ahh, I think I’m all set, thanks!” was my quick reply. She gave me another look that my wife gives me quite often. It is the “what a moron” look. I just smiled weakly in return and waddled off.

 

Any ways, our next stop was to the jewelry/watch store to pick up my watch. They quickly got it for me and it fit like a glove! Lady Trip really wanted to try BINGO as she has never done it before (I vaguely remember playing it with my grandmother when I was a little kid. This was back when dinosaurs walked the Earth so you had to be careful calling out a false BINGO. Those velociraptors got a little testy about such things).

 

So, we were off to get some tickets or sheets or whatever they’re called at the early BINGO registration table when I spotted a big watch sale going on right next to the BINGO line.

“Hey honey, I’m just going to take a look at these while you’re waiting in line,” I said.

 

Lady Trip eyed me suspiciously.

 

“I just bought one honey. I’m only seeing what else they have. Just poking around,” I said with a smile and my most innocent face I could muster.

 

Apparently, my innocent face wasn’t as innocent as I thought it was. Lady Trip gave me that look. The one that told me that she didn’t believe a word I said, but it wasn’t worth her time to knock some sense into me. So, she just rolled her eyes and headed off to wait in line for BINGO tickets/sheet thingies.

 

I found her in line about 20 minutes later. I walked up to her with my head hung down and a crap eating grin on my face. In my hand hung a fancy bag weighed down by a heavy watch box. She gave me another one of her looks (she has several of them and she is well versed in using them. In fact, she really doesn’t even need to talk to me, since I am usually doing something that results in one of her looks and I know exactly what she means by that look.)

 

All of the ladies in line with her wanted to see the watch so I had to model it for them. (I really should become a hand model!). Luckily, my wife loves me and she changed her look to a smile and laughed at me. She knew from the second I stopped there that I was going to buy another watch. She knows what I’m going to do before I even do!

 

They were having a drawing back at the jewelry store shortly after I bought the watch for another watch. It was only open to those that had bought a watch aboard. Since I had purchased two, I was able to enter two entries. Guess who won a third watch!! I think I need to get a new watch box! Is there a watch buyers anonymous? I think I have a problem! But on the other hand, I only bought two of them!

 

Euphoric from my win, we headed over to the Liquid Lounge for BINGO. I repeated my little ritual of rubbing all of the lion heads on the stairs on our way there (I had done this on our way to the jewelry store, so it apparently was good luck). Unfortunately, it didn’t work this time. A lot of the winners sat right next to us (actually right next to us on both sides!). I guess my lion rubbing extended over to them. Euphoria gone.

 

Since it was such a nice day out, we decided to head out to the pool. We ran back to our cabin to change. As we were changing we heard a loud horn blast. Oh-oh. I pulled open the curtains to find a wall of fog had surrounded the ship again. Our balcony was coated with a nice sheen of water from the misty air.

The fog here in the Maritimes was incredible! It would come out of nowhere and suddenly engulf the ship. I looked over at Lady Trip as she shook her head. Nope, not happening. Seeing that we were already in our swim gear, we made the next logical choice. SPA! Since we had a spa cabin, we had free access to use the Thermal Suites.

 

I really do wish that they had at least a whirlpool there but it was still pretty nice. Our visit was much more relaxing this time around. No one was yelling or complaining about not being able to get the fancy little spa slippers that we got by having a spa cabin or the fancy embroidered spa robes that we wore. I can’t believe that people would complain about not getting things for free that others had to pay to get. The spa cabins cost more, so we get more in them. That’s how things normally work.

 

We were able to catch the sunset as we stopped back at our cabin to change our clothes.

Any ways, after our relaxing time in the spa, we changed our clothes and headed down to catch the Epic Rock show in the Liquid Lounge. This was another really well-done show. The singers were really good (the same ones from the Motor City Motown show) and included a live guitarist to open the show. If you love 80’s rock, especially the big hair rock, then you will love this show.

 

 

As soon as the show ended, we headed back to the jewelry store for the big raffle. Between my watches and the diamond ring that I bought Lady Trip for our 20th anniversary (we’re renewing our vows in Hawaii in a couple months), we had quite a few tickets. Wow, was I surprised to see how many tickets some people had though! We paled in comparison to some others who must have dropped some serious coinage there!

 

Needless to say, we didn’t win this time (I had won on our very first cruise with only one ticket!). We left there and made our way over to the 24-hour pizza joint as we still hadn’t eaten yet. Of all our cruises, this was the best pizza hands down. It was out-flipping-standing! The wait was minimal and it was well worth it!!

 

We were going to head back to the Alchemy for our last night, but we opted for a quiet night back in our cabin instead. We’re just not the party animals that we used to be. I guess old age is catching up to us! We had some wine that we still had left in our cabin, watched a movie on TV, packed up some and called it a night. It was back to NYC early in the morning!

 

 

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[trippingpara]

Saturday, August 12th – New York City

The alarm clock buzzed way to early. Well, it didn’t really buzz, more like rocked us out of bed. For those of you that follow my reviews know that I have learned to put some of my heavier music on for my alarm. It’s a very effective way to get up. I had set my alarm early so I could see us sail in.

 

I had read earlier reviews that stated you needed to be up around 3 a.m. in order to see us sail back into the Hudson River. Before I went to bed, I checked where we were and I just didn't see us getting in that early unless the Captain really put the pedal to the metal which they generally don't do unless they have to.

 

Thankfully, I was right. I went out onto my balcony a couple minutes after 6 a.m. and we had just entered Anchorage Channel off Brooklyn. I missed the Verrazano Bridge but I had gotten that earlier, so I was happy with my timing.

 

I quickly spotted the Queen Mary 2 sitting at the Brooklyn docks.

She is a fast one. We left Halifax with her a couple miles behind us but she steamed past us in the evening and beat us to NYC. I was surprised to see her docked in Brooklyn since Cunard owns their own terminal in Manhattan which was sitting empty when we docked next to it.

 

 

 

 

The U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Eagle sits next the U.S.S. Intrepid in New York's Hudson River

Regent's Seven Seas Navigator and Norwegian's Gem sit docked in Manhattan.

Any ways, I clicked a couple photos (thousand that is!) before heading back inside once we were completely docked. Now that we were up and about, we finalized our packing (with FTTF, we opted to depart with our luggage instead of putting it outside).

 

With everything packed up, we ran over to the Lido deck to grab our last breakfast burrito from the Blue Iguana. Man, we’re going to miss that place!! We slowly ate our last meal there in sorrow-filled silence. Alas, there was no more food to eat and it was time to go. We carried ourselves with a heavy heart back to our cabin and grabbed our gear. Two carry-ons, two camera backpacks and a large Invicta bag with two heavy boxes of booze that we bought on board (we normally never do that but they had a deal that was too hard to pass up – 4 bottles of our favorite rum for $40 bucks. We almost pay that per bottle back home!).

 

We hopped on an elevator down to Deck 3 and exited the ship. Customs was smooth and easy although I had to show the customs agent another form of ID since my passport has me with a beard and I shave it off every summer. Now that we were through customs, we headed over to 48th and 11th Ave to the Kimpton Ink48 Hotel.

 

 

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[LzyCruiser_NWA]

Thanks for your great review.

You've given us many ideas for our trip in 3 weeks!

Could you recall if it's easy or possible to exit the NYC cruise terminal to visit the intrepid pre cruise?

From google maps it looks like the drop off is on the 2nd floor? We just wanted to drop off luggage then visit the intrepid before boarding the ship.

[pacruise804]

Saturday, August 12th – New York City

 

 

 

 

 

 

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These two pictures really grabbed me. Did you use any special filtering/special effects for the top picture, or is that how it naturally looked?

 

The end of a cruise is often sad, but what a view you had to come home to!

[trippingpara]

Thanks for your great review.

You've given us many ideas for our trip in 3 weeks!

Could you recall if it's easy or possible to exit the NYC cruise terminal to visit the intrepid pre cruise?

From google maps it looks like the drop off is on the 2nd floor? We just wanted to drop off luggage then visit the intrepid before boarding the ship.

 

Hi LzyCruiser_NWA. Thank you for the kind words and I'm glad that this review has been helpful for you. We actually entered on the first floor (but we disembarked on the 2nd floor and took an elevator down to the ground street level). We didn't drop any bags off as we only had carry-ons so I really can't comment as to where they were at. The Intrepid is right next door, but be sure to get your tickets in advance. The lines were intense!! Since you will be on a tight timeline, be prepared to not see everything as some of the exhibits had an hour plus wait time. But you can definitely see the flight deck and the Space Shuttle easily. Have fun and enjoy your cruise!

[trippingpara]

These two pictures really grabbed me. Did you use any special filtering/special effects for the top picture, or is that how it naturally looked?

 

The end of a cruise is often sad, but what a view you had to come home to!

 

Hi pacruise804. I'm glad you really liked those photos. The top photo is actually a compilation of 3 photos that I took using exposure bracketing which means I took 3 different photos with each one at a different exposure setting and then merged them together. It's a way to get a photo to look more like what your eye can see when there is challenge with lighting for a camera such as very early morning when the sun is just starting to rise.

[paxpax07]

Love those sunset pictures!

 

Did you have enough time at the Citadel? We are planning to walk their first on our cruise and also visit the Public Gardens with side trips for donair and a few pubs. I was reviewing our AAA Tour Book and it said to allow at least 2 hours.

 

 

 

hello from halifax, just had to comment when i saw you mention donairs and a few pubs. there is the real halifax experience.

you can get through the citadel quicker than 2 hours.

hope you have a great visit.

 

 

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[paxpax07]

great review. sailing the sunshine in dec.

 

glad you enjoyed the maritimes. the leaves are just starting to change. although i find it hard to enjoy fall knowing that winter is coming.

 

 

 

 

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