Cheapo Dad's Trip Report on the Navigator of the Seas (Maybe with few pictures added)...

[harryfat1]

August 11, (Friday) Day 5 - Homeward Bound

 

 

 

The only daily scan for today is the departure info that tells you when your group should be cleared to disembark but you need to listen to the PA or the wall panels by the elevators to get the latest group count if you are in a hurry to get off the ship.

 

A few items of importance to note for Newbies are that cruises are different than land-based vacations in that you must vacate your cabin by 8 AM versus the hotels where the typical checkout is 11 AM but on the other hand, you are already on board by 11 AM so the timeline for cruises is shifted

 

You will need to eat by 8:30 as everything shuts down thereafter

 

If you are in a hurry to get off the ship to catch an early flight, you do the Self Assist where you drag your own luggage off the ship and you can get off at 7:30.  Never done that.  Don’t think we ever will given we are not morning people.

 

However, I noticed they now have a "late self-assist" program that you will take your own luggage off the ship but at a later time.  What's the advantage of that versus getting a tag and having the workers take your luggage off for you?  Just so you can track your luggage and not worry about it being misplaced or have fragile check-in items that you want to protect? 

 

[harryfat1]

At 7:14, nothing happening at RP as people are either eating or are ready to get off the ship with self-assist

 

 

At 7:40, the last picture of the cabin before we head upstairs for breakfast as we are supposed to be out of the cabin by 8.

 

 

 

At 7:45, back to the San Pedro port.  Our car is out there to the left somewhere. 

 

 

Back to California (Dreaming)

 

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

Pretty busy Windjammer at 7:45 as everyone wants to eat up before hitting the road

 

 

 

They had the salmon out for self-serve as it’s the last breakfast for the sailing and they were getting replenished so no need to ration the portions

 

 

 

 

I believe the terminal to the left is where Princess (maybe NCL as well) Cruises dock for their west coast sailings out of San Pedro

 

[harryfat1]

You see they had already closed the entrance to Windjammer by the time we walked out at 8:41. Only one door was open to leave.

 

Remember all the food areas are closed by 8:30 so be sure to get here on time after you vacate the cabins by 8.

 

 

Yeap.  It’s Friday.  Typically Fridays are the best day of the week for working folks but on today, it’s the end of the vacation so less joy in seeing the sign than usual.

 

 

A whole bunch of luggage outside of Windjammer.  Not sure if the owners are eating inside or nearby

 

 

[harryfat1]

Coastal California is a bit odd at times with the Summer/Fall weather.  Whereas you think summer should be hotter than the Fall many times the coastal area is more cloudy/cooler in the summer than the Fall as the coast has fog coverings.

 

So even though it was early August, it was less than 70 degrees outside when we disembarked that morning per my phone app.  But it's hotter this weekend in October (now) than it was back in August. 

 

Not too many places has this weather pattern

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

So remember we were group 14 to get off the ship.  By 8:45, they had already called group 20 something so we were able to get off the ship anytime we were ready.  Walking outside to the Promenade deck to see the walkway. 

 

It’s always the opposite feeling of first-day boarding joy when you are disembarking.

 

 

Whoa, Nellie.  A lot of people trying to disembark at the same time

 

[bobmacliberty]

A sad day. ☹️

[Sea Dog]

10 hours ago, harryfat1 said:

Whoa, Nellie.  A lot of people trying to disembark at the same time

 

THe worst time ever on a cruise ship. It's bad enough realizing the cruise is over and then to just stand in line waiting to get off is really depressing.

[harryfat1]

9 hours ago, Sea Dog said:

 

THe worst time ever on a cruise ship. It's bad enough realizing the cruise is over and then to just stand in line waiting to get off is really depressing.

Yeah, the other option is to just sit in the public lounges to wait for the crowd to die down until they kick you off the ship.

 

We did that for one of our cruises as we had a late flight so we weren't in a hurry to leave and just sat around until some workers came by and say we can get off the ship now (don't let the sliding door hit you on the way out as our liability insurance doesn't cover departing guests).

[harryfat1]

Walking down the ramp.

 

 

The Aft of the ship. No @BIBPhotography dancing with the ladies today.

 

In theory the pier could accommodate an even larger cruise ship whenever someday RCI decides to put more emphasis on west coast cruising and move a bigger ship here. Right now the west coast cruise scene is dominated by Carnival and its subsidiaries 

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

Whole lot of food and supplies being loaded onto the ship.

 

 

They put the pellets onto the smaller forklifts and then they are transported on the bigger forklifts via the opening on the ship.

 

 

Yeah, I don’t get out much so these kinds of “inner workings” of cruise ship operations facicates me while the rest of the rfamily gets bored while I stood there taking pictures.  But I’m not the only one as you see other families checking out the loading of supplies as well.

 

 

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

Oh, yeah, the power supply.  I promised I would talk about it. 

 

My wife was asking me what that white circular thing hooked up to the ship in the back of the picture.  I didn’t know what it was either and had to look it up after coming home as I knew it wasn’t fuel. 

 

 

As it turns out, it’s electrical power so the ship doesn’t have to burn fuel while in port as the ship still needs electricity while docked in port. Many ship/cruise lines have converted their ships to be able to plug into the dockside electricity while docked and can turn off the engine to cut down on carbon emissions.

 

So it's the ship's version of EV plug

[harryfat1]

Okay, we walked down to level 1 of the cruise terminal and then we entered the huge hangar area.  Remember that big gray building from day 1 when we boarded the ship (I know, that was like 2 months ago).  We now are inside it as that’s where they stored the luggage by group number. 

 

As we were already at the 20-something group number, there wasn't too many luggage left for group 14 and we easily spotted our luggage to bring it to US Customs inspection on the far end. There’s a whole group of porters to the left if anyone needs assistance with luggage to the curbside.

 

 

Unlike the old days when you stand in line to give the actual passport to the US Customs agent, you walk up to a computer screen for it to scan your face and if everything turns out OK, you are free to go.  So no need to show anyone a passport unless you run into an issue with the software not recognizing you.

 

So the US CBP wants to know who are you?

 

 

This brings up the next question – in the old days, they had a green piece of paper to declare anything you bought on vacation coming back to the US over the limit. They usually give that out in your cabins on the last day of the cruise to complete but we didn’t get any on this cruise. 

 

Not that there’s much of any chance of anyone buying over the limits in one foreign port visit of Ensenada (well, maybe cigarette/alcohol?) but how do you declare items over the limit?  Just verbally tell the agent who will then process the paperwork for you?

[harryfat1]

Alrighty.  So we cleared Customs and walked outside of the big gray building.  If your party can’t walk to the parking area, you can just chill out at the curbside while the driver gets the car and does the circle loop to pick up everyone.  But since we were all able to walk, we just walked to the parking lot and loaded up the car

 

 

One thing worth noting is unlike Florida where there's a long line of cabs/shuttles waiting by the curbside to take you to the airport, this being CA and most of the cruisers are locals/within a day's drive, there were no cabs outside the wait area. 

 

Not sure what out-of-town folks do - I assume Uber or some prearranged transportation to take them to wherever they need to go.  But just a heads up on the differences if you are used to the Florida ports that cater mostly to out-of-town cruisers. 

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

A couple more pictures of the parking lot before we hit the freeway many people already taken off by 9:15 as evidenced by the half-empty lots.

 

 

Bye-Bye, Navigator

 

 

Let’s queue up Simon and Garfunkel are we are Homeward Bound

 

 

 

[harryfat1]

Nothing especially exciting on the 400 mile drive home.  Similar lunch as one way the down pre cruise.

 

The only thing worth noting is on Highway 5, there is an area where there are A LOT of cows.  When I say A LOT, I don’t mean 50 or 100 cows.  I mean, up to 100,000 cows can be at the Harris Ranch per Wiki:

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harris_Ranch#:~:text=At%20over%20800%20acres%20(320,density)%20in%20the%20United%20States.

 

Largest cow farm on the west coast and believe me, on a hot summer day, that many cows produce a lot of poop and it smells BAD for the motorists driving by even at 70 MPH with our windows closed. 

 

Your worst nightmare is if you experience car trouble in the area and have to wait for an hour next to the cows for a tow truck to come and rescue you…

 

 

 

[Coralc]

I love your reviews Harry. We fly down to Long Beach. Even though we are as local as you are. ☺️ If we can get a SWA sale, it has been as low as $29 p/p one way, sometimes $49. And there are only 2 of us. Then we Uber from LGB to the pier and back at the end of the cruise. There are a few cabs. The taxi area is way, way down at the front of the ship. But there are a lot of Ubers and Lyfts available on cruise days.  

 

We like to skip the cow section of I5. 😁

Edited October 7, 2023 by Coralc

[harryfat1]

As I mentioned your tomato paste/ketchup could be from California’s Central Valley as it’s summertime and tomatoes have ripened and headed for the cannery or the grocery stores.

 

 

 

As it's hot and dry in the summer season, the grassy fields have dried up and turned into a golden color along the freeway.

 

 

Side note: The singer is the girlfriend of Hauser from 2Cellos musical dual whom Bob and I referenced previously

 

 

These will be the last pictures from this cruise as we are back in the outskirts of the Bay Area with the wind farms.  As I mentioned at the start of the trip report, I will start and end the trip with pictures of the windmills.

 

 

 

This concludes my trip report for our Navigators of The Seas Mexico Cruise.  Thanks to all for reading it to the end.  Y’all will need to take a real vacation after reading this much gibberish over the past two months…🤪

 

I will have a few concluding remarks tomorrow.

[Sea Dog]

Great review as always Harry! Thank you for taking us along.

[cruiselover04]

Thank you for your great review. We board Navigator in January for a few cruises B2B to make it worthwhile flying from Ontario. I have made lots of notes, especially the lack of taxis at the port. Will have to research my transport options for the airport. 
 

Jenni

[BIBPhotography]

Sounds like you had a heck of a time!  Thanks for sharing buddy!

[loug1601]

Thank you for another great review Harry. I loved every funny minute of it 😁!

[LuCruise]

10 hours ago, harryfat1 said:

 

One thing worth noting is unlike Florida where there's a long line of cabs/shuttles waiting by the curbside to take you to the airport, this being CA and most of the cruisers are locals/within a day's drive, there were no cabs outside the wait area. 

 

 

 

Awesome review Harry!  Always fun to follow along.  I look forward to reading about your Odyssey one (if you choose to do one), as we'll be on the week after you so fun to compare experiences (again).

 

 

9 hours ago, cruiselover04 said:

Thank you for your great review. We board Navigator in January for a few cruises B2B to make it worthwhile flying from Ontario. I have made lots of notes, especially the lack of taxis at the port. Will have to research my transport options for the airport. 
 

Jenni

As for the taxis, from what I remember, we had to take a shuttle to the LAX-IT area, and from there you can catch a cab.  We were originally going to try uber for the airport but it was too confusing where to get picked up with so stuck to the taxi option.

[bobmacliberty]

11 hours ago, harryfat1 said:

As it turns out, it’s electrical power so the ship doesn’t have to burn fuel while in port as the ship still needs electricity while docked in port. Many ship/cruise lines have converted their ships to be able to plug into the dockside electricity while docked and can turn off the engine to cut down on carbon emissions.

 

I thought I read somewhere that for environmental reasons, you MUST be able to plug into shore power if you want to cruise out of California.  Any idea if this is true?

 

Another great review Harry!  I've missed your reviews.  They are not just reviews, but epic stories with a lot of detours into interesting side discussions.  I know that it takes a LOT of work to put together a review like this and I greatly appreciate your efforts to both entertain and inform.

 

[harryfat1]

22 hours ago, Coralc said:

I love your reviews Harry. We fly down to Long Beach. Even though we are as local as you are. ☺️ If we can get a SWA sale, it has been as low as $29 p/p one way, sometimes $49. And there are only 2 of us. Then we Uber from LGB to the pier and back at the end of the cruise. There are a few cabs. The taxi area is way, way down at the front of the ship. But there are a lot of Ubers and Lyfts available on cruise days.  

 

We like to skip the cow section of I5. 😁

Good info on the cab way at the front.  I didn't see any when we were out but then I must admit that I wasn't really looking for them.  Maybe by the time we came out later, many were already already taken.

 

Yeah, we had 6 people so it was cheaper to drive, and we originally were going to some sightseeing in southern CA for a day afterward but plans changed, and decided to come home earlier.

 

Thanks for reading along all these years, dating back to the Allure report back in 2014, and providing your expertise info on plants and trees.