LAFFNVEGAS Live from Windstar Wind Surf March 2, 2024

[LAFFNVEGAS]

Greetings Fellow Cruisers, Welcome to My Live Report of our Travels to St Maarten to Board Wind Surf.

My husband Tom and I are frequent cruisers. We started cruising in March 2002 with our first ship Royal Caribbean Monarch of the Seas sailing Western Caribbean. The following year April 2003 we sailed in the Inaugural year on the Holland America Zuiderdam. At that time Windstar Cruises was fully owned by Holland America under the Carnival umbrella. We became hooked on cruising and in the early years booked nothing but Holland America, in that time we became good friends with many Crew and Officers.

In 2008 I had a bit of a career change that allowed me to start cruising other cruise lines. We also enjoyed Norwegian Cruise Lines, Princess and Celebrity but always went back home to Holland America. In March of 2007 Holland America/Carnival Corp sold Windstar, for several years after that I know that Windstar had some financial rough seas till they became part of Xanterra Travel Collection and slowly became the small boutique cruise line it is today. 

In those early years I had friends that sailed Windstar as well of heard and knew of crew that were transferred over to Windstar from Holland America so I always knew that we would feel right at home with the crew with their ties to Holland America.

 

The question was would we like the very small Sailing Yachts?

 

Well, we are older now, our enjoyment from cruising has changed over the year. Tom has been retired for several years and for the past 10 years I had been working 2 jobs one of which was the Auto Finance Industry but I retired from that in August so now just working my retirement job that allows me to travel. So this next week will give the answer to that question.

 

I welcome you all to follow along for our first cruise with Windstar. My writing style is a bit like a journal or diary. I more than likely will post a few times during the day and tell you what we are doing at that time. I like to play What's for Dinner?, posting copies of the menus and letting you decide and add what you might want to order from the menu. Because we cruise fairly frequently with Holland America I have been doing this on the Cruise Critic Holland America Board, many from the HAL Board I am sure will be joining all of you to follow along. Plus since Windstar is really a strong part of Holland America History many who are long time HAL cruisers even before me remember Windstar fondly.

 

You may ask why did we decide to sail Windstar? , well I will reveal that later but let's just say we have been wanting to since 2018.

 

Check back frequently, later tonight I will take you with us as we fly out of Harry Reid Internal Airport in Las Vegas on a Red Eye to Miami.

[BaxCruiser]

Looking forward to reading about your new adventure!

[SusieKIslandGirl]

Thanks for the link from the HAL boards. Can't wait for dinner time to arrive!😊

[oakridger]

👀    Watching this thread!  

 

 

~Nancy

[dobiemom]

Bon Voyage! 🙂 

[Toad]

Have enjoyed your posts on HAL board and looking forward to following you here! Interested.

[LAFFNVEGAS]

Good Evening from Harry Reid International Airport in Las Vegas. Surprised how busy the airport is this late at night. I have Lounge access through a credit card so we are enjoying that but what was surprising is how packed this lounge is. We usually use it very early in the morning.

We are on American to MIA Priority Boarding Group one. Hoping to get a few hour of sleep before we get to MIA. 
I have to laugh for the past 4 hours I have had 5 notifications of gate changes either our flight arriving in MIA or the gate we leave out of for SXM. 
I will say good night for now and hopefully will have time to report in when we arrive in MIA.

[ski ww]

Looking forward to your sailing adventure.

[portofrome]

Bon Voyage!

[FlorenceItaly]

I am excited to follow along!  Bon Voyage!!

[jbhcw]

Following!   Bon Voyage!!

[LAFFNVEGAS]

Good morning from the American Admirals Club lounge at D30 at Miami International Airport. It is a beautiful sunny morning. We arrived at 7:14 East Coast time and found that our flight to St Maarten that was to leave at 8:35am it is now not going out till 10:15 which will get us into St Maarten at 2:35. I was originally concerned we would not have a chance to have something to eat. We are in First Class for all segments except from MIA/SXM. This plane only has 8 first class seats compared to the usual 16. We are in premium main cabin and waitlisted for free upgrade but doubt it will happen.

These lounges are always packed. We were just in this Lounge last on December 17th after we disembarked HAL Nieuw Statendam cruise. But it does make it nice to relax, get a bite to eat and relax.

 

[kazu]

I hope you and Tom have a fabulous time, Lisa 🙂 

 

thank you for your LIVE thread and sharing the link with us.  

 

Looking forward to following along.  

 

Bon Voyage to you two.  Have a great cruise and a WONDERFUL time !!!!

 

[LAFFNVEGAS]

With all travel, one must be prepared for delays. We are still in Miami. We were to be boarding 15 minutes ago on this delay. The Captain called for Maintenance with a problem, then they stated they needed to do an aircraft swap because this plane was not ok to fly over water. 
so we are waiting a bit longer.

Text that just came through said fly will now leave at 11:13. Only 2.5 hours delay 😃

[TAW1963]

Have a great time; Bon Voyage!  I look forward to your posts.

[Hogladyrider]

Safe travels looking forward to following along!  You are true troopers just to get to the start of your cruise...Bon Voyage!

[johnlcruise]

Flowing

[LAFFNVEGAS]

Good Afternoon from…… Miami International Airport. Yes we are still here with more time updates of delay than I have ever received. The latest is our 8:35 am flight to now leaving at 2:45pm and not arriving till 6:38. I have canceled dinner reservations. We are just eating unhealthy junk food on American Airlines Lounge 😂

Just yet another reason to arrive at the very least a day before one’s cruise.

It has definitely been a very long day since we left for the airport at 9pm last night.

I will keep you all updated.

[RBCal]

I'll probably see you disembarking next Saturday.  We'll be in St. Maarten a few days before we board on March 9th.

[whogo]

1 hour ago, LAFFNVEGAS said:

Good Afternoon from…… Miami International Airport. Yes we are still here with more time updates of delay than I have ever received. The latest is our 8:35 am flight to now leaving at 2:45pm and not arriving till 6:38. I have canceled dinner reservations. We are just eating unhealthy junk food on American Airlines Lounge 😂

Just yet another reason to arrive at the very least a day before one’s cruise.

It has definitely been a very long day since we left for the airport at 9pm last night.

I will keep you all updated.

With a 3 hour delay the airline owes you a meal voucher, don't know what you get for a six hour delay.

[rafinmd]

Appears to be finally on the way, 7plus hours late.

 

https://www.flightaware.com/live/flight/AAL593/history/20240301/1346Z/KMIA/TNCM

 

Roy

[1ANGELCAT]

Welcome to SXM , watched AA593 arrive on Maho Bay webcam .

Edited March 1 by 1ANGELCAT

[LAFFNVEGAS]

Greeting from Oyster Bay Resort in St Maarten , Roy you are correct we had over a 7 hour delay. I lost count on how many delayed departure times we had. Everyone cheered when we took off and finally landed in St Maarten. They basically kept Immigration open for us  while the rest of the airport was closed. 
The flight over all went smooth, had to cancel our dinner reservations through Open Table for the Infinity Restaurant. Instead of having steak and Caribbean Lobster I had Baileys and Coffee and 2 packages of Biscoff cookies, love to dunk them in the coffee. 
By the time we checked in and a porter took us by golf cart to our room every thing was closed. Oh well I am sure we will more than make up for it on Wind Surf.

We do have a Bay Water View room that we will see more of in the morning but the sound of the waves lapping the shore is quite nice.

This hotel through Windstar also includes breakfast that is served from 7 to 10. Check out must be done by 10 am they they stated the bus to take us to the ship will not be till 1pm.

I am going to call it a day since we got up about 7:30 pacific time on Thursday and have basic not slept yet except for maybe a few short cat naps 😭

[ski ww]

Not a great way to start, but you finally made it. Looks like a nice view from your hotel.

[LAFFNVEGAS]

Good Morning from St Maarten. It’s cruising day and what an amazing view we woke to.

while the hotel itself is not overly close and is older, the view and its charm is amazing. Kind of reminds me of a way of the Royal Kona Resort in Kona Hawaii.