LIVE FROM — Reflection, February 17

[What A Market]

21 minutes ago, SSAtlantic said:

I have never thought to do this. Do you get a entree size portion each or split between you?

What  a great idea. 

But of course one entree size each!

I had to finish Heidi’s. 

😋

[Georgia_Peaches]

7 hours ago, hcat said:

We would actually like it with some wine at the start of the meal  but are too shy

Yes, ask!  We do every time and it’s never an issue. Like you, there’s no room by the end of the meal. 

[hcat]

5 minutes ago, Georgia_Peaches said:

Yes, ask!  We do every time and it’s never an issue. Like you, there’s no room by the end of the meal. 

good to know!

will ask on APEX

[What A Market]

Good morning again from the Reflection as we cruise into St. Thomas.

Another amazingly beautiful sunny day with calm seas.

 

Cafe al Bacio is a bit busier this morning. (Ship time is 7:00AM as I type this.)

We arrive in St. Thomas at 9:00AM and excursions, including ours, head out at 9:30. 
Snorkeling today for us on a ship’s excursion.  
I’ve done a really large number of private and ship organized snorkel/scuba excursions.

This type of activity works perfectly fine arranged thru the ship.

I prefer to plan private excursions though for all other port activities.

 

Edited February 20 by What A Market

[What A Market]

Here’s a screen shot of an App I’m addicted to now thanks to Jim_lain.

The App is called Windy.

You can look at all sorts of weather and sea condition forecasts while your cruising.

Fun or terrifying depending on the conditions you can see coming at you.  🤣

Today is a fun day!  This screenshot shows the swells.

[What A Market]

Simple scene of the table setting in Luminae for breakfast. I guess I’ll say “just lovely.”  
 

 

[What A Market]

Gently cruising into the port of Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas. 
 

I guess this was a purpose built dock by Royal Caribbean. Been out at this pier once before in 2022. It’s a bit removed from the actual town. 

[What A Market]

Some other scenes as we pull in. 
They built a small tourist shop area right at the pier. There is nothing else out here except commercial port stuff. 
 

 

[hcat]

Nice photos but this is not our fav pier in St Thomas..  not much in way of shops or food.  We had to take a taxi into " town" or to  the other  main pier area..The ride was quite speedy and 

"wild".  

 

Booking a ship's excursion was smart.. You will likely go right from the ship!

ENJOY!

[What A Market]

14 minutes ago, hcat said:

Booking a ship's excursion was smart.. You will likely go right from the ship!

ENJOY!

Yep, the “turbo cat” for our snorkeling excursion followed into this port. I can see her tied up now across the way. 
 

I think that’s it in the background. 

[txtechmk]

Thanks for posting.  Love your photos.  Have a great rest of your cruise!

[spammie]

Loving your posts!  So sorry to hear about your friend Susie.  😞  I lost my mom 15 years ago to pancreatic cancer.  Horrible beast!  I missing docking in Havensight.  I heard from someone that Celebrity has a 5 year deal to dock at Crown Bay.  I also prefer the Retreat Lounge on S Class ships versus the E Class.  I like to sit at the bar to have my adult beverage not at a chair.  🙂  Just FYI one of my favorite You Tubers, Jay from the Ship Life is on your cruise!  Can't wait for more! Wanda

[luv2camp04]

5 hours ago, What A Market said:

Here’s a screen shot of an App I’m addicted to now thanks to Jim_lain.

The App is called Windy.

You can look at all sorts of weather and sea condition forecasts while your cruising.

Fun or terrifying depending on the conditions you can see coming at you.  🤣

Today is a fun day!  This screenshot shows the swells.

Windy is a great app.  We use it for our RV travels.  A motorhome traveling down the road is a big billboard in wind so we like to be prepared.  Loving your review.  We'll be on Equinox in June.

[Lynnguine]

Sorry for the loss of your friend. Life isn’t fair sometimes. 
Enjoy your cruise. We are doing this one in April after the LONG covid break. 

[Jim_Iain]

I just found your Live and will be following along.   I'm not a big fan of Reflection but have to say they have they best Michael's Club Bar in the fleet.   Always so much fun to sit at the bar and socialize with other guests and the bartender.

[What A Market]

Just back from a really nice snorkel/beach excursion.

It was called Turbo Cat snorkel excursion to Buck Island. (Or something like that.)

 

Was worried as we lined up on the pier for the short walk to our boat.

The line was huge! Turned out there were 92 people on this excursion.

Originally I signed up for the afternoon version of this excursion, but the ship moved us to the morning.

(Also an initial Ugh!)

 

As I chatted with several others in line, it turned out most of us were moved from the afternoon to morning. The guess was they couldn’t fill both the morning and the afternoon excursions.

The ship’s excuse was “shoreside conditions.”  Yeah, right!

 

Our boat had a capacity for just over 100, which made for tight-ish seating.

I’ve done versions of this excursion before and never had more than 50 people for the trip.

But the ride out to Buck Island was about 20 minutes, so easy enough.

 

No rum punch until after the snorkel part of the excursion, but it flowed freely after that.

Then it was quick (mildly rocky) sail over to a beach area.

This is a “wet” landing.  Meaning they back boat up to beach and you jump in.

I’m 6-1 and water was up to my chest.  It was fun listening to people ask the Captain if he was going to dock onto the beach so they could get ashore.

 

Beach bag on head and rum punch lifted in air and it was wade ashore.

Had to wade back to boat for refills on rum punch. (No cabana boys/girls bringing refills — The horror…… LOL)

 

Any way, great crew. They were a riot throughout.

Despite the seemingly over full boat, the company was fun which made for a fun excursion.

Back in time for quick bite at Oceanview, which was also a plus.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited February 20 by What A Market

[What A Market]

I didn’t take phone on the excursion, so no photos to share.

Here’s a photo though of a similar (somewhat newer) turbo cat that I snapped from balcony after we got back from our excursion.

[hcat]

Way too crowded! 

Which Buck Island was it?

 

There is one  near St Croix but this seems closer to St Thomas???

 

so how was the snorkelling..fish? coral? currents?

 

Sad to say, we are  done with snorkel adventures. I got caught in coral at the St Croix Buck Island  (swift current). My husb rescued me,  but got cut and had a severe reaction (like shellfish allergy).. lasted quite awhile

 

. So now look for us on the glass bottom explorers!

[What A Market]

5 hours ago, spammie said:

I missing docking in Havensight.  I heard from someone that Celebrity has a 5 year deal to dock at Crown Bay. 

The view isn’t the best in this port, but sure beats the hell out of the view from my desk at the office! (And yes, as DW would note, the one I was supposed to retire from just over a year ago. She leaves out the part though where it allows us to sail in Upper Suites.) 😏

 

 

 

Edited February 20 by What A Market

[What A Market]

38 minutes ago, hcat said:

Way too crowded! 

Which Buck Island was it?

 

There is one  near St Croix but this seems closer to St Thomas???

 

so how was the snorkelling..fish? coral? currents?

 

Sad to say, we are  done with snorkel adventures. I got caught in coral at the St Croix Buck Island  (swift current). My husb rescued me,  but got cut and had a severe reaction (like shellfish allergy).. lasted quite awhile

 

. So now look for us on the glass bottom explorers!

This was the Buck Island off of St. Thomas. 
Very nice for this type of outing. 
Plenty of fish. Clear water. Almost no current. 
 

Sorry about your incident!  Scary. 

Sometimes I’m surprised I get Heidi in the water, but she’s a gamer. Even got her certified in Scuba back in the 90’s for a couple of Windstar cruises in Tahiti. I’ve been diving since the mid-70’s, but mostly stick to snorkeling now. 

Edited February 20 by What A Market

[dogsdogs]

I'm sorry they stuffed 92 souls on the craft for your excursion.  We did the Golden Eagle Catamaran excursion in St. Maarten through Celebrity once and they had funneled many pax from a Royal Caribbean ship on there too.  There were 85 aboard plus the crew and you could only move in unison.  They charge a lot for those excursions and they should limit the capacity.  

[mahdnc]

I prefer Havensight over Crown Bay as well. Then again the last time we were at St Thomas, we had to tender…

[What A Market]

Well, if it’s Wednesday, it must be St. Maarten. Good morning Philipsburg!

[What A Market]

Heidi got up fairly early (by her standards), so having my third double skinny from Cafe al Bacio out on the balcony.  Damn near perfect!😂

 

(By the way, Rita in Cafe al Bacio is a sweetheart!)

[What A Market]

Backing up a coupe of days to San Juan, Puerto Rico.  As noted previously, we were racing the Apex into port. And they beat us by about 15 to 20 minutes. 
 

Interestingly, this seemed to delay our getting cleared by port authorities by about 30 plus minutes. Presumably because they were working on clearing the Apex first. But who knows. No impact to us as we were planning to walk around town and hit up a couple of bars. 
(We walked off the ship just before 5:00pm, so a reasonable/civilized time to start drinking!  😜)

 

The first we hit up was La Factoria. There is a front bar and then several other bars “hidden” behind a sort of unmarked door. Only the front bar was open when we arrived. 
 

Got the last two seats at the bar and ordered a tasty special cocktail.